Estimating medium-term (40 years) carbon uptake in living biomass from Life Terra’s afforestation and reforestation actions: challenges and recommendations

Urban Farm DB summary

This study presents a methodology for estimating potential biomass and carbon accumulation over a 40-year timespan for European afforestation activities, developed for the Life Terra project (LIFE19 CCM/NL/001200). It synthesized data from allometric equations, yield tables, national forest inventories, and national greenhouse gas inventory reports across four European biogeographic regions — Alpine, Atlantic, Continental, and Mediterranean — with the analysis focused mainly on timber plantations due to data availability and reliability constraints. Initial planting densities varied substantially across regions (1,869-7,702 trees/ha) and declined exponentially over time; by year 40, individual tree biomass estimates ranged from 0.08 to 0.20 t/tree with survival rates of 22.0-49.7%, giving stand-level biomass estimates of 54.7-232.6 t/ha. The estimates generally aligned with country-specific literature and IPCC default values but showed considerable site-to-site variation, and the study notes remaining uncertainties related to survival/mortality rates and climate change impacts.