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Trophic rewilding can expand natural climate solutions

Nature Climate Change volume 13, pages 324–333 (2023)Cite this article

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Abstract

Natural climate solutions are being advanced to arrest climate warming by protecting and enhancing carbon capture and storage in plants, soils and sediments in ecosystems. These solutions are viewed as having the ancillary benefit of protecting habitats and landscapes to conserve animal species diversity. However, this reasoning undervalues the role animals play in controlling the carbon cycle. We present scientific evidence showing that protecting and restoring wild animals and their functional roles can enhance natural carbon capture and storage. We call for new thinking that includes the restoration and conservation of wild animals and their ecosystem roles as a key component of natural climate solutions that can enhance the ability to prevent climate warming beyond 1.5 °C.

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Fig. 1: Global distribution of candidate animal species and ecosystems for which there is a high potential to expand natural climate solutions through trophic rewilding.

Data availability

All the data used in this study are included in this Perspective (and its Supplementary Information).

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by funding from One Earth and Rewilding Europe to O.J.S. and M.S., from the EU H2020 Research and Innovation Program project MEESO (Ecologically and economically sustainable mesopelagic fisheries #817669) to F.B., and from the Danish National Research Foundation grant DNRF173 and VILLUM FONDEN grant 16549 to J.-C.S.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. School of the Environment, Yale University, New Haven, CT, USA

    Oswald J. Schmitz

  2. Global Rewilding Alliance, Wild Foundation, Boulder, CO, USA

    Magnus Sylvén

  3. Department of Watershed Sciences and The Ecology Center, Utah State University, Logan, UT, USA

    Trisha B. Atwood

  4. Department of Aquatic Ecology, Netherlands Institute of Ecology (NIOO-KNAW), Wageningen, the Netherlands

    Elisabeth S. Bakker

  5. Wildlife Ecology and Conservation Group, Wageningen University & Research, Wageningen, the Netherlands

    Elisabeth S. Bakker

  6. Sasakawa Global Ocean Institute, World Maritime University, Malmö, Sweden

    Fabio Berzaghi

  7. Division of Biological Sciences and Wildlife Biology Program, University of Montana, Missoula, MT, USA

    Jedediah F. Brodie

  8. Department of Wildlife, Fish, and Environmental Studies, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Umeå, Sweden

    Joris P. G. M. Cromsigt

  9. Department of Zoology, Centre for African Conservation Ecology, Nelson Mandela University, Gqeberha, South Africa

    Joris P. G. M. Cromsigt

  10. Department of Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Andrew B. Davies

  11. Department of Biology, Memorial University of Newfoundland, St. John’s, Newfoundland, Canada

    Shawn J. Leroux

  12. Rewilding Europe, Nijmegen, the Netherlands

    Frans J. Schepers

  13. Department of Biology, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM, USA

    Felisa A. Smith

  14. Arctic Centre, University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland

    Sari Stark

  15. Center for Ecological Dynamics in a Novel Biosphere (ECONOVO) & Center for Biodiversity Dynamics in a Changing World (BIOCHANGE), Department of Biology, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark

    Jens-Christian Svenning

  16. Re:Wild, Austin, TX, USA

    Andrew Tilker

  17. Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research, Berlin, Germany

    Andrew Tilker

  18. School of Forest Sciences, University of Eastern Finland, Joensuu, Finland

    Henni Ylänne

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  1. Oswald J. Schmitz
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  2. Magnus Sylvén
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  13. Jens-Christian Svenning
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Contributions

O.J.S. and M.S. conceived the study. O.J.S. wrote the first draft and conducted the calculations presented in the Supplementary Information. All the authors provided technical and scholarly input and reviewed and revised drafts of the manuscript.

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Oswald J. Schmitz.

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M.S., F.J.S. and A.T. are employed by environmental non-governmental organizations with interests in funding and implementing rewilding programmes for natural climate solutions. They provided technical expertise on applying trophic rewilding and carbon science to climate and conservation policy, and human–nature coexistence. The other authors declare no competing interests.

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Schmitz, O.J., Sylvén, M., Atwood, T.B. et al. Trophic rewilding can expand natural climate solutions. Nat. Clim. Chang. 13, 324–333 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-023-01631-6

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