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A correspondent writes to me giving this link to a CNN article on jungles (or, in PC-speak, rain forests), which says in part:
U.S. and Brazilian researchers say waterways in the Amazon are exhaling far more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than previously thought. Well, this falls into the "d'oh!" category for anyone who thinks about it (which is practically no one). It should be evident that any system, eco or otherwise, that is in dynamic equilibrium, will average outputs equal to its inputs. (Not even Rush Limbaugh claims that the jungle has to be cut down to keep it from overrunning the world.) Likewise, the "news" in the same article that temperate pine forests don't show the expected absorption of CO2. "Natural" systems, over less than geological time, are intended to be in dynamic equilibrium, with no net change to their environments (the ones that don't act that way are quickly eliminated by evolution). If one wants net carbon drawdown from a temperate pine forest, the wood of mature (broadly speaking) trees has to be harvested and turned in forms that do not quickly return to the environment (e.g., furniture, lumber, or paper) and new trees planted. Any other biological system must be treated in the same way to achieve the same ends. To think otherwise is environmentalist; i.e., not to think at all. (UPDATE: And I managed to forget to put the link in. "D'oh" on me.) John "Akatsukami" Braue Thursday, April 18, 2002 |
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