Comparison of greenhouse gas emissions of different biomass management scenarios in Indonesian peatlands

Peatlands play an important role as carbon pools with one third of the world's soil carbon stored (Joosten & Clarke, 2002). However, peatlands of Southeast Asia have suffered shrinkage due to economic and natural resource pressure, often caused by land use change and fires. In this work, a comparison of three scenarios related to current land uses and aboveground biomass valorization of peatlands was performed. The objective of this study is to compare the global contribution to climate change that could be avoided by means of the biomass valorization and stopping the fires in peatlands. Three scenarios were defined to compare the impact to climate change through greenhouse gas emissions of different land management for biomass from peatland. The scenario assessment is based on meta-analysis reviews. The total greenhouse gas emissions estimated for the scenarios “conservation”, “business as usual” and “biomass valorization” were 141, 1114 and 205 t ha-1 CO2 equivalent respectively. The “biomass valorization” scenario avoid 909 t ha-1 CO2 equivalent in comparison with “business as usual” scenario and, contributes 64 t ha-1 CO2 equivalent more than “conservation” scenario. Scenario “biomass valorization” is an alternative to stop the fires in peatlands maintaining a balance between economic activities and contributing in peat formation.