New methods detect twice as much logging as previously estimated
Brazil's Amazon rain forest - one of the most biologically productive regions on the planet - is disappearing twice as fast as scientists previously estimated.
That is the stark conclusion ecologist Gregory Asner and his colleagues reached after developing a new way to analyze satellite images to track logging there.
The team traces the additional loss to selective logging, which some environmental groups say is occurring illegally. The technique removes trees piecemeal from a forest, rather than carving large swaths. This has made it easier to hide. This project is the first time satellites have been used to track selective logging. [Editor's note: The original version identified selective logging as illegal. Not all groups agree that the practice always occurs illegally.]
For the region, this activity increases the forest's vulnerability to wildfires and undermines its biological productivity. Selective logging in the region releases nearly 100 million tons of additional carbon dioxide into the atmosphere each year.
Read more -here-
Humm....so it contributes to global warming......
The good news is that if you hurry and get in on Halburton stock....oxygen might not be as expensive to buy in 10 years...
Satellite images reveal Amazon forest shrinking faster
Well we can't blame it all on Brasils rain forest. Im sure we have someplace somewhere in our country that we could duplicate that environment and replace what they take away if we really wanted to.
Pie
Pie
SG Pimp Name : *Treacherous P. Shizzle*
*
The fight for our way of life needs to be fought on our own soil, for our own people and because of our own interests.
*
Hey, If Me & My Buddies Were Making Billions of Dollars I'd Tell Ya What Ya Wanted To Hear Too!
*
The fight for our way of life needs to be fought on our own soil, for our own people and because of our own interests.
*
Hey, If Me & My Buddies Were Making Billions of Dollars I'd Tell Ya What Ya Wanted To Hear Too!
True, but you best not be expecting to be getting our wood much longer if America refuse to honor NAFTA.De Plano wrote:I bet the forests in Canada are still being cut at a faster rate than Brazil. We just get more of the wood from Canada and the forest is a lot less diverse
They also have photos showing the ice caps up north melting a lot faster then expected too. The next 30 to 50 years should be an interesting one enviromentally. Especially with countries ignoring or flat out doing nothing about Global Warming. Canada for one talks a lot about cleaning polluting less and trying to clean up the enviroment to go along with the goals of Kyoto, but so far it has only been talk. We are one of the worest pollutant offenders out there. I think we are ranked 14th now and used be ranked 3rd cleanest. Right below us is America.
"There is a big difference between breaking the law and having a law designed to break you. We will not be broken." -- Jinny Simms
"On the street everything is legal! I don't believe in an eye for an eye, I believe in 2 eyes for an eye." -- Bas Rutten
"On the street everything is legal! I don't believe in an eye for an eye, I believe in 2 eyes for an eye." -- Bas Rutten
De Plano i'll try to explain the conflict there:
Our planet constantly recieves radiated energy from the sun. Our atmosphere (and the gases that compose it) is largely transparent to visible light in the form of photons. This energy is expressed as light, but also heats the planet. Through the process of radiation the planet usually reflects some of that heat back into space. The gases that cattle and humans expel (largely carbon dioxide and methane) prevent this energy from leaving our atmosphere. So basically, we prevent the heat we absorb from the sun from leaving, resulting in a warming of the atmosphere.
What I should point out is that this process is necessary to prevent Earth from cooling too rapidly into another Ice Age.. what we are doing right now is adding to the natural process and raising global atmospheric temperature.
The problem with the research finding global warming to be a farce is that it only examines certain factors like mean global temperature, ice depth, and ocean levels. They argue that these levels have been there in the past. The problem lies in that they do not admit that we are in a trend of noticable temperature increase year by year.
So, there is good news: Scientists underestimated the amount of CO2 aborbed by carbon sinks in our atmosphere.. so the CO2 damage is not as bad as suspected. The problem with the Amazon is really more that we are losing species there like nowhere else. There are over 300 species per square kilometer in that region, more than we have in all of Canada. Monocultural forest like we have here is something that was very common in the Devonian Period, prior to dinosaurs and is actually less evolved. The loss of these amazon species is so harmful because there is more diversity represented there than on the rest of the earth combined. We might be destroying natural antibiotics, and disease cures that would be truly helpful every day.
My take: Global warming is happening, and it matters - but lets focus on its real sources (peat bog burning in Indonesia, cattle industry and cars) rather than one logging area. Despite the tendency to make this problem into a global warming problem too few people realize that if we destry the rain forest we are destroying the world's most diverse and arguably most evolved biome. If people don't wake up and start worrying about that instead of global warming i'm worried we may lose far more than our coastal cities.
/rant
Our planet constantly recieves radiated energy from the sun. Our atmosphere (and the gases that compose it) is largely transparent to visible light in the form of photons. This energy is expressed as light, but also heats the planet. Through the process of radiation the planet usually reflects some of that heat back into space. The gases that cattle and humans expel (largely carbon dioxide and methane) prevent this energy from leaving our atmosphere. So basically, we prevent the heat we absorb from the sun from leaving, resulting in a warming of the atmosphere.
What I should point out is that this process is necessary to prevent Earth from cooling too rapidly into another Ice Age.. what we are doing right now is adding to the natural process and raising global atmospheric temperature.
The problem with the research finding global warming to be a farce is that it only examines certain factors like mean global temperature, ice depth, and ocean levels. They argue that these levels have been there in the past. The problem lies in that they do not admit that we are in a trend of noticable temperature increase year by year.
