There is a saying that as “California goes, so goes the nation.” This is certainly true of the state’s pioneering climate policies and actions.

California is again leading in climate action, developing a new approach to reducing carbon emissions through leveraging the power of forests and other biological sinks to help meet its ambitious climate goals. Doing so will both reduce net carbon emissions and promote climate adaptation and resilience overall. It will transform nature from being a victim of climate change to one of our most powerful tools in the fight against it.

Called for by AB1757 (Rivas, 2022), California launched a first-in-the-nation effort to establish implementation targets for actions in the natural and working lands (NWL) sector, the basis of our carbon sequestration, to help meet its carbon reduction and climate goals. AB1757 called for an Expert Advisory Committee (EAC) that would develop target recommendations for actions to promote carbon sequestration gains
from these biological sinks. Comprised of academics, community members, tribes, and practitioners, the EAC is chaired by PFT President Laurie Wayburn (Forest Flash September 2023). Consideration of this sector is crucial, as forest loss and degradation are the second-largest source of anthropogenic CO2 emissions globally. The loss and degradation of California’s forests, too, have been serious emissions sources, in the billions of tons of CO2. Uniquely for carbon emissions sectors, though, these biological sinks can reabsorb carbon from the atmosphere, not just reduce emissions to the atmosphere.

Recognizing that, the EAC’s recommendations call for very significantly increased conservation and restoration of the state’s natural and working lands — the basis of sequestration. They also call for combining short-term restoration actions with conservation to ensure gains
are actually maintained over time. In the forest sector alone, changing management through voluntary working forest conservation easements of privately owned forests could achieve at least 150-300 million tons of CO2 emissions reductions in 10 years — more than what the state estimates will be gained through electrification in the transportation sector overall. The final report of this phase of the Committee’s work was issued in mid- November, with another year of work in 2024.