title: High-resolution forest carbon stocks and emissions in the Amazon.
abstract: Efforts to mitigate climate change through the Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD) depend on mapping and monitoring of tropical forest carbon stocks and emissions over large geographic areas. With a new integrated use of satellite imaging, airborne light detection and ranging, and field plots, we mapped aboveground carbon stocks and emissions at 0.1-ha resolution over 4.3 million ha of the Peruvian Amazon, an area twice that of all forests in Costa Rica, to reveal the determinants of forest carbon density and to demonstrate the feasibility of mapping carbon emissions for REDD. We discovered previously unknown variation in carbon storage at multiple scales based on geologic substrate and forest type. From 1999 to 2009, emissions from land use totaled 1.1% of the standing carbon throughout the region. Forest degradation, such as from selective logging, increased regional carbon emissions by 47% over deforestation alone, and secondary regrowth provided an 18% offset against total gross emissions. Very high-resolution monitoring reduces uncertainty in carbon emissions for REDD programs while uncovering fundamental environmental controls on forest carbon storage and their interactions with land-use change.
authors.affiliation: Department of Global Ecology, Carnegie Institution for Science, Stanford, CA 94305, USA. gpa@stanford.edu
authors.forename: Gregory P
authors.initials: GP
authors.lastname: Asner
authors.forename: George V N
authors.initials: GV
authors.lastname: Powell
authors.forename: Joseph
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Mascaro
authors.forename: David E
authors.initials: DE
authors.lastname: Knapp
authors.forename: John K
authors.initials: JK
authors.lastname: Clark
authors.forename: James
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Jacobson
authors.forename: Ty
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Kennedy-Bowdoin
authors.forename: Aravindh
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Balaji
authors.forename: Guayana
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Paez-Acosta
authors.forename: Eloy
authors.initials: E
authors.lastname: Victoria
authors.forename: Laura
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Secada
authors.forename: Michael
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Valqui
authors.forename: R Flint
authors.initials: RF
authors.lastname: Hughes
mesh_terms: D018533:Biomass; D002244:Carbon / Q000378:metabolism*; D057231:Climate Change; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources; D017753:Ecosystem; D055593:Geological Phenomena; D010568:Peru; D045483:Rivers; D014197:Trees / Q000254:growth & development / Q000378:metabolism*; D014480:United Nations
chemical_list: D002244:Carbon
references.citation: Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2008 Jul 8;105(27):9439-44
references.pmid: 18591652
references.citation: Science. 1998 Oct 16;282(5388):439-42
references.pmid: 9774263