How is agriculture going to get net zero by 2040?

[Muddyroads]

But again - methane trips you up....

Please tell me you’re not serious.

 

[Cowabunga]

If offsetting is good enough for 'THEM' using farmland, it's got to be good enough for us that own and use the land. No more need be planned for.

Except that the UK government and the opposition are dead set on actually demonising and killing off big sectors of UK agriculture regardless. It will be death by a thousand cuts, aided and abetted by the NFU by the look of it. What's their game? Are they just not up to the job or are they too thick to see where this is leading for no good reason? Perhaps they would like to explain to their members their quiet acceptance of the government's stance and policies without question as to the validity of the case?

 

[SilliamWhale]

Please tell me you’re not serious.

How'd you mean? Remember to get to net zero it means you've got to produce some figures that will be accepted by others so they can believe that you are at net zero.

Now depending on who's calculator you pick up it will depend. At the moment the influencers are picking up the calculator that is saying methane and grazing animals = bad.

I'm not arguing about whether or not cattle vs avocados etc. If we are expected to get to net zero then to whom are we accountable to get there?

 

[SilliamWhale]

Trivial compared to the amount of carbon captured. Still well negative thanks.

In your eyes yes. And mine too probably.

But will it allow you declare you are producing at net zero? Remember someone is in charge of deciding what it is.

 

[SilliamWhale]

If offsetting is good enough for 'THEM' using farmland, it's got to be good enough for us that own and use the land. No more need be planned for.

Except that the UK government and the opposition are dead set on actually demonising and killing off big sectors of UK agriculture regardless. It will be death by a thousand cuts, aided and abetted by the NFU by the look of it. What's their game? Are they just not up to the job or are they too thick to see where this is leading for no good reason? Perhaps they would like to explain to their members their quiet acceptance of the government's stance and policies without question as to the validity of the case?

So theoretically can I say that I've got 10 miles of hedgerow and that's my carbon offset for my oil usage? And then I sleep soundly?

The one that I can't see a way around is nitrous oxides from N

 

[Muddyroads]

In your eyes yes. And mine too probably.

But will it allow you declare you are producing at net zero? Remember someone is in charge of deciding what it is.

If we can’t do it, no other industry has a cat in hells chance, and that includes forestry in this country.

 

[Cowabunga]

So theoretically can I say that I've got 10 miles of hedgerow and that's my carbon offset for my oil usage? And then I sleep soundly?

The one that I can't see a way around is nitrous oxides from N

That is nothing compared to the hundreds of thousands of tons belched out by the transport, steel, concrete industries and leaks from factories and the oil and gas industries, both current and old abandoned works. Then there’s rubbish dumps.
Agriculture is the only industry that can offset its own emissions from its own resources. The mass purchase of every available acre of land by investment funds on behalf of gross emitters has already begun. Potential sellers of land should be aware that their land might be worth ten times or more what these investors are cuuently offering as demand, fuelled by legislation led panic, forces emitters to reduce what they can and offset the rest.

 

[Barleymow]

Minimal use of tractors, fert and sprays. Not using the grain drier among other things, however in the REAL world it all depends on the season

The 15% moisture allowed should go back up to 16%

 

[Muddyroads]

That is nothing compared to the hundreds of thousands of tons belched out by the transport, steel, concrete industries and leaks from factories and the oil and gas industries, both current and old abandoned works. Then there’s rubbish dumps.
Agriculture is the only industry that can offset its own emissions from its own resources. The mass purchase of every available acre of land by investment funds on behalf of gross emitters has already begun. Potential sellers of land should be aware that their land might be worth ten times or more what these investors are cuuently offering as demand, fuelled by legislation led panic, forces emitters to reduce what they can and offset the rest.

Offsetting should be banned.

 

[Cowabunga]

Offsetting should be banned.

Why? I know it’s a load of cobblers but we as farmers should be in the prime position to exploit it.

 

[Muddyroads]

We should be paid directly for any carbon sequestered over and above what we emit, not be selling it to dirty industries to allow them to just carry on as they are. If they are to be sold at all, I believe it should be to other sectors of agriculture who for whatever reason aren’t able to achieve zero. Pigs and poultry are the first that come to mind.

 

[DaveGrohl]

But again - methane trips you up....

Why?

Did he say he was expanding? I didn't see it.

 

[DaveGrohl]

Instead of buying land here to plant trees on, why don’t the big companies pay Brazil not to chop the rain forests down as the trees are already there.

( this may be too simplistic)

It's not too simplistic at all, it's absolutely whacked the nail on the head. This would be precisely the best use for this ridiculous greenwash money. And these polluters shouldn't be applauded for it, their only reward should be to be allowed to continue trading.

