Some feared the paper would be used to justify indiscriminate tree-planting, with damaging consequences for biodiversity, agriculture and access to water. However, a closer look at the companys standards and practices clarifies that its one of the most trustworthy climate-focused orgs in the world. In this case, it merely leaked carbon dioxide to foreign locations. In this case, the project isnt making a difference since the carbon dioxide can and will be offset without it. For humans and wildlifes sake, verifying forestry carbon offsets is a non-negotiable step. Thomas Crowther: Everyone [in restoration] wants to do good. For . Not only might tree planting fail to reliably sequester carbon, trees can also heat the atmosphere more than many other habitat types. 8 Billion Trees is a carbon offset company that runs large-scale planting operations in the Amazon Rainforest. Its not like these two things are in competition, says Wayne Walker, a scientist at the Woods Hole Research Center. (n.d.). Shortly afterwards she wrote an opinion piece for the New York Times headlined To save the planet, dont plant trees. Those grazing animals can help prevent wildfires, Mahmood Nasir explained. But the idea of planting individual trees isolates them from the microbes in the soil, the birds, the animals and the other plants that are necessary.. But critics believe that it is an unsustainable and expensive waste of resources. A study published this week in the journal PNAS found that the most effective way to protect the Amazon rainforest might be to leave it in the hands of its indigenous residents. "Many saplings planted in Gujranwala burnt within no time due to intense heat,'' said the senior government official. Organizers of the Cauvery tree-planting project have said the criticism against it is a baseless opinion that contains blatant untruths and loose comments with no backing in facts. It says the trees will revive the river by increasing water retention. Headlines around the world declared tree planting to be the best solution to climate change, lead author of the critique Joseph Veldman said in a statement at the time. Retrieved July 17, 2021, from: https://carbonmarketwatch.org/2014/08/29/carbon-leakage/, 4G Badgley, J Freeman, J Hamman, B Haya, A T Trugman, W R L Anderegg, D Cullenward (2021). Ukraine updates: Russia says defense minister visits Donbas, Russian mercenary chief says Bakhmut almost fully encircled, Biden thanks Scholz for 'profound' German support on Ukraine. However, it does have some drawbacks. (2021, June 15). If you liked this story,sign up for the weekly bbc.com features newsletter, called The Essential List. The founder of the foundation that launched it, yogi and author Sadhguru, joined Salesforces Benioff at a press conference for the trillion trees campaign in Davos. There are people at odds with science and believe that such conservation and restoration efforts are not necessary. Why would an upscale resort or hotel be dumping rooms that can be sold, and instead issuing "free" coupons that can be used or booked at any time in the future ? By using this site you consent to our use of cookies. Tree-planting campaigns have taken off, with everyone from YouTube creators to high-powered CEOs embracing trees as a solution to the climate crisis. Thomas Crowther understands more than most the danger of simple, optimistic messages about combating the climate crisis. The Dave Matthews Band 2023 Tour has committed to help plant an additional one million trees with The Nature Conservancy's Plant a Billion Trees program, a global forest restoration effort, having fully funded three million trees from 2020 - 2022.With your help and with commitments from the band, The Dreaming Tree Wines and other tour partners, we can help advance this goal in an effort to . Please view our privacy policy for more information. The study also looked at regions that were best able to stop that from happening, and found that indigenous territories had the best success rates. The study also warned that the ability of indigenous peoples to protect their lands is under threat. The worlds leading authority on climate science, the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), has recognized that when local communities land rights are jeopardized, it poses risks to both people and the planet. So how much can trees really help us solve our climate problem? (n.d.). In January, scientists affiliated with the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew in Britain published their 10 golden rules for restoring forests, which prioritize conservation of existing natural forests over planting. Using a multi-layered fact-checking and verification process is essential to the success of afforestation projects. There are also further associated costs, a senior government official familiar with this project told DW on the condition of anonymity. He explained that saplings have also been planted in places already suffering from water scarcity. Sally Archibald, an ecologist at Wits University in South Africa, says that planting enthusiasts often overlook the fact that people are using all this land that everyone thinks is available for planting trees. The former A3 London to Portsmouth road at Hindhead, after being restored back to