image: Jack pine regeneration following stand-replacing wildfire view more
Credit: Image credit: Grant Domke.
Researchers examine how increasing the number of forest trees can offset carbon emissions in the United States. Aimed at mitigating tree loss and offsetting carbon emissions, several initiatives are underway to increase tree planting in US forests. Grant M. Domke and colleagues examined data pertaining to more than 130,000 forested plots from the national forest inventory conducted by the US Department of Agriculture's Forest Service. The authors found that forests and forest products in use and in landfills annually offset the equivalent of more than 14% of economy-wide carbon dioxide emissions in the United States. However, almost 33 million hectares of productive forestland in the United States are understocked with trees, given that trees cover less than 35% of the area. Fully stocking all understocked productive forestland with trees could increase carbon sequestration by approximately 20%. Current tree-planting efforts by the federal government and state and private entities result in an estimated 1.2 billion trees planted on forestland annually that sequester between 16 and 28 million metric tons of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere each year. The findings suggest that concentrating tree planting on understocked productive forestland may substantially increase carbon sequestration capacity in the United States, according to the authors.
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Article #20-10840: "Tree planting has the potential to increase carbon sequestration capacity of forests in the United States," by Grant M. Domke, Sonja N. Oswalt, Brian F. Walters, and Randall S. Morin.
MEDIA CONTACT: Grant Domke, US Department of Agriculture, St. Paul, MN; tel: 612-503-6153; e-mail: grant.m.domke@usda.gov
Journal
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences