Christopher Neill
Christopher Neill
Earlier this year the planet crashed its way through a scary barrier—a whole year with an average temperature that was 1.5 degrees Celsius above the 1850 to 1900 average.
That’s important because climate scientists have estimated that keeping the Earth’s fossil-fuel-induced temperature increase under 1.5 degrees would prevent the most-dramatic consequences of climate change—like melting polar icecaps, extreme weather and rapid sea level rise. In the 2016 Paris climate agreement, more than 200 nations agreed to pursue efforts to keep temperature increases below 1.5 degrees.
Today, almost no climate scientist thinks this goal can be reached. That key danger point—a global temperature rise of 1.5 degrees sustained over several years instead of just one year—is not far off. It will arrive as soon as 2030.
The slow pace at which we can wean ourselves off carbon-emitting fossil fuels, and the enormous momentum contained in the climate system, already guarantee that climate will change rapidly over decades to centuries. Our actions now won’t stop change—but they will determine how much change our descendants will have to endure.
Our actions can also reduce disruptions to the natural world. Increasingly, my answer to “what can I do” is to support policies that protect, conserve and connect open space and natural lands.
Large, varied and connected open spaces allow natural processes—such as tree growth and reproduction, flooding and in some places fire—to dominate landscapes. Large areas create shifting mosaics of habitat that don’t have to stay fixed over time. Patches lost to disturbances are not lost if spaces are large enough that they get recreated elsewhere.
The most climate-resilient landscapes mapped by biologists are large, connected areas with lots of topographic relief. Lateral connections and elevation gradients also allow plant and animal populations to move north, or upslope, as climate warms.
Natural and healthy ecosystems provide services like water purification, land surface cooling, carbon storage, chemical detoxification, nutrient recycling and pest control. I’d throw in aesthetic beauty and intellectual stimulation that lift the human spirit.
I like talking about land conservation goals in terms of 30 by 30—a plan hatched in the Biden administration but with widespread support—to conserve at least 30 percent of US land and freshwater by 2030.
The beauty of 30 by 30 is it can be applied at small and large scales. And it’s achievable. Falmouth has about 28 percent of its land in some form of conservation protection—mostly owned by the state, town or The 300 Committee. Six hundred key acres would get us to that goal.
At the scale of Massachusetts and New England, the picture is mixed. The clearest and most up-to-date assessment of land protection in New England comes from a report by David Foster colleagues last year published by the Harvard Forest, entitled “Wildlands in New England: Past, present and future.”
Massachusetts has about 30 percent of land protected in some form or another. But at the same time, only 2.3 percent of that land is fully protected as wildlands (reserves that emphasize natural processes over active human management). New Hampshire has 34 percent protected lands, Connecticut only 22 percent.
The state owns 90 percent of all protected land in Massachusetts and the federal government only 6 percent (in contrast, the federal government owns 54 percent of protected lands in Vermont and 75 percent in New Hampshire). But wildland reserves make up only 3.3 percent of all of New England.
Most protected areas are small. Two-thirds are less than 1,000 acres and more than half are smaller than 500 acres (barely larger than Beebe Woods plus Peterson Farm).
On the plus side, the large number of smaller protected areas in New England also mean that protected lands—and even wildlands—are relatively accessible. According to the Harvard Forest report, half of New Englanders live within 10 miles of a wildland and all live within 41 miles.
Last September, Governor Maura Healey issued an executive order that directed the Department of Fish and Game to review biodiversity conservation efforts and establish goals and strategies to achieve a nature-positive future for Massachusetts. This is progress. But the state needs to step up and establish a dedicated revenue stream for land conservation.
We are lucky to live in a town that supports multiple land trusts.
The wildlands report team is right: “Wildlands are…critical for addressing the global crises arising from climate change, biodiversity loss, and threats to human well-being. Both the opportunity and the need for Wildland conservation in New England have never been greater.”
The work these groups do is the core of climate adaptation. So if you want to “do something” about climate change, support land trusts and argue for more land conservation funding.
Christopher Neill is an ecosystem ecologist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center and a member of the board of directors of Falmouth Water Stewards.
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