Restoring Abandoned Farmland to Mitigate Climate Change on a Full Earth: One Earth
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Andrew Lockley
Aug 22, 2020, 10:02:18 PM8/22/20
to CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>
https://www.cell.com/one-earth/fulltext/S2590-3322(20)30363-8
Restoring Abandoned Farmland to Mitigate Climate Change on a Full Earth
Yi Yang
Sarah E. Hobbie
Rebecca R. Hernandez
Jacob M. Jungers
Ming Yang
Wei-Qiang Chen
Show all authors
Open AccessDOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oneear.2020.07.019
Summary
Degraded farmlands have been abandoned worldwide, especially in high- and middle-income countries. These lands help combat climate change as they undergo natural recovery of vegetation and soil carbon and remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. However, recovery can be slow, requiring decades to centuries to approach pre-cultivation or natural states, and in some cases, soils remain degraded without active restoration. In this perspective, we present an overview of how carbon capture and storage on abandoned farmland can be accelerated and maximized via managing plant diversity as both a means and an end of restoration, creating and applying biochar to soil, and co-developing with renewable energy as techno-ecological synergies. These strategies can jointly tackle climate change and land degradation while contributing to and reinforcing multiple other Sustainable Development Goals. Although challenges exist, adoption of these strategies could be facilitated by increasing governmental and corporate initiatives at global and regional levels, especially developing carbon-offset markets for agriculture.
Thomas Goreau
Aug 23, 2020, 7:06:58 AM8/23/20
to Andrew Lockley, CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>
Excellent paper! Thirty years ago Norman Myers and I found there was enough abandoned land in Brazil alone to stabilize CO2.
The abandoned lands were basically composed of one weed tree that can’t be used for firewood, one thorny shrub that poisons cattle, and passion flower vine with beautiful flowers but no fruit, compared to hundreds of species in the original forest.
The forest had been maintained by internal nutrient cycling despite very poor soils, but burning and erosion causes the nutrients to be lost, so the ecosystem with the highest biomass and productivity turned into semi-desert scrub severely depleted of nutrients.
Turning invasive weeds to biochar to grow diverse food forests is the best use of this land.
We have proposed such projects to the India Forestry Department.
Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
Chief Scientist, Blue Regeneration SL
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Technical Advisor, Blue Guardians Programme, SIDS DOCK
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
Books:
Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
No one can change the past, everybody can change the future
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Ronal Larson
Aug 23, 2020, 7:44:55 PM8/23/20
to Thomas Goreau, CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>, Andrew Lockley
Tom and CDR list; cc Andrew
1. I agree with your assessment. This is a paper that understands biochar. (repeating the URL:https://www.cell.com/one-earth/fulltext/S2590-3322(20)30363-8
or in pdf format: https://www.cell.com/action/showPdf?pii=S2590-3322%2820%2930363-8
2. I have one small nitpick - I believe they have not understood the big role that biochar will be playing in backing up wind and solar electric systems.
About 1/3 of the way on p 181, they write:
a. "One advantage of biomass is that it can be stored
inexpensively, allowing electricity to be produced on demand.”
[RWL: True and very important. Not true for wind and solar PV.
b. "However, the cost of renewables coupled with storage is reaching
price parity with biomass,98 and new energy-storage technologies
are being developed to further reduce these costs.101
[RWL: Also true.
c. " In short,
compared with wind and solar energy, biomass presents few advantages for reducing GHG emissions.
[RWL; Also mostly true. But what is missing is the huge cost of the long term electric battery storage when you are trying to remove the last fossil fuel portions (last 5-10% using natural gas peakers).
3. This is an excellent recent article thet predicts one has to almost double the needed electric generation if the needed reliability is met with electric storage batteries:
'Long-run system value of battery energy storage in future grids with increasing wind and solar generation." Dharik S. Mallapragadaa,⁎, Nestor A. Sepulvedaa,b, Jesse D. Jenkinschttps://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0306261920309028?via%3Dihub
Unfortunately this is not a freebie article, The situation is more dire than than this final sentence of the abstract: "Increasing storage duration increases storage value in some cases, but this increase in value may be insufficient to compensate for the increase in capital cost per kW even under the future cost scenario.”
. So this backup storage problem can’t be fixed with hydro, geothermal, etc. It can be fixed with biomass and especially biochar.
4. To repeat; this Yang et al article is the most biochar-supportive article I have read in a long time. I hope we can hear from anyone believing these authors have missed something.
5. I will now also send this exchange over to the biochar list, where this abandoned land topic came up a year or two ago (with support then especially from Rick Wilson).
6. Thanks again to Tom Goreau for his added information below
But your link to a “Brazil alone” article didn’t work for me; can you supply again? I’m impressed by “alone"
Ron
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/CarbonDioxideRemoval/96CE6934-4D9A-40E9-BEC2-5391AEE74380%40bestweb.net.
