Reinforcing Europe’s carbon sink through actionable levers

How can Europe continue the path towards climate neutrality by 2050? This is the issue that the European agreement setting an intermediary climate target for 2040 aims to clarify. On 5 March 2026, European ministers endorsed the revision of the European Climate Law and its target of a 90% reduction in emissions by 2040. Achieving this net target depends not only on the rapid decarbonisation of emitting sectors but also on the level of carbon sinks – that is, the capacity of our forests, soils and agricultural land to capture carbon. However, over the past 10 years, the forest carbon sink has been declining unpredictably. Whilst the implementation of the agreement involves the revision of several key regulations (LULUCF, ESR), excessive optimism regarding the forest carbon sink threatens the achievement of these targets. Europe’s path to climate neutrality must better anticipate a likely more modest contribution from the forest carbon sink and step up efforts on other levers we can  influence.  

The EU’s assumptions regarding the capacity of ecosystems to sequester greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions should be treated with caution 

By 2040, the majority of Europe’s GHG emissions sequestration is expected to come from the land sector, or the LULUCF sector (land use, land-use change and forestry). According to the European Commission’s impact assessment, the level of sequestration in ecosystems is projected to reach -317 MtCO2 in 2040.  

However, recent trends in the carbon sink should prompt Member States to be cautious about the level of carbon sequestration that can realistically be expected. Between 2014 and 2023, the EU’s average annual net carbon sink decreased by 30%, standing at -198 MtCO2. In light of this, the European Environment Agency therefore considers it unlikely that the target set by the EU LULUCF Regulation (which defines emissions targets for the land sector) of -310 MtCO₂ sequestered in ecosystems by 2030 will be met. Furthermore, the growing impacts of climate change make the future of the natural carbon sink particularly uncertain: projections estimate that European ecosystems could sequester between -100 and -350 Mt CO₂ eq by 2050.

The decline in the carbon sink is driven by the decline in the forest carbon sink 

Forests are the main carbon sink in Europe. Between 1990 and 2022, European forests absorbed nearly 10% of the EU’s GHG emissions.  

But over the last 10 years, this trend has been disrupted. Despite an increase in forest cover, the forest carbon sink is shrinking: forests continue to store carbon, but at a slower rate than before. Over the course of a decade, the forest carbon sink has thus fallen by nearly a third, from -456.9 MtCO2eq/year over the 2010–2014 period to -332.6 MtCO2eq/year between 2020 and 2022. This trend is evident across all European regions to varying degrees. In France, the forest carbon sink has been divided by two.  

This trend can be attributed to several interrelated factors, the exact extent of which has yet to be determined: 

• Increased harvesting; 

• Increased tree mortality due to climate change, which leads to a rise in extreme weather events and natural disturbances such as forest fires, droughts and pest outbreaks (bark beetles, pine nematodes, etc.);  

• Slower forest growth due to more frequent droughts; 

• A slowdown in afforestation and forest expansion in certain contexts.  

These factors can broadly be divided into two categories. On the one hand, there are long-term factors (spanning several decades), which are difficult to predict and therefore difficult to manage: first and foremost, the effects of climate change. On the other hand, there are factors whose effects are more predictable in the short term and can be managed through public policy and adjustments to forestry practices. These factors include, amongst others, the rate of afforestation and the level of harvesting.

Step up efforts on what we can manage

Several regulations need to be updated to effectively reflect the implementation of the agreement on the European target for 2040. These include the LULUCF Regulation (covering emissions from land use and forestry) and the Effort Sharing Regulation (ESR), which concerns emissions from transport, agriculture, buildings and waste. Failing to properly account for changes in the forest carbon sink during the revision of these regulations could jeopardise Europe’s decarbonisation pathway.  

To avoid this, one option could be to factor in a more modest contribution from forests and to step up efforts on the factors we can control managed in order to safeguard the natural carbon sink.

In practical terms, this means: 

1. Calibrating European climate policies on the basis of a conservative assumption regarding forest carbon sinks and anticipating greater emission reduction efforts in other economic sectors; 

    

2. To raise the targets for controllable manageable levers capable of increasing the natural carbon sink. These levers include:  

• Increasing the use of long-lived wood products. Depending on the scenario, this lever could sequester between -23 and -39 MtCO2/year by 2030. 

• Increasing storage in agricultural soils. A study estimates the potential of this lever at between -150 and -350 MtCO2/year at European level. It is based on four key practices:  

• • Agroforestry and the planting of hedgerows, which could sequester up to -60 MtCO2/year  

• • Prioritising grass in animal feed (without, however, increasing livestock numbers), with a sequestration potential estimated at -45 MtCO2/year 

• • The introduction of catch crops, which could also enable the storage of approximately -45 MtCO2/year; 

• • The restoration of peatlands, whose carbon sequestration potential is estimated at -109 MtCO₂/year.

The publication of the impact assessment accompanying the revision of the LULUCF and ESR regulations, scheduled for the summer, will be a milestone in evaluating the EU’s strategy responding to the loss of the forest carbon sink. At the same time, the implementation of the CRCF (Carbon Removal and Carbon Farming) Regulation must provide a framework capable of supporting the development and financing of the various levers. For the CRCF to realise its full potential, the challenge will be to generate sufficient demand for European carbon credits.