Planting Trees In Tropics May Provide Strongest Returns In Cooling Planet: Study

Planting trees in the tropics, rather than in higher latitudes, could be more rewarding in terms of cooling the planet, according to a new study on regional effects of afforestation.

- Press Trust Of India

Researchers, including those from the University of California Riverside, US, said that planting trees provides an overall positive effect for the world's climate by pulling out warming carbon from the atmosphere.

However, local effects on temperature not related to carbon varied significantly by region. For instance, trees at higher latitudes could have a slight heating effect, while the opposite is true in the tropics, they said.

“Our study found there is more cooling from planting trees in warm, wet regions, where they grow year-round. Tropical trees not only pull carbon dioxide from the air, they also cool while releasing water vapour,” first author James Gomez, a graduate student at the University of California Riverside, said.