Undisturbed tropical forests are absorbing nearly one-fifth of the CO2 released by burning fossil fuels, a new study has found. Trees in undisturbed tropical forests are soaking up more CO2 than people realized.

The scientific report published in “Nature” magazine suggests that the world’s remaining tropical forests remove 4.8 billion tons of CO2 emissions from the atmosphere each year. This includes a previously unknown carbon sink in Africa, which annually absorbs 1.2 billion tons of CO2.

The study was based on taken data on African tropical forests from the past 40 years and has shown that for at least the past few decades each hectare of intact African forest has trapped an extra 0.6 tonnes of carbon per year.

The scientists then analyzed the new African data together with South American and Asian findings to assess the total sink in tropical forests. Analysis of these 250,000 tree records reveals that, on average, remaining undisturbed forests are trapping carbon, showing that they are a globally significant carbon sink.

“We are receiving a free subsidy from nature,” said Dr. Simon Lewis from the University of Leeds, and the lead author of the paper, in a press statement.

“Tropical forest trees are absorbing about 18 percent of the CO2 added to the atmosphere each year from burning fossil fuels, substantially buffering the rate of climate change.”

– (CNN)
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Wow! Where would we be without humanity’s best, brightest and most “educated”…oh, right where we are now, in crisis! When will they give “Nature” her full credit for being the intelligence sponsoring their bullshit? Maybe they’ll get the point when movies like “The Happening”, start to happen?