Al Mayadeen English

  • Ar
  • Es
  • x
Al Mayadeen English

Slogan

  • News
    • Politics
    • Economy
    • Sports
    • Arts&Culture
    • Health
    • Miscellaneous
    • Technology
    • Environment
  • Articles
    • Opinion
    • Analysis
    • Blog
    • Features
  • Videos
    • NewsFeed
    • Video Features
    • Explainers
    • TV
    • Digital Series
  • Infographs
  • In Pictures
  • • LIVE
News
  • Politics
  • Economy
  • Sports
  • Arts&Culture
  • Health
  • Miscellaneous
  • Technology
  • Environment
Articles
  • Opinion
  • Analysis
  • Blog
  • Features
Videos
  • NewsFeed
  • Video Features
  • Explainers
  • TV
  • Digital Series
Infographs
In Pictures
  • Africa
  • Asia
  • Asia-Pacific
  • Europe
  • Latin America
  • MENA
  • Palestine
  • US & Canada
BREAKING
Russian Ministry of Defense: 37 Ukrainian drones destroyed in 4 hours over regions of Russia and the Black Sea.
Sheikh Qassem: Our supporters make up more than half of Lebanon's population, and all of these people are united under the banner of protecting Lebanon, its Resistance, its people, and its integrity.
Sheikh Qassem: There will be no phased handing in of our arms. [The Israelis] must first enact the agreement before we start talking about a defensive strategy.
Sheikh Qassem: Be brave in the face of foreign pressures, and we will be by your side in this stance.
Sheikh Qassem: Stripping us of our arms is like stripping us of our very soul, and this will prompt us to show them our might.
Sheikh Qassem: We will not abandon our arms, for they gave us dignity; we will not abandon our arms, for they protect us against our enemy.
Sheikh Qassem: The US efforts we are seeing are aimed at sabotaging Lebanon and constitute a call for sedition.
Sheikh Qassem: If you truly want to establish sovereignty and work for Lebanon’s interests, then stop the aggression.
Sheikh Qassem: The United States, which is meddling in Lebanon, is not trustworthy but rather poses a danger to it.
Sheikh Qassem: The United States is preventing the weapons that protect the homeland.

Tropical trees dying twice as fast from climate change

  • By Al Mayadeen English
  • Source: Agencies
  • 20 Jun 2022 10:44
4 Min Read

Trees are surviving only half as long as they used to, according to a new research.

  • x
  • Tropical trees dying twice as fast from climate change
    Palm trees in Peru (Gabriel Hidalgo)

Climate change, according to a new study, may have caused rainforest trees to die more quickly beginning in the 1980s.

The findings of a long-term worldwide research published in Nature on May 18, 2022, demonstrate that since the 1980s, tropical trees in Australia's rainforests have been dying at a pace twice as fast as previously, likely owing to climate changes.

According to this study, as the drying influence of the environment has grown owing to global warming, tropical tree death rates have more than quadrupled over the previous 35 years.

The degradation of such forests reduces biomass and carbon storage, making it more difficult to meet the Paris Agreement's obligation to keep global peak temperatures far below the objective of 2 degrees Celsius. The latest research, led by scientists from the Smithsonian Environmental Research Center, Oxford University, and the French National Research Institute for Sustainable Development (IRD), examined comprehensive data sets from Australia's rainforests.

It discovers that during the previous four decades, the average tree death rate in these woodlands has more than doubled. Researchers determined that trees are surviving about half as long as they used to, and this is consistent across species and places throughout the region. The researchers believe the impacts may be traced back to the 1980s.

According to Dr. David Bauman, a tropical forest ecologist at Smithsonian, Oxford, and IRD, and lead author of the study, “It was a shock to detect such a marked increase in tree mortality, let alone a trend consistent across the diversity of species and sites we studied. A sustained doubling of mortality risk would imply the carbon stored in trees returns twice as fast to the atmosphere.”

The senior research scientist at Smithsonian and senior author of the study Sr. Sean McMahon stated, “Many decades of data are needed to detect long-term changes in long-lived organisms, and the signal of a change can be overwhelmed by the noise of many processes.”

Related News

UN warns of urgent need to shield workers from heat

Great barrier reef coral loss largest in decades amid bleaching crisis

Bauman and McMahon highlight that one of the most amazing results from the study is that not only has the mortality rate increased, but it has been increasing since the 1980s, which suggests that Earth has been suffering due to climate change for several decades.

