Canada, a huge carbon sink

[Hamloc]

Saskatchewan is one of the Largest CO2 Emitters on the planet.....per capita

So I am curious Mustardman have ever thought past your statement, the why and how of Saskatchewan residents being the "largest C02 emitters on the planet.....per capita." Saskatchewan has roughly 31.3 acres of crop land per capita, by comparison Alberta has 5.48 acres per capita. I would say with a relatively small population Saskatchewan's economy is based on export. So now that you have made this sanctimonious statement how do you propose that you lower Saskatchewan's C02 output with its small population and it industries that export goods to survive?!

[chuckChuck]

Canada's total carbon sink would have been larger prior to settlement because grassland soils and forests held large amounts of carbon in equilibrium. Carbon is still released through decomposition in equilibrium but the inputs equal outputs with some year to year variability.

Soils can only hold so much carbon before they hit a certain maximum after that it is difficult to add additional carbon unless grasslands change to forest.

Farmers should be paid to sequester carbon but that will mean they will also have to pay when grasslands are broken up, trees are cutdown, or farm practices release carbon.

If all the grasslands are returned to grazing that would store the maximum amount of carbon. Increasing soil organic matter is a long process in cropping systems especially when conventional tillage is used. Grazing systems can do it faster.

[furrowtickler]

Canada's total carbon sink would have been larger prior to settlement because grassland soils and forests held large amounts of carbon in equilibrium. Carbon is still released through decomposition in equilibrium but the inputs equal outputs with some year to year variability.

Soils can only hold so much carbon before they hit a certain maximum after that it is difficult to add additional carbon unless grasslands change to forest.

Farmers should be paid to sequester carbon but that will mean they will also have to pay when grasslands are broken up, trees are cutdown, or farm practices release carbon.

If all the grasslands are returned to grazing that would store the maximum amount of carbon. Increasing soil organic matter is a long process in cropping systems especially when conventional tillage is used. Grazing systems can do it faster.

When you return all your farm to grassland let us know .
As you know virtually no one uses conventional tillage in western Canada anymore. The last one in your area rented his land out a few years ago.

[jazz]

Grazing systems can do it faster.

What a crock. Where in the f did you get that idea? Intensive continuous cropping of annuals sequesters way more CO2 than idle grasslands.

The natural grass where we farmed was about as high as your ankle and finished its intensive growth season a month before our crops did.

[blackpowder]

Some people likely won't be satisfied until Western Canada is entirely grazed by buffalo.
Hope they all have the cash to live in Jane Fonda's zip code.

[AlbertaFarmer5]

[QUOTE=LWeber;442961]

Why weren't the Conservatives hammering these points to counter Trudeau's carbon tax during last election campaign.

Better yet:

How did farmers go from getting paid for carbon sequestering to paying for carbon emissions?

The short answer, is also the one that exposes the true nature of the entire movement. It isn't, and never was about saving the planet. It is the same reason why the supposedly revenue neutral CO2 tax is already no longer revenue neutral, etc etc.

[chuckChuck]

https://scied.ucar.edu/imagecontent/carbon-cycle-diagram-nasa https://scied.ucar.edu/imagecontent/carbon-cycle-diagram-nasa

This diagrams illustrates Earth's carbon cycle. It shows how carbon atoms 'flow' between various 'reservoirs' in the Earth system. The sizes of reservoirs are in units of gigatons of carbon (GtC). Flows between reservoirs are in units of gigatons of carbon per year (GtC/yr). The values for human influences such as fossil fuel use and cement production represent the state of the carbon cycle in the mid-1980s.

[chuckChuck]

"As you know virtually no one uses conventional tillage in western Canada anymore."

Many areas with high residues still use tillage in Manitoba and parts of Saskatchewan and Alberta. Many of the crop acres in North America are in corn soybeans with quite a lot of tillage.

Direct seeding, reduced tillage, cover crops, and grazing systems are effective at reducing soil emissions, but once carbon sinks get to equilibrium, decomposition of residues and organic matter still produce emissions equal to inputs.

It takes awhile to build soil organic mater and store carbon in soils.

If all the residues left after direct seeded crops weren't breaking down and releasing some CO2, you would have an incredible pile of residue left on the surface.

In perennial pastures a lot of the carbon is in the below ground root systems.

[mcfarms]

So I take it you are Biodynamic farming then Chuck?