9 results for tag: Climate Change

Like a voice in the wilderness

ROSSLYN BEEBY 17 Sep, 2011 12:00 AM http://www.canberratimes.com.au/news/opinion/editorial/general/like-a-voice-in-the-wilderness/2295146.aspx?storypage=0# 'Life on earth is inconceivable without trees,'' the great Russian playwright Anton Chekov wrote in a letter to a friend in the late 1880s. ''Forests create climate, climate influences peoples' character, and so on and so forth. There can be neither civilisation nor happiness if forests crash down under the axe.'' And in the first act of Uncle Vanya, there's an environmental monologue, in which the country doctor Mikhail Astrov passionately rails against the destruction of Russia's forests ...

Forest logging a big carbon culprit

Ben Cubby May 24, 2011 http://www.theage.com.au/environment/conservation/forest-logging-a-big-carbon-culprit-20110523-1f0vv.html STOPPING logging in old-growth forests, particularly in southern Australia, is one of the best ways of making timely cuts to Australia's greenhouse gas emissions, according to the Climate Commission's first report. Established forests store much more carbon dioxide than plantations, so cutting them down releases more heat-trapping gases, it concluded. ''In general, forests with high carbon storage capacities are those in relatively cool, moist climates that have fast growth coupled with low decomposition rates, and ...

How to make money from trees without cutting them down

Paddy Manning. April 23, 2011 http://www.theage.com.au/business/how-to-make-money-from-trees-without-cutting-them-down-20110422-1drho.html REDD Forests, a little company 20 per cent owned by Kathmandu founder Jan Cameron, is proving that threatened native forest in Tasmania can have more value standing than if it was logged, by generating carbon credits. Next week, the first 55,549 verified carbon units approved in this country - each representing a tonne of greenhouse gas emissions saved - will pop up on a register maintained by the Washington-based Verified Carbon Standard. The units would be worth about $700,000 at current market prices of ...

Forest logging a big carbon culprit

Ben Cubby May 24, 2011 http://www.theage.com.au/environment/conservation/forest-logging-a-big-carbon-culprit-20110523-1f0vv.html STOPPING logging in old-growth forests, particularly in southern Australia, is one of the best ways of making timely cuts to Australia's greenhouse gas emissions, according to the Climate Commission's first report. Established forests store much more carbon dioxide than plantations, so cutting them down releases more heat-trapping gases, it concluded. ''In general, forests with high carbon storage capacities are those in relatively cool, moist climates that have fast growth coupled with low decomposition rates, and ...

Industrial logging linked to frequency and severity of fire

5 March 2010 - Reporter: Gregg Borschmann http://www.abc.net.au/rn/breakfast/stories/2010/2837143.htm One year on from the Black Saturday fires in Victoria, many Australians, and the Bushfires Royal Commission, are still trying to explain the ferocity of the blaze that claimed 173 lives and burned more than 450,000 hectares. The idea that the Australian bush burns the way it always has is being challenged by David Lindemayer, a professor of forest and wildlife management at the Australian National University. Lindenmayer has been working in the Victorian forests for almost 30 years, and he says the latest research indicates that logging a forest ...

Forest logging creates fire traps: academic

4/03/2010   http://www.industrysearch.com.au/Features/Forest-logging-creates-fire-traps-academic-4857     Decades of industrial logging in Australia's wet forests have made them more fire prone, raising urgent fire management issues, according to an ANU academic. - Martyn Pearce, ANU Media Professor David Lindenmayer of the Fenner School of Environment and Society challenges current fire protection practices in the March issue of Australasian Science magazine. "Much discussion focuses on how to best protect human lives and built assets," Professor Lindenmayer writes. "But management also needs to counter the effects of past forestry ...

Preserving old-growth forests is vital to saving the planet

Gavan McFadzean - June 22, 2009 http://www.theage.com.au/opinion/preserving-oldgrowth-forests-is-vital-to-saving-the-planet-20090621-cshx.html SO WHERE are the world's most carbon-rich forests? Not the tropical rainforests of the Amazon, Borneo or Africa's Congo Basin, according to research by the Australian National University. They are the tall, old-growth mountain ash forests of Victoria's Central Highlands — a 90-minute drive east of Melbourne. The researchers studied 132 forests from around the world to discover the regions that stored the most carbon. Their findings, published in the US-based Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, ...

Forests to the rescue on climate

Matthew Franklin and Siobhain Ryan - The Australian, September 04, 2008 http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,,24290893-11949,00.html KEVIN Rudd will be asked to dramatically lift Australia's reserves of natural forests and grasslands as part of its climate change solution in a bid to ease emissions cuts on industry as part of the transition to a low-carbon economy. The Prime Minister's climate change adviser, Ross Garnaut, yesterday urged Australia to lift its focus on retaining natural forests and grasslands in northern Australia as part of its climate change response. The Australian understands the concept of boosting biosequestration has ...

Green Carbon Report

Click here to view the Green Carbon Report, published in 2008.