Computing land use emissions of greenhouse gases

Abstract

A model has been developed to estimate the regional emission of greenhouse gases from land-use related sources. Driving forces for this model are the changing regional demand for food and wood products driven by demographic and economic developments (Zuidema et al., 1994). To include the environmental conditions, which are essential factors determining the flux for certain sources, emissions are grid-based where possible. Grid-based explicit calculations are given for CH₄ emission from rice, wetlands, emissions from deforestation, savanna burning and agricultural waste burning and N₂O from natural soils, arable lands and deforestation. For a number of sources (landfills, domestic sewage treatment, termites, methane hydrates and aquatic sources) geographically explicit calculations are not yet possible because of data limitations. For most of the sources the global results of the calculations are in agreement with other scenario studies, although there are differences for a number of individual sources.