Monitoring, Measuring, Mitigating: Performance-Based Conservation Programs to Reduce Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sequester Carbon

Remarks by Bruce I. Knight, Chief,
Natural Resources Conservation Service,
at the
USDA Symposium on Natural Resource
Management to Offset Greenhouse Gasses

Raleigh, NC
November 20, 2002

It’s an honor to be here tonight. I’d like to thank Steve McNulty of the Forest Service for hosting us here in Raleigh. I think I can speak for all of the other USDA agencies that helped sponsor the Symposium and say that we appreciate all of the hard work you and your staff put into this event.

The issues facing agriculture are getting more and more complex every day. Farmers know very well that forces outside the farm gate can often have greater impacts on a farm than what happens from fence-row to fence-row. A problem like climate change is an excellent example. The decisions we make about climate change will certainly have implications for farmers, as well as forest land owners.

I’d like to re-enforce what you have probably heard at this meeting. As we face these challenges, we will be counting on science to inform our decisions. It is not a stretch to say that the work being presented at this symposium is important to the future of the world, of our nation, and our agricultural lands.

Each of these three areas of importance – the world, our nation, and our agricultural lands – causes our leaders and our citizens to look at a different aspect of the greenhouse gas issue.

In world terms, we know that gases produced on one continent or in one country have an effect everywhere. The world looks to highly productive nations such as the United States to curb their emissions of greenhouse gasses, while we all recognize that increasing emissions in the developing world is a serious problem. That kind of international debate is not new to agriculture. We have long dealt with similar issues when it comes to commodity trading. We are also now dealing with these issues as they relate to environmental protection.

In national terms, we have the same realization that gases produced in one sector have an effect in other parts of the country and around the world. In industries such as manufacturing and energy, and between states and regions, the debate over environmental responsibility has been intense and is getting more intense every year. Concentration of industries in one area produces problems that affect concentrations of the human population in other areas.

In this country, we already see this kind of geographic concentration and dispersal of environmental problems in such agricultural industries as confined animal feeding operations and intensive crop production. The importance of greenhouse gas emissions on agriculture in this country is a comparatively recent issue, but it has become an important part of our agenda at NRCS and in the Department of Agriculture. President Bush has set an ambitious agenda for reducing greenhouse gasses. He challenged USDA to recommend targeted incentives for greenhouse gas offsets from agriculture and forests. He also challenged us to help the Department of Energy in setting up a new and improved registry for crediting private sector actions to offset reductions in greenhouse gases.


Reducing Emissions and the Economics of Agriculture

While we work to reduce agricultural greenhouse gas emissions, we must always remember the important place of agriculture in our society. People eat food, and someone has to produce it. In this country, we are blessed with the most productive agricultural economy in the world. We not only feed ourselves, but we help feed the world.

We need to find ways to encourage our farmers and ranchers to reduce greenhouse emissions while strengthening our agricultural economy. The focus on our working lands must remain the production of food and fiber. The technologies and systems for reducing emissions or sequestering carbon must be compatible with production systems. For example, I use no-till on my farm in South Dakota, both for production reasons and for conservation reasons. Another example is the compatibility between production and emission control represented by methane digesters.

Although the costs of implementing these technologies and practices fall on the landowner, many of the benefits go to the public. So, to keep agriculture strong, we must find ways for landowners to recoup many of the costs. That means finding ways to place a value on the benefits our farmers and ranchers produce and creating a market for those benefits. Creating such a market for environmental benefits is impossible if we do not know what indicators to monitor and how to measure them.

Direct measurement of greenhouse gas emissions on a large scale is a difficult challenge. But, measurement technologies are vital to identifying key indicators of environmental goods and services. Integrating measurement technologies into monitoring systems is key -- not only to determining performance of existing systems – but to evaluating new practices and management systems.

In addition, development of mitigation strategies will depend on our ability to measure greenhouse gasses across a variety of scales. Putting proven research behind these three things – monitoring, measuring, and mitigating – is the difficult job you as scientists have taken on.


