It's Official! Abbott's price on soil carbon $0!

Tony Abbott plans to nationalise the carbon credits farmers could earn for storing carbon in soils in the same way the Howard Government nationalised the carbon that farmers were forced to store by the native vegetation laws. "Tony wants farmers to help the government meet its 2020 target for free," says Michael Kiely from the Carbon Farming & Trading Association. At a public forum in Tamworth a farmer asked Tony what the deal would be for soil carbon. He must have been astonished to hear Tony say that not all landholders are motivated by financial incentives. "A lot of people are doing it without any payment from government," he said. Maybe, but only people with significant off-farm income. "I was on Jock Laurie's property near Walcha," says Tony. "Jock is increasing the carbon content of his soil and again he's doing it because he thinks it's worth doing without any additional incentive from government." Nationals Senator Barnaby Joyce stood by while Tony Abbott gave his answer to the question: Can farmers get a square deal from the Opposition? Tony Abbott: "So we're going to go to the market and we're going to spend as little as we need to to get the result we want." Can the price get lower than $0?

No, Minister (It's just not Carbon Farming)

An environmental conservation project that is being paraded as "a model for carbon farming" by the Government is damaging the cause of carbon farming. "It gives a free kick to those who complain that Carbon Farming is only about trees. Turning food-producing properties into national parks is not carbon farming, nor any form of farming," says Michael Kiely, Chairman of the Carbon Farming & Trading Association. The decision by R.M. Williams Agricultural Holdings to remove cattle from the 520,000ha Henbury Station in the Northern Territory and turn the property into a national park is trumpeted as "Leading the way in carbon farming". The property was bought for $13m (two-thirds of which was paid from Caring For Our Country funds) and the company plans to make the project pay through carbon credits for soil and vegetation "to sequestrate up to 1.5 million tonnes of carbon dioxide emissions per year for the next 10-15 years," says the Department of the Environment & Water. "The aim is to establish a model for generating biodiverse carbon credits to fund ongoing conservation management and to generate new sustainable income streams." These questions need to be answered: 1. How sustainable are the income streams? What happens in Year 16 when the revenue from carbon credits stops? Cattle cannot be reintroduced. 2. Does the absence of grazing animals remove the function of refreshing vegetation and disturbing the soil's surface to encourage new growth which helps avoid desertification. 3. Have any of the Minister's scientific advisers access to data on the increasing levels of biodiversity above and below the ground when soil carbon levels rise?

CHINA GETS A CARBON TAX

THE CHINESE GOVERNMENT has announced that it will have a national emissions trading scheme at the same time as Australia, reports Reuters. China will pilot six emissions trading schemes by 2013, and set up a national trading platform by 2015, according to Xie Zhenhua, vice-minister of China's economic planner the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC). The official Xinhua news agency said on Sunday that, like Australia, China will pilot a carbon trading scheme and gradually build a market for emissions trading to meet pollution goals and fight climate change. To get started, Beijing will force power-intensive industries to pay higher electricity tariffs than other industries. Beijing will also encourage energy conservation by improving laws, regulation and taxation policies and asking financial groups to fund low-carbon emission projects. The Government will also discourage 'excessive growth' in power-intensive sectors. Reuters says companies and governments around the world are turning to emissions trading as a way to combat climate change and join a world carbon market worth $142 billion last year.

Getting serious about risk & return

The Opposition Direct Action plan promises to achieve ‘lowest cost’ abatement by inviting farmers to tender their best price for soil carbon offsets in a market with only one buyer – the Government. Australian farmers won’t line up to sell a government soil carbon at bargain basement prices. The plan would pit farmer against farmer in a race to the bottom to see who could cut their throats the fastest. Farmers are gunshy after a protracted scare campaign about soil carbon sequestration convinced many that trading soil carbon is dangerous. And, as with any market, the higher the perceived risk, the better the money advantage has to be. The price of $8 to $10 a tonne has been floated by the Coalition. The responsibilities of a Carbon Farmer are high, including holding the carbon in the soils for 100 years. There’s too much uncertainty with this program. It can be cut off at any time. Knowing the pragmatism that surrounds Direct Action, there is too much risk for a farmer to take for a few dollars a tonne. In a Clayton’s market, farmers face a ‘take it or leave it’ attitude with only one buyer. As for the assertion that the price could be zero because farmers take up sustainable farming without the promise of offsets, why haven't they done it already? Get serious.

Nature defies logic on soil carbon

The journal Nature has made the headlines today with a story about emissions from soils that was misunderstood by journalists reporting on it. The study concluded that increased levels of CO2 in the atmosphere cause certain soil microbes to release methane and nitrous oxide. The scientists and journalists all assumed that this was bad news for soil carbon sequestration. Logically, however, it is the opposite. It is not the CO2 in soils that causes the additional emissions of methane and nitrous oxide, but the CO2 in the atmosphere. If there is more CO2 in the atmosphere, soils will release more Greenhouse Gases. Soils can take CO2 out of the atmosphere. Therefore we need to get soils working hard as soon as possible. If we don’t, soils will be 20% less effective at taking CO2 out of the atmosphere.

