Comment on "The global tree restoration potential"

Simon L Lewis; Edward T A Mitchard; Colin Prentice; Mark Maslin; Ben Poulter

doi:10.1126/science.aaz0388

Comment on "The global tree restoration potential"

Science. 2019 Oct 18;366(6463):eaaz0388. doi: 10.1126/science.aaz0388.

Authors

Simon L Lewis^{1

2}, Edward T A Mitchard³, Colin Prentice⁴, Mark Maslin⁵, Ben Poulter⁶

Affiliations

¹ Department of Geography, University College London, London WC1E 6BT, UK. s.l.lewis@leeds.ac.uk.
² School of Geography, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT, UK.
³ School of GeoSciences, University of Edinburgh, Edinburgh EH9 3FF, UK.
⁴ Department of Life Science, Imperial College, Ascot, Berks SL5 7PY, UK.
⁵ Department of Geography, University College London, London WC1E 6BT, UK.
⁶ NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt, MD, USA.

PMID: 31624179
DOI: 10.1126/science.aaz0388

Abstract

Bastin et al (Reports, 5 July 2019, p. 76) state that the restoration potential of new forests globally is 205 gigatonnes of carbon, conclude that "global tree restoration is our most effective climate change solution to date," and state that climate change will drive the loss of 450 million hectares of existing tropical forest by 2050. Here we show that these three statements are incorrect.

Publication types

Comment

MeSH terms

Carbon
Climate Change
Forests*
Trees*

Substances

Carbon