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Maximizing Carbon Benefits of Sustainable Forestry and Wood Utilization

This workshop discusses the importance of incorporating sustainable forestry and wood utilization in carbon accounting to maximize climate change mitigation. It highlights the discrepancies between US EPA, CalEPA, and transnational corporations in carbon accounting methodologies, and emphasizes the need for comprehensive accounting of all carbon pools and future growth rates. The workshop also explores the financial and carbon balance associated with different forestry management practices and the potential for future technology and market changes to impact carbon allocations.

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Maximizing Carbon Benefits of Sustainable Forestry and Wood Utilization

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  1. Californians all live in wood homes but don’t talk about where the wood came from Bill Stewart billstewart@berkeley.edu HWP Workshop April 27, 2018

  2. Only time the US EPA and Cal EPA agree: on not counting the full IPCC (2014) benefits of all harvested wood products in the social cost of carbon • US EPA suggests social cost of carbon should not include damages outside US and suggests using the Calpers like 7% discount rate • CalEPA’s ARB is primarily focusing on a very large and hetergenous set of lands (NWL) and ignoring wood for bioenergy potential and ignores the substitution benefits of using wood, not cement and steel, in buildings. Run it through their calculations, and the only projects that can get offset money are those that REDUCE sustainable harvest levels.. • Transnational corporations such as BP use a high social cost of carbon for internal planning. $40/tCO2 could spur new wood energy pathways – but won’t change HWP pathways.

  3. AB 1504 required carbon sequestration estimates for all timber harvest plans (THPs) • What to count? Full life cycle of sustainable forestry OR immediate changes in a few carbon pools when THP is an open regulatory document? • ‘Sustainable Forestry’ is the underlying theme of the Forest Practices Act – and it is a broader construct than simply annual accounting of forest carbon pools • For an individual landowner considering a THP, NTMP, or WFMP they need to consider their goals, the potential revenues and costs based on ever changing markets and regulations, and how much th

  4. Manage/Let Grow Ratio to yr 80 1.23

  5. Manage/Let Grow Ratio to yr 80 1.15

  6. Manage/Let Grow Ratio to yr 80 1.11

  7. Manage/Let Grow Ratio to yr 80 0.60 This is what matches up with the strict sectoral accounting – of ecosystem carbon and HWP carbon. The other benefits related to energy and substitution would show up as (unmeasurable slivers of ) reductions in fossil fuel energy, cement, steel, and other sectors. Adding up the slivers in one place is why scenario accounting is a useful complement for directing policy

  8. Accounting, accounting….. • The financial balance depends on what benefits generate revenue • The carbon balance depends on • The impact that forest management has on future growth rates (AB 1504 ecosystem measurements show a very significant carbon return to more active forest management) • Counting the pathways of all harvested tree volume – left in forest to decompose or burn, used initially for energy, put into products, what happens to the post-consumer ‘waste’ – to energy, to landfills, to decomposition • How changing technology and market prices can change future allocations – for instance a surcharge on decomposable materials that goes into landfills could fund more recovery and use of ‘natural’ natural gas – and that could improve the carbon footprint of HWPs – OR NOT (depending on what energy it displaces)

  9. Canadian and Swedish IPCC (2014) compliant forward looking scenario systems “The most climatically beneficial alternative, expressed as reduced cumulative radiative forcing, in both the short and long terms is a strategy aimed at high forest production, high residue recovery rate, and high efficiency utilization of harvested biomass. Active forest management with high harvest levels and efficient forest product utilization will provide more climate benefit, compared to reducing harvest and storing more carbon in the forest.” Gustavsson et al. 2017 The benefits only start to really add up after a few decades. Just like planting a seedling, the benefits of improved utilization products takes time to generate large benefits.

  10. Concluding Points • Count all the carbon pools – including wood energy even though it gets lost in massive energy sector in sectoral inventories • Current year carbon accounting is different than scenario accounting – and both are necessary • Investing in better, then best, technologies is key to long term progress

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