There is a place in So Cal now called The Aspens South Coast we lived in 30 years ago. It has (had?) an incredibly dense concentration of trees, something I’ve not seen since in that region, which is of course desert.
This time of year when you opened the gate that separated the treed interior from the parking lot you felt like the air conditioning had been turned on. We have very fond memories of the place. Its only disadvantage for me was that spring caused my allergies to go crazy.
Totally worth it.
show comments
hervature
Genuine question for people in the field. My understanding is that the cooling effect of trees is primarily driven by evaporative cooling. That is, the shade effect only really exists because the plant does not shrivel up and die due to storing water. How much more effective are trees vs. big swamp coolers? Even in this article, they admit that daytime cooling of half a degree requires 3 times more water.
I recently bought some wooded land and unlike most people I know I've been extremely selective cutting down trees on it.
It's actually comfortable to be outside there. Even in the summer it's almost completely shaded. I was kind of surprised how extreme it is. I know trees make it harder to work and if you're hiring people they probably can't tolerate it but since I'm doing everything myself I don't have to clear everything and wait for it to grow back.
show comments
Raphell
I don’t think planting trees is only for cooling things down. Sometimes it’s just about helping people feel like they can go outside. In really hot places, even a bit of shade can change your mind about stepping out.
asmor
That captcha sure reduces the effectiveness of me reading that by 100%.
seemaze
Why is Las Vegas, NV referred to as ‘Vegas’, but Los Angeles, CA is not referred to as ‘Angeles’?
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b00ty4breakfast
I'm sure any future endeavor to plant trees in the goddamn desert will have no negative environmental consequences at all. It's not as if the city in the goddamn desert is already in the middle of a regional water crisis as of last year or anything...
This needing a study is like the discovery in Idiocracy that soil needs to be watered with water, not Brawndo's soft drink.
Plant trees, not ACs...
North America's greed for energy resources is just bonkers from an outside perspecive.
show comments
onlypassingthru
> The selected tree species is Bur Oak, given that it is included in the SNWA Regional Plant (SNWA 2021) list, it is marked as a street tree in the list...
Who the hell is planting oaks in Vegas? Oaks are non native and moderately water intensive trees. If this study is based on oaks, it calls into question the validity of the data since this is a tree that absolutely does not belong in the Mojave desert.
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noobermin
I've only scanned the abstract but the conclusion seems too weak given the other stated findings. Sure given different metrics (air temp vs radiant heat) may give different stories for different trees, but that wouldn't lead me to conclude it needs to be evaluated on a "case by case basis" more so than the metric depends. That is not the same thing as "case by case basis."
They should be more proud of their findings. Why insult it out of the gate?
show comments
6Az4Mj4D
I saw video last week in India there was similar experiment done in sun the temperature 45 degrees C and 30 step walk under the tree the temperature 36 degrees C. We need more trees as an easy solution
show comments
konsalexee
This is a repeating study, seeing this again and again, so not sure about its novelty.
In Europe we even assigned our first "Chief Heat Officer", which makes total sense.
show comments
sneak
The best way to produce shade in the Nevada desert is with solar panels.
The sky is rarely cloudy and solar just blasts all day every day here.
I covered my backyard in Vegas with ground panels and now I charge my EV off of a 100% off grid solar system. The sun provides enough energy in my small yard for 2-3x my driving needs.
I think that's why Alabama despite all its flaws doesn't have quite as much projected warming as other southern states: lots of trees.
show comments
schaefer
As a matter of local trivia, today (2025.07.01) we had a wind storm in vegas that downed many trees. :)
gerdesj
I've just been presented with a captcha thingie asking me to select all things that can be picked up by a pair of chopsticks described as "the tool in the image"
Fuck off.
Then that vanished and another even more vapid effort appeared.
Fuck off.
If you need to piss around with this sort of nonsense, you probably shouldn't be entrusted with a website.
show comments
EGreg
Is it just me, or has anyone also noticed that trees in southern climates closer to the equator (not jungles) have very few leaves and shade as opposed to trees in climates away from the equator (not tundras)?
What happens if you import northern US trees, the ones that produce a lot of shade, into southern states? Has this been tried?
It is also why there is very little shade in, say, Florida. Only occasional parts of the Martin Grade “scenic” highway look like a regular scene in the north.
show comments
jgord
any group strategy to push back against the overuse of whole-page captchas ?
Do we all need to run an AI browser plugin now that auto-fills cloudflare captchas ?
matthewfcarlson
Surprise surprise, vegetation is way better than concrete when it comes to being comfortable in a city
There is a place in So Cal now called The Aspens South Coast we lived in 30 years ago. It has (had?) an incredibly dense concentration of trees, something I’ve not seen since in that region, which is of course desert.
