Forests & Climate Change Talk

The Massachusetts College of Liberal Arts in North Adams will host a Forests & Climate Change talk by William Moomaw on January 28^th at 7 p.m. at Murdock Hall.

Moomaw, Emeritus Professor of International Environmental Policy at the Fletcher School – Tufts University, will give a talk titled, “Battling Climate Change One Forest at a Time.”

Moomaw will discuss how, over the past 100 years, forests have been actively managed for the production of wood and paper, and more recently for industrial scale wood fuel for heat and electricity. As a result, our forests are purposely kept in a relatively young stage and harvested well before the trees have reached maturity and a large stock of stored carbon and the forest has achieved its full ecological potential.

Forests of the world have the potential to store twice what they now store, but this will require a change in management practices. Moomaw will explain how having a higher percentage of older forests will also slow and potentially reverse the decline in both the total population of species and their diversity.

This free presentation will take place at 7 p.m. on January 28th in room 218 of Murdock Hall on the MCLA campus.

For more information, contact Elena Traister at (413) 662-5303.