For a long time, farmers have known that soil organic matter helps improve soil quality. It increases the water-holding capacity of soil and enhances friability and the nutrient content of the soil. Organic matter is the crucial element that affects the chemical, physical, and biological properties of the soil, ensuring its proper function, on which human society depends.
Soil organic matter helps to reduce erosion and improves soil structure, causing better water quality in groundwater and surface waters. Therefore, it ensures food security and reduces negative impacts on the ecosystem. Carbon is one of the most crucial elements of soil organic matter. Now the question is, what makes soil carbon sequestration in the USA so crucial? We shall discuss this in the following section of the blog.
Why Soil Carbon Sequestration in the USA Is So Crucial?
The primary reason for soil carbon sequestration is to avoid the dangerous effects of climate change. It is imperative to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. However, strategies like storing carbon emissions from biofuel-burning power plants or planting forests to absorb carbon have their problems. If used on a large scale, they would need too much land, water, and energy, or they could be costly.
Soil carbon sequestration in the USA is a natural way to reduce carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. It has much less impact on land and water, requires less energy, and is not as expensive. Better land management and agricultural practices will also increase soils’ capability to capture and store carbon, helping to deal with global warming. Figuring out the best ways to enhance soil carbon storage is crucial.
Source: Freepik
The Earth Is Losing Carbon:
How much carbon the soil can absorb and how long it can be stored will vary according to the location. It is effectively determined by the land management practices. A significant section of the land that can support plant life on earth has been converted to croplands, pastures, and rangelands. Thus, soils have lost 50 to 70% of the carbon that they once held. Agricultural practices that disturb the soil, like tilling, planting mono-crops, removing the crop residue, use of fertilizers and pesticides, and over-grazing, expose the carbon in the soil to oxygen, allowing it to burn off in the atmosphere—also, deforestation, thawing permafrost, and draining of peatlands cause the soil to release carbon.
How Soil Stores Carbon?
As the plants respire, they return carbon dioxide to the atmosphere and exude carbon as a sugary substance through the roots. The secretion feeds the microbes that live underground. When the plants die, soil microbes break down the carbon compounds and use them for metabolism and growth, respiring some carbon back into the atmosphere. Since microbial decomposition releases carbon dioxide, the soil can store more carbon when protected from microbial activity. One way that can happen is through the formation of soil aggregates.
This occurs when the tiny particles of soil clump together, preventing carbon particles from entering. Mycorrhizal fungi produce sticky compounds that help in soil aggregation and can transfer carbon into the soil. Soils with high clay content can also form chemical bonds protecting carbon from microbes. These aggregates offer the proper structure to the soil, which is crucial for healthy plant growth.
Soils Can Sequester Carbon:
According to a study, better soil management can increase a cropland’s capability to retain 1.85 gigatons of carbon yearly. This is equivalent to what the global transportation sector emits every year. Soils will continue to sequester carbon for 20 to 40 years before they can be saturated. Most of the crops are annual. So, after harvest, the fields are left bare. If the crop residue is left in the ground or cover crops that are not to be harvested, it can compensate for the carbon losses from tillage by putting more carbon into the soil.
Crop rotation and the use of diverse crops, especially those with deeper roots like perennials, add more varied biomass to the soil—thus more carbon. When tillage is reduced, soil carbon is not exposed to oxygen, and soil aggregates stay intact, preventing carbon.
Rotational grazing helps keep carbon in the soil by shifting the herds to new pastures after grazing. This allows the old ones to regrow, and carbon in the form of manure is spread out.
Manure and compost increase soil productivity and the formation of stable carbon, which can remain in the soil for decades. By restoring soil with natural sources of organics that support beneficial microbes and improve plant growth, plants will flourish and draw carbon from the atmosphere. The plants will grow at a more robust rate, drawing CO2 rapidly.
Soil carbon sequestration in the USA requires you to have complete and accurate details of your soil. Let us help you with that. Visit – https://soiloptix.com/ to get your soil tested.
