{"id":28421,"date":"2026-05-20T11:10:57","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T15:10:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/?post_type=story&p=28421"},"modified":"2026-05-20T11:10:58","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T15:10:58","slug":"clark-environmental-scientist-contributes-to-study-that-raises-questions-about-climate-solutions","status":"publish","type":"story","link":"https:\/\/www.clarku.edu\/news\/2026\/05\/20\/clark-environmental-scientist-contributes-to-study-that-raises-questions-about-climate-solutions\/","title":{"rendered":"Clark environmental scientist contributes to study that raises questions about climate solutions"},"content":{"rendered":"\n\n\n

Nature article highlights climate-driven risks to forests that could alter carbon-offset programs<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

The U.S. forests involved in carbon-offset programs \u2014 through which companies compensate for their greenhouse gas emissions \u2014 face significant and growing risks from climate-driven disturbances such as wildfire, drought, and insect outbreaks, according to a study published in Nature<\/em> on May 20.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The study\u2019s findings raise critical questions about the long-term reliability of these widely used climate solutions, which enable companies to fund projects that store carbon in forests, according to its authors. While forests can absorb large amounts of carbon dioxide, their research shows that this storage is far less permanent than many policies assume.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Geography
Professor Christopher A. Williams of Clark\u2019s School of Climate, Environment, and Society<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe research indicates that a large share of forest carbon offset projects face a significant chance of losing carbon over time, particularly as climate change intensifies disturbance patterns,\u201d says Christopher A. Williams<\/a>, a co-author and professor of geography and environmental science in Clark\u2019s School of Climate, Environment and Society<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

An well-known expert on the climate impacts of forests, Williams contributed to the study, \u201cForest carbon protocols underestimate climate-driven carbon loss risks<\/a>,\u201d by lead author Chao Wu, a former postdoctoral researcher in biology at the University of Utah and now an assistant professor at China\u2019s Tsinghua University, and senior author William Anderegg, professor of biology and leadership team member of the University\u2019s Wilkes Center for Climate Science & Policy. The research team included scientists from seven other universities and organizations.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cForests are facing increasing risks due to climate change. Those risks have been underappreciated to date in climate policies like carbon markets. With better science, we can set these policies up to potentially work better,\u201d Andregg says. \u201cThese are multi-billion-dollar carbon markets that have a problem with risks to durability, but the good news is that we’re providing a potential solution as well.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Rising risks to forest carbon storage<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

The study combined extensive forest inventory data, satellite observations, and climate modeling to assess the likelihood that forests will lose stored carbon over the next century. The findings show that disturbances \u2014 especially wildfire \u2014 pose a substantial and increasing threat.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cCompared to other natural disturbances, we found that wildfire is the largest climate-sensitive risk to durability for forest nature-based climate solutions,\u201d Wu says. \u201cOur analysis shows for the first time what a robust buffer pool should look like for current carbon offset U.S. forest projects after accounting for accelerating climate threats.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A \u201cbuffer pool\u201d is a reserve of extra carbon credits set aside in case projects fail or forests lose carbon unexpectedly.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The research team mapped areas across the continental United States, showing their risks of a carbon \u201creversal\u201d \u2014 or carbon loss \u2014 occurring at least once in the next 100 years from wildfire, drought or insects. The maps compared the risks under historical models and updated ones that account for climate change.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 The differences are stark.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Under the team\u2019s analysis, the portion of the country projected to experience a reversal by wildfire expanded from 10% to 33%; from 19% to 21% for drought; and from 23% to 25% for insects. Broad areas in Idaho, Southern California, Arizona and New Mexico show an 80% or more chance of experiencing such a carbon loss due to wildfire over the next century.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Carbon markets and the challenge of permanence<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Nature-based climate solutions \u2014 like protecting or restoring forests \u2014 play a central role in global climate strategies.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For instance, Williams\u2019 Biogeosciences Research Group uses remote sensing and big-data geo-computation to quantify these carbon emissions avoided by protecting forests, removing carbon with forest growth, and examining the important climate impacts of changing surface reflectivity (albedo) that happens with changes in tree cover. With Clark researcher Natalia Hasler, Williams developed a toolset<\/a> used by practitioners and land managers to estimate how albedo change might affect reforestation or afforestation projects across the world. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

However, such nature-based climate solutions rely on the assumption that carbon stored in trees remains out of the atmosphere for decades to centuries.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cNature-based climate solutions are either protecting forests or growing them to store carbon and keep it out of the atmosphere,\u201d according to Anderegg. \u201cMost policies fund that investment in forest carbon through a claim of a \u2018carbon offset\u2019 where fossil-fuel emissions are allowed to continue somewhere else. Somebody\u2019s buying that credit, assuming that a ton of carbon in the trees is the same as a ton of carbon in fossil fuels that you emit to the atmosphere.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

To manage the risk of carbon loss, offset programs set aside a portion of credits in a shared \u201cbuffer pool,\u201d which functions like insurance. However, the study finds that these reserves are currently too small to cover likely future losses \u2014 potentially by several-fold.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A path toward more reliable climate solutions<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Despite the challenges, the researchers emphasize that improvements are within reach. By incorporating the latest science into policy design, carbon offset programs can better manage risk and strengthen their environmental integrity.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThere is some positive news here. Once you have the best-available science and data directly incorporated into programs and policies, you can then inform and strategically guide where new projects get developed. This ability to choose and really focus on forest carbon in low-risk areas is very promising,\u201d Anderegg says. \u201cThis can incentivize these forest activities where they’re likely to last, and then maybe steer clear of areas where forests are likely to be gone in 100 years.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cThe good news,\u201d Williams says, \u201cis that updating buffer pool sizes, improving risk assessments, and prioritizing lower-risk regions could significantly improve the durability of forest carbon storage.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The underlying research for the study was supported by the David and Lucille Packard Foundation, the National Science Foundation, the Department of Energy, NASA, and the Wilkes Center for Climate Science & Policy.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Nature article highlights climate-driven risks to forests that could alter carbon-offset programs The U.S. forests involved in carbon-offset programs \u2014 through which companies compensate for their greenhouse gas emissions \u2014 face significant and growing risks from climate-driven disturbances such as wildfire, drought, and insect outbreaks, according to a study published in Nature on May 20. 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