Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best? • Hacker News Board

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#111

Post by TeMPOraL » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 6:55 PM UTC

ryanmercer wrote: post #89

TeMPOraL wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I had a stupid thought yesterday that I need to run numbers on, but I wonder if following would be possible: Allocate some large area of ground for planting fast-growing trees. Dig a large and deep hole in the middle; something like 20 meters in diameter x 500 meters in depth. Let the trees grow; when they're mature, cut them down, throw into the hole, and throw a bunch of dirt (from the mound you made by digging the…

Placing them in arid caves/mines would lock the carbon up much longer.

So, we could skip the hole drilling part, and set up shop near abandoned mines? That turns the idea from expensive to relatively trivial to do.

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#112

Post by lostlogin » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 6:57 PM UTC

exhilaration wrote: post #90

guelo wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

nationalforests.org does reforesting of recently burned forests which are probably burning more frequently due to climate change. I don't think replacing forests that were alive when you were born should count as offsetting your personal CO2 emissions, if the idea is to have an actual effect it has to be new trees in new forests.

On a related note, today's New York Times has an article about the recent fires in California. Near the end the author states that the 2018 Camp Fire released ...an estimated 3.6 million metric tons of greenhouse gases that, as seems to happen at least once every fire season lately, was more than enough to obliterate the progress made by all of California’s climate-change policies in a typical year. https://www.nytim…

I’d assume that the following spring and for the next year or 3, there would be a huge growth increase in the area due to ash, light and space.

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#113

Post by lostlogin » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:05 PM UTC

ptah wrote: post #29

crispsquirrel wrote: post #8

I really want to start planting trees because this planet needs more trees, it's not a joke or some hippy movement, the consequences are real. I just feel like doing so in the UK is a bureaucratic nightmare. Plus buying trees to plant isn't cheap. I might just start saving up for land and planting trees there if I can.

a lot of plants can be propagated from twigs, you don't need to buy more

I’ve found that rooting hormone vastly increases the number that do well. I’ve also been told but have not tried, that you can make a DIY rooting hormone by soaking green willow twigs in water than adding your cuttings.

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#114

Post by hinkley » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:13 PM UTC

There are a lot of people in this thread conflating 'mature' with 'in decline'.

Remember that there are many, many species of tree with a natural lifespan in their preferred environment that can be measured in hundreds of years. That's a huge time period between full-sized and 'slowly falling apart'.

A tree in decline may have heart rot. Every year its losing wood while making new. It's a fight against gravity and the elements. When the losses outpace the gains the tree loses integrity, major limbs start falling off, and eventually the trunk fails. If you told me this tree is carbon neutral, I'd have to take your word for it. But for the previous thirty years? That tree was socking away tons - literally - of carbon.

There are "mature trees" in the world today that will outlive the children sitting beneath them.

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#115

Post by stordoff » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:13 PM UTC

dleslie wrote: post #66

notatoad wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

did you read a different article? "In England, you would not need planning permission to plant less than two hectares (20,000 sq metres) in a low risk area, it said."

Of course I did. How do you expect one determines an area to be low-risk? To do so requires assessment from all stakeholders who could deem it not to be low-risk.

If I understand it correctly, you can just look it up.

Woodland Trust:

> In England, planning permission isn’t needed if your project is under 2ha and in a low risk area. Check your area using the Forestry Commission land information search.

https://www.woodlandtrust.org.uk/plant-trees/advice/where/

Map browser: https://www.forestergis.com/Apps/MapBrowser/ (via https://www.gov.uk/guidance/use-the-land-information-search)

Then enable the Forestry Commission > Targeting and Scoring > Low Risk Areas for Woodland Creation layer.

At the very least, if your plan is to just beg forgiveness, it would give you a better argument that you thought it was acceptable and at least tried to comply.

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#116

Post by squish78 » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:14 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #21

dx87 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was an article posted recently that said the best way to increase the co2 uptake is by cutting down the fully grown trees and planting new trees. Full grown trees don't absord as much co2 as a tree that is still growing, and the needles that some trees drop make the ground acidic, preventing new trees from growing. The problem is that you have to find something to do with all the wood so the captured co2 doesn'…

I had a stupid thought yesterday that I need to run numbers on, but I wonder if following would be possible: Allocate some large area of ground for planting fast-growing trees. Dig a large and deep hole in the middle; something like 20 meters in diameter x 500 meters in depth. Let the trees grow; when they're mature, cut them down, throw into the hole, and throw a bunch of dirt (from the mound you made by digging the…

This is possible, and there is an entire agricultural method to it called Hügelkultur

https://www.permaculture.co.uk/articles/many-benefits-hugelk...

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#117

Post by zAy0LfpBZLC8mAC » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:20 PM UTC

pvaldes wrote: post #74

dx87 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was an article posted recently that said the best way to increase the co2 uptake is by cutting down the fully grown trees and planting new trees. Full grown trees don't absord as much co2 as a tree that is still growing, and the needles that some trees drop make the ground acidic, preventing new trees from growing. The problem is that you have to find something to do with all the wood so the captured co2 doesn'…

> Full grown trees don't absord as much co2 as a tree that is still growing This does not seem logical. Two cars emit more C02 than one car. Two leaves will absorb more CO2 than one leaf. A 2m young tree will never be able to consum so many CO2 as its older 40m high grandparent with a x10000 mass (mass that must be maintained).

> Two leaves will absorb more CO2 than one leaf.

And two leaves will also release more CO2 than one leaf, once it's on the ground, decaying.

Trees don't make carbon magically vanish, trees store it in cellulose, aka (more or less), wood. A tree that doesn't grow more wood does not store more carbon, and there is nothing to be "maintained", mass does not just disappear.

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#118

Post by captainmojo » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:31 PM UTC

dobleboble wrote: post #56

You can sign up for a service that will plant trees on your behalf. Do your own research, but these ones seemed pretty good and plant 1 tree per $1. https://onetreeplanted.org/ https://trees.org/

I've been liking Eden Reforestation (https://edenprojects.org/), which employs local populations to plant trees in deforested areas. Ecosia is listed on their Partner page, so I'd assumed that's how it works under the hood.

I'm interested in hearing about other projects, too.

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#119

Post by captainmojo » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:34 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #21

dx87 wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There was an article posted recently that said the best way to increase the co2 uptake is by cutting down the fully grown trees and planting new trees. Full grown trees don't absord as much co2 as a tree that is still growing, and the needles that some trees drop make the ground acidic, preventing new trees from growing. The problem is that you have to find something to do with all the wood so the captured co2 doesn'…

I had a stupid thought yesterday that I need to run numbers on, but I wonder if following would be possible: Allocate some large area of ground for planting fast-growing trees. Dig a large and deep hole in the middle; something like 20 meters in diameter x 500 meters in depth. Let the trees grow; when they're mature, cut them down, throw into the hole, and throw a bunch of dirt (from the mound you made by digging the…

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2266747/

Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?

#120

Post by m12k » Wed, Jul 31, 2019, 7:39 PM UTC

jerkstate wrote: post #7

I did a rough spreadsheet some time back based on this 1998 EPA carbon sequestration worksheet [1] and found that an average person from a high carbon output country needs about 600-1000 trees to offset their carbon output. There are about 3 trillion trees for a population of 7 billion people for an average of 428 trees per person, so that means you have to make up the delta of about 172 to 572 trees over the course…

How long does such a model expect the trees to keep the carbon captured? Most (non-rain-)forests burn eventually, so for a long-term solution, we need to make sure that the carbon that is captured stays captured. I saw some mention of special grass as a good option, since it stored most of its carbon in its roots.