ELSS 1.4

• What are the global management strategies to protect Carbon Cycle (6) - Wetland Restoration - Afforestation - Agricultural Practices - Cap and Trade - Carbon Capture and Storage - International Agreements
• What are wetlands Classified marine or coastal wetlands or peatland
• Why are wetlands so valuable to the carbon cycle - Wetlands have a disproportionate quantity of stored carbon relative to other ecosystems
• Why do wetlands have a disporportionate quantity of stored carbon compared to other ecosystems (2) - Because anaerobic respiration occurs in the water logged conditions leads to slow decomposition rates hence carbon input is greater - Rate of carbon sequestration in wetlands is higher than other biomes whilst their area is much smaller
• What are the management strategies to protect wetlands (3) - RAMSAR convention - Blue carbon initiative - Peatland restoration
• What is the RAMSAR convention - Introduced in 1975, the oldest intergovernmental modern day treaty to conserve the wetlands
• What are the problems with the RAMSAR convention - Wording lead to uncertainties as many 'wetlands' are under threat may not have the biodiversity required to be covered uner the conventions definition for a wetland
• What would the ramsar conventions conservation of wetlands lead to (2) - Reducing the flood risk on coastlines by 60% - Restoration of 30 million hectares of degraded coastal wetlands sequestering 200 million tonnes of carbon
• What is the blue carbon intiative - A global programme to mitigate climate change through restoration and sustainable use of coastal and marine ecosystems - Does this through developing management approaches and financial incentives to conserve blue carbon
• What are the three forms of blue carbon (3) - Mangroves - Salt Marsh - Seagrass meadows
• Characteristics of mangroves (2) - found at the edge of land and sea regularily flooded by tidal water - 30-50% of mangroves are lost globally at a rate of 2% per year
• What percent of scottish land is peatland 20%
• How much carbon is stored in Scottish peatland 2500Mt
• Why does scotland require the input of groups like Peatland ACTION - 70% of blanket bog and 90% of raised bog is damaged - in 2019 Scottish Peatlands released 4% of UK total greenhouse gas emissions
• What are the scottish government doing to tackle the Peatland Problem - Aims to restore 625,000 acres by 2030 with a £250 million investment
• How are peatland ACTION adapting the peatland to reduce its emissions (4) - Reprofiling - Forest-Bog conversion - Bunding - Ditch Blocking
• What are the disadvantages of Wetland restoration (3) - Space requirement in locations with high development potential like in Scotland - Indetifying individuals qualified to undertake the restoration work - No national legal level framework meaning action is likely to be uncoordinated
• Characteristics of Salt Marshes - Lost at a rate of 2% a year and cover more than 140 million hectares of Earth's surface
• Give an example of a salt marsh restoration project (2) - Steart Peninsula £20 million salt marsh creation project - Aims to create 250 hectares of salt marsh
• Characteristics of sea grass meadows - Cover less than 0.2% of ocean floor but store 10% of carbon buried in the oceans each year
• Give an example of a seagrass meadow restoration project - Loch Craignish project to restore once thriving meadow by depositing 220,000 oysters into the lock providing habitats for wildlife and acting as a water filter to allow sea grass to better photosynthesise
• How many miles of British coastline is inhabited by salt marsh and seagrass 11,000
• What are the afforestation management strategies (3) - UNREDD - China's Great Green Wall programme - African landscape restoration initiative
• How are is UNREDD managing afforestation (2) - By mobilising 1 billion USD to reduce forest emissions by 1 gigatone per year - Aims to mobilise a further 5 billion USD by 2025
• How does UNREDD scheme manage the carbon cycle through afforestation - Rich countries pay developing countries to preserve their forests avoing the increase in CO2 emissions if destroyed
• Is the UNREDD scheme effective (3) - 150 million USD is needed to bridge the gap between current funding and whats needed - The destruction of tropical forests has actually increased - However 570,000 hectares are protected by their 46 active agreements
• How is the chinese great green wall programme managing the carbon cycle - Expected to fix 270,000 tonnes of carbon from the atmosphere by planting 3.3 million trees increasing forect area from 12% to 25% by 2025
• Is the china great green wall programme effective - It has already made a difference by increasing forest area to 22% from 12% in china
• How is the african landscape restoration intiative managing the carbon cycle (2) - Bringing 100 million hectares of deforested african forest landscape into restoration by 2030 - Allows for more carbon absorption reducing future droughts and wildfire risk
• Is the african landscape restoration intiative effective - No evident success yet depsite £600 million investment in Rwanda
• How much carbon does feeding the world release - 17,000 megatons annually - 27% of total emissions
• How is the US changing agricultural practises (3) - Reducing fertiliser inputs - Adjusting livestock feed - Capturing methane emissions from manure
• How is adjusting livestock feed benfiting the carbon cycle - Reduces emissions from digestive systems
• His adjusting livestock feed effective - Ineffective in the long term as it needs more funding and genetic modification takes a long time
• How does capturing methan emissions from manure work and is it effective - Anaerobic digestions convert methane into renewable energy - It is a costly but effective infrastructure
• How is vietnam changing its agricultural practises (3) - Smart water schemes - Irrigation management - Improved crop varities
• How is vietnam struggling with new agricultural schemes (2) - Low adoption rates - High cost of installations are near impossible for developing countries without foreign aid
• What is cap and trade (3) - A country is given a certain number of carbon credits - Government distribute the credits amongst the countries greatedt emittors - If a company emits less carbon than their allotted credits they can sell the remaining to a company who has spent more than allocated
• What are the problems with cap and trade (3) - Only involves worlds largest emittors not individual behaviour - Caused distortions between countries who have cap and trade and those who dont (they are able to offer lower Prices) - When it started there were too many credits in circulation hence they didn't incentivise companies to reduce their emissions
• Describe the 3 point process of carbon capture and storage 1. CO2 separated from the powerstation emissions 2. CO2 compressed and transported by pipeline to storage facility 3. CO2 injected into porous rock deep underground