2. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
IPCC reports are the result of extensive work from
scientists around the world.
1 Summary for Policymakers
1 Technical Summary
16 Chapters (AFOLU=Chap 11)
235 Authors
900 Reviewers
More than 2000 pages
Close to 10,000 references
More than 38,000 comments
3. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
AFOLU
• Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use (AFOLU) is unique
among the sectors in WGIII.
• Enhancement of removals of GHGs, as well as reduction of
emissions through management of land and livestock.
• Agriculture is central to the livelihoods of many social groups
• AFOLU sector is responsible for ~ < 25% (~10-12 Gt CO2eq/yr)
of anthropogenic GHG emissions
• Mainly from deforestation and agricultural emissions from livestock,
soil, biomass burning and nutrient management
• 2000-2010
• GHG emissions/yr-1: agricultural @ 5.0-5.8 Gt CO2eq/yr
• GHG flux/yr-1: land use change activities @ 4.3-5.5 Gt CO2eq/yr
4. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Trends in emissions | What happened in the last decades?
• The emissions of GHGs accelerated despite reduction efforts…
Most
emission
growth is CO2
from fossil
fuel
combustion
5. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Which sectors contributed to this increase ?
• About 75% of the 10 GtCO2eq growth in annual anthropogenic GHG emissions between 2000
and 2010 comes from the energy supply and industry sectors
• Since 2000, GHG emissions have been growing in all sectors, except AFOLU (24% - 12 GtCO2eq)
6. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
AFOLU emissions for the last four decades/General Trend
7. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Global trends from 1971 to 2010 in area of land use/Region
Some of this being transferred to Africa
8. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
AFOLU emission-WGII/AR5/ Sector
9. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
GHG emissions rise with growth in GDP and population;
long-standing trend of decarbonisation of energy reversed.
10. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Net global CO2 flux from AFOLU/Trend in emissions
1750 to 2011
Cumulative
1980–1989 1990–1999 2000–2009
Gt CO2 Gt CO2/yr Gt CO2/yr Gt CO2/yr
IPCC WGI Carbon Budget, Table 6.1a:
Net AFOLU CO2 flux b 660 ± 293 5.22 ± 2.93 5.52 ± 2.93 3.83 ± 2.93
Residual terrestrial sinkc -550 ± 330 -5.50 ± 4.03 -9.53 ± 4.40 -9.17 ± 4.40
Fossil fuel combustions and
cement productiond 1338 ± 110 20.17 ± 1.47 23.47 ± 1.83 28.23 ± 2.20
Meta-analyses of Net AFOLU CO2 flux:
IPCC WGI Table 6.2e 4.77 ± 2.57 4.40 ± 2.20 2.93 ± 2.20
Houghton et al, 2012d 4.18 ± 1.83 4.14 ± 1.83 4.03 ± 1.83
11. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Without more mitigation, global mean surface temperature
might increase by 3.7° to 4.8°C over the 21st century.
Includes geo-ingineering
12. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Mitigation requires major technological/institutional changes
and upscaling of low- and zero carbon energy
13. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Mitigation pathways and measures | What will be the
consequences of low ambition?
• Delaying mitigation will increase the difficulty for limiting warming to 2°C
14. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Mitigation pathways and measures | How AFOLU will be
influenced by mitigation efforts in other sectors?
• Mitigation requires changes throughout the economy. Efforts in one sector
determine mitigation efforts in others
15. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Substantial reductions in emissions would require large
changes in investment patterns.
16. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Global land use and biomass flows arising from human
economic activity in 2000
Smithetal.GCB,2013
17. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Barriers and challenges in AFOLU
• Financing, poverty,
institutional, ecological,
technological
development,
• Feedbacks to
adaptation and
conservation
• Competition between
different land‐uses
• Promoting synergies:
integrated systems or
multi-functionality, e.g.
ecosystem services
18. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Since AR4, there has been an increased focus on policies
designed to integrate multiple objectives, increase co-
benefits and reduce adverse side-effects.
• Sector-specific policies dominates the economy-wide
policies.
• Regulatory approaches and information measures are often
environmentally effective.
• Since AR4, cap and trade systems for GHGs have been
established in a number of countries and regions.
• The reduction of subsidies for GHG-related activities in
various sectors can achieve emission reductions,
depending on the social and economic context.
19. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Section 2
•Prospects for AFRICA
20. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
What are the challenges for Africa (LDC Box WG III-Chap 11)
• GHG will increase: food production leading to
short term land conversion
• Technology will not be sufficient for the
necessary transitions to low GHG
• Access to market and credits, capacities to
implement mitigation options
• Non-permanence and leakage
• Managing Risks, Co-benefits or trade-offs for
mitigation (and adaptation)
21. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
AFOLU and Low Emission Development Pathway
• AFOLU: a variety of mitigation options and a large, cost-
competitive mitigation potential—flexibility—for mitigation
technologies
• Projections: land‐related mitigation strategies (agriculture,
forestry, bioenergy) were projected to contribute 20 to 60%
of total cumulative abatement to 2030, and still 15 to 45% in
2100.
