Modeling deforestation baselines using GEOMOD - Instituto ...

Finalizing Avoided Deforestation Baselines
Millones de ton de Carbono
5.00
4.50
4.00
3.50
3.00
2.50
2.00
1.50
1.00
0.50
Oyamel Forest
Forest Plantation
Oak Forests
Pine Forests
Pine-Oak Forest
0.00
2000 2005 2010 2015 2020 2025 2030
Year
Figure 26. Cumulative carbon emissions from deforestation in the Meseta Purepecha. Over the
30-year period, about 4.6 million tons of carbon would be emitted.
Over the 30 year period, 83,717 ha of forest cover was projected to be converted to non-forest uses in the
region, emitting about 4.6 million tons of carbon.
VI.
Conclusions
Spatial modeling tools have allowed us to evaluate the empirical rate of land-use change and
corresponding changes in carbon stocks in the States of Campeche and Michoacan. They
have also provided the means to study the dynamics between land use/land cover types over
time. The results show that a projected baseline for deforestation in Meseta Purépecha
would result in about an additional 87,000 ha of loss in forest cover with a corresponding
carbon emissions of 4.6 million t C. The projected baseline for the Calakmul region of
Campeche shows a further loss of 273,000 ha of forest and a corresponding net carbon
emissions of 8.9 million t C.
Without GEOMOD we would not have been able to specify the location of projected
deforestation in the regions. We hypothesized that using GEOMOD would allow us to
estimate carbon emissions with greater certainty than can be done with a simple baseline
prediction. GEOMOD provides more accurate carbon estimates because of the model’s
spatial specificity, 2) provides the ability to model regional and project-specific ‘withoutproject’
scenarios in one pass, and 3) removes some of the uncertainty inherent in all
modeling, whether spatial or non-spatial, by its strict adherence to the use of the kappa-forlocation
statistic applied to empirical patterns of land use change
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