Bibliography
Welcome to our interactive bibliography. Here you can explore publications relating to Nature-based Solutions and their potential to address societal challenges, including climate change adaptation & mitigation, disaster risk reduction, ecosystem health, food & water security, and human wellbeing & development. For papers and other outputs directly produced by the Nature-based Solutions Initiative please visit our outputs page.
Filter
711 publications found
-
Rapid assessment to facilitate climate‐informed conservation and nature‐based solutions
Conservation Science and Practice (2021). Methodological Article. Original Research.
https://conbio.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/csp2.472Abstract
The need to ensure that rising investment in nature-based climate solutions delivers expected outcomes hinges on incorporating current and future climate into design and implementation. Technical guidelines and formal planning processes serve a purpose in ensuring the quality of climate-informed strategies for local projects. The inherent complexity, cost, and time required to use these tools, however, can make them inaccessible or daunting. Taking lessons learned from a decade of funding over 100 adaptation initiatives in conservation—some of which also provide mitigation benefits—we describe a simple rapid assessment framework for use by practitioners and funders. This framework, which we refer to as the 5Ws (what, when, where, why, and who) of climate-informed action, serves as a guide to make projects more robust to future climate.
Nature-based solutions in generalClimate change adaptationClimate change mitigationMaximizing the effectiveness of national commitments to protected area expansion for conserving biodiversity and ecosystem carbon under climate change
Global Change Biology (2021). Review.Abstract
Global commitments to protected area expansion should prioritize opportunities to protect climate refugia and ecosystems which store high levels of irrecoverable carbon, as key components of an effective response to biodiversity loss and climate change. The United States and Canada are responsible for one-sixth of global greenhouse gas emissions but hold extensive natural ecosystems that store globally significant above- and below-ground carbon. Canada has initiated a process of protected area network expansion in concert with efforts at reconciliation with Indigenous Peoples, and acknowledged nature-based solutions as a key aspect of climate change mitigation. The US, although not a party to global biodiversity conventions, has recently committed to protecting 30% of its extent by 2030 and achieving the UNFCCC Paris Agreement’s mitigation targets. The opportunities afforded by these dual biodiversity conservation and climate commitments require coordinated national and regional policies to ensure that new protected areas maximize biodiversity-focused adaptation and nature-based mitigation opportunities. We address how global commitments can best inform national policy initiatives which build on existing agency mandates for regional planning and species conservation. Previous analyses of global conservation priorities under climate change have been tenuously linked to policy contexts of individual nations and have lacked information on refugia due to limitations of globally available datasets. Comparison and synthesis of predictions from a range of recently developed refugia metrics allow such data to inform planning despite substantial uncertainty arising from contrasting model assumptions and inputs. A case study for endangered species planning for old-forest-associated species in the US Pacific Northwest demonstrates how regional planning can be nested hierarchically within national biodiversity-focused adaptation and nature-based mitigation strategies which integrate refugia, connectivity, and ecosystem carbon metrics to holistically evaluate the role of different land designations and where carbon mitigation and protection of biodiversity’s resilience to climate change can be aligned.
Area-based approachesEcosystem-based managementClimate change adaptationClimate change mitigationForestRevealing the widespread potential of forests to increase low level cloud cover
Nature commuications (2021). Original Research.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-24551-5Abstract
Forests play a key role in humanity’s current challenge to mitigate climate change thanks to their capacity to sequester carbon. Preserving and expanding forest cover is considered essential to enhance this carbon sink. However, changing the forest cover can further affect the climate system through biophysical effects. One such effect that is seldom studied is how afforestation can alter the cloud regime, which can potentially have repercussions on the hydrological cycle, the surface radiation budget and on planetary albedo itself. Here we provide a global scale assessment of this effect derived from satellite remote sensing observations. We show that for 67% of sampled areas across the world, afforestation would increase low level cloud cover, which should have a cooling effect on the planet. We further reveal a dependency of this effect on forest type, notably in Europe where needleleaf forests generate more clouds than broadleaf forests.
