[Pil-pc-oceania] Carbon Farmers links: Carbon Coailition vs ?

[Deb Guildner]

Hi all,

Of all the things that one person can do to achieve carbon neutrality -
( I have yet to calculate my carbon footprint but that is of course a necessary prerequisite),
providing financial support to carbon farmers to offset my carbon footprint has to be ethical gold..or rather paydirt!.
For a while I was in the black, as I part-owned 100 acres of forest and part of a high conservation (and carbon!) wetland....
but now I am just another landless peasant in the heart of this evil city, and a parasite on the planet with an L (for carbon-sucking loser) stamped on my unworthy carcass (sniffles).

I stumbled upon this website whilst trying to find the 'carbon lockdown' article in New Scientist.
http://carbonfarmers.blogspot.com/
which led to this website:
http://www.carboncoalition.com.au/
I have yet to contact them but it is on the list to do.

Regarding the New Scientist article, I havent seen it yet. (I have read NS magazine since the early 80's, but I don't always see eye to eye with many scientists' work).
Common sense dictates that such a carbon lockdown scheme will never come to fruition. I particlularly hate the stupid debate about the value of trees in sequestering CO2. 

Perhaps my time on the Tasmanian Old Growth Forest campaign in the leadup to the 2004 federal election (with accompanying trip to the Tarkine Rainforest Wilderness, and the horrific sight of Gunns bulldozers levelling huge tracts of forests) has blighted any possible appreciation of Ning Zeng's theory paper (sse link: http://www.sccsvolunteers.org.uk/?p=671 ) but then again I have never been a great fan of carbon sequestration schemes. At all.

By contrast, the idea of financially supporting carbon farmers as well as eating their produce (where it is organically farmed) has a lot of appeal.
I'll post another email when I have had a chat to them..

Cheers
Deb


HOW TO BUY CABON FARMERS OF AUSTRALIA SOIL CREDITS
Simply use the online payment system. If you have questions, call Carbon.FarmersTof Australia on (612) 6374 0329.

FOR MORE INFORMATION 
Contact Convenor Michael Kiely 0417 280 540, or 02 6374 0329 
Or visit www.carboncoalition.com.au. 
Blog http://carboncoalitionoz.blogspot.com

The CARBON FARMERS OF AUSTRALIA SOIL CREDIT is based on the following indicators:

1. The history of soil management for the plot in question.
2. The history of soil management for the entire property.
3. The training record of the land manager.
4. The land management techniques used on the entire property.
5. The imputed increase in soil carbon in the plot in question over the period since the change in land management.
6. Membership of Carbon.FarmersT Of Australia, a group of conservation land managers who are also actively working to restore the natural resource base.

NB. When the politicians and scientists finally catch on to the danger we are facing and the need for soil carbon credits, we will have a new system that accurately measures out the Carbon 'sequestered'. But we can't afford to wait for them. In the words of Professor Stuart Hill, UWS, "If you get tangled up in measurement you will sink into a quagmire and never achieve your goal."

"PROVISIONAL CARBON CREDITS" - HOW THEY WORK

CARBON FARMERS OF AUSTRALIA SOIL CREDITS are Provisional Carbon Credits. This is your guarantee that you are getting what you pay for. They are set at a very conservative rate of 2 tonne CO2e per hectare per year where land management has changed since 1990: 

. from till to no till (ploughing to no ploughing)
. from till to pasture
. from set stocking to grazing management

These categories are based on estimates published by authorities such as the Australian Greenhouse Office: "The review clearly indicated that the introduction of a cropping phase into uncleared land or a well-established pasture with high plant biomass, reduced soil carbon density by 10 to 30 t/ha in soils to 30 cm depth... Likely changes in soil carbon densities associated with changes in soil tillage practices are of the order of 5 to 10 t/ha when they occur..." (Australian Greenhouse Office, National Carbon Accounting System, Technical Report No. 43, January 2005) And the work of leading CSIRO soil scientists Roger Swift and Jan Skjemstad: ".it is suggested that a sequestration rate in the of about 2 Mt C pa is within the realms of possibility. Ideally the carbon levels can be restored to the same values that were supported the soils in their virgin state under native vegetation. In some instances the soils may be capable of sustaining higher organic matter levels than in their virgin state... Let us assume that half of the total amount of carbon lost from these soils can be recovered over a twenty year period and that in any one year one third of the 45 M ha is in a recovery or organic matter build-up mode. On this basis...the annual rate of sequestration of carbon by agricultural soils would be in the region of 4.4 Mt C pa. A more conservative target of 2.2 Mt C pa based on the treatment of 7.5 M ha pa ... could well be achieved. "- Roger Swift and Jan Skjemstad, "Agricultural Soils as Potential Sinks for Carbon", CSIRO Land and Water for the CSIRO Biosphere Working Group, http://www.dar.csiro.au/csiro_reserved/BWG/agricultural_soils.htm Our estimates are also informed by K.Y. Chan's work on soil carbon levels under different land management methods in NSW which revealed that soil carbon levels were 2 to 2.7 times higher in pasture soil than in cropped soils, and up to 2.4 times higher in minimum till than in conventional tillage soils. (Chan, K.Y. "Soil particulate organic carbon under different land use and management," Soil Use and Management (2001) 17, 217-221.)

Once the science provides us with a verifiable measurement approach, the surface area will be rescaled to meet the amount 'measured' in the soil below. 

Provisional Carbon Credits allows the Soil Storage of CO2 to start!
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