A mid-level state official steered a contract for relief efforts in western North Carolina to the firm run by her former bosses at ReBuild NC. State officials had removed the agency from Hurricane Helene recovery efforts in the fall.

By Lisa Sorg

The North Carolina Division of Emergency Management last week fired a subcontractor that had been founded by top officials at ReBuild NC, the now discredited state agency that botched response efforts after hurricanes Matthew and Florence in 2016 and 2018.

NC Fires a Disaster Relief Subcontractor Founded by Former ReBuild NC Boss

Bill Hare is CEO and founder of Climate Analytics, and Claudio Forner is head of climate policy at Climate Analytics.

To address climate change, the answer should be relatively simple: governments need to decarbonise their economies by first focusing on stopping the burning of fossil fuels. But we are currently facing a crisis involving the land sector that could put the 1.5˚C warming limit at further risk.

The scientific community is clear that including land and forest carbon storage together with fossil fuels and other emissions in national single national targets – as some governments are doing – will likely allow for greater emissions of fossil fuel carbon. This will hinder our ability to limit warming to 1.5°C, and in the worst case it may become impossible. We explain why in a recent report.

Two examples illustrate the scale of this crisis. Australia and Brazil are relying on their reported land carbon sequestration to meet a substantial part of their 2030 and/or 2035 climate targets, significantly reducing the crucial cuts needed in fossil fuel-related carbon dioxide (CO₂) emissions.

“It’s shameful”: Amazon Indigenous people call for oil drilling ban at COP30

Let’s be clear: the idea that land-based carbon removal/sequestration can “offset” CO₂ emissions from burning fossil fuels is scientifically flawed. For all practical purposes, fossil fuel CO₂ emissions are irreversible. They can stay in the atmosphere for thousands of years, whereas land-sector “offsets” or “sinks” are impermanent – especially when considering the increasing number of wildfires around the planet.

And this is not the only issue: there’s a range of other substantial problems that have been analysed in the scientific literature.

Under the Paris Agreement’s emissions reporting rules, governments are allowed to equate fossil fuel emissions and the drawdown of CO₂ by some natural carbon sinks – like the boreal forests – as a one-for-one trade, as set out in this recent paper published in Nature. This means a country could appear to have ‘achieved net zero’ while still contributing to ongoing warming, as emissions continue to rise amid increased tree planting and forest protection.

Carbon fertilisation confuses the numbers

Many countries, particularly developed-country governments, are using ‘managed land’ definitions to claim that carbon uptake from their forests and other ecosystems is additional because of direct human activities, when much of it may be just passive carbon uptake due to atmospheric CO₂ fertilisation and other effects caused by fossil fuel emissions. For example, increased levels of CO₂ in the atmosphere lead to increased growth by plants and more carbon uptake – a phenomenon that is not the result of active forest management.

One recent estimate is that about 44% of the additional carbon sequestered in the terrestrial ecosystem since the 2000s is due to the carbon fertilisation effect which, in turn, is mostly due to fossil fuel emissions. A substantial fraction of this would be counted within government accounting frameworks for their reporting of what’s called ” LULUCF” (Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry).

A clear example is Australia, which, in recent years, has continually revised both its historical and projected land sector emissions and in particular carbon sequestration, to the extent that it can now claim to have nearly reached its 2030 target, while barely taking any new action to cut fossil fuel emissions.

In the case of Brazil, its 2035 NDC is cast in net emission terms and does not differentiate between the contribution of its land sector and the fossil fuel sector, making it impossible to work out what, if anything, is actually going to be done.

Brazil calls on local groups to “inspire” governments in boosting climate action

This year, Brazil will be hosting COP30 – but the LULUCF accounting in its 2035 NDC is opaque, at best, while its energy sector emissions continue to rise. The Climate Action Tracker has always excluded LULUCF from its country analyses for all the reasons cited above, set out in detail here, and Brazil’s 2035 NDC is a perfect example of the rationale for this decision.

Forests: carbon sink or source?

There are similar issues with the countries that encompass the northern boreal forests. In this report on the contribution of these forests to the Paris Agreement’s 1.5˚C warming limit, we found that global models assessing carbon emissions and sequestration from forests differ substantially from land sector emissions reported by governments.

Governments’ national inventories show the land sector as a global sink, but the global models show it as a source of emissions. The difference between the two is marked: roughly the equivalent to the entire emissions from the US in 2023.

We set out a clear list of recommendations in our report, starting with a call for governments to first focus on decarbonising their economies, and for them – and corporations – to set separate targets for land use sinks, to transparently communicate how much they intend on relying on sinks to reach their climate targets – otherwise known as nationally determined contributions (NDCs).

Comment – COP30 must heed the elephant in the room: fossil fuels

Instead of deploying what increasingly look like creative accounting tricks, governments must get on with the job of prioritising fossil fuel emission reductions.

Alongside clearly accounting for LULUCF, governments also need to commit to ending deforestation by 2030 and set out how and when they plan to cut their emissions to net zero, including their planned use of carbon trading to help them get there.

Without enhanced transparency and a fossil-first approach to emission reductions, the land sector could drive overall emissions higher. But with concerted action to halt deforestation and restore carbon sinks, land has an important role to play in reaching net zero and keeping the Paris Agreement’s 1.5˚C warming limit within reach.

The post Why governments should not hide behind forests to meet their emissions goals  appeared first on Climate Home News.

Why governments should not hide behind forests to meet their emissions goals 

Environmental advocates help to rewrite legislation to rehabilitate brownfield sites.

By Douglas J. Guth

Michigan lawmakers are again aiming to boost state environmental cleanup standards and force polluting industries to rehabilitate brownfield sites. “Polluter pay” legislation, facing broad opposition from Republicans, failed last year but Democrats said they are engaging with industry stakeholders to craft laws that will target the worst sites and offenders.

Michigan Lawmakers Aim to Revisit ‘Polluter Pay’ to Enforce Cleanup of Toxic Sites