System Analytical Assessment of the Carbon Balance in Austria : Final Report Part II: Dynamical Modeling

1997

153 S.

Ill., graph. Darst., zahlr. Lit. Ang.

Bandaufführung

162691

This study assesses and quantifies sources and sinks of carbon compounds of relevance to Austria on the basis of an integrated operational model framework, the Austrian Carbon Balance Model (ACBM). The model and its current state of development are documented, thereby taking account of carbon-relevant human activities, pools, fluxes and feedbacks that have been identified to be of importance to Austria's carbon balance, currently and in the future. The ACBM Covers: Austria's biosphere encompassing the moduks forestry and agriculture, and Austria's technosphere encompassing a set of submodules ranging from energy to wood and food & feed industries to biomass-relevant products, including biogenic waste. Presently, the ACBM allows to realize a Reference Scenario for Austria for 1990 - 2050, which is defined to include: 1) a reference scenario for the energy system, based on Scenario AI (selected region: Western Europe) of the global IIASA-World Energy Council study; and 2) a scenario that keeps current (1990) land-use/cover conditions constant into the future for the remainder of the ACBM. Model results illustrate the relative importance of subsystems in terms of magnitude of carbon fluxes, carbon source/sink strength, characteristic temporal scale, and susceptibility to emission reduction measures. The two most dominant subsystems are Austria's energy system (strong carbon source) and Austria's exploitable forest system (strong carbon sink). Taking account of the present state of model development, that is, of the manifold simplifications, model restrictions and modeling assumptions, and thus all drawbacks in regard to model interpretation, the careful conclusion to be made is that Austria, in spite of enjoying considerable sink benefits due to the growth of its exploitable forest, will most likely not be in the position to effectively reduce its net atmospheric carbon contribution, if following the Reference Scenario. Evidence is strong that this statement also holds for a living biomass sink strength, which is greater than the one presently realized for Austria's exploitable forest in the ACBM. Uncertainties underlying the biosphere are great but could be reduced considerably, provided forest-statistical and agricultural field data availability and consistency are improved.