“STEWARDSHIP IN FORESTRY” Forestry Projects for Terrestrial Sequestration -- Regulatory and Public Acceptance Issues -- Jim Cathcart, Ph.D. Oregon Department

“STEWARDSHIP IN FORESTRY”

Forestry Projects for Terrestrial Sequestration

-- Regulatory and Public Acceptance Issues --

Jim Cathcart, Ph.D.

Oregon Department of Forestry

West Coast Regional Carbon Sequestration Partnership Kick-Off Meeting

September 30 - October 1, 2003

Sacramento, California


Terrestrial Component - Forestry

• Regional Opportunities - State by state baselines and carbon supply curves

• Feasibility - “pilot projects”

• Regulatory and Public Acceptance - Policy development


Carbon Pools

Above Ground Dead Wood

Below Ground


Scale

Tree Stand Landscape


Examples of Actions

Forestation - (sequestration and storage)

Longer Rotations - (increase carbon pools)

Structure Based Management - (increase carbon pools, especially dead wood)

Forest Health - stabilize carbon pools

Tree Planting - Cities (energy savings)

Conserve Forestlands - (avoid carbon losses)


Pilot Project ConsiderationsLand Use Change

(1) Forestation of marginal agricultural land, grazing lands or

degraded and understocked forestlands

Forest Management

(1) Alternative Silviculture - Increasing carbon storage in large

trees and dead wood.

(2) Reducing Wildland Fire Risk - Thinning and hazardous fuel

treatments.

(3) Riparian Functions - Protect, enhance and restore.

(4) Growing stock - Longer harvest rotations


Feasibility Analysis

• Technical Capacity - Ability to sequester and store, or avoid release of, carbon dioxide

• Cost - Opportunities forgone, implementation

• Quality Assurances - Additionality, leakage, permanence, reliability, risk.

• Monitoring - Measurement, accounting and reporting

• Verification - Auditing, registration, certification.


Objective - Feasibility Analysis

Identify pilot demonstration projects for Phase II implementation that are the most:

• Cost effective,

• Technically feasible

• Publicly acceptable.


Regulatory and Public Acceptance Issues

• Buy-In

• Co-Benefits

• Changed Behavior

• Accounting

• Effectiveness


Buy-InEducation and outreach• Public understanding, acceptance and support that increased

levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide is a problem worth solving

• Curriculum based primary school education programs

• Showcase successes and failures.

Policy Development• Science based

• Incentive based - landowners are the solution, not the problem

• Form stakeholder groups and advisory committees so special interests gain access and ownership to policy development


Co-Benefits

Terrestrial carbon sequestration technologies must lead to the other things we want from our forests.

• Environmental

• Social

• Economic

Incentive for Sustainable Forestry


Changed Behavior

Additionality Wickedness

Current -- Direct causation. We made it happen. Rewards non-regulated behaviors (i.e., most obvious changed behavior).

What’s Needed -- People make investments in carbon storage practices a priori are first in line in getting a return on this investment through market-based payments.


Changed Behavior

Baseline Wickedness

Problem -- People with lower baselines have more to sell. The best way to position yourself in the market is to lower your baseline now.

Solution -- Baseline is not what someone is doing, but what someone could have been doing (i.e., allow use of a conceptual baseline to properly reference good behavior and early adopters).


Changed Behavior

Baseline Creep

Problem -- Changes in forest protection law standards penalizes those early adopters that exceeded previous forest protection law standards (a regulatory taking of the value of their carbon storage if you will).

Solution -- Carbon storage gains brought about by changes in forest protection law standards need to still “count” - any market value of the carbon storage should be used as the compensation mechanism for the regulatory change.


CARBON ACCOUNTING

Principles

• Measured• Transparent• Complete

Standards

• Debits and credits• Duration (permanence)• Baseline and scale• End-product use• Co-Benefits• Leakage• Other greenhouse gases• Public access• Third party verification

Quality and Reliability


Effectiveness

Can We Make a Difference?

• New forests take decades to come on line with storage

• Limits to how much carbon can be stored in forests

• Forest health risks exacerbated by climate change

• Changes in species distribution and growth dynamics

Terrestrial sequestration is considered a near- to medium-term solution for mitigating growth in atmospheric concentrations of CO2.


ExampleRiparian Management “Pilot”



Feasibility

Technical capacity -- Baseline conditions, structural capacity (living and dead biomass) to increase carbon storage, management practices to achieve structural capacity.

Cost -- Opportunities forgone from reduced timber harvest.

Quality Assurances -- Voluntary and regulatory standards (additionality questions), increased harvest elsewhere (leakage), durability of riparian buffers (permanence and risk), changing landowners and land use (reliability).



Feasibility

Monitoring -- Sample design and frequency, development and use of regional look-up tables, spatial and tabular database design, reporting requirements.

Verification -- Repeatability of sample design, transparency of records and reports.



Regulatory and Public Acceptance Issues

• Buy-In - Compensation for improved riparian management.

• Co-Benefits - Fish and water quality.

• Changed Behavior - More riparian protection.

• Accounting - Periodic, repeatable and transparent measurements of carbon pools.

• Effectiveness - Documented reductions in CO2 from increased long-term carbon storage.

Documents

“STEWARDSHIP IN FORESTRY” Forestry Projects for Terrestrial Sequestration -- Regulatory and Public Acceptance Issues -- Jim Cathcart, Ph.D. Oregon Department