New Perspective on Climate Costs & Ag

One of the greatest concerns about a climate change law is the potential increase in energy costs that could arise.  Just like virtually any other policy, a climate law can be done in a way that is very expensive to implement, and thus, very expensive for consumers -- OR, it can be done in a way that creates a modest increase in cost and yields a new market for conservation, renewable energy and leads to far greater energy diversity and security.

The devil really is in the details.

When federal agencies like EPA and DOE model various climate proposals, they usually look at multiple scenarios that could emerge off of a given proposal.  In this way, the modeling tries to account for the numerous variables that could affect a climate law's cost and/or implementation.  

Unfortunately, this modeling is often complex and very difficult to distill down to a level that the public would be interested in and could understand.  As a result, what often happens is interest groups on the right and the left pick and choose the scenarios and the data that they want to see and present that to the public as "the cost assessment" of a given policy.  

To get a more accurate view of climate policy, it is important to take full account of all the scenarios and variables involved.  In fact, a better way to look at modeling is as a means to detect which policy levers will cause an effect (raise or lower prices) based on how they are utilized in the law.

For example, recently, the American Farm Bureau and the Fertilizer Institute have made claims about the high cost of cap-and-trade climate proposals that may encourage some folks to see it as a net negative for agriculture.  However, closer scrutiny of the underlying analysis being used by these groups (a study conducted by the Doane Advisory Services, 2008) shows that this picture is not a complete one and may in fact present a misleading view of the potential economic opportunity that a cap-and-trade system represents.  Of course, it all depends on WHICH type of cap-trade system is put into place and of key importance, how many offsets are allowed and how well constructed is the agriculture offset market.

Its worth really understanding this important issue, because otherwise the agriculture industry could miss out on major economic opportunities by not participating in the debate.  Meanwhile, the absence of that participation has little chance of preventing a climate bill from passing -- it just means the TYPE of bill that passes is likely to be less positive for the agriculture sector

But don't take my word for it -- a new analysis out by Duke University's Nicholas Institute and Texas A&M professor Bruce McCarl goes through this issue in detail and points out some of the flaws that exist in the Doane analysis.

Below is a brief excerpt of the beginning of their white paper as well as a link to the full report.

Commentary on Impacts of Carbon Prices and Energy Costs on Returns to Agricultural Producers 

 

Brian C. Murray, Nicholas Institute for Environmental Policy Solutions, Duke University 

Bruce A. McCarl, Department of Agricultural Economics, Texas A&M University  

Justin Baker, Center on Global Change, Duke University 

 

A report issued by Doane Advisory Services in May 2008 titled An Analysis of the Relationship between 

Energy Prices and Crop Production Costs, has received recent attention as some interest groups have 

used it as evidence of how a U.S. federal cap-and-trade program – or any similar climate policy that 

creates a price on greenhouse gases (GHGs) would negatively affect U.S. farmers.   The study takes 

energy prices from EPA’s economic analysis of the Lieberman-Warner America Climate Security Act 

(S.2191) and combines this with USDA data on input costs from the eight largest crops (by value) in the 

United States to gauge how the higher energy costs expected under GHG controls translate into higher 

farm operating costs.  Higher farm operating costs provides the study’s lone measure of farmer well- 

being and the authors thereby imply that the economic harm to farmers equals their increased 

operating costs.  

The Doane report usefully addresses an important set of issues.  Yet there are a number of reasons why 

the results provide a misleading view of the impact on farmers of a carbon price including: 

-- Recent projections of cap-and-trade policy in EPA’s analysis of the Waxman-Markey bill shows 

smaller energy sector impacts than the estimates used in the Doane report 

 

-- The study uses a simple crop budget rather than a full structural economic model to capture the 

complex market linkages and substitution among inputs that determine net returns to 

agricultural producers.   

-- The study ignores the following factors that raise the returns to farmers 

o higher prices received by farmers reflecting the input higher costs 

o biofuels as an income source 

o offsets from agriculture as an income source 

-- Other recent independent studies of carbon price impacts on agriculture capture many of the 

missing features identified above and tell a different story 

To read the full report, click here.

