Galina Churkina, Daniel Brown, and Gregory Keoleian,

Carbon stored in human settlements: the conterminous United States, Global Change Biology 16, 135-143

Urban areas are responsible for more than 70% of anthropogenic
release of carbon dioxide and 76% of wood used for industrial purposes.
The authors show that human settlements can store as much carbon per
unit area as tropical forests, which have the highest carbon density of
natural ecosystems. By the year 2000, carbon storage in towns and
cities across the conterminous United States equaled about 10% of the
total U.S. land carbon storage.

UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN • MAX PLANCK INSTITUTE FOR BIOGEOCHEMISTRY • LEIBNIZ CENTER FOR AGRICULTURAL LANDSCAPE RESEARCH

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