CF to stop Ammonia production in uk

[DaveGrohl]

Wasn't that long ago the US was happily importing conventional corn from the Black Sea as organic!

GE appears to be becoming more acceptable here than GM. Some say a subtle difference ( i'm no scientist ) others say greenwash...

Is GE genetic engineering or gene editing? It’s all in the presentation. I’ve forgotten where we are with all this adjusted false labelling.

 

[DaveGrohl]

two interesting things I have come across in the last two days,

1. There are spikes in Methane above fertliser plants, so making fertliser is releasing a potent greenhouse gas.
2. Wild fires are causing the Ozone layer to deteriorate.

One cause of wild fires is lack of grazing by cattle and sheep (to remove the fuel load), not the only cause but certainly makes fires more likely.

Lack of animal muck, means we certainly need fertliser. Muck can't replace fertliser, but lack of muck means we need more fertliser.

But..... I keep hearing cattle are bad! When I can see more cattle and eating more meat, would be better for both those things. However, why let an inconvenience like the truth get in the way!

2. Pretty sure I’ve read on a few occasions that wild fires are far less common now over a period of a hundred years. What we do have now though is a media that has lost its mind and creates scare stories whenever it can. Soz, but I haven’t got a ref. I may be wrong, but I can't be @rsed to fact check myself. I’ve done enough of that for one day.

 

[Still Farming]

After more money??

Farmers Guardian

CF Fertilisers has announced it will temporarily halt the production of ammonia at its Billingham. But industry figures have warned the closure poses a ’serious threat to animal welfare’ and called...

www.facebook.com

 

[Chae1]

If fertiliser is £1000/ton I'm sure they might consider reopening.

 

[l'ordinary bonville]

how will that work , pig producers struggling to make ends meet

Quite

Feed expensive grain to pigs and lose money producing our own fertiliser.

May be better to just accept lower yields and save the hassle and heartache of keeping pigs with an unreliable customer

 

[kiwi pom]

perhaps arable is unsustainable then

I was probably using the term arable incorrectly, I use it to include all the grass and clover seed grown in this area that is then used around the world by the livestock farmers, as well as all the other small seeds grown.
Potatoes, onions and carrots are here in large numbers too, I count those as being grown on an arable farm.
A large number of those will be grown by each business, along with livestock (often a dairy unit) as part of a sustainable rotation.

You're right though, wheat and OSR does not make a sustainable rotation.

 

[kiwi pom]

actually what we need is a complete re jig of the entire food system. I look at YouTube videos of the US rural economy sort of imploding, as well as populations in the West not cooking but eating Ultra Processed Foods (which lead to diabetes - which will bankrupt the NHS here) and we are wasting lots of food, while spending very little of our income on it. Whole system is set up to suit the multinational food corporations (as well as big Pharma - who benefit by selling drugs to cope with ill health caused by diet).

Yes, I think you're probably quite right.
I don't think that changes the fact that the restrictive system that is organic cannot produce enough food to feed the planet.
We need a little bit of everything and everyone's collective knowledge to do it.

 

[thorpe]

Need for slaughter houses, pop, food processing etc etc that why the gov. Bailed them out allegedly??

yea , here we go again!

 

[B'o'B]

If anyone is interested in adding legumes to their sward, I’ve been combining my AB15 Countryside Stewardship land this week.
I currently have approximately 15t of harvested mix of ryegrass/red clover/birdsfoot trefoil feed that could be added to grazing livestock feed rations to add some legumes to pastures. It’s been dried down to between 11-14% moisture. I expect to harvest a similar amount in the next week weather permitting. PM me if interested.

 

[EJS]

2. Pretty sure I’ve read on a few occasions that wild fires are far less common now over a period of a hundred years. What we do have now though is a media that has lost its mind and creates scare stories whenever it can. Soz, but I haven’t got a ref. I may be wrong, but I can't be @rsed to fact check myself. I’ve done enough of that for one day.

