Posts

Showing posts from February, 2008

TO PLANT OR NOT TO PLANT! by Larry Powell

Image
The value of planting trees was questioned at a public meeting in Rossburn, MB on Feb.21st. Perhaps up to a hundred people were there, including several students from local schools. The meeting was called to examine how climate change might affect agriculture. Two speakers at the meeting actually challenged the role of tree-planting as a way to absorb harmful greenhouse gasses. Curt Hull of Climate Change Connection , one of the meeting's guest speaker, said trees may absorb such gasses during their life-cycle, (through a process known as "sequestration) but actually put it back into the air when they die and decay. *(See his more detailed explanation, and another view from the PFRA below .) Another speaker, Leloni Scott of Manitoba Agriculture and Rural Initiatives, agreed. Ms. Scott claimed tree-planting is over-rated as a way to "sequester" gasses. Unconventional Wisdom? Those statements clearly came as a surprise to several people in attendance,including one of t