If Peugeot plants a tree in the forest, will it offset the CO2 in the atmosphere?
Six years on, French automaker Peugeot is finally seeing one of its environmental initiatives bear fruit... so to speak.
The manufacturer actually began a forestry project back in 1999 by embarking on a plan to build a living 'carbon sink,' in the form of two million trees. Six years on, Peugeot's Fazenda São Nicolau forest (in the Brazilian state of Mato Grosso) is coming of age and is now able to remove carbon from the atmosphere.
When it undertook the plan, Peugeot actually started out by figuring out how much C02 its vehicles produce, then it picked a commensurate number of trees to plant in an effort to level the environmental scales.
According to new analysis, the forest has already zeroed out some 55,000 tons of CO2.
[Source: MotorTorque via AskaPrice.com]
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Howard Kerr 3:17PM (4/17/2006)
I give up, what does an electric slot car, on a track made to look like a winter road rally, have to do with reducing CO2 gas?
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Erik 3:18PM (4/17/2006)
That is awesome! Major kudos, Peugeot! They should be bragging about this. Now if only trees removed CO and HCs as well...
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Zippo 3:33PM (4/17/2006)
All I can say that if GM built a forest to offset the pollution its big SUV's make... It would be one ginormous forest. But honestly more manufacturers should do the same and plant some trees.
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wbsiii 3:34PM (4/17/2006)
and they also succeeded in drastically increasing the methane in the atmosphere produced by those 2 million growing trees, which is 24 times the greenhouse gas that CO2 is (see Nature Jan. 2006).
i wonder how long until they realize that cutting them all down will be better for the environment?? : ]
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Chester 4:00PM (4/17/2006)
It's worth noting that the Nature paper #4 mentions (http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v439/n7073/abs/nature04420.html) cannot explain the mechanism by which this happens (though there is some speculation regarding ligins.) Nothing against #4 - the sarcasm is clear enough - but I just don't want other people jumping on this when the whole picture isn't known yet. Regardless, it is a really interesting finding...
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Chris 4:12PM (4/17/2006)
To answer the title of this post, YES. Carbon offsets are going to play a big roll in the coming years as countries strive to meet their quotas.
And #4,you're not 100% right. The data from Keppler et. al. in the Nature 12 Jan 2006 article does document that trees (and all plants) are sources of methane. The data, while preliminary, suggests a significant portion of global methane comes from plants (at a reported 23 times greater impact on global warming). Many media sources picked up on this article to denounce the value of carbon offsets, much to the dismay of Keppler and the others - they are referenced in several newer articles voicing their displeasure at this interpretation of their findings. And others still are using the findings of Keppler and his collegues to show that even though planting more trees does result in increased methane emissions, there is still a very sizable reduction in global warming agents by carbon offsets.
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Bob_Ericson 5:32PM (4/17/2006)
They're just pushing off the carbon until a later time. What happens when the forest burns? (it will) Or when a tree dies and it's carbon is consumed by insects? (it will)
You can shuffle a little here and there but unless you're gonna bottle it back into the ground from whence it came, you're killing the planet.
(IF you actually buy that crap)
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Nick 7:30PM (4/17/2006)
Bob_Ericson,
They're talking about carbon dioxide offsets, not carbon offsets. Plants inhale carbon dioxide and exhale oxygen, as a byproduct of photosynthesis, and they do return carbon to the ground when they are eaten and pooped out. This is a good plan and idea.
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jb 12:29AM (4/18/2006)
Okay so that takes care of the old lady in my neighborhood who still drives her stinking (and loud[and actually kind of minty]) 504 diesel wagon by my house everyday.
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VW-Guy 8:51AM (4/18/2006)
No matter how you look at it, more trees are a GOOD IDEA! I can't believe anyone would think otherwise.
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Barry K. Nathan 2:21AM (4/19/2006)
According to this article, it seems that the CO2 reductions from trees outweigh the methane production:
http://www.scienceagogo.com/news/20060018205918data_trunc_sys.shtml
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Barry K. Nathan 2:26AM (4/19/2006)
(I ran into problems trying to post this the first two times. I hope this doesn't show up 2 or 3 times. If my comment doesn't go through this time, I give up...)
According to this article, it seems that the CO2 reductions from trees outweigh the methane production:
http://www.scienceagogo.com/news/20060018205918data_trunc_sys.shtml
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