Quantifying the impact of key factors on the carbon mitigation potential of managed temperate forests.

Background: Forests mitigate climate change by reducing atmospheric -concentrations through the carbon sink in the forest and in wood products, and substitution effects when wood products replace carbon-intensive materials and fuels. Quantifying the carbon mitigation potential of forests is highly challenging due to the influence of multiple important factors such as forest age and type, climate change and associated natural disturbances, harvest intensities, wood usage patterns, salvage logging practices, and the carbon-intensity of substituted products. Here, we developed a framework to quantify the impact of these factors through factorial simulation experiments with an ecosystem model at the example of central European (Bavarian) forests.