Need for relevant timescales when crediting temporary carbon storage

CARBON FOOTPRINTING
First Online:
Received:
Accepted:

Abstract

Purpose

Earth faces an urgent need for climate change mitigation, and carbon storage is discussed as an option. Approaches for assessing the benefit of temporary carbon storage in relation to carbon footprinting exist, but many are based on a 100-year accounting period, disregarding impacts after this time. The aim of this paper is to assess the consequences of using such approaches that disregard the long timescale on which complete removal of atmospheric CO2 occurs. Based on these findings, an assessment is made on what are relevant timescales to consider when including the value of temporary carbon storage in carbon footprinting.

Methods

Implications of using a 100-year accounting period is evaluated via a literature review study of the global carbon cycle, as well as by analysing the crediting approaches that are exemplified by the PAS 2050 scheme for crediting temporary carbon storage.

Results and discussion

The global carbon cycle shows timescales of thousands of years for the transport of carbon from the atmosphere to pools beyond the near-surface layers of the Earth, from where it will not readily be re-emitted as a response to change in near-surface conditions. Compared to such timescales, the use of the 100-year accounting period appears hard to justify. We illustrate how the use of the 100-year accounting period can cause long-term global warming impacts to be hidden by short-term storage solutions that may not offer real long-term climate change mitigation. Obtaining long-term climatic benefits is considered to require storage of carbon for at least thousand years. However, it has been proposed that there may exist tipping points for the atmospheric CO2 concentration beyond which irreversible climate changes occur. To reduce the risk of passing such tipping points, fast mitigation of the rise in atmospheric greenhouse gas concentration is required and in this perspective, shorter storage times may still provide climatic benefits.

Conclusions

Both short- and long-term perspectives should be considered when crediting temporary carbon storage, addressing both acute effects on the climate and the long-term climate change. It is however essential to distinguish between short- and long-term mitigation potential by treating them separately and avoid that short-term mitigation is used to counterbalance long-term climate change impacts from burning of fossil fuels.

Keywords

Climate change mitigation Carbon cycle Carbon storage crediting Accounting period for global warming potential Carbon footprints 
This is a preview of subscription content, log in to check access.

Notes

Acknowledgments

This paper has been written as part of an industrial PhD project which is co-funded by the Danish Agency for Science Technology and Innovation. The authors wish to thank for useful suggestions and comments on the manuscript from Jesper Hedal Kløverpris, Sune Balle Hansen and Teunis Dijkman, as well as constructive comments from the review process.

Supplementary material

11367_2012_527_MOESM1_ESM.doc (82 kb)
Data given in the Electronic supplementary material covers results from a literature survey of stocks and transport times of the global carbon cycle. (DOC 82.5 kb)

