Re:CO2 already emitted will warm Earth beyond climate target...
by adrianN on Friday January 08, 2021 @12:40AM
(#25681864)
Basic biology should tell you that the only thing that counts for carbon capture is biomass added. Anything that the tree does that doesn't permanently add to its mass can't capture carbon permanently. Hence, once a tree stops growing, it stops capturing carbon. It still respirates because it does things that require energy, but any carbon it captures doing so is released fairly quickly again, e.g. when the leaves it produced in spring fall off and rot. Of course many trees keep growing a little even after they reach maturity, but the rate of growth is minuscule. A mature stable forest stores a large amount of carbon, but it hardly captures any more.
[ Parent
| on HN ]
Re:CO2 already emitted will warm Earth beyond climate target...
by pmiller2 on Friday January 08, 2021 @12:42AM
(#25681878)
Well, you know what? Plants reproduce, too.
And, BTW, trees don't stop growing. They keep adding mass in their trunks. Literally the first google hit for "do trees stop growing": https://earthsky.org/earth/what-makes-a-tree-stop-growing
Edit: guess what? They even grow faster as they get older! https://www.npr.org/2014/01/16/262479807/old-trees-grow-fast...
Re:CO2 already emitted will warm Earth beyond climate target...
by adrianN on Friday January 08, 2021 @12:45AM
(#25681890)
That is a different point.
Anyway, the land we have is limited. You literally can't cover the planet in one big forest to capture the gigatons of carbon we have released. You have to do active forest management and store the carbon somewhere stable, for example as biochar.
Re:CO2 already emitted will warm Earth beyond climate target...
by pmiller2 on Friday January 08, 2021 @12:47AM
(#25681899)
Reducing the numbers of those pesky humans would help.
Re:CO2 already emitted will warm Earth beyond climate target...
by imtringued on Friday January 08, 2021 @03:30AM
(#25682761)
That's the one thing climate change is good at once it gets bad. I thought we wanted to avoid this?
Re:CO2 already emitted will warm Earth beyond climate target...
by pmiller2 on Saturday January 09, 2021 @01:11AM
(#25697861)
No. The one thing we want to avoid is making the Earth into an unlivable hellscape for those who remain alive.