Global trends in wildfire and its impacts | Royal Society

Catching up with the authors of Global trends in wildfire and its impacts: perceptions versus realities in a changing world

royalsociety.org

 

[Dave645]

actually what we need is a complete re jig of the entire food system. I look at YouTube videos of the US rural economy sort of imploding, as well as populations in the West not cooking but eating Ultra Processed Foods (which lead to diabetes - which will bankrupt the NHS here) and we are wasting lots of food, while spending very little of our income on it. Whole system is set up to suit the multinational food corporations (as well as big Pharma - who benefit by selling drugs to cope with ill health caused by diet).

There is a good chance they got it right, but maybe we will not make it to 2040.

the way things are going, food will become key as it did during the war, but this time, many factors will overwhelm supply not just war.
I have children, I am scared for them and their long term futures string a few years like this together and food will start to get shaky far more so than it is now, if I was the government I would be maximising the support of my farming indusrty, that’s not direct support but the key supplies that underpin our production like nitrogen and chemicals, and basic profitability, I have said a number of times they should support the starting of renewable nitrogen, my guess is it will take a few years to even get it up and running but they need to get the ball rolling, so not relying on natural gas to make nitrogen, is the long term solution, so it’s better to start sooner rather than later.
If it takes 10 years to get a fully renewable nitrogen production factory running then now is the time to start.

 

[Hindsight]

There is a good chance they got it right, but maybe we will not make it to 2040.

the way things are going, food will become key as it did during the war, but this time, many factors will overwhelm supply not just war.
I have children, I am scared for them and their long term futures string a few years like this together and food will start to get shaky far more so than it is now, if I was the government I would be maximising the support of my farming indusrty, that’s not direct support but the key supplies that underpin our production like nitrogen and chemicals, and basic profitability, I have said a number of times they should support the starting of renewable nitrogen, my guess is it will take a few years to even get it up and running but they need to get the ball rolling, so not relying on natural gas to make nitrogen, is the long term solution, so it’s better to start sooner rather than later.
If it takes 10 years to get a fully renewable nitrogen production factory running then now is the time to start.

Don’t worry Dave all our leaders have first class honours degrees in PPE from oxbridge. your childrens future is safe.

 

[Wolds Beef]

@kiwi pom You can not be to far from Rakaia! You might even be a Davey!! 1,000's of cows over winter and seed crops in summer along with a contracting business. Yes, Bill was at school with me!!
WB

 

[Wisconsonian]

There is a good chance they got it right, but maybe we will not make it to 2040.

The youtube video fails to mention that the two scenarios that "accurately predicted" the current trends, both predict failure around 2040, but rising production in the current day, as is happening, hence why they are "accurate".

While the less accurate "stable world" prediction, which is the one they obviously favored, showed declining food production and industrial output BEFORE NOW, then stable population etc. into the future. That decline has not happened, hence that model is not as accurate as the other two.

So, if you believe that the folks at MIT in 1972 that did this computer model had enough knowledge of economics, agriculture, technology etc. etc. to accurately model it with 1972 computers, then you should be very worried. If you believe they were writing an opinion piece cloaked in "ecology" and "computer tech", then they were obviously wrong on their predictions from 70 to present, and the next twenty years will prove them much more wrong.

The masters thesis of the "director of sustainability" speaks for itself.

edit: I should have said slower growth in production rather than "declining food production and industrial output BEFORE NOW"

 

[dairydurham]

Seems they tried some this year and plan to put more in next

They also have the premium price of their own brand,and thankfully for them they are not reliant on the omsco price !

 

[No wot]

@kiwi pom You can not be to far from Rakaia! You might even be a Davey!! 1,000's of cows over winter and seed crops in summer along with a contracting business. Yes, Bill was at school with me!!
WB

Is he the farmer who had a column in FW , then sold up and went to New Zealand

 

[Dave645]

The youtube video fails to mention that the two scenarios that "accurately predicted" the current trends, both predict failure around 2040, but rising production in the current day, as is happening, hence why they are "accurate".

While the less accurate "stable world" prediction, which is the one they obviously favored, showed declining food production and industrial output BEFORE NOW, then stable population etc. into the future. That decline has not happened, hence that model is not as accurate as the other two.

