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Cited by 37Climate Change Policy and EconomicsBioenergy crop production and managementLand Use and Ecosystem Services

Land‐based climate solutions for the United States

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Robertson, G. Philip, Hamilton, Stephen K., Paustian, Keith, Smith, Pete·2022·Global Change Biology
DOI 10.1111/gcb.16267PMC PMC9544421
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Abstract

Meeting end‐of‐century global warming targets requires aggressive action on multiple fronts. Recent reports note the futility of addressing mitigation goals without fully engaging the agricultural sector, yet no available assessments combine both nature‐based solutions (reforestation, grassland and wetland protection, and agricultural practice change) and cellulosic bioenergy for a single geographic region. Collectively, these solutions might offer a suite of climate, biodiversity, and other benefits greater than either alone. Nature‐based solutions are largely constrained by the duration of carbon accrual in soils and forest biomass; each of these carbon pools will eventually saturate. Bioenergy solutions can last indefinitely but carry significant environmental risk if carelessly deployed. We detail a simplified scenario for the United States that illustrates the benefits of combining approaches. We assign a portion of non‐forested former cropland to bioenergy sufficient to meet projected mid‐century transportation needs, with the remainder assigned to nature‐based solutions such as reforestation. Bottom‐up mitigation potentials for the aggregate contributions of crop, grazing, forest, and bioenergy lands are assessed by including in a Monte Carlo model conservative ranges for cost‐effective local mitigation capacities, together with ranges for (a) areal extents that avoid double counting and include realistic adoption rates and (b) the projected duration of different carbon sinks. The projected duration illustrates the net effect of eventually saturating soil carbon pools in the case of most strategies, and additionally saturating biomass carbon pools in the case of forest management. Results show a conservative end‐of‐century mitigation capacity of 110 (57–178) Gt CO 2 e for the U.S., ~50% higher than existing estimates that prioritize nature‐based or bioenergy solutions separately. Further research is needed to shrink uncertainties, but there is sufficient confidence in the general magnitude and direction of a combined approach to plan for deployment now.

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  • Carbon-negative biofuels derived from switchgrass grown on marginal land could contribute to keeping the global temperature increase below 1.5°C.

    “This finding is consistent with the existing literature and suggests carbon- negative biofuels derived from switchgrass grown on marginal land could contribute to keeping the global temperature increase below 1.5°C”

    From Global warming intensity of biofuel derived from switchgrass grown on marginal land in Michigan (2023) · cites this paper as Robertson et al., 2022

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Cited by

Sorted by citations

Authors
Robertson, G. P., Hamilton, S. K., Paustian, K., & Smith, P.
Affiliations
  • Great Lakes Bioenergy Research Center (US)
  • Colorado State University (US)
  • University of Aberdeen (GB)
Corresponding author
Robertson, G. Philip
ORCID
Venue
Global Change Biology
Publisher
Wiley
Published
2022-05-31
Volume
28
Issue
16
Pages
4912-4919
ISSN
  • 1354-1013 (ISSN-L)
  • 1365-2486
DOI
10.1111/gcb.16267
PMC
PMC9544421
OpenAlex
W4281618598
Cited by
37
References
9
Citations by year
2026: 1 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 15 · 2023: 13 · 2022: 2
FWCI
7.24
Type
journal article
Language
en
Open access
Licence
Locations
  • Global Change Biology (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed Central (publishedVersion, cc-by-nc)
  • PubMed (publishedVersion)
  • Aberdeen University Research Archive (Aberdeen University) (submittedVersion)
  • OSTI OAI (U.S. Department of Energy Office of Scientific and Technical Information) (submittedVersion)
  • Griffith Research Online (submittedVersion, cc-by-nc)
Funders
U.S. Department of Energy (DE‐SC0018409, DE‐AR0000826)
Topics
  • Social Sciences › Economics, Econometrics and Finance › Economics and Econometrics › Climate Change Policy and Economics
  • Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Agronomy and Crop Science › Bioenergy crop production and management
  • Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Land Use and Ecosystem Services
Keywords
nature-based solutions, reforestation, soil carbon sequestration, forest carbon sink, carbon saturation, agricultural land use change, United States
MeSH terms
Agriculture, Carbon, Climate, Soil, United States, Biomass, Carbon Sequestration

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