Many climate change plans include planting billions of trees to clean the air, protect water sources and cool down cities. But a new study published in Bioscience found that U.S. tree nurseries don’t grow enough trees to meet these goals. Nor do they have the species diversity needed to improve urban trees’ resilience towards invasive pests, air pollutants and other stressors.
“Trees are this amazing natural solution to a lot of our challenges, including climate change. We urgently need to plant many millions of them,” said Tony D’Amato, study co-author and forest ecologist at the University of Vermont, in a statement.
However, according to the study, there might not be enough seedlings to accomplish this.
Why Do We Need Trees?
Trees do more for our health than just clean up the air we breathe. Being around trees lowers stress, improves cognition and boosts longevity. They also cool cities by up to 2.9 degrees Fahrenheit when comparing urban forests to unforested urban areas.
