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Scientists Discover Link Between Trees and Electricity
An anonymous reader writes "Everyone knows trees give us all oxygen so we can breathe, but according to Australian scientists, they also affect the concentration of positive and negative ions in the air. A team from the Queensland University of Technology's International Laboratory for Air Quality and Health ran experiments in six locations all over Brisbane and found that positive and negative ion concentrations in the air were two times higher in heavily wooded areas than in open grassy areas, such as parks."
Shocking!
The planet is one giant brain!
Static electricity occurs when one thing rubs against another thing. Trees have a lot more surface area for the wind to rub against than empty fields.
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This has been known for a very long time and it's very much common knowledge. Ambient negative ion levels can even be obtained through weather services in my country. My Daikin air conditioner even claims to keep ambient ion levels at "lush forest" levels and it's not near new. Just do a google search for "forest negative ion" and you'll find tons of products and articles on the subject. Why is this at all news?
"Trees act as radon pumps, bringing the gas to the surface and releasing it to the atmosphere through transpiration - a process where water absorbed by the root system is evaporated into the atmosphere from leaves. This is especially prevalent for trees with deep root systems, such as eucalypts."
The QUT scientists estimated that, in a eucalyptus forest, trees may account for up to 37 per cent of the radon in the air when transpiration rates were highest.
So... If I go into the forest, I'm more likely to be breathing radon, and at greater concentrations? Um... I do like the trees, but from this I'm not sure the feeling is mutual...
http://www.livescience.com/5711-electricity-harvested-trees.html
Trees actually produce a small current when a nail is inserted into them and connected to a ground. It is not via the same mechanism as a battery.
I think he exaggerated a bit. But most of the non-protected forests are replanted fast growing pine monocultures, not healthy natural forests.
Maybe you should keep your eyes on the road.
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Trees aren't equal. Fast-growing trees drain nutrients but absorb little CO2, for example. Very damaging to the environment, if planted in excess - which is why it is common in the US. Plantations are also not "woods" in any meaningful sense - woods aren't just trees, but complex ecosystems that include wildflowers, fungi, etc. Real woods don't generally have massive wildfires, those are almost invariably the consequence of plantations or excessively-managed areas. Not always, true, but natural forests with natural clearings and natural recycling of raw materials will tend to utilize forest fires to sweep out excessive trash and allow seedlings to grow -- this is obviously not possible when the heat destroys even the fire-resistant seed pods/cones and topsoil.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
Ions (charged particles) are not all related to radiation.
Then why are alpha, beta, and gamma radiation called "ionizing"? Alpha is a positive helium ion, and beta is an electron.
Note the phrasing: "not all", implying that some are, and some are not. An ion is a charged particle, a waterfall produces additional ions in the air without the involvement of radon or other ionizing radiation.
something i noticed while looking for some land to buy, the only trees the usa has left in any large areas is in national and state parks.
That's not entirely true. I live in Maine. Indeed, it was pretty much clear cut a century ago. At that time, it was only about 20% forested. We simply cleared much of the land in order to farm. Over the last 100 years, we have moved away from agriculture and the state is now about 90% forested. Very little land here is actually in the hands of the feds or the state. In fact, about 2/3 of the land area is owned as large parcels (millions of acres) by private timber companies.
Many other parts of the country have similar stories. Trees were clear cut a century ago. As areas moved away from an agricultural economy, reforestation occurred. A great deal of the land in the central part of the US, which is now used for agriculture, has not been heavily forested in centuries. The trees weren't cut down -- there just weren't many to begin with.
Trees aren't equal. Fast-growing trees drain nutrients but absorb little CO2,
Citation needed.
1) One would think a fast growing tree would have to absorb CO2 (and nutrients) in order to build all that cellulose quickly.
2) If that tree is subsequently harvested (and a new one replanted) and converted into timber, or paper that ends up in archives or landfills it means more CO2 locked up for years (yes paper manufacturing is normally environmentally unfriendly but it doesn't have to be so)
http://www.fia.fs.fed.us/library/briefings-summaries-overviews/docs/ForestFacts.pdf
"It is estimated that—at the beginning of European settlement—
in 1630 the area of forest land that would become
the United States was 1,045 million acres or about 46
percent of the total land area. By 1907, the area of forest
land had declined to an estimated 759 million acres or
34 percent of the total land area. Forest area has been relatively
stable since 1907. In 1997, 747 million acres—or
33 percent of the total land area of the United States—
was in forest land. Today’s forest land area amounts to
about 70 percent of the area that was forested in 1630.
Since 1630, about 297 million acres of forest land have
been converted to other uses—mainly agricultural. More
than 75 percent of the net conversion to other uses
occurred in the 19th century."
And it does go on to describe the kinds of differences - one of which you mention - between historical and contemporary forest composition.
