Biobrandstoffen worden door de Europese Commissie en de Nederlandse overheid voorgesteld als onderdeel van een integrale benadering om de emissie van broeikasgassen te reduceren en om de energiezekerheid te vergroten, waarbij tevens rurale ontwikkeling gestimuleerd wordt. Om de beschikbaarheid van duurzame biobrandstoffen voor Nederland in 2020 te schatten, is er in deze studie gekeken naar de mogelijke ontwikkelingen die te verwachten zijn op het gebied van de productie van biobrandstoffen in de nabije toekomst.

Climate change is one of the main factors that will affect biodiversity in the future and may even cause species extinctions. We suggest a methodology to derive a general relationship between biodiversity change and global warming. In conjunction with other pressure relationships, our relationship can help to assess the combined effect of different pressures to overall biodiversity change and indicate areas that are most at risk. We use a combination of an integrated environmental model (IMAGE) and climate envelope models for European plant species for several climate change scenarios to estimate changes in mean stable area of species and species turnover. We show that if global temperature increases, then both species turnover will increase, and mean stable area of species will decrease in all biomes. The most dramatic changes will occur in Northern Europe, where more than 35% of the species composition in 2100 will be new for that region, and in Southern Europe, where up to 25% of the species now present will have disappeared under the climatic circumstances forecasted for 2100. In Mediterranean scrubland and natural grassland/steppe systems, arctic and tundra systems species turnover is high, indicating major changes in species composition in these ecosystems. The mean stable area of species decreases mostly in Mediterranean scrubland, grassland/steppe systems and warm mixed forests.

Food supply and food distribution have been and are important issues in the global political arena. The recent emergence of biofuel policies has increased the influence of the policy arena on agricultural production. In this paper we show the regional impact of changes in the European Common Agricultural Policy and biofuel policy. Shifting trade patterns, changes in agricultural production, and expansion of agricultural area or intensification of agriculture result in changes in land use and land use emissions. Higher prices for agricultural crops on the world market together with changing production raise agricultural income. Brazil is the region the most affected. The results show that arrangements or policies will be needed to avoid negative impacts in other regions of changing agricultural or biofuel policies in the European Union.

This paper evaluates the role of land in long-run climate stabilization mitigation scenarios. The details of land modeling for common stabilization policy scenarios are, for the first time, presented, contrasted, and assessed. While we find significant differences in approaches across modeling platforms, all the approaches conclude that land based mitigation – agriculture, forestry, and biomass liquid and solid energy substitutes – could be a steady and significant part of the cost-effective portfolio of mitigation strategies; thereby, reducing stabilization cost and increasing flexibility for achieving more aggressive climate targets. However, large fossil fuel emissions reductions are still required, and there are substantial uncertainties, with little agreement about abatement magnitudes. Across the scenarios, land mitigation options contribute approximately 100 to 340GtC equivalent abatement over the century, 15 to 40% of the total required for stabilization, with bio-energy providing up to 15% of total primary energy. Long-run land climate modeling is rapidly evolving with critical challenges to address. In characterizing current capability, this paper hopes to stimulate future research and the next generation of land modeling and provide a point of comparison for energy and climate policies considering bio-energy, reduced deforestation and degradation, and cost containment.

To demonstrate potential future consequences of land cover and land use changes beyond those for physical climate and the carbon cycle, we present an analysis of large‐scale impacts of land cover and land use changes on atmospheric chemistry using the chemistry‐climate model EMAC (ECHAM5/MESSy Atmospheric Chemistry) constrained with present‐day and 2050 land cover, land use, and anthropogenic emissions scenarios. Future land use and land cover changes are expected to result in an increase in global annual soil NO emissions by ∼1.2 TgN yr −1 (9%), whereas isoprene emissions decrease by ∼50 TgC yr −1 (−12%). The analysis shows increases in simulated boundary layer ozone mixing ratios up to ∼9 ppbv and more than a doubling in hydroxyl radical concentrations over deforested areas in Africa. Small changes in global atmosphere‐biosphere fluxes of NO x and ozone point to compensating effects. Decreases in soil NO emissions in deforested regions are counteracted by a larger canopy release of NO x caused by reduced foliage uptake. Despite this decrease in foliage uptake, the ozone deposition flux does not decrease since surface layer mixing ratios increase because of a reduced oxidation of isoprene by ozone. Our study indicates that the simulated impact of land cover and land use changes on atmospheric chemistry depends on a consistent representation of emissions, deposition, and canopy interactions and their dependence on meteorological, hydrological, and biological drivers to account for these compensating effects. It results in negligible changes in the atmospheric oxidizing capacity and, consequently, in the lifetime of methane. Conversely, we expect a pronounced increase in oxidizing capacity as a consequence of anthropogenic emission increases.

