To meet pledges to save forests spending must triple, U.N. report says
Four years after a global pledge to end deforestation, the amount of money going toward conserving and restoring forests is not enough, the analysis found.
Nations are not spending enough to ensure that the forests that cover nearly a third of the planet remain healthy, according to a new United Nations report. To meet various international climate, biodiversity and land restoration goals, annual global spending needs to triple to $300 billion by 2030, the report found.
Forests are the “quintessential definition of a public good,” because of the benefits they provide, said Gabriel Labbate, who leads the climate mitigation unit at the U.N. Environmental Program and is one of the lead authors of the analysis.
Read more on The New York Times.
The impacts of climate change on the frequency and severity of physical hazards are putting many communities at risk. As the threat of climate change grows, so too does the need for accessible information, tools, and expertise to support climate-resilient decision making across multiple scales, from communities to countries. Woodwell Climate Research Center believes there is a need to localize and customize climate risk assessments. This information is critical for local government leaders as they make planning decisions, but it is not available to all communities. Woodwell believes that this science should be freely and widely available. To address this gap, Woodwell works with communities across the world, including Louisville, KY, to provide community climate risk assessments, free of charge. This report was generated in partnership with the Louisville Metropolitan Sewer District (Louisville MSD), so we have focused this analysis within the geographic area of Jefferson County, KY.
How can we help scientists tell their stories?
Science has a communication problem. This week on Possibly we’re taking a look at an audio-storytelling organization, called Transom, that’s trying to help fix it.
Welcome to Possibly. Where we take on huge problems, like the future of our planet, and break them down into small questions with unexpected answers. I’m Megan Hall.
Science has a communication problem. It can be hard for everyday people to understand what scientists are saying about their research..
Juliana Merullo and Nat Hardy are here to tell us about a science storytelling workshop trying to help solve this problem.
Read more or listen on Possibly.
Feeding Resilience: Ethiopia
Compound security, hunger, and climate risks
A Crossroads for Conflict, Food, and Climate
Ethiopia sits at the intersection of climate change, food security, and conflict risks that will shape the country’s internal stability, influence on East African security, and geopolitical role for years to come.
In a comment published in Nature Climate Change, Mark Bradford, the E.H. Harriman Professor of Soils and Ecosystem Ecology, and Yale School of the Environment research scientists Sara Kuebbing and Alexander Polussa ’25 PhD, together with colleagues Emily Oldfield ’05, ’11 MESc, ’19 PhD, of Environmental Defense Fund (EDF) and Jonathan Sanderman of the Woodwell Climate Research Center, argue that the scientific evidence supporting soil carbon’s role in mitigating climate change remains too weak to meet the standards required for policy and carbon markets.
Read more here.
On September 19, Woodwell Climate submitted public comment on the U.S. Forest Service’s proposed rulemaking to rescind the 2001 Roadless Area Conservation Rule, also known as the Roadless Rule. This rule banned logging and the creation of new logging roads in 58 million acres of National forests.
The federal agency’s intent to rescind the Roadless Rule aligns with the presidential Executive Order, “Unleashing Prosperity through Deregulation” which seeks to remove obstacles to extracting natural resources on public lands. Additionally, the agency claims the repeal of the rule will allow forest managers to remove trees from “overstocked forests” to prevent wildfire and disease.
Woodwell Climate strongly opposes the rescission of the rule, citing the best available science that shows increased roadways and subsequent logging will result in ecological degradation, increased wildfire, and loss of critical carbon stocks.
“The Roadless Rule currently protects millions of acres from extractive activities that would result in ecosystem degradation and increased vulnerability to wildfire,” writes Senior Scientist Rich Birdsey in the comment. “Rescinding the Roadless Rule would harm many public uses of the land, cause significant emissions of greenhouse gases, and destroy critical habitat for many species of wildlife.”
Federal forests have major carbon storage and climate mitigation potential, absorbing approximately 3% of U.S. emissions from fossil fuel burning each year. Mature and old growth forests are responsible for the majority of that, and the Roadless Rule has been instrumental in preventing the logging of these important forests, including the Tongass National Forest in Alaska.
“Increased logging is the single greatest threat to these forests and the carbon they hold — and it is the threat we most directly control,” the Woodwell Climate comment states. “As the impacts of climate change become more extreme and damaging, we should prioritize protecting mature and old growth forests on federal lands, not harvesting them.”
Additionally, studies show that road building into previously undisturbed forests actually increases vulnerability to fire. This is because most wildfires are caused by human ignitions which become more common with better access roads. Undisturbed mature and old-growth forest ecosystems are also more resilient to wildfires compared to forests that are actively logged and managed.
Read the full public comment here.
Huge danger from permafrost loss
With the Arctic warming four times as fast as the rest of the globe, and fires now routinely burning large swaths of northern forests, carbon stored in permafrost is rapidly escaping into the atmosphere where it can warm the planet even faster. Edward Alexander, Senior Arctic Lead at the Woodwell Climate Research Center and a Co-Chair of the Gwich’in Council International, speaks with Host Jenni Doering about the enormous climate risks of permafrost loss and how Indigenous cultural practices can help protect this vital resource.