Confusion surrounds a new method letting state governments earn carbon credits for ceasing native forest logging, with support and fierce opposition coming from opposite ends of the debate over what it means for regional communities and the climate.
The Improved Native Forest Management (INFM) method was approved under the Australian Carbon Credit Unit (ACCU) Scheme by Assistant Minister for Climate Change and Energy Josh Wilson on Thursday, 25 June. It lets state governments earn Australian Carbon Credit Units (ACCUs) by permanently ceasing planned harvesting in defined areas of multiple-use public native forests, commonly known as state forests.
The NSW Government proposed the method, and plans to use it to help fund the proposed Great Koala National Park, a reserve whose footprint would extend across forests in both the North Coast and New England regions.
Opposition to the scheme has come from groups that rarely agree with each other, creating confusion about whether this is a good or bad thing environmentally as well as economically.
NSW Farmers President Xavier Martin said the method exposed a double standard between government and private landholders.
“The INFM method is being used to bank credits for forests already targeted for protection – yet farmers have been blocked from banking carbon credits for not clearing land they may otherwise have cleared,” Mr Martin said.
“This flawed carbon accounting methodology is also being used to underpin the environmental rationale for the Great Koala National Park’s (GKNP), despite experts identifying serious integrity problems in the methodology.”
NSW Farmers argues the method fails the test of additionality, the requirement that emissions cuts be genuine and measurable rather than a re-badging of carbon already stored in a forest, in construction material, or in regrowth.
The Emissions Reduction Assurance Committee (ERAC), the independent body that reviews carbon methods, spent close to 18 months assessing the INFM method, receiving 371 submissions during public consultation before concluding it met the legal integrity standards required.
In response to consultation feedback, the method’s proponent replaced an initial flat 5 per cent leakage deduction with an independent, project-level assessment of up to 40 per cent, and removed an option that would have allowed harvesting to be deferred rather than stopped permanently.
Under the arrangement, the NSW Government would earn ACCU revenue for 15 years, while NSW taxpayers would fund the national park’s management for the remaining 85 years of its 100-year permanence obligation.
“The footprint of the proposed GKNP represents a massive overreach and there has been no proper, in-depth consultation with impacted landholders whose perpetual leases have been forcibly acquired or on what it will mean for farmers and regional communities,” Mr Martin said.
Forestry Australia, the professional body for foresters, raised similar concerns for different reasons. Forestry Australia President Dr Michelle Freeman said the organisation supported high-integrity carbon methods for native forests, but that this one fell short.
“Our concern is that this method, as approved, falls short in a number of areas, including additionality, leakage and low ability to generate carbon outcomes,” Dr Freeman said.
Environmental groups opposed the method just as strongly, though for the opposite reason. Bob Brown Foundation Patron Christine Milne said the scheme let major polluters buy their way out of cutting emissions.
“This Labor scam means that the cost of protecting forests is licensing pollution, increasing global warming, raising the hazard of bushfires and forest destruction,” Ms Milne said.
Not everyone considers the method flawed. Australian Climate and Biodiversity Foundation Chair Dr Ken Henry said it gave regional communities a funded alternative to a declining native timber industry.
“The economics of native forest logging have been heading one way for a long time and to pretend otherwise is counterproductive,” Dr Henry said.
Janet Hallows, director of climate programs and nature-based solutions at the Climate Market Institute, the peak body for ACCU buyers and sellers, said the finished method reflected genuine improvement through consultation.
“They’ve obviously integrated some of the feedback from the stakeholder consultation process, so really demonstrating good practice policy design,” Ms Hallows said.
NSW Environment Minister Penny Sharpe confirmed the state would proceed to register a carbon project for the national park, with its creation conditional on the project’s successful registration.
Despite the competing claims, NSW Farmers said it would keep pressing for the national park’s footprint to be reduced and for farmers to be treated the same as public land managers when it comes to carbon credits and forestry.
“If it is good enough for government, it is good enough for farmers,” Mr Martin said.
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