Relying on Scientists for the Science

As the nation’s lead agency for conservation on private lands, NRCS has a very limited research mission. Our primary mission is to help landowners conserve, maintain, and improve our natural resources and environment. We help landowners assess the situation on their lands and develop conservation goals. We set the standards for conservation practices. And, yes, we administer government programs that help landowners and communities reach their conservation goals.

We rely on proven research to achieve our mission. While NRCS is a science-based agency, we rely on other USDA agencies, such as the Agricultural Research Service and the Cooperative State Research, Education, and Extension Service, and on academic and industry scientists to perform much of the research that puts the science behind our conservation practices.

Our scientists and experts are charged with putting the science into practice. That is why the work you are doing here in Raleigh this week and our long-term cooperation with you is so important. And why I am so pleased to be here with you tonight to encourage you in your important work.


What Conservationists Need from Scientists

I am also happy to be here tonight because it gives me a chance to give you my ideas about what a conservation agency such as NRCS needs from the research community to keep our work with landowners on a sound scientific footing.

Tonight, I want to talk about our need for proven research in three areas with regard to greenhouse gas emissions and carbon sequestration – monitoring, measuring and mitigating. These three “M”s are the keys to trading credits in greenhouse gas emissions.


Monitoring and Measuring

We need to know more precisely which agricultural practices and systems produce greenhouse gasses and how much, so that we can look back in 20 years and see that we made a difference.

We must develop and improve upon our water quality track record as we work on greenhouse gases, so that we can track the impacts of improved agriculture practices on greenhouse gases emissions and sequestration. We can’t monitor everything, but we have to be able to measure the critical system components and link them appropriately. In short, we need to monitor the right things at the right place at the right time.

Monitoring systems should be closely and clearly linked to the needs of landowners and managers who must make resource management decisions, as well as the needs of policy officials who must also make resource management decisions. It does little good to monitor, or worse yet, ask producers to monitor, if there is not a decision based on the output of the monitoring.

For example, monitoring indicators of methane emissions from grazing livestock has to be tied to changes in forage or herd management that can be implemented by a producer within the context of a profitable operation.

We also need good science to point out and keep track of all of the benefits of various conservation practices, whether for reducing greenhouse gas emissions or achieving other goals. For example, many of our practices to control erosion and improve water quality have the extra benefit of sequestering carbon in the soil. Many of the practices we implemented under existing animal waste programs also have the extra benefit of sequestering carbon.

We need to look at all aspects of the environment at the same time, including soil, water, air, plants, and animals, and use an integrated approach to see how the elements fit together. For example, we need to know the effects of using crop residues for biomass versus leaving it in the field.

We need good baseline figures in all areas.

We need more workable measurement systems if we ever hope to develop a greenhouse gas trading market. Realistically, agriculture and forestry offset projects will work best as part of a portfolio with multiple benefits to the environment. Look at the anaerobic digester as an example: Credits from methane reduction benefits, on their own, may not support an investment in this technology. But combine those credits with other benefits – like public goals for water quality, odor, and air pollutants – and the whole package may well support applying the technology on a larger scale.

And now that we’ve built the concept, we need to build confidence. Companies are understandably reluctant to invest in forest and agriculture offsets without reliable estimates of the benefits of land management practices. Our charge is to take down the barrier of doubt, confusion, and uncertainty. In fact, President Bush has said, “Our government will … move forward … to create world-class standards for measuring and registering emission reductions.”

To realize the heart of the President’s plan transferable credits – we need a first-class reporting system that’s clear, consistent, and credible. The greenhouse gas registry, after all, will be the marketplace where companies looking for lower-cost offsets will get reduction credits from farmers and others who have met the registry’s criteria.

The way we see it, for this crediting system to work, the reporting guidelines must be straightforward and practical. They must be simple enough to use, offer technical support to make sure they’re adopted, and generate confidence in the reported actions. USDA will host two meetings in January as we develop guidelines for agriculture and forestry offsets that will stand behind the accuracy of the registry.