EcoTech's Miracle Mineral

Recently, I and others at my firm completed a scoping report for a company called Ecotech, which mines a natural "miracle" mineral called zeolite.  Zeolite is a unique mineral with many agricultural applications that provides environmental benefits, including improved water quality, reduced greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from manure and fertilizer, and enhanced methane capture in anaerobic digestion.  We were looking into the potential greenhouse gas benefits or carbon credits that could come from using zeolite.  It turns out that when you feed this mineral to livestock (cattle and pigs especially) it binds the nitrogen in the manure so well that there is very little run off when the manure is then applied to a crop field as fertilizer. Also, when you put zeolite directly into a digester used to capture methane from manure, you are able to increase the amount of methane you can capture by 10-30%.

The ability to reduce nitrous oxide (one of the greenhouse gases coming off of manure) would be hugely significant because it is some 300 times more potent in terms of global warming than the main gas, carbon dioxide.  Methane is some 25 times more potent than C02 and will be a very important part of the coming carbon market.

You can check out the report at the Clark Group website by clicking here.

Testifying on the Need for Ag Offsets

Fred Yoder testified this week before the Small Business Committee on behalf of the National Corn Growers Association regarding the role of agriculture in climate change. Fred is a member of the Ag Carbon Market Working Group and the past President of the NCGA (check out earlier posts on this blog to read about his experiences at the UN Climate Change Conference in Poland).

Fred's testimony focused on the importance of designing an offset policy that allows agriculture to contribute to the solution for climate change and produce revenue for rural America. There was particular emphasis during the hearing on the need for offsets to counterbalance any potential cost increase from cap-and-trade. Fred was joined on the panel by Roger Johnson, new President of the National Farmers Union, alongside reps from other industries (roofing, steel). Fred and Roger both outlined the necessity to create an offset policy that incentivizes farmers to reduce and sequester GHG emissions – and how that would mean crediting early actors, involving USDA, designing effective protocols, and allowing unlimited domestic offsets.

Questions from Committee members covered the role of ag in climate change solutions and the potential for costs to the economy. Fred and Roger both highlighted that the potential for cost increase coupled with the current economic situation underscores the critical need to design an offset policy that lowers the cost to the economy.

The hearing is available online and below.
http://www.youtube.com/view_play_list?p=0B9D4A59DF00BDD2

Fred’s testimony:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GlObhoGk9q8&feature=PlayList&p=0B9D4A59DF00BDD2&index=2

Fred’s discussion of potential costs and the importance of engaging from 1 min 50 to 5 min 25:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1q509kFUy-Y&feature=PlayList&p=0B9D4A59DF00BDD2&index=8

Some Enviro Groups Opposing Offsets in Waxman-Markey Climate Bill

As I have noted to folks in the agriculture community, the offsets issue is one that not all environmental groups support.  In fact, a good number of them are philosophically opposed to allowing agriculture to provide the service of reducing (or sequestering) greenhouse gas emissions in a more cost-effective manner for would-be capped sectors of industry.

Below is a letter that a number of environmental groups have signed and sent to Reps Waxman and Markey in opposition to the offsets title.

A few things to think about as you read this letter:

1) If agriculture is not "at the table" representing this new multi-billion dollar market, it will be folks like these who are listened to and the cost of implementing a climate bill will go up for the whole economy, not just for agriculture.

2) There ARE some environmental groups that have stuck their necks out to work with the agriculture sector on this -- namely Environmental Defense Fund and National

Wildlife Federation . . . so while you may not agree with these groups on everything,

folks in the agriculture industry should take advantage of these partnerships to fight the political battle that is brewing over offsets

**************************************************

April 23, 2009
The Honorable Henry Waxman
Chair, Committee on Energy and Commerce
The Honorable Edward Markey
Chair, Subcommittee on Energy and Environment

