Are Wood Fuels a Climate-Friendly Energy Source?
The boreal (Nordic) forest belt, covering large parts of Alaska, Canada, Scandinavia and Russia, probably stores more carbon than the world’s tropical rainforests. At the same time, boreal forests are considered an important source for bioenergy, with the potential for significant expansion of the energy harvest. Bjart Holtsmark’s work in recent years has focused on how the slow-growing boreal forests should be managed from a climate-policy perspective.
While visiting CES from 18 October to 6 December, Mr Holtsmark will mainly work on a paper that summarises the findings from his research on forest management. The basic issue is whether harvesting for bioenergy purposes should be subsidised, or whether is would be better for the climate for a policy to be designed that provides incentives for less harvesting and increased carbon sequestration in the forests.
Mr Holtsmark is also working on a joint paper with Michael Hoel and Katinka Holtsmark on how the German forester Martin Faustmann’s rules from 1849 for forest management should be adjusted in light of the social cost of carbon emissions.
Mr Holtsmark has also done research on the crafting of international environmental agreements. In the recent Handbook in Energy and Climate, he has an article entitled “International cooperation on climate change: why is there so little progress?” He has also recently published a couple of articles with a political approach to international climate policy, where he discusses whether there could be some adverse effects of international emissions trading leading to reduced efficiency and increased emissions. A third topic of Mr Holtsmark’s research is the relationship between population growth and the climate.
Bjart Holtsmark is a research economist at Statistics Norway. He is also affiliated with the Oslo Centre for Research on Environmentally Friendly Energy (CREE). In the period 2000–2001, Mr Holtsmark was Assistant Director General in the Tax Department at the Norwegian Ministry of Finance. From 1995 to 2000, he was a research fellow at the Centre for International Environmental and Climate Research – Oslo (CICERO).