Marginal abatement cost curves for UK agriculture, forestry, land-use and land-use change sector out to 2022

Greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture, land use, land use change and forestry (ALULUCF) are a significant percentage of UK industrial emissions. The UK Government is committed to ambitious targets for reducing emissions and all significant industrial sources are coming under increasing scrutiny. The task of allocating shares of future reductions falls to the newly appointed Committee on Climate Change (CCC), which needs to consider efficient mitigation potential across a range of sectors. Marginal abatement cost curves are derived for a range of mitigation measures in the agriculture and forestry sectors over a range of adoption scenarios and for the years 2012, 2017 and 2022. The results indicate that in 2022 around 6.36 MtCO2e could be abated at negative or zero cost. Further, in same year over 17% of agricultural GHG emissions (7.85MtCO2e) could be abated at a cost of less than the 2022 Shadow Price of Carbon (£34tCO2e).Environmental Economics and Policy,

City limits: sexual politics and the new urban left in 1980s Sheffield

In the 1980s Sheffield had a vibrant political milieu made up of labour and new social movement activists who were variously supported by a left-wing Labour-led City Council. Sheffield City Council developed their own form of local socialism which fed into the ideas of the new urban left and left-wing thinkers like Stuart Hall and his contemporaries at Marxism Today. Sheffield City Council was interested in uniting class and identity politics in a form of political renewal; however, both the Council and the city’s dominant labour movement preferred to focus on material concerns. Sheffield’s politics was energetic but inchoate and messy. Whilst the Council and labour movement made supportive links with peace, anti-apartheid and women’s movements, certain groups were left on the outside. Uniting class and identity over gay politics proved a bridge too far. This article explores Sheffield’s gay politics to show how left-wing solidarity in the city broke down. Sheffield’s new urban left found its limits in the arena of gay politics

Evidence review of the potential wider impacts of climate change mitigation options: agriculture, forestry, land use and waste sectors

A report prepared for Scottish Government. Greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation is a central policy objective in Scotland. The Climate Change (Scotland) Act 2009 sets an interim 42% reduction target for 2020 and an 80% target for 2050 across all sectors of society (1990 baseline). As a priority policy area, it has become vital to better understand the co-benefits and adverse impacts arising from mitigation actions on our environment, economy and society. Integrated assessment is key in prioritising environmental actions, reducing adverse impacts and enhancing positive co-effects. This report aims to summarise evidence on the wider impacts (WI) of GHG mitigation options (MO) in the Agriculture, land use, land use change and forestry sectors (ALULUCF) and those related waste management. The key findings of the review, are a summary of the wider impacts and an overview of the challenges in quantifying and monetising these impacts

Capturing cropland and grassland management impacts on soil carbon in the UK LULUCF inventory

This project aimed to identify the extent to which emissions due to changes in Soil Organic Carbon (SOC) stocks arising from Cropland and Grassland/Grazing Land management can be incorporated into the UK’s Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) inventory. Key management activities were identified which might affect SOC stocks. A literature review carried out as part of the project concluded that tillage reduction cannot be considered a reliable management option to increase the SOC content of UK soils. However increasing crop residue returns and increasing inputs of manure and fertiliser could increase SOC stock although the SOC stock increases resulting from manure and fertiliser inputs could be outweighed by increases nitrous oxide emissions and the risk of nitrate run-off. The review found that increasing crop yields through increased fertilisation and improved crop rotation could increase the annual input of crop residues and root exudate to soils and hence increase SOC on low fertility soils. Manure additions resulted in greater C sequestration than the addition of equivalent amounts of N as mineral fertiliser and the effect lasted longer. However, increasing inputs of nitrogen from fertiliser or manure risk increasing N2O emissions which could negate any increases in SOC stock. IPCC default stock change factors were judged to be inappropriate to the UK, based on expert opinion and the literature review findings. Therefore the project used the Daily DayCent and Landscape DNDC models to attempt to estimate stock change factors for Cropland management activities under UK conditions. Although based on a very limited dataset this suggested that the effect of Cropland management activities under UK conditions might be less than implied by the IPCC stock change factors. Tillage reduction was found to have little effect on SOC stocks. Increasing manure and crop residue inputs increased SOC stocks, with manure inputs being particularly effective. A framework for reporting SOC stock changes resulting from Cropland management was developed, and used to assess mitigation options. Overall the impact of Cropland Management on SOC is likely to be very small compared to other activities in the LULUCF inventory such as land use change. The most effective mitigation option was using Cropland from annual tillage crops to perennial crops, fallow and set aside. However given the need for food production there is limited scope for such change. Increasing manure, fertiliser and crop residue inputs gave smaller increases in SOC stocks, but practical considerations limit the scope of these actions. Lack of field data on the effect of Grassland improvement on SOC stocks was identified as a knowledge gap. The literature review suggested that intensification could increase SOC stocks under pasture on mineral soils. However, expert opinion suggested that this might not be the case for rough grazing on organo-mineral soils, where intensification might lead to SOC loss. This lack of data meant that it was not possible to calibrate or validate models to estimate UK specific stock change factors for Grassland. As the IPCC stock change factors were judged to be inappropriate to UK conditions assessment of the mitigation potential of Grassland management using these factors was not carried out to avoid presenting potentially misleading results. Suggested strategies for filling these knowledge gaps are outlined in the report. Attempts to assess grass/crop rotation patterns across the UK using data from the Integrated Administration and Control System (IACS) used to handle Common Agricultural Policy (CAP) payments were hampered by difficulties in obtaining access to the data. However land use change matrices were generated for England and Wales, and used to map areas of change. Subject to data availability, this approach could be used in future inventories to give a better representation the effect of rotation patterns on SOC stocks

