scholarly journals The Role of Forests in Climate Change Mitigation: The EU Context

2021 ◽  
pp. 507-520
Author(s):  
Matteo Vizzarri ◽  
Roberto Pilli ◽  
Anu Korosuo ◽  
Ludovico Frate ◽  
Giacomo Grassi
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Carbon Sink ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Forest Growth ◽  
Carbon Accumulation ◽  
Reference Level ◽  
Forest Sector ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Carbon Neutrality ◽  
The Eu

AbstractThe European Union (EU) aims at reaching carbon neutrality by 2050. Within the land use, land-use change, and forestry (LULUCF) sector, forestry will contribute to this target with CO2 sink, harvested wood products (HWP), and use of wood for material or energy substitution. Despite the fact that the forest sink currently offsets about 9% of the total EU GHG emissions, evaluating its future mitigation potential is challenging because of the complex interactions between human and natural impacts on forest growth and carbon accumulation. The Regulation (EU) 2018/841 has improved robustness, accuracy, and credibility of the accounting of GHG emissions and removals in the LULUCF sector. For the forest sector, the accounting is based on the Forest Reference Level (FRL), i.e., a projected country-specific value of GHG emissions and removals against which the actual GHG emissions and removals will be compared. The resulting difference will count toward the EU GHG target for the period 2021–2030. Here, we provide an overview of the contribution of forests and HWP to the EU carbon sink for the period 2021–2025 (proposed FRLs) and focus on the contribution of mountain forests to the EU carbon sink, through exploring co-benefits and adverse side effects between climate regulation and other ecosystem services.

scholarly journals An attempt to assess the monetary value of carbon absorbed in the Polish forest sector

2018 ◽  
Vol 60 (1) ◽  
pp. 3-10
Author(s):  
Krzysztof Jabłoński ◽  
Włodzimierz Stempski
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Forest Management ◽  
Emissions Trading ◽  
Carbon Sink ◽  
High Price ◽  
Reference Level ◽  
Trading System ◽  
Climate Convention ◽  
Emissions Trading System ◽  
The Eu

Abstract Forests and forest management play a vital role in capture and storage of carbon dioxide, which contributes to mitigation of climate change. Forests are not only a natural carbon sink. Proper forest management can enhance biomass production, providing wood to be converted into e.g. construction timber, paper and furniture as well as wood fuels and, as a result, considerably enlarge this carbon sink. Poland, being a party of the Climate Convention and Kyoto Protocol and a member of the EU is obliged to provide yearly reports on carbon emissions and sequestration, including the Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) sector, of which forestry is the leading constituent. Forests, with the sequestration rate at a level of 3.93 t CO2·ha−1 form practically the only important carbon sink in the LULUCF category. Unfortunately the LULUCF sector has not been yet included in the current climate policy framework. The purpose of the study was an attempt to estimate the hypothetical value of carbon stored in forestry, resulting from the reported quantities of the emitted and sequestered carbon. The calculations were based on figures included in the National Inventory Report for Poland, reported yearly to the Secretariat of the Climate Convention. Among the forestry carbon sources/sinks, reported annually, the sequestration resulting from forest management significantly exceeds the net sequestration from afforestation/deforestation activities. Average data from recent years show that forest management is a net CO2 sink, with 12 Mt CO2·y−1 (above the forest management reference level, FMRL), and when combined with the carbon pool change resulting from afforestation/deforestation activities, it can be regarded as a net carbon sink sequestering nearly 15 Mt CO2·y−1. That value, when multiplied by the price of carbon emission allowance (e.g. EUA), could be a source of over 80 mill Euros per year, if used as a commodity on the emissions market. Due to high price volatility of CO2 emission allowances, the calculated profits are hypothetical, and the EU Emissions Trading System does not include forestry. These potential gains can become realistic after the LULUCF sector has been included in the emissions trading system.

scholarly journals Economic and Environmental Consequences of the ECJ Genome Editing Judgment in Agriculture

Agronomy ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 11 (6) ◽  
pp. 1212
Author(s):  
Alexander Gocht ◽  
Nicola Consmüller ◽  
Ferike Thom ◽  
Harald Grethe
Keyword(s):  
Genome Editing ◽  
Agricultural Sector ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Food Products ◽  
Food Prices ◽  
Farm Income ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Environmental Consequences ◽  
European Court ◽  
The Eu

