Corners for Conservation. Some resources for carbon sequestration in Agriculture/farming. Per CPW, here’s your chance to “Shape the Future of Outdoors”.
Corners for Conservation
I forget how, but I ended up going down a rabbit hole reading up on CPW’s Corners For Conservation program.
It started with the first link below, which details what a local (Eastern Plains--local to me) dryland farmer was doing with his field corners.
Let’s back up a quick step in case you’re not familiar. The term “corner” can sometimes refer to a literal corner of a field, as in the diagram heading this post; it can be the area of a farmer’s field untouched by center pivot irrigation. Corner can also mean a part of a dryland field where the farmer chooses to not sow crops whether that’s in the middle or along a road or what have you.
As a quick side note, field corners relating to the areas not touched by center pivot irrigation are a topic I’ve written about a fair bit before. The second and third links below cover water buy ups in the Lower Arkansas River Valley where places like Colorado Springs have bought up the water farmers used to use for flood irrigation in the corners of their fields by buying some water and helping the farmer pay for center pivot irrigation.
Back to corners for conservation, the CPW essay linked first below covers the author’s visit--alongside a CPW small game manager--to a dryland farm where the farmer has partnered with CPW to find plants to put into the corners of his field. The plants flower, providing food and shelter for wildlife and pollinators. Quail and pheasant were specifically mentioned. CPW, and interestingly the Nature Conservancy, partners with growers to provide seeds and guidance for making wildlife habitat in field corners.
This struck me as an interesting program, yet another way in which to showcase how agriculture fits in with nature, and not in opposition to it.** This is also a much better use for field corners, frankly, than what I’ve seen of the water buy ups in the Lower Arkansas Valley.
If it’s an interest, give it a look. There are some related links at the bottom of the page where you can read up some more if you’d like.
**Not even in the same ballpark as commercial, production Ag, but I’ve given over quite a bit of real estate in my small fruit empire to plants that support pollinators and birds. Some of this is for pretty and to keep abundant life around me, but some of it is practical as pollinators increase yields and birds are on patrol for insects.
Some resources for carbon sequestration in Agriculture/farming
I’ve written a few times about the State Land Board and (what I think will be) a push to use carbon sequestration on public lands as a way to drum up money.
After thinking about it for a bit, I realized that perhaps a quick primer and some resources about carbon sequestration on land would be in order.** I put three links below as resources.
The first is an article from Successful Farming magazine on various conservation credits (including carbon). The second is a congress.gov article on carbon sequestration credits. This latter covers more than just carbon credits for farms; it’s a good general resource on taxes and carbon credits. The third link is an article on carbon credits written by an environmentalist economics journal.
I won’t go link by link and give a run down on each, rather, I want to highlight various important points to note about carbon sequestration on land, pulling from the various links as I go.
The first important thing to note is right there at the top of link 1. The idea of conservation programs on Ag land is not terribly new. Conservation Reserve Programs (CRP) are a government run program where the government pays growers to take land and, skipping lots of detail, put it in reserve. The land is not planted with crops nor grazed, but is not permanently taken out of production either. It is conserved, but the option to return the land to production is there. CRP’s have been, according to the first link, around since the 1980s.
Quoting from the first link, CRP’s provide “... for an emergency reserve of hay and grazing opportunity in times of drought or other weather events.”
Contrast this with a carbon sequestration lease. Besides being a lease/easement that private entities can engage in, these types of agreements are much more involved, the terms might be more rigid and proscribed, they might take away any option of production, and they often require measurement.
In fact, many private entities for these types of agreements follow the government’s lead in spelling out specific metrics. The second link, the one on tax policy, gives a sense of what the government wants for carbon sequestration tax credits. Private entities might differ in details, but the themes would be the same. You have to measure the amount of carbon you take out of the system, and no double dipping.
