There are more than 18,000 parks and gardens in National Capital Territory (NCT) spread in about 8000 ha in various locations throughout Delhi. These urban forests are recognized for their social, cultural recreational and aesthetic values apart from conserving the biodiversity of the region and improving local climate. As these green pockets are monitored, managed and protected strictly by Government agencies and possess moderate to high tree density hence has huge potential in contributing towards carbon sequestration. Estimate of carbon stocks and stock changes in tree biomass are necessary for reporting to UNFCCC and will be required for Kyoto Protocol reporting. Till date no data is available on the carbon stored by such green patches of utter importance in Delhi/NCR. Moreover, there is also a need to manage such areas from carbon sequestration point of view i.e. for short and long term carbon storage. In this modern world global warming and climate change has hit the centre stage and so treecarbon accounting is gaining gradual attention among scientists and experts across the globe in recent times. In this backdrop carbon quantification of trees growing in parks of East Delhi was carried out. Thirty six parks (combined area 4.48 ha) were randomly selected for the study from Mayur Vihar-1 area which comes under east Delhi. 18 tree species including 2688 trees were recorded from 4.48 ha. The biomass and organic carbon of standing live trees was estimated by non destructive method. Stocking density came out to be 600.00 stems/ha. Above Ground Biomass came out to be 444.31 Tons while Below Ground Biomass was calculated as 66.65 Tons. Total Standing Biomass was calculated as 510.96 Tons. Total Organic carbon stored was 255.49 T. Data revealed that the urban forest patch considered for the study (4.48 ha) is a young forest (Av. DBH 21.31 cm) and thus has the ability to sequester more carbon in the coming years.
