REDD+

Forest carbon credits and REDD+

‍

Deforestation contributes roughly 11% of the world’s carbon emissions — more than all of the world’s cars and trucks combined. While that number is high, it also means that halting deforestation and degradation is one of the most effective ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. REDD+ projects achieve emissions reductions by protecting forest areas and stopping the carbon stocks stored there from being released into the atmosphere.

‍

REDD+ carbon credits support the conservation of forests through two main activities:

‍

Avoiding Unplanned Deforestation or Degradation (AUDD)

Limits unauthorized deforestation or forest degradation from illegal activities, like encroachment into protected areas or private land for the establishment of smallholder cropping systems, pastures, or illegal logging.

‍

Avoiding Planned Deforestation (APD)

Limits authorized deforestation or degradation, like legally permitted conversion of private land for commercial agriculture or cattle pastures.

The history of REDD+

‍

While forest preservation projects (including some with similarities to REDD+) have been around since the 20th century, REDD+ as an official framework begins in the early 21st century. It was developed over many years by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)’s Conference of Parties (COP) to provide a scaffold for forest carbon sequestration and enhanced forest management. The “plus” indicates the benefits of REDD projects beyond carbon emissions, including community engagement, livelihoods, and building the capacity of forests to store more carbon. While the acronym was first introduced at COP 11 in 2005, the full framework wasn’t finalized until the 2015 Paris Agreement.

‍

The goal of forestry carbon credits was to provide an economic incentive for landowners stronger than the ones driving deforestation, creating a viable pathway for them to keep forests intact rather than cutting them down for financial gain.

How does REDD+ work?

‍

The first step of structuring a REDD+ project is thoroughly assessing the drivers of deforestation or degradation in order to establish an accurate baseline. That lets the developer quantify the delta between carbon emissions in the baseline scenario and the project scenario. With accurate quantification, we can understand how many tonnes of CO₂ are being avoided each year, and therefore how many credits the project may issue.

‍

The next step is to create a plan for effecting and monitoring that impact. In the case of AUDD projects, developers may need to proactively guard the project area against deforestation activity. And for either type of REDD+ project, it will involve consistent monitoring through technology (like satellite mapping) and using sample plots.

‍

Forests are complex ecosystems. That alone makes it difficult to know how much net carbon a given parcel of land is sequestering each year — or when it’s destroyed how much carbon is emitted. But the economic and cultural incentives that drive people towards deforestation activities are also complex. Altogether, this makes REDD+ projects difficult to develop.

The importance of baselining for REDD+

‍

We’ve talked about baselining throughout, but it can’t be overstated. Without accurate baselines, it wouldn’t be possible to issue carbon credits for REDD+ projects. When baselines aren’t sufficiently accurate, it can lead to overcrediting, and ultimately this can lead to widespread distrust of REDD+ and carbon markets as a whole.

‍

Baselines take into account the carbon stock of the project area — in other words, how much carbon is stored in the biomass of the forest. They look at the expected rate of deforestation within the project area and aim to understand how nearby reference regions compare to the project region. The baseline itself could be set up or commissioned by the project developer, or it could be a jurisdictional baseline used for the entire region.

‍

Public peer-reviewed biomass maps and satellite data can provide a historical baseline, which is used to check whether the reported values are within a reasonable range. Field plot sampling and remote sensing over the course of the project allow for the estimate of land coverage change. Comparing the estimated baseline emissions to the monitored emissions gathered sets the quantified avoided emissions.

‍

Baselining is also key for measuring project performance. This can be challenging to estimate for REDD+ projects, but new methodologies use jurisdictional baselines that are assigned to all projects within a boundary. This enhances the integrity of REDD+ projects because it makes it more difficult to inflate baselines, which would lead to inaccurate measurements.

REDD+ stability and permanence

‍

Long-term forest protection through REDD+ projects has high potential, but it also faces economic and cultural barriers. In regions where the project boundaries are established through contracts with landowners, for instance, the individuals can choose not to renew the contract at its conclusion. Likewise, a chronic absence of official deforestation control or high deforestation pressure might be risks for the permanence of project areas.

