This is the best summary I could come up with:
Trees provide innumerable benefits to the world, from food to shelter to oxygen, but researchers have now found their dramatic rebound in the eastern US has delivered a further, stunning feat – the curtailing of the soaring temperatures caused by the climate crisis.
The recovery of the US’s eastern forests has blunted global heating mainly through the trees’ transpiration, in which water is drawn up through the roots to the leaves and then released into the air as vapor, slightly cooling the surrounding area.
By poring over data from satellites and weather stations located across the eastern US from 1900 to 2000, Barnes and her colleagues found reforested areas have provided this cooling impact on a grand scale, with most of this effect occurring within 400 meters of the trees.
“Moving forward, we need to think about tree planting not just as a way to absorb carbon dioxide but also the cooling effects in adapting for climate change, to help cities be resilient against these very hot temperatures.”
Patrick Gonzalez, a University of California, Berkeley, climate change scientist and forest ecologist who wasn’t involved in the new study, said the work provides “strong support” to the theory of cooling trees.
“Cutting carbon pollution from cars, power plants and other human sources that burn coal, oil and methane remains the essential solution to halt climate change,” he said.
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