ABSTRACT
Many forest-based projects have been developed and are currently under various stages of implementation. Much experience has been gained from these projects with respect to measuring, monitoring, and accounting for the carbon benefits derived from them. Focusing on carbon simplifies project development because the problem is reduced to calculating the net differences between carbon stocks for the ‘with-project’ and the ‘without-project’ conditions (also referred to as the business-as-usual baseline) on the same piece of land over a specified time period. The challenge is to identify which carbon stocks need to be quantified in the project, to measure them accurately to a known, and often predetermined, level of precision, and to monitor them over the length of the project.
