Canadian Forest Service Publications
Carbon sequestration and land management under uncertainty. 2001. Krcmar-nozic, E.; Stennes, B.; van Kooten, G.C.; Vertisnky, I. European Journal of Operations Research 135(3): 616-629.
Year: 2001
Issued by: Pacific Forestry Centre
Catalog ID: 20669
Language: English
Availability: Not available through the CFS (click for more information).
Available from the Journal's Web site. †
DOI: 10.1016/S0377-2217(00)00326-X
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Abstract
Uncertainty about the role of forestry and land-use change in mitigating global warming is addressed using a possibilistic linear programming model of forest and agricultural land management. The objective is to maximize the cumulative net discounted returns in the two sectors, while meeting specific carbon-uptake goals and maintaining stable flows of timber over the planning horizon. Because of the ambiguity related to timber yield and carbon parameters, and vagueness of policy targets, ordinal measures of uncertainty are applied. While ordinality entails a loss in precision, it makes it possible to solve complex problems. This paper compares land-use policies in the boreal forest of Northeastern British Columbia under uncertainty with those from more a more typical scenario that applies best-guess parameter values. Including uncertainty into the possibility analysis changes optimal land-use and forest management and leads to different levels of projected timber supply, economic performance and carbon sequestration. The amount of carbon dioxide removed from the atmosphere and the economic cost of carbon uptake are sensitive to how the decision-maker tackles uncertainty.