‘Do we work in the areas currently impacted by bushfires? We
have no current projects in these areas. Where we plant is dependent
on where we can source suitable land to create biodiverse native car-
bon sink and get a covenant to protect the trees for 25-100 years. Are
we at risk of losing any trees we’ve planted? All bushland is susceptible
to fires but, as of today, there are no bushfires near our planting sites.
How do we protect our projects against bushfires? We prepare fire
management plans for each of our planting sites. This includes outlin-
ing any potential fire risks or hazards, the location of fire breaks, and
the accessibility of water supplies and fire fighting equipment. Because
we plant native trees and shrubs, many of the species are adapted to
survive occasional bushfires. Here’s a post we wrote about a bushfire
that hit a SA planting site of ours in 2014, and how it rebounded after
the fire:
https://cncf.com.au/rising-from-the-ashes/.’
This note from CNCF illustrates the benefit of choosing effective carbon
offset programs.
Some bushfires are inevitable and natural, but careful planting and
management of the sites as CNCF does means there is less risk of cat-
astrophic bushfires, and when bushfires occur less damage is done.
Isn’t planting trees a very slow way of offsetting carbon pollution
as it is 40 to 50 years before the full effect of the carbon offsets
from planting the tree is realized?
Two responses to this:
1. As the saying goes ‘The best time to plant a tree was 20 years
ago. The second best time is today’. Planting trees in appro-
priate ways does take carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere,
so it is an effective way to reduce the damage done by our
carbon emissions, therefore the sooner we start to do it the
better. Those of us who have been giving money to organisa-
tions like Carbon Neutral to plant trees for 10 years are seeing
the impact of that giving increase every year. So, in this last
year, 10 times as much carbon dioxide was being removed
from the atmosphere as compared to when giving started.
2. It is true that some investments take time before their full ben-
efits are realised. But that is not a reason not to invest. Would
we not invest in solar panels because 95% of their benefits in
displacing fossil fuels are in the future?
- John Goss
Carbon Action Project
15
1 March 2020