5th July 16:00-18:00 – NHM Lecture Theatre

Part of the Nature-based Solutions Conference, 5-7 July 2022, University of Oxford

Convenors: Oxford Net Zero and the Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford

This session will start by reviewing the potential of NbS to support climate change mitigation, clarifying the scientific basis that NbS require fossil fuels to be kept in the ground. It will then directly address current criticisms that NbS are being used for greenwashing, including what the evidence for this is and how it is being done, as well as exploring how this can be avoided. Discussions will broach whether and how NbS can and should play a role in achieving net-zero and be used in offsetting schemes and, if so, how we ensure the price is high enough to avoid cascades of negative impacts on people, climate and nature. The discussion will also include the possibility of using net-zero momentum as a window of opportunity to scale up NbS projects, and discussion of insetting as an alternative to offsetting. We will ask how to ethically and sustainably bridge the divide between the public and private sectors on NbS and why we need to.

Speakers

• Steve Smith | Executive Director, Oxford Net Zero and CO2RE – Chair
• Cécile Girardin | Ecosystems Lab, Environmental Change Institute, University of Oxford
• Pete Smith | Professor of Soils and Global Change, University of Aberdeen
• Stephanie Roe | Global Climate Lead Scientist at WWF, Lead Author IPCC AR6 WGIII
• Kaya Axelsson | Net Zero Policy Engagement Fellow at University of Oxford
• Aline Soterroni | Research Fellow at the Nature-based Solutions Initiative and Oxford Net Zero

For more information and to register, see the Nature-based Solutions Conference website.