Carbon Neutrality: Forests as Guardians of Climate Balance

Achieving carbon neutrality is essential to combating climate change. Forests are vital to achieving this goal but global action is urgent.

Climate change is having a visible and frightening impact on many parts of the planet. Among its devastating consequences for the environment and human life are extreme weather events such as droughts, heatwaves, floods, tsunamis, rising temperatures, rising sea levels, loss of biodiversity, and many others. A direct response to the growing climate crisis we are currently facing is achieving carbon neutrality.

Excessive emissions of greenhouse gases (GHG), especially CO₂, are byproducts of human activities such as burning fossil fuels, deforestation, and intensive agriculture. These emissions have increased the concentration of these gases in the atmosphere and, consequently, a rise in global temperatures.

Until GHG emissions reach carbon neutrality, the planet’s temperature will continue to rise with increasingly serious consequences. In order to limit global warming to 1.5°C, a limit considered safe by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), it is essential to achieve carbon neutrality by 2050. This objective is defined in the Paris Agreement, signed by 195 countries.

In December 2019, the European Commission presented the European Green Deal, a plan to achieve climate neutrality in Europe by 2050.

But what is carbon neutrality and how can forests help achieve this goal?

Achieving carbon neutrality means reaching a balance point, i.e. a balance between greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, including carbon dioxide and methane, and their absorption into the atmosphere by so-called carbon sinks, with emissions being reduced to as close to zero as possible.

In order to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions to zero, they must be offset by carbon sequestration. In other words, the aim is to ensure that human CO₂ emissions are offset by activities that remove the same amount of CO₂ from the atmosphere, such as planting trees and developing carbon capture and storage technologies, among others.

Carbon reservoirs, or carbon sinks, are any systems that absorb more carbon than they emit. The main natural carbon sinks are the soil, forests, and oceans. So far, no artificial carbon sink has been capable of retaining carbon from the atmosphere on the scale needed to combat global warming.

Forests play an important role in this equation, acting as true ‘carbon guardians’ by contributing to carbon sequestration and storage. Trees absorb carbon dioxide from the atmosphere through photosynthesis, transforming it into biomass and storing it in their trunks, branches, leaves, and roots. In addition, forest soil also acts as a carbon reservoir, storing significant amounts of organic carbon.

EU forests absorb the equivalent of 7 percent of the EU’s total greenhouse gas emissions every year. There are currently 159 million hectares of forest area in the European Union, which represents 43.5 percent of the EU’s land surface. This forest area coverage can vary substantially from one Member State to another, from just over 10 percent in Malta to around 70 percent in Finland.

In addition to their role as carbon sinks, forests offer different benefits to ecosystems: they help protect the soil from erosion, participate in the hydrological cycle, and provide a habitat for different species; thus, they contribute to biodiversity and help control the local climate.

Despite acting as the ‘lungs of the planet’ and being carbon sinks, forests are not enough to offset the total emissions that are currently the result of human activity, generated in practically every activity we carry out, from energy production to transport, industry, and agriculture, among others.

This ecosystem faces increasing threats, such as deforestation, one of the main causes of rising CO₂ concentrations in the atmosphere, as it releases large amounts of carbon stored in trees and forest soil. Forest degradation and forest fires, often aggravated by rising temperatures and extreme weather conditions, have contributed to the destruction of forest ecosystems and the release of CO₂ into the atmosphere.

Protecting and restoring forests is essential to achieve carbon neutrality; their capacity to absorb and store carbon would increase. This can be done through forest reform, which integrates stricter conservation policies, economic incentives for sustainable forestry practices, investments in reforestation and restoration of degraded ecosystems, and implementation of forest management strategies that promote the health and resilience of forest ecosystems.

In addition to forests, other carbon sinks, such as soil and oceans, also play an important role in achieving carbon neutrality. Sustainable agricultural land management and increasing the carbon sequestration capacity of coastal and ocean ecosystems are complementary measures that can help reduce CO₂ emissions and achieve carbon neutrality goals.

Another way to reduce carbon emissions and achieve carbon neutrality is to offset these emissions from one sector by reducing them in another. This can be achieved by investing in renewable energies, energy efficiency, or clean, low-emission technologies.

In short, achieving carbon neutrality is a matter of urgency and global responsibility. All sectors of society, including governments, companies, non-governmental organisations, and individuals, must work together to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and protect natural carbon sinks because we are all agents of change. Only with cohesion and unity in society can we guarantee a sustainable and resilient future for our planet and future generations.

VIDEOS

• https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aJcNV9JbA7M

LINKS

• https://www.europarl.europa.eu/topics/pt/article/20190926STO62270/como-a-ue-podera-atingir-a-neutralidade-carbonica-ate-2050
• https://www.europarl.europa.eu/topics/pt/article/20170711STO79506/usar-melhor-as-florestas-da-ue-como-sumidouros-de-carbono
• https://www.europarl.europa.eu/topics/pt/article/20230316STO77629/alteracoes-climaticas-os-gases-com-efeito-de-estufa-mais-nocivos-para-o-planeta
• https://www.consilium.europa.eu/pt/policies/green-deal/#what
• https://www.publico.pt/2023/08/18/azul/noticia/falta-reforma-floresta-podera-causa-meta-neutralidade-carbonica-2060326
• https://rr.sapo.pt/noticia/pais/2023/12/09/portugal-nao-se-compromete-com-a-neutralidade-carbonica-antes-de-2045/358531/Associar%20%C3%A0s%20celebra%C3%A7%C3%B5es%20do%20dia%20mundial%20da%20%C3%A1rvore,%20da%20floresta%20e%20da%20%C3%A1gua

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