There are some very logical things that they must not escape the thought and this is that the planet has been going through different stages in which it has not been affected by the uprooting caused by the cutting down of entire forests throughout the world. This logging has meant that we find more and more desert areas, with the logical consequences.
The pre-industrial atmosphere contained more particles and clouds with greater brightness than previously thought. This is the latest discovery of the CLOUD experiment, a collaboration of 80 scientists at CERN particle laboratory near Genoa. This changes our understanding that it was in the atmosphere before humans began to degrade it with pollution.
Most water clouds need a few tiny particles to act as 'seeds' for their formation and growth. If a cloud has more of these seeds, and therefore more water droplets, it will appear brighter and reflect more of the sunlight from the Earth's surface. This makes it possible to cool down the climate.
So it is understood that the number and size of particles in the atmosphere is vital to predict not only how bright the planet's clouds are, but what the temperatures will be. To this day, half of those particles come from natural sources. That includes dust from the ground, volcanoes, fires, or sea foam that evaporates in the air, leaving tiny particles of salt in the atmosphere.
Many of these particles are the result of burning fossil fuels. This produces soot, but also sulfur dioxide gas, which manages to draw the sulfuric acid into the atmosphere. While causing acid rain, sulfuric acid molecules can hold together and grow into particles. Other molecules such as ammonia from time to time help to "stick" the sulfuric acid molecules, and generally this process forms about half of the particles that make up the seeds for the atmosphere today.
The ability of the gases that arise from trees to create the necessary particles (terpenes) for the formation of clouds, was first proposed in 1960 to explain the blue haze seen over the woods in remote areas. These particles called terpenes are very important for a cleaner atmosphere, as indicated by the results obtained in CLOUD.
This leads us to the fact that while pollution from fossil fuel combustion and other sources has to be reduced, the natural components of clouds become increasingly important. To help replace cloud seeds from air pollution, the trees will be able to help us to limit rises in global temperatures.