Dear Chairmen Waxman and Markey,
We commend you on the effort you have undertaken in crafting your draft “American Clean Energy & Security Act of 2009.”  While there is much to applaud in this bill, there are also areas for substantial improvement.  While we will be communicating to you separately with respect to other issues, our organizations are concerned in particular about one key element that threatens to undermine its integrity and effectiveness in addressing climate change:  the large carbon offsets provisions of the draft bill.  As pointed out in recent testimony before your Energy and Environment Subcommittee by the Government Accountability Office,  quality assurance for carbon offsets is all but impossible to verify.  To craft a bill that allows for 2 billion tons of offsets per year — roughly equivalent to 27% of 2007 U.S. greenhouse gas emissions — is to allow for continued and dangerous delay in real action by our country at a time when the world is looking to the U.S. for leadership on climate change.

Initial calculations suggest that allowing for 2 billion tons of offsets per year would mean that covered entities in the U.S. could use offsets to avoid curtailing their own significant greenhouse gas emissions until 2026.  Given current climate science , such a delay in investing directly in new low-carbon energy infrastructure is unacceptable.

Increasing evidence is revealing the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM), the world’s biggest carbon offset market, is failing to deliver real climate or sustainable development benefits.   Most fundamentally, the CDM has actually facilitated an increase in overall greenhouse gas emissions —undermining the most fundamental and critical goal of all — stemming the growth of greenhouse gas emissions in the Earth’s atmosphere.

The draft bill intends to reduce emissions from tropical deforestation via two contrasting approaches.  The first, called Supplemental Emissions Reductions from Reduced Deforestation, is a fund-based approach with the aim of slowing tropical deforestation emissions by at least 720 million tons per year by 2020.  The fund approach as written into the draft bill could enable effective policies, activities and measures to slow tropical deforestation, which unfortunately would be undone through the second approach based on bringing hundreds of millions of tons of international forestry offsets into the U.S. carbon market each year.

Forest offsets as proposed in the draft bill fail to acknowledge forest governance problems, as well as the customary land and forest rights of Indigenous peoples including the rights of free, prior and informed consent of Indigenous peoples in forest regions to participate, or choose not to participate, in the new carbon commodity market. Forest credits have a well-recognized potential to destabilize carbon markets by introducing large volumes of cheap offsets, huge variations in estimates of carbon stocks and fluxes over time, and uncertainties over how to monitor emissions and the impacts of policies upon rates of deforestation and emissions. 
       
Domestically, environmental justice organizations and activists are equally concerned that all offsets — whether in criteria pollutants or in carbon — will add to the pollution burden of already overburdened communities of color while increasing incentives for corruption. 

As the United States moves forward on domestic climate legislation, we urge you to ensure that your basic reduction targets for greenhouse gases and other agents, such as black soot  are bold enough and achieved quickly enough to keep global temperature rise well below 2 degrees Celsius. We urge you to:

1) Take the lead on strong action on climate change at home by opposing any international carbon offsets, including forest offsets, as part of any compliance regime on climate change; and
2) Ensure that the domestic offset market does not become part of a compliance system to regulate emissions.

Signed,

May Boeve, 350.org
Gillian Caldwell, 1 Sky
Rajya Waghray, Church World Service
Pam Richart, Eco-Justice Collaborative

Mike Ewall, Energy Justice Network
Nia Robinson, Environmental Justice Climate Change Initiative
Robert Weissman, Essential Action
Devin Helfrich, Friends Committee on National Legislation
Brent Blackwelder, Friends of the Earth
Jane Williams, California Communities Against Toxics
Mike Tidwell, Chesapeake Climate Action Network
Neil Tangri, Global Anti-Incinerator Alliance
Bradley Angel, Greenaction for Health and Environmental Justice
Carroll Muffett, Greenpeace USA
Tom Goldtooth, Indigenous Environmental Network
Dr. Arjun Makhijani, Institute for Energy & Environmental Research
Patrick McCully, International Rivers
Kimberly Wasserman, Little Village Environmental Justice Organization
Marie Dennis, Maryknoll Office for Global Concerns
David A. Kraft, Nuclear Energy Information Service
Michael Mariotte, Nuclear Information and Resource Service
Tyson Slocum, Public Citizen
Michael Brune, Rainforest Action Network
Chad Simmons, Safe & Green Campaign
Rabbi Arthur Waskow, Shalom Center
Daphne Wysham, Sustainable Energy & Economy Network Adam G. Gerhardstein, Unitarian Universalist Association of Congregations

