Questions & Answers

Monoculture Plantations

In 2003, when climate forestation projects were first being discussed, a number of NGOs expressed concern that such projects would lead to a significant increase in fast growing tree-farm plantations, which would in turn lead to poor biodiversity and detrimental environmental impacts. It was even suggested that, in a worst case scenario, these fast growing tree farms would even replace natural forests.

When the CarbonFix Standard entered the market in 2007 a new benchmark was set. This benchmark allowed organisations to plant on previously degraded land and manage them in a sustainable way. The benchmark has lead NGOs to realize that forestations can also provide major positive effects for the environement and people when implemented correctly.


No root-cause Solution

Fossil fuels are limited and when burnt they emit emissions into the atmosphere. Because of this, society needs to transform how it produces and uses energy. Although forests absorb carbon out of the atmosphere, the initial transmission of carbons into the air is not prevented.
 
Hence, investments in climate forestations do not contribute to reducing society's dependence on fossil fuels, but as long as fossil fuels are burned, forests are the only answer we can give. We see tree planting activities as one tool out of many to reach the world goal of -80% CO2 in 2050.


Permanence Issues

Though planting a tree will result in decreasing the amount of carbon in the atmosphere, nobody can guarantee that the forest will exist in 1000 years. However, this is not our key concern at the moment.
 
Today's challenge is to lower the amount of CO2 in our atmosphere by 80% by the year 2050 (the official goal of the UN). Every tree planted today helps us reach this goal. CarbonFix ensures with its standard the permanence of the credits for the next 50 years.


Harvesting Trees

Many people believe that their carbon credits are lost as soon as trees are harvested. This is not true. Forests continue to grow as harvested trees are replaced by new ones. CarbonFix certified projects can only sell carbon credits that are feasible for the project area.
 
Methodological Challenges

How much carbon is stored in a tree depends on factors like geographical location, species, soil type, climate etc. To ensure that no overestimation is made on the carbon stored by the forest, CarbonFix has set different safeguards:

Conservative approach
All parameters used for the determination of the net CO2-fixation must be derived from the best available scientific sources. In their synergy, they must lead to a conservative calculation approach. This means that in case of uncertainties:
- the CO2-fixation should be underestimated, and 
- the baseline and leakage should be overestimated

Cabon pool “harvested wood”
Some CarbonFix projects produce timber. This timber generally has additional climate effects, which, however, are NOT accounted for by the standard's methodology. 

What are typical positive effects from harvested wood?
- Wood is used for furniture and as building material. Such use stores carbon for much longer than the time of the climate project.
- Wood can be used to replace energy intensive materials, e.g. using wooden window frames instead of aluminum frames.
- Wood is a direct substitute for fossil fuels, e.g. using pellets to heat a home rather than oil.
 
Monitoring over 50 years
To ensure that the carbon stays in the trees, CarbonFix certified projects are being monitored by third-party auditors up to 50 years after planting. Observed shortfalls must either be compensated by planting additional trees or through buying the shortage of credits from other projects.

When these possibilities are exhausted, the carbon credits of the carbon buyers are compensated by credits of the CarbonFix buffer. This buffer is an insurance pool, where 30% of all credits from CarbonFix certified projects are payed in.


Forest Fire

See point above "Monitoring over 50 years".


Lack of Additionality

A carbon credit is only worth its money, when its additionality has been proven. The term additionality is used to explain the fact that trees have been planted only due to the additional means provided from the sales of the carbon credits.

CarbonFix therefore uses the additionality test provided by the Climate Secretariat of the UN. Although CarbonFix still sees room for improvement for this tool, it is currently seen as the best way to measure additional carbon reductions.