I found in PAW’s April 2023 Climate Issue numerous references to carbon emissions effect on Earth’s air and water — but no reference to carbon sequestration in living soil. Earth’s soils have unlimited capacity to sequester carbon, hold water, and grow increasingly rich and dark while reversing desertification. Soil loss of carbon is of more concern than increase of carbon in the atmosphere.
Climate scientists talk about carbon sequestration, but they don’t actually do it. Carbon is sequestered by no-till farmers, ranchers engaged in planned rotational grazing, tropical gardeners planting food forests, permaculturists building swales and terraces to hold water in the soil, subsistence farmers Farming God’s Way, among the many effective techniques of regenerative agriculture. The Sahel, just south of the Sahara, has been re-greening in recent decades. Increases in CO2 favor enhanced plant growth.
When atmospheric carbon (the basis of photosynthesis) drops below 250 ppm, plant growth stops. (See Plant Responses to Low CO2 of the Past.) Greenhouses pump CO2 into their atmosphere to enhance plant growth. Atmospheric carbon rose to 6000-9000 ppm during the Ordovician Period when life thrived on this planet.
Conservative Princeton Association (CPA) is pleased to sponsor an event at Reunions 2023, Why Climate Change is Not an Emergency (May 27, 11 a.m., Lewis Library Room 138). Check your assumptions at the door!
Students and alumni are invited to join CPA’s lively discussion group for conservatives, libertarians and constitutionalists on Tigernet. Questions, email lindianne@snakerivermusicgardens.org.