We recognize as we move forward that there are many open questions. This is as it should be. Many of these questions can be addressed with the help of the scientific community. But our objectives are clear.

While nations can pass laws, they cannot suspend the laws of economics. The measurements must not cost more than the commodity. And, until we can accurately measure the commodity, whether it is sequestered carbon or reduced nitrous oxide emissions, the value of the commodity will be heavily discounted to the point that it has no value.

Policy design, program assessment, and program management are all important components of a successful greenhouse gas management strategy, but it is unlikely that one model, instrument, technique, or practice is going to work in every situation. The challenge is to integrate technologies into a realistic system.

Measuring changes in carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide in agricultural soils and vegetation and methane from grazing livestock are non-point source problems, similar to those we encountered with water quality. Measuring these slow rates of change across vast amounts of land will present a major challenge. On the other hand, methane and nitrous oxide emissions from manure handling systems will be much easier to measure, because they are similar to point sources.

Interpretation of measures is also important. Because we are so agriculturally productive, we cannot view our production of greenhouse gasses in absolute terms. It is probably a better idea for us to find ways to measure greenhouse gas production per unit of agricultural production.

Some of the basic science may not appear at first to be very useful, but I am confident that developments in computation, network communications, and other areas will produce important advances in estimating greenhouse gases.

NRCS has a direct interest in the development of monitoring systems and indicators. This is probably the area that will demand the most collaboration across agencies and disciplines if we are to achieve meaningful results.


Mitigating

While there continues to be discussion within the scientific community on the rate and timing of climate change, the concerns for agriculture are best summarized as: Mitigating the impact of change on farmers and identifying the role of farmers in mitigating greenhouse gases.

There has been a well-deserved focus on carbon sequestration. However, methane and nitrous oxide from agriculture are significant sources of greenhouse gas emissions. Nitrogen is the most potent of the greenhouse gasses and the one where agriculture changes can contribute the most, yet there is little in the way of models or quantitative data. Plus, these other gasses represent an opportunity for farmers to benefit economically.

We need good science to figure out how to balance our efforts appropriately among the various greenhouse gasses. The goal of all our efforts is to develop socially, ecologically, and economically feasible management recommendations.

It is not possible for research to examine every potential mitigation option, so we must be flexible enough to determine which new practices have value. I encourage more researcher involvement with locally led demonstration and pilot projects that involve producers and conservation groups to develop new ways to solve problems. In addition, we need research that helps us further understand the interrelationships between conservation and management systems on our soil, air, water, animals, and plants, while mitigating greenhouse gases.

The history of the agricultural air quality issue thus far is an example. For non-scientists, it is tempting to see a clear example of degraded air quality, then look at some industrial or agricultural practice going on nearby, and then assert that there is a cause and effect relationship between the practice and the poor air quality, and that controlling the practice will improve the air quality.

Without proven research, we cannot justify making that kind of connection, or placing a burden on landowners to take actions that may or may not solve the problem. And there is societal pressure to move out ahead of the research. To make educated guesses about the effects of practices. The science simply needs to catch up and move ahead.

In states like California and Arizona, the air quality challenges are so severe that all of government is probably implementing solutions well ahead of the science. We need for the science to catch up, so future actions can be taken in ways that are supported by the knowledge base.


Two Futures

I want to compare two quite different futures for agriculture when it comes to reducing greenhouse gas emissions. One is the future under regulation, and the other is the future under voluntary conservation. Experience shows us that either future is possible. Let me explain why I think a voluntary approach probably is better for all of us.

First, let’s look at the future under regulation.

The regulatory approach focuses first on the problem – in this case, greenhouse gasses. Our own leaders and citizens, as well as leaders and concerned people around the world want the United States to do more to reduce greenhouse emissions.

