Upland agricultural systems for sheep and beef enterprises cover approximately 141,000ha, or 14%, of agricultural land in Northern Ireland. While soil primary productivity and food production (£/ha) is higher for more intensive lowland farming, the other four soil functions (nutrient cycling, carbon sequestration, water regulation and biodiversity) are more prominent in upland systems. However, upland farming on peatlands has provided modern challenges based on historical land management. Even with large stores, carbon sequestration and water regulation in the uplands can be impacted, for example, by (historical) land drainage on peatlands (Grand-Clement et al., 2013). Furthermore, extreme events can induce feedbacks between wetting and drying cycles and alter the carbon balance (Dhillon and Inamdar, 2013).
Previous upland research indicates that restoration of drained areas can offset some carbon losses, although there is some ambiguity on the scale of effectiveness (Wilson et al., 2011; Turner et al., 2013). Carbon flux in the uplands should be placed into context with expected emissions factors used in land use accounting, and with other agricultural sectors in Northern Ireland. For example, IPCC Tier 2 emission factors used in Northern Ireland agriculture are not generally based on domestic studies, and can be bluntly applied to heterogenous land management units (Peter et al., 2016). At the scale of the hill farm, information is required to test expected gaseous emissions over different sub-environments (deep peat, shallow peat, wet grassland, etc.), and during different conditions such as drought periods.
Even with high-temporal resoluation gas monitoring (CO2/CH4), there are important knowledge gaps on the magnitude and seasonality of gas emissions spatially (e.g., different ecotopes and areas in different phases of degradation/restoration), and which can aid in validating more remotely sensed data (e.g., Lees et al., 2021). Such knowledge is important to upland agriculture as policy seeks to maximise soil functions as public goods, and which can be developed into results-based ecosystems’ services payment schemes.
This proposal will investigate gaseous emission knowledge gaps in the context of a 1,000ha hill farm research platform in Northern Ireland (in collaboration with the College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise), where greenhouse gas emissions are monitored continuously at a flux tower site.
The aim of the proposal is to assess upland gas dynamics to aid in the development of results-based ecosystems services schemes. The experimental objectives are to:
Assess the use of a mobile gas analyser for spatial investigations of CO2 and CH4 emissions in upland areas.
Compare spatial gas emissions over peatland and other ecotopes compared with static higher resolution measurements.
Compare gas emissions from peatlands under different stages of restoration.
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