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. 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 UN- Habitat, 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. Cost-benefit analysis.
Rationale of the research. Scope of the research. Objectives and research questions. Research conceptual framework .15 CHAPTER 2: MATERIALS AND METHODOLOGIES.
Data collection and materials. Valuation of blue carbon credits. Cost-benefit analysis.20 CHAPTER 3: RESULTS AND DISCUSSION. Blue carbon ecosystems of Vietnam’s Mekong River Delta.
Blue carbon stocks. Blue carbon emissions. Valuation of blue carbon ecosystem services. Blue carbon benefits.
Blue carbon costs. Cost-benefit Analysis .44 CHAPTER 4: CONCLUSION AND RECOMMENDATIONS. Limitations and implications for further research .50 APPENDIX 1: MATRIX OF LEARNING OUTCOMES FOR THE RESEARCH .62 LIST OF TABLES Table 1.1: Different funding approaches to blue carbon activities .1: Annual emission factors associated with activities within wetlands .1: Total considered areas for each type of blue ecosystem .2: Dominant species distribution of mangroves by the province in the MRD .3: Blue carbon stock by the province of the Mekong River Delta (MgC) .4: Mangrove-related LUCC in the VMRD from 1979 to 2016 (in ha) .5: Annual emission factor associated with the classified activity .6: Aquaculture productivity in the Mekong River Delta.7: CO2 emission/removal from LUCC activities in the mangroves of MRD .8: Provisioning values of the mangrove ecosystems (US$ ha-1yr-1, 2010) .9: Carbon sequestration value of blue carbon ecosystems in VMRD .10: Correspondence between ecosystem services and components of Total Economic Value .11: Total blue carbon benefits of the MRD (2010 price) .12: Estimated costs of a 10-year mangroves restoration project (2010 price) .13: Costs and benefits of shrimp culture development in the MRD .14: Scenario 1- Cost-benefit analysis per 1ha of shrimp culture development at household-scale .15: Scenario 2 - Cost-benefit analysis per 1ha of shrimp culture development at enterprise-scale .16: Scenario 3 - Cost-benefit analysis per 1 ha of mangroves restoration and protection (carbon price selected at US$1.17: Scenario 4 - Cost-benefit analysis per 1 ha of mangroves restoration and protection (carbon price selected at US$51/MgCO2eq) .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 .2: Inundation risk map of the Mekong River Delta for the 100 cm sea-level rise scenario .3: Climate Change and Other Interacting Abiotic Actors Influencing Blue Carbon Stocks over Landscapes .4: Research conceptual framework .1: Total Economic Value Framework .1: Distribution of blue carbon ecosystems in the Vietnamese Mekong River Delta.2: Nominal C storage capacity (MgC ha-1) of the Mekong River Delta .3: Comparison of blue carbon ecosystems organic C storage (MgC ha-1) .4: LUCC maps of the MRD from 1979 to 2015 .32 ii LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS CCER Chinese Certified Emissions Reductions CDM Clean Development Mechanism CDR Carbon dioxide removal CFI Carbon Farming Initiative CPMD Coastal Protection for the Mekong Delta COP United Nations Climate Change Conference CSR Corporate social responsibility EF Emission factor Emergent Organization for Forest Financing ERPA Emission Reductions Payment Agreement ETS Emissions Trading Scheme FCPF Forest Carbon Partnership Facility IPCC Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change KFS Korea Forest Service LEAF Lowering Emissions by Accelerating Forest Finance Coalition LUCC Land use and land cover change LULUCF Land use, Land-use Change and Forestry MONRE Ministry of Natural Resources and Environment MRD Mekong River Delta NAMA Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions NAPA National Adaptation Programmes of Action NBS Nature-based solutions NDC Nationally Determined Contributions NRM Natural Resource Management REDD+ Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in developing countries VCS Verified Carbon Standard VMRD Vietnamese Mekong River Delta iii CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION 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. Even if all current National Determined Contributions (NDC) are implemented, we would still be on track for a 2. 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.
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. 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 1 (CDR), in addition to emissions reduction (Arias, et al.
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. 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. 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. 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. 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 2 oceans in binding carbon, encompassing the ocean’s vegetated habitats of mangroves, salt marshes, and seagrasses in particular (Nellemann, et al.
In its latest assessment report, IPCC defined blue carbon as the “biologically-driven carbon fluxes and storage in a marine system that are amenable to management” (Arias, et al. For these particular conditions, coastal blue carbon research, mainly focuses on the coastal rooted vegetation systems of mangroves, tidal salt marshes, and seagrasses, due to their large productivity and controllability (Tang, et al. Large productivity can be interpreted as their intense carbon sequestration capacity, comparable to the terrestrial ecosystems, regardless of the small aboveground biomass and areal coverage (Mcleod, et al. The average carbon burial rates of salt marshes, mangroves, and seagrasses are 218 ± 24, 226 ± 39, 138 ± 38 g C m-2 yr-1, respectively, over 50 times faster than the burial rate of the fastest terrestrial ecosystem – temperate forest.
Controllability refers to the control that human has over the coastal ecosystems. Specifically, anthropogenic activities can protect, restore or degrade and destroy these systems, thus increasing or decreasing blue carbon. Unlike terrestrial plants, marine plants cannot fix the atmospheric CO2 until it has been dissolved in seawater through complex physicochemical processes, that largely control the CO2 absorption rates (Kuwae & Hori, 2019). Similarly, the blue carbon stocks are influenced by various factors, especially through the changes (e.
burial, trapping, and loss) of sediments and organic carbon induced by tidal flows (Figure 1. If properly maintained and conserved the trapped organic carbon in blue carbon sediments can be stored on-site for centuries or more (Kuwae & Hori, 2019). In 2009, Nellemann et al. set an important foundation for blue carbon research by emphasising the enormous carbon capture potential of the marine living organisms, and their vital role in providing other non-carbon ecosystem services.
The authors also came up with key policy recommendations for the protection, management, and restoration of the crucial ocean carbon sinks, which involved the establishment of a global blue carbon fund.