References

  1. Archer D, Brovkin V (2008) The millennial atmospheric lifetime of anthropogenic CO2. Clim Change 90:283–297CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  2. Archer D, Kheshgi H, Maier-Reimer E (1997) Multiple timescales for neutralization of fossil fuel CO2. Geophys Res Lett 24:405–408CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  3. Archer D, Eby M, Brovkin V, Ridgwell A, Cao L, Mikolajewicz U, Caldeira K, Matsumoto K, Munhoven G, Montenegro A, Tokos K (2009) Atmospheric lifetime of fossil fuel carbon dioxide. Annu Rev Earth Planet Sci 37:117–34CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  4. Bertaux JL, Carr M, Des Marais DJ, Gaidos E (2007) Conversations on the habitability of worlds: the importance of colatiles. Geology and habitability of terrestrial planets. Space Sci Rev 129:123–165CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  5. Brandão M, Levasseur A (2011) Assessing temporary carbon storage in life cycle assessment and carbon footprinting: outcomes of an expert workshop. Publications Office of the EuropeanUnion, Luxembourg. ISBN 978-92-79-20350-3Google Scholar
  6. Brandão M, Levasseur A, Kirschbaum MUF, Weidema BP, Cowie AL, Jørgensen SV, Hauschild MZ, Pennington DW, Chomkhamsri K (2012) Key issues and options in accounting for carbon sequestration and temporary storage in life cycle assessment and carbon footprinting. Int J Life Cycle Assess. doi: 10.1007/s11367-012-0451-6
  7. BSI (2008) PAS 2050:2008 specification for the assessment of the life cycle greenhouse gas emissions of goods and services. British Standards Institution, LondonGoogle Scholar
  8. BSI (2011) PAS 2050:2011 specification for the assessment of the life cycle greenhouse gas emissions of goods and services. British Standards Institution, LondonGoogle Scholar
  9. Clift R, Brandão M (2008) Carbon storage and timing of emissions. Centre for Environmental Strategy, University of Surrey, GU2 7XH, UK. ISSN: 1464–8083Google Scholar
  10. Council of the European Union (2005) Climate change: medium and longer term emission reduction strategies, including targets: council conclusions. Information Note. Council of the European Union, Brussels. Document number 7242/05Google Scholar
  11. Denman KL, Brasseur G, Chidthaisong A, Ciais P, Cox PM, Dickinson RE, Hauglustaine D, Heinze C, Holland E, Jacob A, Lohmann U, Ramachandran S, da Silva Dias PL, Wofsy SC, Zhang X (2007) Couplings between changes in the climate system and biogeochemistry. In: Solomon S, Qin D, Manning M, Chen Z, Marquis M, Averyt KB, Tignor M, Miller HL (eds) Climate change 2007—the physical science basis. Contribution of working group I to the fourth assessment report of the intergovernmental panel on climate change. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New YorkGoogle Scholar
  12. Des Marais DJ (1997) Isotopic evolution of the biogeochemical carbon cycle during the Proterozoic Eon. Org Geochem 27:185–193CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  13. Dornburg V, Marland G (2008) Temporary storage of carbon in the biosphere does have value for climate change mitigation: a response to the paper by Miko Kirschbaum. Mitig Adapt Strateg Glob Change 13:211–217CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  14. Fearnside PM (2008) On the value of temporary carbon: a comment on Kirschbaum. Mitig Adapt Strateg Glob Change 13:211–217CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  15. Finkbeiner M (2009) Carbon footprinting—opportunities and threats. Int J Life Cycle Assess 14:91–94CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  16. Forster P, Ramaswamy V, Artaxo P, Berntsen T, Betts R, Fahey DW, Haywood J, Lean J, Lowe DC, Myhre G, Nganga J, Prinn R, Raga G, Schulz M, Van Dorland R (2007) Changes in atmospheric constituents and in radiative forcing. In: Solomon S, Qin D, Manning M, Chen Z, Marquis M, Averyt KB, Tignor M, Miller HL (eds) Climate change 2007—the physical science basis. Contribution of working group I to the fourth assessment report of the intergovernmental panel on climate change. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge New YorkGoogle Scholar
  17. Hansen J, Sato M, Kharecha P, Beerling D, Berner R, Masson-Delmotte V, Pagani M, Raymo M, Royer DL, Zachos JC (2008) Target atmospheric CO2: where should humanity aim? Open Atmospheric Science Journal 2:217–231CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  18. Jørgensen SV, Hauschild MZ (2010) Need for Relevant Timescales in Temporary Carbon Storage Crediting. Presentation held at the Expert Workshop on Temporary Carbon Storage for use in Life Cycle Assessment and Carbon Footprinting, at the Joint Research Centre of the European Commission, Ispra October 2010. Abstract available in Brandão and Levasseur (2011)Google Scholar