• RISKS: potential implications for biodiversity, food
security and other services (ensuring co-benefits,
avoiding land competition)
22. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
These Options make
economic sense even witho
the benefit of carbon finance
23. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Land carbon cycle assessment
C-emission C-sequestration C-pools
Forest carbon stock inventory
Carbon accounting and surveys
Ecosystem models and mapping
Dynamic vegetation models
Trees Height,
DBH, TCC
Forest/trees
Biomass
Biomass
change over
time
Forest
disturbance
area
Field & RS
Field,Models&RS
Field & RS
Models & RS
Data Needs
24. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Mitigation from a cross-sectoral perspective
• Reassessment of complex landscapes systems for
climate mitigation
• Need of trade-off with current livelihood activities
• Bioenergy-biofuel issue: accounting for livelihoods
and food security
• Urban-Rural connections in terms of natural
resources fluxes
• Ecosystem services
• Whole farm approaches for low emission development
25. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Forest Sector
• Importance of
non forested
lands
• MRVs
• Mitigation as a
response for
social
adaptation
needs?
26. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Mbow et al., 2012, GLP Report series (REDD=
challenges and prospects for Africa)
Non “Forest” Ecosystems
27. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Agriculture
• Emission from the agricultural sector
(including fires, shifting cultivation, cropland,
pasture, etc.
• Non CO2 GHG emission
• Sustainable agriculture potential to offset
emission from agriculture
• Importance of bioenergy in the net budget
28. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Methods used for an overall carbon budgeting
• Independent observed data
– Bottom-up ecosystem inventories of land fluxes, biomass,
allometry, hand held instruments, sample collections, mobile
devices, etc.;
• Satellite based approaches
– NPP, GPP, NEP, Fire data and emission from vegetation
burning (derived from e.g. MODIS), Land use (FAO FRA
2010) and or land cover (GlobeCover, ABG Biomass maps);
• Modeling
– Atmospheric inversion, biogeochemical models, dynamic
vegetation modeling, phenology, soil C, water pools and
fluxes;
• Secondary data (including activity data) to derive
emission data based on emission factors.
29. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Uncertainties and data gaps
• Uncompleted data set:
– Data gaps, short period of observations (productivity data, climate
data,) limited data e.g. for CH4 and N2O;
• Assessment of fluxes from land use change:
– Mostly deforestation and forest degradation, inter-annual variability
of C fluxes;
• Implications of definition of forest and non-forest land
cover:
– Land cover reported areas: level of aggregation or disaggregation of
cover types in classification schemes;
• Limited validation datasets:
– For model calibration or scaling-up terrestrial fluxes, go beyond the
dense forest zones.
30. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Method Net source (sector) Net sink (sector) observation
UNFCC report, National
communications
0.95 Pg CO2-eq-yr
(C contribution from
LUCF)
-0.31 Pg Cyr
(removal by forest)
Africa=small sink
Atmospheric inversion 0.3 Pg C yr (land use
CO2)+0.26 Pg C yr (fossil
fuel)
Negative of this value (ecosystem
sequestration)
Africa= Carbon
neutral
Up-scaled terrestrial
fluxes using in situ
observations
No data No data Unknown (See:
Carbo Africa?)
Dynamic Global
Vegetation Models
(DGVM)
0.14 Pg C yr (ORCHIDEE
1980)
-0.13 Pg C yr (ORCHIDEE 1990) Africa= from net
source to net small
sink (CO2
fertilization?)
Emission from land use
change
No data No data Unknown
Vegetation fires and
domestic biomass
burning
1.03 Pg C yr (GFED 1977-
2011)
Inconsistent data from improved
fire management
unknown
Lateral fluxes through
river
Only flux modeling No data Unknown
N2O 0.99 Pg CO2-eq yr Approximation based on Unknown
Based on Valentini et al, 2014, Biogeoscience
Is Africa a net source or a net sink?
31. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
• High resolution data sets of crop production
systems
• Standardized and homogenized data on soil as well
as forest degradation
• Improved understanding of the mitigation potential,
interplay, costs as well as environmental and socio-
economic consequences of land use based mitigation
options
• Better understanding of the effect of changes in
climate parameters, rising CO2 concentrations and
N deposition on productivity and carbon stocks of
different types of ecosystems
Needs for data-General
32. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Needs for data-Specific
• Importance of Agroforestry: Land use change datasets
ignores most agroforestry area
• Definition of forest
• Peatlands and flooded vegetation
• Deforestation rates in non-Forest areas
• Modeling efforts to be harmonized: periods and
parameters in consideration
• Full budgeting of GHGs
• Emission embedded to trade of forest products
• Fires emissions
• Emissions from Peatlands and Mangroves; from fires
33. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Evolving needs for data
• More flux tower, increased land cover quality
• More satellite product ( e.g. GEOSAT to drop the error
of annual CO2 fluxes significantly)
• Emission factors and activity data
• Improved fire data from MODIS can improve DGVM
outputs
• Influence of CO2 fertilization mentioned in GDVM will
mostly benefit C4 plants dominated by grass
• Implication of stabilizing land use change (decreasing
trend since the 1980s) land use trends in Africa
• Combination of methods for a full budgeting of GHGs
34. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Managing trade-offs
Adaptation
Mitigation
Positive Negative
Positive
Soil carbon sequestration,
improved water holding
capacities, use of manure
instead, mixed agroforestry for
commercial products, income
diversification with trees,
reduced nitrogen fertilizer, fire
management
Dependence on biomass energy,
overuse of ecosystem services,
Increased use of mineral fertilizers
Poor management of nitrogen and
manure, over extraction of non-
timber products, timber extraction
Negative
Integral protection of forest
reserves, limited rights to
agroforestry trees, Forest
Plantation excluding harvest
Use of forest fires for pastoral and
land management, tree exclusion in
farming lands,
Bundling mitigation and adaptation benefits
Mbow et al, 2014-COSUST
35. Working Group III contribution to the
IPCC Fifth Assessment Report
Thanks.
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