No-Till's Carbon Storing Benefits Studied

Some of you may have heard about recent attack's on no-till or conservation tillage's ability to store carbon in soils at greater rates than tilled fields.  Science can be a confusing thing, especially when it is taken out of context and looked at piecemeal.  Of course, the science on no-till's ability to store carbon in soils, just like on every other issue, will continue to evolve and should be followed.  But the clear majority of the science today indicates that no-till does indeed store carbon in many soils.

Below is a very good paper from the Consortium for Agricultural Soils Mitigation of Greenhouse Gases on no-till's ability to store carbon in soils.  I recommend it to you as an excellent overview of the research to date and as an answer to some of the no-till critics.

CASMGS paper

Tillage Effects on Soil Carbon Accumulation

July 31, 2008

 

Summary: 

Data from existing long-term field experiments provides the best source of knowledge about tillage and other production management effects on soil carbon content.  The preponderance of this data shows that that adoption of no-tillage increases soil C, relative to conventional tillage, in most U.S. cropland soils.

 

Background:

Numerous studies of replicated, long-term field experiments comparing conventional tillage (e.g. moldboard plow, chisel, disk) and no-tillage have demonstrated that most soils, following conversion to no-tillage, show an increase in soil carbon (C) content relative to tilled soils, when the measurements are integrated over the full depth of soil affected by tillage (typically the top 20-30 cm) (see reviews by Paustian et al. 1997, West and Post 2002, Ogle et al. 2005).  In general, positive soil C responses are obtained first after several years of no-till management (Six et al. 2004) and after 20-30 years, the relative rates of C accumulation tend to decline as soil C levels approach a new equilibrium level under no-till conditions (West and Post 2002).   Specific mechanisms by which the physical disturbance from tillage increases soil C loss (and conversely, that reduce soil C loss under no-till) have been proposed and supported by field and experimental evidence (e.g. Six et al. 2000, Denef et al. 2004).  On the basis of this experimental evidence, sequestration factors for reduced and no-tillage management have been developed (Ogle et al. 2005) and implemented for inclusion in the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) guidelines for national greenhouse gas inventories (IPCC 2006) and values for C credits due to no-till management have been sanctioned by the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX).

 

At the same time, it has been long recognized that not all soils respond positively in terms of gaining C under no-till – in particular, soils with an already high content of soil C and cropland soils in cool, moist climates often do not show increases in C content under no-till compared to plow tillage; for example, this has been found for several experimental sites in eastern Canada (Anger et al. 1997).  The reasons for this lack of response to reduced tillage intensity is not yet clear, although preliminary results suggest that reduced decomposition rates of buried residues under cool, moist climates and ‘saturation’ of physically-protected soil organic C in high C soils are potential mechanisms (E. Gregorich, personal communication; D. Angers, personal communication).  However, the large majority of cropland soils in the US do not fall into this category.

 

Recently, a few researchers have raised questions about whether no-till, in general, actually leads to a relative increase in soil carbon when viewed at whole soil level, as illustrated in the papers by Baker et al.[1] and Blanco-Canqui and Lal[2].  The foundation of their arguments lay largely in the fact that most measurements of no-till vs tillage systems in long-term experiments have often only measured the top 30 cm or less of the soil profile, although several sites have been measured to depths of up to 100 cm.  These authors argue that if soil carbon contents are summed to a greater depth of the soil profile (e.g the top 0 to 60 or 100 cm) then in most cases there is no statistically significant difference between different tillage systems.  The problem with this argument is two-fold. First, it is true that the effects of no-till adoption are typically manifested in the top 20-30 cm of soil, which is the zone of soil disturbance in a tilled system!  The vast majority of tillage comparisons show no significant differences in soil carbon content below the tillage zone (Ogle et al. 2005).[3]  Secondly, because the change in soil C due to tillage management (the ‘signal’) is relatively small relative to the ‘background’ soil C content (the ‘noise’), by adding in the additional C stored in lower parts of the profile (even if differences below the plow layer are not significant), this calculation increases the ‘noise’ in the estimate such that the signal-to-noise ratio decreases and thus it is not surprising that comparisons of C content for the entire soil profile are often not significantly different.  A more meaningful determination is to utilize, as far as possible, measurements for different soil depth increments to the full depth of the soil profile and then to evaluate whether soil C contents are different below the tillage zone, and if not, then the estimates should be based on the measurements encompassing the depth of tillage, where the main effects of tillage management are manifested.  This is the procedure that has been used in developing the IPCC soil C change factors for tillage management (IPCC, 2006).