Increasing CO₂ in the atmosphere makes plants grow faster. This extra plant growth is one of the main ways ecosystems could slow climate change. With more CO₂, plants grow more, soaking up carbon dioxide through photosynthesis and depositing carbon in wood and soil. But some of that extra carbon also provides fuel to microorganisms whose byproducts, nitrous oxide and methane, end up in the atmosphere and counteract the cooling effects of more plant growth. "It's an ecological point and counterpoint: the more the plants soak up CO₂, the more microbes release these more potent greenhouse gases," said Bruce Hungate, Professor at Northern Arizona University and co-author on the study. "The microbial counterpoint is only partial, reducing the cooling effect of plants by about 20%."

Professor Alex McBratney of Sydney University - who estimated that soil carbon sequestration could absorb between 10% and 30% of Australia's emissions prior to the study - now estimates CO2 absorption could remove between 8% and 30%.

Insider's Guide To Carbon Tax Support For Farmers

This analysis of the Carbon Tax funding for farmers is brought to you by the Carbon Farming & Trading Association.

We told Minister Combet last February that the Soil Carbon Research Program would provide only 20% of the data needed to make trade in soil carbon offsets possible, he seemed surprised. When we asked him was there any more money to finish the job, he said “No!” Something happened between then and last Sunday when the Carbon Tax detail was released. Blame it on the Independents and Greens.

The headline: $1.5 billion for landholders to switch to more climate friendly activities on farm.

In summary, this is how the $1.5 billion is divided up:

• $201 million for research into “new ways of storing carbon and reducing pollution in the land sectors.”

• $20 million to “convert research into practical methodologies which are recognised under the Carbon Farming Initiative

• $99 million “for landholders to take action on the ground, including testing new ways to increase soil carbon and reduce pollution.”

• $250 million for the Carbon Farming Initiative non‑Kyoto Carbon Fund will be used by the Government to purchase carbon credits that will create “incentives to undertake land-based action such as the storing of soil carbon, revegetation and forest conservation.”

• $946 million from the Biodiversity Fund “for landholders to undertake projects that establish, restore, protect or manage biodiverse carbon stores.”

• $44 million will provide "a refundable tax offset to encourage the uptake of conservation tillage farming techniques and participation in soil carbon sequestration research”.

A total of $1.5 billion for land sector activities. Stupendous. Let’s look a little more closely at the numbers. First, divide it all by 6 to get the annual figure as all amounts are to cover 6 years (except the conservation tillage 15% tax offset – it is for 3 years).

The $201 million for research amounts to $33 million per year. By comparison, the Soil Carbon Research Program (SCRP) had a total of $25.5 million over three years. But this new funding is not solely for soil carbon. It has to be shared between projects “to improve soil carbon, reduce pollution from livestock and crops, and enhance sustainable agricultural practices. Novel approaches, including biochar, biofuels and new crop and grazing species, will be targeted”. If the SCRP achieved 20% of it’s task with $25.5 million, it would need an additional $100 million to complete it. (The Commonwealth contributed $8 million to the initial SCRP budget, the balance coming from partners such as GRDC. The Commonwealth contribution would therefore be $32 million.) Will soil carbon get the funds? Not without a fight. Is it the research we want?? Good question. Populating models with “monopractice” data* on the grounds that it will help guide farmers’ decisions about whether to 'invest' in soil carbon activities does not translate into a trading regime. However it could be the basis for a scientifically-respectable CCX-style estimation system; ie. assigning a fixed rate of sequestration to a certain practice in a certain climate zone. The resulting data is the best a scientist can do, not the best a farmer can do. Carbon farmers are “poly-practitioners”; ie. they apply a suite of soil management practices to enrich their soil. Simply adding the results for the separate practices together does not add up, because the mechanism is ecological; the dynamic is geometrical, not arithmetic. Ie., it grows by multiplication, not addition.

$20 million will be available to convert research into practical methodologies which are recognised under the Carbon Farming Initiative. This will speed up the development of methodologies because right now there is no incentive to produce meths other than good citizenship.

$99 million will be provided “for landholders to take action on the ground, including testing new ways to increase soil carbon and reduce pollution.” This could mean there is money for farmers to hire scientists and do the research that is being neglected. ie, demonstrating true potential for sequestration.

The $250 million to be spent buying voluntary market offsets (Non-Kyoto) for “the storing of soil carbon, revegetation and forest conservation” implies that a soil carbon methodology is passed by the Domestic Offsets Integrity Committee (DOIC). Yet the document says soil carbon will emerge ‘over time’, which betrays a belief that only science can provide a solution. (A reference to ‘engaging more scientists and independent experts’ to do research could indicate that the Government is willing to broaden the skillsets and perspectives applied to the wicked problem of soil carbon.)

It may look like a straight copy of Abbott’s Direct Action plan, but it is only a faint echo. The $40 million per year the Government intends to spend can purchase 4 million units at $10 (although the Government has not indicated a price). The Opposition’s Direct Action soil carbon solution, whereby the Government is the only buyer and farmers compete to offer the lowest price, expects to purchase 10 million units in 2012-3, rising to 85 million units per year in 2020. This “market mechanism” does not fit the Association’s idea of an ideal system because it operates to restrict returns to farmers and reduce the contribution that the soil carbon solution can make to addressing climate change and landscape restoration, both of which rely on widespread change of land management practice.