  19. Kirschbaum MUF (2006) Temporary carbon sequestration cannot prevent climate change. Mitig Adapt Strateg Glob Change 11:1151–1164CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  20. Levasseur A, Brandão M, Lesage P, Margni M, Pennington D, Clift R, Samson R (2012) Valuing temporary carbon storage. Nature Climate Change 2:6–8CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  21. Meehl GA, Stocker TF, Collins WD, Friedlingstein P, Gaye AT, Gregory JM, Kitoh A, Knutti R, Murphy JM, Noda A, Raper SCB, Watterson IG, Weaver AJ, Zhao ZC (2007) Global climate projections. In: Solomon S, Qin D, Manning M, Chen Z, Marquis M, Averyt KB, Tignor M, Miller HL (eds) Climate change 2007—the physical science basis. Contribution of working group I to the fourth assessment report of the intergovernmental panel on climate change. Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, U.K. and New York, NY, USAGoogle Scholar
  22. Meinshausen M, Hare B (2002) Temporary sinks do not cause permanent climatic benefits. Achieving short-term emissions reduction targets at the future’s expense. Greenpeace Background Paper, Greenpeace, p 7Google Scholar
  23. Moura-Costa P (2002) Carbon accounting, trading and the temporary nature of carbon storage. The Nature ConservancyGoogle Scholar
  24. Moura-Costa P, Wilson C (2000) An equivalence factor between CO2 avoided emissions and sequestration–description and applications in forestry. Mitig Adapt Strateg Glob Change 5:51–60CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  25. Müller-Wenk R, Brandão M (2010) Climatic impact of land use in LCA—carbon transfers between vegetation/soil and air. Int J Life Cycle Assess 15:172–182CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  26. NOAA (2011) Trends in carbon dioxide. (Year 2009). http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/. Accessed 21 Feb 2011
  27. Rubin E, Meyer L, de Coninck H, Abanades JC, Cook P, Davidson O, Doctor R, Dooley J, Freund P, Gale J, Heidug W, Herzog H, Keith D, Mazzoti M, Metz B, Osman-Elasha B, Palmer A, Pipatti R, Smekens K, Soltanieh M, Thambimuthu K, van der Zwaan B (2005) Technical summary. In: Metz B, Davidson O, de Coninck H, Loos M, Meyer L (eds) IPCC special report: carbon dioxide capture and storage. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, pp 17–50Google Scholar
  28. Shine KP (2009) The global warming potential—the need for an interdisciplinary retrial. Clim Change 96:467–472CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  29. Shine KP, Berntsen TK, Fuglestvedt JS, Skeie RB, Stuber N (2007) Comparing the climate effect of emissions of short- and long-lived climate agents. Phil Trans R Soc A 365:1903–1914CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  30. Siegenthaler U, Sarmiento JL (1993) Atmospheric carbon dioxide and the ocean. Nature 365:119–125CrossRefGoogle Scholar
  31. Solomon S, Qin D, Manning M, Alley RB, Berntsen T, Bindoff NL, Chen Z, Chidthaisong A, Gregory JM, Hegerl GC, Heimann M, Hewitson, Hoskins BJ, Joos F, Jouzel J, Kattsov V, Lohmann U, Matsuno T, Molina M, Nicholls N, Overpeck J, Raga G, Ramaswamy V, Ren J, Rusticucci M, Somerville R, Stocker TM, Whetton P, Wood RA, Wratt D (2007) Technical summary. In: Solomon S, Qin D, Manning M, Chen Z, Marquis M, Averyt KB, Tignor M, Miller HL (eds) Climate change 2007—the physical science basis. Contribution of working group I to the fourth assessment report of the intergovernmental panel on climate change. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New YorkGoogle Scholar
  32. UNFCCC (1998) Report of the conference of the parties on its third session, held at Kyoto from 1 to 11 December 1997. Addendum. Part Two: Action Taken by the Conference of the Parties at its third session. United Nations Office, Geneva. FCCC/CP/1997/7/Add.1Google Scholar
  33. Weidema BP, Thrane M, Christensen P, Schmidt J, Løkke S (2008) Carbon footprint: a catalyst for life cycle assessment? J Ind Ecol 12:3–6CrossRefGoogle Scholar

Copyright information

© Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2012

Authors and Affiliations

  • Susanne V. Jørgensen
    • 1
    • 2
  • Michael Z. Hauschild
    • 1
  1. 1.Division for Quantitative Sustainability AssessmentDepartment for Management Engineering, Technical University of DenmarkKongens LyngbyDenmark
  2. 2.Novozymes A/SBagsværdDenmark

Personalised recommendations