46 & 2
We bought 160 acres of densely forested land a while back. The only part not wooded were a few acres at the front that had been used as farmland. One summer we rented a tree planter, pulled it behind a tractor and in a matter of 3 days planted 70,000 trees. (they're really cheap when you buy them in that volume) We also raised turkeys and released them into the wild (illegally) and brought the wild turkey back to the county in question over a period of 10 years or so. As we put out more and more broods the neighbors started getting involved. Some of our neighbors started gathering roadkill and leaving them in piles in strategically placed areas with pre-made nesting boxes... now we have bald eagles. I'm not sure where the bears and cougars came from but I'm sure there are similar stories involving them that I don't know about. The simple fact is, as a child growing up in the 70's, there were NO big game animals in that area besides deer. There were a few grouse and pheasant but that was about it. Now the countryside is so rife with wildlife we're starting to have problems with Car+bear accidents. It's an amazing change. If there's one thing the USA has got going for it, it's the return of the wilderness.
> Everyone knows that trees give us all oxygen so we can breathe
I certainly don't know any such thing. In fact I thought forests were net zero oxygen because when trees die the decay of the tree consumes as much oxygen as the tree produced during its life. Not to mention that of course at night the tree is burning the sugars it made during the day by photosynthesis.
Plankton is where there is a possible net oxygen increase because when they go dead they can sink, and when that happens they don't decay.
You don't know what you're talking about. Trees are good as habitat, and for erosion... but CO2? The vast, vast majority of CO2 absorbed is done so by algae in the oceans. Trees are barely a blip. Pines grow fast and burn easily which enriches the soil. Clearly you dont live anywhere where there's a forest but when you do... there are fires. The pines burn quickly. The oaks survive... the pines leave ash which makes the soil less acidic and acts as fertilizer. Most pinecones only open when heated by fire... that's evolution for you. The phoenix trees.
How does that happen? Why do people stop using their land for farming? Do they just keep it to have a nice place to spend a weekend? Or is the land so cheap that they don't actually worry about paying property taxes?
I can't speak for the midwest but in New England there were once a lot of fairly small farms. If a house comes with an additional 5-50 acres of property, at $1000 an acre for rural land, it may not add a great deal to the cost of the house. If it's wetland, and therefore difficult to develop or harvest timber from, around here it might go for $500 an acre. Many people with a few tens of acres in this area are engaged in small scale timber harvesting so having the extra land isn't necessarily a financial burden.
As far as taxes, some people will place "the back 40" in to tree growth. State law here allows a landowner to develop a timber harvest plan and get a significant reduction on property tax. In unincorporated parts of the state, I've heard this amounts to $1/acre per year in total tax. I don't know how much of a tax rebate individuals get inside an incorporated town but it is very significant. A number of communities have been complaining about the state mandated tax abatement program and urging reforms because of abuse. For example, owners of waterfront property have been known to place the land into tree growth even though they couldn't possibly harvest the timber due it's close proximity to water -- environmental laws. Of course, this is some of the more expensive property as well.
When I lived outside Seattle I heard of tax abatement programs for landowners who use their property for agricultural uses. Some of the requirements were pretty minimal. We had neighbors who stabled horses or bread a horse per year specifically so they could receive abatements which were only available for land used for agriculture. Property taxes were quite high there so I can certainly see the appeal of working the system.
Well, it is not immediately clear from the GP, but the draining/absorbing comes from different sources. While CO2 absorbtion is mostly from the air (which is why plants can grow bit in pots with little change to the soil), the nutrients are generally taken from the ground, thus "draining" it, in the absence of fertilizer or some other way to return nutrients to the ground. Most notable of these nutrients, and what is usually the limiting factor, is nitrogen (specifically, nitrates). Some trees actually leave the soil with more nitrogen, however, due to having a symbiotic relationship with nitrogen-fixing bacteria that lives in their roots, but these trees are in general not the fast-growing varieties grown in forestry. See Wikipedia for some details.
As for the actual CO2 absorbtion rates, I would imagine that while fast-growing varieties probably absorb CO2 faster, on the whole, there is the whole density thing to consider.
I'm working on my Master Gardener certification. And I can tell you that EVERY element trees absorb or expel is ionized. Trees don't interact with anything but anions and cations. So there's that! Nothing a $250 course in plants wouldn't have taught you!
"Stratigraphically the origin of agriculture and thermonuclear destruction will appear essentially simultaneous" -- Lee
The pines burn quickly. The oaks survive...
Where do you live? In Florida, it's the pines that are fire adapted and the oaks that burn. If a fire is hot enough / the pines are small enough, the pines die too, but pre-European settlement, Florida had vast old-growth pine forest which experienced natural (lightning ignited) fires every few years.
Today, the oaks don't burn either because they live in damp bottomlands that don't burn easily due to moisture content, or because fires in oak forest are actively suppressed. Many pine forests in Florida today are managed with periodic prescribed (intentional) burning, which kills the oak scrub.
The problem is not the number of trees, but the types. Once the clear cutting began, the trees that grew back were of one or two varieties, not the multiple varieties that used to exist.
Further, many of the replantings that take place now are for the forest industry (i.e. pine) and not oaks, ash, chestnut, etc that used to exist.
Certainly we had the blights which took their toll, but the diversity which used to exist no longer does in the vast majority of areas.
Think McDonalds on every corner rather than Bob's Bugers, Carol's Cakes, or Fred the Fishmonger.
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