There is another likely farmer response depressant: the intrusion of Government bureaucracy into the marketplace. Seeking to use a market to attract conservative farmers who would run a mile from anything that looked like government environmental program, the Association was shocked to read the following: “Natural resource management organisations will develop plans in each region to guide where carbon farming projects should be located in the landscape. These can be used by landholders to identify and develop activities to reduce carbon pollution.” This creates another level of decision-making to slow down the process and add costs.

The Big ticket item was the billion dollars for ‘BIODIVERSITY”. The Biodiversity Fund will support:

• reforestation and revegetation in areas of high conservation value including wildlife corridors, rivers, streams and wetlands
• management and protection of biodiverse ecosystems, including publicly owned native forests and land under conservation covenants or subject to land clearing restrictions
• action to prevent the spread of invasive species across connected landscapes.

Trees and native vegetation can make a major contribution to landscape resilience and farm production, but this is a very narrow definition of Biodiversity. In farmland, Biodiversity can be found in the species density in pasture grasses, in the species density in soil microbial communities, in grassy woodlands, and in the edge effect of ribbon planting of crops. Biodiversity naturally increases with soil carbon. The two are interdependent. We will need to broaden this definition to gain funds for on farm biodiversity projects. The amount to be spent from the Biodiversity funds on mainly reforestation or forestation is gobsmacking when considered alongside the budget for soil carbon. The Government says the money is to be used “for landholders to undertake projects”, but there is a danger that the lion’s share of it will find its way into salaries with precious little left over for farmer incentives. The “extension/education/encouragement” model is very effective at changing behaviour in those open to the message. But this Conversion Model can be slow-acting and even ineffective with the conservative majority – failing to gain even consideration from minds made up after a lifetime immersed in a culture of traditional ways. The prospect of additional income from growing a new commodity in parallel with their existing enterprises is proven to gain attention long enough for consideration of the proposition. In doing so, this commercial return incentive would work faster because it offers the means to balance risk of experimenting with new business practices. The market model would add potency to the extension model, providing the agencies with access to groups of farmers formerly unavailable to them.

Given the amounts of money on offer and the broad terms of reference, there is likely to be a feeding frenzy by stakeholders who traditionally work in this space and who naturally feel entitled, and newcomers like ourselves (though 6 years is a lifetime in carbon issues) who are pursuing a paradigm shift and need resources to prove our contention. Soil Carbon will have to compete vigorously to not only get a fair share of the resources that we helped to make available, but also to avoid losing control of our destiny by having the agenda fall into unsympathetic hands.

There is a lot of hard work to be done and someone has got to do it – all day every day. This is the reason we formed the Carbon Farming & Trading Association. To give you the opportunity to play an active part in the effort, to build the resource base we need to field a team – because if we don’t turn up, you can be sure the others will, and 85% of success is simply in turning up.

http://www.carbonfarmersofaustralia.com.au/CarbonFarmers/Representation/Association.html

*The Potential of Australian Farmers to Earn Income from Soil Carbon Sequestration has been estimated at unrealisticially low levels. The peer-reviewed science fails to replicate what farmers can achieve because it studies only monopractice (single practice change), it does not study polypractice (multiple practice changes) which is the real-world behaviour of farmers seeking to enrich their soils and increase their soil carbon levels.

The highest level of increase recorded by scientists studying monopractices is 0.5 tonnes of carbon. Experienced carbon farmers using multiple land management changes have recorded 30 tonnes and more per year for 10 years.

These tonnages are not recognised by government scientists because they have not studied it and have no plans to study it. Officially they don't exist. The studies, when they take place, can take up to 5 years. Years can pass before funding is available, then three year field trials, followed by a year getting the results published in an academic journal before it can be considered 'sound science'.

The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists have declared that there is no peer-reviewed science that reveals the potential of carbon farming for soil carbon sequestration. They are right. Public policy has not been informed by knowledge of the existence of the Hidden Tonnes of Soil Carbon.

A $1.3bn Magic Pudding for Agriculture

The Gillard Government has announced a $1.3bn package of assistance to Agriculture under the Carbon Tax. This is how the Government announced it. [Our observations in brackets.]

Boosting wider land action

The Government will purchase carbon credits through the Carbon Farming Initiative non-Kyoto Carbon Fund. This $250 million program over six years will create incentives to undertake land-based action such as the storing of soil carbon, revegetation and forest conservation. [This is a blatant adoption of the Opposition's Direct Action approach for agriculture. It was an initiative promoted by Senator Christine Milne in the Multi-Party negotiations.]

Credits from these projects can also be sold to companies wanting to offset their carbon pollution to meet voluntary commitments to carbon neutrality. [These offsets still have to meet the stringent Kyoto requirements which are enshrined in the Carbon Farming Initiative Integrity Standards].

Australia will continue working to develop new international rules that recognise a wider range of action to reduce pollution on the land. In future, this may allow landholders to sell credits from a wider variety of projects to companies with obligations under the carbon price. [Australia is campaigning to haveArticle 3.4 of the Kyoto Protocols repealed because they block the sale of agricultural offsets on the international compliance market. They force nations wishing to report their agricultural emissions to include non-man made emissions such as those caused by drought or fire.]

