30 October 2009

Optimising Carbon in the Australian Landscape

The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists has published a report highlighting the benefits of terrestrial carbon and its essential role in helping Australia meet its international obligations, reduce the potential of dangerous climate change and improve our landscape's ability to adapt to climate change.

The focus in climate change policy has centred on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from energy generation, manufacturing and transport, because this is fundamental to any solution to climate change. However, the science now tells us that it will be next to impossible for nations to achieve the scale of reductions required in sufficient time to avoid dangerous climate change unless we also remove carbon from the atmosphere and store it in vegetation and soils.

Terrestrial carbon includes carbon stored in forests, woodlands, swamps, grasslands, farmland, soils, and derivatives of these carbon stores, including biochar and biofuels.

The power of terrestrial carbon to contribute to the climate change solution is profound, with benefits including:

• lowering the economic cost of achieving Australia's emission reduction targets;
• paving the way for Australia and the world to adopt deeper emission cuts;
• providing a new source of income for Australian agriculture and other land managers to manage our landscapes more sustainably; and
• helping Australia adapt to climate change by improving the health of our natural assets.

Read the full Wentworth Group report here. (2392KB)