More food with fewer emissions
We have read recently how China has converted an area the size of France from desert into a lush oasis capable of producing soft fruits, nuts , cattle and sheep in abundance; how Saudi Arabia is building a city which is capable of being self sustainable. Amazing scientific work in agriculture and geoengineering is being undertaken.
Our food system is world wide and growing. It distributes, consumes, and disposes of resources for food production. It ensures that we can have seasonal fruits and vegetables all year round, and that you can get a wide variety of options from all around the world.
It’s not surprising that agriculture generates about a quarter of the world’s total greenhouse emissions. That figure is even set to increase as the world’s population increases and the developing world diversifies its consumption. In terms of greenhouse gas emissions, this sounds like a big problem.
But new research shows it doesn’t have to be that way. In fact, agriculture could become not carbon neutral, but carbon negative in a couple of decades.
Researchers at Cornell University and Princeton University found the food system could generate net negative emissions, reducing more than it adds. Changes in agricultural technology and management would result in an annual removal of 13 billion tons of CO2 by 2050. The world now emits about 50 billion tons of CO-equivalent every year.
Previous studies have found that changing diets around the world would significantly reduce emissions in the food system sector. If the entire population adopted a flexitarian diet (less meat) by 2050, emissions would be reduced by 8.2 billion metric tons. While this is a lot, it’s not sufficient for the sector to achieve net negative emissions. So while eating less meat is definitely a good idea, researchers looked at something else.
Houlton and his team decided to look beyond diets and also consider the potential of agricultural technologies for reducing emissions. They looked at a dozen technologies that could reduce agricultural greenhouse gas emissions. They found that the most effective ones are soil modification to crops, agroforestry, sustainable seafood harvesting practices, and hydrogen-powered fertilizer production. In other words, there are a lot of things that farmers can do to improve the sustainability of their crops.
“Feed-additives, manure digesters, agroforestry, and soil amendments can all be implemented without the need for major changes to global infrastructure or supply chains,” the researchers wrote in their paper in the journal PLOS Climate. “Many of the technologies we examine offer local economic and environmental co-benefits.”
The scientists have highlighted a few specific solutions that can be deployed.
For example, silicate rock dust can be added to crop soils every five years to accelerate the formation of carbonates, which then absorb carbon dioxide, the researchers said. This can sequester several billion metric tons of CO2 per year. Planting trees on unused farmland and farming seaweed at the ocean surface also has much potential, they said.
Alan Stevenson spent four years in the Royal Australian Navy; four years at a seminary in Brisbane and the rest of his life in computers as an operator, programmer and systems analyst. His interests include popular science, travel, philosophy and writing for Open Forum.
Max Thomas
October 5, 2023 at 8:40 am
There is ample scope for carbon sequestration in carbon-deficient Australian agricultural soils. The CSIRO product known as biochar, not only can recover latent energy in waste but it is a rich and compact source of carbon. The link below is to my article first published in “Chemistry in Australia” detailing the use of biosolids derived from sewage for agricultural soils. More information concerning Biochar is readily available on the web.
http://chemaust.raci.org.au/sites/default/files/pdf/2015/CiA_Apr2015.pdf