The DOI matches its Crossref record; 78 of the 79 references it cites were found in a registry or an index.
Unexpectedly large impact of forest management and grazing on global vegetation biomass
Open accessAbstract
Carbon stocks in vegetation have a key role in the climate system. However, the magnitude, patterns and uncertainties of carbon stocks and the effect of land use on the stocks remain poorly quantified. Here we show, using state-of-the-art datasets, that vegetation currently stores around 450 petagrams of carbon. In the hypothetical absence of land use, potential vegetation would store around 916 petagrams of carbon, under current climate conditions. This difference highlights the massive effect of land use on biomass stocks. Deforestation and other land-cover changes are responsible for 53-58% of the difference between current and potential biomass stocks. Land management effects (the biomass stock changes induced by land use within the same land cover) contribute 42-47%, but have been underestimated in the literature. Therefore, avoiding deforestation is necessary but not sufficient for mitigation of climate change. Our results imply that trade-offs exist between conserving carbon stocks on managed land and raising the contribution of biomass to raw material and energy supply for the mitigation of climate change. Efforts to raise biomass stocks are currently verifiable only in temperate forests, where their potential is limited. By contrast, large uncertainties hinder verification in the tropical forest, where the largest potential is located, pointing to challenges for the upcoming stocktaking exercises under the Paris agreement.
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“The biomass of the world ' s vegetation ( 25 ) has halved over human history”
From Pervasive human-driven decline of life on Earth points to the need for transformative change (2019) · cites this paper as [25]
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“The total biomass of crops cultivated by humans is estimated at ≈10 Gt C, which accounts for only ≈2% of the extant total plant biomass (17).”
From The biomass distribution on Earth (2018) · cites this paper as [17]
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“Combining data from independent sources such as these enables a robust assessment of the total plant biomass (17).”
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“The latter is estimated at 11.3 Mkm 2 in 2000 (9)”
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“Approximately 450 Gt of C is bound up in terrestrial biota, primarily in plants (86), while only ~6 Gt of C is found in ocean biota (87).”
From Earth beyond six of nine planetary boundaries (2023) · cites this paper as [86]
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“Land conversions (i.e., replacement of forests with cropland and pastures) and land management [i.e., harvesting of timber from managed forests or removal of herbaceous biomass through grazing (9)] almost equally cause these differences.”
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“Converted grassland holds biomass stocks that are less than 10% of the potential biomass stock (9).”
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Citations
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A large and persistent carbon sink in the world’s forests
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“Information on cropland types 32 was used to identify permanent crops, other trees within cropland 33 are not included in the cropland layer, complying with FAO definitions 31 .”
Research works printed but not linked: 1
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Metadata
- Authors
- Erb, K.-H., Kastner, T., Plutzar, C., Bais, A. L. S., Carvalhais, N., Fetzel, T., Gingrich, S., Haberl, H., Lauk, C., Niedertscheider, M., Pongratz, J., Thurner, M., & Luyssaert, S.
- Affiliations
- University of Klagenfurt (AT)
- University of Vienna (AT)
- Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry (DE)
- Max Planck Institute for Meteorology (DE)
- Stockholm University (SE)
- Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam (NL)
- Corresponding author
- Erb, Karl-Heinz
- ORCID
- Venue
- Nature
- Published
- 2017-12-20
- Volume
- 553
- Issue
- 7686
- Pages
- 73-76
- ISSN
- 0028-0836 (ISSN-L)
- 1476-4687
- PMC
- PMC5756473
- OpenAlex
- W2780388729
- Cited by
- 727
- References
- 79
- Citations by year
- 2026: 56 · 2025: 77 · 2024: 111 · 2023: 101 · 2022: 131 · 2021: 78 · 2020: 80 · 2019: 61 · 2018: 31
- FWCI
- 32.61
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- bronze
- doi.org
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- Nature (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Europe PMC (PubMed Central) (acceptedVersion)
- PubMed Central (acceptedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- Max Planck Digital Library (submittedVersion)
- MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) (submittedVersion)
- MPG.PuRe (Max Planck Society) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- VU Research Portal (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion)
- Funders
- European Space Agency
- European Commission (640176, H2020, 263522, UID/AMB/04085/2013)
- Vetenskapsrådet (621‐2014‐4266)
- Horizon 2020 Framework Programme (640176)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Forestry › Forest Management and Policy
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Forestry › Forest ecology and management
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Land Use and Ecosystem Services
- Keywords
- terrestrial carbon stocks, plant biomass, land use change, deforestation, forest management, grazing, carbon loss, climate change mitigation, biomass energy, tropical forests, temperate forests, carbon verification
- MeSH terms
- Animals, Animal Husbandry, Carbon, Conservation of Natural Resources, Human Activities, Plants, Trees, Tropical Climate, Forestry, Biomass, Uncertainty, Internationality, Global Warming, Carbon Sequestration, Forests
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