Ecological restorationEcosystem-based mitigationClimate change adaptationClimate change mitigationForestNature’s contributions to people: Weaving plural perspectives
One Earth (2021). Original Research.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2590332221003511Abstract
“Nature’s contributions to people” (NCP) is designed to provide space for the recognition of diverse and evolving culturally mediated ideas about what people derive from, and co-produce with, nature. Its origins, along with the IPBES conceptual framework in which it is embedded, is transdisciplinary, action-oriented, and inclusive and also embraces pluralism. NCP provides both generalizing and context-specific perspectives and analytical tools that can be interwoven and enables diverse actors to represent nature-people interactions for different scales, audiences, and decision-makers. NCP therefore can be used to understand and communicate the ways in which ongoing biodiversity decline may affect the complex relationships between people and nature. This Primer presents NCP in accessible language, highlights its unique contribution as a tool for plural valuation of nature in conservation assessments, clarifies common misconceptions, and provides examples of the innovative ways NCP has already been applied around the world.
Not applicableHuman well-being & developmentLong-term vegetation restoration increases deep soil carbon storage in the Northern Loess Plateau
Nature Scientific Reports (2021). Original Research.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-021-93157-0Abstract
Afforestation plays an important role in soil carbon storage and water balance. However, there is a lack of information on deep soil carbon and water storage. The study investigates the effect of returning farmland to the forest on soil carbon accumulation and soil water consumption in 20-m deep soil profile in the hilly and gully region of the Chinese Loess Plateau. Four sampling sites were selected: Platycladus orientalis (Linn.) Franco forest (PO: oriental arborvitae), Pinus tabulaeformis Carr. Forest (PT: southern Chinese pine), apple orchard (AO) and farmland (FL, as a control). Soil organic carbon (SOC) and soil inorganic carbon (SIC) content were measured in 50-cm sampling intervals of 20-m soil profiles, as well as the associated factors (e.g. soil water content). The mean SOC content of PT was the highest in the 1–5 m layer and that of FL was the lowest (p < 0.05). Compared with FL, the SOC storages of PO, PT and AO increased by 2.20, 6.33 and 0.90 kg m−2 (p > 0.05), respectively, in the whole profile. The SIC content was relatively uniform throughout the profile at all land-use types and SIC storage was 9–10 times higher than SOC storage. The soil water storage of PO, PT and AO was significantly different from that of FL with a decrease of 1169.32, 1161.60 and 1139.63 mm, respectively. After the 36-yrs implementation of the “Grain for Green” Project, SOC in 20 m soil profiles increased as a water depletion cost compared with FL. Further investigation is still needed to understand the deep soil water and carbon interactions regarding ecological restoration sustainability in the Northern Loess Plateau.
Ecological restorationClimate change mitigationEcosystem healthForestIntegrating nature-based solutions in flood risk management plans: A matter of individual beliefs?
Science of The Total Environment (2021). Original Research.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0048969721039681Abstract
The formulation of management plans as required by EU environmental policies such as the Floods Directive may facilitate the uptake of nature-based solutions (NBS) into practice. Previous research has indicated that the uptake of NBS in water management plans is still low and hindered by various elements of the existing water governance system. However, research so far neglected the role of water managers as “plan-makers” of solution strategies and programs of measures, as well as their beliefs in choosing certain measures in the plan-making process. The aim of this study is to shed more light on the plan-makers’ reasoning for integrating, or not integrating, NBS into specific flood risk management plans (FRMPs). We conducted ten qualitative interviews with plan-makers from Germany and adopted a grounded theory approach to identify their beliefs that underlie the process of formulating FRMPs as well as their perceived role in this process. The analysis reveals a dominance of shared substantive and relational beliefs that are obstructive to a greater uptake of NBS in FRMPs. In particular, identified beliefs about NBS often do not align with their self-perception of their role in being the “plan-makers”. We present a differentiated portrait of water managers as key actors in the decision-making on FRMPs, illustrating that while water managers are belonging to the same distinct professional group with a similar social role in the decision-making process, they do not necessarily share the same preferences.
