Have you ever seen a 400-foot-tall tree? Because I know I haven’t. If you were going through forests in Northern California, redwoods — monstrous trees that stand at 400 feet, or the equivalent of a 40-story building — wouldn’t be uncommon.

The redwood is not your average tree. Redwoods have been said to live from 1,000 to 3,000 years, and possibly even 5,000 years. They’ve probably seen more history than your history textbook could even tell you about.

Tree enthusiasts are trying to revive these ancient trees, partially for the possibility that redwoods could help change the effects of global warming.

But, how, do you make a 40-story tree out of just about nothing?

Cloning.

If you can clone a cat or dog, why can’t you clone a tree? According to an article in The New York Times, cloning trees would use a process called micropropagation — taking samples of the trees and feeding them with synthetic growth hormones.

How will this affect the rest of us?

Well, you can be certain you won’t see a redwood on your street corner any time soon, or in your backyard. Redwood clones are to be sold and then planted to finance this cloning project, according to David Milarch, the co-founder of the Archangel Ancient Tree Archive.

Redwoods were harvested in the twentieth century. What those deforestation people didn’t know is they were destroying history. “About 5 percent of the native old-growth redwoods remain,” speculate experts from The New York Times

Deforestation needs to stop. Trees are essential for life because they suck up all the carbon dioxide that we breathe out. If there are not trees to exchange this for oxygen, then the human species may cease to exist. Planting a redwood could help re-forest old woods, as well as suck up more carbon dioxide than the average tree because they have longer lifespans.

Although redwoods are not ideal to plant in a neighborhood, the idea of cloning trees should be taken into great consideration to help the environment. If more redwoods, or trees in general, were planted across the country — if not the world — each tree would help increase the exchange of carbon dioxide to oxygen and help reverse the global warming that continues to affect the world.

The changes won’t be instant, as much as we may wish, but the more redwoods that are cloned and planted, the more we are reversing the deforestation and effects of not recycling and being environmentally friendly over the years.