 

Other data that has been used to question whether no-till really increases soil carbon are total ecosystem C flux from eddy covariance measurements (Baker et al. 2007).  While eddy covariance (EC) techniques are a highly useful approach in C cycling research, there are several drawbacks which make them inappropriate for drawing inference about soil C changes.  First, there are only (to our knowledge) 2-3 locations in the U.S. where EC is being used to estimate ecosystem C balances for systems under no-till (Baker et al., Verma et al. 2005), thus any inferences made cannot be considered general for no-till systems.  Secondly, EC measurements have so far been for the first 2-3 years following conversion to no-till, in other words, during the transition phase between conventional and no-till when soil C increases are expected to be lowest.  Finally, the typical rates of C accumulation determined from long-term plot studies (e.g. 0.1 to 0.5 tonnes C per ha) are likely to be within the ‘error’ estimate for annual net C accumulation using EC methods, thus there is little confidence in the estimates obtained for annual soil C changes (furthermore, EC estimates to date are typically unreplicated, hence a true determination of the error associated with these annual C changes are not possible).  Hence the best method for determining soil C changes due to changes in soil management practices (including tillage) is through careful soil measurements in which the accumulated change in soil C over several years can be accurately determined.

 

An important point raised by Blanco-Canqui and Lal (2008) is that we currently lack good data on tillage effects under actual on-farm conditions.  Our best information on tillage impacts are from field experiments administered by land grant universities and by governmental research agencies (e.g. ARS)[4].  However, the approach taken in the paper by Blanco-Canqui and Lal – i.e., paired field (‘across the fence’) comparisons of tilled and no-till practices – involved a number of serious shortcomings.  First, paired comparisons – because they lack a true control – have a high degree of uncertainty.  Even if similar soil and slope conditions are chosen it is impossible to know if soil carbon contents were the same before a change in tillage practices occurred.  Secondly, in on-farm comparisons it is difficult to isolate the effect of tillage from other management variables.  In most of the comparisons described by Blanco-Canqui and Lal (2008), crop rotations and nutrient management, as well as tillage, were different within the paired comparisons – hence apparent differences between fields cannot, in fact, be attributed to tillage.  As the authors themselves point out, several of the apparent tillage differences, if real, are likely due to factors other than tillage, e.g., from pg. 697, “Unlike the NT [no-till] field, however, the PT [plow tillage] field was under winter wheat and rye cover crops, which were plowed under every year.  Thus we hypothesize that the higher SOC [soil organic carbon] with PT may have been due to the use of cover crops.  In MLRA 124, the higher SOC with PT may have been due to the use of continuous corn, a high biomass-producing crop, in contrast with the corn-soybean-alfalfa rotation in the NT field.  Annual burying of coarse corn residues in PT soils may have increased SOC at lower depths compared with the relatively low-biomass-producing rotation adopted in NT farming”.

 

Instead of using unreliable paired comparisons, new measurements of soil C change under actual on-farm conditions should be based on a resampling over time of on-farm benchmark sites, as part of a nationwide soil C monitoring network.  Such a network is currently under development as part of the National Resources Inventory (NRI) administered by USDA-NRCS (J. Goebel, personal communication).  Resources to establish and build out this network should be a high priority.  In the meantime, our data from existing long-term field experiments provides the best source of knowledge about tillage (and other management) effects on soil C – here, the preponderance of evidence supports the conclusion that adoption of no-tillage increases soil C, relative to conventional tillage, in most US cropland soils.

