Study finds Australian forests store more carbon
Updated
A new study has found that Australia's untouched forests can store three times as much carbon as previously thought.
Scientists examined 240 sites of intact natural forests in south-east Australia and found they can store up to 640 tonnes per hectare.
The largest stocks were found in the central highlands of Victoria and Tasmania.
Professor Brendan Mackey from the Australian National University says forests should be considered part of the climate change solution because they can soak up excess carbon.
"If all those forests were cleared and all of the carbon in the biomass in the soil were to be released into the atmosphere - that would be the equivalent of about 80 per cent of Australia's annual greenhouse gas emisisons every year for 100 years," he said.
"So we really have to protect our natural forests."
