Scientists from NASA created the map of the height of the planet’s forest.
The map was generated using 2.5 million by laser pulse measurements from space.
According to the map, forest heights decrease at a higher elevation and are highest at low latitudes, decreasing in height the farther they are from the tropics (except 40° south latitude in southern temperate rainforests in Australia and New Zealand).
The maps below are done with tree height treated as elevation to give a sort of canopy topography map.
Western North America
Eastern North America
South America
Europe
Southeast Asia
Central Africa
Australia
The highest forests concentrated in mountain areas.
Mountain areas don’t have agricultural value and are difficult to log another factor. Moreover, the mountains also serve to increase precipitation and rainfall.
