Opinion: How To Pin Down Nature Claims In Voluntary Markets

Carbon Herald

Written By: Violet George

Published: February 1st, 2024

Photo Credit: Unsplash/CC0 Public Domain

Measuring biodiversity is really difficult. First you have to decide what aspects are important – is it a particular species, the number of species or their abundance, or the habitats in which they live? Then you have to decide what to measure and how, before finally getting your boots muddy and actually doing it. No wonder that nature claims within the voluntary carbon market are so hard to verify.

A shift in perspective might help. What motivates conservation action is the perception of loss due to damaging human activities. We know, for example, that the more deforestation happens, the more polluted an area becomes, or the greater the number of people living within it, the worse the impacts on wildlife. Perhaps we could measure those drivers of loss instead, and track the effects of action to mitigate them?

BeZero’s new report outlines a possible approach centred on the five major drivers of loss of biodiversity. In no particular order, they are climate change, land/sea use change, overexploitation of natural resources, pollution, and invasive non-native species. These can all be quantified using a range of existing ground-based and remotely sensed data capture techniques, with innovation and improvement ongoing. It follows that project impacts on these five axes could be tracked over time and matched against project developers’ claims for biodiversity outcomes.

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