An international team of scientists from the UK and South Africa studied the impact of offsetting carbon emissions by creating tree plantations. According to them, this method is not very effective in combating climate change and poses a threat to local ecosystems. To work published In the scientific journal Ecology and Evolution Trends (TEV).
Despite the wide variety of ecosystem services provided by tropical ecosystems, society has reduced the value of these ecosystems to a single metric: carbon. The article states that current and new policies should not contribute to ecosystem degradation through tree planting with a narrow approach to carbon sequestration.
It is often assumed that planting trees to sequester carbon also benefits biodiversity and increases socioeconomic benefits, but the study authors say this is often not the case.
Tropical ecosystems have high biodiversity and provide many ecosystem benefits, such as maintaining water quality, soil health, and plant pollination.
By comparison, carbon capture plantations are typically monocultures, dominated by only five tree species grown worldwide for their lumber and pulp (teak, mahogany, cedar, sevillea, and black locust).
Although these plantations are economically valuable, they generally support lower levels of biodiversity. For example, in Brazil’s Cerrado savannah, a 40% increase in tree cover reduced plant and ant diversity by approximately 30%.
Plantations can directly destroy ecosystems by reducing river flows, depleting groundwater and acidifying soils, researchers say.
The report also states that tackling emissions simply by planting new trees would require the use of huge areas. To compensate for humanity’s annual greenhouse gas emissions, an area comparable to the combined area of Russia, China, the USA and the UK would need to be completely covered by forests.
To solve the problem, scientists say it is necessary to focus on preserving intact ecosystems such as tropical grasslands and savannas.
Previous scientists I learnedArctic mosses and lichens can transform from carbon sinks to carbon producers.
Source: Gazeta
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