Extending Forest Rotation Age for Carbon Sequestration: A Cross-Protocol Comparison of Carbon Offsets of North American Forests
Date
2009-04-22
Author
Advisors
Richter, Daniel deB.
Galik, Christopher
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Abstract
As the issue of climate change rises in prominence, growing attention is being paid
to the ability of forests to mitigate rising atmospheric concentrations of CO2. Through
carbon offset programs, forest owners can be offered financial incentives to enhance
the uptake and storage of carbon on their lands. This project presents a modeling
framework within which the creditable carbon potential can be quantified from extending
the rotation age of multiple forest stands. The differences in creditable carbon
potential from rotation extensions across several North American forest types are
explored. Additionally, the model enables the comparison of project creditable carbon
amongst three accounting methodologies: the Department of Energy 1605b Registry, the
Chicago Climate Exchange Protocol, and the Voluntary Carbon Standard Protocol. There
are important methodological differences between these carbon accounting schemes which
have implications to both forest owners and policymakers alike. It is shown here
that the inclusion of methodologies to account for such issues as leakage, permanence,
additionality and baseline-establishment, while increasing the overall legitimacy
of any forest carbon offset program, can reduce creditable carbon to the forest owner
by up to 70%. Regardless of the protocol used, Pacific Northwest forest types emerge
as the most effective at sequestering carbon on a per area basis.
Type
Master's projectPermalink
https://hdl.handle.net/10161/960Citation
Foley, Timothy (2009). Extending Forest Rotation Age for Carbon Sequestration: A Cross-Protocol Comparison
of Carbon Offsets of North American Forests. Master's project, Duke University. Retrieved from https://hdl.handle.net/10161/960.Collections
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