UK Biodiversity Indicator D1b, Removal of greenhouse gases by UK forests

This spreadsheet is the underlying data for the biodiversity indicator D1b, Removal of greenhouse gases by UK forests. The benefits that humans receive from the environment have become more widely recognised. The Millennium Ecosystem Assessment and the more recent UK National Ecosystem Assessment both highlighted that ecosystems and the services they deliver underpin our very existence. We depend on them to produce our food and timber, regulate water supplies and climate, and breakdown waste products. We also value them in less obvious ways: contact with nature gives pleasure, provides recreation and is known to have a positive impact on long-term health and happiness. Measuring the status of ecosystem services is therefore a critical aim of the indicator set. Greenhouse gas removal is a regulating service that contributes to reducing the scale and future impacts of climate change (climate change mitigation). UK forests are a large store of carbon and also act as an active carbon 'sink', removing carbon dioxide (CO2), a greenhouse gas, from the atmosphere and storing it as carbon in living biomass, leaf litter and forest soil. This sequestration of CO2 is an essential ecosystem service. The data presented are from the UK's Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) greenhouse gas inventory, which provides estimates of the annual rate of emissions and removals of greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide (CO2), methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O)) from the atmosphere by forests in the UK between 1990 and 2013 (Figures D1bi and D1bii). LULUCF emissions and removals are given in terms of carbon dioxide equivalent. The carbon dioxide equivalent (CO2e) of a mixture of greenhouse gases is the quantity of CO2 that would have the same global warming potential. Showing greenhouse gas removals by type of woodland is interesting from a biodiversity perspective as it allows a clearer presentation of the contribution made to greenhouse gas removals by broadleaf woodland, most of which constitutes priority habitat. Data inputs and some model components used to produce the estimates of greenhouse gas removals, published in the Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry greenhouse gas inventory (LULUCF), are currently under review and likely to change in 2016. This is one of a suite of 24 UK biodiversity indicators published by JNCC on behalf of Defra; the latest publication date was 19 January 2016 - for indicator D1b the latest data are for 2013.