Global Deforestation Demoed In Google Earth

eldavojohn writes "On Google's official blog, they claim a 'new technology prototype that enables online, global-scale observation and measurement of changes in the earth's forests.' Ars has more details on what Google unveiled at Copenhagen. If you have Google Earth installed, you can find a demonstration here. Many organizations and government agencies are on board with this initiative to put deforestation before the eyes of the public. If only satellite data of North America existed before the logging industry swept in!" It's interesting to contemplate the implications for intelligence gathering of Google's automated tools to compare satellite photos.

Comments

Trees

[arizwebfoot]

Interestingly, before the white man appeared in North America, there were an average of 8 trees per acre and now there are an average of 220 trees per acre in the US alone.

Just saying...

Re:Trees

[Tekfactory]

8 Trees per acres sounds about right for centuries old trees in pristine forest.

I have a quarter acre with 5, 30-40 year old maples on it, we also have 2 Japanese Cedars and a Cherry tree.

200 trees in an acre would be pretty closely spaced young trees, maybe like an orchard or nursery.

Now what we should be looking at is not how many trees we have per acre, but how many of those are young AND carbon absorbing trees, compared to carbon producing trees from decomposition. Forests have a carbon life cycle, and their balance shifts during that cycle, also some species of tree are better absrbers than others.

Re:Trees

[dkleinsc]

It's important to note that the North American forests were not "pristine" when the white folks showed up. The people who had lived there for a few thousand years had practiced some fairly sophisticated forest management. For instance, they would regularly clear undergrowth to make it easier to travel and hunt, and put significant effort into managing herd sizes. They also cleared some spaces for agriculture, which the Pilgrims in particular took advantage of when they went to set up their own colony.

Re:Trees

[piltdownman84]

[Citation needed]

Not the op, but the number I have is: Natural Density in California is 60 trees per acre, but it currently is at 273 per acre. From "Green House Gas Emissions From Four California Wildfires: Opportunities To Prevent and Reverse Environmental and Climate Impacts" (PDF)

North American Reforestation.

[tjstork]

The original poster wishes he could see North America before the logging industry swept in. Around 30-50 years ago, his intuition would have been rewarded. But, for the last decades, much of the United States has actually been reforested, rather than deforested. The reasons for this are complex and mixed, but some factors include the original mills going out of business in the Northeastern USA, adoption of better forestry practices, a reversion of farmland to homesites - which invariably means planting even more trees, and so on.

Indeed, Americans have been catching something of a break as they have planted so many trees that North America would be a net carbon sink, if they didn't also drive so many cars. This picture changes as all the new trees mature and their carbon uptake decreases. But, the important lesson here is that while Americans might be bad about CO2 emissions, they have, in their own way, also showed how areas can be reforested, that were once barren.

Re:North American Reforestation.

[IndustrialComplex]

Trees don't remove CO2 from the atmosphere in any permanant way.

If you go from 0 trees, to 1 tree that you replant every time the old one dies then you have removed 1 trees worth of carbon from the air as long as you keep a tree growing.

If you go from 0 trees to 1 tree that you harvest every time it is fully grown and use the wood in building a house or some other permanent structure and keep replanting that tree every 10-15 years then you are removing 1 tree's worth of carbon from the atmosphere every 10-15 years.

It is only if you plant a tree and let it die and decompose and plant no additional trees that your example holds.

Oregon

[fwarren]

We have more trees here in Oregon now than were here 100 years ago or even 200 years ago. (Unlike nature, we don't let forest fires burn them down.)

We plant them all over the place and take care of them. Every time we cut one tree down, we plant 3 to 10 more of them.

We really are not deforested to the west of the Mississippi. Now east of the Mississippi is a different story. But no one is talking about deforestation on the east coast. They only talk about it out west where we have plenty of trees to go around.

School kids went out 30 years ago on filed trips here in Oregon to plant trees. Why? As a reminder that most of the income in this state came from logging, and that timber was a renewable resource. If we plant trees today, then in 20 years when you are old enough to work a timber job, there will be plenty of trees to cut down.

I live in a county that has been devastated by the loss of 80% of the logging industry. We have as many trees now as we had 30 years ago. The only difference is we have 15% unemployment and we can't cut and replant trees to actually make a living.

Earth first -- we will log the rest of the planets later

Re:Oregon

[geekoid]

"The only difference is we have 15% unemployment and we can't cut and replant trees to actually make a living"

what does that mean?

Also, forest fires don't burn down forests.

"Every time we cut one tree down, we plant 3 to 10 more of them."

Cite needed.

"They only talk about it out west where we have plenty of trees to go around."
there is a reason for that, it's called 'shifting baseline'. Basically it mean that people who grow up where there aren't trees have no reference to go by to realize there should be trees.

In Oregon people cans ee the fantastic forests, and when they start to diminish they say something.

Careful citing logging industry stats, they ahve a tendency to be massively incorrect.

For example, According to the Labor dept.there are only about 8000 worker in the logging industry, but they would have you believe there are 100K +.

Re:You might not be as right as you think

[Rei]

Can you explain the massive deforestation evident from satellite imagery in South America? Huge swaths of land that used to be rainforest are now used for grazing cattle and soybean/palm oil farms.

The satellite deforestation record doesn't completely match up with the surface deforestation record, so both of them are suspect. Plus, ten years ago, a scientist made an error on a non-peer-reviewed graph that was later used as the cover of a report on deforestation.