The claim: Climate change is a ‘scam’ because Australia’s trees and mangroves absorb more CO2 than the country produces
A July 15 Instagram post (direct link, archive link) purports that one person’s explanation of Australia’s net carbon emissions proves that climate change is not real.
“Man gives crazy theory that proves climate change is a scam,” reads the post, which includes a video of a person talking.
“According to government figures, Australia is producing 499 million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year,” the speaker says, according to a text overlay on the muted video. “But what I also found is that one mature tree will absorb 48 pounds, or 21.77 kilograms, of carbon dioxide per year. And Australia currently has 24 billion standard size trees, absorbing 453 million metric tons of carbon dioxide per year. And that’s just trees – doesn’t include any other plant life – and particularly doesn’t include mangroves, and mangroves will absorb 50 times more carbon dioxide per year than a standard sized tree.”
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
- Goal 13: Climate Action
Our rating: False
Australia added a net of more than 400 million tons of carbon dioxide to the Earth’s atmosphere in 2021, the most recent year for which data is available, after accounting for natural carbon sinks such as trees. Australian climate researchers say the post fundamentally errs in oversimplifying the process by which plants intake and release carbon dioxide.
Post misinterprets Australian climate data
It is correct that Australia produced more than 500 million tons of carbon dioxide in 2021, the most recent year for which government data and estimates are available.
However, the person in the post does not accurately represent the net carbon dioxide emissions for Australia that year, according to a spokesperson from the Australian Department of Climate Change, Energy, the Environment and Water.
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs)
- Goal 13: Climate Action
The carbon cycle is more complex than post posits
The person in the video misunderstands the carbon cycle and makes claims that are not supported by climate research, according to Australian climate researchers and agencies.
Plants and ecosystems like trees and mangroves transform water and carbon dioxide from the air into food through photosynthesis, releasing oxygen back into the Earth’s atmosphere.
But calculating the carbon sequestration capacity of an ecosystem is more nuanced than the post claims, according to Rodney Keenan, a professor at the University of Melbourne’s School of Agriculture, Food and Ecosystem Science.
“Using estimates of carbon sequestration per tree and multiplying by an estimate of the total number of trees is not a scientifically valid way to estimate carbon sequestration across a forest or continent,” Keenan told USA TODAY in an email. “Sequestration rates of individual trees vary with many factors: climate and soil conditions during the lifespan of the tree and the extent of competition from surrounding trees or shrubs.”
Will Cornwell, a professor at the University of New South Whales’ School of Biological, Earth & Environmental Sciences agreed, noting that plants both emit and absorb carbon dioxide.
“The issue is that plants do photosynthesis quite a lot per year, but the vast majority of that carbon is returned to the atmosphere quickly via plant respiration and decomposition,” Cornwell told USA TODAY in an email. “The number that the video uses is not ‘net ecosystem exchange’, it’s gross photosynthesis per tree, which is a fundamental mistake,” Cornwell said.
He compared the erroneous calculation in the video to “using revenue for a particular calculation when you should be using profit.”
The spokesperson for the department concurred with both scientists and told USA TODAY the figure in the video isn’t consistent with its carbon sink and sequestration models
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) addressed in the article:
- SDG 13: Climate Action
The article discusses climate change and the misconception that Australia’s trees and mangroves absorb more CO2 than the country produces, which is related to SDG 13 on Climate Action.
Specific targets under SDG 13:
- Target 13.1: Strengthen resilience and adaptive capacity to climate-related hazards and natural disasters
- Target 13.2: Integrate climate change measures into national policies, strategies, and planning
- Target 13.3: Improve education, awareness-raising, and human and institutional capacity on climate change mitigation, adaptation, impact reduction, and early warning
- Target 13.5: Implement the commitment undertaken by developed-country parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to a goal of mobilizing jointly $100 billion annually by 2020 from all sources to address the needs of developing countries in the context of meaningful mitigation actions and transparency on implementation and fully operationalize the Green Climate Fund through its capitalization as soon as possible
The article does not specifically mention these targets, but the discussion on climate change connects to the broader goal of taking action to combat climate change and its impacts.
Indicators mentioned or implied in the article:
- Net carbon emissions: The article mentions that Australia added a net of more than 400 million tons of carbon dioxide to the Earth’s atmosphere in 2021.
- Carbon sequestration: The article mentions that Australia’s mangroves and seagrass sequestered up to 14.2 million tons of carbon dioxide in 2021.
- Greenhouse gas emissions: The article states that Australia’s net greenhouse gas emissions were 465 million tons of carbon dioxide equivalent in 2021.
These indicators can be used to measure progress towards the targets under SDG 13, such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions and increasing carbon sequestration.
Table: SDGs, Targets, and Indicators
| SDGs | Targets | Indicators |
|---|---|---|
| SDG 13: Climate Action | Target 13.1: Strengthen resilience and adaptive capacity to climate-related hazards and natural disasters | – |
| SDG 13: Climate Action | Target 13.2: Integrate climate change measures into national policies, strategies, and planning | – |
| Target 13.3: Improve education, awareness-raising, and human and institutional capacity on climate change mitigation, adaptation, impact reduction, and early warning | – | |
| Target 13.5: Implement the commitment undertaken by developed-country parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change to a goal of mobilizing jointly $100 billion annually by 2020 from all sources to address the needs of developing countries in the context of meaningful mitigation actions and transparency on implementation and fully operationalize the Green Climate Fund through its capitalization as soon as possible | – | |
| Target 13.? | Net carbon emissions, carbon sequestration, greenhouse gas emissions |
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Source: usatoday.com
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