Photo Credit: Nick Grier / American Forests
THE LAST TWO SUMMERS have brought levels of heat to our lands and oceans that have climate scientists concerned and somewhat baffled. It was not supposed to get quite this bad quite this quickly, according to leading climate models.
This has serious implications for our trees and forests. Deadly hot summers are killing trees in our cities just when we need them most for shade and sapping the vigor of forests just when we need them to sequester carbon dioxide. Wildfire is spreading in extent and severity that has roughly tripled in recent decades.
It is our urgent mission to protect our trees and forests so they can protect us by combatting the impacts of climate change. This is the process of climate adaptation as applied to the field of forestry. We need to get good at this very quickly.
Whether we are planting trees in cities or recovering burn scars on our national forests, every reforestation project is an opportunity to fine-tune how we prepare the site for planting, select the right trees and genetic strains, and plant and care for those trees. The solution is different for each site, like solving a Rubik’s Cube of forestry decisions for each landscape and city.
As the stories in American Forests magazine highlight, our organization has centered its leadership on solving this forest-adaptation puzzle. We have steadily added more scientific experts in this field to our staff, formed partnerships with Tribal nations to integrate Indigenous knowledge, and made climate-informed reforestation central to advancing Tree Equity in cities and reforestation of public and Indigenous lands alike.
Photo Credit: Molly Henry / American Forests
Shining examples include our work in Rhode Island to develop a climate-resilient planting guide for the Providence region, a model since replicated elsewhere in partnership with the U.S. Forest Service and the Northern Institute of Applied Climate Science. We are also proud that our climate-resilient reforestation plans for landscapes such as the Rio Grande Valley of Texas and south central Oregon have been embraced by government agency partners and are now being implemented. We are pushing to make these leading examples the new normal for how this work will be done nationwide.
But what and how we plant must also align with finding the most impactful places to plant. I’m proud that we are harnessing data and science in bold new ways to get the most out of each tree planted for climate change, health, water, wildlife and much more.
This starts with using American Forests’ Tree Equity Score to optimize planting trees as “nature’s air conditioners” in our cities. Tree Equity Score not only shows where trees are lacking, neighborhood-by-neighbor- hood, but also shows where our tree gaps overlap with the populations facing the greatest health risks. The tool provides the actual temperature differential compared to the citywide average in each neighborhood.
Among other things, this data shows that the lowest-income neighborhoods across America, where air conditioning is in shortest supply, have on average 26% less tree cover than the wealthiest neighborhoods and are on average 6 degrees Fahrenheit hotter. For some neighborhoods, the difference can be nearly 20 degrees.
Cities are using the accessible, easy-to-use Tree Equity Score tool to guide a wave of urban tree planting across America. An effort of this type and scale has never been seen before in any country on Earth — just in time to combat dangerous heat and increasing heat-related death and illness in cities nationwide. This work is powered by the $1.5 billion in funding that American Forests helped to secure in the Inflation Reduction Act. The money supports Forest Service grants to cities and their partners to do this work.
This data-driven site selection is just as important for trees outside of cities. In the climate-stressed and wildfire- scarred landscapes where much of American Forests’ reforestation work is centered, we use high-quality data and analysis to determine which lands in each burn scar will fail to naturally regenerate so we can target planting in locations where intervention is required to save the forest.
Every organization must play its unique part to overcome the existential threat of climate change, and I am proud that we are using our scientific and technical expertise to show our country and other nations how to get these “right tree, right place” details right. Every tree and every forest is a potential solution, but only if we have the smarts to unlock that potential.
Thank you for helping us fulfill our unique opportunity to teach others these skills and lead by example in our own on-the-ground efforts.
For more news and updates from Jad, follow him on X @JadDaley.