Conservation tillage

The Carbon Farming Futures program will include specific support for conservation tillage equipment. This will be delivered by a 15 per cent refundable tax offset for eligible equipment. This will incentivise farmers to move to zero till and minimum tillage farming techniques which can enhance soil carbon, water retention and productivity. [This was an initiative promoted by Tony Windsor MP in the Multi Party Negotiations.]

Farmers will be required to participate in research and methodology development to assist efforts to settle methods for crediting soil carbon under the Carbon Farming Initiative. [A 15% refundable tax offset will not be enough to turn a conviction deep cultivator into a zero-tiller. We need carbon offsets for zero till, which will require abandoning the Additionality Principle.]

Carbon Farming Futures

The Carbon Farming Futures program will deliver $429 million over six years to help farmers and other landholders benefit from financial opportunities under the Carbon Farming Initiative:

• support will be provided for research to investigate new ways of storing carbon and reducing emissions in the land sector, including biochar and biofuels
• this ongoing program will support landholders to take action such as testing new ways to increase soil carbon and reduce emissions
• new funding will be made available to test more effective methods for measuring carbon stored in soils and to integrate carbon farming into everyday farm business
• extension officers and outreach activities will give landholders access to information to help them benefit from carbon farming.

[This is fantastic news because Minister Combet told us there was no more $$$ for research after the $25m Soil Carbon Research Program ran out next year. Rob Oakshott and Tony Windsor gave strong voice of asupport for soil carbon during the negotiations. However, more funds should not be an excuse for delaying action on trading. The sooner we can get the highest number of farmers sequestering carbon the better. The next drought is coming.]

The ongoing Biodiversity Fund has been allocated $946 million over the first six years of the program and will support projects that establish, restore, protect or manage biodiverse carbon stores. Funding will be provided for establishing mixed species plantings in targeted areas, such as areas of high conservation value including wildlife corridors, riparian zones and wetlands. [A billion dollars for planting trees? It seems the Greens drove a hard bargain. There are ways to use trees that increases the productivity of farms and ways that do not. Note well.]

The Fund will also support action to prevent the spread of invasive species across connected landscapes and the management of existing biodiverse carbon stores. This includes land already under conservation covenants, subject to land clearing restrictions, and publicly owned native forests

Regional Planning for Climate Change

Regional Natural Resource Management (NRM) organisations are well placed to help plan for climate change and to maximise the social and environmental benefi ts of carbon farming projects. Around $44 million over five years will go to make regional NRM plans climate-ready. This will include funding to develop detailed scenarios on climate change impacts on a regional level. The plans will guide where biosequestration projects should be located in the landscape. This whole of region approach will help to maximise the benefits for biodiversity, water and agricultural production. The plans will provide an assessment of how projects can maximise landscape resilience, improving each region’s ability to tackle and adapt to Australia’s changing climate.

[This is disturbing and could have fatal consequences for soil carbon and sequestration.The market does not need more regulation and bureaucracy . The soil carbon offset is something that is hard enough to sell to farmers as it is without the intrusion of environmental agencies telling farmers where they can establish projects and how to run them. It could scare farmers off.]

[Over the coming days we will seek more detail from the Government.]

The Hidden Tonnes of Soil Carbon

The Potential of Australian Farmers to Earn Income from Soil Carbon Sequestration has been estimated at unrealisticially low levels. The peer-reviewed science fails to replicate what farmers can achieve because it studies only monopractice (single practice change), it does not study polypractice (multiple practice changes) which is the real-world behaviour of farmers seeking to enrich their soils and increase their soil carbon levels.

The highest level of increase recorded by scientists studying monopractices is 0.5 tonnes of carbon. Experienced carbon farmers using multiple land management changes have recorded 30 tonnes and more per year for 10 years.

These tonnages are not recognised by government scientists because they have not studied it and have no plans to study it. Officially they don't exist. The studies, when they take place, can take up to 5 years. Years can pass before funding is available, then three year field trials, followed by a year getting the results published in an academic journal before it can be considered 'sound science'.

The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists have declared that there is no peer-reviewed science that reveals the potential of carbon farming for soil carbon sequestration. They are right. Public policy has not been informed by knowledge of the existence of the Hidden Tonnes of Soil Carbon.

“Carbon Price Good News For Farmers”

Carbon farming income as much as $100g per year

The Gillard Government’s announcement of a price for Carbon is welcomed by the Carbon Farming & Trading Association. It is good news for farmers because they can make additional income. Farmers can be paid the carbon price for reducing their emissions or capturing and storing carbon in soils and trees. The Carbon Farming Initiative legislation is complementary to the Carbon Tax legislation and is in the final stages of being passed through the Senate. “Farmers stand to make significant additional income if they take maximum advantage,” says Michael Kiely, Chairman of the Carbon Farming & Trading Association. “If soil carbon CO2 offsets fetch $23 a tonne, our best carbon farmers could make more than $100,000 a year at the top end of estimates.”*

“Add to that offsets earned for reducing methane from animals, reducing nitrogen emissions from animals and fertiliser, removing feral animals, planting native forests, reducing burning stubble and grasslands, etc. and there are many opportunities in prospect for farmers.”

