Untouched forests store 3 times more carbon

SYDNEY, Aug 5 (Reuters) - Untouched natural forests store three times more carbon dioxide than previously estimated and 60 percent more than plantation forests, said a new Australian study of "green carbon" and its role in climate change.

Green carbon occurs in natural forests, brown carbon is found in industrialised forests or plantations, grey carbon in fossil fuels and blue carbon in oceans.

Australian National University (ANU) scientists said that the role of untouched forests, and their biomass of green carbon, had been underestimated in the fight against global warming.

The scientists said the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the Kyoto Protocol did not distinguish between the carbon capacity of plantation forests and untouched forests.

Yet untouched forests can carry three times the carbon presently estimated, if their biomass of carbon stock was included, said the ANU report released on Tuesday.

Currently, forest carbon storage capacity is based on plantation forest estimates.

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Reading, writing, tree planting

STUDENTS would plant trees during school hours to combat climate change under a plan being advocated by Australia's chief scientist.
Jim Peacock wants to conscript an army of "Carbon Kids", arguing tree planting would "enrich a national curriculum".

Dr Peacock also wants the government to pay indigenous communities to revegetate land to provide economic opportunities.

He plans to lobby Indigenous Affairs Minister and Education Minister Julia Gillard about his blueprint.

"The total amount of forest that children can plant is very small but they can be associated with larger scale things . . so that children will be able to feel part of something much larger and they can see change," Dr Peacock said.

"It's got to be part of what children learn about now, in the past it hasn't been. I've been quite shocked that it hasn't been part of the curriculum.

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