Efforts such as the Kyoto Accords are global attempts to address problems through an approach that is essentially regulatory in nature. The Kyoto approach sets goals that are not fully linked to science and invites governments and scientists to come up with ways to meet the goals.

Given the uncertainties that remain regarding climate change, approaches like those taken in the Kyoto Accords are getting ahead of the science.

Regulatory approaches have real costs, and, these costs are not necessarily borne equally. In the case of greenhouse gasses, developing countries don’t have commitments under the Kyoto Protocol and won’t incur the costs. Another consideration is that regulations can remove incentives for innovation. Under regulation, industries tend to adopt the goal of meeting the standards, rather than to find new and better ways to get the job done.

We have seen this approach in the management of animal waste. Animal waste is an important problem. Our nation adopted a regulatory approach to solving the problem, and we have seen unintended results both in this country and abroad. Regulations in the livestock industry controlled waste, but created a methane problem. Economic forces, coupled with the need to meet regulatory requirements, accelerated consolidation of the livestock feeding industry.

Production shifted from state to state, driven largely by market and state regulatory forces. During this time, production has also moved out of the country, to areas where there was less regulation. One unintended result of this approach is the clearing of huge areas of land in other parts of the world, such as the Cerrado in Brazil, to produce soybeans. Another result is less production and fewer jobs – in this country, as parts of the livestock industry move to avoid regulation.

Fortunately, with growing cooperation between Federal agencies and the passage of the new farm bill, we are beginning to make it more economical for domestic producers to do their job and meet regulatory requirements. But we have a long way to go before we bring economics and conservation into the proper alignment in the livestock industry.

The other future is the future under voluntary conservation.

In this future, farmers and industry act voluntarily to implement solutions to problems. Secretary Veneman has pointed out that American farmers and ranchers have a strong conservation ethic. In her words, “We all know that farmers are the best stewards of the land.”

The Natural Resources Conservation Service bases its entire philosophy on the conservation ethic of producers. We have seen what producers have done voluntarily to reduce soil loss, improve water quality, and improve wildlife habitat.

The key to success in our voluntary approach is to base our actions on proven research – both environmental and economic. Proven research gives groups like NRCS and its partners in conservation the chance to use outreach and education. We use the science to make producers more aware of what they can contribute to the solution and how they can benefit from doing so.

Proven research also gives NRCS what it needs to come up with practice standards and set program priorities to address the problem. In the voluntary approach, we use proven research to motivate producers and to provide high quality technical assistance. We keep regulations “lean and local,” and leave most decisions to local leaders and local producers.

We develop voluntary partnerships to provide leadership, funding, and expertise to get the job done. Whenever possible, we use market mechanisms to attain desired results. These results include more conservation on the land and a stronger agriculture industry in our own country, coupled with less environmental degradation abroad.

We need to integrate economic incentives and management systems in a practical way. Farmers and ranchers are practical people and respond well when good conservation is linked to good economics. In my own operation, I crossbreed Tarentaise with Angus because I get growth and muscle, marketability and flavor, and at the same time better feed conversion and waste management. That is a win-win on my farm.

The voluntary approach will work best if we create win-win, incentive based tools. On a policy level, we should be looking for ways to leverage public and private resources. For example, cost-share programs for erosion and water quality could be combined with private credits for carbon dioxide and nitrous oxide reductions.

These incentives should be additive, rather than mutually exclusive. This approach would allow us to use multiple incentives to get the results we need.


Conclusion

In conclusion, let me say that we are fortunate to have so many top scientists and scientific organizations working with USDA as we meet the challenges in front of us. Your efforts will produce the proven research we need to monitor greenhouse gas emissions, measure and place a value on the contributions made by producers to solving the problem, and help us set standards for practices that really do provide mitigation.

Your work is important to every aspect of the challenge of greenhouse gas emissions and carbon sequestration. I thank you for your efforts, and I wish you success. With your contributions, we can solve these problems in a future based on voluntary conservation. Without your contributions, we would have to live with whatever a future based on regulation might bring.

Thank you.