heathland. During the 2020 WEF meeting in Davos, Switzerland, Benioff announced that 300 companies and numerous governments have committed to hitting 1t.orgs target. Restoring these forests is crucial to preserving life as we know it. As an added assurance, buyers can visit the. They point to flaws in the studies that have inspired large-scale programs, and say that harmful types of tree planting are regularly conflated with beneficial natural forest restoration. Protecting existing forests and planting new ones are surely good things to do. The underlying problem is that our society is releasing greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide (CO2), that are warming the Earths climate to levels we have never experienced before. There was also division over how to reforest: allow humans to plant enormous numbers of saplings or leave ecosystems to regenerate on their own? According to Thomas Crowther, a professor of environmental systems science at Eidgenssische Technische Hochschule Zrich, reforestation is the top climate change solution in terms of carbon dioxide storage potential.8, Plus, forestry carbon offsets are crucial to wildlifes wellbeing. Retrieved July 17, 2021, from: https://www.footprintnetwork.org/resources/glossary/. Terrapass was conceived by Dr. Karl Ulrich and a team of 41 students from the University of Pennsylvania. If you plant trees there, youre losing livelihoods, youre losing future opportunities, and youre damaging natural biodiversity., Many planting proponents acknowledge that trees can have negative effects, but that putting the right trees in the right places can sequester carbon, rebuild forests, and enhance agricultural productivity. 8 Billion Trees is a Business that is Prioritizing the Cause of Actually Planting 8 Billion Trees Around The World, While Setting the Example of How a Cause Centric Business Can Succeed LOS ANGELES, CA / ACCESSWIRE / February 14, 2019 /The founders of 8 Billion Trees are pleased to announce the launch of a new company that has one simple mission: to change the world, one tree at a time. Restoring forests may be one of our most powerful weapons in fighting climate change. Just a couple things at the top today, and then I look forward to taking your questions. However, they also have locations or partner with businesses, such as manufacturing plants, overseas. These figures have been widely criticised as overhyped and unreliable. If successful, the platform could help move away from the carbon in, carbon out logic underlying many conservation projects. Its up to us to make our own maps, she says. The government said that the project would cost a little over 125 billion rupees ($750 million, 633 million) but critics claim that other costs are being ignored. Will They Affect the Climate? To view this video please enable JavaScript, and consider upgrading to a web browser that supports HTML5 video. 1Terrapass. And a Pakistani government investigation found that at least $3 million in Tree Tsunami funds were stolen, mostly by government officials and landowners involved in the program. The government claims that the survival rate of the planted trees is over 60%, but some critics dispute this. Nobodys against trees, said Benioff, adding, This is a time of action, not words. The official criticized the lack of accountability and said that a number of people close to the chambers of power have set up nurseries from which the government buys the trees for planting. The science behind the press releases claim that new forests could suck in two-thirds of all historic human emissions remaining in the atmosphere was also questioned. We are aware of no other viable climate change solution that is quantitatively as large in terms of carbon drawdown, the authors from the Crowther Lab at ETH Zurich said in their comments published in Science last October. In Cambodia, a Battered Mekong Defies Doomsday Predictions, How Weather Forecasts Can Help Dams Supply More Water, In Scramble for Clean Energy, Europe Is Turning to North Africa, As Millions of Solar Panels Age Out, Recyclers Hope to Cash In. A study published in July 2019, led by Thomas Crowther of ETH-Zurich in Switzerland, estimated the world has room for an extra 0.9 billion hectares of forest. One of its leading supporters is Marc Benioff, the billionaire CEO of Salesforce, who pledged funds to plant 100 million of them. However, other reforestation experts are critical of Ungers findings. When we asked them about their decision to do this, they gave us a candid response: This implies natural climate solutions could mop up about 30% of the CO2 we need to deal with every year. In October 2019, the journal Science published four highly critical comments. Since the project has no substantial value, this renders the sold carbon credits useless. Ethiopia aimed to plant 5 billion seedlings in three months. South Africa has recently faced critical water shortages affecting major cities that have been exacerbated by invasive trees, and the government spends millions of dollars annually on a program called Working for Water to remove them from key watersheds and conservation areas. (Image) 6 Earth needs our help. As part of the provinces Billion Tree Tsunami, which began in 2014, the government gave free seedlings to landowners