Assessing soil based solutions to carbon management

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Globally, 50% of the carbon fixed by photosynthesis cycles back into the atmosphere via the soil. However, mean residence times for non-living organic matter in soil are long (decades) compared to that of atmospheric CO2 (years). The world's soils consequently contain two to three times as much carbon and good soil management is vital for both greenhouse gas balance and, potentially, climate change mitigation. Theoretically soil-stored carbon can be increased by: putting more carbon in (increasing NPP), putting it deeper in the soil, or possibly managing soil disturbance or 'quality' of plant inputs in a way that retards breakdown. Cropping perennial biomass crops on land formerly used for grain production is likely to affect each of these parameters. Further, producing bioenergy from biomass pyrolysis offers an opportunity to genuinely sequester a portion of carbon in agricultural by-products into the soil as the recalcitrant char by-product (biochar), whose natural analogues have a residence time of 1000 to 10000 yrs. Since biochar also appears to moderate water dynamics and both gaseous and leaching losses of N, it has the potential to very significantly alter the greenhouse gas balance of arable agriculture, at the same time as maintaining physical benefits usually associated with more labile organic matter fractions.

Objectives:
1. Evaluate the trajectory of carbon in soils planted from arable to perennial biomass crops, and the contrasting physical distribution of this carbon within the soil and with respect to depth.
2. Gain a mechanistic description of the processes involved in the above by integrating soil physical fractionation techniques with allied models, focusing particularly on root-soil interactions.
3. Conduct a systematic evaluation of biochar research needs relevant to various 'models' of implementation.
4. Evaluate the dynamics of root carbon in biochar-enriched soil using integrated measurement-modelling approaches.

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