CALIFORNIA
Field Crops A SPECIAL GROWERS’ REPORT OF AG ALERT ®
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Garrett Boudinot and Sophie Nasrallah of Cornell University sample soil amended with basalt rock dust in a corn field in Geneva, New York. The amendment may boost crop yields and capture carbon.
A common rock may be carbon solution for farming By Kathy Coatney
Some estimates suggest there is enough of the byproduct to cover the world’s agricultural land for several years, based on what’s already stockpiled, Boudinot said. “We find that with many of the crops we apply these amendments on, not only are we driving really high levels of carbon dioxide removal, but we’re also improving crop pro- ductivity,” Boudinot said. Aside from the calcium and magnesium that comes from the rocks, he said, there are lots of other plant macro- and micronutrients including potassium, nitrogen, phosphorus, boron, iron and zinc. Bowles Farming Co. in Los Banos is participating in the trials. The diversified oper- ation grows extra-long staple cotton, alfalfa, tomatoes, carrots, garlic, onions, herbs and nut crops. “We’re pretty involved in trialing all sorts of different things on the ranch, whether it’s regenerative ag practices, soil-health initiatives, biodiversity, even a native seed company,” said Derek Azevedo, executive vice president of Bowles Farming. He said the farm has a permitted compost site where it receives green waste from cities and make compost on the farm. Azevedo met with researcher Ben Houlton, who was then with UC Davis before mov- ing to Cornell University as a professor of ecology and biology. After an initial meeting
Research is being conducted on using pulverized basalt rock, which is high in calcium and magnesium, as a soil amendment to sequester carbon on farms. The studies are aimed at reducing carbon emissions and additionally improving soil health and crop yields. Carbon sequestering is a major component of the project, according to Garrett Boudinot, a research associate at the Atkinson Center for Sustainability at Cornell University. Boudinot is part of broad-based carbon studies involving multiple research entities, including the Working Lands Innovation Center at the University of California, Davis. In agricultural research, field tests using rock-dust applications to nourish soils are showing promise for capturing carbon and increasing yields for crops such as corn and alfalfa. Related studies, in California, New York, Illinois, Canada and Australia are testing the applications with soybeans, olive trees, sugarcane and hemp. “What this rock-dust amendment does is it converts the carbon dioxide into forms that aren’t going to turn back into carbon dioxide,” Boudinot said, adding the method would permanently remove the carbon dioxide. Basalt rocks are one of the most common rock types on the planet, Boudinot noted. “Basalt is present on every continent, so there’s lots of this to go around,” he said. “These basalts actually exist as already pulverized stockpiled reserves from byproducts of existing mining operations.”
See ROCK, Page 8
May 18, 2022 Ag Alert 7
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