These opportunities will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference in Dubbo NSW on 28-29 September, 2011.

*Leading carbon farmers report increases in soil carbon of 2% in a decade: 0.2% @ 30cms @ Bulk Density 1.0: 22tCO2-e/Ha/yr @ $23/t: $506/Ha. For 200Ha: $101,000. (NB. $23/t is the price to apply in the Compliance market. Soil carbon will initially be traded in the Voluntary market, price estimated at $10-15/tCO2-e, but the pathway to the Compliance market is anticipated by the Carbon Farming Initiative. For a more conservative estimate, simply halve the price and the resulting income. Note the above calculation based on 200Ha. Average farm size 800Ha. Note that the price on carbon will rise in the coming decade.)

Onwards to 15 August

The Australian reported it as if it was inevitable, but the final vote for the Carbon Credits (Carbon Farming Initiative) Bill 2011 did not make it onto the schedule of the Senate today. The Opposition wanted to stop the Bill, saying there are too many unknowns and issues left in the hands off the Minister and his expert panel. We complain about bureaucratic interference, but we would rather have a CFI that is a work in progress rather than wait while department's imagine how the details will be. The fact that there is still a lot of the detail that we can help develop that detail (via the meths process). It would be unkind to suggest that the Liberals want to be able to say they support the CFI but not in this form. It allows the to say No while still being nice to farmers..// The Nats - apart from Senator Nash - have a catatonic reaction to anything with the word 'carbon' in it. When did they last stand up for farmers? We have to wait until 15 August for next sitting. But meths are still being processed. ONWARDS!

Minister suffers 100 Years

"Carbon storage has to be permanent if it is going to be treated as equivalent to carbon emissions from the industrial sectors." Sen. Joe Ludwig, the Minister for Agriculture, is a victim of the 100 Years Rule misconception that dogs the soil carbon solution. There is no science behind this statement. There can be no equivalence between biological cycles and industrial emissions. Offsets earned by avoiding emissions of CO2 by using renewable energy instead of digging up a tonne of coal and burning it are said to be permanent and offsets earned by converting CO2 into soil and rootmass are said to be volatile and unsafe. Yet who can guarantee that the tonne of coal won't be dug up and burned at some future time, say tomorrow. Given the world's appetite for coal, this is not unreasonable. Yet the humus colloid can remain stable for 1000 years. Coal emissions avoided are even more insecure than soil carbon, in this scenario. The 100 Year Rule was not chosen by scientists based on evidence, it was chosen by policy makers - aka. politicians - based on ignorance and prejudice. Scientists are unified in their objection to soil carbon offsets, according to the CSIRO's ECOS magazine.

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

What the Senators told the Minister: Additionality

I want to again highlight some of the evidence that the committee heard and the committee's recommendations, and then seek the minister's response. We heard from Carbon Farmers of Australia and the Carbon Farming and Trading Association who claimed:... the •business as usual‘ rule, which penalizes Landcare farmers and other progressive landholders who have taken up carbon farming techniques early and—potentially—rewards laggards who continue to degrade their soils. The association described this treatment of progressive farmers as 'the ultimate perverse outcome'. They stated: The impact of that is that there will be property not under contract for carbon farming. By that I mean that these progressive farmers will eventually sell out or pass the farm on and there is no guarantee that that regime will continue. We believe that people would not desecrate a carbon rich environment because of the obvious value of such a thing, but it is not guaranteed.

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

What the Senators told the Minister: About Permanence 1

The Senate is debating the Carbon Farming Initiative legislation. Three senators quoted our evidence before the Senate Inquiry during the debate so far, so the voices of carbon farmers was heard:

Senator Richard Colbeck (Liberal, Tasmania)

5 July 2011

I want to move on to the issue of permanence. It is a

complex issue and one that needs modification as part

of this legislative process. It is interesting that some

farmers who came in to talk to us, who are all about

storing carbon in their landscape, brought in to us

presentations demonstrating how they were changing

their farming methodologies to store carbon in their

landscape. They talked about the improvements in

productivity. They discussed with us the carrying

capacity of their land as a result of their different

management practices. And yet Mr Kiely, who came

before the committee to give us evidence, says that

permanence is 'the deal killer'. He said:

No farmer would be silly enough to agree to 100 years for

soil carbon or 100 years for anything. A finance lender

would want to know seriously the impact on the value of the

property of agreeing to such a thing. We did some research

into the 100 years thing and discovered it was a policy

decision, not a scientific measure …

These are people who are committed to carbon storage,

who are practising the sorts of things the government

wants to encourage, and they are saying that the

government processes are a 'deal killer'. And these are

the sorts of people who the government should

legitimately be listening to as part of this process. It is

only common sense that practitioners, who have spent

time and effort in trying to develop their farms and

who actually practice these things, and have some

expertise, should be listened to by the government.

Senator Nick Xenaphon, Independent, South Australia

6 July, 2011

'Permanence' is defined in the act as '100 years'. On the

face of it, that gives a great deal of confidence. But it is

not realistic in the context of farming practices and it is

not realistic in getting a good outcome.

