Undisturbed forests store more carbon than logging plantations to help fight global warming

(Photo of old growth eucalyptus tree from Flickr and photographer Tony from Sidney)

News Update 1: A new Australian study says natural forests, with their taller trees and larger canopies, store 60% more carbon than plantation, or industrial, forests. They also store more than the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimated in its 2007 report. Researchers at Australian National University found that in addition to growing larger, untouched trees grew older and stored carbon longer than trees cut down on a rotating basis. Biomass and soil store about 3 times as much carbon as that in the atmosphere, the report said, and 35% of the CO2 in the atmosphere came from past deforestation, while 18% of annual carbon emissions now are from deforestation. (Source: Reuters)