Exploring the solution space for different forestry management structures in New Zealand under climate change

The concept of “solution spaces” is used to explore the potential future of forestry under climate change for different types of forestry management structures. We base the analysis in New Zealand, where forestry plays an increasingly critical role in the nation's climate policy, but the concept could be applied to any region. Understanding solution spaces and the ways in which they can be influenced at different levels of ownership is a critical step towards effective climate change adaptation. Building on the base of existing climate projections, scenarios, and economic and social science literature, we form an assessment of the capacity of each forest owner typology to influence their solution spaces into the future. Different management structures have strengths in different areas – while industrial forest managers may be able to utilise emerging technologies better than their smaller scale counterparts for example, they may be less agile and flexible. The sector as a whole may benefit from working collectively to draw on the respective strengths of each typology. Critically, planning now to expand the space into the future will be essential

Integrated modelling of social-ecological systems for climate change adaptation

Analysis of climate change risks in support of policymakers to set effective adaptation policies requires an innovative yet rigorous approach towards integrated modelling (IM) of social-ecological systems (SES). Despite continuous advances, IM still faces various challenges that span through both unresolved methodological issues as well as data requirements. On the methodological side, significant improvements have been made for better understanding the dynamics of complex social and ecological systems, but still, the literature and proposed solutions are fragmented. This paper explores available modelling approaches suitable for long-term analysis of SES for supporting climate change adaptation (CCA). It proposes their classification into seven groups, identifies their main strengths and limitations, and lists current data sources of greatest interest. Upon that synthesis, the paper identifies directions for orienting the development of innovative IM, for improved analysis and management of socio-economic systems, thus providing better foundations for effective CCA

How the future of the global forest sink depends on timber demand, forest management, and carbon policies

Deforestation has contributed significantly to net greenhouse gas emissions, but slowing deforestation, regrowing forests and other ecosystem processes have made forests a net sink. Deforestation will still influence future carbon fluxes, but the role of forest growth through aging, management, and other silvicultural inputs on future carbon fluxes are critically important but not always recognized by bookkeeping and integrated assessment models. When projecting the future, it is vital to capture how management processes affect carbon storage in ecosystems and wood products. This study uses multiple global forest sector models to project forest carbon impacts across 81 shared socioeconomic (SSP) and climate mitigation pathway scenarios. We illustrate the importance of modeling management decisions in existing forests in response to changing demands for land resources, wood products and carbon. Although the models vary in key attributes, there is general agreement across a majority of scenarios that the global forest sector could remain a carbon sink in the future, sequestering 1.2–5.8 GtCO2e/yr over the next century. Carbon fluxes in the baseline scenarios that exclude climate mitigation policy ranged from −0.8 to 4.9 GtCO2e/yr, highlighting the strong influence of SSPs on forest sector model estimates. Improved forest management can jointly increase carbon stocks and harvests without expanding forest area, suggesting that carbon fluxes from managed forests systems deserve more careful consideration by the climate policy community

The Future of Maine\u27s Forests Under alternative Socioeconomic, Climate and Conservation Pathways