Let me quote from page 35 of the Senate committee

report. The Chairman of the Carbon Farming and

Trading Association, Michael Kiely, said:

No farmer would be silly enough to agree to 100 years for

soil carbon or 100 years for anything. A finance lender

would want to know seriously the impact on the value of the

property of agreeing to such a thing. We did some research

into the 100 years thing and discovered it was a policy

decision, not a scientific measure ...

That is a real concern. We need to listen to key

stakeholders such as the CFTA. It would be foolish not

to listen to those who have that firsthand practical

knowledge. This was a recommendation about the

issue of permanence in the inquiry into these bills. It is

important that the DOIC continue to update, amend

and improve the scheme into the future.

Senator Simon Birmingham, Liberal, South Australia

The CFTA appeared before the inquiry and

described the provision as the 'deal killer'. I will read

an extract of the evidence that is highlighted in the

inquiry. Mr Michael Kiely, Chairman of the CFTA,

stated:

No farmer would be silly enough to agree to 100 years for

soil carbon or 100 years for anything. A finance lender

would want to know seriously the impact on the value of the

property of agreeing to such a thing. We did some research

into the 100 years thing and discovered it was a policy

decision, not a scientific measure ...We believe that 100

years is a perverse outcome. The result is said to be

necessary so buyers can be confident they are getting

value—that is, genuine abatement—so they get nothing.

There is nothing available for them. We have found

examples where the IPCC and the Verified Carbon Standard

have allowed other periods of time recently—20, 25, 30-odd

years. We believe we could work within that sort of time

frame.

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

No need to go, Joe

Listening to the Senate debate on the Carbon Farming Initiative... the Minister for Agriculture who has carriage of the matter in that House had some trouble answering questions about how Common Practice will be assessed (a mixture of stakeholder consultation, surveys and 'common sense') during attempts by Opposition, Greens and Independent Nick Xenophon to have amendments accepted and left the Chamber during a break in proceedings, leaving it to a junior minister (Evans) who clearly had trouble and who called on another senator (Feeney) to explain why the amendments were unacceptable. No reflection on Senator Ludwig, of course. CFI is hard to understand and he has the cattle industry screaming for his blood because it was caught out running a sloppy supply chain operation and left itself exposed to a PR disaster and the industry blamed everyone but itself - especially the government for responding to the will of the people and shutting down the supply chain until the industry cleaned up its act. The board of the MLA should consider its position - it has had several previous incidents that should have indicated the type of crisis it is likely to encounter and it should have directed senior management to develop a Crisis Management Plan like any other business or industry. (Woops! We know where Joe was this afternoon, reintroducing cattle trade...-0)

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

We're here because we're here because we're here

There is a disconnect between cause and effect in the Alice In Wonderland world of the Carbon Farming Initiative. The purchase of offsets is assumed to be a strictly limited, one dimensional transaction in which the buyer is interested only in ‘genuine abatement’ as dictated by the narrowly-focussed Kyoto Protocol.

The purpose of the CFI is to get broad involvement among farmers in abatement activities to take advantage of the vast acreage of Australia’s farming and grazing lands to help meet the global community’s goal of less that 2°C increase in global mean temperature. The term ‘board involvement’ should be defined in terms of the needs of the objective – which is to have the largest number of farmers possible sequestering and avoiding as much carbon emissions as possible as soon as possible and for as long as possible.

In the voluntary market at least buyers are free to respond to such a proposition. Whereas in the compliance market it is a strict accounting exercise, based on national targets, the voluntary market can entertain such concepts as ‘a hectare that is not under contract for sequestration is not secured as part of the national effort’. It is also not guaranteed to be part of the regeneration of soil health and biodiversity in farm landscapes.

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

Avoiding emissions or avoiding the issue

To make it easier for farmers to find their way through the thicket of tests that stand between their desire to take part in the Carbon Farming Initiative and actually doing it, the Government has established 2 lists: a Positive List of activities that are automatically approved and for which there are methodologies ready for use; and a Negative List of activities that are automatically excluded. There is a major distortion in the ease of making its way onto the Positive List for an activity that involves emissions avoidance vs the difficulty facing a sequestration activity. It is a distortion based on a misunderstanding of the nature of abatement.

Whereas an offset created by renewable energy such as biomass as fuel stock or the energy created in the biochar process can be equated easily to tonnes of CO2 emissions avoided by substitution of a tonne of coal burned, there is no guarantee that the tonne of coal not burned today will not be mined and burned tomorrow. As such, given the world’s appetite for coal, the Permanence of such an offset is far less secure than soil carbon’s stable fractions. Yet the 100 Year Rule is not applied in one case and is applied in the other.

Similarly, an offset created by any one of a number of practices that cause ruminants to emit less methane will find it easier to achieve Positive status than the process of sequestration which – as part of the farm carbon cycle that produced the methane and is reprocessing it back into vegetation, food and soil – is not recognized for the role it plays. Methane emissions are treated as a simple zero-sum calculation whereas its production and sequestration is far more complex while soil sequestration is damned with unmanageable complexity when it is in fact a simple, predictable process.

