Stocks of dead wood or necromass represent an important portion of biomass and nutrients in tropical forests. The objectives of this study were: 1) to evaluate and compare the necromass of “terra firme” and lowlands forests, (2) to study the relationship between necromass, above-ground biomass and wood density, and (3) to estimate the necromass of the department of Madre de Dios, Peru. Stocks of necromass and above-ground biomass were estimated at three different locations using permanent plots and line intercept transects. The average volume of necromass for the three sites was 72.9 m3 ha-1 with an average weight varying between 24.8 and 30.7 Mg ha-1, depending on the estimations of dead wood density used for the calculations. Terra firme forests had significantly higher stocks of necromass than lowland forests. The amount of necromass was 11% of the total above-ground biomass in Ma...

La cantidad de madera muerta o necromasa representa una importante porción de la biomasa y de los nutrientes en los bosques tropicales. Los objetivos de este estudio son: 1) hacer una evaluación y comparación entre la necromasa de los bosques de altura o tierra firme y los bosques inundables o bajíos, (2) estudiar las relaciones entre la necromasa, la biomasa aérea y la densidad de madera del bosque, y (3) proporcionar una primera estimación de la necromasa para todo el departamento de Madre de Dios. La necromasa gruesa y la masa aérea vegetativa fueron estudiados en tres diferentes lugares utilizando parcelas permanentes y líneas de intersección. El promedio del volumen de madera muerta gruesa fue de 72,9 m3 ha-1, con un peso entre 24,8 y 30,7 Mg ha-1 dependiendo de la densidad de madera muerta usada en los cálculos. Los bosques de tierra firme contienen significativamente má...

New infrastructure that seeks to connect Iquitos with Saramiriza includes building a ~350-km paved road alongside the Tigre river in Loreto. This project is a threat to the conservation of one of the largest areas of tropical forest on the planet and the largest and deepest peatlands in the Amazon basin. In this study, focused on the second section of the proposed road (Huambé – Marsella), we used a “business-as-usual” scenario (BAU) and a “road” scenario to show that road construction would lead to substantial loss of forest cover and increase CO2 emissions. The current loss of forest cover in a buffer zone of 20 km around the Huambé-Marsella road, estimated up to 2018, was 3.4 %. Using a multi-layer perceptron (MLP) neural network, we estimated deforestation of 80 071.11 ha and emissions of 35.55 Mt CO2 -eq for the period 2019-2064 in the BAU scenario, while the scenario wi...

New infrastructure that seeks to connect Iquitos with Saramiriza includes building a ~350-km paved road alongside the Tigre river in Loreto. This project is a threat to the conservation of one of the largest areas of tropical forest on the planet and the largest and deepest peatlands in the Amazon basin. In this study, focused on the second section of the proposed road (Huambé – Marsella), we used a “business-as-usual” scenario (BAU) and a “road” scenario to show that road construction would lead to substantial loss of forest cover and increase CO2 emissions. The current loss of forest cover in a buffer zone of 20 km around the Huambé-Marsella road, estimated up to 2018, was 3.4 %. Using a multi-layer perceptron (MLP) neural network, we estimated deforestation of 80 071.11 ha and emissions of 35.55 Mt CO2 -eq for the period 2019-2064 in the BAU scenario, while the scenario wi...

Los bosques primarios intactos de la Amazonía peruana se comportan como sumideros de carbono: un servicio ecosistémico clave a nivel mundial. Este sumidero fue cuantificado en 0.54 Mg C ha-1 año-1 (1990-2017) para los bosques amazónicos intactos de las Áreas Naturales Protegidas (ANPs) de Perú y las zonas de amortiguamiento. En otras palabras, la conservación de bosques intactos en ANPs ayudó a remover 9.6 millones de toneladas de carbono de la atmósfera por año, lo cual equivale aproximadamente al 85% de las emisiones de la quema de combustibles fósiles del país durante el 2012. Este servicio de remoción de CO2 atmosférico es necesario incluir en el inventario nacional de gases de efecto invernadero, y en los compromisos nacionales de reducción de emisiones, por dos razones. Primero, debido a ser un flujo importante, nos ayudaría a tener una aproximación más real del b...

The primary intact forests of the Peruvian Amazon act as a carbon sink: a key ecosystem service of international importance. This sink has been quantified as 0.54 Mg C ha-1 year-1 (1990-2017) for the intact Amazonian forest in the protected areas and associated buffer zones of Peru. In other words, the conservation of intact forests in protected areas has helped to remove 9.6 million tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere per year, which is equivalent to approximately 85% of the emissions from fossil fuel combustion in Peru during 2012. It is necessary to include this carbon sink in the national inventory of greenhouse gas emissions for two reasons. Firstly, because it is a an important flux, it would help for estimating the carbon balance of Peru more accurately. Secondly, it would strengthen the need to maintain the integrity of these forests, for their role both as a stock and sink of c...