In this paper, we assess the global consequences of implementing first- and second-generation bioenergy in the coming five decades, focusing on the nitrogen cycle. We use a climate mitigation scenario from the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development's (OECD) Environmental Outlook, in which a carbon tax is introduced to stimulate production of biofuels from energy crops. In this scenario, the area of energy crops will increase from 8 Mha in the year 2000 to 270 Mha (14% of total cropland) and producing 5.6 Pg dry matter per year (12% of energy use) in 2050. This production requires an additional annual 19 Tg of N fertilizer in 2050 (15% of total), and this causes a global emission of 0.7 Tg of N2O-N (8% of agricultural emissions), 0.2 Tg NO-N (6%), and 2.2 Tg of NH3-N (5%). In addition, we project that 2.6 Tg of NO3(-)-N will leach from fields under energy crops. The emissions of N2O may be an important term in the greenhouse gas balance of biofuels produced from energy crops.

The aim of this study is to explore policy options that could have major positive or negative impacts on biodiversity. The main question is whether the 2010 Biodiversity Target can be met at global and regional levels. Effects up to 2050 are taken into account. According to a business as usual scenario (baseline), and six individual options, it is unlikely that the 2010 target will be met at either global level or regional level. The loss of biodiversity is expected to continue at an unchanged pace in the coming decades. Key drivers, global population and economic activity are expected to keep on growing. Between 2000 and 2050, the global population is projected to grow by 50% and the global economy to quadruple. The need for food, fodder, energy and wood will unavoidably lead to a decrease in the global natural stocks. The negative impact of climate change, nitrogen deposition, fragmentation, infrastructure and unchecked human settlement on biodiversity will further expand. As a result, global biodiversity is projected to decrease from about 70% in 2000 to about 63% by 2050. According to this baseline scenario, the rate of biodiversity loss over the coming decades will increase instead of decrease. Some options for reducing the rate of loss in the longer term may lead to an increase in the rate of loss in the short term. Increase ofprotected areas to 20% of all ecological regions and sustainable meat production contribute to bringing the 2010 target closer, and may potentially reduce the rate of loss before 2050. Measures for limiting climate change by, amongst others, large-scale production of bioenergy seem to inevitably lead to additional loss of biodiversity in the medium term (2010-2050). By 2050 the biodiversity gain from avoided climate change does not compensate for the biodiversity loss due to additional land use, although this may be reversed in the long term (>2100). Large-scale plantation forestry also leads initially to additional biodiversity loss through increased land use. However, when plantations gradually take over global production (> 2040 in this option) the total biodiversity loss becomes less than that from ongoing exploitation of mostly (semi-)natural forests. Full trade liberalization in agriculture (WTO) will lead to further loss of biodiversity through ongoing agricultural expansion and large-scale land conversion in low-cost areas, where agricultural productivity is less efficient. Major loss results from a production shift by abandoning agricultural areas in developed regions and converting large natural areas in developing regions, concentrated in Latin America and Southern Africa. The shift results in higher net land requirements at the global level, since current crop yields are higher in the developed regions. Full trade liberalization in agriculture in combination with poverty alleviation in SubSaharan Africa leads to additional loss of biodiversity through agricultural expansion. Over the next 50 years much of the world's remaining natural capital will consist of mountainous, boreal, tundra, ice and (semi-) arid ecosystems, generally considered less suitable for human settlement. The reader should be aware that this study is not meant to predict the future but to explore the major contributions of various currently debated policy options. Not all the possible measures or their combinations were assessed, and inland waters and marine ecosystems have not been considered. In all calculations agricultural productivity has been optimistically estimated. Less optimistic trends would correspond to an additional biodiversity loss of several percent . Increase in agricultural productivity will therefore be a key factor in reducing biodiversity loss in the future. We stress that option effects in terms ofdirection and relative magnitude are more robust than the absolute baseline trend. This studywas commissioned by the Secretariat ofthe Convention on Biological Diversity (SCBD) and carried out by the Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency (MNP) in cooperation with the World Conservation Monitoring Centre of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP-WCMC), UNEP/GRID-Arendal and the Agricultural Economics Research Institute (LEI, part of Wageningen University and Research Centre). The results were used as input for the second edition of the Global Biodiversity Outlook (GBO-2).