Ecosystem-based disaster risk reductionDisaster risk reductionAmazonia as a carbon source linked to deforestation and climate change
Nature (2021). Original Research.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03629-6Abstract
Amazonia hosts the Earth’s largest tropical forests and has been shown to be an important carbon sink over recent decades. This carbon sink seems to be in decline, however, as a result of factors such as deforestation and climate change. Here we investigate Amazonia’s carbon budget and the main drivers responsible for its change into a carbon source. We performed 590 aircraft vertical profiling measurements of lower-tropospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide at four sites in Amazonia from 2010 to 2018. We find that total carbon emissions are greater in eastern Amazonia than in the western part, mostly as a result of spatial differences in carbon-monoxide-derived fire emissions. Southeastern Amazonia, in particular, acts as a net carbon source (total carbon flux minus fire emissions) to the atmosphere. Over the past 40 years, eastern Amazonia has been subjected to more deforestation, warming and moisture stress than the western part, especially during the dry season, with the southeast experiencing the strongest trends. We explore the effect of climate change and deforestation trends on carbon emissions at our study sites, and find that the intensification of the dry season and an increase in deforestation seem to promote ecosystem stress, increase in fire occurrence, and higher carbon emissions in the eastern Amazon. This is in line with recent studies that indicate an increase in tree mortality and a reduction in photosynthesis as a result of climatic changes across Amazonia.
Not applicableClimate change adaptationClimate change mitigationEcosystem healthForestHow to halve the carbon and biodiversity impacts of biofuel-driven land-use change in Brazil
Biological Conservation (2021). Original Research.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006320721002664#s0050Abstract
Minimising the environmental impacts of biofuel production is an urgent global challenge. Over the next decade, increased demand for sugarcane-based ethanol in Brazil could result in over one million hectares of the nation’s native forest and grassland being replaced directly by sugarcane or indirectly by displaced crops and pastureland. Here we integrate future ethanol demand scenarios in Brazil within a spatially-explicit planning framework aimed at minimising impacts of ethanol-driven agricultural expansion on aboveground carbon stocks and 453 species of immediate conservation concern. We show that ethanol-driven agricultural expansion that is blind to carbon and biodiversity values would release 44.9 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent (MtCO2eq), and would impact habitat for at least 273 species. When compared to this conservation-blind scenario, agricultural expansion that avoids carbon and biodiversity values would reduce emissions by 87% (5.8 MtCO2eq) and would avoid impacts on habitat for 113 species. These findings are immediately relevant to policy makers seeking to guide ethanol-driven land-use change away from important environmental areas in Brazil. Our planning methodology can also be extended to other natural areas at risk of bioenergy-driven agricultural expansion.
Infrastructure-related approachesClimate change mitigationEcosystem healthAsymmetry in the climate–carbon cycle response to positive and negative CO2 emissions
Nature Climate Change (2021). Original Research.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-021-01061-2Abstract
Negative CO2 emissions are a key mitigation measure in emission scenarios consistent with temperature limits adopted by the Paris Agreement. It is commonly assumed that the climate–carbon cycle response to a negative CO2 emission is equal in magnitude and opposite in sign to the response to an equivalent positive CO2 emission. Here we test the hypothesis that this response is symmetric by forcing an Earth system model with positive and negative CO2 emission pulses of varying magnitude and applied from different climate states. Results indicate that a CO2 emission into the atmosphere is more effective at raising atmospheric CO2 than an equivalent CO2 removal is at lowering it, with the asymmetry increasing with the magnitude of the emission/removal. The findings of this study imply that offsetting positive CO2 emissions with negative emissions of the same magnitude could result in a different climate outcome than avoiding the CO2 emissions.
Not applicableClimate change mitigationBiodiversity needs every tool in the box: use OECMs
Nature (2021). Communication.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02041-4Abstract
To conserve global biodiversity, countries must forge equitable alliances that support sustainability in traditional pastoral lands, fisheries-management areas, Indigenous territories and more.
Area-based approachesEcosystem-based adaptationEcosystem healthCoastal wetlands mitigate storm flooding and associated costs in estuaries
Environmental Research Letters (2021). Original Research.
