Hacker News

points by dosinga 16 hours ago | 0 comments

I think this is a case of a misleading headline. Do the 250K trees even enter into this:

> Police said that, based on current information, there have been irregularities and shortcomings in drainage and water management at the data centre project's worksite

250K trees sounds like a lot, but Finland has like 20B trees, so it would take 3 hours for Finland to grow this back

[–] Arainach 16 hours ago

> 250K trees sounds like a lot, but Finland has like 20B trees, so it would take 3 hours for Finland to grow this back

That's not how math.....or trees.....work.

[–] dosinga 15 hours ago

how is it not? Finland cuts down hundred of millions of trees every year. they grow back, that's how their lumber industry works. Google presumably cut trees that were of a random age, not of harvesting age.

I realize it is seasonal, but the maths still works. distribute all trees in cohorts of three hours age. every three hours they move one up. every three hours there's 250k trees more over the entire range, allowing Finland to cut the mature trees to make paper.

[–] DocTomoe 15 hours ago

Actually, that's exactly how forestry departments think of forest: how many (harvestable) volume units of wood grows per time unit. No cute, parental firefighting bear needed: Smokey doesn't like wildfires because burnt wood can't be sold.

[–] inglor_cz 15 hours ago

While this is indeed not how trees work, it puts the number into a useful perspective.

Finland, comparable in size to Montana, is basically one huge forest (75% tree cover) dotted with lakes, and a lot of those forests are harvested every year. Of the entire EU, this is probably the place where trees are the least rare.

250 thousand trees cut down in England would have been a very different story.

[–] dosinga 15 hours ago

even England has 2 billion trees or so though, way less than Finland but 250k trees is still not that much

[–] ghurtado 16 hours ago

Bro is using the Factorio model of resource reallocation.

[–] SecretDreams 16 hours ago

Exactly. There's a whole gestation period where the mom tree carries the baby tree to term. Then the baby tree needs years to mature and develop. And because the dad tree was lost in the great google felling of 2026, the baby tree will be raised in a single tree family household, which will put additional strain on its development.

[–] fred_is_fred 16 hours ago

Single tree moms are less of a problem in the Nordics though. Programs like Head Saplings can help though.

[–] drivingmenuts 16 hours ago

Oh, that's just great. It'll turn into a juvenile delinquent tree, hiding behind other trees to leap out and scare unsuspecting hikers.

[–] delichon 16 hours ago

  Growing stock volume: ~2.66B m^3
  Annual volume increment: 103M m^3
  Approximate number of trees: 20B
  Implied average tree volume: ~0.1275 m^3
  Volume of 250K trees: 250K x 0.1275 m^3 ~ 32K m^3

  Time for remaining trees to grow that volume back: 32K m^3 / 103M m^3/year ~ 0.00031 years ~ 2.7 hours

[–] whatevaa 16 hours ago

9 woman can't bring baby in a month. That 3 hour estimate makes no sense.

[–] synecdoche 16 hours ago

It may do so in the form of volume or weight in carpentry materiel or other wood products.

[–] paulhebert 16 hours ago

Yes but the people concerned about this are clearly concerned about the environmental impact of losing forested land, not how many wood products are available.

[–] watwut 16 hours ago

But ... but ... but 2240 women can bring a baby in 3 hours! Surely!

[–] sampo 16 hours ago

> 250K trees sounds like a lot

In this case, it's 3.3 sq-km (or 1.3 sq-miles) of forest.

[–] gwjeglkefnf3 16 hours ago

What does the total number of trees in Finland have to do with the amount of time it would take to grow 250K tree back?

[–] alienbaby 16 hours ago

I think he means, if an average tree adds say ~10g of wood per day, I had 20B trees and cut down 250000 of them, how long do the remaining trees take to grow back the wood that was lost from the trees that were cut down.

Turns out, if the trees lost are about 2000kg, it takes about ~ 2.5 days.

[–] mynameisash 15 hours ago

Except:

a. Even if this model were reasonable, removing trees isn't ameliorated by letting them grow back in 2.5 days. As an analogy, if I steal $100 from you, it's not reasonable for me to say, "But it only takes you x hours to earn that $100 back." No, you're out that $100.

b. Tree growth (eg, carbon sequestration) is non-linear. The first year of growth of a tree is much less productive than the 50th year.