How do we get to 18 million tCO2-e per year by 2030?
Australia’s forest industry has challenged itself to make an even greater contribution to Australia’s emissions reduction goal by:
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Responsible for 13 MT CO2-e per year from 2030Building Block 1 |
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Storing carbon in new forest plantations see new BAE economics report here |
Replanting existing forest plantations to maximise on-going carbon storage |
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Responsible for 1.1 MT CO2-e per year from 2030Building Block 3 |
Responsible for 0.7 MT CO2-e per year from 2030Building Block 4 |
| Increasing the use of wood products in the construction of new detached residential houses, multi-rise apartment and commercial buildings to offset emissions | Reducing emissions from our processing and industrial facilities by being more energy efficient and using renewable bioenergy (both electricity and renewable heat) instead of fossil fuels |
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Responsible for 1 MT CO2-e per year from 2030Building Block 5 |
Responsible for 1.1 MT CO2-e per year from 2030Building Block 6 |
| Reducing emissions in transport by replacing fossil fuels with renewable biofuels | Reducing emissions by supporting the use of sustainable biomass for cofiring in existing coal fired power stations |
Australia’s forest product industries are proposing to remove over 18 million tonnes of CO2-e per year by 2030.
Australia’s forest industries can contribute around 23% of the current annual emissions reduction target by 2030.
23% (or over 18 million tonnes of CO2-e) equates to the annual emissions reductions from around 4,200 modern wind turbines.
Or off-setting over 3 million cars worth of emissions running on fossil fuels for a year.*
Even more carbon storage and emissions reduction initiatives that Australia’s forest industries could capitalise on include:
- Counting the additional carbon stored in the below-ground biomass (e.g. roots) of new plantation.
- Increasing use of renewable bioenergy to supply heat and power in other commercial applications and primary industries directly replacing fossil fuels
- Increasing use of renewable biofuels (including biodiesel) instead of fossil fuels
- enhanced management of sustainable native forests to maximise the ongoing storage of carbon
- increased production and use of bioproducts for many everyday uses, such as coffee cups, solvents in paints, medicines, cosmetics etc – to directly replace fossil fuel-based solvents and plastics.
1 Note: New plantations carbon storage figures are based on a new June 2018 report, commissioned by Forest & Wood Products Australia, by BAEconomics (Anna L. Matysek and Brian S. Fisher) titled ‘Carbon sequestration potential of plantation forestry expansion in Australia’.
Assumptions underlying the calculations
* American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) www.awea.org