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac0c45Abstract
As storm-driven coastal flooding increases under climate change, wetlands such as saltmarshes are held as a nature-based solution. Yet evidence supporting wetlands’ storm protection role in estuaries—where both waves and upstream surge drive coastal flooding—remains scarce. Here we address this gap using numerical hydrodynamic models within eight contextually diverse estuaries, simulating storms of varying intensity and coupling flood predictions to damage valuation. Saltmarshes reduced flooding across all studied estuaries and particularly for the largest—100 year—storms, for which they mitigated average flood extents by 35% and damages by 37% ($8.4 M). Across all storm scenarios, wetlands delivered mean annual damage savings of $2.7 M per estuary, exceeding annualised values of better studied wetland services such as carbon storage. Spatial decomposition of processes revealed flood mitigation arose from both localised wave attenuation and estuary-scale surge attenuation, with the latter process dominating: mean flood reductions were 17% in the sheltered top third of estuaries, compared to 8% near wave-exposed estuary mouths. Saltmarshes therefore play a generalised role in mitigating storm flooding and associated costs in estuaries via multi-scale processes. Ecosystem service modelling must integrate processes operating across scales or risk grossly underestimating the value of nature-based solutions to the growing threat of storm-driven coastal flooding.
Ecosystem-based disaster risk reductionClimate change mitigationDisaster risk reductionCoastlineDoes restoring native forest restore ecosystem functioning? Evidence from a large-scale reforestation project in the Scottish Highlands
Restoration Ecology (2021). Original Research.
https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/rec.13530Abstract
Given the worldwide plans for extensive tree planting we urgently need to understand how and where implementation will contribute to goals such as those for carbon sequestration. We used a long-term, large-scale native reforestation project in the Scottish Highlands to assess the response of carbon storage and other ecosystem functions to reforestation and grazing exclusion. We measured above-ground carbon, topsoil carbon, topsoil nitrogen, decomposition rates, soil invertebrate feeding activity, tree regeneration, and ground-layer and moss height at 14 sites that are in the early stages of reforestation and fenced to exclude grazing. Reforestation areas were compared to unforested and mature forest areas that are both grazed and ungrazed, using 10 × 10 m plots. Above-ground carbon in the reforestation plots (1.4 kg/m² [95% CI: 0.6, 2.6], average age 20 years since reforestation) was c. 8% of the mature forest plots (17.1 kg/m² [13.1, 21.8]). Topsoil carbon was lower in the reforestation plots (18.78 kg/m² [11.79, 25.78]) than in the unforested (29.82 kg/m² [24.34, 35.29]) or mature forest (31.39 kg/m² [22.91, 39.88]) plots. Responses of other functions to the reforestation and grazing interventions varied. Our results suggest that reforestation may trigger carbon loss from areas with high initial soil carbon even with low disturbance establishment, at least in the short term. Our work emphasises where we lack knowledge: on the potential for long-term re-accumulation of soil carbon under semi-natural native reforestation, soil carbon sequestration in the deeper soil layers and the response of soil carbon to natural regeneration.
Ecological restorationClimate change adaptationClimate change mitigationEcosystem healthForestRestoring Degraded Lands
Annual Review of Environment and Resources (2021). Original Research. Review.
https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-environ-012320-054809Abstract
Land degradation continues to be an enormous challenge to human societies, reducing food security, emitting greenhouse gases and aerosols, driving the loss of biodiversity, polluting water, and undermining a wide range of ecosystem services beyond food supply and water and climate regulation. Climate change will exacerbate several degradation processes. Investment in diverse restoration efforts, including sustainable agricultural and forest land management, as well as land set aside for conservation wherever possible, will generate co-benefits for climate change mitigation and adaptation and more broadly for human and societal well-being and the economy. This review highlights the magnitude of the degradation problem and some of the key challenges for ecological restoration. There are biophysical as well as societal limits to restoration. Better integrating policies to jointly address poverty, land degradation, and greenhouse gas emissions and removals is fundamental to reducing many existing barriers and contributing to climate-resilient sustainable development.