 

[roscoe erf]

COP26: 'Croissant has higher carbon footprint than bacon roll'

Carbon footprint labels on food served at COP26 in Glasgow have shown that a plant-based croissant has a bigger impact on the environment than a bacon sandwich.

www.farminguk.com

 

[matttargett4]

I do genuinely think it can be done

but not with the present model, I know that’s a cop out but I’ve been saying for a while there needs to be a proper mechanism for accounting it, forget methane for a minute.

the last time I looked at a calculator it was asking me about how many loads of concrete I use per yr, I turned it off.

my job is to sell a product with zero carbon footprint, everybody else has to do the same, the concrete needs to be carbon neutral when it leaves the plant, I suffer the haulage, the same with palm kernal and co, if they cut down the rainforest that’s there look out, if I ship it from Malaysia that’s my problem.

if you look at it in that way ( I think it’s sense but tell me if I’m wrong) then it’s much easier.

as a livestock producer because of their stupid stance on methane I will need to tackle that but there’s plenty of tech emerging that will help a lot, my system would favour locally produced feed but in the main I do that and I can do some more of it, let’s not forget if they love trees 15% of my farm is hedge or woo anyway, yes I plough etc but with machinery prices going how they are buy 2030 that won’t be possible anyway, I have plenty of soils at 10% om and they all gain every year.

no I haven’t calculated all this but I know I’m a damn site closer to real net zero than most other industries.

as a side note my uncle said to me the other day “carbon offsetting is like Fred west having kids”

maybe the funniest thing I’ve ever heard

 

[Jameshenry]

Net Zero....

 

[spin cycle]

How?

Don't get me wrong I'm all for reducing carbon emissions and nitrous oxides where we can but NET ZERO. Actual net zero??

i did some maths using uk googled data for sequestration and kiwi data for sheep emissions good while back......result was we were carbon negative then just using hedges and trees on the farm....apparently

trouble is the 'data' about climate change is a 'sh!te show'......every time you find a stat another one somewhere else rubbishes it....for example the other week i read that global co2 rose during the pandemic.....then today there's a story that it fell 5% and is now recovered

myself and @yellowbelly found info on climate....@delilah rubbished it (no critiscism).....then says tesco freezers burn more leccy than uk ag....and that is rubbished

CONCLUSION.....just fekkin ignore all of it......APART from batters nfu colluding in attempts to steal our sequestration IMO

 

[egbert]

Surely it is easy to get to net zero with livestock.
All permanent grass.
Only eat grass or hay, or silage as long as it isn't wrapped.
Never house anything.
Use stored water or rivers.
No fertilizer and only use clover for nitrogen.
Sell all produce to local outlets and slaughter at the local abattoir just up the road.
Drive all livestock along the roads again.
Cattle hides used for clothing or furnishings.
Sheep skins for clothing and Ugg boots.
Wool for warm jumpers.
Have a good sized veg garden with fruit bushes and trees.
Have enough vines to make decent wines.
Barley and hops for beer.
Use coppiced timber for fencing and firewood.

Maybe have an electric bicycle to go to Town charged from solar panels.
No problem to get to net zero.

I'm already doing a lot of that....but I'm never going to be 'net zero', as long as I can phone up for some red diesel to be tankered in, pop down to the filling station with the defender etc etc.

There's no such thing.

Grassland and trees both capture carbon as they grow, that's true, but they both cycle it back again soon enough.
The very longest trees can hold it is a century or two, after that, it's reached a natural ceiling.

C4 news was gushing the other night about afforesting land and stopping deforestation.
The example was a 'fragment of the ancient Caledonian forest' , where we were assured, the scrubby birchs and bracken beds were sequestering far more carbon than a newly planted woodland -cue view of commercial scale softwood nearby.
(although they're none to clear whether felling operations therein are 'deforestation'.)
I would guess one would be growing at an annual rate of barely a tonne -above ground harvestable timber growth- per hectare, while the other would be doing at least 10-12 tonnes.
The 'ancient forest' clearly still had boulders poking through the ground surface.

It's such a huge and wholesale ignorance of the reality that, like the cow-burp methane discussion, means there is NO chance.- none whatsoever- that we'll grasp the nettle.

I'll likely 'take the coin', however it manifests, but I'll firmly have my fingers crossed behind my back.

 

[yellowbelly]

We all should stick together (I know, easier said than done with UK farmers ) and 'ring fence' ALL our land, trees, hedges, etc.

OK, trade the carbon offsets between ourselves, if we want, but we shouldn't sell them to the big polluters (like airlines, for example) just so they can make themselves appear 'green" and be able to carry on belching out carbon.

We have the resource to make UK Ag's carbon footprint very low (I'm not sure anything that has to buy in any inputs can ever be truely neutral).

Let all the other feckers put their own house in order at their expense and not ours. They've walked all over us for too long.

 

[Hjwise]

But again - methane trips you up....

I can see a time in the next ten years or so that agriculture has removed it’s reliance of fossil fuels (using green hydrogen and green electricity for energy inputs). That then leaves other greenhouse gas emissions, but they are parts of natural cycles. As I understand it, methane about 12 years and nitrous oxide just over 100 years. How long does a cycle have to be before it turns from ‘just part of the natural cycle’ in to ‘a harmful greenhouse gas emission’?