Genome-edited crops are on the verge of being placed on the market and their agricultural and food products will thus be internationally traded soon. National regulations, however, diverge regarding the classification of genome-edited crops. Major countries such as the US and Brazil do not specifically regulate genome-edited crops, while in the European Union, they fall under GMO legislation, according to the European Court of Justice (ECJ). As it is in some cases impossible to analytically distinguish between products from genome-edited plants and those from non-genome-edited plants, EU importers may fear the risk of violating EU legislation. They may choose not to import any agricultural and food products based on crops for which genome-edited varieties are available. Therefore, crop products of which the EU is currently a net importer would become more expensive in the EU, and production would intensify. Furthermore, an intense substitution of products covered and not covered by genome editing would occur in consumption, production, and trade. We analyzed the effects of such a cease of EU imports for cereals and soy in the EU agricultural sector with the comparative static agricultural sector equilibrium model CAPRI. Our results indicate dramatic effects on agricultural and food prices as well as on farm income. The intensification of EU agriculture may result in negative net environmental effects in the EU as well as in an increase in global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. This suggests that trade effects should be considered when developing domestic regulation for genome-edited crops.

scholarly journals Deep Decarbonisation from a Biophysical Perspective: GHG Emissions of a Renewable Electricity Transformation in the EU

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (10) ◽  
pp. 3685 ◽  
Author(s):  
Louisa Di Felice ◽  
Maddalena Ripa ◽  
Mario Giampietro
Keyword(s):  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Large Role ◽  
Renewable Electricity ◽  
Power Sector ◽  
Steady Decrease ◽  
Industrialised Countries ◽  
Support Decision Making ◽  
The Eu ◽  
New Infrastructure

In light of climate change and security concerns, decarbonisation has become a priority for industrialised countries. In the European Union (EU), decarbonisation scenarios used to support decision-making predict a steady decrease in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, mostly driven by changes in production mixes and improvements in efficiency. In the EU’s decarbonisation pathways, the power sector plays a large role, reaching zero emissions by 2050. From a biophysical perspective, decarbonisation becomes not just a matter of replacing carbon-intensive with carbon-neutral electricity flows, but also a matter of building and maintaining new infrastructure (funds) which, in turn, is associated with GHG emissions. By not accounting for the emissions associated with funds, particularly those required to increase grid flexibility, scenarios used to inform decarbonisation narratives in the EU are missing a key part of the picture. We show that a rapid and deep decarbonisation of the EU’s power sector through a production-side transition between the years 2020 and 2050 leads to cumulative emissions of the order of 21–25 Gt of CO2 equivalent, within a range of approximately 35–45%. The results are obtained by modelling two decarbonisation pathways where grid flexibility increases either through storage or through curtailment. The analysis suggests that scenarios informing decarbonisation policies in the EU are optimistic and may lead to a narrow focus on sustainable production transformations. This minimises the perceived urgency of reducing overall energy consumption to stay within safe carbon budgets.

scholarly journals Beneficial land-use change in Europe: deployment scenarios for multifunctional riparian buffers and windbreaks

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Oskar Englund ◽  
Pål Börjesson ◽  
Blas Mola-Yudego ◽  
Göran Berndes ◽  
Ioannis Dimitriou ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Biomass Production ◽  
Large Scale ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Riparian Buffers ◽  
Environmental Benefits ◽  
Land Use Impacts ◽  
Eu Member States ◽  
The Eu

Abstract The land sector needs to increase biomass production to meet multiple demands while reducing negative land use impacts and transitioning from being a source to being a sink of carbon. The new Common Agricultural Policy of the EU (CAP) steers towards a more needs-based, targeted approach to addressing multiple environmental and climatic objectives, in coherence with other EU policies. In relation to this, new schemes are developed to offer farmers direct payments to adapt practices beneficial for climate, water, soil, air and biodiversity. Multifunctional biomass production systems have potential to reduce environmental impacts from agriculture while maintaining or increasing biomass production for the bioeconomy across Europe. Here, we present the first attempt to model the deployment of two such systems, riparian buffers and windbreaks, across >81.000 landscapes in Europe (EU27 + UK), aiming to quantify the resulting ecosystem services and environmental benefits, considering three deployment scenarios with different incentives for implementation. We found that these multifunctional biomass production systems can reduce N emissions to water and soil loss by wind erosion, respectively, down to a “low” impact level all over Europe, while simultaneously providing substantial environmental co-benefits, using less than 1% of the area under annual crops in the EU. The GHG emissions savings of utilizing the biomass produced in these systems for replacing fossil alternatives, combined with the increases in soil organic carbon, correspond to 1-1,4% of total GHG emissions in EU28. The introduction of “eco-schemes” in the new CAP may resolve some of the main barriers to implementation of large-scale multifunctional biomass production systems. Increasing the knowledge of these opportunities among all EU member states, before designing and introducing country-specific Eco-scheme options in the new CAP, is critical.