Ecological restorationClimate change mitigationEcosystem healthHuman well-being & developmentCoastlineForestGrasslandWetlandTowards a multidimensional biodiversity index for national application
Nature Sustainability (2021). Perspective.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-021-00753-zAbstract
The lack of urgent action to reverse biodiversity loss is partly due to the complex nature of biodiversity as a feature of our planet. Subsequently, policymakers receive an often-confusing variety of narratives on why biodiversity matters, which makes it difficult to link biodiversity loss and risks to the attainment of sustainable development. Making this link clearer calls for a multidimensional perspective on biodiversity to reassess what we value, facilitate mainstreaming and support national decision-making. We propose a co-produced Multidimensional Biodiversity Index to connect biodiversity science to the political agenda that accounts for the diversity of values underpinning nature–human relationships.
Ecological restorationEcosystem-based adaptationEcosystem healthHuman well-being & developmentAssessing how ecosystem-based adaptations to climate change influence community wellbeing: a Vanuatu case study
Regional Environmental Change (2021). Original Research.
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10113-021-01809-8Abstract
Climate change poses significant threats to wellbeing and livelihoods of people and the ecosystems in many Small Island Developing States (SIDS). Adaptation solutions must counteract these threats while also supporting development in vulnerable SIDS. Suitable options need to ensure that connections between the social, economic, and environmental dimensions of socio-economic systems are defined in a way that can support how decisions are made (and by whom) and how these can impact on other parts of these systems. This is particularly important in many Pacific SIDS, where communities practise customary natural resource management and continue to rely on local natural resources. In this study, we model the anticipated impacts of climate change and the benefits of the ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) approaches on community wellbeing in Vanuatu. To do this, we applied participatory and expert elicitation methods to develop a Bayesian network model, which was designed to evaluate community wellbeing responses at four explicit spatial scales. The model includes both acute and chronic impacts of climate change, the impact of coral bleaching, and the potential loss of Vanuatu’s fringing coral reefs. The model predicts that all proposed EbA interventions will have a positive impact on wellbeing in all four locations to some degree, by either directly improving the integrity of Vanuatu’s ecosystems or by protecting these ecosystems as a positive spill-over of related actions. Significantly, it also predicts that if climate change exceeds 1.5 °C of warming, the costs of achieving the same level of wellbeing are increased.
Ecosystem-based adaptationEcosystem healthHuman well-being & developmentMarineEffects of large herbivores on fire regimes and wildfire mitigation
Journal of Applied Ecology (2021). Original Research.
https://besjournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1365-2664.13972Abstract
1. Abandonment of agricultural land is widespread in many parts of the world, leading to shrub and tree encroachment. The increase of flammable plant biomass, that is, fuel load, increases the risk and intensity of wildfires. Fuel reduction by herbivores is a promising management strategy to avoid fuel build-up and mitigate wildfires. However, their effectiveness in mitigating wildfire damage may depend on a range of factors, including herbivore type, population density and feeding patterns.
2. Here, we review the evidence on whether management with herbivores can reduce fuel load and mitigate wildfires, and if so, how to identify suitable management that can achieve fire mitigation objectives while providing other ecosystem services. We systematically reviewed studies that investigated links between herbivores, fire hazard, fire frequency and fire damage.
3. We found that, in general, herbivores reduce fuel load most effectively when they are mixed feeders, when grazing and browsing herbivores are combined and when herbivore food preferences match the local vegetation. In some cases, the combination of herbivory with other management strategies, such as mechanical clearing, is necessary to reduce wildfire damage.
4. Synthesis and Applications. We conclude that herbivores have the capacity to mitigate wildfire damage, and we provide guidance for grazing management for wildfire mitigation strategies. As areas undergoing land abandonment are particularly prone to wildfires, the maintenance or promotion of grazing by domestic or wild herbivores is a promising tool to reduce wildfire risk in a cost-effective way, while also providing other ecosystem services. Relevant land-use policies, including fire suppression policies, agricultural and forest(ry) policies could incentivise the use of herbivores for better wildfire prevention.
Ecosystem-based managementEcosystem-based mitigationClimate change mitigationDisaster risk reductionForest