A new AHDB-led pilot in the UK has found that soil carbon on farms could be 30% higher than current estimates. The project sampled over 5,000 fields across 178 farms, taking cores up to one meter deep. It found that 95% of farm carbon is in the soil, with deep peat soils in the Cambridgeshire Fens and Somerset Levels holding over 600 tonnes per hectare. This challenges standard methods that only measure to 30 cm depth and could affect how farm carbon is valued in environmental schemes. The pilot also used LiDAR to assess above-ground carbon in trees and hedges, though that accounted for only 5% of total carbon. Each farm completed a carbon audit to identify emission reduction actions. The data is being reviewed by a new scientific advisory group. The findings suggest current carbon accounting may miss a significant portion of stored carbon, which has implications for carbon credit markets and net zero targets in agriculture.
