A climate change-induced surge in brief but intense thunderstorms poses a growing but underrecognized threat to trees in tropical forests, a finding that could have major implications for carbon storage and tropical biodiversity under future global warming scenarios. That’s according to a recently published paper, which determines that short-lived but powerful convective storms — combining high winds with lightning — have become a major driver of tree mortality in Panama and elsewhere in the tropics. Researchers estimate storm activity may already cause 30 to 60% of tree mortality in tropical forests globally. Concerningly, that percentage is likely to rise, with data showing tropical storm activity increasing 5-25% every decade, according to study lead author Evan Gora, a forest ecologist at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies. “If storms are [already] this major driver of mortality as a baseline, and storm activity is [also] increasing, then that would suggest that storms are killing a lot more trees,” Gora says. But, as the paper notes, there are still limited data from around the tropics with most work on storm impacts concentrated in Panama, Brazil and Borneo. Yet for Gora, his team’s findings coincide with observations that tree mortality has been increasing over the past several decades in the Amazon and Australia, suggesting storms may be playing a role. Research suggests that tree mortality due to lightning may be lower in Central African forests compared with other tropical regions, says Bianca Zoletto. There are still high levels of uncertainty as to how intensifying…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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