Selected Energy-Related Emissions and Indicative Forest Carbon Uptake: An IPCC-Based Screening Assessment

Carbon-accounting studies of small, lightly industrialized provinces remain underrepresented despite their relevance to regional climate policy. This study quantifies energy-related CO2 emissions from selected sources in Tunceli Province, Eastern Türkiye, for 2022 using the IPCC Tier 1 methodology, with an activity-based bottom-up road-transport estimate as a sensitivity analysis. Because the official grid factor is published on a CO2-equivalent basis, we report the aggregate in Gg CO2-eq yr−1. Under the adopted activity-data assumptions, the selected sources were estimated to produce 288.47 Gg CO2-eq yr−1. The fuel-based road-transport series reaches a minimum in 2020, although observed vehicle-activity data are lacking. As an illustrative scenario conditional on the assumed coefficients, applying a literature-derived gross-uptake coefficient range of 2–5 t CO2 ha−1 yr−1, whose local applicability could not be established, to 137,718 ha of productive closed-canopy forest gives an indicative gross sequestration potential of 275.44–688.59 Gg CO2 yr−1; the upper bound exceeds the compiled emissions, and the lower bound does not. So the comparison shows only that forest uptake capacity is of the same order of magnitude as emissions, not an observed net balance or an operating sink. Under ceteris paribus assumptions, a 75% reduction in residential coal use would avoid about 97.85 Gg CO2 yr−1 (33.9% of the baseline), roughly 42% of which would be reintroduced by natural-gas substitution. Residential heating decarbonization, building efficiency, and forest conservation emerge as mitigation priorities for small forest-rich provinces.