Oxford Professor Yadvinder Malhi, a study co-author, highlighted that corals in the Great Barrier Reef have also suffered from climate change recently.

“Our work shows if you look shoreward from the Reef, Australia’s famous rainforests are also changing rapidly. Moreover, the likely driving factor we identify, the increasing drying power of the atmosphere caused by global warming, suggests similar increases in tree death rates may be occurring across the world’s tropical forests. If that is the case, tropical forests may soon become carbon sources, and the challenge of limiting global warming well below 2 °C becomes both more urgent and more difficult.”

Read more: Australia's Great Barrier Reef suffering 'widespread' bleaching

Susan Laurance, Professor of Tropical Ecology at James Cook University, added that “long-term datasets like this one are very rare and very important for studying forest changes in response to climate change. This is because rainforest trees can have such long lives and also that tree death is not always immediate.”

Recent Amazonian research has also found that tropical tree mortality rates are rising, decreasing the carbon sink. However, the reason remains unknown.

Intact tropical rainforests are important carbon sinks, functioning as mild brakes on the rate of climate change by absorbing around 12% of human-caused carbon dioxide emissions.

Examining the temperature ranges of the tree species with the greatest mortality rates, the team concludes that the key climate driver is increased atmospheric drying power. As the atmosphere heats, it takes more moisture from plants, causing increasing water stress and, eventually, an increased risk of mortality in trees.

When the researchers crunched the statistics, they discovered that the loss of biomass from the recent spike in mortality has not been compensated by biomass gains from tree growth and recruitment of new trees. This suggests that the increased mortality has resulted in a net loss in the ability of these forests to offset carbon emissions.

  • global warming
  • Climate change
  • tropical trees
STOP THE HEAT: A Climate Change Coverage

STOP THE HEAT: A Climate Change Coverage

Most Read

Tom Artiom Alexandrovich, executive director of the defense division of the Israeli National Cyber Directorate, undated (Social media)

Israeli-born US prosecutor drops Israeli officer child sex crime

  • Politics
  • 19 Aug 2025
Almost instantly after the Helsinki Accords were signed, organisations sprouted to document purported violations, whose findings were fed to overseas embassies for international amplification. (Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by Zeinab el-Hajj)

How ‘Human Rights’ became a Western weapon

  • Opinion
  • 23 Aug 2025
Israeli soldiers stand on the top of armoured vehicles parked on an area near the Israeli-Gaza border, as seen from southern Israel, Wednesday, Aug. 20, 2025 (AP)

Palestinian fighters target Israeli soldiers, vehicles in Gaza

  • Politics
  • 21 Aug 2025
Launch of a ballistic missile from Yemen toward the occupied Palestinian territories. (YAF military media)

Yemeni Forces announce firing hypersonic missile at Al-Lydd Airport

  • Politics
  • 22 Aug 2025

Coverage

All
The Ummah's Martyrs

Read Next

All
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu speaks during a press conference at the Prime minister's office in al-Quds, Occupied Palestine, Sunday, Aug. 10, 2025 (AP)
Politics

Netanyahu deliberately derailing truce with Gaza occupation: Hamas

Irish President Michael Higgins arrives to deliver his speech during a 42nd World Food Day celebration at FAO headquarters in Rome, on Oct. 16, 2023. (AP Photo/Alessandra Tarantino)
Politics

Irish president renews call for UN military intervention in Gaza

US Ambassador to Turkey and Special Envoy to Syria Tom Barrack speaks during an interview with The Associated Press at the US Embassy in Aukar, northern suburb of Beirut, Lebanon, Monday, July 21, 2025 (AP)
Politics

US envoy, Netanyahu discuss restraining attacks on Lebanon, withdrawal

Smoke billows following Israeli airstrikes in multiple areas in Sanaa, Yemen, Sunday, Aug. 24, 2025 (AP)
Politics

Ansar Allah vow sustained Gaza support despite Israeli strikes

Al Mayadeen English

Al Mayadeen is an Arab Independent Media Satellite Channel.

All Rights Reserved

  • x
  • Privacy Policy
  • About Us
  • Contact Us
  • Authors
Android
iOS