So, there is good news: Scientists underestimated the amount of CO2 aborbed by carbon sinks in our atmosphere.. so the CO2 damage is not as bad as suspected. The problem with the Amazon is really more that we are losing species there like nowhere else. There are over 300 species per square kilometer in that region, more than we have in all of Canada. Monocultural forest like we have here is something that was very common in the Devonian Period, prior to dinosaurs and is actually less evolved. The loss of these amazon species is so harmful because there is more diversity represented there than on the rest of the earth combined. We might be destroying natural antibiotics, and disease cures that would be truly helpful every day.
My take: Global warming is happening, and it matters - but lets focus on its real sources (peat bog burning in Indonesia, cattle industry and cars) rather than one logging area. Despite the tendency to make this problem into a global warming problem too few people realize that if we destry the rain forest we are destroying the world's most diverse and arguably most evolved biome. If people don't wake up and start worrying about that instead of global warming i'm worried we may lose far more than our coastal cities.
/rant
-
YARDofSTUF
- Posts: 70006
- Joined: Sat Nov 11, 2000 12:00 am
- Location: USA
-
aeonblue11
- Member
- Posts: 43
- Joined: Sat Jun 04, 2005 2:15 am
*cho* wrote:True, but you best not be expecting to be getting our wood much longer if America refuse to honor NAFTA.
Stop that. The US and Canada are not going to stop trading because of NAFTA or the WTO. It would hurt the US economy, no doubt about it. It would absolutely destroy the Canadian economy. No doubt about that either.
You need to remember that the US buys about 85% of Canada's exports.
Canada, by comparison, buys about 23% of US exports.
You don't really want to push the issue, since if we were being insistent about trading parity your entire economy would collapse. I'm not trying to cause a fight, but these are the numbers, and Canada enjoys a large trade surplus with the US regardless of soft lumber tarriffs. The value of the soft lumber tarriffs is miniscule compared to the amount of money it would cost the Canadians to "cut off" trade with the US. You would be committing economic hari-kiri over an economic splinter under you fingernail. Protecting that surplus is vital to Canadian national interests. Therefore, irregardless of political posturing, the real power (ie the money) in Canada isn't going to let their politicians get really silly about it.
Regards,
-Bouncer-
Bouncer wrote:Stop that. The US and Canada are not going to stop trading because of NAFTA or the WTO. It would hurt the US economy, no doubt about it. It would absolutely destroy the Canadian economy. No doubt about that either.
You need to remember that the US buys about 85% of Canada's exports.
Canada, by comparison, buys about 23% of US exports.
You don't really want to push the issue, since if we were being insistent about trading parity your entire economy would collapse. I'm not trying to cause a fight, but these are the numbers, and Canada enjoys a large trade surplus with the US regardless of soft lumber tarriffs. The value of the soft lumber tarriffs is miniscule compared to the amount of money it would cost the Canadians to "cut off" trade with the US. You would be committing economic hari-kiri over an economic splinter under you fingernail. Protecting that surplus is vital to Canadian national interests. Therefore, irregardless of political posturing, the real power (ie the money) in Canada isn't going to let their politicians get really silly about it.
Regards,
-Bouncer-
I have no problem pushing it. Softwood lumber industry is a very important industry for BC. I don't think our entire economy would fail. It would be hurt for sure but we could find others to trade with. I personally do hope we link our soft wood lumber with our energy. I'm tired of Canada having to wait for rulings handed down by NAFTA and other organizations just to be ignore by the American government.
It will be interesting to see what happesn, but then again Martin in the end won't do a damn thing to help BC. Why would he, we have no impact on politics, only Ontario and Quebec do.
Besides America's biggest trading partner is now China. If Canada was smart we would start finding others to trade with too, so we wouldn't be pushed around as much.
"There is a big difference between breaking the law and having a law designed to break you. We will not be broken." -- Jinny Simms
"On the street everything is legal! I don't believe in an eye for an eye, I believe in 2 eyes for an eye." -- Bas Rutten
"On the street everything is legal! I don't believe in an eye for an eye, I believe in 2 eyes for an eye." -- Bas Rutten
-
ub3r_n00b
- Posts: 2086
- Joined: Sun Feb 16, 2003 6:31 pm
- Location: Rivendel, East of The Ford of Bruinen
De Plano wrote:I bet the forests in Canada are still being cut at a faster rate than Brazil. We just get more of the wood from Canada and the forest is a lot less diverse
Yeah they are. But guess what? We plant 2 trees for every tree we cut down. The reason why trees is being cut down in Canada is mainly for the production of various wood products, plywood and all that. The reason why trees are being cut down in the Amazon is somewhat different. Most of it is being clearcutted for companies like McDonalds so that they can erect massive farms for cattle.
This is freaking serious. Global Warming is no joke - it is happening. Anyone who tells you different is paid by a forestry company of some kind.
YOS - you are right. It will all balance out. Unfortuneately the cost is going to be the lives of the human race.
We can do something to make a difference, this epidemic is preventable. I am already suffering from the choices of my predecessors - do not let your next of kin suffer from your own ignorance as well.
Kyoto was rejected because the US has too much interest in its industrialization and mega corporations to care about the rest of the worlds health and future. When the corporations basically run the economy I can see why they rejected it - still doesn't mean we have to suffer for it.
Preet