Forests play key role in offsetting carbon discharge
Print Edition
China’s terrestrial ecosystems, including forests, shrubs and farmlands, have played a key role in storing carbon emissions over the past decades, Chinese research has shown.
A study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States yesterday, found that China’s forests, shrubs and croplands sequestrated 201.1 million tons of carbon every year from 2001 to 2010, which offset 14.1 percent of the carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels in China during the same period.
The research showed forests are China’s major carbon sinks, contributing 80 percent of the carbon storage by terrestrial ecosystems, while croplands and shrub lands make up 12 percent and 8 percent respectively.
“These carbon stock changes are largely attributed to climate change, ecological restoration projects and cropland management,” said Fang Jingyun, lead scientist of the research and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
In particular, China’s six major ecological restoration schemes, the Natural Forest Protection Project, the Shelter Forest Program in northern, northeastern and northwestern China, the Grain for Green Program, the Returning Grazing Land to Grassland Project, the Yangtze River and Zhujiang River Shelter Forest Project and the Beijing-Tianjin Sand Source Control Project, have contributed 36.8 percent of the total carbon sequestration by terrestrial ecosystems, Fang said.
Reviewers of PNAS commented that the study is important because it demonstrates how ecosystem restoration can play a substantial role in climate change mitigation.
“2001 to 2010 was a period when China made a rapid economic development. It’s a remarkable achievement that China’s terrestrial ecosystems could offset 14.1 percent of the carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels,” Fang said.
Yu Guirui, deputy director of the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said the research shows that China has great potential in carbon sequestration.
“Previously people were not sure whether we could mitigate climate warming by artificial means. China has implemented so many ecological programs, which were originally for the purpose of ecological protection. But our research demonstrates that those projects also play an important role in carbon sink,” Yu said.
The findings “offer useful lessons to other developing countries that are experiencing similar economic and social transformations,” Fang said.
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