Carbon markets underestimate the risks U.S. forests face from climate change, researchers warn
The world's forests form a vast network of carbon reservoirs, keeping carbon sequestered from the atmosphere where its presence is disrupting Earth's climate systems. Many corporate, national and state climate policies rely ...
But when trees die suddenly—from wildfire, drought or insect infestation—vast amounts of greenhouse gases are released, exacerbating ongoing climate change. And the warming climate is accelerating this problem by making such disturbances more frequent and severe.
New research led by University of Utah scientists in collaboration with international experts sought to determine the likelihood forests will release their stored carbon over the next 100 years. Along the way, they documented how current carbon-credit systems fail to accurately account for that risk in U.S. forests, particularly the parched U.S. West.
But the research points out ways this problem can be corrected, according to William Anderegg, senior author on the study that appears in Nature.
"Forests are facing increasing durability risks due to climate change," said Anderegg, a biology professor at the University of Utah. "Those risks have been underappreciated to date in multi-billion-dollar carbon markets.
"But with better science, we can set these policies up to potentially work better," continued Anderegg, a leadership team member of the university's Wilkes Center for Climate Science & Policy. "We're providing a potential solution as well."
Some forests in the U.S. Southwest burned by wildfire are not returning as forests. The land pictured here is a one-time pinyon-juniper woodland at Mesa Verde National Park, in southwest Colorado, which burned years ago. Credit: William Anderegg, University of Utah
The plume from the Elkhorn fire rises above the Salmon River on July 30, 2023 in the Idaho's Payette National Forest. Credit: Brian Maffly, University of Utah