and paid them annually for every tree that survived. * This article has been edited on 3 June 2020 to add details of the correction issued in Science on the paper by Thomas Crowther and his team. Although some large tree planting programs, like Chinas, began decades ago, many observers tie the recent enthusiasm for tree-planting to the 2011 Bonn Challenge, a joint initiative of the German government and the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) to get governments to commit to restoring 150 million hectares of degraded and deforested land by 2020. "Did anybody plant trees for the Amazon Jungle? All of this makes it easier to offset your carbon footprint, and aids in the pursuit of furthering the mission to heal the planet and save animals. In the first year alone, Terrapass gained more than 2,400 members and reduced 36 million pounds of CO2.1. "They have not appointed sufficient staff to look after these trees and who will look after them in hilly areas and desert regions anyway?". About Terrapass | The Terrapass story and who we are. Its hard to predict how many trees theyll kill in the near future and how much carbon that will put into the atmosphere, but its likely to be considerable. a film arguing for extra protections for the worlds forests, The UK government has planted millions of trees over the last decade, in 2016 one Indian state planted 50 million trees in one day, Ethiopia claimed to have planted 350 million in a day, a campaign encouraging all its readers to plant a tree, remove a quarter of the carbon dioxide currently in the air, the global total of 41 billion tonnes of CO2, one of the most effective carbon drawdown solutions to date, Crowther's team published an extensive correction, the best place to plant new trees is the tropics, we have created a cooling effect that slightly offset the warming from greenhouse gas emissions, a more plausible figure would be 11-15 billion tonnes of CO2 per year, natural climate solutions could mop up about 30% of the CO2 we need to deal with every year, a 2018 report on greenhouse gas removal technologies, planting trees in dry areas can cause water scarcity because they suck up so much, enabling more plant growth and therefore more carbon storage, planting rich new forests can boost local biodiversity, Similar conflicts over land use exist in all countries. So, they become known as empty credits. That is a little over half our annual emissions, but they emphasise that many of the strategies they studied would not be cost-effective: a more plausible figure would be 11-15 billion tonnes of CO2 per year. Tree-planting initiatives have been further boosted by academic papers that claim enormous benefits from tree planting and maps that identify areas that could support more trees. Many Pashtuns grew alien eucalyptus on their pastures because it paid more than the traditional rentals. Through people's empowerment, the 8 Billion Trees can plant more trees, rebuild even more habitats, and sequester even more carbon emissions, Chambers said. The reports authors state, Our analysis of crediting errors demonstrates that a large fraction of the credits in the program do not reflect real climate benefits. This means that the state overestimated its offsets by a staggering 30 million tCO2e. In the following years, Terrapass grew into a major resource of carbon credits, eventually helping more than 1,000 individuals and institutions mitigate their climate impact. Wang Jiang/VCG via Getty Images. The location, species planted, and how people are involved can all jeopardize success. Others thought the paper dramatically overstated where new forests could grow by including savannahs and grasslands in its artificial intelligence-derived estimate of land suitable. We encourage you to research and examine these records to determine their accuracy. This practice involves increasing forests carbon dioxide storage capacity by altering forest management operations, such as the frequency of timber harvests. Volunteers plant trees on the edge of the Badain Jaran Desert on Chinas Tree-Planting Day on March 12, 2021 in Gansu Province. There are also deeper problems, because trees have more than one way to affect the climate. Trees in the United States already provide $6.8 billion in health benefits every year by filtering pollution from the air, on top of additional benefits from cleaner water, wildlife habitat and forest industries. But a growing number of scientists and environmentalists are challenging this narrative on tree-planting. We may need something thats ultra-large-scale industrial in 10 to 20 years.. But the reaction we need to give to those people is: youre doing this totally wrong because youre lacking ecological information. Specifically, according to a 2007 study that has been repeatedly confirmed, the best place to plant new trees is the tropics, where trees grow fastest and thus trap the most CO2. Launched in 2019, the project with support from the United Nations Environment Programme is aiming to plant 10 billion trees by 2023. "One of the factors leading to fire in various parts of the world is the elimination of grazing areas, which helps prevent such catastrophes," he said. April8,2021, In late January, the multibillionaire Elon Musk took to Twitter and abruptly