Forest-Smart Buying Can Lower Your Carbon Footprint
by Union of Concerned Scientists on 09.24.07
Tropical deforestation is responsible for about 20 percent of total annual global warming emissions, making it second only to fossil fuels in terms of climate impact. Forests play a major role in regulating global temperatures by absorbing heat-trapping carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and storing it in their cell walls. Earth loses more than 18 million acres of forestland every year—an area larger than Ireland—according to the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP).
The best way to reduce emissions from tropical deforestation is to help ensure these trees are not cut down in the first place. Your purchasing decisions can play a role in this effort:
Wood: When buying wood products, look for labels that indicate the wood comes from sustainably managed forests. There are several forest certification programs in place worldwide. For home improvement projects, you can avoid new wood products altogether by using reclaimed wood for floors and wood-free materials (such as composite resin boards) for other projects.
Coffee: Make your daily cup o’ joe using shade-grown coffee beans, which are grown under a forest canopy. In addition to supporting the preservation of forestlands, shade-grown coffee requires less fertilizer and pesticides to grow compared with coffee grown under full sun. A quick Google search can lead you to online coffee retailers if you can’t find any at your local grocery store.
Paper: While most U.S. papers are not made from tropical woods, reducing overall demand for virgin paper can have a global impact. You can support forest-friendly paper by buying paper made from sustainably harvested timber, a high percentage of post-consumer recycled content, or wood-free fibers such as kenaf.
NOT cutting down forrests is of great importance, the ecological ramifications of trying to "grow" and/or "offset" our carbon emmisions may not work out exactly and as simply as it seems.
Tropical deforestation has much of an impact on the cloud cover and water cycle in the area, but this only relates directly to tropical regions (from studies). This means to recover from deforestation in tropical areas is VERY difficult. Imagine needing more water to grow, of which was already lost......from deforestation. We need to focus on maintaining what we have because adding to them may not be feasible in the future when climates have shifted so dramatically.
The "save-all" for the biomass/offseting industry is sometimes defined as the "rapid-renewable" plants/trees such as bamboo, eucalyptus, and wheat because they can offset alot of carbon in their short and rapid life-cycles. What has not been study as much is their consumption of water and effect on the water-cycle.
Point being: CO2 and global warming are too intertwined and because of this we may overlook the ramifications of focusing too much on one particular area of global warming.
Great article: http://www.conbio.org/CIP/article82sin.cfm
Also, in planting and maintaining forests consideration of additional natural disasters associated with climate change....such as forest fires.
article:
http://bioconversion.blogspot.com/search?updated-min=2007-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-08%3A00&updated-max=2008-01-01T00%3A00%3A00-08%3A00&max-results=50
In the US, most logging is pine, is it not? I imagine an organized group of people could replant pine faster than it could be logged.
Are there groups that do this?
I live in the grassy prairies, trees aren't really native to here :)
The Forest Stewardship Council is the only truly reputable international forest certification program.
What about avoiding bio fuels? You know the ones they are burning tropical forests to grow more cane and soy to produce?
A lot of deforestation is done to make pasture for cattle, primarily spurred by the fast food industry. So cutting down on the fast food beef from the big international chains can indirectly reduce the amount of deforestation taking place. Go for the chicken sandwich instead.
Way to miss out on the obvious, "Don't eat meat." If I recall correctly, a significant portion of deforestation is because of cattle farmers. A significant portion of crops grown in the U.S. is fed to cattle. I'd be willing to bet that not eating meat would make more of an impact than buying non-tropical paper.
I read in the Economist a few years back that Brazilian cattle farmers could burn rainforest and the land would be theirs to graze beef cattle. If you look at most deforested regions they are now being used to grow burger patties or become desertified.
Reduce your red-meat intake, it will be a blessing to your longevity as well as humanity's (to say nothing for the cow that's suffered like you'd never believe...).