scholarly journals Globalization and GHG Emissions in the EU: Do We Need a New Development Paradigm?

2021 ◽  
Vol 13 (17) ◽  
pp. 9936
Author(s):  
Nela Vlahinić Lenz ◽  
Barbara Fajdetić
Keyword(s):  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Climate Impacts ◽  
Environmental Taxes ◽  
Hydrogen Energy ◽  
Low Carbon ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Climate Effect ◽  
Development Path ◽  
New Development ◽  
The Eu

The European Union (EU) has adopted a new development strategy based on “green” growth and announced carbon neutrality by 2050. Still, the EU’s previous development path was mainly based on trade openness and globalization, with positive economic and negative climate impacts. The aim of this paper was to test the hypothesis of globalization-induced carbon emissions in order to evaluate a possible future development path. The Arellano–Bond estimator was employed for dynamic panel analysis in 26 EU countries over the period 2000–2018. A significant and positive relationship was found between economic globalization and passenger mobility and greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, while environmental taxes can correct the negative climate effect. On the other hand, social and political dimensions of globalization reduce negative climate impacts. To achieve net zero emissions, the EU needs to continue its global climate leadership, extend the use of environmental taxes, and stimulate economic growth based on low-carbon technologies such as hydrogen, energy storage, and CCUS.

scholarly journals European union emissions trading system with regard to climate change mitigation in Latvia

2012 ◽  
Vol 8 (-1) ◽  
pp. 29-35 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ilze Pruse
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Climate Change Mitigation ◽  
Emissions Trading ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Eu Ets ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Ghg Emission ◽  
Trading System ◽  
Change Mitigation ◽  
The Eu

Abstract The goal of this paper is to analyse the volumes of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from the European Union Emissions Trading System’s (EU ETS) participants in Latvia in relation to their participation therein. After describing and discussing the EU ETS mechanism and its operation in Latvia in the period 2005-2010, the interconnectedness between the GHG emissions and the EU ETS participants’ operation is analysed. The analysis concludes that, although the EU ETS has contributed towards GHG emission reduction, due to the growth of the economy, overall GHG emissions from the EU ETS participants in Latvia are increasing.

ENVIRONMENTAL CONSUMPTION TAXES ON ANIMAL FOOD PRODUCTS TO MITIGATE GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS FROM THE EUROPEAN UNION

2018 ◽  
Vol 09 (04) ◽  
pp. 1850009 ◽  
Author(s):  
TORBJÖRN JANSSON ◽  
SARAH SÄLL
Keyword(s):  
European Union ◽  
Greenhouse Gas ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Demand Elasticity ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Policy Reforms ◽  
Animal Products ◽  
Reduce Emissions ◽  
Consumption Taxes ◽  
The Eu

Livestock cause around 10% of total greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in the European Union. Despite the large quantities, no economic policy is in place to reduce emissions from the sector. In this paper, we introduce consumption taxes on animal products in the European Union to reduce GHG emissions. Impacts are simulated using the CAPRI model, which was created to analyze the impacts of agricultural policy reforms within the EU. Tax levels of 16, 60 and 290 Euro per ton of GHG emissions are used in the estimations. Our results show that consumption taxes have small mitigation effects, up to 4.9% of total agricultural emissions from the EU-27, mainly due to inelastic demand. The main source of reductions is beef and France is the country where most reductions would take place, given high levels of production and consumption in the country, combined with a large demand elasticity of beef.

