How businesses can contribute to carbon sequestration

As the Inter­go­vern­men­tal Panel on Cli­mate Change (IPCC) remin­ded us in 2018 : limi­ting glo­bal war­ming to +1.5°C by 2100 will require a rigo­rous decrease of our emis­sions but also the deve­lop­ment of mea­sures to increase car­bon seques­tra­tion. Yet, it should be noted that only car­bon seques­tra­tion poten­tials asso­cia­ted with the use of bioe­ner­gy with car­bon cap­ture and sto­rage (BECCS) as well as plan­ting new trees were consi­de­red in these models. 

Accor­ding to Cli­mate Action Tra­cker, we are cur­rent­ly still on track for a rise in tem­pe­ra­ture of 2.7°C–3.1°C¹. In this context, various recent publi­ca­tions high­light the cru­cial role of tech­no­lo­gi­cal² advances and nature-based solu­tions. Data sug­gests that, if imple­men­ted, nature-based solu­tions could help reduce tem­pe­ra­ture by 0.4°C in a glo­bal war­ming sce­na­rio of +1.5°C by the year 2100³.

Howe­ver, these nature-based solu­tions would not be able to contri­bute this much in the case of a +3°C tra­jec­to­ry. Indeed, the capa­ci­ty of car­bon seques­tra­tion in bio­mass would be alte­red by rise of tem­pe­ra­tures that is too high. And, contra­ry to cur­rent models, the range of nature-based solu­tions is much broa­der than just the use of BECSS and affo­res­ta­tion (i.e. plan­ting trees). Other nature-based solu­tions avai­lable fall into three cate­go­ries : (1) conser­ving cur­rent car­bon stocks (e.g., by stop­ping defo­res­ta­tion), (2) res­to­ring degra­ded eco­sys­tems, and (3) imple­men­ting new prac­tices that store car­bon. In this article I will focus on this third solution. 

Increa­sing car­bon seques­tra­tion

As an example, imple­men­ting new far­ming prac­tices in the agri­cul­tu­ral sec­tor, such as cover crops or reha­bi­li­ta­ting degra­ded soils, would make it pos­sible to cap­ture approxi­ma­te­ly 0.8GtCO2/year⁴ on a glo­bal scale (com­pa­red to ~42GtCO2 emit­ted in 2017)⁵. Fur­ther­more, a natio­nal-scale diag­nos­tic per­for­med in France confir­med the exis­tence of a maxi­mum poten­tial⁶ of 29 MtCO2/year – equi­va­lent to 39% of French agri­cul­tu­ral emis­sions in 2016 (exclu­ding land use). To roll this out on a nation­wide scale would involve imple­men­ting new mea­sures such as exten­ding the use of inter­me­diate crops, agro­fo­res­try prac­tices, adding tem­po­ra­ry mea­dows and increa­sing the dura­tion of their use. 

Moreo­ver, volun­ta­ry car­bon mar­kets are one of the main ways to pro­mote car­bon seques­tra­tion efforts. The word “mar­kets” is used in the plu­ral because exchanges bet­ween pro­ject lea­ders and buyers are done at dif­ferent scales – either inter­na­tio­nal or local. At the inter­na­tio­nal level, car­bon pro­jects are backed by labels and recor­ded in a regis­try sys­tem to ensure the tra­cea­bi­li­ty of cre­dits and tran­sac­tions bet­ween sub-natio­nal actors (com­pa­nies, pri­vate indi­vi­duals…) loca­ted in dif­ferent regions of the world. 

Bet­ween 2018 and 2020, 401MtCO2 of car­bon cre­dits were issued on the inter­na­tio­nal volun­ta­ry mar­kets⁷. The ave­rage price obser­ved for these car­bon cre­dits, across all cate­go­ries, is 2.7€/tCO2 while pro­jects invol­ving car­bon sto­rage in the forest indus­try hold the top posi­tion with an ave­rage price of 7.5€/tCO2. These prices remain low, howe­ver cri­tics often point out the limits of such invest­ments in these pro­jects. Par­ti­cu­lar­ly when they are used as an easy, low-cost way to demons­trate an ambi­tious cli­mate stra­te­gy without taking signi­fi­cant CO2 reduc­tion measures. 

Mobi­li­sing car­bon label certifications 

One of the trends iden­ti­fied for volun­ta­ry car­bon mar­kets by 2030⁸ is a rise in demand for local car­bon pro­jects – mea­ning ini­tia­tives deve­lo­ped in the buyer’s coun­try – which reso­nate more with the expec­ta­tions of com­pa­nies. The price of car­bon cre­dits coming from these mar­kets could vary bet­ween 40€/tCO2 and 75€/tCO2⁹ which would be more in line with the iden­ti­fied costs for the deve­lop­ment of car­bon seques­tra­tion pro­jects. This is par­ti­cu­lar­ly true for the French agri­cul­tu­ral. Half of pro­jects would gene­rate costs esti­ma­ted at ~49€/tCO2. These pro­jec­tions are in line with the dyna­mics obser­ved in recent years which show a rise of car­bon label cer­ti­fi­ca­tions at the natio­nal level in Europe but also on other conti­nents¹⁰.

Thus, the deve­lop­ment of cer­ti­fi­ca­tion labels, like the Label Bas-Car­bone in France, are a chance for com­pa­nies to explore poten­tial oppor­tu­ni­ties that alrea­dy exist in their value chains. These mecha­nisms make it pos­sible for com­pa­nies to ini­tiate pro­jects while hand­ling poten­tial risks asso­cia­ted with these (non-per­ma­nence, addi­tio­na­li­ty, uncer­tain­ty). In other words, it makes it pos­sible to take action, while pro­vi­ding a fra­me­work to make the most of these efforts. 

The advan­tages asso­cia­ted with an invest­ment in such pro­jects are nume­rous : bet­ter ups­tream mana­ge­ment of the value chain, a reduc­tion of emis­sions out­side a company’s strict per­ime­ter but still within its value chain, contri­bu­tion to glo­bal car­bon neu­tra­li­ty, streng­the­ning ties with raw mate­rial pro­du­cers and deve­lo­ping a ter­ri­to­rial foo­thold. Ups­tream know­ledge of a company’s value chain is also a pre­li­mi­na­ry step to face ano­ther chal­lenge : increa­sing its resi­lience in the face of cli­mate change, through adap­ta­tion measures. 

We must remain rea­lis­tic : the access to volun­ta­ry car­bon mar­kets to sup­port the fun­ding of car­bon seques­tra­tion pro­jects is not a miracle solu­tion to ali­gn all com­pa­nies on a track of 1.5 °C. None­the­less, this frame gives com­pa­nies the oppor­tu­ni­ty to streng­then their value chain and to handle the risks asso­cia­ted with such prac­tices. This is part of a wider range of levers that com­pa­nies have at their dis­po­sal to begin the tran­si­tion towards a low-car­bon model. We must capi­ta­lise on this !