Nature Air

Just heard from Dr. Herster Barres of Reforest The Tropics in response to the recent Earth Day related post. As some of you may recall, we did a fairly extensive two-part post on his organization. My post on the state of earthly matters painted a fairly harsh picture, but I hope there were some shades of optimism, especially because of the hard work of many eco-pioneers in Costa Rica.  Dr. Barres is one of those people, who has dedicated his life to leaving the Earth in better shape than he found it.

“RTT continues to progress.  We should reach 300 acres of the RTT Model carbon-offset forest planted by the end of 2009 with the participation of 65 US sponsors.  Remember that our goal is to develop and demonstrate an improved model of carbon-offset forests.  The Model seeks to make reforestation profitable for the farmer, as profitable as cattle so as to promote the massive reforestation of farm pastures in the tropics.  Specifically, the monetary goal is $500/ha/yr.  If we can achieve this goal, then we have a good chance of making the forest sustainable.  And sustainability means long-term carbon sequestration.

So, more directly addressing your blog, I believe that there may be less of a conflict between profitability (commerce) and good stewardship of the environment.

Our RTT Model, as you may remember, uses mixed-species forests to produce wood and to capture and store carbon.  In addition to add value to the model, we plant bananas and papaya to feed the wildlife and allow the workers to plant many crops between the lines of young seedlings for their food and income.

In the US, we are testing the validity and acceptance of the model to offset US emissions.  It starts with CO2-emission inventories of entities to create the baseline from which we measure our success (or failure) to reduce of GHG emissions.  Then, we ask emitters to donate $5,000-$10,000 per hectare to sponsor a hectare of the RTT Model carbon-offset forest in our program.  The undiscounted cost of capturing and storing a tonne of CO2 in our RTT Model, assuming that we reach our goal is estimated at between $10 and $16.  Steven Chu, new head of the Department of Energy, recently stated that we can expect managing a tonne of CO2 may cost as much as $40-$60, so we may be the cheapest option around.

The truth is that to meet the threat to society of climate change, we will need to use all options within the fields of energy efficiency, conservation, new clean sources of energy and carbon capture and storage.”

Now you know at least one person who is trying to make a difference. Please get in touch with Dr. Barres if you want to know more about Reforest The Tropics.