Ronal Larson
Aug 24, 2020, 9:02:37 PM8/24/20
to Thomas Goreau, CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>
Tom and (adding) CDR List
Thanks - a wonderfully detailed paper. What a shame that biochar (and Terra Preta) only began to be discussed more than a decade later than your (below) paper. I believe your paper would then have included a lot of the material now in the Yang paper, which is the subject of this thread.
List:
See below that this message is a follow up to Tom’s (and then my) laudatory comments about the Yang paper - which combines the topics of abandoned land, CDR, and biochar
I am assuming that Tom intended that his reply to my question in “RWL6” below was intended for this list as well. Tom’s cite is so important on the subject of forests and abandoned land that I have converted it into this alternative pdf format (I don’t have a way to add notes to an HTML version of any paper).
Thomas Goreau
Aug 25, 2020, 9:28:14 AM8/25/20
to Ron, CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>
Thanks, Ron!
Norman Myers was the world’s authority on deforestation and had extensive bibliographies.
Our major omission was not including biochar, which could have greatly strengthened the argument!
We were very well aware of it, I measured soil greenhouse gas emissions from Amazonian soils at the Brazilian National Amazon Research Institute soon after Wim Sombroek did the pioneering work on Terra Preta.
But at that time Terra Preta’s extraordinary carbon content had not yet actually been measured, though they were pretty clearly full of charcoal.
I have the original publication in a box of papers somewhere and will look for it to scan and post.
It’s good to see this argument regaining strength independently 30 years later, because of its obvious correctness, even if the original references are forgotten.
Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
Chief Scientist, Blue Regeneration SL
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Technical Advisor, Blue Guardians Programme, SIDS DOCK
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
Books:
Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
No one can change the past, everybody can change the future
Normally, the above would be enough, but here is a second version having my added highlights - in case anyone wants to see what I considered interesting and/or important.
I am amazed at the large number of Tom’s cites to other papers in 1991 combining climate, forests, and degraded lands. I still need to go back and check how these numbers will change almost two decades laler. But especially might change with biochar presumably greatly helping the economics. So -more coming.
To repeat, Tom was way ahead of most of us on this very important (relatively) new side of lands, forests and climate.
This also next going to the biochar list as did the initial CDR version yesterday.
Ron
On Aug 23, 2020, at 6:22 PM, Thomas Goreau <gor...@bestweb.net> wrote:
I can’t find a pdf of the paper, but the text is on the web at:
<goreau forests-1pdf.pdf><goreau foreests-pdf.pdf>
Ronal Larson
Aug 25, 2020, 1:37:53 PM8/25/20
to Thomas Goreau, yang...@umn.edu, marl...@appstate.edu, CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>
Tom (see inserts for you ) and list and adding the first author, Dr. Yang and also adding a person you have cited: Dr. Gregg Marland
Dr. Yang; Sorry that we didn’t include you earlier in this exchange on your very recent biochar paper cited below. You will see below that the reactions have been extremely positive.
These comments will also be seen on the biochar list, so you can comment on either one.
This is also to ask you to comment on the numerical computations in Dr. Goreau’s paper - and on anything else you see there - from the many other “abandoned land’ authors Tom has cited.
I’m particularly interested in any comments anyone has on the involvement of very recently deceased Dr. Freeman Dyson, from whom Tom has given these (non-fee) cites
I include these two because Dr. Tyson was probably the most respected of all “climate skeptics”. His speaking out favorably and forcibly on photosynthesis as a major solution could still today sway quite a few skeptics on biochar as a climate solution..
Dr. Marland:
This is to also alert you, as a co-author with Dr. Dyson, of this just-beginning exchange on photosynthesis-based means of CDR.
Any comments - especially on the biochar aspect?
See more below.
On Aug 25, 2020, at 7:28 AM, Thomas Goreau <gor...@bestweb.net> wrote:Thanks, Ron!Norman Myers was the world’s authority on deforestation and had extensive bibliographies.
[RWL; Tom. I was sorry to just read that Norman also had died within the past year. I didn’t find that he had ever written on biochar, but i thought this (from 1996: https://www.pnas.org/content/pnas/93/7/2764.full.pdf. ) was worth repeating in this exchange:
4. Soil Protection. In similar style, vegetation and to some
extent biodiversity protects soil cover. Soil erosion is a major
problem in many parts of the world since it leads to (i) significant declines in soil fertility and, thus, in the productivity
of croplands and pastures and (ii) sedimentation of rivers and
other water bodies affecting downstream communities. Fourfifths of the world's agricultural soils are affected by erosion,
and every year 75 billion tonnes (1 tonne = 1000 kg) of topsoil
are washed or blown away, causing 80,000 km2 to be lost to
agriculture. In the past 200 years, the average topsoil depth in
the United States has declined from 23 cm to 15 cm, costing
the American consumer around $300 per year through loss of
nutrients and water and with total costs to the United States
of $44 billion. Worldwide costs of soil erosion are in the order
of $400 billion per year or equivalent to half of what the world
spends on military activities (46).
