Lidar study suggests carbon storage losses greater than thought in Amazon due to losses at edge of forests

By Bob Yirka
Phys.org
October 1, 2020
Category: Forestry
Region: International

An international team of researchers has found that carbon sequestering losses in the Amazon basin have been undermeasured due to omission of data representing losses at the edges of forests. In their paper published in the journal Science Advances, the group describes using lidar to estimate the carbon sequestering abilities of trees along the edges of Amazon forests. Prior research has shown that when part of a forest in the Amazon basin is cut down, the trees that remain at the edges of the forest are not as robust as those that are situated farther in. This is because they are more exposed to pollution, pesticides, herbicides, etc. In this new effort, the researchers noticed that the reduced sequestering abilities of such trees are not included in studies of carbon sequestering losses in the Amazon basin when deforestation occurs. They suspected such losses are greater than previously thought…

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