announced, Am donating $100M towards a prize for best carbon capture technology. IFM is integral to the states carbon-sequestering activity. In 2014, a province of Pakistan launched a Billion Tree Tsunami planting project, which was expanded into a nationwide 10-Billon Tree Tsunami project in 2018. This scatters sunlight back into space, cooling the planet. Science published six critiques of the paper, criticizing its methods and results, and the Crowther Lab was forced to issue corrections. Women participating in Ethiopias mass tree-planting campaign in Addis Ababa last June. The idea is everywhere. The team estimated that the natural climate solutions could lock up the equivalent of 23.8 billion tonnes of CO2 per year. The study also considered planting trees on savannas and grasslands, where planting non-native trees could cause problems for local species. Benioff views Crowther as a Steve Jobs of ecology, an ecopreneur who is using bold research to shine a light on natures potential to mitigate climate change and biodiversity loss. This wasnt good enough for hundreds of Twitter users, who saturated his timeline with yet more support for trees, reinforcing a powerful narrative thats taken hold around the world: Trees are the answer to climate breakdown and many other environmental and social ills, so we need to plant more of them billions or even trillions more. The rich world, she says, is saying to poor countries, We can plant trees here, well give you money if you do plant trees here, but its up to you to decide whether its a good idea and whether its really going to fulfill your development needs.. 4,374 talking about this. We want to protect and help Earth by planting and saving over 8 billion trees. Gujjars lost access to large grazing areas and were forced to sell their animals, abandon their traditional way of life, and seek low-paying jobs in distant cities. Congressional Research Service. This contrasts with the potential sale of empty credits. Instead, it is a social enterprise with a strong focus on awareness campaigns which means their administrative costs are too high to be a charity. He caught the eye of his Dutch backers, DOB Ecology, following his 2015 paper counting the planets three trillion trees, which remains the most authoritative estimate to date. 8 Billion Trees was founded with a simple idea: if people can destroy the Earth, they can also help to rebuild it. part one. But another anonymous government official questioned the validity of this claim, asking where the record is of these 85,000 workers. It provides invaluable data that organizations can use to improve their practices, and see how a project can do better in its planting, reporting, and monitoring of operations. Death 8 APR 1905 - Amsterdam,North Holland . Unfortunately, climate change is certainly a polarizing issue. China is on track to plant 35 million hectares (87 million acres) of trees in its northern arid areas by 2050 to make a so-called Great Green Wall the size of Germany. It would be better to restore species-rich forests, he says. Research shows that these non-native trees can consume significantly more water than native plants and can dry up rivers and wetlands. The concept of empty credits refers to a programs lack of additionality. Its not nothing, but it doesnt really fundamentally change the story: we still need some pretty massive reductions in our emissions. Carbon leakage refers to a company simply displacing their carbon dioxide instead of removing or reducing it.3 For example, imagine a corporation based in the United States. Planting trees can help with both, he says, but only if we do it right. Grasslands, especially waterlogged grasslands, can be shown to hold much more carbon than tree-covered landscapes if subsurface carbon is included in estimates, says Archibald. Numerous organizations are facing newfound scrutiny, and the popular company Terrapass, has not been spared with many wondering, Is Terrapass legit?. not all tree-planting initiatives are created equal. Tree Planting to Rebuild Habitats and Offset Carbon At its core, 8 Billion Trees carries out large-scale tree planting and tree conservation operations to fuel positive environmental change and defend habi Combining the latest biodiversity metrics with a global map of restoration projects, he hopes Restor will allow anyone with an internet connection to assess the impact of the programmes and bring more accountability and direction to conservation. After the initial media blitz rallied excitement for the seemingly simple climate solution, a group of 46 scientists, including Fleischman, responded to the study with their critique. In May 2020, the studys authors made three corrections, including an acknowledgment that they were incorrect to state tree restoration is the most effective solution to climate change to date, and clarifying that new forests could absorb about half as much carbon from the air as the paper initially appeared to suggest. In fact, some planting projects are clearly legitimate without them, because they have government contracts or otherwise. Ive never in my life said we should plant a trillion trees. Organizers of the Cauvery tree-planting project have said the criticism against it is "a baseless opinion that contains blatant untruths