Question

Forests are called lungs of Earth why?

Answer 1

Hint: Forests are the Earth's primary terrestrial habitat and are scattered across the globe. A forest is a region of land inhabited by trees. The forest is a dynamic ecosystem composed mainly of trees that buffer the earth and sustain a multitude of life forms.

Complete Answer:
- The trees help to create a unique environment that, in turn , affects the animal and plant species that can exist in the forest. Trees are an essential component of the ecosystem. On hot days, they clean the air, cool it, preserve heat at night, and act as excellent absorbers of sound.
- Plants have a protective canopy that reduces the effect on the soil of raindrops, thereby reducing soil erosion.
- The layer of leaves falling around the tree prevents runoff and allows the soil to percolate into the water. Roots allow the soil to be left in place. Dead plants decompose to form humus, organic matter that retains the water and provides nutrients to the soil.
 Plants provide shelter for species of various kinds.
- Green plants absorb carbon dioxide during photosynthesis and release oxygen into the atmosphere, just as our lungs absorb carbon dioxide from the blood and infuse it with oxygen.
- The earth's forests serve as air purifiers of the Earth, sucking up massive quantities of carbon dioxide absorbed from the atmosphere. The rainforests generate over 40 percent of the world 's oxygen. Thus forest is defined as lungs of the Earth.
- One of the main carbon sources in the world is rainforests. Tropical forests serve as the Earth's thermostat, controlling temperatures and weather conditions by removing carbon dioxide from the air, storing the carbon and giving us oxygen to breathe.
- The loss of our forests contributes to between 12 and 15% of all greenhouse gas emissions each year — to put that together, trains, aircraft and cars contribute to about 13.5% of all greenhouse gas emissions.

Note: No forest can be considered undisturbed nowadays. We lose over 32 million acres of forests to deforestation every year. Because of rainforest deforestation, we are expected to lose 137 plant, animal and insect species every day, which equates to 50,000 species a year.