This chapter describes the way scenario analysis is used as a convenient tool to envision the future of land use and cover. The main messages of large-scale scenarios and their insights into plausible global and continental-scale trends are described in the chapter. Scenario analysis is the procedure by which scenarios are developed, compared, and evaluated. Scenario analysis does not eliminate the uncertainties about the future, but it does provide a means to represent current knowledge in the form of consistent, conditional statements about the future. There is a variety of ways of classifying land scenarios. One way is to distinguish between qualitative and quantitative scenarios. Scenarios with a greater extent of agricultural land result from assumptions about high population growth rates together with low but steady economic growth, which combine to stimulate large increases in food demand.

Large amounts of carbon (C) have been released into the atmosphere over the past centuries. Less than half of this C stays in the atmosphere. The remainder is taken up by the oceans and terrestrial ecosystems. Where does the C come from and where and when does this uptake occur? We address these questions by providing new estimates of regional land-use emissions and natural carbon fluxes for the 1700–2000 period, simultaneously considering multiple anthropogenic (e.g. land and energy demand) and biochemical factors in a geographically explicit manner. The observed historical atmospheric CO2 concentration profile for the 1700 to 2000 period has been reproduced well. The terrestrial natural biosphere has been a major carbon sink, due to changes in climate, atmospheric CO2, nitrogen and management. Due to land-use change large amounts of carbon have been emitted into the atmosphere. The net effect was an emission of 35 Pg C into the atmosphere for the 1700 to 2000 period. If land use had remained constant at its distribution in 1700, then the terrestrial C uptake would have increased by 142 Pg C. This overall difference of including or excluding land-use changes (i.e. 177 Pg C) comes to more than half of the historical fossil-fuel related emissions of 308 Pg C. Historically, global land-use emissions were predominantly caused by the expansion of cropland and pasture, while wood harvesting (for timber and fuel wood) only played a minor role. These findings are robust even when changing some of the important drivers like the extent of historical land-use changes. Under varying assumptions, land-use emissions over the past three centuries could have increased up to 20%, but remained significantly lower than from other sources. Combining the regional land-use and natural C fluxes, North America and Europe were net C sources before 1900, but turned into sinks during the twentieth century. Nowadays, these fluxes are a magnitude smaller than energy- and industry-related emissions. Tropical regions were C neutral prior to 1950, but then accelerated deforestation turned these regions into major C sources. The energy- and industry-related emissions are currently increasing in many tropical regions, but are still less than the land-use emissions. Based on the presented relevance of the land-use and natural fluxes for the historical C cycle and the significance of fossil-fuel emissions nowadays, there is a need for an integrated approach for energy, nature and land use in evaluating possible climate change mitigation policies.

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This study explores the effects of agricultural trade liberalisation and concomitant changes in agricultural areas and livestock production on greenhouse gas emissions using the coupled LEITAP–IMAGE modelling system. The results indicate that liberalisation leads to an increase in total greenhouse gas emissions by about 6% compared to the reference scenario value in 2015. The increase in CO2 emissions are caused by vegetation clearance due to a rapid expansion of agricultural area; mainly in South America and Southeast Asia. Increased methane emissions in the case of full liberalisation are caused by less intensive cattle farming in regions such as South America and Southeast Asia. This pattern is observed up to 2050. Total global production of milk, dairy and beef do not change with full liberalisation, but production shifts were observed from North America and Europe to South America and Southeast Asia. Results are less pronounced in variants where trade liberalisation is only implemented partially. Remarkably, our study shows in the trade barrier removal scenario larger numbers of dairy cows in Australia and New Zealand (ANZ) then with full liberalisation scenario or a variant in which only milk quota are abolished. This illustrates that different types of liberalisation need to be analysed regionally and per commodity before general conclusions on the impact of trade liberalisation can be drawn. Our study contributes new information on greenhouse gas emissions to a vast number of trade liberalisation studies that focus on economic impacts. The combined economic-environmental impacts need to be assessed in detail before general conclusions on trade liberalisation can be given.