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Forests can sequester carbon dioxide, thereby reducing atmospheric concentrations and slowing global warming. In the U.S ., forest carbon stocks have increased as a result of regrowth following land abandonment and in-growth due to fire suppression, and they currently sequester approximately 10 % of annual US emissions.
This ecosystem service is recognized in greenhouse gas protocols and cap-and-trade mechanisms, yet forest carbon is valued equally regardless of forest type, an approach that fails to account for risk of carbon loss from disturbance. Here we show that incorporating wildfire risk reduces the value of forest carbon depending on the location and condition of the forest.
There is a general trend of decreasing risk-scaled forest carbon value moving from the northern toward the southern continental U.S. Because disturbance is a major ecological factor influencing long-term carbon storage and is sensitive to human management, carbon trading mechanisms should account for the reduction in value associated with disturbance risk.
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This risk can be accounted for rather simply by limiting the sale of forest carbon offsets to a subset of the claimed forest growth (say 80%). I.e., if you claim your forest stand grows 1000 tons of additional carbon, then you can only sell 800 tons of carbon offsets, the remaining 20% must still be protected and conserved in case some of your carbon (or someone else in the off-set program) burns up. Alternatively, we could make the buyers assume the risk by saying that if you want to buy forest carbon off-sets you have to buy 120% of the tons you are required to off-set, in case some of it burns.
This is not directly on point this slideshow helps clarify many misconceptions about forests, logging, and carbon:
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