Worldwide peatland degradations and the related carbon dioxide emissions: the importance of policy regulations

István Urák, Tibor Hartel, Róbert Gallé and Adalbert Balog

Environmental Science & Policy, 2017, vol. 69, issue C, 57-64

Abstract: Peatlands cover cca 3% of the planet‘s surface, yet have disproportional role in carbon stocking. Our goal is to understand the world peatland degradation and it’s possible CO2 emissions for two time periods: 2025 and 2050. First we modeled the future degradation of peatlands and the associated carbon emissions. Second, a conceptual representation was developed to understand the most important socio-political factors behind the observed peatland degradation. We found an increase of the degraded peatland surfaces by 17% till in the period of 2008–2025 (summing cca 559,519km2) and 26% till 2050 (summing 626,048km2). The highest degradation levels expected for Asia (about 472,197km2 until 2050). The global carbon emission resulting from peatland degradation was 1,052.79 Mtone in 1990 and 1298 Mtone in 2008, the differences being largely related to the Asian emissions (47.8% increase from 345 Mtone in 1990 to 722 Mtone in 2008). We expect an increase of carbon emission due to peatland degradation from 2008 to 1582 Mtone until 2025 and to 2118 Mtone until 2050. The model shows that 25% of the current peatlands will be degraded until 2050 and will be responsible for about 8% of the global anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions.

Keywords: Mathematical model; Conceptual representation; Stochastic factors; Local factors; Social factors; Geopolitical factors (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2017
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:enscpo:v:69:y:2017:i:c:p:57-64

DOI: 10.1016/j.envsci.2016.12.012

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