4 ms·
Forests do net sequester carbon. But if you want to really sock away the carbon you harvest the trees and pyrolize it. It will give you energy (heat) you can us
by msftgreed 2mo ago
Forests do net sequester carbon. But if you want to really sock away the carbon you harvest the trees and pyrolize it. It will give you energy (heat) you can use and elemental carbon (biochar). You could bury that a few feet under or innoculate it with microorganisms and work it into fields. Carbon in that form will sit in the soil for hundreds of years. Thousands or millions if you bury it.
- XorNot 2mo agoI mean technically we already do this: renewable plantation timber is a widespread operation (also why I get kind of annoyed at YouTubers talking about how great the timber is in old homes - yes it's great because it was logged from 50 year old old growth forests and now they're all gone because we cut them down).
- quickthrowman 2mo agoYou can just buy engineered wood products that are much stronger than any old growth lumber. My family lake house built in 1970 has three gluelam trusss beams that support the roof. There are even better engineered wood products available these days.
- SV_BubbleTime 2mo ago> Carbon in that form will sit in the soil for hundreds of years. Thousands or millions if you bury it. And what is the scale that global climate change works on? Trees do jack shit for carbon on the scale that is important.
- msftgreed 2mo ago50 tons per acre, over 35 years (to grow the trees to a harvestable age) with an expectation that you can capture ~25-40% of that in long term storage via pyrolizing it. The US alone has ~1 billion acres of forest land and could produce a lot more if needed. Over 35 years, we could remove 50 billion tons * 25-40%. Basically enough to offset a years worth of emissions during those years. It's not enough, but it would be a significant amount of carbon removed. Combined with other efforts, we could put a lot of carbon back in the soil.