“Mobilizing and Monitoring Climate Positive Efforts in Forests and Forestry”

Lomnessjøen and Storsjøen, Hedmark county, Norway. Photo: Ole Martin Bollandsås

Forest potential in the climate policy framework remains underutilized and significantly under-mobilized. Questions about the relative uncertainty surrounding the assessment of carbon content in soils and trees have been one problem. The introduction of strategies for encouraging climate friendly efforts on the part of landowners and other users of wood-based products represents another side of the problem. And finally, how forest carbon is accounted, and thus incentivised or not, in national, regional and international frameworks, represents a third problem. We address each of these at depth. We analyze national level strategies emerging in the context of the 2015 Paris Agreement and how these incentivise the role of forests and forest-based resources in the climate policy framework. Further, we analyze national level incentive systems for encouraging carbon friendly actions on the part of forest owners and consumers of harvested wood products. With this knowledge in hand, we consider new technologies and methods for the more accurate estimation of soil and tree carbon, from the national all the way down to the landowner level. Likewise, we investigate potential mitigation scenarios at the national and local level in three case studies (Netherlands, Romania and Sweden), analyzing response curves to economic and policy incentives. Finally, we analyze how international and regional climate change mitigation strategies can be better linked to subnational incentive systems. The goal is to promote methodologies that will provide a more accurate accounting of forest carbon, and permit the greater mobilization of forests and forest-based resources in national, regional and international climate policy frameworks.

See project pages for more information: http://www.forestinventory.no/forclimit