Enhancing Carbon Sequestration in Forests, Agricultural Lands and Wetlands in the Nordic Countries: Technical Measures and Policy Instruments

The project reviews a range of relevant land-use measures, their climate mitigation effects and the associated policy instruments, with a focus on Denmark, Finland and Sweden. It identifies alternative policy instruments that can be introduced to further augment carbon sequestration in the LULUCF sector in the Nordic countries. Key findings of the project are 1) Several land-use measures relevant for climate mitigation exist (e.g. measures on organic soils, afforestation) although the implementations are rarely explicitly driven by climate goals; 2) Policy instruments are currently limited and less diverse in their forms; 3) Alternative policy instruments include performance based incentive mechanisms, carbon rent approach, and market based instruments. Follow-up research is needed to support, incentivize and augment climate mitigation in the LULUCF sector in the Nordic region.