Protection and forest restoration, according to the study, could contribute significantly to solving the climate crisis, as long as greenhouse gas emissions are reduced. The researchers say that by allowing existing trees to age in healthy ecosystems and restore degraded areas, 249 gigatons of carbon could be sequestered, equivalent to nearly 50 years of US emissions by 2022. But they caution that mass monoculture tree planting and offsetting won't help. forests realize their potential. Humans have cleared about half of the Earth's forests and continue to destroy places like the Amazon rainforest and the Congo Basin that play a key role in regulating the planet's atmosphere. research,  published on Monday in the magazine Nature  as part of a collaboration between hundreds of leading forest ecologists, estimates that outside of urban agricultural areas in regions with a low human footprint, where forests exist naturally, they could sequester large amounts of carbon. About 61 percent of the potential could be realized by protecting standing forests, allowing them to mature into old-growth ecosystems such as the Bialowieza Forest in Poland and Belarus or California's redwood groves that have survived thousands of years. The remaining 39 percent could be achieved by restoring fragmented forests and areas that have already been cleared. (PATRICK GREENFIELD, (This story was originally published by the Guardian)