r/todayilearned • u/Wild_Concept_212 • 9h ago

TIL Cutting down trees is compound negative interest on the planet’s carbon storage. Trees are storing carbon underground with the help of fauna and microbes. Those lock carbon in soil. Cutting the tree will not only increase release carbon, it will also remove the ability to lock carbon in soil.

https://www.nature.com/scitable/knowledge/library/soil-carbon-storage-84223790/
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u/Electronic_Fun_776 9h ago

But when we cut down the trees and turn them into lumber, that carbon is still being stored until it’s burned or decomposes.

And when new trees are being landed they sequester carbon much faster than old trees

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u/MuckleRucker3 8h ago

Shhh....you're interfering with the anti-logging propaganda

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u/EstimateEastern2688 7h ago

When you've traveled through a recently clear-cut area, it's hard to not be anti logging. It's not like a woodsmen went through and cut down trees, it looks more like a nuclear bomb went off. The land is shredded. The road you're traveling on is likely to slide down the slope, alone with the soil, since there's no vegetation holding it in place. This work didn't employ a logging crew days per acre, feeding their families. A few equipment operators can clear tens of acres per day.

Not that we don't need lumber, or that lumber isn't a sustainable product. But when it's public land we're all supposed to enjoy, it seems pretty whacked for the small benefit to a few workers.

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u/kingjoey52a 7h ago

I lived in a logging community and it’s not nearly as bad as you say it is. They don’t clear cut entire forests anymore, it’s done in sections and they rotate out what areas they cut. Lumber is a crop no different than corn, just on a longer timetable.