Forests and their relation with carbon retainment

What is it? How does it work? And how can it help us fight climate change?

First of all, we all need to understand the importance of our forests. They present the world with social, economical, and environmental value. Although the landscape they occupy is the stand-out aspect, we cannot resume their importance to that particular aspect. All the products and benefits we take from forests, varying from wood production, food, recreation to biodiversity, and soil protection. Countless factors that make our forests a resource we must protect and maintain at all costs.

But, there is another thing that forests have given us since the dawn of times that most people don’t even think about it. And that is Carbon Retainment. And our activity is based on that action.

What is carbon retainment? Why do we choose to operate this way? What are the benefits of carbon retainment? Why do we strive to invest and protect forests, given that they are so vastly and recurrently devastated by natural disasters, such as wildfires?

I’ll tell you why.

We chose to operate this way because after studying the subject, we understood it is the best way to positively impact the world.

Carbon retainment helps to reduce the negative impact of carbon emissions on the atmosphere. In the fight against global warming and climate change, it is one of our most powerful weapons.

Why invest in our forests? Can they really be as important as we say?

As far as global forests ecosystems in carbon retainment go, it is responsible for about 85%.

Just to give you an example, in Portugal, where we are starting to operate, data shows that in 2007 the Portuguese forests captured 5,44 million tons of Co2.

Trees can capture significant values of Co2 from the atmosphere, storing it in their composition: leaves, cauls, shells, branches, and roots. Studies have shown that this means that a tree stores in itself as much Co2 as 50% of her biomass.

What is this biomass? It has been defined as “the express amount of vegetable mass available in a forest, where the general estimated biomass components are the live horizontal biomass above the soil, comprised by trees and bushes, the dead biomass above the soil, comprised of tree waists and fallen branches and the subsoil biomass, composed by roots”.