Quoting that link:
“The amount that a taxpayer may claim as a Section 45Q tax credit is computed per metric ton of qualified carbon oxide captured and sequestered (before 2018, the tax credit was exclusively for CO2). For the purposes of the tax credit, qualified carbon oxide is a carbon oxide that would have been released into the atmosphere if not for the qualifying equipment. The amount of the credit, as well as various features of the credit, depend on when the qualifying capture equipment is placed in service (Table 1). The taxpayer has to repay the tax credit (credit recapture) to the Treasury if the carbon oxide ceases to be captured, disposed of, or used in a qualifying manner (i.e., if it escapes into the atmosphere). To claim a tax credit, the carbon oxide emissions must be measured at the point of capture as well as at the point of disposal, injection, or other use.”
The third link is a good primer on the market for carbon sequestration. Carbon sequestration is a product. It can be sold either as carbon indulgences to wipe away your carbon emission sins, or as a “feel good” item you can impress potential customers and/or investors with.
This is, in fact (see the fourth link below for an earlier newsletter), exactly what our state land board is dipping their beaks into now. Taking state lands, and leasing them out for carbon sequestration via plantings.
From what I gather reading from this link, there seems to be a bit of a problem in the carbon sequestration market right now. I’m not sure how much this holds for any deals in this state, including those conceived by the State Land Board, but the problem relates to what we discussed above: verification. Who’s going to do it? Are they reliable? Are they willing to do it for a price that makes the numbers work?
Remember that, government or private, you can’t just toss some seeds around and hold your hand out for money. Getting tax credits and qualifying for agreements means measurable amounts of carbon removed from the atmosphere, not hope.
Further, how long do these deals take to pay off? How long does it take before these things start earning money because verifiable carbon removal may take years (”a decade” is what’s mentioned in the link)?
Let me wrap this up by way of an analogy. Let’s say there was a business which was renovating a building for its new office. The time comes to choose the heating system.
The business could opt for a boiler that they knew worked, that they knew they could get parts for, and one for which they could reasonably estimate costs and service lifetime.
Alternatively, they could invest in (and let’s even assume some tax credits here) a new technology that promised way lower operating costs when it was paid off. A technology which had no known operating lifetime and maintenance costs. A technology which was new enough that specialists would be required for design and/or repair.
If I had to bet my lunch, I’d bet the company would take the former. If it were a government operation, I’d bet my lunch they’d take the latter. Government agencies, playing with other people’s money and seeing more value in appearing to be at the forefront, tend to take those kinds of deals.
I can’t help but wonder if carbon leases will be like that. If I were a farmer, depending on the terms of a carbon sequestration lease, I think I’d be apt to see it like the fancy new heating system. It has the potential to pay off, but it’s a big gamble. In analogy with the above, I wonder if we’ll see more carbon land sequestration deals from government agencies like the State Land Board. They love risks like that. Makes them look good.
It’ll be interesting to see how it comes out.
If you spotted something notable I didn’t cover or didn’t flesh out in enough detail for you, please feel free to add to the comments.
**Note: there are many ways to sequester carbon, including not only vegetation on land but also in deep wells underground. I am only going to touch on the vegetation here.
https://www.agriculture.com/crps-and-carbon-programs-what-s-the-difference-8363606
https://www.congress.gov/crs-product/IF11455#:~:text=$40.89%20per%20Metric%20Ton%20of,adjusted%20for%20inflation%20after%202026.
https://www.ecosystemmarketplace.com/articles/market-fixers-the-new-economics-of-carbon-credit-creation/
https://open.substack.com/pub/coloradoaccountabilityproject/p/heads-up-in-greeley-colorado-state?r=15ij6n&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web&showWelcomeOnShare=false
Per CPW, here’s your chance to “Shape the Future of Outdoors”
Created by a 2021 law (see the first link below), CPW houses an Outdoor Equity Grant Program. I have written about this program before and won’t retread that ground here.
What I want to relay here is that there is a vacancy on that board. This vacancy is your chance to get involved and bring your much-needed perspective to one of the multitude of state boards we have.
Don’t just complain about the direction this state is taking. Light a candle instead of cursing the darkness and put in an application to be a part of this board.
I put a link to the application second below.
https://leg.colorado.gov/bills/hb21-1318
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1FAIpQLScoPDTlgHRl9duWk4kBcm_4roC72uc1XXz9YXPn57n4mhLYAw/viewform