The effect of carbon credits on savanna land management and priorities for biodiversity conservation

Carbon finance offers the potential to change land management and conservation planning priorities. We develop a novel approach to planning for improved land management to conserve biodiversity while utilizing potential revenue from carbon biosequestration. We apply our approach in northern Australi...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:PloS one 2011-09, Vol.6 (9), p.e23843-e23843
Main Authors: Douglass, Lucinda L, Possingham, Hugh P, Carwardine, Josie, Klein, Carissa J, Roxburgh, Stephen H, Russell-Smith, Jeremy, Wilson, Kerrie A
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Accounting
Air pollution
Algorithms
Australia
Biodiversity
Biodiversity conservation
Biology
Carbon - chemistry
Carbon capture and storage
Carbon dioxide
Carbon Dioxide - analysis
Carbon offsets
Carbon sequestration
Cattle
Chemistry
Climate change
Conservation
Conservation of Natural Resources - economics
Conservation of Natural Resources - methods
Councils
Decision Support Techniques
Earth Sciences
Economic aspects
Ecosystem
Ecosystems
Emissions
Emissions control
Emissions trading
Environmental economics
Environmental protection
Equivalence
Forest & brush fires
Geography
Geospatial data
Global warming potential
Grasslands
Grazing
Greenhouse effect
Greenhouse gases
Land conservation
Land degradation
Land management
Land use planning
Livestock
Management
Minimum cost
Models, Statistical
Priorities
Productivity
Protected species
Protection and preservation
Revenue
Seasons
Social and Behavioral Sciences
Software
Storage
Trends
Vegetation
Wildlife conservation
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Summary:Carbon finance offers the potential to change land management and conservation planning priorities. We develop a novel approach to planning for improved land management to conserve biodiversity while utilizing potential revenue from carbon biosequestration. We apply our approach in northern Australia's tropical savanna, a region of global significance for biodiversity and carbon storage, both of which are threatened by current fire and grazing regimes. Our approach aims to identify priority locations for protecting species and vegetation communities by retaining existing vegetation and managing fire and grazing regimes at a minimum cost. We explore the impact of accounting for potential carbon revenue (using a carbon price of US$14 per tonne of carbon dioxide equivalent) on priority areas for conservation and the impact of explicitly protecting carbon stocks in addition to biodiversity. Our results show that improved management can potentially raise approximately US$5 per hectare per year in carbon revenue and prevent the release of 1-2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent over approximately 90 years. This revenue could be used to reduce the costs of improved land management by three quarters or double the number of biodiversity targets achieved and meet carbon storage targets for the same cost. These results are based on generalised cost and carbon data; more comprehensive applications will rely on fine scale, site-specific data and a supportive policy environment. Our research illustrates that the duel objective of conserving biodiversity and reducing the release of greenhouse gases offers important opportunities for cost-effective land management investments.
ISSN:1932-6203
1932-6203
DOI:10.1371/journal.pone.0023843