Abstract
Carbon sequestration is one of the important ecosystem services provided by forested landscapes. Dry forests have high potential for carbon storage. However, their potential to store and sequester carbon is poorly understood in Kenya. Moreover, past attempts to estimate carbon stock have ignored drylands ecosystem heterogeneity. This study assessed the potential of Mukogodo dryland forest-landscape in offsetting carbon dioxide through carbon sequestration and storage. Four carbon pools (above and below ground biomass, soil, dead wood and litter) were analyzed. A total of 51 (400 m2) sample plots were established using stratified-random sampling technique to estimate biomass across six vegetation classes in three landscape types (forest reserve, ranches and conservancies) using nested-plot design. Above ground biomass was determined using generalized multispecies model with diameter at breast height, height and wood density as variables. Below ground, soil, litter and dead wood biomass; carbon stocks and carbon dioxide equivalents (CO2eq) were estimated using secondary information. The CO2eq was multiplied by current prices of carbon trade to compute carbon sequestration value. Mean ± SE of biomass and carbon was determined across vegetation and landscape types and mean differences tested by one-way Analysis of Variance. Mean biomass and carbon was about 79.15 ± 40.22 TB ha-1 and 37.25 ± 18.89 TC ha-1 respectively. Cumulative carbon stock was estimated at 682.08 TC ha-1; forest reserve (251.57 TC ha-1) had significantly high levels of carbon stocks compared to ranches (209.78 TC ha-1) and conservancies (220.73 TC ha-1, P = 0.000). Further, closed forest significantly contributed to the overall biomass and carbon stock (58%). The carbon sequestration potential was about 19.9MTCO2eq with most conservative worth of KES 39.9B (US$40M) per annum. The high carbon stock in the landscape shows the potential of dryland ecosystems as carbon sink for climate change mitigation. However, for communities to benefit from bio-carbon funds in future, sustainable landscape management and restorative measures should be practiced to enhance carbon storage and provision of other ecosystem services.
Highlights
The main carbon pools on earth systems are atmosphere, terrestrial biosphere, ocean and Earth’s crust (Hoover & Riddle, 2020)
The disaggregation of the above carbon stocks for various carbon pools indicates that 56.15% was stored in both above and below ground biomass, 32.09% was stored in the soils, 6.74% in the dead wood and 5.02% in the litter
Significant variation existed in mean biomass and carbon stocks across the different carbon pools (DF3, 200 = 18.95, P = 0.000)—Table 1
Summary
The main carbon pools on earth systems are atmosphere, terrestrial biosphere, ocean and Earth’s crust (Hoover & Riddle, 2020). Terrestrial ecosystems (mainly forest, soil and wetland), are the major carbon pool components on earth’s system (Beedlow et al, 2004; Lal et al, 2012; Xu et al, 2018) and largely contributes to the global carbon balance (IPCC, 2007; Hoover & Riddle, 2020). Anthropogenic activities such as land-use change and combustion of biomass and fossil fuel are largely contributing to de-carbonization and accumulation of bio-spheric greenhouse gases (GHGs)—(Lal et al, 2012; Ciais et al, 2014; Friedlingstein et al, 2019). Climate mitigation strategies focus on reducing emissions of GHGs into the atmosphere but more on removing and stabilizing carbon concentration in the atmosphere (Gren & Aklilu, 2016)
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