Which Trees Offset Global Warming Best?
Wednesday February 20, 2008
Most scientists agree that planting trees is a good way to help reduce global warming and to keep the planet healthy. Even more than other plants, trees absorb carbon dioxide--a greenhouse gas that contributes significantly to global warming--and produce the oxygen that human beings and other animals breathe. But which types of trees are best at helping to curb global warming? And what makes some trees better than others? Learn more about the best trees to plant to offset global warming. Photo courtesy of Getty Images
Comments
You can’t really offset carbon released from fossil fuels with plants: their meager lifetimes of no greater than a century duration is only a heartbeat in geologic time. When they perish, that carbon is returned to the cycle anyways. Makes more sense to stop urban sprawl which takes land that had been supporting biomass production out of the picture. Even reduced use of fossil fuel only delays the inevitable: complete avoidance of fossil fuel is the only way to keep its carbon out of the cycle. Are any of us willing to return to that lifestyle?