Bringing Forest Carbon into Focus: Improved Estimates of Carbon Benefits from Avoided Forest Conversion in New England and New York

Climate change is a global problem and limiting global warming below the 2°C threshold set by the Paris Climate Agreement will require both reductions in new greenhouse gas emissions and removal of existing gases from the atmosphere. Natural Climate Solutions (NCS) is a portfolio of conservation, restoration, and improved land management actions that increase carbon storage or avoid greenhouse gas emissions across forests, wetlands, grasslands, and agricultural lands. This project’s aim is to assess the climate change mitigation potential of NCS opportunities in the northeastern U.S. The work will refine and tailor methods developed in previous studies, including more detailed and quantitative assessment of the albedo-induced radiative forcing and associated CO2 equivalent emissions that would be caused by the avoidance of forest conversion (deforestation), by expanded forest cover (afforestation), or by actively increasing the deciduous component of forest species composition in select regions of New England and New York.