A blueprint released by leading scientists provides crucial insights into the nature repair challenge facing Australia and highlights the role carbon credits can play in meeting that challenge, Carbon Market Institute chief executive John Connor said today.
The highly respected Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists proposed a 30-year investment program to reverse Australia’s environmental decline, which recommends 24 essential, practical actions, and calls for annual investment of about $7.3 billion annually.
“The Wentworth Group blueprint points out that the carbon market can make a substantial contribution to the task of nature repair, and can make the cost of carrying out these actions more manageable,” Connor noted.
“Just as we need to transform our energy system over the next 30 years, so too do we need to transform our degraded landscapes,” Connor said.
“Carbon farming projects that boost the amount of carbon stored in vegetation and soils, and that reduce wildfire risk in our savanna lands can make an important contribution to this task,” he said.
The new blueprint concludes that estimated 919 million tonnes of greenhouse gas could be abated across the continent between 2025 and 2055 by undertaking actions to restore native vegetation, Connor noted.
At a carbon price of $35 to $75 per tonne, rising modestly on an annual basis, vegetation repair over this period using high integrity methods would generate carbon credits worth an estimated $16 billion to $34 billion for farmers, landholders, Aboriginal people, and other beneficiaries, the blueprint estimates.
The blueprint concluded this would provide between 7% and 15% of the total investment required, reducing the annual finance gap to between $6.2 billion and $6.8 billion, Connor noted.
In addition, as the blueprint notes, activities such as better management of soils, and managed burning in savanna grasslands can also generate carbon credits, Connor said.
“As the Wentworth Group has pointed out, it’s important that carbon credit methods are high-integrity, and it’s also important that they augment efforts to reduce point-source emissions, rather than being a substitute for in-house abatement action,” Connor noted.
“In this respect, we welcome actions already taken by the federal government to further strengthen the ACCU scheme, and we look forward to the next round of government changes to bolster scheme transparency and integrity,” Connor said.
Connor noted that the blueprint had also pointed out that additional funding for nature repair could also come from the removal of existing subsidies that degrade the environment.
“I congratulate the Wentworth Group on this six-year research effort, which has drawn on the work of more than 60 expert contributors, scientists, economists, land managers, and other experts,” Connor said.
