Global carbon dioxide removal rates from forest landscape restoration activities

Abstract

BackgroundForest landscape restoration (FLR) has been adopted by governments and practitioners across the globe to mitigate and adapt to climate change and restore ecological functions across degraded landscapes. However, the extent to which these activities capture CO2 with associated climate mitigation impacts are poorly known, especially in geographies where data on biomass growth of restored forests are limited or do not exist. To fill this gap, we developed biomass accumulation rates for a set of FLR activities (natural regeneration, planted forests and woodlots, agroforestry, and mangrove restoration) across the globe and global CO2 removal rates with corresponding confidence intervals, grouped by FLR activity and region/climate.ResultsPlanted forests and woodlots were found to have the highest CO2 removal rates, ranging from 4.5 to 40.7 t CO2 ha−1 year−1 during the first 20 years of growth. Mangrove tree restoration was the second most efficient FLR at removing CO2, with growth rates up to 23.1 t CO2 ha−1 year−1 the first 20 years post restoration. Natural regeneration removal rates were 9.1–18.8 t CO2 ha−1 year−1 during the first 20 years of forest regeneration, followed by agroforestry, the FLR category with the lowest and regionally broad removal rates (10.8–15.6 t CO2 ha−1 year−1). Biomass growth data was most abundant and widely distributed across the world for planted forests and natural regeneration, representing 45% and 32% of all the data points assessed, respectively. Agroforestry studies, were only found in Africa, Asia, and the Latin America and Caribbean regions.ConclusionThis study represents the most comprehensive review of published literature on tree growth and CO2 removals to date, which we operationalized by constructing removal rates for specific FLR activities across the globe. These rates can easily be applied by practitioners and decision-makers seeking to better understand the positive climate mitigation impacts of existing or planned FLR actions, or by countries making restoration pledges under the Bonn Challenge Commitments or fulfilling Nationally Determined Contributions to the UNFCCC, thereby helping boost FLR efforts world-wide.Electronic supplementary materialThe online version of this article (10.1186/s13021-018-0110-8) contains supplementary material, which is available to authorized users.

Global Woody Biomass Harvest Volumes and Forest Area Use Under Different SSP-RCP Scenarios

“…It is unclear if potential biomass stocks should be used for primary forests, because there is not sufficiently inventory data available on primary forests in the global level (Baccini et al, 2017;Erb et al, 2018;Pugh et al, 2019). Moreover, it is unclear if managed and secondary forests can be fully recovered back to primary forests (Ferreira et al, 2014;Chazdon and Guariguata, 2016;Berenguer et al, 2018;Bernal et al, 2018). Finally, primary forests may not achieve their potential biomass stocks, because they are exposed to natural disturbances (Kauppi et al, 2018).…”

Ecosystem-Based Approaches to Bioenergy and the Need for Regenerative Supply Options for Africa

“…Here, we use restoration scenarios with different restoration options having different biomass stocking potentials (Table 1). We derived dry biomass equivalents for the emission values presented in Bernal et al [40]. For conversions, we used an average wood fraction of 0.47 from the total biomass [41].…”

Tourism and rewilding: an introduction – definition, issues and review

“…Navarro and Pereira (2015) suggest that at the regional scale rewilded abandoned agricultural areas can, provide habitat for biodiversity with conservation results as high as or higher than that other land management options. Minimal intervention forest regrowth is regarded as an important means of carbon sequestration (Ciccarese, Mattsson, & Pettenella, 2012;Kuemmerle et al, 2008), although not as great as planted forests and woodlots in the first 20 years of growth (Bernal, Murray, & Pearson, 2018), along with improvements in soil and water quality (Chazdon, 2008;Götmark, 2013;Qi, Li, Zhang, & Zhang, 2019), and may be especially important for water regulation so as to reduce flooding (Carver, 2016). Large-scale forest restoration can also have considerable aesthetic and cultural benefits (Lamb, 2018), including recreation and tourism.…”