The James Hutton Institute
This page is no longer updated. The Macaulay Land Use Research Institute joined forces with SCRI on 1 April 2011 to create The James Hutton Institute.
THE STATE OF SCOTLAND'S FARMED ENVIRONMENT 2005
10. SCOTTISH AGRICULTURE AND CLIMATE CHANGE
MANAGING THE SOILS OF SCOTLAND
The soils of Scotland contain the bulk of the UK soil carbon pool. It is estimated that 13.6% (>1 m ha) of Scotland ’s land surface is overlain by deep peat soils. This represents about 5000 tonnes of carbon stored per hectare or about 10 times the equivalent stored in the mineral soils which are more common in England . Taken together, the carbon stored in the deep peats and the shallower peaty soils of Scotland is about 170 times more than stored in all the vegetation of Scotland (Milne and Brown, 1997). Soil carbon can be lost either through climate change or as a consequence of inappropriate land management (e.g. drainage of deep peats). Either would have major effects in relation to added GHG emissions. Biological mitigation can occur via 3 routes:
- conservation of the existing soil carbon pools
- sequestration by increasing the size of the carbon pools
- substitution of sustainably produced biological products (e.g. use of timber rather than concrete or biofuels for heat and power)
The ERDC recommended that there should be more research on the processes of GHG release from Scottish soils and the potential for mitigating GHG emissions, and to use this to develop a co-ordinated soil protection strategy (Scottish Parliament, 2005).
The greatest potential for mitigating future GHG emissions from UK soils lies with Scottish agriculture and forestry. Policy for these areas is wholly devolved.
ROLE OF AGRICULTURE >>