So, if you believe that the folks at MIT in 1972 that did this computer model had enough knowledge of economics, agriculture, technology etc. etc. to accurately model it with 1972 computers, then you should be very worried. If you believe they were writing an opinion piece cloaked in "ecology" and "computer tech", then they were obviously wrong on their predictions from 70 to present, and the next twenty years will prove them much more wrong.

The masters thesis of the "director of sustainability" speaks for itself.

I think you need to rewatch it, in the stable world it was about 2025 when food started to dip, resources had declined as they have the amount of oil gas and coal left declines yearly, but not industrial output it stagnated. Which if your taking note happened during covid and is happening for a number of reasons like oil and gas prices and availability of raw materials.
Sure I agree there predictions have zero chance to be perfect in every detail but the trends they predict are visible and active.

 

[Wisconsonian]

I'm not watching that again, I skimmed the relevant parts, and they never discuss what the differences are in the models that make one model fit the recent data better than the other models. That was the best I could tell of the difference, the slower growth in the "stable" model makes it a worse fit. And I should have said slower growth, not decline. Feel free to analyze the raw data and tell me just what the differences between the models are that make them fit better or worse, I didn't see it in the study, and I suspect the models and data were massaged enough to be useless even before considering whether a "better" current production level than some of their 1972 predictions means bad news because they thought that production was unsustainable in 1972.

 

[Dave645]

I'm not watching that again, I skimmed the relevant parts, and they never discuss what the differences are in the models that make one model fit the recent data better than the other models. That was the best I could tell of the difference, the slower growth in the "stable" model makes it a worse fit. And I should have said slower growth, not decline. Feel free to analyze the raw data and tell me just what the differences between the models are that make them fit better or worse, I didn't see it in the study, and I suspect the models and data were massaged enough to be useless even before considering whether a "better" current production level than some of their 1972 predictions means bad news because they thought that production was unsustainable in 1972.

I see you say you only took a skim, and so miss most of the content, they ran thousands of models and averaged the results disregarding the outlying results to take only the most likely results, but again if you had watched it you would have seen that.
It doesn’t matter how unlikely they were accurate with there predictions made in 1972 if some or all of the results can be seen today, then maybe the outcomes they predicted will also follow, that’s the point. If we can see similarities with todays world in there predicted world, then the outcomes they predicted become relevant.

look up something called, Earth overshoot day, I share a link below but Wikipedia do a good page showing the date change over time, it’s scary reading we are on an unsustainable path, and went the wheels fall off it will not be pretty.

anyone with eyes can see we are in the decline of oil and gas sure we still have more but less than there was is now available, which is a decline in resources, same for rain forests there is not more of them now than then, untouched farm land, water, coal all have had stocks reduced over time, the net result is what we see declining food production just take anywhere in the USA that having water limitations, and require irrigation, take almond farming it’s declined rapidly due to lack of water.
We have seen weather shifts effecting production, population growth, lots of factors expected in there predictions, just because the predictions they showed from the results do not match what we see perfectly doesn't say the results of there prediction are giving false results. It just means the factors that effect the outcome are playing out for real, given accurate data from the actual following 50 years would mean that if rerun it would be more accurate to predict our true end game.

for me we need resilience and that doesn’t come from more of the same it requires planning and targets that lead to sustainable systems that include recycling and products that make that simple a reduction in single use products which include manufactured goods and fossil fuels, but this can only be done with planning and will take time the game then becomes can we do it, and afford it, in the time we have left, we are only one world wide food shortage away from the fall of our society. The larger the worlds population the more likely that is to happen.

good chat I understand your reluctance to believe a study from the 1970’s but when it was made doesn’t make the predictions impossible to happen.
to make my point from data not from the 1970’s

https://www.overshootday.org/

this is data showing how far out of whack we are pushing things, and yet we carry on blindly.

 

[DaveGrohl]

Global trends in wildfire and its impacts | Royal Society

Catching up with the authors of Global trends in wildfire and its impacts: perceptions versus realities in a changing world

royalsociety.org

Thanks. Good little summary that. Particularly liked the 400 million years bit at the end. Detail and nuance are everything as always. One general takeaway from it was that stupid humans are responsible for more and more of these fires that occur, whether through discarding a match or simply building their houses next to flammable material. Or enacting daft policies that actually make a normal thing worse.