Deforestation biomass and carbon finance in Amazonia

Biomass dynamics in Amazonia are quantified and the value that carbon finance could deliver from slowing deforestation is assessed. Above-ground forest biomass in the Legal Amazon shrank from 90 Pg to 76 Pg between 1978 and 2004. An average decrease of 0.64 Pg (standard error 0.38 Pg) per year was estimated for primary and econdary vegetation. For an improved, spatially and temporally explicit estimation, a time series of remote-sensing results and a model of secondary forest area and age distribution was combined with a large-scale forest-growth model. The observed trend of biomass decline is continuous and defines a baseline that the avoidance of deforestation could be measured against. Based on scenario calculations, the emission reductions from slightly reduced deforestation rates could be valued in the range of El billion annually. Carbon finance for reducing emissions from deforestation ('avoided deforestation'), which is being discussed as an additional mechanism under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol, has the potential to alter the economic logic driving forest conversion.