Access to the Positive List is easy for avoided emissions because policymakers have accepted an unjustifiably simplified notion of how these abatements operate.

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

Perfectly perverse outcome of CFI

FARM A – Degraded soils due to decades of ‘flogging’ the paddocks. Farmer signs a soil carbon contract and introduces new practices that capture Carbon.

FARM B – Soils recovering after 10 years of carbon farming. Farmer forced by terms of trade to sell property. New owner refused access to CFI contract. Introduces ‘flogging’ regime for paddocks. Sequestration ceases.

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

Additionality doesn't add up

The Government's solution to the absurd Financial Additionality Rule could see farmers forced to fill out forms every year to report on their farming practices, whether they are involved in the Carbon Farming Initiative or not. A "Common Practice" test is used to replace the Financial Additionality provision, which excluded a project if it resulted in higher production and hence higher profits - which it is assumed should be enough to get farmers to change their practices. (Soil carbon cannot be increased without increasing biomass and hence production. Yet the majority of farmers still don't practice soil-carbon-friendly farming.) Replacing Financial Additionality rule is the Common Practice rule which holds that a farming practice qualifies as "Additional" if it is not common practice in its industry, part of its industry or in the type of environment in which the farmer is working. If it is not common practice it goes on the "Positive List". Who decides what’s on the list? The Minister. How will he do this? The common practice test can only be applied if there exists accurate statistics of farm practices in every locality, parish and district across Australia. As this data does not exist, a major data gathering exercise or census will be required, involving a compulsory survey to be filled in by every landholder, even those not wishing to involve themselves in the CFI. The resulting database will need to be kept up to date, so farmers could find themselves filling in forms every year. It is variously estimated that there are between 100,000 and 180,000 agricultural enterprises in Australia. The response rate to such a survey would need to be close to 100% to give confidence in the decisions taken about common practice. At the same time, there needs to be precise definitions of farm practices that take into account the variants of those practices. There will need to be some way of deciding when a variant is far enough removed from the original practice to be considered a new practice. For instance there are no clear boundaries separating no-till from zero-till, minimum-till, direct drill, pasture cropping, no-kill/no-till and other alternative forms of cultivation. There will need to be a statistical cut off point that acts as the boundary beyond which a practice is ‘common practice’. That boundary point, wherever it is chosen to be, will be arbitrary and a source of injustice. The levels of complexity grow exponentially when the project must be measured against the others in the farmer’s industry or part of the industry and type of environment. Who decides what is a part of an industry and what isn’t? And type of environment? Once on the Positive List a practice is not guaranteed to stay there. Regular reviews of the ‘common practice’ situation will need be conducted to decide who stays and who goes. Who decides who stays on the list? The answer to that question every time is “The Minister”. In no other market is a Minister so actively engaged in regulating daily activity, not even the Treasurer. While the goodwill and good intentions of the current incumbent are unquestioned, a future minister may not be so disposed. The Carbon Farming & Trading Association recommends that the Common Practice Test be abandoned and “Additional” redefined as applying to all sequestration effected from the date that a baseline is established.

The new Carbon Farming Law will be explained at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

Free The Market!

Putting a price on carbon allocates resources most efficiently, from polluters to providers of sequestration services and renewable energy. The ‘hidden hand’ of the market guides the resources from the energy sources of the past into the energy sources of the future. Markets work most efficiently to the extent that they are free. A free market is a market in which economic intervention and regulation by the state is limited to tax collection and enforcement of private ownership and contracts. It is the opposite of a controlled market in which the state directly regulates how goods, services and labour may be used, priced or distributed rather than relying on the mechanism of supply and demand. The mechanisms for government intervention in markets inevitably create complexity. Complexity creates costs and acts as a disincentive to involvement. The development of the Positive and Negative Lists in the Carbon Farming Initiative as an attempt to simplify procedures for the approval of methodologies is in itself a testimony to this principle. The Lists are the main mechanism of regulation in a market-based instrument into which, with the best of intentions, the Minister and his Department have written themselves roles that will make proceedings slow and expensive.

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

Abbott's Direct Action guaranteed until 2015

Tony Abbott talks with 7.30's Chris Uhlmann 4/7/2011

TONY ABBOTT: What we've said, Chris, is that we are happy. We want to achieve a five per cent reduction. We believe that we can achieve that reduction by our direct action policy. We'll be reviewing things as time goes by. We've said that in 2015 there'll be a review and we'll announce well before 2020 what we think should happen after that.

CHRIS UHLMANN: And will that five per cent reduction that you're aiming for get all the things that the Australian people clearly want? Will it look after Kakadu, will it make sure that the Barrier Reef is safe?

TONY ABBOTT: Well, five per cent under us will achieve as much as five per cent under the Government.

CHRIS UHLMANN: Which you say is nothing.

TONY ABBOTT: Well, look, five per cent is five per cent. And if the Government is going to achieve all these good things by a five per cent reduction in emissions, well, we'll achieve the same good things.

CHRIS UHLMANN: Why would you have a policy that costs $10.5 billion that you think will achieve nothing?