Maine is a historically important timber supply region in North America and understanding the potential change in forestlands and their product industries affected by climate change and various socio-economic conditions can better improve the forest healthy and sustain a sustainable product industry. A statistical harvest choice model for the state of Maine was developed in chapter 1. It was estimated using a multinomial logit model of two products, under varying management intensities, and ownership classifications across varying market conditions. Results indicate that stumpage prices have a significant effect on forest landowners\u27 harvest decisions and that the expansion of conservation land will have a relatively small impact on Maine’s timber supply. In chapter 2, five shared socioeconomic narrative pathways were developed to explore the consequence of changes in Maine’s social-economic elements to the future of the forest sector. Quantitative assumptions were combined with the stand-level harvest choice model to estimate a possible range of outcomes for the carbon stock and timber supply from 2020-2100. Results indicate a wide variation in timber harvest and carbon stock across all pathways, with the largest variation driven by changes in stumpage prices. In nearly all cases, Maine’s forest and carbon stock are estimated to expand over the next 80 years. In chapter 3, four greenhouse gas emission scenarios estimated using the HadGEM2 and CCSM4 climate models were used to quantify the impact of climate change on Maine’s forests through 2100. The forest landscape model LANDIS-II with PnET-Succession extension was used to project changes in aboveground biomass (AGB) and carbon (AGC) resulting from climate change, and the normalized and calibrated forest yield curves were then linked with the stand-level harvest choice model to quantify impacts to timber supply. Our simulation results demonstrated that forest AGB and AGC were most driven by continued recovery dynamics. In addition, climate change also has a net positive impact on growth and biomass accrual. As a result, Maine’s forest, carbon, and timber stocks are all expected to increase through 2100 under all climate change scenarios. In chapter 4, the SSPs framework was combined with the landscape model and timber economic model to explore the physical impacts of climate change as well as policies and socio-economic change on Maine’s forest sector. We found that Maine’s forests would become a large reservoir of carbon if current trends continued. Further, we estimated that socio-economic changes contribute to larger variations in forest supply and carbon stocks than climate change. Finally, new forest conservation policies may need to be implemented for a future where high GHG emissions and high socioeconomic challenges to mitigation scenarios, which could otherwise result in losses in forest carbon

Australasia

Observed changes and impacts Ongoing climate trends have exacerbated many extreme events (very high confidence). The Australian trends include further warming and sea level rise sea level rise (SLR), with more hot days and heatwaves, less snow, more rainfall in the north, less April–October rainfall in the southwest and southeast and more extreme fire weather days in the south and east. The New Zealand trends include further warming and sea level rise (SLR), more hot days and heatwaves, less snow, more rainfall in the south, less rainfall in the north and more extreme fire weather in the east. There have been fewer tropical cyclones and cold days in the region. Extreme events include Australia’s hottest and driest year in 2019 with a record-breaking number of days over 39°C, New Zealand’s hottest year in 2016, three widespread marine heatwaves during 2016–2020, Category 4 Cyclone Debbie in 2017, seven major hailstorms over eastern Australia and two over New Zealand from 2014–2020, three major floods in eastern Australia and three over New Zealand during 2019–2021 and major fires in southern and eastern Australia during 2019–2020

Assessing Consistency of Scenarios Across Scales Developing globally linked internally consistent scenarios under the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways framework

