Role of Carbon in Agriculture

Role of Carbon in Agriculture

Using the six hotspots on graphic below, investigate how carbon flows through and is stored in an agroecosystem

❓Check your knowledge!

Describe the pathways through which carbon is transformed: 

a. [Water, Oxygen, Methane, or Carbon dioxide] is converted into carbohydrates by plants through the process of photosynthesis.

b. Organic carbon is converted into CO2 through [respiration, fermentation, photosynthesis, methanogenesis] of plants, animals and microbes.

c. Organic carbon is converted into [water, oxygen, methane, or carbon dioxide]  when biomass is burned

d. Low-oxygen environments like wetlands and ruminant stomachs lead to organic carbon being transformed into [water, oxygen, methane, or carbon dioxide] . 

e. When organic carbon is consumed by microbes or animals, some of that carbon is respired as [water, oxygen, methane, or carbon dioxide]  and some of it is incorporated as biomass. 

Identify the following statements as a way an agroecosystem can either build or lose carbon:

a. Tillage 

b. Reducing fallow frequency 

c. Establishing a windbreak 

d. High winds erode topsoil 

c. Anaerobic conditions of wetland 

Discussion board: If you have any questions throughout Module 1, please use the discussion board to below to post.

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Role of Carbon in Soil Health and Agricultural Productivity

Citations

(1) Soil Management Bank. Australian Soil Management. 2019. https://www.australiansoil.com.au/soil-management-benefits (2) Follett, R., Mooney, S., Morgan, J., Paustian, K., Allen Jr., L., Archibeque, S., … Robertson, G. (2011). Carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas fluxes in agriculture: challenges and opportunities. Ames: Council for Agricultural Science and Technology (CAST). (3)Paustian, K., Six, J., Elliott, E. et al. Management options for reducing CO2 emissions from agricultural soils. Biogeochemistry 48, 147–163 (2000). https://doi.org/10.1023/A:1006271331703(4)L. E. Flint, A. L. Flint, M. A. Stern, A. Myer, W. Silver, C. F. Casey, F. Franco, K. Byrd, B. Sleeter, P. Alvarez, J. Creque, T. Estrada and D. Cameron, California's Fourth Climate Change Assessment, Increasing soil organic carbon to mitigate greenhuose gases and increase climate resiliency, 2018.(5)  J. Lavelle, F. Cotrufo, Soil carbon is a valuable resource, but all soil carbon is not created equal. The Conversation (2020), (available at https://theconversation.com/soil-carbon-is-a-valuable-resource-but-all-soil-carbon-is-not-created-equal-129175). (6) The Keeling Curve. The Keeling Curve (2020), (available at https://scripps.ucsd.edu/programs/keelingcurve/). (7) B. Deluisi, ESRL Global Monitoring Laboratory - Education and Outreach. Esrl.noaa.gov (2020), (available at https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/education/carbon_toolkit/basics.html). (8) Jonathan Sanderman, Tomislav Hengi, and Gregory J. Fiske. 2017. Soil carbon debt of 12,000 years of human land use. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: Sep 2017, 114 (36) 9575-9580; DOI: 10.1073/pnas.1706103114(9)J. Hansen, M. Sato, P. Kharecha, K. V. Schuckmann, D. J.  Beerling, J. Cao, S. Marcott, V. Masson-Delmotte, M. J. Prather, E. J. Rohling, J. Shakun, P. Smith, A. Lacis, G. Russell and R. Ruedy, Earth System Dynamics, 2017, 8, 577–616.(10)Paustian, K., Lehmann, J., Ogle, S. et al. Climate-smart soils. Nature 532, 49–57 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nature17174 (11) Hansen, J et al. : Young people's burden: requirement of negative CO2 emissions, Earth Syst. Dynam., 8, 577–616, , 2017