Leveraging Nature-based Solutions for climate resilient and biodiverse urban futures
Following the joint IPCC and IPBES call to action to align policy, finance, and action for solving the twin crises of biodiversity and climate change, we propose to launch a Special Collection in npj Urban Sustainability that will publish high quality case studies, comparative assessments, and conceptual advances for leveraging urban nature-based solutions to reveal progress and advance research and action on climate mitigation, adaptation, and biodiversity conservation in ways that support equity and human well-being. How can cities take the lead? What empirical examples of successes can be championed to create models for replication and scaling up NBS approaches to transform cities for resilience, equity and sustainability? What can we learn from successes and difficulties in urban NBS initiatives to jointly address the biodiversity and climate crises in urban territories?
At COP26, trillions of dollars were pledged to invest in NBS for carbon drawdown, but none were committed in urban areas. There is a disconnect between NBS for climate mitigation and the need to invest in NBS for adaptation in cities where most people live and are impacted by climate driven extreme events. Additional Urban areas have the most direct potential impacts of NBS on human health. Aligning goals for solving the biodiversity crisis and limiting impacts of climate change on people, infrastructure, and economies requires a focus on cities and urban regions.
We are seeking a balance of perspective papers, empirical papers and case studies from the Global North and Global South across the following three themes.
Theme 1: Studies that uncover tensions in the assessment and achievement of carbon neutrality, biodiversity and well-being goals through NBS that point towards solutions for uniting adaptation and mitigation to conserve biodiversity and support human well-being outcomes
Theme 2: Empirical case studies and analyses that demonstrate shifts in policy, planning, and new governance structures that can enable joint biodiversity and climate solutions at local scales (e.g., new forms of public-private partnerships, or multi-level governance arrangements)
Theme 3: Examples of enabling finance and other business and governance measures to support the upscaling of nature-based and climate solutions to support rapid transformations toward sustainability
Editors
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Sandra Lavorel
CNRS Grenoble
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Christopher Raymond
University of Helsinki
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Timon McPhearson
The New School
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Pippin Andersson
University of Cape Town
About the Guest Editors
Sandra Lavorel obtained a doctorate in ecology in 1991 and became a researcher at the CNRS since 1994 and she is now research director. She heads a research group on "Dynamics of socio-ecosystems in a changing world" at the Laboratoire d'Ecologie Alpine de Grenoble.
Sandra's current research focuses on the impacts of combined climate change and land management on ecosystems and their services. This interdisciplinary research at the interface between functional ecology and social sciences, with close involvement of local and regional stakeholders, contributes to national and international biodiversity and ecosystem assessments. She chairs the French National Ecosystem Assessment and has actively contributed to the assessments of the International Platform for Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES). In particular, she was the lead author of the Europe and Central Asia Assessment, where she coordinated work on paths to a sustainable future. She joined the IPBES Multidisciplinary Expert Group in 2018.
Christopher Raymond is an interdisciplinary sustainability scientist with research interests in senses of place; assessment of the multiple values of nature, including the co-benefits of nature-based solutions; and participatory mapping theory and practice. He leads the Human-Nature Transformations Research Group at the University of Helsinki and multiple projects relating to the assessment of the co-benefits and costs of nature-based solutions, including issues of environmental justice and social inclusion. He is also actively engaged in research seeking to unlock trade-offs to societal transformation toward sustainability, drawing upon a socio-ecological-technological systems theoretical perspective. Professor Raymond is also a Coordinating Lead Author of the IPBES Values Assessment (Chapter 2, Concepts) and founding member of the Participatory Mapping Institute (PMAP).
Timon McPhearson is an urban ecologist with expertise in urban ecosystem services, nature-based solutions and resilience to climate change in cities. He is also an Associate Research Fellow at Stockholm Resilience Centre and Senior Research Fellow at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies. As an IPCC Lead Author he focuses on developing pathways for urban adaptation and resilient futures in cities. In 2019 he was awarded the Sustainability Science Award and the Innovation in Sustainability Science Award by the Ecological Society of America.
Pippin M. L. Andersson is a plant ecologist who is interested in socially-informed ecologies and in recent years has focused her research on the ecology in and of cities. Her research is informed by her geography and primarily looks at the ecology of African cities and biodiversity in cities.