‍

That said, REDD+ carbon credits also provide a clear and measurable economic benefit. Robust, long-term financing plans make this an even bigger stability factor. When carbon revenues are the exclusive income source, ensuring and proving their stability makes them an appealing source of income. The most successful projects are able to address the root causes of deforestation and create legitimate, community-based action plans to address those drivers over the long term.

‍

Because REDD+ projects are also dependent on deep cultural relationships to forests, these projects go hand in hand with numerous co-benefits driven by respecting land rights and including communities in decision-making. In fact, community engagement can even improve project fundamentals, like increasing permanence overall by building commitments to maintaining forests, and thus carbon stocks. At their core, REDD+ projects are offering sustainable livelihoods as an alternative to unsustainable ones.

REDD+ leakage and additionality

‍

REDD+ projects conserve a portion of a forest that may have previously been used or allotted for livelihood use, whether legal or illegal. Shifting those activities to elsewhere also shifts carbon emissions elsewhere. This is known as “leakage.” Planned deforestation projects work with what is known as an “agent of deforestation,” an entity that is responsible for the land-shifting activities. Preventing leakage is dependent on ensuring that the agent of deforestation does not move their deforestation activities outside of project boundaries during a project period, as this would eliminate the carbon benefit of the work. Because unplanned deforestation projects tackle illegal deforestation activities, it can be harder to ensure activities are not moved outside of project boundaries. In these projects, leakage can be monitored over time by observing deforestation activities across “leakage belts,” which are areas of land beyond project boundaries with similar characteristics that would be prime targets for the activity.

‍

Strong governance, community engagement, and economic activities can all help reduce leakage. Weak engagement could lead to deforestation in areas outside the project boundary, and the carbon emissions will leak into those areas instead.

‍

For REDD+ projects, it is particularly important that measures to prevent leakage be addressed and implemented from the outset because of a project’s impact on the local markets. The boundaries of each project allow for measurement and tracking, but only within the project. Leakage outside the boundaries caused by the shift of activities like logging can be more difficult to track and measure.

‍

Because these leaks are closely related to human activities, one way to address them is by establishing livelihoods and bolstering local economies. Often, carbon revenues are the only income source in REDD+ projects because the project boundaries could impact the area’s markets. This can be a boon to the project overall; it means that it will be easier to demonstrate financial additionality in a project.

‍

“Additionality” refers to the climate impact that the sales of carbon credits are directly responsible for addressing. So, a credit needs to have clear, measurable carbon benefits that would not exist without that project. For REDD+, the benefit is both avoided emissions, because the ecosystem continues to hold carbon, as well as preserving the forest as a carbon sink.

‍

Because there are often significant economic and even cultural barriers to implementing REDD+ projects, demonstrating financial additionality is fairly straightforward. Without carbon credits, conserving the forest would almost never have as much inherent financial incentive versus cutting it down. But with them, a whole new financial sector is available.

The ecosystem services for REDD+

‍

An additional positive outcome of REDD+ projects is that they extend beyond carbon storage and greenhouse gas reduction, as important as those are. REDD+ also provides a wide range of social and ecosystem services.

‍

Endangered species and biodiversity

By conserving forests, especially diverse, established forests, REDD+ also protects endangered species and reduces biodiversity loss. Higher resilience (see below) also lessens biodiversity loss from extreme weather and disasters, like fires.

‍

Air, water, and earth quality

Healthy forests also mean better air, water, and earth. Forests regulate air and water quality, filtering out pollutants. Strong root systems also prevent erosion and keep topsoil in place.

‍

Increased resilience to climate disasters

Conservation of forest ecosystems also increases resilience to disasters by creating storm breaks, stabilized slopes, and trees more capable of withstanding fire. Even extreme heat has less of an effect on older trees with deeper roots.

‍

Livelihoods

Diversifying opportunities for earning income also increases the resilience of local communities in the face of climate change. REDD+ projects generate jobs both directly and indirectly.