[Terrapreta] No-till farming doesn't work as C-saver

[Ruy Korscha Anaya de la Rosa]

Hola la banda,

I got surprised to see the title of this thread posted by Lorenzo since here
in Action Carbone we promote no-till farming as an emission reduction
activity, however we do not claim it as carbon offset project and we do not
sell any carbon credits from this.

Anyway, I read further on that Climateprogress.org website where Lorenzo
took the post from Joseph Romm and I find one of the responses from Dr.
Stephen S. Mulkey (University of Florida) quite pertinent:
__________________________________________________________________________


   1. Stephen Mulkey Says:
   May 21st, 2008 at 8:46
am<http://climateprogress.org/2008/05/21/no-till-farming-does-not-save-carbon-and-is-not-a-carbon-offset/#comment-13047>

   Joe -

   It is useful to raise the issue of whether or not conservation tillage
   can improve soil carbon stocks, but it is too soon to reach the conclusion
   in your headline. The article that you cite by Baker et al. is a commentary,
   not a regular article. As such, it draws on the authors' reading of a
   relatively limited set of studies.

   I would suggest that we need additional gas exchange and SOC analysis to
   determine how conservation tillage may function in various soils. In
   Florida, because of warm temperatures and abundant rainfall, much of the SOC
   is leached to lower levels. I would expect total SOC to be higher under
   no-till because less carbon would be lost from the surface due to runoff and
   microbial respiration. In effect, the longer surface carbon stocks remain in
   place, the more opportunity for carbon to be leached to lower soil layers
   where it could be sequestered long term.

   We need more study of this issue, and your strongly worded conclusion may
   serve to further polarize opinion about the value of offsets in the lay
   community. I suggest that we call instead for a comprehensive study and
   review of North American agricultural soils. We need to know more, and this
   can be said about most forms of offsets from forestry and agriculture. In
   general, we must establish a credible baseline and quantify real
   additionality before offsets can be marketed. The manual by the Nicholas
   Institute makes this point. Offsets should be established on a case by case
   basis, after appropriate analysis of local conditions and existing
   management practice. It seems that the carbon market in the US is running
   ahead of the science and ahead of the development of official regulations.

   Sincerely,

   Stephen S. Mulkey, PhD
   University of Florida
   Gainesville, FL 32611

________________________________________________________________________________

As Dr. Mulkey implies, I think that our knowledge is quite limited on the
EXACT amount of carbon offsets we can achieve from forestry and agriculture
practices such as Terra Preta and REDD projects. Neverthless, we must not
ban them from the portfolio of projects aiming to fight global warming and
we should create an alternative to the Carbon Market. Actually, Action
Carbone will finance a small-scale Terra Preta project in India soon.
Despite the fact that we mostly work in the Voluntary Carbon Market and we
sell VERs (Verified Emission Reductions) we will not claim any VER from this
Terra Preta project.

Actually, the Voluntary Carbon Market, which is supposed to be more flexible
than the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) of the Kyoto Protocol is somehow
taking care of projects failing to stricly comply to the complex,
bureaucratic and slow CDM's rules and procedures. However, the trend has
been slowing down a little bit due to the development of rigid and complex
Voluntary Standards and the buyer's demand for an exact 0.985 credit (random
numbers just to show how accurate they want the estimation).

Moreover, the report "State of the Voluntary Carbon Markets 2007: Picking up
Steam" published in 2008 by Ecosystem Marketplace and New Carbon Finance
mentions that buyers of voluntary credits tend to purchase offsets that most
closely resemble those of the compliance market rather than indulge in the
sort of experimentation and innovation that many believe the markets offer.

This standstill situation is due to the current market rules and demands,
which push both, carbon buyers and sellers to stick to a certain type of
projects. Innovative projects do exist; projects concerning Reforestation,
Reduced Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD), Biochar
sequestered in soil (Terra Preta), etc. do not only avoid or offset GHG
emissions but also are extremely beneficial to our natural resources and
biodiversity and promote the so-called sustainable development in different
ways. But, unfortunately they face a considerable number of barriers to
attract investment through the Carbon Market.

In fact, most of the emission reduction projects involving the interaction
between organic matter and soil (e.g. no-tillage) struggle enormously to
become eligible for Carbon Finance. They encounter several obstacles such as
the lack of appropriate methodologies, the demand for a rock-solid
measurement of the emission reductions, critics from the media, the possible
small-scale size, cost and location of the respective project and the fact
that the only currency in this Carbon Market is the ton of carbon dioxide
equivalent (tCO2eq.) reduced per year.

The latter also hinders the implementation of innovative projects featuring
big awareness rising and education to the potential participants. The reason
is that mitigation could be measured in the tCO2eq. currency whereas
education to the present and future generations (probably more important
than mitigation to cool down our planet in the long term) cannot be
reflected in carbon money.

Chido,

Ruy

____________________________________
Ruy  Korscha Anaya de la Rosa
Project Manager
Goodplanet / Action  Carbone
Domaine de Longchamp,
Carrefour de Longchamp
75116  PARIS
France
<www.goodplanet.org> <www.actioncarbone.org>
E-mail: ruy at actioncarbone.org
Tel:  +33 (0) 1 70 64 83 02
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