 

References

 

Angers, D.A., M.A. Bolinder, M.R. Carter, E.G. Gregorich, C.F. Drury, B.C. Liang, R.P. Voroney, R.R. Simard, R.G. Donald, R.P. Beyaert and J. Martel. 1997. Impact of tillage practices on organic carbon and nitrogen storage in cool, humid soils of eastern Canada. Soil Tillage Res. 41:191-201.

Baker, J.M., T.E. Ochsner, R.T. Veterea and T.J. Griffis. 2007. Tillage and soil carbon sequestration.  What do we really know? Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment 118:1-5.

Blanco-Canqui, H. and R. Lal. 2008.  No-tillage and soil-profile carbon sequestration: An on-farm assessment. Soil Science Society of America Journal 72:693-701.

Denef, K., J. Six, R. Merckx, and K. Paustian. 2004. Carbon sequestration in microaggregates of no-tillage soils with different clay mineralogy. Soil Science Society of America Journal 68:1935-1944.

IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). 2006.  2006 IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories, Prepared by the National Greenhouse Gas Inventories Programme, Eggleston H.S., Buendia L., Miwa K., Ngara T. and Tanabe K. (eds). Published: IGES, Japan.

Ogle, S.M., F.J. Breidt and K. Paustian. 2005. Agricultural management impacts on soil organic carbon storage under moist and dry climatic conditions of temperate and tropical regions.  Biogeochemistry 72:87-121.

Paustian, K., O. Andren, H. Janzen, R. Lal, P. Smith, G. Tian, H. Tiessen, M. van Noordwijk and P. Woomer. 1997. Agricultural soil as a C sink to offset CO₂ emissions. Soil Use and Management 13:230-244.

Six, J., Elliott, E.T. and Paustian, 2000. K. Soil macroaggregate turnover and microaggregate formation: A mechanism for C sequestration under no-tillage agriculture.  Soil Biology & Biochemistry 32:2099-2103.

Six, J., S.M. Ogle, F.J. Breidt, R.T. Conant, A.R. Mosier and K. Paustian. 2004.  The potential to mitigate global warming with no-tillage management is only realized when practiced in the long term. Global Change Biology 10:155-160.

Verma, S.B., A. Dobermann, K.G. Cassman, D.T. Walters, J.M. Knops, T.J. Arkebauer, A.E. Suyker, G.G. Barba, B. Amos, H. Yang, D. Ginting, K.G. Hubbard, A.A. Gitelson and E. A Walter-Shea. 2005.  Annual carbon dioxide exchange in irrigated and rainfed maize-based agroecosystems. Agri. Forest. Meteror. 131:77-96.

 

---

[1] Baker, J.M., T.E. Ochsner, R.T. Veterea and T.J. Griffis. 2007. Tillage and soil carbon sequestration:  What do we really know? Agriculture, Ecosystems and Environment 118:1-5.

[2] Blanco-Canqui, H. and R. Lal. 2008.  No-tillage and soil-profile carbon sequestration: An on-farm assessment. Soil Science Society of America Journal 72:693-701.

[3] Baker et al. (2007) argue that one way in which plowed soils could accumulate more C in deeper depths in the soil profile, compared to no-till, is if no-till results in a more superficial distribution of roots, such that comparatively more root residues are deposited in deeper soil zones under plow tillage.  Unfortunately, there are very few measurements of root distributions comparing tilled and no-tilled systems – Baker et al. (2007) cite only one study (from Switzerland) showing a deeper root distribution under plow tillage.  While this potential mechanism is worthy of further research, it does not merit rejecting the many long-term tillage comparisons showing no significant differences in soil C below the depth of tillage.

[4] However, it should be pointed out that the vast majority of agricultural field research being used for management and policy decisions in other areas (e.g. on genetics, yield, nutrient management, etc.) is also derived from controlled field research settings, and not from on-farm studies.

