FOREST EUROPE » Climate Change and Energy

Forests, sustainable forest management and wood products play a vital role in climate change mitigation. Growing forests sequester carbon, while wood products continue to store carbon through their life time. Wood is an important source of renewable energy, and can be a substitute for energy-intensive materials with higher greenhouse gas emissions. The FOREST EUROPE policy and tools aim to strengthen the contributions by forests in combating climate change.

FOREST EUROPE has since its start in 1990 developed policy tools for promoting and implementing sustainable forest management in the pan-European region. Promoting the role of forests and sustainable forest management in combating the negative effects of climate change through both mitigation and adaptation measures have been central tasks in this work. The sustainable forest management concept and its tools are essential for ensuring adaptation of forests to climate change, as well as optimising the contribution of forests and the forest sector to climate change mitigation. FOREST EUROPE policy instruments are relevant for developing policies and tools aimed at reducing emissions through land use, land-use change and forestry activities (LULUCF), as well as for deforestation and forest degradation projects in developing countries (REDD) under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) process.

Combating climate challenges with forests and wood

Forest biomass in Europe stores 53 billion tonnes of carbon, an increase of 2 billion tonnes since 1990, as presented in the report “State of Europe’s Forests 2007”. Further substantial amounts of carbon are stored in forest litter and soils, as well as in wood based products. Sustainable forest management produces environmental-friendly material. Forest biomass, wood processing residues and recovered wood represent important sources of renewable energy, which can reduce greenhouse gas emissions by replacing fossil fuels.

The IPCC Fourth Assessment Report “Climate Change 2007. Mitigation of climate change” (IPCC Working Group III) underlines that in the long term, sustainable management of forests will generate the largest sustained mitigation benefit. The climate experts emphasise that sustainable forest management should aim at maintaining or increasing forest carbon stocks, while also producing an annual yield of wood for timber, fibre or energy from the forest.

Because of the key role of forest ecosystems and forest based products in the long term mitigation of and adaptation to climate change, forest management and land-use are central elements in the existing global climate regime and in negotiations of future climate policies (post-Kyoto, after 2012).

Pan-European guidelines for afforestation and reforestation

Afforestation and reforestation are possible measures to reduce the carbon dioxide level in the atmosphere and are part of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its Kyoto Protocol. FOREST EUROPE has developed “Pan-European Guidelines for Afforestation and Reforestation with a special focus on the provisions of the UNFCCC” in cooperation with the Environment for Europe/Pan-European Biological and Landscape Diversity Strategy (EfE/PEBLDS). The guidelines are targeted at afforestation and reforestation programmes that aim, inter alia, at carbon sequestration and reduction of CO2 emissions. The Guidelines provide recommendations for implementing economically viable, environmentally sound, socially equitable, and culturally acceptable afforestation and reforestation projects. They address requirements of other land-users, as well as conservation of sites of high ecological, landscape and cultural value. The guidelines may also serve as an example for developing and implementing afforestation and reforestation programmes in other regions of the world.