As Scotland misses yet another climate target, Andrew Midgley, our Senior Land Use Policy Officer explains why we want to see the Government focusing more on Nature-based Solutions that help reduce emissions at the same time as reversing biodiversity declines.
The recently published Scottish greenhouse gas emissions statistics for 2022 point to the fact that, yet again, the annual target has been missed. Although emissions have reduced by 50 per cent from 1990 levels, the target was 53.8 per cent, meaning that we are collectively off-track in our efforts to reach Net Zero by 2045. The figures highlight an ongoing lack of strong climate action.
To be fair to Government, climate has come right up the agenda in recent years and while we believe that more can be done, it is nevertheless the case that climate considerations are closer to the centre of decision making. But we believe that there are some specific areas that need much greater attention, specifically around the way the land is used and the role that nature can play.
When most people think about the need to reduce emissions, thoughts turn to transport and heating our homes, but in Scotland (in contrast to the UK as a whole) the way the land is used is critically important. We can see this by delving into some of the latest data.
On the face of it, the latest statistics make it look fairly straightforward: ‘Agriculture’ is the second largest emitting sector, and ‘Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry’ is a tiny source of emissions.
Figure 1: Scottish Greenhouse Gas Emissions 2022 (MtCO2e)*. Source: https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-greenhouse-gas-statistics-2022/documents/
Things are, however, not quite so straightforward. The ‘Agriculture’ category in the graph does not actually account for all of farming’s emissions or removals and the LULUCF figure hides some important detail.
If we separate out the land use sources and sinks and re-present the data, we can suddenly see how important land management is in Scotland’s Net Zero journey.
Figure 2: Scottish Greenhouse Gas Emissions 2022 with land use sources and sinks presented separately (MtCO2e). Source: adapted from data available here: https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-greenhouse-gas-statistics-2022/documents/
It is now possible to see that Scotland’s land itself is the biggest source of emissions—it outstrips transport by some margin.
Although the LULUCF data is conventionally reported as a net figure where the ‘sources’ and ‘sinks’ cancel each other out, in reality, the removal of emissions in forestry in Galloway does not somehow erase the fact that peatlands in the Highlands are still a big source of emissions.
The latest report includes a little more detail on the sources and sinks in the LULUCF category. It shows that forestry and grassland on mineral soils are net sinks, and that peatlands and mineral croplands are substantial sources of emissions to the atmosphere.
This means that while agriculture looks like the second biggest source of emissions, the actual emissions from all of the activities associated with farming are actually much higher (it’s just difficult to see it because of the way the data are recorded).
Figure 3: Sources and sinks of GHG emissions in Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry, Scotland, 2022 (MtCO2e). Source: https://www.gov.scot/publications/scottish-greenhouse-gas-statistics-2022/documents/
The biggest contributor to land use emissions is damaged peatlands. In a healthy condition these peatlands would be storing large amounts of carbon and slowly sequestering a little more, but because around 80% of our peatlands are damaged, they are releasing that carbon and represent one of the biggest single sources of emissions in Scotland. Indeed, if we look again at the first graph, we can see that peatland emissions are bigger than the entire ‘Industry’ category.
Changing the way we manage the land clearly has a massive role to play in reaching Net Zero.
This is why we in the RSPB take a keen interest in this issue. On the one hand, we can see that reaching Net Zero is going to involve significant land use change and that change could be both positive and negative for nature. We want to make sure that we reach Net Zero in ways that also address the biodiversity crisis at the same time.
On the other hand, we take an interest because we can see that nature is also part of the solution. As the peatland example shows, healthy peatlands are better for the climate. Investing in restoring nature can play an important role in reducing emissions and reaching Net Zero.
So while the recent report focuses attention on missing annual targets, we are more focused on how these figures point to some key issues: the need to reduce emissions from the land and to increase removals. That means focusing much more on things like restoring peatlands.
The government is well aware of these issues, but progress is slow. The government recently celebrated ‘Record high peatland restoration’ with more than 10,000 hectares of peatland being restored over the last year, without acknowledging that it needs to restore around 20,000 ha/year to reach its own target and that the Climate Change Committee has suggested that it needs to restore 45,000 ha/year to reach Net Zero. Indeed, it is worth noting that while the government is aiming to restore 250,000 hectares of peatland by 2030, it acknowledges that there is around 1.5m ha of degraded peatland. The government’s ambition is low despite restoring degraded peatland being one of the most cost-effective ways we can reduce carbon emissions and fight climate change.
As we look to the future, then, we want to see a much greater focus on Nature-based Solutions like peatland restoration. These can reduce emissions, help nature and support rural jobs. I’m not suggesting that we don’t need to do other things to get to Net Zero; we will need to do everything, in combination, and at pace, but we can do a lot more on peatlands relatively cost-effectively and there are real wider benefits.
* MtCO2e refers to million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent. This allows the different greenhouse gases to be considered under one consistent measure for assessing the contribution of greenhouse gases to global warming.
Header image shows a top-down aerial view of numerous bog pools at RSPB Scotland's Forsinard Flows nature reserve. Credit: Stephen Magee