Carbon Rotation Ages and the Offset Measurement Conundrum

be left unharvested to avoid CO2 emissions and retain stored carbon, or harvested to take advantage of carbon entering post-harvest wood product (PHWP) pools while new growth removes CO2 from the atmosphere. To examine carbon rotation ages that consider commercial timber plus carbon prices, decay of PHWP pools and the timing of carbon fluxes are taken into account, the latter by weighting future carbon fluxes as less important than current ones. While inclusion of PHWP carbon pools greatly affects the optimal forest rotation age and generation of forest carbon offsets, the weighting of carbon fluxes as to when they occur creates a divergence between the socially and privately optimal rotation ages that is not accounted for by a carbon price, even though carbon pricing is regarded as the best means of correcting the climate externality