Trees are sometimes said to lower albedo, supposedly making the Earth’s surface darker and thus absorbing more heat. But in fact, forests result in greater cloud formation overhead, significantly raising albedo - and bringing much-needed rain. "... for midlatitude regions, the cooling effect of clouds — in combination with that of carbon sequestration — outweighed the solar radiation that forested areas absorbed. The models showed that clouds form more frequently over forested areas than over grasslands and other areas with short vegetation, and that this enhanced cloud formation had a cooling effect on Earth’s atmosphere. The researchers observed from the satellite data that clouds also tend to form earlier in the afternoon over forested areas, which results in a longer duration of cloud cover and more time for clouds to reflect solar radiation away from the Earth."