Ecosystem Services Provided by Urban Forests in the Southern Caucasus Region: A Modeling Study in Tbilisi, Georgia

Climate

Levan Alpaidze¹  Rocco Pace² 

[1] Faculty of Social and Political Sciences, Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University, 1 Ilia Tchavtchavadze Avenue, Academic Building I, Tbilisi 0179, Georgia;Institute of Research on Terrestrial Ecosystems (IRET), National Research Council (CNR), Via G. Marconi 2, 05010 Porano, Italy;

关键词: urbanization;    nature-based solutions;    urban parks;    Eastern Europe;    i-Tree Eco;   

DOI  :  10.3390/cli9110157

来源: DOAJ

【 摘 要 】

All cities globally are growing considerably as they are experiencing an intensive urbanization process that leads to high soil consumption and pollution of environmental components. For this reason, cities are required to adopt measures to reduce these impacts and tree planting has been suggested as a cost-effective strategy. In our study, we implemented for the first time in a Southern Caucasus city the i-Tree Eco model to quantify the main ecosystem services provided by urban forests. Trees in two parks in Tbilisi, EXPO Park (694 trees) and RED Park (1030 trees), have been measured, and a model simulation was performed for the year 2018. These green infrastructures store large amounts of carbon in their woody tissues (198.4 t for EXPO Park and 126.5 t for RED Park) and each year they sequester 4.6 and 4.7 t of CO₂ for EXPO Park and RED Park. They also remove 119.6 and 90.3 kg of pollutants (CO, NO₂, O₃, PM_2.5, SO₂), and reduce water runoff of 269.5 and 200.5 m³, respectively. This analysis highlights the key role of urban forests in improving the environmental sustainability of the city of Tbilisi and provides important decision support for tree species selection in this geographic area.

【 授权许可】

Unknown