Contributions of ecological restoration policies to China's land carbon balance

Chao Yue; Mengyang Xu; Philippe Ciais; Shu Tao; Huizhong Shen; Jinfeng Chang; Wei Li; Lei Deng; Junhao He; Yi Leng; Yu Li; Jiaming Wang; Can Xu; Han Zhang; Pengyi Zhang; Liankai Zhang; Jie Zhao; Lei Zhu; Shilong Piao

doi:10.1038/s41467-024-54100-9

Contributions of ecological restoration policies to China's land carbon balance

Nat Commun. 2024 Nov 9;15(1):9708. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-54100-9.

Authors

Chao Yue^#^{1

2

3}, Mengyang Xu^#⁴, Philippe Ciais⁵, Shu Tao^{6

7}, Huizhong Shen⁶, Jinfeng Chang⁸, Wei Li⁹, Lei Deng^{10

11}, Junhao He^{10

11}, Yi Leng⁹, Yu Li⁴, Jiaming Wang⁴, Can Xu^{12

13}, Han Zhang¹⁴, Pengyi Zhang⁴, Liankai Zhang^{12

13}, Jie Zhao¹⁵, Lei Zhu⁹, Shilong Piao^{16

17}

Affiliations

¹ College of Natural Resources and Environment, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China. [email protected].
² State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China. [email protected].
³ Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China. [email protected].
⁴ College of Natural Resources and Environment, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China.
⁵ Laboratoire des Sciences du Climat et de l'Environnement, LSCE/IPSL, CEA-CNRS-UVSQ, Université Paris-Saclay, Gif-sur-Yvette, France.
⁶ Guangdong Provincial Observation and Research Station for Coastal Atmosphere and Climate of the Greater Bay Area, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen, China.
⁷ College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China.
⁸ College of Environmental and Resource Sciences, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.
⁹ Department of Earth System Science, Ministry of Education Key Laboratory for Earth System modeling, Institute for Global Change Studies, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.
¹⁰ State Key Laboratory of Soil Erosion and Dryland Farming on the Loess Plateau, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China.
¹¹ Institute of Soil and Water Conservation, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China.
¹² Kunming General Survey of Natural Resources Center, China Geological Survey, Kunming, China.
¹³ Technology Innovation Center for Natural Ecosystem Carbon Sink, Ministry of Natural Resources, Kunming, China.
¹⁴ College of Economics and Management, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, China.
¹⁵ Shandong Provincial Key Laboratory of Water and Soil Conservation and Environmental Protection, College of Resources and Environment, Linyi University, Linyi, China.
¹⁶ Sino-French Institute for Earth System Science, College of Urban and Environmental Sciences, Peking University, Beijing, China. [email protected].
¹⁷ State Key Laboratory of Tibetan Plateau Earth System, Resources and Environment, Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China. [email protected].

^# Contributed equally.

Abstract

Unleashing the land sector's potential for climate mitigation requires purpose-driven changes in land management. However, contributions of past management changes to the current global and regional carbon cycles remain unclear. Here, we use vegetation modelling to reveal how a portfolio of ecological restoration policies has impacted China's terrestrial carbon balance through developing counterfactual 'no-policy' scenarios. Pursuing conventional policies and assuming no changes in climate or atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO₂) since 1980 would have led China's land sector to be a carbon source of 0.11 Pg C yr^-1 for 2001-2020, in stark contrast to a sink of 175.9 Tg C yr^-1 in reality. About 72.7% of this difference can be attributed to land management changes, including afforestation and reforestation (49.0%), reduced wood extraction (21.8%), fire prevention and suppression (1.6%) and grassland grazing exclusion (0.3%). The remaining 27.3% come from changes in atmospheric CO₂ (42.2%) and climate (-14.9%). Our results underscore the potential of active land management in achieving 'carbon-neutrality' in China.