Wednesday, January 2, 2008

The Secrets of the Forest

Harvard Forest, a 3,000 acre forest labratory in north central Massachusetts, is tracking the forest's breathing to determine how carbon dioxide flows in and out. Scientists found that more carbon is being stored than released, and much more is being stored in the soil than previously thought. The questions they would now like to answer are why the forest is storing carbon faster and faster over time, why the carbon is going into to soil, and how long it will continue to do so.

"The forests of the world are currently taking up 25 percent of all the carbon from burning fossil fuels, and we would very much like to know whether that's going to continue or whether it could turn around, and the forests put that back into the atmosphere."
In a Forest's Breath, Deciphering Climate Clues
by Dan Charles, NPR, All Things Considered, December 31, 2007

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