Baseline map of carbon emissions from deforestation in tropical regions.
Policies to reduce emissions from deforestation would benefit from clearly derived, spatially explicit, statistically bounded estimates of carbon emissions. Existing efforts derive carbon impacts of land-use change using broad assumptions, unreliable data, or both. We improve on this approach using satellite observations of gross forest cover loss and a map of forest carbon stocks to estimate gross carbon emissions across tropical regions between 2000 and 2005 as 0.81 petagram of carbon per year, with a 90% prediction interval of 0.57 to 1.22 petagrams of carbon per year. This estimate is 25 to 50% of recently published estimates. By systematically matching areas of forest loss with their carbon stocks before clearing, these results serve as a more accurate benchmark for monitoring global progress on reducing emissions from deforestation.
Ecosystem Services Unit, Winrock International, Arlington, VA 22202, USA. nharris@winrock.org
Nancy L
NL
Harris
Sandra
S
Brown
Stephen C
SC
Hagen
Sassan S
SS
Saatchi
Silvia
S
Petrova
William
W
Salas
Matthew C
MC
Hansen
Peter V
PV
Potapov
Alexander
A
Lotsch
D017954:Africa South of the Sahara; D001208:Asia; D018533:Biomass; D002244:Carbon; D003247:Conservation of Natural Resources; D003906:Developing Countries; D017753:Ecosystem; D007843:Latin America; D009010:Monte Carlo Method; D058998:Remote Sensing Technology; D012987:Soil; D014197:Trees; D014329:Tropical Climate
D012987:Soil; D002244:Carbon