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Can we talk about how planting trees is not the climate fix everyone thinks it is?
I read a study from the University of Leeds that said planting a trillion trees would only cancel out about 10 years of global emissions at best, and that number stuck with me. Everyone at my office keeps saying we should just plant more trees and call it a day, but the math does not work like that. Trees take decades to soak up carbon, and a lot of the land we would need is already being used for farms or towns. Meanwhile, the same study pointed out that cutting fossil fuels does way more, way faster, and nobody wants to hear that part. I brought this up at a city council meeting in Phoenix back in March and got side eyed like I said something crazy. Does anyone here actually think tree planting programs are worth pushing, or are we just doing it because it feels good?
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kelly3383d ago
Oh come on, tree planting still has real value that your study math leaves out, because those forests also protect soil, cool cities, and give wildlife a place to live while we wait on the slow work of cutting emissions. Saying it is pointless just because it is not a magic bullet seems like a great way to give people an excuse to do nothing at all.
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