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Global mitigation potential of carbon stored in harvested wood products

Formally Refereed

Abstract

Carbon stored in harvested wood products (HWPs) can affect national greenhouse gas (GHG) inventories,
n which the production and end use of HWPs play a key role. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) provides guidance on HWP carbon accounting, which is sensitive to future developments of socioeconomic factors including population, income, and trade. We estimated the carbon stored within HWPs from 1961 to 2065 for 180 countries following IPCC carbon-accounting guidelines, consistent with Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAOSTAT) historical data and plausible futures outlined by the shared socioeconomic pathways. We found that the global HWP pool was a net annual sink of 335 Mt of CO2 equivalent (CO2e)·y−1 in 2015, offsetting substantial amounts of industrial processes within some countries, and as much as 441 Mt of CO2e·y−1 by 2030 under certain socioeconomic developments.

Keywords

carbon sequestration, harvested wood products, climate chang, forest sector, shared socioeconomic pathways

Citation

Johnston, Craig M. T.; Radeloff, Volker C. 2019. Global mitigation potential of carbon stored in harvested wood products. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. 116(29): 14526-14531. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1904231116.
Citations
https://www.fs.usda.gov/research/treesearch/58256