Assessing the viability of blue carbon credits in vietnam cases of the mekong river delta

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY VU MINH HANG ASSESSING THE VIABILITY OF BLUE CARBON CREDITS IN VIETNAM: CASES OF THE MEKONG RIVER DELTA MASTER'S THESIS VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI VIETNAM JAPAN UNIVERSITY VU MINH HANG ASSESSING THE VIABILITY OF BLUE CARBON CREDITS IN VIETNAM: CASES OF THE MEKONG RIVER DELTA MAJOR: CLIMATE CHANGE AND DEVELOPMENT CODE: 8900201.02QTD RESEARCH SUPERVISOR: Assoc Prof MAKOTO TAMURA Hanoi, 2022 PLEDGE I assure that this thesis is original and has not been published The use of results of other research and other documents must comply with regulations The citations and references to documents, books, research papers, and websites must be in the list of references of the thesis I have read and understood the plagiarism violations I pledge with personal honor that this research result is my own and does not violate the Regulation on prevention of plagiarism in academic and scientific research activities at VNU Vietnam Japan University (Issued together with Decision No 700/QD-ĐHVN dated 30/9/2021 by the Rector of Vietnam Japan University) Author of the thesis Vu Minh Hang ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This research would not have been completed without the support of many people My heartfelt gratitude goes to my supervisor, Tamura Sensei, for his insights, knowledge, and wisdom, for always believing in me, and for encouraging me to push through my boundaries, and comfort zones I’m proud of and grateful for my time working with him Sincere thanks to all of my professors and staff at Vietnam Japan University, for nurturing such a wonderful and supportive learning environment Their efforts and passions have not gone unnoticed To my sisters at MCCD, who always root for me This journey would have been so lonely without them To Laids, who lit my spark for climate change studies, and all of my colleagues at UNHabitat, I am forever indebted to them And lastly, to my family, whom I own everything, all of mine is yours, including this TABLE OF CONTENT LIST OF TABLES i LIST OF FIGURES ii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS iii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background .1 1.2 Literature review .2 1.2.1 Blue carbon 1.2.2 Carbon credit 1.2.3 Cost-benefit analysis 1.3 Research overview 1.3.1 Rationale of the research 1.3.2 Scope of the research 10 1.3.3 Objectives and research questions .14 1.3.4 Research conceptual framework 15 CHAPTER 2: MATERIALS AND METHODOLOGIES 16 2.1 Data collection and materials 16 2.2 Methodologies 17 2.2.1 Valuation of blue carbon credits 17 2.2.2 Cost-benefit analysis 20 CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION 26 3.1 Calculation results .26 3.1.1 Blue carbon ecosystems of Vietnam’s Mekong River Delta .26 3.1.2 Blue carbon stocks 27 3.1.3 Blue carbon emissions 32 3.1.4 Valuation of blue carbon ecosystem services .34 3.1.5 Blue carbon benefits 37 3.1.6 Blue carbon costs 39 3.1.7 Cost-benefit Analysis 39 3.1.8 Sensitivity analysis 43 3.2 Discussion .44 CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS 46 4.1 Conclusion 46 4.2 Recommendations 47 4.3 Limitations and implications for further research 48 REFERENCES 50 APPENDIX 1: MATRIX OF LEARNING OUTCOMES FOR THE RESEARCH 62 LIST OF TABLES Table 1.1: Different funding approaches to blue carbon activities Table 2.1: Annual emission factors associated with activities within wetlands 19 Table 3.1: Total considered areas for each type of blue ecosystem 26 Table 3.2: Dominant species distribution of mangroves by the province in the MRD 27 Table 3.3: Blue carbon stock by the province of the Mekong River Delta (MgC) .31 Table 3.4: Mangrove-related LUCC in the VMRD from 1979 to 2016 (in ha) 32 Table 3.5: Annual emission factor associated with the classified activity 33 Table 3.6: Aquaculture productivity in the Mekong River Delta 33 Table 3.7: CO2 emission/removal from LUCC activities in the mangroves of MRD 34 Table 3.8: Provisioning values of the mangrove ecosystems (US$ ha-1yr-1, 2010) 35 Table 3.9: Carbon sequestration value of blue carbon ecosystems in VMRD 36 Table 3.10: Correspondence between ecosystem services and components of Total Economic Value 37 Table 3.11: Total blue carbon benefits of the MRD (2010 price) 38 Table 3.12: Estimated costs of a 10-year mangroves restoration project (2010 price) 39 Table 3.13: Costs and benefits of shrimp culture development in the MRD 40 Table 3.14: Scenario 1- Cost-benefit analysis per 1ha of shrimp culture development at household-scale .40 Table 3.15: Scenario - Cost-benefit analysis per 1ha of shrimp culture development at enterprise-scale 41 Table 3.16: Scenario - Cost-benefit analysis