carbon footprint

[Tom L]

my neighbor, who went to college and spent 20 yrs as a landscaper, knows quite a bit about trees and grass, plants ect.
according to him (not sure if he is right, but I will take his word on it) a 6ft x 6 ft chunk of grass, or a medium size tree will take enough CO2 out of the air to satisfy
a normal persons carbon footprint on a yearly basis. car exhaust, grill, breathing, ect.

found that pretty interesting , that such a small area of green grass would convert that much into oxygen.
makes you wonder about all the environmental talk of carbon footprints ect.

[Kansas]

I did a little checking, and I think those numbers are way low. One acre of forest ground supposedly negates 18 people's carbon footprint. There should be more than 18 trees in an acre of forest. And I think that is the worldwide footprint, not the USA, which is close to three times that.

Without getting into a carbon argument, I do know this. They are wanting to  put in a coal fired power plant in extreme southwest Kansas. Its been a long term thing for them to get all the licenses and permission to put it in.I sit on an advisory board for the Kansas Forest Service. I remember a couple of years ago they talked about the power company buying a whole bunch of seedlings to offset the carbon. Think they were just going to give them away. Been too long to remember all the details, but I know it would have been good for the KFS, being they have a greenhouse for pine and ERC, plus arrange hardwood seedlings to be sold from other suppliers, plus packages for wildlife. It kind of looks like the plant will go in, although a smaller version than they originally wanted. Wish I could remember the number of seedlings, but it was a heck of a bunch of them. If I remember right, a lot would have gone to towns and cities.

[mesquite buckeye]

CO2 makes plants, including trees grow faster and yield more.

[Cedarman]

Kansas, does it make a lot of sense to plant more cedar in Kansas so the cedar cutters can be paid to cut it down, push it up, and then light a match?

[SwampDonkey]

It does if the government is involved in any way.

[Kansas]

Kansas, does it make a lot of sense to plant more cedar in Kansas so the cedar cutters can be paid to cut it down, push it up, and then light a match?

It never has made much sense to me to sell pines and ERC in Kansas. The pines eventually all get infected and die. And of course you know what ERC do. Guess its a throwback to the days of shelterbelts being promoted.

[Brucer]

Remember, the carbon has to go somewhere. Here's the math.

A few years back I read a report that said the average Canadian household generated 5 metric tons of CO2 each year. I have no idea if that's reasonable or not. Substitute your own number if you have a different one.

5 tonnes = 11,000 pounds.

The carbon content of CO2 is 12/44, so there would be 3000 pounds of carbon in the average household's emissions (11,000 x 12 / 44 = 3000).

Assume all the carbon processed by the green plants is used to make cellulose. The carbon content of cellulose is 72/162. In other words 72 pounds of carbon would make 162 pounds of cellulose. The rest of the weight comes from hydrogen and oxygen. That means 3000 pounds of carbon is going to give you 6750 pounds of cellulose, which would be dry wood. Throw in 50% for moisture on top of that and you get about 10,000 pounds per year of green wood.

Of course, a tree is made up of more than just cellulose. However, the other hydrocarbons found in wood -- starches and sugars -- have a similar carbon content.

Remember, I'm just ballparking the numbers. It looks like 11,000 pound of CO2 emissions would be offset by roughly the same amount of tree growth. Is that a reasonable number for a "medium sized tree?"

[mesquite buckeye]

Biggest removal of CO2 is by formation of limestone.

Biggest source of CO2 is vulcanism.