Isra-Mart srl: New scheme calculates grain’s carbon emissions

Isra-Mart srl news:

FARMWAY, in conjunction with energy consultants, FiveBarGate, has recently launched ‘Farming Footprints’ a service using the farmer’s own input data to calculate carbon emissions per tonne of grain, for each consignment of grain or even each individual field.

Richard Martin, Farmway, says: “Under the Fuel Quality Directive biofuel producing companies are obliged to use feedstock from ‘sustainable sources.’ Currently they are able to use standard or default values whereby all UK produced grain is considered acceptable.

“But this is likely to change in the future. High yielding, efficiently grown crops have a better carbon balance than others and this will be of value to oil producers, who will have to prove the sustainability of their feedstock to gain credits from the government.

“Many farmers are able to produce at values far better than standard, but are not being rewarded for doing so. By being able to produce a carbon efficiency certificate for each consignment the farmer should be able to negotiate carbon value in a transaction separate from the supply of grain.”

To become involved farmers need to register with Farming Footprints and provide farm and field data, such as fertiliser, chemicals, seed rate and cultivations.

As well as providing the farmer with information about his carbon performance, he will also be able to compare his performance to that of others in a similar area or soil type.

Simple graphs are produced to show his carbon footprint in relation to other fields in the area. This information can be used to compare things such as nitrogen use and variety choice in a completely confidential way.