Mention carbon capture and visions of large scale projects aimed at skimming CO2 from coal plant plumes and burying it deep underground come to mind.
Rangeland makes up 31% of the nation's land and soils holds three times more carbon as the atmosphere
But there are simpler and potentially more effective ways to sequester carbon and help restore the earth’s natural, pre-industrial atmospheric balance. One getting more attention these days can best be described as soil sequestration.
Cropland and rangeland in the United States are a net carbon sink that annually filter about 18 percent of fossil fuel carbon emissions and store it in leaves, roots, wood and soil. Much of this benefit has come as the nation has re-grown its forests.
So what about expanding the effort to the 31 percent of the U.S. that is rangeland? (Rangeland make up about half the planet’s surface worldwide.) Doing so would offset 3.3 percent of the country’s CO2 fossil fuel emissions, according to a report by the Environmental Defense Fund.
The big gain comes because soil holds three times as much carbon as the atmosphere. Looked at differently, one ton of carbon stored in the soil removes 3.67 tons from the atmosphere.
If rangelands were re-forested or simply seeded with shrubs and brush, the nation would get a boost in the fight against global warming. But since about half the rangeland in the U.S. is owned by the government and most is used for grazing by ranchers, the politics are likely beyond reach.
That’s unless financial incentives are used. What if the re-vegetated lands were offered emissions reduction credits that could be bought and sold under a cap-and-trade bill, the defense fund asks?
Such a scheme might work. Dollars talk and ranchers might consider re-growth a simple way to make money. It also might shrink the nation’s beef industry, also a plus in a climate change fight.
