By the Light of the Sun: Trees, Wood, Photosynthesis and Climate Change

The mission of this book is to detail how to better harness the power of the products of photosynthesis to offset adverse climate change. Specifically, this book asserts that trees and forests, plus wood products, will be even more important in assisting to tackle climate change, and in contributing to a sustainable energy and carbon neutral future. This book details how trees and forests will be a critical ingredient in the search for a zero net carbon emissions future. Not only do trees ‘suck’ carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere and wood products store it away for decades, but trees have the capacity to be at the centre of a sustainable future for humanity. They will be an essential energy component beyond the end of the fossil fuel era.

The book advocates the wider utilisation of wood-based products that use less energy in their manufacture, store carbon, and have the capability to restrict the use of high energy materials, like steel and aluminium.

The good news, says this book, is that the most dangerous impacts of climate change may still be avoided if humanity moves fossil fuel-based energy systems towards renewable sources, and increases the use of sustainable materials like wood.

Even though there is much to be worried about climate change-wise, this book is not too despondent. It says that in an increasingly carbon-constrained world, trees, forests and wood products are important, not only as carbon ‘sinks’ but as substitutes for more carbon-intensive materials and fossil fuels.

John Halkett’s last book: Jungle Jive: Sustaining the forests of Southeast Asia was released by Connor Court Publishing in 2016. This and his past five books traverse a wide range of topics, but all have trees at the centre of the narrative.