Dr. Laporte is a biologist whose research centers on the applications of satellite imagery to tropical forest ecosystems, including vegetation & carbon mapping, land-use change, deforestation causes and consequences on carbon and biodiversity. She has been involved in numerous environmental projects in Central Africa over the past ten years, working with in-country scientists, foresters, and international conservation organizations to develop integrated forest monitoring systems and promote forest conservation. She received her doctorate in tropical biogeography from l'Université Paul Sabatier in Toulouse, France.
WHRC - 2010
Interview with Nadine Laporte, Ph.D., Associate Scientist at the Woods Hole Research Center (WHRC)
REDD stands for « Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation »
It is designed to address 12 to 15% of the total annual anthropogenic carbon emissions. It is recognized as the most promising international policy mechanism through performance-based financial incentives for reducing emissions from land use and land use change in the tropics.
REDD+ refers to the recent inclusion of conservation, sustainable management of forests, and enhancement of forest carbon stocks in this new mechanism which, after five years of discussion under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), there is little hope it will be formally adopted at the next climate treaty of the Convention of the Parties (COP) in Cancun in December of 2010.
If the REDD mechanism is implemented, tropical countries will have to reduce their emissions under an agreed « baseline », and remote sensing combined with field information would be the basis of an operational, robust, cost effective system for « Measuring, Reporting and Verifying » (MRV) emissions at the subnational and national level. There are still a lot of discussions regarding how baselines will be determined historically (calculated against past carbon emissions), modeled (based on potential future emissions), but it is evident that any MRV system will rely on the availability and quality of a systematic earth observation system.
While REDD could keep more tropical forests standing and benefit climate, biodiversity, and the water cycle, it is insufficient for effectively reducing global carbon emissions or saving all forest habitats and associated wildlife. Developed countries also need to agressively reduce their greenhouse gas emissions and their high demand for food, fiber and wood, which come at a high energy price and also drive deforestatation and carbon emissions in many tropical nations. The forests of Brazil and Indonesia have paid a high price in relation to the increasing demands for goods in developed economies. In order to protect our global forests and their associated biodiversity most effectively, a new economic and social vision based on quality of life, rather than consumption, is required. We need a full environmental accounting system, not just a carbon accounting system .