TONY ABBOTT: Well, I don't say it will achieve nothing, because one of the good things about our policy, Chris, is that all of the measures that we will fund under our policy, the extra trees, the extra soil carbon, the smart technology to take carbon dioxide from power stations and, amongst other things, create stockfeed and biodiesel with it, these are all intrinsically good things. More trees are good, better soil is good and new products are good...

Opportunities in the Carbon Farming Initiative will be revealed at the Carbon Farming Conference & Expo, 28-29 September, 2011

Climate Change Is Crap? Researchers Push the Boundary With High Carbon Emission Scenario

ScienceDaily (July 4, 2011) — US and Swiss researchers have, for the first time, modelled a climate system with extremely high carbon emissions in an attempt to test the boundaries of the current computer simulation programs that inform us. Published on July 5, in IOP Publishing's journal Environmental Research Letters, the study has revealed the potentially devastating effects that high carbon emissions could have on our climate. Little attention has previously been paid to the upper bound range of future emissions which, as the researchers state, is imperative when testing the outcomes of climate change simulations.

The A1FI scenario, considered in the most recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), represents the upper bound of predicted carbon emissions. The researchers, from the National Centre for Atmospheric Research, Colorado, and the Institute for Atmospheric and Climate Science, Zurich, created two hypothetical high carbon emission scenarios and compared their effects to the existing emission scenarios. The first scenario created, CurrentMix, assumed that global energy behaviour would remain constant but that the global population would rise to 11 billion by 2100. The increase in carbon emissions envisaged in the A1FI scenario would be doubled by the end of the century. The second scenario, AllCoal, was designed as a thought experiment to exceed all likely emissions for the remainder of the century. This scenario assumed that the global population would increase to 15 billion by 2100 and that demand for fuel sources would increase, with more demand placed on coal -- the fuel with the highest amount of carbon per unit of energy. This would result in four times the increase in carbon emissions envisaged in the A1FI scenario.

According to the researchers' computer simulations, the major differences between each scenario would begin to materialise towards the end of the 21st century. By 2100, the AllCoal and CurrentMix scenarios would produce a warming of over 12 Kelvin (K) in the Arctic regions, with global sea levels rising by 33 cm and 27 cm respectively due to the thermal expansion of the oceans. The A1FI scenario showed a 21 cm increase in sea levels; however the figures did not account for melting ice-sheets, which could increase sea levels by large amounts. The AllCoal scenario projected a complete loss of summer Arctic sea ice by 2070. Each of the scenarios showed the typical pattern of increased rainfall towards the poles and drying subtropics. For example, the AllCoal scenario showed a 30-80 per cent precipitation reduction in Southern Europe, Central America, and Southern Australia as well as increases of 50-200 per cent in the Arctic and Antarctic regions, Northern Canada and Siberia.

The increase in most regions' maximum temperatures went up by a factor of two in the AllCoal scenario; however some regions showed a considerably larger increase. In particular, the maximum summer temperatures in Northern Europe increased by 6-7 K by 2100. Lead author Dr Ben Sanderson said, "Our study considered a future in which fossil fuel availability is completely unrestricted and climate change is unmitigated, resulting in significant additional warming above the entire range of scenarios considered in the Fourth Assessment Report of the IPCC."

"This study showed us that the model behaves on a global scale largely as we would expect."

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The above story is reprinted (with editorial adaptations by ScienceDaily staff) from materials provided by Institute of Physics.

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Journal Reference:

1. Benjamin M Sanderson et al. The response of the climate system to very high greenhouse gas emission scenarios. Environmental Research Letters, 6 034005, July 5, 2011 DOI: 10.1088/1748-9326/6/3/034005

Institute of Physics (2011, July 4). Researchers push the boundary with high carbon emission scenarios. ScienceDaily. Retrieved July 6, 2011, from http://www.sciencedaily.com­ /releases/2011/07/110705071737.htm

Allan Savory:"Change is Coming"

Allan Savory, the Patron Saint of Sustainable Farming, is visiting Australia and we met up with him out at Brewarrina (5 hours NNW of UAMBY) at the 17,000 acre grazing property 'Bokhara Plains'. The originator of Holistic Resource Management - a system of guided decision-making - Allan is the mentor of thousands of farmers around the world. At this field day at Graham and Cathy Finlayson's plains cattle enterprise, Allan expressed his frustration at the number of farmers practicing a luke warm version of HM - saying results will only come if farmers adopt an extreme version of grazing management: smaller paddocks, bigger herds, more impact, more response. Allan is convinced that agriculture holds the key to the triple crises of Climate Change, Desertification and Biodiversity. Soil is degenerating and holding less rainfall. Agriculture is more dangerous than fossil fuels, he says. We are a desert-making species. Only animals correctly used in the landscape can save us: "We have no option." He excoriated those who are vilifying animals such as cattle and sheep, based on mistaken understanding of their role in the landscape. Allan urged his listeners to read Paul Gilding's book The Great Disruption in which Gilding advises that society be put on a war footing to meet the onslaught of Climate Change. The Carbon Farming Conference in Dubbo NSW on 28-29 September, 2011 will address these issues.

Graham Finlayson explaining his wagonwheel system of paddocks radiating out like a pizza from a central watering point.