By D. Neil Bird
Introduction
Storage of carbon in forests and woodproducts was originally suggested not as a solution to the problem of global climate change but rather a method of buying time until a new technology arrived to solve the real problem of fossil fuel and deforestation emissions. According to Breuer (1979) ,
“Worldwide large scale reforestation could provide, within 15-20 years, an additional biospheric sink of the order of magnitude of the present input [from fossil fuel burning and deforestation]. Its capacity would be limited to a time span of several decades, but this time could be used to develop and deploy alternative energy sources …”
With this view in mind in seems clear that the value of carbon stored within a forestry project IS DIFFERENT than carbon emitted by fossil fuel combustion and land-use changes. The problem is how to evaluate these two so that they are comparable.
Solution
The proposed solution requires knowledge of three time constants. The first two have been identified previously. They are storage duration, ts, and average lifetime of carbon in the atmosphere, tc. The third, as suggested by the citation above, is the time-horizon, th. This is the time over which the storage matters. It might be the time to a critical CO2 saturation level in the atmosphere or the time at which the new technology should arrive.
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