Current projects
Means for reducing emissions from traffic, their costs and impacts on fairness
The goal for the project is to discover new, feasible ways to reduce traffic emissions in order for the development of traffic emissions to, for its part, support Finland’s path to carbon neutrality by 2035. Information on the climate impacts and financial impacts, social acceptability and links to health is generated for the purposes of a feasibility assessment.
The aim of the project is to provide a new factual background for the discussion on the roadmap to fossil-free traffic and the necessary increase in emissions reductions. The work done during the project will also specify the impacts as regards climate policy actions being prepared or designed (especially as regards emissions trading for road traffic, boat traffic and aviation (CORSIA)).
The project produces an openly accessible road traffic model that can be used to examine the emissions impacts of the current actions and any potential further actions. The impacts on emissions are reported on a life cycle basis as well as on a regional basis in order to allow for a holistic understanding.
The project is implemented 1.6.2021-30.6.2024
Project participants: Finnish Environment Institute, University of Oulu, Finnish Meteorological Institute, University of Helsinki, Tampere University
Further information: Jyri Seppälä/The secretariat of the Finnish Climate Change Panel,
Analysis of forest use in relation to securing carbon sinks and protecting biodiversity
The Panel’s previous studies have not examined the impacts of conserving biodiversity on the targeting of felling and the carbon sinks in managed forest land. At the provided level of logging, strict conservation will lead to pressure for felling being targeted in a smaller forest area than before, which may be assumed to reduce the carbon sink. On the other hand, the protected areas act as carbon sinks, which will reinforce the sink. The selection of conservation areas will also have an effect: If some of the areas for conservation are established on forest land where felling has been performed, the costs will be lowered and the young forest may offer a better starting point for climate change adaptation.
The project simultaneously looks at questions related to forest carbon sinks and the conservation of biodiversity. The project will provide answers to the question of how forest carbon sinks will develop under the strict conservation of old forests when the levels of felling are allowed to vary. At the same time, structural characteristics are used to analyse how the biodiversity of commercial forests will develop as the pressure for felling increases. A separate analysis looks at how the size of the carbon sink and the amount of logging can be regulated using the minimum diameter and age for final felling. The analysis also offers a starting point for examining other control methods concerning felling. The aim for the project is to compile together the modelling results that look at various changes in biodiversity and carbon sinks with a view to various background results from commercial forestry. The project is implemented in cooperation with the Finnish Nature Panel.
Project participants: University of Helsinki, the Finnish Nature Panel
Further information: The secretariat of the Finnish Climate Change Panel,