University gets forest grant

The University of Minnesota has received a $319,820 grant from the Minnesota Forest Resources Council to assess carbon sequestration, storage, and emissions associated with Minnesota forests and forest products.

The Department of Natural Resources says that in one year, Minnesota’s forests absorbed 19 million tons of carbon dioxide. That’s the equivalent of taking 4 million gas-powered cars off the road for an entire year.

The Nature Conservancy says reforestation and cover cropping are the two most potent climate solutions in the state. It’s about planting more trees which capture carbon, protecting old forests which store it, and managing all of them in a smarter, more resilient way.

The university, which runs the Cloquet Forestry Center, will gather data from all forest carbon locations, or “pools,” in live and dead trees, forest soils, harvested wood and in forest products such as lumber. The data will enable university scientists to develop methodologies to better monitor forest carbon trends and to develop “life cycle assessments” that track carbon sequestration and storage over 100- or 150-year periods starting first in the forest, then into wood products, and eventually to emission as carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.