Our major omission was not including biochar, which could have greatly strengthened the argument!
[RWL: Yes - in my opinion, biochar is moving as fast as it is mainly because of the thousands of years of successful Terra Preta. I wish we could prove anything about how much was inserted thousands of years ago. Amazonian natives and Terra Preta are NOT getting the credit deserved.
We were very well aware of it, I measured soil greenhouse gas emissions from Amazonian soils at the Brazilian National Amazon Research Institute soon after Wim Sombroek did the pioneering work on Terra Preta.
[RWL: I’m very surprised to hear this - although I knew of your work in the Amazon. To others: biochar only received its current name in 2007.
But at that time Terra Preta’s extraordinary carbon content had not yet actually been measured, though they were pretty clearly full of charcoal.I have the original publication in a box of papers somewhere and will look for it to scan and post.
[RWL: To which of your papers are you referring? Please give us as many as you can on this topic of soils.
It’s good to see this argument regaining strength independently 30 years later, because of its obvious correctness, even if the original references are forgotten.
[RWL: I have included Dr. Marland in hopes there can be some further filling in. His work goes back well over 40 years.
Anyone else able to give historical background for the Yang paper? To repeat - I think this “Yang-soil” paper makes a better case for biochar as a CDR option than any I recall recently.
Ron. (nothing more from me below - with thanks to Andrew for starting this 3 days ago.)
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/CarbonDioxideRemoval/FCE20F5C-75E8-4525-83AA-8F36BB9E20AE%40bestweb.net.
Thomas Goreau
Aug 27, 2020, 6:42:17 AM8/27/20
to Yi Yang, Ron, marl...@appstate.edu, CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>
Dear Yi Yang,
We’re looking forward to your next paper!
Most of us who have studied and used biochar are convinced its potential has been greatly underestimated.
In particular, biochar should be used with basalt rock powder, which maximizes both productivity and carbon sequestration benefits:
Best wishes,
Tom
Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
Chief Scientist, Blue Regeneration SL
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Technical Advisor, Blue Guardians Programme, SIDS DOCK
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
Books:
Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
No one can change the past, everybody can change the future
On Aug 27, 2020, at 12:45 AM, Yi Yang <yang...@umn.edu> wrote:Dear all,Thanks for including me in the discussion and for your positive feedback.Biochar is not a very active area of research. Hopefully this will cheer you up. :) Another project of mine is to estimate the biochar potential in China. One issue we've found is that although there is a large amount of biomass that can be turned into biochar, a large fraction of them is currently being used for other purposes. Too bad.Best,Yi
Ronal Larson
Aug 27, 2020, 1:20:16 PM8/27/20
to Yi Yang, Thomas Goreau, marl...@appstate.edu, CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>
Dr. Yang and ccs
See inserts:
On Aug 26, 2020, at 10:45 PM, Yi Yang <yang...@umn.edu> wrote:Dear all,Thanks for including me in the discussion and for your positive feedback.
[RWL: To repeat, your paper is very important to the world of CDR. I will try to get this also to the biochar list.
Biochar is not a very active area of research. Hopefully this will cheer you up. :)
[RWL: Thanks for your follow-up - saying that ’not’ should have been “now”. Which does cheer me.
Another project of mine is to estimate the biochar potential in China.
[RWL; Can you add a little more on the biochar-China topic? It seems to be several times larger than the rest of the world combined and thee biochar community know this. However, I have never seen anything on Chinese official goals - and/or something on growth rate.
What can you say about doubling times for the last five years and the next five? Chinese government investment to date in $millions?
Mostly done for solving serious problem of smoke from crop residue burning - but other rationales?
Can you estimate number of recent and current PhDs? There are an enormous number of biochar papers coming to us from China.
One issue we've found is that although there is a large amount of biomass that can be turned into biochar, a large fraction of them is currently being used for other purposes. Too bad.
[RWL: Does this comment relate to China, Minnesota, or everywhere? Are you suggesting a resource scarcity? What solution?
(Another response coming to your later additional message today.)
Ron
Best,Yi
Ronal Larson
Sep 16, 2020, 1:51:47 AM9/16/20
to Yi Yang, Thomas Goreau, marl...@appstate.edu, CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com <CarbonDioxideRemoval@googlegroups.com>
Dr. Yang, list and ccs:
1. Below I have excised a lot of important material that referred to past work by Drs. Goreau and Marland (apologies to them) - in order to concentrate on the original thread topic of a new important biochar paper by yourself and colleagues. This paper found at:
2. I changed this thread subject somewhat, because of Dr. Yang’s strong connections to China, and my belief that US politicians will be well aware of how the Chinese took several large financial gclimate-related ambles several decades ago. . To end up now as the acknowledged leaders in both PV and wind with huge and continuing financial gains. No guarantee they can do the same with biochar - but……..
