[Terrapreta] Fwd: Fwd: Global Carbon Cycle

[lou gold]

Hello Again,

I have to admit that I haven't understood all aspects of these system so
please let me off the hook of defending them all. I want to focus on just
one:

>
>
> Consider a "mature" forest. By definition, a "mature" forest has 0
> Annual Increment... there is no net gain or loss of biomass... the
> forest mass lost by dying trees is made up for by new growth from
> younger trees. If the trees are cut and used for building, then the
> carbon content of the wood is sequestered in a building, and new space
> is freed up for growth of new trees to take Carbon out of the
> atmosphere. A mature forest does nothing to alleviate the Greenhouse
> Effect, and as far as I can see, saving Mature Forests is a blatant
> Carbon Credit Scam.


It works this way. 20% of Brazil's carbon emissions is smoke from
deforestation. Then there is the added emissions of whatever is released
from the denuded soil. Then there is whatever is  burned for fuel. Then
there is the life-cycle releases as products become wastes. The point is
that the natural carbon sink retains its carbon much longer and in decay
slowly contributes to ecosystem functions such as creating habitat,
filtering water and building new soil. Indeed the quickly growing young
plantation draws down CO2 much faster, but it is nowhere near the pace of
the release in deforestation.

There are two processes we want to reward. 1) Slow the release into the
atmosphere of carbon from wherever it is "sunk" and 2) retrieve from the
atmosphere into new sinks in many forms (like terra preta). The thought is
that it will take public policies to incentivize these processes.
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