Forest Preservation, Tree Planting Could Actually Worsen Climate Change

CLIMATEWIRE | Carbon markets that fund forest preservation and tree-planting might actually be worsening climate change by increasing risks for wildfires that emit massive levels of greenhouse gases, a new United Nations-affiliated report says.

Forests have been seen as one of the most effective places to counter climate change by absorbing carbon emissions. But that’s changed, says a May paper from the United Nations University Institute for Water, Environment and Health (UNU-INWEH), an academic arm of the international U.N.

In the past decade, wildfires of record-breaking size have erupted in places such as Canada, Australia, Siberia and the Amazon rainforest. This week, forest wildfires forced evacuations of thousands of Canadians in Manitoba and Alberta provinces.

If you're enj