North Carolina Natural and Working Lands Action Plan Turnball Creek Educational State Forest in Bladen County. (Photo courtesy of North Carolina Forest Service) June 2020 Purpose of the North Carolina Natural and Working Lands Action Plan The purpose of the North Carolina Natural and Working Lands Action Plan (referred to as the NWL Action Plan) is to identify and create opportunities and outline specific projects for North Carolina’s natural and working lands (NWL) that sequester carbon, build ecosystem and community resilience, provide ecosystem benefits, and enhance our economy. This action plan can be used by 1) public and private landowners and managers; 2) impact partners such as universities, nonprofit organizations, corporations, land-use consultants and investors; and 3) federal, state and local planners, and policymakers to facilitate meeting North Carolina’s goals identified under the plan. Specifically, the NWL Action Plan addresses the following issues: • Define the stakeholders’ shared goals developed for the NWL Action Plan; • Present the current state of our NWL; • Quantify the potential impact of various actions; • Recommend specific actions that facilitate meeting the shared goals; • Identify implementation pathways, partners, and funding to facilitate taking action; • Discuss roadblocks currently preventing the use of certain action pathways; and • Encourage working on broad policy initiatives that would greatly enhance meeting our goals. The writers of this document recognize that working to improve NWL requires a great deal of time, planning, organizing, collaborating, and funding. This plan seeks to identify and prioritize short-term, cost-effective, and pragmatic solutions, as well as identifying longer-term actions that require more effort and funding, including potential legislative or programmatic changes. The writers also see this plan as a “living document” with periodic updates and progress reports. Acknowledgments We are thankful to all the stakeholders, subcommittee members, and partner organizations who gave their time and effort freely to work on this plan. Without their support and guidance, the recommendations would not have taken shape. We specifically thank Rick Savage of the Carolina Wetlands Association for working on all the subcommittees, providing much-needed cohesion for the plan, and assisting on writing and editing the document. In addition, we thank the Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions - Ecosystem Services Program for developing much of the data used in the plan and the Storymaps. We also thank the US Climate Alliance and its partners for peer-reviewing the draft plan. i North Carolina Natural and Working Lands Action Plan June 2020 Table of Contents 1.0 Overview of the NWL Action Plan Process .......................................................................................... 1 1.1 Directives Calling for the NWL Action Plan ......................................................................................... 1 1.2 Overview of Stakeholder Process .......................................................................................................... 2 1.3 Stakeholder Shared Goals for Natural and Working Lands ................................................................... 3 1.4 List of Participants ................................................................................................................................. 4 2.0 Natural and Working Land Basics ......................................................................................................... 7 2.1 Data on Land Use Types ........................................................................................................................ 7 2.2 New Ideas: Blue Carbon ...................................................................................................................... 10 2.3 Economic and Social Value of NWL ................................................................................................... 11 2.3.1 Value of the Land and the Ecosystem Services ..................................................................................... 11 2.3.3 Value of Resilience ............................................................................................................................... 13 2.4 North Carolina Greenhouse Gas Inventory .......................................................................................... 14 3.0 Stakeholder Recommendations ............................................................................................................ 16 3.1 Transformative Recommendations ...................................................................................................... 18 3.1.1 Protect and Restore Forests and Wetlands in Flood Prone Areas ....................................................... 18 3.1.2 Facilitate Voluntary Landowner Participation in Carbon Offset and Ecosystem Services Markets ... 21 3.1.3 Build a Natural and Working Lands Solutions Toolbox ....................................................................... 23 3.1.4 Integrate Climate Adaptation and Resiliency Strategies into Local Comprehensive Plans ................. 26 3.2 Priority Recommendations Key ........................................................................................................... 28 3.3 Priority Recommendations for Forest Lands ....................................................................................... 29 4.3.1 Protect Forest Lands ............................................................................................................................ 30 3.3.2 Restore Forest Land ............................................................................................................................ 33 3.3.3 Enhance Forest Land ........................................................................................................................... 36 3.4 Priority Recommendations for Floodplains and Wetlands .................................................................. 39 3.4.1 Protect and Restore Floodplains .......................................................................................................... 40 3.5 Priority Recommendations for Pocosins .............................................................................................. 45 3.5.1 Restore Pocosins .................................................................................................................................. 46 3.5.2 Enhance Pocosins ................................................................................................................................. 54 3.6 Priority Recommendations for Coastal Habitats .................................................................................. 61 3.6.1 Protect Coastal Habitats ...................................................................................................................... 62 3.6.2 Restore Coastal Habitats ...................................................................................................................... 68 3.7 Priority Recommendations for Urban Lands ....................................................................................... 72 3.7.1 Protect Urban Lands ............................................................................................................................ 73 3.7.2 Enhance Urban Lands .......................................................................................................................... 77 3.8 Priority Recommendations for Agriculture .......................................................................................... 81 3.8.1 Recommendations to Enhance Agriculture .......................................................................................... 82 ii North Carolina Natural and Working Lands Action Plan June 2020 4.0 Existing North Carolina NWL Plans and Resources ........................................................................... 97 5.0 Acronym List ....................................................................................................................................... 99 6.0 Glossary ............................................................................................................................................. 101 APPENDIX I: Methods for Quantitative Estimates of Natural And Working Lands Potential List of Tables Table 1-1: Stakeholders’ Shared Goals for the NWL Action Plan .................................................................... 3 Table 1-2: Limitations on Recommendations .................................................................................................... 4 Table 1-3: Subcommittee Members ................................................................................................................... 4 Table 2-1: North Carolina Land Uses Changes 2001-2016 (million acres) ....................................................... 8 Table 2-2: Miles of Coastline and Rivers in North Carolina ............................................................................. 9 Table 2-3: GHG Emissions & Sinks from Land Use/Land Use Changes/Forestry (MMT CO2e) .................. 15 Table 3-1: Summary Table of Priority Recommendations .............................................................................. 17 Table 3-2: Developed Land Use Area in 2016 ................................................................................................ 72 Table 3-3: Methane
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