Recently a number of forest products corporations have used a broad range of metrics to report and demonstrate the beneficial impacts of their products and processes. Some of these developments are very interesting, and draw upon established methods for calculating embodied carbon in products (using life cycle assessment, LCA) and stored sequestered carbon in forests. In this presentation I will consider three of these metrics: embodied carbon; stored sequestered carbon; and the displacement effect.
As society, business and policy begin to consider greenhouse gas emission reductions and our national commitment to a net zero future, it is important to communicate the role that sustainable forest management, timber and bio-based materials can play. The important role of forest carbon sequestration presents a direct method for removing carbon from the atmosphere. However, many debates remain open around transferring this information downstream to report the carbon stored in harvested wood products. Further, there has been increased interest in quantifying the displacement effect – when a low embodied carbon product such as timber is used in preference to a higher embodied carbon product for the same purpose. Is there potential to report displaced carbon emissions of wood products alongside the stored carbon? If this method were to be adopted, what data would be needed and how could transparency be ensured?