TY - JOUR
T1 - Protect young secondary forests for optimum carbon removal
AU - Robinson, Nathaniel
AU - Drever, C. Ronnie
AU - Gibbs, David A.
AU - Lister, Kristine
AU - Esquivel-Muelbert, Adriane
AU - Heinrich, Viola
AU - Ciais, Philippe
AU - Silva-Junior, Celso H.L.
AU - Liu, Zhihua
AU - Pugh, Thomas A.M.
AU - Saatchi, Sassan
AU - Xu, Yidi
AU - Cook-Patton, Susan C.
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© The Author(s) 2025.
PY - 2025/7
Y1 - 2025/7
N2 - Avoiding severe global warming requires large-scale removals of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Forest regeneration offers cost-effective carbon removals, but annual rates vary substantially by location and forest age. Here we generate grid-level (~1-km2) growth curves for aboveground live carbon in naturally regrowing forests by combining 109,708 field estimates with 66 environmental covariates. Across the globe and the first 100 years of growth, maximum carbon removal rates varied 200-fold, with the greatest rates estimated in ~20- to 40-year-old forests. Despite a focus on new forests for natural climate solutions, protecting existing young secondary forests can provide up to 8-fold more carbon removal per hectare than new regrowth. These maps could help to target the optimal ages and locations where a key carbon removal strategy could be applied, and improve estimates of how secondary forests contribute to global carbon cycling.
AB - Avoiding severe global warming requires large-scale removals of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Forest regeneration offers cost-effective carbon removals, but annual rates vary substantially by location and forest age. Here we generate grid-level (~1-km2) growth curves for aboveground live carbon in naturally regrowing forests by combining 109,708 field estimates with 66 environmental covariates. Across the globe and the first 100 years of growth, maximum carbon removal rates varied 200-fold, with the greatest rates estimated in ~20- to 40-year-old forests. Despite a focus on new forests for natural climate solutions, protecting existing young secondary forests can provide up to 8-fold more carbon removal per hectare than new regrowth. These maps could help to target the optimal ages and locations where a key carbon removal strategy could be applied, and improve estimates of how secondary forests contribute to global carbon cycling.
UR - https://www.scopus.com/pages/publications/105008921121
U2 - 10.1038/s41558-025-02355-5
DO - 10.1038/s41558-025-02355-5
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:105008921121
SN - 1758-678X
VL - 15
SP - 793
EP - 800
JO - Nature Climate Change
JF - Nature Climate Change
IS - 7
ER -
