When trees make rain: Could restoring forests help ease drought in Australia?

If you’ve ever walked in a rainforest or even a greenhouse, you’ll know that the air inside is heavy with moisture.

This phenomenon is caused by trees releasing water vapour through pores in their leaves called stomata.

We also know that many big forests, and rainforests in particular, tend to get more rain than surrounding areas — hence the name.

Although people have guessed that forests could help make rain, it’s always been a chicken-or-egg scenario: do forests make rain or do areas with high rainfall grow forests?

An expanding body of evidence supports the idea that forests, in the right conditions, not only make rain locally but also hundreds of kilometres away.

In Australia, we’ve cut down nearly 40 per cent of our forests in the past 200 years, leaving a fragmented landscape in their place.

more…

Tau.Neutrino said:

When trees make rain: Could restoring forests help ease drought in Australia?

If you’ve ever walked in a rainforest or even a greenhouse, you’ll know that the air inside is heavy with moisture.

This phenomenon is caused by trees releasing water vapour through pores in their leaves called stomata.

We also know that many big forests, and rainforests in particular, tend to get more rain than surrounding areas — hence the name.

Although people have guessed that forests could help make rain, it’s always been a chicken-or-egg scenario: do forests make rain or do areas with high rainfall grow forests?

An expanding body of evidence supports the idea that forests, in the right conditions, not only make rain locally but also hundreds of kilometres away.

In Australia, we’ve cut down nearly 40 per cent of our forests in the past 200 years, leaving a fragmented landscape in their place.

more…

All you need to do to turn deserts into rainforests is build wind farms and solar farms, apparently.

Peak Warming Man said:

Tau.Neutrino said:

When trees make rain: Could restoring forests help ease drought in Australia?

If you’ve ever walked in a rainforest or even a greenhouse, you’ll know that the air inside is heavy with moisture.

This phenomenon is caused by trees releasing water vapour through pores in their leaves called stomata.

We also know that many big forests, and rainforests in particular, tend to get more rain than surrounding areas — hence the name.

Although people have guessed that forests could help make rain, it’s always been a chicken-or-egg scenario: do forests make rain or do areas with high rainfall grow forests?

An expanding body of evidence supports the idea that forests, in the right conditions, not only make rain locally but also hundreds of kilometres away.

In Australia, we’ve cut down nearly 40 per cent of our forests in the past 200 years, leaving a fragmented landscape in their place.

more…

All you need to do to turn deserts into rainforests is build wind farms and solar farms, apparently.

Where does the linked article talk about wind farms and solar farms?

Trees release water vapor through their leaves
via their vascular system just beneath its bark
which they’d initially taken up through their roots

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-dicqNoODg

iow
Trees require a wet forest floor otherwise there’s
no water present to re-release into the atmosphere.

Evidently conditions were once right for forests, but
you’re right, deforestation for fun and profit robbed
the land water, & top-soil required to hold moisture.

In “DUNE”, Frank Hubert suggests a system to recapture
moisture from the desert atmosphere, but it took an
enormous amount of dedication, and above all… TIME.

The Rev Dodgson said:

Peak Warming Man said:

Tau.Neutrino said:

When trees make rain: Could restoring forests help ease drought in Australia?

If you’ve ever walked in a rainforest or even a greenhouse, you’ll know that the air inside is heavy with moisture.

This phenomenon is caused by trees releasing water vapour through pores in their leaves called stomata.

We also know that many big forests, and rainforests in particular, tend to get more rain than surrounding areas — hence the name.

Although people have guessed that forests could help make rain, it’s always been a chicken-or-egg scenario: do forests make rain or do areas with high rainfall grow forests?

An expanding body of evidence supports the idea that forests, in the right conditions, not only make rain locally but also hundreds of kilometres away.

In Australia, we’ve cut down nearly 40 per cent of our forests in the past 200 years, leaving a fragmented landscape in their place.

more…

All you need to do to turn deserts into rainforests is build wind farms and solar farms, apparently.

Where does the linked article talk about wind farms and solar farms?

I don’t know, I didn’t read it.

Peak Warming Man said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

Peak Warming Man said:

All you need to do to turn deserts into rainforests is build wind farms and solar farms, apparently.

Where does the linked article talk about wind farms and solar farms?

I don’t know, I didn’t read it.

Fair enough.

So where’s the link with the stuff about wind farms and solar farms turning deserts into rainforests then?

The Rev Dodgson said:

Peak Warming Man said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

Where does the linked article talk about wind farms and solar farms?

I don’t know, I didn’t read it.

Fair enough.

So where’s the link with the stuff about wind farms and solar farms turning deserts into rainforests then?

“Installing huge numbers of solar panels and wind turbines in the Sahara desert would have a major impact on rainfall, vegetation and temperatures, researchers say.
They found that the actions of wind turbines would double the amount of rain that would fall in the region.
Solar panels have a similar impact although they act in a different way.
The authors say their work reinforces the view that large-scale renewables could transform the Sahara region. “

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-45435593

It’s unbelievable what renewable energy can do.

Ogmog said:

Trees release water vapor through their leaves
via their vascular system just beneath its bark
which they’d initially taken up through their roots

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9-dicqNoODg

iow
Trees require a wet forest floor otherwise there’s
no water present to re-release into the atmosphere.

Evidently conditions were once right for forests, but
you’re right, deforestation for fun and profit robbed
the land water, & top-soil required to hold moisture.

In “DUNE”, Frank Hubert suggests a system to recapture
moisture from the desert atmosphere, but it took an
enormous amount of dedication, and above all… TIME.

David Attenborough; The Private Life of Plants
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tk5IwL2iNgU
Water transport in a plant

Thanks for alerting me to that paper, PWM.