per of mangroves restoration and protection (carbon price selected at US$1.85/MgCO2eq) 42 Table 3.17: Scenario - Cost-benefit analysis per of mangroves restoration and protection (carbon price selected at US$51/MgCO2eq) .42 Table 3.18: Sensitivity analysis and benefits comparison of mangroves restoration and shrimp culture development 43 i LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1.1: Accumulation of Blue Carbon Stocks in the Coastal Ecosystems .4 Figure 1.2: Inundation risk map of the Mekong River Delta for the 100 cm sea-level rise scenario 13 Figure 1.3: Climate Change and Other Interacting Abiotic Actors Influencing Blue Carbon Stocks over Landscapes 14 Figure 1.4: Research conceptual framework 15 Figure 2.1: Total Economic Value Framework .24 Figure 3.1: Distribution of blue carbon ecosystems in the Vietnamese Mekong River Delta .27 Figure 3.2: Nominal C storage capacity (MgC ha-1) of the Mekong River Delta 30 Figure 3.3: Comparison of blue carbon ecosystems organic C storage (MgC ha-1) 31 Figure 3.4: LUCC maps of the MRD from 1979 to 2015 .32 ii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CCER CDM CDR CFI CPMD COP CSR EF Emergent ERPA ETS FCPF IPCC KFS LEAF LUCC LULUCF MONRE MRD NAMA NAPA NBS NDC NRM REDD+ VCS VMRD Chinese Certified Emissions Reductions Clean Development Mechanism Carbon dioxide removal Carbon Farming Initiative Coastal Protection for the Mekong Delta United Nations Climate Change Conference Corporate social responsibility Emission factor Organization for Forest Financing Emission Reductions Payment Agreement Emissions Trading Scheme Forest Carbon Partnership Facility Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Korea Forest Service Lowering Emissions by Accelerating Forest Finance Coalition Land use and land cover change Land use, Land-use Change and Forestry Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment Mekong River Delta Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions National Adaptation Programmes of Action Nature-based solutions Nationally Determined Contributions Natural Resource Management Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in developing countries Verified Carbon Standard Vietnamese Mekong River Delta iii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 1.1 Background The compromises at the end of the 26th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP) in Glasgow in November 2021 were seen as “not enough” (Guterres, 2021) to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees C, as committed by all nations joining the Paris Agreement Little progress has been shown since Paris Under current national policies, the temperature increase by the end of the century is estimated to be 2.7 oC (UNEP, DTU, 2021) Even if all current National Determined Contributions (NDC) are implemented, we would still be on track for a 2.4oC increase (CAT, 2021) In case of a miracle and we can put an end to all human-induced emissions today, climate change and its impact would persist for centuries, due to the radiative forcing from the accumulated greenhouse gases (Collins, et al., 2013) The 6th Assessment Report on the Physical Science Basis of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded with high confidence that “global CO2 emissions would need to decline to net zero to halt global warming” (Arias, et al., 2021) Joining over 130 countries worldwide, Vietnam has made its own net-zero pledge at COP26, expected to be delivered by 2050 Considering the challenges the country is still facing in the fight against climate change, concrete policies and action plans must be in place to accommodate such a progressive target A Paris ambitious scenario is set to be realised, by achieving a “balance between anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of greenhouse gases” (United Nations, 2015) However, taking into account the historical cumulative CO2 emissions from 1850 to 2019 of 2,390 (± 240) GtCO2 (Delmotte, et al., 2021), the remaining carbon budget is shrinking, fast At a 67% chance, the remaining budgets to limit warming to 1.5oC and 2oC are 400 GtCO2 and 1,150 GtCO2, respectively While current annual global CO2 emissions are around 40 GtCO2/year (Friedlingstein, et al., 2021), deep and rapid decarbonisation is therefore urgently required, to maintain the Earth’s carbon budget and stabilise the global surface temperature Thus, all mitigation pathways that could keep our climate goal within reach rely on carbon dioxide removal (CDR), in addition to emissions reduction (Arias, et al., 2021) Using CDR methods, the excess CO2 will be removed from the atmosphere through anthropogenic activities and durably stored in “geological, terrestrial or ocean reservoirs, or in products” Depending on their characteristics, CDR options are