This time of year when you opened the gate that separated the treed interior from the parking lot you felt like the air conditioning had been turned on. We have very fond memories of the place. Its only disadvantage for me was that spring caused my allergies to go crazy.
Totally worth it.
Genuine question for people in the field. My understanding is that the cooling effect of trees is primarily driven by evaporative cooling. That is, the shade effect only really exists because the plant does not shrivel up and die due to storing water. How much more effective are trees vs. big swamp coolers? Even in this article, they admit that daytime cooling of half a degree requires 3 times more water.
Related:
Las Vegas is embracing a simple climate solution: More trees (npr.org) 21 days ago | 143 comments https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44231151
Nights in Las Vegas Are Becoming Dangerously Hot (nytimes.com) 10 months ago | 1 comment https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41223831
I recently bought some wooded land and unlike most people I know I've been extremely selective cutting down trees on it.
It's actually comfortable to be outside there. Even in the summer it's almost completely shaded. I was kind of surprised how extreme it is. I know trees make it harder to work and if you're hiring people they probably can't tolerate it but since I'm doing everything myself I don't have to clear everything and wait for it to grow back.
I don’t think planting trees is only for cooling things down. Sometimes it’s just about helping people feel like they can go outside. In really hot places, even a bit of shade can change your mind about stepping out.
That captcha sure reduces the effectiveness of me reading that by 100%.
Why is Las Vegas, NV referred to as ‘Vegas’, but Los Angeles, CA is not referred to as ‘Angeles’?
I'm sure any future endeavor to plant trees in the goddamn desert will have no negative environmental consequences at all. It's not as if the city in the goddamn desert is already in the middle of a regional water crisis as of last year or anything...
https://www.knpr.org/show/knprs-state-of-nevada/2024-08-29/w...
This needing a study is like the discovery in Idiocracy that soil needs to be watered with water, not Brawndo's soft drink.
Plant trees, not ACs...
North America's greed for energy resources is just bonkers from an outside perspecive.
> The selected tree species is Bur Oak, given that it is included in the SNWA Regional Plant (SNWA 2021) list, it is marked as a street tree in the list...
Who the hell is planting oaks in Vegas? Oaks are non native and moderately water intensive trees. If this study is based on oaks, it calls into question the validity of the data since this is a tree that absolutely does not belong in the Mojave desert.
I've only scanned the abstract but the conclusion seems too weak given the other stated findings. Sure given different metrics (air temp vs radiant heat) may give different stories for different trees, but that wouldn't lead me to conclude it needs to be evaluated on a "case by case basis" more so than the metric depends. That is not the same thing as "case by case basis."
They should be more proud of their findings. Why insult it out of the gate?
I saw video last week in India there was similar experiment done in sun the temperature 45 degrees C and 30 step walk under the tree the temperature 36 degrees C. We need more trees as an easy solution
This is a repeating study, seeing this again and again, so not sure about its novelty.
In Europe we even assigned our first "Chief Heat Officer", which makes total sense.
The best way to produce shade in the Nevada desert is with solar panels.
The sky is rarely cloudy and solar just blasts all day every day here.
I covered my backyard in Vegas with ground panels and now I charge my EV off of a 100% off grid solar system. The sun provides enough energy in my small yard for 2-3x my driving needs.
I remember seeing similar heat reduction claims in a more tropical, non desert env. https://reasonstobecheerful.world/green-corridors-medellin-c...
I think that's why Alabama despite all its flaws doesn't have quite as much projected warming as other southern states: lots of trees.
As a matter of local trivia, today (2025.07.01) we had a wind storm in vegas that downed many trees. :)
I've just been presented with a captcha thingie asking me to select all things that can be picked up by a pair of chopsticks described as "the tool in the image"
Fuck off.
Then that vanished and another even more vapid effort appeared.
Fuck off.
If you need to piss around with this sort of nonsense, you probably shouldn't be entrusted with a website.
Is it just me, or has anyone also noticed that trees in southern climates closer to the equator (not jungles) have very few leaves and shade as opposed to trees in climates away from the equator (not tundras)?
What happens if you import northern US trees, the ones that produce a lot of shade, into southern states? Has this been tried?
It is also why there is very little shade in, say, Florida. Only occasional parts of the Martin Grade “scenic” highway look like a regular scene in the north.
any group strategy to push back against the overuse of whole-page captchas ?
Do we all need to run an AI browser plugin now that auto-fills cloudflare captchas ?
Surprise surprise, vegetation is way better than concrete when it comes to being comfortable in a city