and loose comments with no backing in facts." It says the. Mahmood Nasir believes any plant that is grown outside its natural biome is expensive and environmentally disastrous. The US-based corporation might reduce the CO2 emissions of its primary location to comply with American climate policies, but ramps up operations overseas. Thats going to have a bigger impact.. Since dark surfaces absorb more heat, a dark tree-covered surface will trap more of the Suns heat and warm the local climate. Researchers have identified South Africa's Kruger National Park (seen here) as suitable for planting trees, even though it is mostly a natural open savanna ecosystem. Restor will combine the latest biodiversity metrics with a global map of restoration projects. Additionality means that the offset project prevents a certain amount of carbon dioxide from entering the atmosphere. In 2014 Unger calculated that, by chopping down forests from 1850 to the 2000s and thus preventing them emitting volatiles, we have created a cooling effect that slightly offset the warming from greenhouse gas emissions. The initiative reached its commitment target early and now aims for 350 million hectares by 2030, and it has generated many offshoots and subsidiary programs. At this point we have emitted so much CO2, and left emissions cuts so late, that we are almost certain to miss our targets of limiting warming to 1.5C or 2C. The carbon marketplace is one of the most powerful tools we have to mitigate climate change effects. In line with this, Law has highlighted that planting rich new forests can boost local biodiversity, as well as improving water availability. More about Adam Welz, Never miss a feature! Reforestation was a potent tool for climate crisis mitigation, just less so than initially suggested, and certainly not a replacement for decarbonisation. First and foremost, 8 Billion Trees is a social enterprise- not a charity. Terrapass is one of many US carbon offset companies that have been under increasing scrutiny in recent months. They still think forests play a role in solving the climate crisis their skepticism mostly centers around efforts to plant trees in places they werent before, or to plant large swaths of a single species to essentially create tree plantations instead of real forests. Planting a . Recent research shows that large areas of the American West may have permanently lost their forest cover. They say that it will take decades for the already-existing environmental degradation to be reversed. Everyone with a smartphone will be able to show where their purchases came from, says Crowther. Areas that are now used for farming such as rearing sheep on hill country can be difficult to reforest (Credit: Getty Images), The real uncertainties are not scientific, but socio-political. This led the state to set the average stock too low, causing inflated carbon credit estimations. The public will also be able to assess the impact of their own back garden. Few people realize that such a change would transform Pakistan's climate, not only protecting the country from disasters but also saving millions of lives, she added. However, there are also surprise benefits of planting trees. She points out that the polar regions are warming faster than the rest of the planet, so much of the snow may melt in the coming decades in which case planting trees will not make the ground that much darker. Then, the analysts find the difference between the forests current and future carbon stocks (after implementing IFM). Theres virtually nowhere where lands just lying idle and you can just come along and do that.. Trees have emerged as one of the most effective methods for drawing existing carbon out of the atmosphere (Credit: Getty Images). Planting trees on snowy terrain that once reflected the sun could even turn those places into dark patches that actually absorb heat. Currently, groundwater has to be extracted for the plants, putting strains on already depleted reserves. In 2020 alone, the 25.8 Mha (mega hectares) of tree cover perished.9, (A Gha is a global hectare, meaning the biologically productive hectare with the worlds average biological productivity per year.10). A total cumulative of 165 billion tonnes of removal will be needed by 2050 in order to align with the 1.5C pathway, according to BeZero Carbon Liked by Tarick Belahbib Ce mardi 4 octobre 2022, le Prix Nobel de physique vient d'tre attribu alain aspect, directeur de recherche CNRS mrite au Laboratoire His work includes an award-winning film about eccentric birders in New York City and exposs of environmental crime throughout southern Africa. "Future papers in the series will build on the foundation of counting trees, extend the areas studied, and look ways to calculate their carbon content," said Tucker. They say that planting programs, especially those based on large numerical targets, can wreck natural ecosystems, dry up water supplies, damage agriculture, push people off their land and even make global warming worse. 8 Billion Trees was born on November 10th, 2018. Billion Tree Tsunami Programme Khyber Pakhtunkhwa. We now know those headlines were wrong. Veldman argued that planting trees where they dont belong can harm ecosystems, make wildfires worse, and even exacerbate global warming.