The Product Carbon Footprint of EU beet sugar (Part I)

2012 ◽  
pp. 169-177 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ingo Klenk ◽  
Birgit Landquist ◽  
Oscar Ruiz de Imana
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Environmental Sustainability ◽  
Production Systems ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
Cane Sugar ◽  
Average Case ◽  
Methodological Choices ◽  
Land Use Efficiency ◽  
Beet Sugar ◽  
The Eu

The calculations made to obtain the PCF of EU white sugar from sugar beet have revealed that the results are extremely sensitive to methodological choices and this article provides some recommendations in that regard. A comparison of EU beet sugar with two examples of raw cane sugar imported and refined in the EU, showed that the PCF range for EU refined cane sugar is on average similar, if not higher (642–760 kg CO2eq/t sugar) than the total methodological PCF range for the EU beet sugar average case (242–771 kg CO2eq/t sugar). A review of the published literature revealed, on the one hand, that land use change emissions for cane sugar can be very significant but are rarely taken into account, and on the other hand, that overseas transport and refining adds a significant amount of emissions to the PCF of raw cane sugar imported into the EU. An overall land use efficiency comparison between cane and beet production systems also concluded that significantly more land (51%) is required by cane systems to produce an equivalent set of products (sugar and co-products) with an equivalent amount of GHG emissions. Finally, the limitations of PCFs as a tool to evaluate the overall environmental sustainability of EU beet sugar were also analysed

Assessing impacts of urban form on GHG emission with high-resolution spatial grids to implement nature-based solutions for carbon neutral cities

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica Page ◽  
Haozhi Pan ◽  
Zahra Kalantari
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
High Resolution ◽  
Urban Form ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Anthropogenic Activities ◽  
Ghg Emissions ◽  
The European Union ◽  
Land Use Pattern ◽  
Net Zero ◽  
The Impact

<p>Globally, urban areas contribute significantly to the emissions of the greenhouse gases (GHGs) which are leading to anthropogenic climate change. To achieve long-term sustainable development goals, urban regions will need to grow and develop in such a way that they can both provide a good quality of life for all of their inhabitants, and also reduce and offset their GHG emissions to reach and maintain net-zero GHG emissions.</p><p>This work aims to further our understanding of the impact of urban form and growth on GHG emissions, to identify ways in which nature-based solutions (NBS) can be integrated into urban planning to help cities reach net zero emissions while continuing to grow sustainably. We will conduct a high-resolution (1x1km) spatial accounting and mapping of GHG emissions from selected urban anthropogenic activities (residential, commercial, transportation) for Stockholm, Sweden which includes those factors relevant to and impacted by urban form (such as density, land use pattern transportation networks, green spaces) to allow for the analysis of different types of city spatial patterns and planning decisions and their implications in GHG emissions. The results will be further expanded to cities across the European Union (EU) for comparison. Conclusions will be drawn about where and how NBS interventions should be used most effectively to reduce urban GHG emissions and facilitate sustainable city growth in the future.</p><p><strong>Keywords:</strong> Sustainable cities; Land-use; Greenhouse Gas Emissions; Nature-based Solutions</p>

The Forest Sector in the 2030 EU Climate Policy Framework: Looking back to Assess Its Future

2021 ◽  
Vol 18 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 124-142
Author(s):  
Kathrin Böhling ◽  
Maria Fernanda Marques Todeschini
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Climate Policy ◽  
Policy Framework ◽  
Climate Mitigation ◽  
Forest Sector ◽  
Carbon Neutrality ◽  
Wide System ◽  
Climate Action ◽  
Significant Step ◽  
Coalitional Politics

Abstract From 2021 onwards, forests and forestry will for the first time contribute to the European Union’s climate action targets. The new Land Use, Land Use Change & Forestry (lulucf) Regulation commits Member States to achieve carbon neutrality on the basis of an EU-wide system. The system accounts for carbon sequestered and emitted from forests and other land uses like crop- and wetland. What looks like a significant step in the Union’s climate policy framework, however, leaves the large potential of Europe’s forest sector for climate mitigation untapped. The present article draws this conclusion from a comprehensive analysis of 67 documents related to decision-making on the lulucf Regulation. It reveals coalitional politics and the salience of the Commission’s behavior as key to explain the Regulation’s limited scope and concludes with assessing the future role of forests in the Union’s climate policy framework.

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