New Resource - A Look Ahead at the New Administration/Congress

It's a new day in Washington -- with a new Congress and a new President.  For the climate issue, that means BIG changes are in store.  It is important that the agriculture sector understand the new players that will be running the committees of jurisdiction on this issue and to note what the new President's plans are -- so that the agriculture sector can be prepared to defend its interests.

An EXCELLENT resource that I highly recommend is the Agricultural Carbon Market Working Group.  This group is comprised of farm leaders who have been working and leading on the ag-climate issue for nearly 4 years.  This group is cross-commodity and geographically diverse -- so they bring many different points of view to the issue.

Of particular value is their Resources page which contains memos and white papers on various parts of the complex ag offsets/climate issue.  Today, they have added a new paper focusing on the transition of the new administration and the a new Congress -- and what that means for the ag-climate issue.  

You can read the paper by clicking here.

Grazing Management Has Big Carbon Credit Potential

There's good news out today about how grazing can rack up carbon credits (of course, that's only if the law counts this practice).  Below is a great article that my colleague Sara Brodnax found talking about how changes in grazing practices could have a major impact worldwide on reducing GHG emissions.  

Let's hope the policy incentives are there to reward and promote this behavior rather than require it outright.  The other point to note is again, the importance of dealing with additionality in order to have a project type count as a legitimate offset.

Reuters News 

 
By David Fogarty, Climate Change Correspondent, Asia

SINGAPORE, Jan 20 (Reuters) - Simple changes in grazing practices could soak up millions of tonnes of carbon a year, helping fight climate change, improving farm productivity and earning farmers carbon credits, a scientist said on Tuesday.

But such measures needed to spread globally to more than 120 million farmers working grazing lands, such as savannah and shrubland, Andreas Wilkes of the World Agroforestry Centre in Beijing, said.

The measures also needed to be backed by the United Nations in a broader climate pact to help farmers earn carbon credits as an incentive and to pay for changes in grazing management.

Rangelands hold up to 30 percent of the world's soil carbon and span more than five billion hectares, or about 40 percent of its landmass, Wilkes and a colleague, Timm Tennigkeit, wrote in a recent report.

In grasslands, most of the carbon is in the soil, except for treed grassland, which hold a sizeable portion above ground.

Wilkes said changing grazing practices, such as replanting one or more different plant species, or sealing off portions of grassland, can boost soil carbon content.

"It depends on what the problems causing or preventing proper management are," he told Reuters in a telephone interview.

"In some places, it will be there are too many animals, so you simply reduce their number. If the soil has already begun to degrade, then maybe planting grasses is the best option.

"It's a matter of education and often also supporting conditions, such as policies. None of it is rocket science."

Improved management of grazing lands has the potential to lock away between 1.3 billion and 2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide-equivalent worldwide up to 2030, the report says.

"Most carbon-sequestering practices also have other benefits. Increasing soil carbon content will generally improve soil fertility," it says, leading to increased livestock productivity.

At present, only U.S. farmers can earn carbon credits through improved grazing land practices.

The Chicago Climate Exchange has created an accounting standard for emissions reductions from rangelands, such as plots farmed with modern equipment that precisely positions seeds and fertiliser instead of energy-wasteful tilling, or to restore previously degraded rangeland through rotational grazing.

But the CCX's standards have been criticised as being lax and doing little to slow climate change, since farmers have carried out such practices regardless of carbon credit incentives.

Wilkes said it was crucial the next phase of the Kyoto Protocol, expected to be agreed by the end of this year, included agriculture and sustainable land management.

He said the centre was designing a pilot project together with the Food and Agriculture Organization in China.

The aim was to submit the project, together with methods to measure and verify rangeland soil carbon sequestration to the Voluntary Carbon Standard.

The International Emissions Trading Association and the World Economic Forum are among the groups backing the VCS, which aims to provide global benchmarks to ensure a credible voluntary carbon market.  

"Once the politicians can see the market is putting its money in rangelands and there are viable methodologies that everyone thinks are sound, then that may open up the opportunities at the international level," said Wilkes.