Setting the forest reference levels in the European Union: overview and challenges

IF 3.9 3区环境科学与生态学 Q2 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES

Carbon Balance and Management Pub Date : 2021-07-31 DOI:10.1186/s13021-021-00185-4

Matteo Vizzarri, Roberto Pilli, Anu Korosuo, Viorel N. B. Blujdea, Simone Rossi, Giulia Fiorese, Raul Abad-Viñas, Rene R. Colditz, Giacomo Grassi

{"title":"Setting the forest reference levels in the European Union: overview and challenges","authors":"Matteo Vizzarri, Roberto Pilli, Anu Korosuo, Viorel N. B. Blujdea, Simone Rossi, Giulia Fiorese, Raul Abad-Viñas, Rene R. Colditz, Giacomo Grassi","doi":"10.1186/s13021-021-00185-4","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div><h3>Background</h3><p>The contribution of EU forests to climate change mitigation in 2021–2025 is assessed through the Forest Reference Levels (FRLs). The FRL is a projected country-level benchmark of net greenhouse gas emissions against which the future net emissions will be compared. The FRL models the hypothetical development of EU forest carbon sink if the historical management practices were continued, taking into account age dynamics. The Member States’ FRLs have been recently adopted by the European Commission with the delegated Regulation (EU) 2021/268 amending the Regulation (EU) 2018/841. Considering the complexity of interactions between forest growth, management and carbon fluxes, there is a need to understand uncertainties linked to the FRL determination.</p><h3>Results</h3><p>We assessed the methodologies behind the modelled FRLs and evaluated the foreseen impact of continuation of management practices and age dynamics on the near-future EU27 + UK forest carbon sink. Most of the countries implemented robust modelling approaches for simulating management practices and age dynamics within the FRL framework, but faced several challenges in ensuring consistency with historical estimates. We discuss that the projected 16% increase in harvest in 2021–2025 compared to 2000–2009, mostly attributed to age dynamics, is associated to a decline of 18% of forest sink (26% for living biomass only).</p><h3>Conclusions</h3><p>We conclude that the FRL exercise was challenging but improved the modelling capacity and data availability at country scale. The present study contributes to increase the transparency of the implementation of forest-related EU policies and provides evidence-based support to future policy development.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":505,"journal":{"name":"Carbon Balance and Management","volume":"16 1","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":3.9000,"publicationDate":"2021-07-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8325867/pdf/","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Carbon Balance and Management","FirstCategoryId":"89","ListUrlMain":"https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s13021-021-00185-4","RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"环境科学与生态学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q2","JCRName":"ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES","Score":null,"Total":0}

引用次数: 0

Abstract

Background

The contribution of EU forests to climate change mitigation in 2021–2025 is assessed through the Forest Reference Levels (FRLs). The FRL is a projected country-level benchmark of net greenhouse gas emissions against which the future net emissions will be compared. The FRL models the hypothetical development of EU forest carbon sink if the historical management practices were continued, taking into account age dynamics. The Member States’ FRLs have been recently adopted by the European Commission with the delegated Regulation (EU) 2021/268 amending the Regulation (EU) 2018/841. Considering the complexity of interactions between forest growth, management and carbon fluxes, there is a need to understand uncertainties linked to the FRL determination.

Results

We assessed the methodologies behind the modelled FRLs and evaluated the foreseen impact of continuation of management practices and age dynamics on the near-future EU27 + UK forest carbon sink. Most of the countries implemented robust modelling approaches for simulating management practices and age dynamics within the FRL framework, but faced several challenges in ensuring consistency with historical estimates. We discuss that the projected 16% increase in harvest in 2021–2025 compared to 2000–2009, mostly attributed to age dynamics, is associated to a decline of 18% of forest sink (26% for living biomass only).

Conclusions

We conclude that the FRL exercise was challenging but improved the modelling capacity and data availability at country scale. The present study contributes to increase the transparency of the implementation of forest-related EU policies and provides evidence-based support to future policy development.

Abstract Image

查看原文本刊更多论文

制定欧洲联盟森林参考水平：概述与挑战

背景2021-2025 年欧盟森林对减缓气候变化的贡献通过森林参考水平 (FRL) 进行评估。森林参考水平是一个预测的国家级温室气体净排放量基准，未来的净排放量将与之进行比较。在考虑到树龄动态的情况下，如果继续采用历史管理方法，森林参考水平将模拟欧盟森林碳汇的假设发展情况。欧盟委员会最近通过了成员国的 FRL，并发布了修订（欧盟）2018/841 号条例的（欧盟）2021/268 号委托条例。考虑到森林生长、管理和碳通量之间相互作用的复杂性，有必要了解与确定 FRL 相关的不确定性。结果我们评估了建模 FRL 背后的方法学，并评估了管理实践和龄期动态的持续性对欧盟 27 国和英国森林碳汇的预期影响。大多数国家都采用了稳健的建模方法，在森林碳汇框架内模拟管理实践和龄期动态，但在确保与历史估计保持一致方面面临着一些挑战。我们讨论了 2021-2025 年采伐量预计比 2000-2009 年增加 16%（主要归因于龄期动态）与森林碳汇减少 18%（仅活生物量减少 26%）的关系。本研究有助于提高欧盟森林相关政策实施的透明度，并为未来的政策制定提供循证支持。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

求助全文

约1分钟内获得全文求助全文

来源期刊

Carbon Balance and Management Environmental Science-Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law

CiteScore

7.60

自引率

0.00%

发文量

审稿时长

14 weeks

期刊介绍： Carbon Balance and Management is an open access, peer-reviewed online journal that encompasses all aspects of research aimed at developing a comprehensive policy relevant to the understanding of the global carbon cycle. The global carbon cycle involves important couplings between climate, atmospheric CO2 and the terrestrial and oceanic biospheres. The current transformation of the carbon cycle due to changes in climate and atmospheric composition is widely recognized as potentially dangerous for the biosphere and for the well-being of humankind, and therefore monitoring, understanding and predicting the evolution of the carbon cycle in the context of the whole biosphere (both terrestrial and marine) is a challenge to the scientific community. This demands interdisciplinary research and new approaches for studying geographical and temporal distributions of carbon pools and fluxes, control and feedback mechanisms of the carbon-climate system, points of intervention and windows of opportunity for managing the carbon-climate-human system. Carbon Balance and Management is a medium for researchers in the field to convey the results of their research across disciplinary boundaries. Through this dissemination of research, the journal aims to support the work of the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) and to provide governmental and non-governmental organizations with instantaneous access to continually emerging knowledge, including paradigm shifts and consensual views.