Title: Land use, land-use change and their effect on greenhouse gas emissions and removals from Greek forests

Authors: Iordanis Tzamtzis; Petros Ganatsas

Addresses: Laboratory of Silviculture, School of Forestry and Natural Environment, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, P.O. Box 262, 54124, Thessaloniki, Greece ' Laboratory of Silviculture, School of Forestry and Natural Environment, Aristotle University of Thessaloniki, P.O. Box 262, 54124, Thessaloniki, Greece

Abstract: The role of LULUCF activities has been already recognised for the climate change mitigation. Mitigation can be achieved by increasing GHG removals from the atmosphere (e.g., afforestation) and/or decreasing emissions (e.g., reducing deforestation). This paper deals with the current status of GHG balance in Greek forests, and the effect land use and land-use changes had during last decades. Data from the 1st NFI, a great number of forest-management plans, and on land-use changes in Greek forests were used. Special emphasis was laid on the evaluation of the methods applied, the data utilisation in the national GHG inventory, while specific gaps were identified. Forest land acts as a net carbon sink during the studied period; its capacity increased from approximately −1.1 Mt CO₂eq in 1990 to −2.1 Mt CO₂eq in 2016, mainly due to forest management practices. Net emissions from deforestation amounted to 0.5 Mt CO₂eq in the period 2008-2016.

Keywords: carbon sequestration; UNFCCC; Kyoto Protocol; climate change; LULUCF; forest management; deforestation; mitigation actions.

DOI: 10.1504/IJGW.2020.110215

International Journal of Global Warming, 2020 Vol.22 No.1, pp.111 - 131

Received: 19 Nov 2019
Accepted: 31 Mar 2020
Published online: 09 Oct 2020 *

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