New Zealand is both an Annex I Party to the UNFCCC, and an Annex B country of the
Kyoto Protocol. By ratifying the latter, NZ has committed to reduce greenhouse gas
emission to 1990 levels. The country should take domestic actions and can also use any of
the Kyoto Protocol flexible mechanisms. Afforestation and reforestation on low carbon
density land has been recognised as a carbon sink and hence a possible mitigation option
for climate change. The current situation for New Zealand is that at least over the first
commitment period (2008-2012) the country is in deficit, because emissions have
continued to grow over the 1990 level, there is an increase in the deforestation rate and
lower rates of new planting.
The objective of this study is to analyse the potential of the New Zealand forest sector as an
integrated system to mitigate climate change. It also analyses the impact of different
mechanisms on potential area of new land planting, management of stands, and the supply,
allocation, and demand of wood, and wood products.
The New Zealand forest industry carbon balance (i.e net atmospheric exchange minus
emissions) is modelled for different national estate scenarios, log allocation of harvested
volume and residues used for bioenergy. The net present value of these scenarios is
estimated and the economic viability assessed. The level of incentives needed to increase
the returns to an economically viable level is estimated in term of carbon unit value ($/tC).
Moreover the land use economics at a project level (land market value vs land expectation
value) is assessed. Incentives needed in monetary terms and carbon value are also
estimated. The implications of discounting carbon benefits are discussed.
It was found that the carbon balance of the whole industry should be analysed for policy
development on climate change mitigation options. New planting, longer rotation ages,
avoiding deforestation, and allocating additional harvested volume to sawmills showed
positive impact to the atmosphere. New planting appeared to be not economically viable,
thus incentives are needed. It is acknowledged that, there are emissions from the sector that
were not included, and that data and models used need further research to improve the accuracy of the results. Moreover, assumptions on the economic issues and an analysis of
simultaneous implementation of more than one mitigation option would also improve the
results.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:canterbury.ac.nz/oai:ir.canterbury.ac.nz:10092/2019 |
| Date | January 2009 |
| Creators | Loza-Balbuena, Isabel |
| Publisher | University of Canterbury. School of Forestry |
| Source Sets | University of Canterbury |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic thesis or dissertation, Text |
| Rights | Copyright Isabel Loza-Balbuena, http://library.canterbury.ac.nz/thesis/etheses_copyright.shtml |
| Relation | NZCU |
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