Seems weird as shit. I mean yes, you can see that these structures could have this effect, but you wouldn’t think it would be a significant effect.
e.g. enough solar panels to power the entire world would have an area less than 1% that of the Sahara. It’s not going to be a major change in overall albedo.

http://science.sciencemag.org/content/361/6406/1019

Ogmog said:

In “DUNE”, Frank Hubert suggests a system to recapture
moisture from the desert atmosphere, but it took an
enormous amount of dedication, and above all… TIME.

WIND-TRAPS

Drinking Water From Air Humidity

Peak Warming Man said:

The Rev Dodgson said:

Peak Warming Man said:

I don’t know, I didn’t read it.

Fair enough.

So where’s the link with the stuff about wind farms and solar farms turning deserts into rainforests then?

“Installing huge numbers of solar panels and wind turbines in the Sahara desert would have a major impact on rainfall, vegetation and temperatures, researchers say.
They found that the actions of wind turbines would double the amount of rain that would fall in the region.
Solar panels have a similar impact although they act in a different way.
The authors say their work reinforces the view that large-scale renewables could transform the Sahara region. “

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-45435593

It’s unbelievable what renewable energy can do.

Yes, I think we can all agree that a fair amount of scepticism is appropriate on that one.

from the article

“Around half of the rainfall decline, at least up until the year 2000, is a result of land clearing,” Dr Andrich told the ABC at the time.

Historic clearing on the east coast has had a comparable impact, according to Clive McAlpine from the University of Queensland.

“Especially in southeast Australia around the Murray-Darlin Basin area,” he said.

“Trees are a micro-climate, they cool the land surface. We’ve done a little bit of work with satellites which shows that temperatures are 2 to 3 degrees hotter in areas that have got no trees,” he said.

“In 2003 which was a bad El Nino year, it was 2 degrees hotter over a large area of eastern Australia historical clearing.”

Tau.Neutrino said:

When trees make rain: Could restoring forests help ease drought in Australia?

If you’ve ever walked in a rainforest or even a greenhouse, you’ll know that the air inside is heavy with moisture.

This phenomenon is caused by trees releasing water vapour through pores in their leaves called stomata.

We also know that many big forests, and rainforests in particular, tend to get more rain than surrounding areas — hence the name.

Although people have guessed that forests could help make rain, it’s always been a chicken-or-egg scenario: do forests make rain or do areas with high rainfall grow forests?

An expanding body of evidence supports the idea that forests, in the right conditions, not only make rain locally but also hundreds of kilometres away.

In Australia, we’ve cut down nearly 40 per cent of our forests in the past 200 years, leaving a fragmented landscape in their place.

more…

There is some evidence in our earlier history that rain extended further south than the top end and central top end when dense forests existed in upper central Australia.

This is some evidence of the cloud seeding potential created by the transporation from leaves into the atmosphere during that period as a hypothesis of at least one Australian scientist who studied the soil layers dating back to those periods.

An open forest of gum trees adapts to changes in weather systems rather well though.

Rainforests shrink rapidly when under pressure and open forest tree species tend to populate damaged fringes of rainforests more rapidly than what rainforest trees do.

I think this is for two reasons i.e rain forest tree species may have a lower rate of growth and a lot the plant species rely on the protection of an established canopy to support the ecosystems to sustain a rain forest.

Where as open forests can regenerate on open bare tree cleared areas.

However something very important is the topography of the area , as Steve would say the landscape affects how pressure systems can form that create conditions conducive to rain. For example, he would say simply flooding Lake Ayer doesn’t create the conditions for more rain due to the surrounding like land forms, mountains etc..

There are two major problems in trying to establish trees in areas they do not naturally occur, one is its extreme temperatures, and two is the low rainfall, neither of which due to the scale required to rectify these problems, means you have Buckey’s in affecting the natural rainfall.

Three thoughts.

• Blocking high
• Tropical cyclones
• Evapotranspiration

When a blocking high pressure system establishes itself over the Aurtralian continent, then it deflects rain away. That NASA satellite movie of world rainfall shows how rain avoids Aurtralia.

At the moment, the only thing that can break through the blockade imposed by the blocking high is tropical cyclones that head inland as a rain depression. This can deposit so much water in central Australia that it cools the continent enough to diminish and sometimes banish the blocking high for up to five years. Rain from all sides can then penetrate into the interior. But as the centre of Australia dries up, the temperature rises again and the blocking high is reestablished.

Evapotranspiration is the sum total of water loss by evaporation and water koss by transpiration. In forested areas, trees pump a lot of water into the atmosphere, much more than could be lost by evaporation alone.

dv said:

enough solar panels to power the entire world would have an area less than 1% that of the Sahara. It’s not going to be a major change in overall albedo.

surely the correct response
to such a result
is to use
more power

SCIENCE said:

dv said:

enough solar panels to power the entire world would have an area less than 1% that of the Sahara. It’s not going to be a major change in overall albedo.

surely the correct response
to such a result
is to use
more power

I canna

dv said:

SCIENCE said:

dv said:

enough solar panels to power the entire world would have an area less than 1% that of the Sahara. It’s not going to be a major change in overall albedo.

surely the correct response
to such a result
is to use
more power

I canna

DV leave a light on for me.

The loss of trees has been catastrophic for the environment and planting them again is surely of benefit but to restore conditions to previous will take a minimum of a thousand years to repair even after planting all the trees back.

roughbarked said:

The loss of trees has been catastrophic for the environment and planting them again is surely of benefit but to restore conditions to previous will take a minimum of a thousand years to repair even after planting all the trees back.

The reason I state this should be obvious. The trees were here for an average of a thousand years alive before they were torn down. Many were here for much longer, yes.