ASSOCIATIONS
A shift to timber construction would make quite a difference for achieving the climate stabilisation targets of the Paris agreement.
Buildings can become
carbon sink if wood
replaces cement and steel
By Sawmilling South Africa (SSA)
Replacing cement and steel in urban construction by wood could avoid
greenhouse gas emissions from cement and steel production and turn buildings
into a carbon sink, the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research in
Germany (PIK) announced in early February.
D
epending on the scenario, between 10 million
tons and close to 700 million tons of carbon
could be saved every year, according to a
PIK study.
Although global carbon emissions amounted to around
11 000 million tons every year, PIK noted that a “shift to
timber would make quite a difference for achieving the
climate stabilisation targets of the Paris agreement."
For the study, the scientists assumed a ‘business as usual’
scenario with just 0.5% of new buildings constructed with
timber by 2050 and analysed the effects if this number was
brought up by up to 50%.
If countries with current low industrialisation levels also made
the transition to a wood-based construction sector, even a
90% timber share was conceivable, according to the study.
However, while the required amount of timber harvest was
available, such an upscaling would clearly need most careful,
sustainable forest management and governance, according
to the study.
www.timberiq.co.za
"Urbanisation and population growth will create a vast demand for
the construction of new housing and commercial buildings," said
lead author and PIK scientist, Galina Churkina.
According to PIK, a five-storey residential building structured in
laminated timber could store up to 180 kilos of carbon per square
meter -- three times more than natural forests with a high carbon
density could do above ground.
Still, even if 90% of new buildings would be timber constructions,
the carbon accumulated in such wooden cities over thirty years
would only sum up to less than one tenth of the overall amount of
carbon stored aboveground in forests worldwide.
"Protecting forests from unsustainable logging and a wide range
of other threats is thus key if timber use was to be substantially
increased," said co-author Christopher Reyer from PIK.
To cover demand, additional plantations would be needed,
including the cultivation of fast-growing bamboo by small-scale
landowners in tropical and subtropical regions, said Reyer.
Source: GWMI
// APRIL / MAY 2020
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