Terrestrial ecosystem management for climate change mitigation

Decreasing the human impact on the atmosphere will necessitate active management of terrestrial carbon pools and greenhouse gas fluxes. Biospheric greenhouse gas emission mitigation measures such as increasing forest area and increasing forest biomass density, build-up of soil carbon and avoided emissions from deforestation offer cost-efficient solutions while in the long run they are limited by land availability, saturation, and concerns about their permanence. Biomass can also be used to produce low greenhouse gas intensive materials, feedstock for energy production and if combined with carbon capture and sequestration it can offer permanent negative emissions. Although most terrestrial management options appear as competitive mitigation measures from an economic point of view, issues of governance remain most contentious as they induce competition for land and other ecosystem services.