Actions and results

Areas of action

Forestry works in the demonstration sites were carried out between 2018 and 2019, except for some plantations, which had to be postponed due to COVID-19 and which were finally carried out during the autumn of 2020.

Montmell LU

The area included in the action totals 9.5 ha. It includes Aleppo pine woods in a post-fire coastal area, with some stands untreated and others that have received treatment on previous occasions. A group of Aleppo pine has been planted, grafted with stone pine stylet scions.

Vall de Rialb LU

The area included in the action totals 11.1 ha. The action has focused on mature Austrian pine and Scots pine woods within a Pre-Pyrenees/Central Catalonia climate. Enrichment planting was performed in a post-fire Portuguese oak grove.

Les Aspres LU

The area included in the action totals 21.9 ha. The actions have been carried out on adult cork oaks and other post-fire regenerated stands. A group of Aleppo pine has been planted.

Replans de Berguedà LU

The area included in the action totals 12.4 ha, involving pure and mixed post-fire deciduous oak, Aleppo pine, Scots pine and Austrian pine woods.

Capçaleres del Llobregat LU

The area included in the action totals 8.64 ha, involving adult Scots pine woods within a Pre-Pyrenees/Central Catalonia climate.

Serres d’Ancosa LU

The area included in the action totals 13.7 ha, involving adult Aleppo pine woods within a coastal climate. Enrichment planting has also been carried out with noble broad-leaved trees.

In order to complete these actions, two agroforestry plantations have been carried out, in areas other than those described, and cork oak and cherry tree plantations from several years back were monitored. In total, these other actions have involved an area of 10.61 ha.

Mitigation and adaption actions

  • Management of stands in the post-fire regeneration phase.
  • Forest management in adult stands.
  • Forestations: Forestry and agroforestry plantations.
  • Forest management practices with an impact on the carbon balance in the soil.
  • Strategic management for forest fire prevention.

Design of the voluntary Climate Credit market

The voluntary climate credit market aims to put developers (owners of forests containing woodland that can mitigate climate change) in touch with buyers (companies committed to the environment that need to offset their emissions) with the goal of generating economic activity that ensures profitability through multifunctional and mitigating forest management. This design of the market will be solid, transparent, non-exclusive and supervised by an independent third party. The developers and buyer companies that are to form part of the climate credit market will be duly identified.

Action C6 of the LIFE Climark project provides for the design of the climate credit market. Prior to this design, an information search exercise has been performed with the aim of analysing the response offered by the different compensatory mechanisms to the problems that are found most habitually: the project’s additionality, temporality and permanence, action monitoring and verification, and the integration of quantitative and qualitative variables in the climate credit.

Video interview team C2M

Pilot tests

The pilot tests scheduled for LIFE CLIMARK should allow us to evaluate each of the future climate credit market’s implementation phases, leading up to its eventual launch in 2023.The tests help to assess the suitability of the planned forest actions and the methodology for calculating their impact and to calculate the climate credits generated. We work with the different stakeholders in each territory to specify how the entire process should be organised, from the proposal of the forestry project to its effective financing and subsequent certification.

The phases included in each of the pilot tests are:

  • Identification of the main ecosystem services to be improved and the main players to take into account in each territory, at the landscape level. Several informative and participatory meetings are set up to cover the general idea behind the project and the specific objectives of each test.
  • Drafting of a Climate Change Mitigation and Adaptation Forest Project (PROMACC), a manual for the roll-out of grouped multifunctional forest management, with the selection of the different stands, management models and itineraries to follow and quantification of this management’s impact in terms of carbon, water and biodiversity. The PROMACC must include the costs of silvicultural management and site management (marking and monitoring) as well as those related to the in-situ communication of the action to being carried out.
  • The PROMACC will be assessed in terms of the Climate Credits it generates, equivalent to the hectares of resilient landscape resulting from the planned management. Each Climate Credit will have an associated economic value according to the cost per hectare of the PROMACC and an impact of the proposed management for the next 15 years, the tonnes of carbon to be offset, the cubic metres of water to be provided and the percentage improvement in the carrying capacity of biodiversity.
  • Once the project has been defined, the search begins for the necessary funding, from private and/or public entities, to implement the project. The monitoring of actions is key to the correct provision of ecosystem services.
  • The pilot test includes communication – press releases and dissemination on social media – and training tasks durint the project’s implementation.
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Vall de Lord

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Conca del Segre-Rialb

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Castellar del Vallès

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Serra de Miralles-Orpinell-Ancosa

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Zona Volcànica de la Garrotxa

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Vall d’en Bas

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Vall de la Muga

8 pilots tests have been launched in the project, in eight areas with different environmental and socio-economic contexts. The following five, which are at a more advanced stage, are worth highlighting:

  • Serra de Collserola: forests very close to Barcelona and with a strong influx of visitors. Biodiversity conservation is very important in this area, due to it being in a natural park, as is fire prevention, due to its proximity to large urban centres. This pilot test is currently being implemented thanks to private funding.
  • AFG de les Arenes: peri-urban forests in the municipality of Castellar del Vallès, located in a strategic area for the prevention of large forest fires. The main  financing entity is Castellar del Vallès Town Council and the entity promoting forest management is the Forest Owners Association of Castellar del Vallès, Gallifa and Sant Llorenç Savall.
  • Segre-Rialb Basin: covers 6 municipalities in the countries of La Noguera (Ponts, La Baronia de Rialb and Tiurana) and L’Alt Urgell (Peramola, Bassella and Oliana) with a significant forest area. Rural environment around the Segre-Rialb reservoir that provides water reserves for the public.
  • Serra de Miralles-Orpinell: covers 6 municipalities in the counties of La Noguera (Ponts, La Baronia de Rialb and Tiurana) and L’Alt Urgell (Peramola, Bassella and Oliana) with a significant forest area. The entity promoting the management of this project is the Segre-Rialb Basin Forestry Association, in the rural surroundings of the reservoir. The project promotes ecological restoration actions mainly linked to the recovery of ecosystem services after the effects of major forest fires from the 1980s onwards.
  • Vall de Lord: valley of the Cardener basin in El Solsonès above the Llossa del Cavall reservoir that covers 3 municipalities: Sant Llorenç de Morunys, Guixers and La Coma i la Pedra. Scots pine and oak forests that have expanded due to the abandonment of farming. The promoter of the pilot test is the Lord Valley Forestry Association and the project includes forest stands in strategic fire prevention areas close to the main watercourses running through the valley.

Other pilot tests haven started as part of the project, located in the Garrotxa region and in the Muga Valley, while work is under way to replicate a possible climate credit market in the Veneto region of Italy.

After the project ends in September 2022, you will find the pilot PROMACCs at: https://creditsclimaticsforestals.cat/es/promacc-en-cartera/

Serra de Collserola