If the aim is to sequester carbon, then planting trees seems to be only half the solution. We also need to prevent the captured carbon reentering the atmosphere by combustion or decay. It seems to me that it would be beneficial to landfill as much wood as possible to capture the carbon underground and limit aerobic decay, and rather than recycling wood products, sustainably harvest as much new wood as possible. In this case, the best place to plant a tree would be where it could be most economically lumbered, and the best kind of tree would be that most useful for industry.
Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
51–60 of 218 posts
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#52In Lewisham there is a group of volunteers doing excellent work planting street trees (Street Trees for Living - https://brockleystreettrees.blogspot.com/p/welcome2.html)
They work with the council and have organised the planting & maintenance of over 600 trees since 2012 (including the lovely Himalayan Birch outside my house which I sponsored last year).
I have also helped out here and there and created a 'tree map' a few years ago which has information on all the publicly owned trees in the Borough - http://maps.catfordstreettrees.org.uk/ (I actually happen to currently be in the process of updating the map with new data)
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#53I 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…
There is one thing that I don't understand. I plant 1000 trees, I sequester the CO2 I create by driving, heating my home and all the activities done by third parties to keep me alive (food, hospitals, etc). But that CO2 is still under the sky and most of it will be released when the trees die. It's not like we're pumping it back into oil fields or coal mines and never see it again. So this 1T trees initiative is a st…
The goal is to increase the biomass. There is no reason it stays constant. More soil, more forest, higher trees.
I tried to find literature, but came back empty handed, on whether it is better to let tree grows on a parcel, or cut grass regularly and let it compost, adding biomass to it.
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#54I 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…
There is one thing that I don't understand. I plant 1000 trees, I sequester the CO2 I create by driving, heating my home and all the activities done by third parties to keep me alive (food, hospitals, etc). But that CO2 is still under the sky and most of it will be released when the trees die. It's not like we're pumping it back into oil fields or coal mines and never see it again. So this 1T trees initiative is a st…
Don’t plants convert CO2 into O2 and sugar, meaning the CO2 no longer exists? When the tree dies what mechanism causes CO2 to be released?
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#55"You should not plant trees on ... grassland that has never been ploughed..." Can anyone shed some light on the reason behind not planting in open grassland?
Think about it, this is in Britain right? Grassland that has never been ploughed is going to be pretty rare, probably some kind of old ecology that shouldn't be converted to forest willy-nilly. That's my guess anyway.
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#56You 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/
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#57I don't see how 1.5 billion trees is enough to offset the UK's carbon emission rate. If you go by a tree sequestering a ton of carbon over a 40 year lifetime, and the UK emitting 368 megatons per year... you're sequestering on average 37.5 million tons per year (less when they're young, more when they're old), which is only one tenth of what the UK emits in one year.
Plant 15 billion trees and then you're carbon neutral, on average, for the 40 years, and carbon negative if they live longer. But isn't that like planting trees on half of the land of the UK?
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#58Also we should stop cutting down the existing forests. Brazil and Canada have both been in the news recently for clear cutting their rainforests (yes, CA has inland rainforest!)
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#59I 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.
Trees can grow from seed. Johnny Appleseed was an American myth about a man who planted thousands of apple trees by hand using pips as he walked across the country. Seeds can be extremely low cost.
Acorns and conkers can be gathered in their thousands each day in the British autumn.
Re: Tree planting: Where can I do it and which type is best?
#60Funny, how come this topic isn't flagged, but one revealing new information (updates from interim IPCC models) has been flagged:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=20574620
As for tree planting - absolutely necessary, but without a political solution, it won't do much but buy a bit of time. And that is ONLY true if we stop ongoing, accelerating deforestation.
A political solution would likely be better than individuals trying to plant a few trees.