In global environmental change research, anticipating the implications of large-scale environmental changes on local development is an important endeavour for mitigating and adapting to difficult challenges. Researchers have used multi-scale scenario analysis to anticipate future changes. Simply put, multi-scale scenario analysis is used to model cross influences between factors or drivers operating at different scales, for example, global, regional, and national levels. To ensure that scenarios are plausible, which is important for policy decisions, scenarios must be consistent across scales. However, there is confusion to what cross-scale consistency means. Consistent scenarios across scales refers to how lower level (e.g., national) scenarios should be developed considering various development pathways at the global scale that can potentially influence domestic developments. Scenario studies often use the term ‘consistent’ as defined by Zurek and Henrichs’ (2007) linking strategies. Zurek and Henrichs (2007) categorize different strategies for linking scenarios across scales. The categorization is based on the process by which scenarios developed by different modelling teams are linked. The degree to which these scenarios are linked is characterized as equivalent, consistent, coherent, comparable, and complimentary—with equivalent as the strongest link, whereas complimentary as a weak or no link. Link strength is defined by how similar (or different) the scenario elements (logics, drivers, assumptions) are. Linking scenarios across scales (e.g., global and regional) should aim to be equivalent or consistent across scales; this can be achieved by quantitative downscaling. For scenarios developed in parallel, the degree to which these scenarios can be viewed as consistent depends on whether the elements in these scenarios are the same, if not similar. However, adhering to this criterion is challenging because lower level scenarios may require different scenario elements to be incorporated in the scenario development process—these elements are factors or drivers that are operating at a more localized scale. Therefore, constraining the selection of scenario elements for developing regional or national level scenarios may be impractical. There are varying degrees of consistency of scenarios across scales much like the concept proposed by Zurek and Henrichs (2007) that spans from equivalent to complimentary. However, there is a missing ‘threshold’ in their framework—at what point should scenario studies be considered inconsistent. This thesis offers a re-interpretation on the concept of linking strategies by identifying the threshold for which scenarios can be considered inconsistent. In so doing, I would argue for the need to reinterpret Zurek and Henrichs (2007) concept of linking strategies to advance scholarship in multi-scale scenario research. This dissertation presents original research by developing an extension study on Canada’s energy futures under the Shared Socioeconomic Pathway (SSP) scenario framework. The SSP framework is intended to support more detailed analyses of societal change at a more localized scale; this framework is described in thematic special issues in Climatic Change and Global Environmental Change in 2014 and 2017 respectively. The SSPs described in these special issues are the ‘basic’ global version; from them, ‘extended’ SSPs could be elaborated further for detailed regional and national analyses (O’Neill et al., 2017, 2014). The basic SSPs provide a global framing for different socioeconomic and climate change policy developments up to 2100 (O’Neill et al., 2014). The Canadian oil and gas sector interacts directly with global energy markets and is already playing a key role in driving climate change, both as a high carbon emitter and as a major exporter of fossil fuels. Given this context, a multi-scale study provides an understanding of the broader implications of global influences on Canada’s low-carbon energy transition and vice-versa. According to the requirement set out in the SSP guidance note (van Ruijven et al., 2014), extension studies must be linked (or ‘hooked’) to the global SSPs in order to be consistent. The scientific community has developed multiple approaches for extending basic SSPs. One of the approaches is to re-specify the SSP elements. This extension study links to the SSP elements by adding elements necessary for more detailed national and sectoral analyses. Prior to developing scenarios for Canada, there is a need to identify relevant scenario elements. Identifying and prioritizing scenario elements are usually left to scenario developers’ subjective interpretation of experts or stakeholder opinions. How one expresses which scenario elements are important resides in individuals’ mental models, which are not accessible to others. In contrast, here candidate scenario elements are gleaned from the existing Canadian energy futures studies published in 2015 to 2016, which are then subjected to a network analysis. Network statistics can be used to more objectively identify which scenario elements are key since the method is transparent and data is accessible for public inspection (Lloyd and Schweizer, 2014). Elements identified as important by network analysis are then incorporated for multi-scale scenario analysis. Cross-impact balance (CIB) analysis (Weimer-Jehle, 2006) is used to search for scenario configurations that are consistent across scales. The result of multi-scale scenario analysis suggests that pathways to decarbonization in Canada are likely promoted by domestic effort regardless of which global development pathways (either carbonized or decarbonized) unfold. Scenarios in which the world remains carbonized and Canada decarbonizes and vice-versa are internally consistent. In relation to Zurek and Henrichs’ (2007) linking strategies, a conventional belief or assumption that global and local scenario outcomes must match across scales to be “consistent” has emerged in the scenario research community—though not everyone agrees with this assumption (e.g., van Ruijven et al., 2014; Wiek et al., 2013). This assumption was tested in this research. The result also tells us that internal consistency does not require that the outcomes across scales should be the same. Due to confusion about what cross-scale consistency means, there is the need to perform internal consistency checks in multi-scale scenario analysis. There is also the need to revise the operational definition of consistency across scales. The term scenario consistency across scales should not be confused with their degree of linkages (i.e., more or fewer links). Instead, we can use the consistency definition provided by CIB: internally logically consistent. Nonetheless, what may be more useful is to define the term “inconsistent”. This should be reserved for scenarios that are found to have internal logic problems—scenarios that, for good reasons, would be dismissed as implausible