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(Jay Mantri/Unsplash) |
Reforestation is one of our options for combating climate
change, but deciding where to plant trees is more difficult than you would
expect. This is why researchers have created an interactive map that shows the
best places to reforest in the United States.
It's called the Reforestation Hub, and it uses color coding
to indicate which counties have the most reforestation potential. The map's
creators hope that it will prove to be a useful resource for the government and
individual environmental organizations.
According to forest restoration scientist Susan Cook-Patton
of the Nature Conservancy, "a lot of the knowledge we need to make
informed decisions about where to deploy reforestation already exists; it's
only spread around a lot of different locations."
We tried to bring this information together to create a menu
of reforestation options, allowing people to choose what they would like to see
in their city, state, or country. Not everyone has the computer science
experience to dig into the raw data, so we tried to bring this information
together to develop a menu of reforestation options
The team discovered 51.6 million hectares (nearly 200,000
square miles) of forest regeneration opportunities in the United States, after
excluding areas where tree planting isn't possible or where the land is
otherwise used (for productive crops, for example).
The researchers calculated that if all of that land was
reforested, it could absorb about 314.2 million tons of carbon dioxide per
year. That's more than all the emissions emitted by personal vehicles in
California, Texas, and New York combined, or roughly 67 million vehicles, and
it's 15% of the reduction pledge the US made as part of the Paris Agreement.
The researchers looked at how land is currently used, how
expensive it would be to convert it, and what other benefits reforestation in a
specific area could bring in addition to carbon capture (reducing urban heat,
for example).
Although there is no single best place to restore forest
cover, Cook-Patton reports that the southeastern United States has a relatively
high density of opportunities.
This is an area with high carbon accumulation rates, low
prices, and plenty of opportunities to achieve multiple benefits such as
biodiversity habitat development, water quality improvement, and climate
mitigation.
Other important considerations were taken into consideration
as well, such as whether areas had previously been classified as national
forest land and the possibility of flooding in a given region.
The final map divides the United States into a grid that
depicts ten distinct types of property, ranging from urban open fields to
post-fire lands recovering from fires. The most promising areas for conversion
are those already used for grazing, not just because of the carbon dioxide that
would be collected, but also because it could help us cut back on our meat
intake.
Reforestation won't solve the climate problem on its own,
but understanding where it can make the most difference – and how to do it in
the most effective way – can make a big difference. The researchers plan to
create similar maps for other countries in the future.
We have about a decade to control climate change, and I'm
excited about the potential for this study to help push decisions to invest in
reforestation as a climate solution, according to Cook-Patton.
The research has been published in One Earth.
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