Brendan's project publications
Tracking ecosystem stability across boreal Siberia
Forests around the world are under immense pressure from human land use and climate change, however vastly improved remote sensing techniques can help identify where forests are under greatest stress from a wide range of human-caused and climate risks.
Primary forest carbon key to achieving Europe’s Green Deal 2030
Restoration of forest ecosystems by allowing continued growth of regenerating forests, active restoration measures, and re-connecting fragmented remnants across landscapes, will provide crucial mitigation benefits that contribute to emissions reduction targets as well as existing and future co-benefits.
Policy brief: Conservation connectivity and the biodiversity-climate nexus
Connectivity between conservation areas is vital for protecting and restoring biodiversity and ecosystems and can play a key role in supporting national responses to climate change, in Australia and around the world. Through a National Conservation Corridors Framework Australia could meet both climate and biodiversity outcomes and protect First Nations cultural heritage.
Policy brief: Ecosystem integrity maximises climate mitigation and minimises risk in international forest policy
The ecological, social and economic values of forests are widely known and avoiding their loss and degradation has been recognized in national and international policy as critical for helping address the many global problems we face.
Policy brief: Carbon accounting improvements for operationalising the Glasgow Climate Pact
The need for integrated policy action to mitigate climate change and conserve biodiversity has now been recognised in Article 38 of the Glasgow Climate Pact. This emphasises the importance of protecting, conserving and restoring nature and ecosystems, including forests and other terrestrial and marine ecosystems.
Assessing community readiness for REDD+ projects in the DRC
Payment for ecosystem service (PES) schemes are programmes that compensate forest communities for refraining from undertaking extractive uses, such as mining, intensive logging, and clearing. PES schemes can be important policy tools in meeting climate targets but effective deployment demands an understanding of local deforestation drivers and host communities’ preferences.
Policy brief: The economic value of the world’s forests
Our planet’s forests provide many benefits to society’s continued well-being yet are subjected to ongoing loss and degradation. These activities provide financial benefits but unless we understand the value of what is lost when the forests are cleared and degraded, we will not be able to make informed decisions about their use and management.
Using ecosystem integrity to maximise climate mitigation and minimise risk in international forest policy
Rules and guidelines that treat forests equally in key international policy frameworks regardless of their risk profiles limit their effectiveness and can facilitate forest degradation. Here we assess the potential for using a framework of ecosystem integrity to guide policy goals.
Mapping forest stability within major biomes using MODIS time series
Forest stability is a key component of ecosystem integrity and primary forests. Current remote sensing products largely focus on deforestation rather than forest degradation, and depend on machine learning calibrated with extensive field measurements. To address this, we used MODIS time series to develop a novel approach for mapping forest stability across forest biomes.
Policy brief: Burning forests for energy is not a source clean energy
The recent shift towards using forest biomass burning for energy comes with grave risks of highly perverse outcomes, including increased CO2 emissions and negative impacts on forest ecosystem integrity.