generally classified into two main categories: the nature-based options including enhanced biological production and storage on land, in the coastal and open ocean, and the technological options including enhanced geochemical processes on land, in the ocean, and chemical methods Although having the highest sequestration potential and longest timescale of carbon storage, the technological options are often energy-, and capital-intensive and come with multiple trade-offs (Arias, et al., 2021) The nature-based methods, nevertheless, are currently considered the most cost-effective, viable, and provide co-benefits, despite their limited long-term potential (Erbach & Victoria, 2021) The restoration of vegetated coastal ecosystems, or blue carbon ecosystems, if done correctly, could offer benefits that extend beyond its mitigation potential (Pörtner, et al., 2019) 1.2 Literature review 1.2.1 Blue carbon Being the largest carbon sink in the world, the ocean is absorbing over 25% of the total CO2 emissions (Shutler & Watson, 2020) and over 90 percent of the excess heat (Dahlman & Lindsey, 2021) Occupying less than 0.5% of the seabed, the vegetated coastal ecosystems of mangroves, salt marshes, and seagrasses are responsible for more than half if not three-quarters of the carbon buried in the marine sediments (Nellemann, et al., 2009) However, these ecosystems are degrading and disappearing at an alarming rate, from 2- 7% annually All told, up to 67% of the historical global mangroves, 35% of salt marshes, and 29% of seagrasses have been lost Without proper interventions, a further 30-40% of salt marshes and seagrasses, and almost all of the unprotected mangroves could disappear in the next 100 years (Pendleton, et al., 2012) This could significantly affect the historical soil and biomass carbon stocks, resulting in fluxes of carbon dioxide released back to the atmosphere, threatening the global biodiversity, or worse, increasing the vulnerability of the human coastal communities to climate change The “blue carbon” concept was first introduced in 2009 by the United Nations Environment Programme in its assessment report titled Blue Carbon: The role of healthy 4.3 Limitations and implications for further research This research, although aiming to calculate the carbon stocks of the entire VMRD, only used secondary data The selected nominal set of data for calculation could only provide an overview of the VMRD blue ecosystems, rather than precisely reflect the actual carbon stocks Field surveys and in-depth interviews were recommended by the experts for data collection, however, could not be done within the scope of this research due to time and resources constraint In addition, the reality showed that mangrove rehabilitation and restoration projects often fail, mainly from choosing the wrong species for the locations Thus, the actual costs of blue carbon restoration and protection could be much higher than what has been presented in this research Similarly, the costbenefit analysis has not included the environmental impacts of shrimp culture activities, which implies an actual higher cost for this type of development option Nonetheless, to the author’s knowledge, this research is still one of the first attempts to measure the capacity and potential of the VMRD blue carbon ecosystems As mentioned above, further research on the salt marshes, mudflats, and seagrass meadows ecosystem of Vietnam is desperately needed, to improve data credibility, and the viability of blue carbon credits, and through that promote the restoration and protection of these valuable blue carbon ecosystems In addition to carbon sequestration and storage, mangroves, salt marshes, and seagrasses are essential to the coastal communities, through the provision of various services, from nurturing fisheries, protecting the coast against climate change impacts of sea-level rise and flooding, to generating income for local people from timber, wood, and tourism… Results from CBA suggested that blue carbon projects are economically efficient, as the benefits yielded substantially overshadow the costs, from 4.48 up to 72.56 times, depending on the discount rate, and choice of the carbon price Finally, although not perfectly done, the author hopes that this research could provide an overview of the “true” potential of blue carbon ecosystems in the Vietnamese Mekong River Delta, which could support the decision-making process for the local governments, as well as the communities Ultimately, by adequately acknowledging their contribution to climate change mitigation and adaptation, these coastal ecosystems 48 will be taken into consideration in 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x x x x x x x PLO8 x x x PLO6 x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x x 62