LULUCF

In Europe managed land (i.e. forests, grasslands, and croplands) in total takes up carbon from the atmosphere. Currently land based net removals offset about 8% of the total EU greenhouse gas emissions.

About LULUCF

It is important to consider the future development of emissions and removals from the land use sector when setting emission reduction targets. If the net carbon land sink would be reduced in the future, emissions reduction efforts would have to be even more ambitious to be effective. The ESM group has developed a methodology to project the emissions of greenhouse gases from land use, land use change and forestry (LULUCF) activities for EU countries, looking at emissions, reduction potentials and mitigation costs until 2030 and 2050.

Methodology

The economic backbone of the model cluster forms GLOBIOM. It takes up data on the development of GDP, population and bioenergy demand from external models or databases. GLOBIOM integrates global competition of 28 world regions for different commodities and provides the Global Forestry Model G4M with projected total wood production per region and information on the development of land and wood prices. G4M uses that input to project the development of forest area, forest biomass stocks, associated emissions and forestry Net Present Value.

By the introduction of a carbon price, e.g. in form of a tax, the potential for and costs of emission reduction and sink enhancement can be assessed at country level.

External models GLOBIOM and G4M are linked to (depending on project): POLES, PRIMES, CAPRI, EPIC, EFISCEN. 

LULUCF Projects


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Last edited: 22 July 2013

International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA)
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