Improving Estimates of Avoided Forest Conversion Carbon Accounting

w cost solutions are critical for the rapid transition to the low-carbon economies needed to meet climate goals. Avoided forest conversion offers the second highest climate mitigation potential (behind reforestation) of the 20 natural climate solution pathways. Importantly, avoided forest conversion could deliver over forty percent of total emissions reductions at <$10 per ton CO2e. Marsh Institute Research Scientist Natalia Hasler received funding from The Nature Conservancy (TNC) for the project SCI Climate Science, which will improve upon prior approaches to forest conversion carbon accounting by incorporating albedo (the amount of energy absorbed by the Earth’s surface) impacts on local and global climate in generating estimates. The new and improved data will be incorporated into TNC’s naturebase.org website, a publicly available natural climate solution web platform.

For full project descriptions, see the Marsh Institute Research Projects web page.