January 25, 2009 by mike.

The possibility that global warming and climate change will not occur in a gradual and orderly manner is well known to folks who follow climate closely, but is less well-understood for folks who rely on NBC or NPR for their science.

This study indicates that slight warming is increasing the death rate of trees in the old growth forests of the west. As these trees die, they no longer breathe in and hold carbon dioxide and breathe out oxygen for us, their function as a carbon scrubbing life-form is over at that point. The long term consequence of less healthy forests spill over into habitat required for many animals, an ecosystem that functions as an amazing aquifer for much of the West and more.

I do wonder when we are going to wake up to the scale of this problem and start making the really large public policy changes to roll the greenhouse gas accumulation back into the range that is associated with a fairly stable and livable global climate. That range is probably 350 ppm and lower.

clipped from www.google.com Study: Western forests dying at increasing rate GRANTS PASS, Ore. (AP) — Trees in old growth forests across the West are dying at a small, but increasing rate that scientists conclude is probably caused by longer and hotter summers from a changing climate. Old growth forests, particularly those in the Northwest, store large amounts of carbon, making them a resource in combatting global warming, said Jerry Franklin, a professor of forest ecology at the University of Washington. But as trees die, they decompose and give off carbon dioxide, contributing to the amount of greenhouse gases. Young forests store very little carbon, and it takes hundreds of years to replace old growth, he said. “If it’s a gradual process, we may be fine,” said Mark E. Harmon, professor of forest ecology at Oregon State University. “If it is a real sudden process, it could be problematical.”

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