3. Below I try to continue this theme - with great admiration for the Chinese leadership on a technology that Dr. Yang and.partners also strongly support (independent of China). Today’s responses below in bold italics.
On Sep 15, 2020, at 3:18 PM, Yi Yang <yang...@umn.edu> wrote:Hi Ron,Sorry for my late reply, but over the past two weeks I made a trip from China to the US. It was hectic with all the packing, traveling, and settling down after arrival. Please see my responses below.
On Thu, Aug 27, 2020 at 12:20 PM Ronal Larson <rongre...@comcast.net> wrote:Dr. Yang and ccsSee inserts:On Aug 26, 2020, at 10:45 PM, Yi Yang <yang...@umn.edu> wrote:Dear all,Thanks for including me in the discussion and for your positive feedback.[RWL: To repeat, your paper is very important to the world of CDR. I will try to get this also to the biochar list.Biochar is not a very active area of research. Hopefully this will cheer you up. :)[RWL: Thanks for your follow-up - saying that ’not’ should have been “now”. Which does cheer me.Another project of mine is to estimate the biochar potential in China.[RWL; Can you add a little more on the biochar-China topic? It seems to be several times larger than the rest of the world combined and thee biochar community know this. However, I have never seen anything on Chinese official goals - and/or something on growth rate.What can you say about doubling times for the last five years and the next five? Chinese government investment to date in $millions?Mostly done for solving serious problem of smoke from crop residue burning - but other rationales?Can you estimate number of recent and current PhDs? There are an enormous number of biochar papers coming to us from China.
I don't think there are national policies yet. Nor do I know how many PhDs are working on it. But you are right that a large number of biochar papers are now published by Chinese scholars. In doing policy search, I've found the following:
In 2015, biochar was officially promoted as a soil amendment in the “Agricultural Sustainability Development and Planning for 2015-2030” issued by the Ministry of Agriculture. In 2017, the China Industry Technology Innovation and Strategic Alliance for Biochar was established, involving 26 research institutes and corporations, to develop the biochar industry by tackling barriers across the entire supply chain from basic research to pyrolysis process improvement and biochar products development.
One issue we've found is that although there is a large amount of biomass that can be turned into biochar, a large fraction of them is currently being used for other purposes. Too bad.[RWL: Does this comment relate to China, Minnesota, or everywhere? Are you suggesting a resource scarcity? What solution?
This is specific to China. I'm still "digging" the data, so I can't provide a concrete estimate yet. For forest residues, I can say with high certainty that there is very little left in China for biochar because most of forest residues (including wood products) are being used by various industries including paper and bioenergy. My team is still trying to get a better handle on other sources like sludge from wastewater treatment plants and crop residues, and manture.
[RWL3: I believe China is THE global leader in planting forests over the last several decades. So some harvesting and more planting to cover this shortage seems assured. But I am sorry to hear of this tight supply. Please keep us informed on what your team learns.
[RWL4: thanks. Anthing you can learn should be valuable to those of us interested in accelerating. CDR. China seems to be the certain leader in biochar - and perhaps all forms of CDR.
Our goal is to understand the total carbon sequestration potential of biochar in China.
Again, thanks for your important biochar paper that started this CDR thread..
Ron
Nothing new below.
Ron
Best,YiOn Wed, Aug 26, 2020 at 1:37 AM Ronal Larson <rongre...@comcast.net> wrote:Tom (see inserts for you ) and list and adding the first author, Dr. Yang and also adding a person you have cited: Dr. Gregg MarlandDr. Yang; Sorry that we didn’t include you earlier in this exchange on your very recent biochar paper cited below. You will see below that the reactions have been extremely positive.These comments will also be seen on the biochar list, so you can comment on either one.This is also to ask you to comment on the numerical computations in Dr. Goreau’s paper - and on anything else you see there - from the many other “abandoned land’ authors Tom has cited.
<snip>
[RWL: I have included Dr. Marland in hopes there can be some further filling in. His work goes back well over 40 years.Anyone else able to give historical background for the Yang paper? To repeat - I think this “Yang-soil” paper makes a better case for biochar as a CDR option than any I recall recently.Ron. (nothing more from me below - with thanks to Andrew for starting this 3 days ago.)
<snip>
On Aug 23, 2020, at 5:06 AM, Thomas Goreau <gor...@bestweb.net> wrote:
Excellent paper! Thirty years ago Norman Myers and I found there was enough abandoned land in Brazil alone to stabilize CO2.
<snip>
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