A comparison of baseline methodologies for 'Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation'

Huettner, Michael; Leemans, Rik; Kok, Kasper; Ebeling, Johannes

doi:10.1186/1750-0680-4-4

Cited by 63 publications

(51 citation statements)

References 19 publications

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“…A similar issue has been identified in assessing emissions reductions from avoiding deforestation and forest degradation (REDD): calculated emissions credits are highly dependent on the selected baseline to which future forest carbon stocks are compared (Huettner et al, 2009;Griscom et al, 2009;Sloan and Pelletier, 2012).…”

Section: Forest Carbon Accounting Approachesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Forest carbon accounting methods and the consequences of forest bioenergy for national greenhouse gas emissions inventories

McKechnie

Colombo

MacLean

2014

Environmental Science & Policy

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While bioenergy plays a key role in strategies for increasing renewable energy deployment, studies assessing greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from forest bioenergy systems have identified a potential trade-off of the system with forest carbon stocks. Of particular importance to national GHG inventories is how trade-offs between forest carbon stocks and bioenergy production are accounted for within the Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use (AFOLU) sector under current and future international climate change mitigation agreements. Through a case study of electricity produced using wood pellets from harvested forest stands in Ontario, Canada, this study assesses the implications of forest carbon accounting approaches on net emissions attributable to pellets produced for domestic use or export. Particular emphasis is placed on the Forest Management Reference Level (FMRL) method, as it will be employed by most Annex I nations in the next Kyoto Protocol Commitment Period. While bioenergy production is found to reduce forest carbon sequestration, under the FMRL approach this trade-off may not be accounted for and thus not incur an accountable AFOLU-related emission, provided that total forest harvest remains at or below that defined under the FMRL baseline. In contrast, accounting for forest carbon trade-offs associated with harvest for bioenergy results in an increase in net GHG emissions (AFOLU and life cycle emissions) lasting 37 or 90 years (if displacing coal or natural gas combined cycle generation, respectively). AFOLU emissions calculated using the Gross-Net approach are dominated by legacy effects of past management and natural disturbance, indicating near-term net forest carbon increase but longer-term reduction in forest carbon stocks. Export of wood pellets to EU markets does not greatly affect the total life cycle GHG emissions of wood pellets. However, pellet exporting countries risk creating a considerable GHG emissions burden, as they are responsible for AFOLU and bioenergy production emissions but do not receive credit for pellets displacing fossil fuel-related GHG emissions. Countries producing bioenergy from forest biomass, whether for domestic use or for export, should carefully consider potential implications of alternate forest carbon accounting methods to ensure that potential bioenergy pathways can contribute to GHG emissions reduction targets.

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Section: Forest Carbon Accounting Approachesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Forest carbon accounting methods and the consequences of forest bioenergy for national greenhouse gas emissions inventories

McKechnie

Colombo

MacLean

2014

Environmental Science & Policy

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“…Such baselines are critical for assessing an emission reduction operation as well as for negotiating meaningful targets. Therefore, one of the key tasks of REDD is to determine feasible, transparent, and sound deforestation emission baselines and accounting rules [30].…”

Section: Baseline Modelingmentioning

confidence: 99%

Opportunity Costs of Carbon Emissions Stemming from Changes in Land Use

Liu

2015

Sustainability

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Abstract:The REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) mechanism allows carbon sinks to be used as carbon credits in order to offset emissions from other sources. However, this practice has raised a number of issues relating to financial incentives. In this study, we develop a spatially explicit model for predicting carbon emissions from deforestation that meet baseline levels as well as farmers' opportunity costs (measured in US dollars per ton of CO2e) under three temporal scenarios with several potential discount rates for agricultural income. Additionally, we use two different accounting methods recommended by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), including the average storage method and the "ton-year approach," to evaluate emissions reductions. We find that farmers are more likely to prefer REDD in the short-run when discount rates are higher than 10%. However, further analysis indicates that opportunity costs would increase significantly over longer periods of time (middle-term schemes of 35 years or long-term schemes of 55 years), thereby dissuading farmers from choosing REDD. Our findings highlight the drawbacks in using REDD to mitigate global climate change and conserve forests based on farmers' financial incentives.

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“…Our paper attempts to provide further insights into how to choose the most robust and effective baseline methodology. This paper joins the literature dedicated to the optimal contract design of REDD schemes (Huettner et al 2009;Busch et al 2009Busch et al , 2011Sathaye et al 2011). We compare the impacts of four different baselines on REDD success.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…The historical baseline might, therefore, fail to account properly for the true opportunity costs 2 A.C. Pana and J. Gheyssens that landowners face. Trying to address these issues, several baseline methodologies have been proposed; for an overview, see Huettner et al (2009) and Griscom et al (2009). Our paper attempts to provide further insights into how to choose the most robust and effective baseline methodology.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Baseline choice and performance implications for REDD

Pana

Gheyssens²

2015

Journal of Environmental Economics and Policy

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Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD) projects are being designed and implemented across tropical countries, intending to curb the contribution of deforestation to greenhouse gas emissions. An important aspect of REDD implementation is the baseline against which reductions are measured. The baseline estimates the business-as-usual emissions from deforestation and forest degradation. We solve a dynamic model of land conversion from forest to agriculture in the presence of REDD, and assess the performance of four baselines. We show that none of the analysed baselines dominates in all performance aspects, and that the final baseline choice needs to maximise the trade-off between the effectiveness to reduce deforestation, cost-efficiency, and changes in income. The frequently used historical average baseline could be improved by using a forward-looking one, which is shown to better account for the opportunity costs faced by landowners. This result hinges on the ability of the baseline to predict deforestation rates without significant underestimations. We advocate the switch from a single-threshold baseline to a corridor methodology, which would provide continued incentives to reduce deforestation, even during periods of high opportunity costs. We finally show how the selection of certain baseline attributes, such as corridor bandwidth and symmetry, can enhance performance. Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and forest Degradation (REDD) projects are being designed and implemented across tropical countries, intending to curb the contribution of deforestation to greenhouse gas emissions. An important aspect of REDD implementation is the baseline against which reductions are measured. The baseline estimates the business-as-usual emissions from deforestation and forest degradation. We solve a dynamic model of land conversion from forest to agriculture in the presence of REDD, and assess the performance of four baselines. We show that none of the analysed baselines dominates in all performance aspects, and that the final baseline choice needs to maximise the trade-off between the effectiveness to reduce deforestation, cost-efficiency, and changes in income. The frequently used historical average baseline could be improved by using a forward-looking one, which is shown to better account for the opportunity costs faced by landowners. This result hinges on the ability of the baseline to predict deforestation rates without significant underestimations. We advocate the switch from a single-threshold baseline to a corridor methodology, which would provide continued incentives to reduce deforestation, even during periods of high opportunity costs. We finally show how the selection of certain baseline attributes, such as corridor bandwidth and symmetry, can enhance performance.

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A comparison of baseline methodologies for 'Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation'

Cited by 63 publications

References 19 publications

Forest carbon accounting methods and the consequences of forest bioenergy for national greenhouse gas emissions inventories

Forest carbon accounting methods and the consequences of forest bioenergy for national greenhouse gas emissions inventories

Opportunity Costs of Carbon Emissions Stemming from Changes in Land Use

Baseline choice and performance implications for REDD

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