Catalan Climate Credits: investing in resilient landscapes

The Government of Catalonia created its first climate credit system to enhance the absorption of CO2 emissions. Carbon credits are an exchange unit designed to facilitate investments in nature-based solutions in Catalonia, Spain, within the framework of voluntary compensation or corporate social responsibility initiatives. The Catalan system allows offsetting regional greenhouse gas emissions to benefit rural areas, for example.

The climate credits generated in forestry, organic carbon in soil management like agriculture practices, and restoration of coastal and marine habitats are included in the system. The new system increases multifunctional forest management through climate change mitigation and adaptation projects for the provision of ecosystem services: carbon absorption, generation of forest blue water, prevention of forest fires, and biodiversity.

The project integrates different estates and owners, public or private, in a joint management based on a multilevel co-governance. However, some of the barriers to tackle are regulating the climate credit market and the mechanisms to pay for the provision of the different ecosystem services, ensuring that the market is transparent and credible, replicating the scheme for more resilient landscapes within and outside Catalonia, promoting new ecosystem services provided by forest management in the Mediterranean, developing ex-post methodologies to determine the impact of measures taken using new technologies, increasing training and improving companies engaged in forestry work, and improving communication and raising awareness of the role of multifunctional forest management in the eco-social transition towards a more resilient landscape.

More on Catalan Climate Credits

Forest climate credits system of Catalonia (in Spanish)

LIFE Climark

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• Category: Resources, Factsheets
• Tag: Catalonia, Bioregions-EIB Workshop 2024, Overcoming investment barriers in the forest sector