A new study by ‘climate modeller’ Dr Chris Huntingford has found
tropical forests are unlikely to lose biomass in response to greenhouse
gas emissions caused by global warming. (He doesn’t appear to be a
crackpot either.)
Huntingford and his colleagues at the Oxford Centre for Ecology &
Hydrology used simulations with twenty-two climate models to explore
the response of tropical forests in the Americas, Africa and Asia to
greenhouse-gas-induced climate change. In all but one of the models, no
loss of forest cover was found.
“Using simulations with 22 climate models and the MOSES–TRIFFID land
surface scheme, we find that only in one of the simulations are tropical
forests projected to lose biomass by the end of the twenty-first
century—and then only for the Americas,” the report explains.
We should point out that Huntingford does not dispute the reality of
climate change or its potential effects on the environment, as this Guardian article attests.
The report also acknowledges that uncertainty remains over how tropical
forest carbon stocks might alter in response to changes in climate and
atmospheric composition.
“Despite the considerable uncertainties, we conclude that there is
evidence of forest resilience for all three regions,” Huntingford
stated.
So basically, tropical forests could be resilient to climate
change, but there isn’t enough evidence one way or the other to know
for sure.
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