Forest density study blows hole in excess CO2 myth and the supposed need for carbon taxes

Monday, July 04, 2011 by: Jonathan Benson, staff writer
Tags: forest density, CO2, health news

(NaturalNews) We have all heard it before. Humans are supposedly producing too much carbon dioxide (CO2), which is contributing to "global warming" -- and the only solution, of course, is to have the United Nations (UN) distribute carbon use credits and implement carbon taxes to offset an impending global disaster. However, a new study published in the online journal PLoS One helps debunk this myth by showing that the natural world is basically taking care of this excess CO2 naturally, without the need for increased government control over individuals.

Anyone with a basic knowledge of the way trees and other plants function knows that they require CO2 in order to survive. And upon absorbing CO2, plants naturally release oxygen for humans and animals to breathe. This cycle has been going on since the beginning of time, and it continues to occur today, despite the plethora of human environmental abuses that appear to have damaged and obstructed the earth in many other ways.

According to the report, much of the damage caused by increases in CO2 and deforestation has been made up for by naturally increasing forest densities, at least as far as CO2 is concerned. Based on a survey of 68 different nations, the report explains that between 2000 and 2010, the amount of carbon stored by forests in both North America and Europe has actually increased dramatically, even though the overall land area of these forests has remained largely unchanged.

Even in areas of Africa and South America where massive deforestation efforts have cleared much of the land, increasing forest densities in those that remain have made up for much of that loss. This does not discount, of course, the other types of damage caused by deforestation (loss of biodiversity, animal extinction, etc.), but it does overrule the scare tactics being propagated by climate change apologists who insist that CO2 is destroying the earth.

"Higher densities means world forests are capturing more carbon," said experts from both Finland and the US in response to the report. And the US is a perfect example of this, as its timberland area increased by only one percent between 1953 and 2007, while its actual volume of growing stock increased by a whopping 51 percent during the same time.

So rather than implement totalitarian controls over human activity in the name of saving the planet, perhaps it is time to just let nature do the job on its own.

Sources for this story include:

http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/06/06/us...