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Options to use Art 6 for blue carbon management

By Dorothée Herr, IUCN

By Blue Forests Project

January 22^nd, 2019

"Article 6 of the Paris Agreement can become the international mechanism that provides the necessary incentive for host countries to fully integrate coastal blue carbon into their NDCs" (Herr et al. 2018).

It still happens that the term blue carbon is interpreted as being a market mechanism only. While there is no internationally agreed definition on “blue carbon” (yet), it solely describes that specific coastal and marine ecosystems act as carbon sinks or sources, which can be influenced by human interactions. But it does not prescribe any policy scheme or finance mechanism that can be used to incentive better management. A paper by Herr et al. 2017 (Pathways for implementation of blue carbon initiatives) elaborates on the different policy and finance options for coastal blue carbon management, and links those with activities we already see in countries, especially those engaging in the GEF Blue Forests project.

In order to get a better understanding broadly, and provide some advice to those countries engaged in the GEF Blue Forests project, also called Small-Scale Interventions (SSIs), IUCN and Climate Focus developed a new paper analysing the opportunities and challenges of the Paris Agreement’s Article 6 for blue carbon ecosystems.

Steven Lutz (Blue Carbon Programme Leader, GRID-Arendal) with Mikoko Pamoja committee members at Gazi (Kenya)

In a nutshell, the Art. 6 lays out different market and non-market based mechanisms for countries to use in order to foster quick and efficient emission reductions. While Article 6.2 enables countries to voluntarily engage in decentralized forms of cooperation, whereby Parties can implement country-led collaborative market mechanisms and transfer Internationally Transferred Mitigation Outcomes (ITMOs), Article 6.4 creates a centralized crediting mechanism governed by a UNFCCC body and open to all (similar in several aspects to JI and the CDM). Article 6.8, in turn, establishes a framework for non-market cooperation approaches which can entail the provision of finance where mitigation benefits are retained in full by the host country.

The new paper proposed an overall phased cooperative approach for coastal blue carbon under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement which would establish incentives for countries to protect coastal ecosystems, while at the same time improving countries’ domestic capacities through data collection, enhanced transparency and more comprehensive accounting of blue carbon stocks and fluxes in these ecosystems. Importantly, the suggested phased approach would also contribute to gradually enhancing the coverage of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) in blue carbon countries to include coastal carbon and help to progress to emission reduction or limitation targets.

Blue carbon monitoring in Vanga (Kenya) . Photo credit: Amina Juma Hamza/KMFRI

While the goal at the last UNFCCC COP 24 (2018 in Katowice, Poland) was to agree on the Paris Rulebook and underlying decisions to make the Paris Agreement fully operational from 2020, decisions in terms of Art 6 have been differed to COP 25 (for further details see here). While countries can plan ahead, additional guidance from the COP would set a clearer path for Parties fully include and develop efforts on blue carbon as part of Art 6.

References

Herr, D., von Unger, M., Laffoley, D., & McGivern, A. (2017). Pathways for implementation of blue carbon initiatives. Aquatic Conservation: Marine and Freshwater Ecosystems, 27, 116-129.

Herr, D., Chagas, T., Krämer, N., Conway, D., Streck, C. (2018). Coastal blue carbon and Article 6. Implications and opportunities. Amsterdam: Climate Focus. Available at: https://climatefocus.com/sites/default/files/20181203_Article%206%20and%20Coastal%20Blue%20Carbon.pdf

UNFCCC. (2015). Adoption of the Paris Agreement Report No. FCCC/CP/2015/L.9/Rev.1. United Nations Framework Commission on Climate Change. Available at: https://unfccc.int/resource/docs/2015/cop21/eng/l09r01.pdf