Nitrous oxide emissions from European agriculture - An analysis of variability and drivers of emissions from field experiments

Nitrous oxide emissions from a network of agricultural experiments in Europe were used to explore the relative importance of site and management controls of emissions. At each site, a selection of management interventions were compared within replicated experimental designs in plot-based experiments. Arable experiments were conducted at Beano in Italy, El Encin in Spain, Foulum in Denmark, Logården in Sweden, Maulde in Belgium, Paulinenaue in Germany, and Tulloch in the UK. Grassland experiments were conducted at Crichton, Nafferton and Peaknaze in the UK, Gödöllö in Hungary, Rzecin in Poland, Zarnekow in Germany and Theix in France. Nitrous oxide emissions were measured at each site over a period of at least two years using static chambers. Emissions varied widely between sites and as a result of manipulation treatments. Average site emissions (throughout the study period) varied between 0.04 and 21.21 kg N₂O-N ha⁻¹ yr⁻¹, with the largest fluxes and variability associated with the grassland sites. Total nitrogen addition was found to be the single most important determinant of emissions, accounting for 15% of the variance (using linear regression) in the data from the arable sites (<i>p</i> < 0.0001), and 77% in the grassland sites. The annual emissions from arable sites were significantly greater than those that would be predicted by IPCC default emission factors. Variability of N₂O emissions within sites that occurred as a result of manipulation treatments was greater than that resulting from site-to-site and year-to-year variation, highlighting the importance of management interventions in contributing to greenhouse gas mitigation

“We’re happy as we are”: the experience of living with possible undiagnosed dementia.

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from Cambridge University Press via the DOI in this record. It is estimated that a third of people in the United Kingdom with signs of dementia are living without a formal diagnosis. In Wales, the proportion is nearly half. Some explanations for the gap between prevalence of dementia and number of diagnoses include living with a long-term partner/spouse and systemic barriers to diagnosis. This study recruited participants from the Cognitive Function and Ageing Studies-Wales (CFAS-Wales) cohort, randomly selected from people aged over 65 living in two areas of Wales, who met study criteria for a diagnosis of dementia and did not have a record of a formal diagnosis in general practice records. We aimed to understand more about the contexts and circumstances of people who live with and cope with cognitive difficulties without having a formal diagnosis of dementia. We conducted qualitative interviews with six participants and their spouses, and additionally with four family members of three invited people who were unable to take part. Themes were generated using thematic analysis. We present the argument that there is an adaptive response to low service levels and a complex interaction between the expectations of levels of service, perceptions of the legitimacy of cognitive problems and the right to make demands on services. This paper concludes that more could be done to address barriers to diagnosis and treatment services for those living with symptoms of dementia, but that the value placed on diagnosis by some individuals might be lower than anticipated by government policy.Alzheimer's SocietyEconomic and Social Research Council (ESRC