Does a forest, managed sustainably for forest products, qualify as a sink for sequestered carbon?
Several carbon-accounting programs consider sustainably managed forests as valid carbon sinks, since they effectively remove carbon from the atmosphere for long periods, often longer than undisturbed trees in natural settings do. Thus, a forest landowner may justifiably claim a credit if he or she can demonstrate that harvested products are likely to prevent their carbon content from re-entering the atmosphere for a long period. b. Are forest products, themselves, carbon sinks? To the extent harvested forest products, such as building products or paper products, prevent a portion of woody cellulose from breaking down into carbon and re-entering the atmosphere, they are carbon sinks. The quality of the carbon sink-the extent to which its carbon-retention may be assured to persist over time-will influence how various carbon-accounting programs discount it in the offsets market. Since it is unreasonable for a particular, individual forest product’s life to be traced, the discount would be
