Taking excess carbon out of the atmosphere, where it is driving climate change, and locking it into the soil, where it improves its health and agronomic productivity, is the impetus behind a new five-year, $15 million project at The Ohio State University.
Funding for the project comes from a $5 million grant from the Washington, D.C.-based Foundation for Food & Agriculture Research and about $10 million in matching contributions from Ohio State, commodity groups, industry and other donors. The project will measure how much organic and inorganic carbon gets sequestered in the soil under different farming practices in key regions across the western hempishere.
What science knows about carbon sequestration, says Rattan Lal, Ohio State Distinguished University Professor of Soil Science, has mostly come from simulation modeling carried out on computers, along with a limited number of experiments in the field.
Read more at: Ohio State University
Soil scientist Rattan Lal is principal investigator of the project, titled “Enhanced Soil Carbon Farming as a Climate Solution.” (Photo Credit: Ken Chamberlain, CFAES)