Cork Christmas Trees owner Fintan Riordan has been growing trees for over 30 years and has over 360 acres of forestry, 30ac of which are Christmas trees.

Riordan has carried out case studies on carbon offset, using his own plantation, and claims that 1ha of 30-year-old forestry sequesters a total of 20t of carbon dioxide (CO2) every year.

A tree sequesters CO2, with the stem accounting for 60% of the sequestration. A tree also stores carbon in the roots, with this accounting for 40% of sequestration.

Cork Christmas Trees has 350ac of mature forestry, which, according to Riordan, sequesters approximately 2,900t of carbon annually.

Calculations

Riordan has calculated that over 30 years, the plantation will sequester 600t of CO2 per hectare or 87,000 tonnes of CO2.

Cork Christmas Trees has 35ac of Christmas trees.

These trees are smaller than the mature forestry, comprising of a mix of 2ft to 30ft-tall trees. The average height of trees on this plantation is 10ft, which is about one third of the size of a 30-year-old forestry spruce.

Riordan claims that this calculates to 6.6t of carbon per ha at Cork Christmas Trees. A total of 92t of CO2 is sequestered every year, and over 30 years of this rotational crop, a total of 2,772t of CO2 is sequestered, according to Riordan.