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Lyubov Kurkalova, Catherine Kling, and Jinhua Zhao Center for Agricultural and Rural Development

Explore the impact of accurate soil carbon assessment technology on conservation tillage in Iowa. Learn about policy possibilities, cost savings, and the role of measurement technology in policy design and implementation.

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Lyubov Kurkalova, Catherine Kling, and Jinhua Zhao Center for Agricultural and Rural Development

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  1. The Value of Accurate, Field-Scale, Soil Carbon Assessment Technology: Conservation Tillage in Iowa Lyubov Kurkalova, Catherine Kling, and Jinhua Zhao Center for Agricultural and Rural Development Department of Economics Iowa State University Paper presented at USDA Symposium on Natural Resource Management to Offset Greenhouse Gas Emissions, Raleigh, NC, November 2002

  2. Background • Agricultural practices can sequester carbon • Lots of excitement about potential • To lower atmospheric concentrations of Carbon • To provide an additional revenue source for farmers

  3. Policy Possibilities • Carbon markets • Voluntary, small scale • US Mandate, akin to SO2 cap & trade • Direct payments of subsidies • Conservation Security Program • CRP

  4. Subsidy Programs • Practice – Based • Pay for adopting new practices • Easy to observe, but ignores heterogeneity in land and potential C storage • Performance – Based (like a C market) • Pay for C sequestered • Either expected or measured • Hybrid: Can target land that yields most C benefits, but pay for practice

  5. Role of Soil Carbon Measurement Technology in Policy Design and Implementation • Carbon Market • Accurate, field-scale measures of incremental C storage to verify legitimacy of trades • Subsidy Programs • Practice-based (no targeting) demands less accuracy • Targeted or performance-based requires more accuracy

  6. Our Paper: What are Cost Savings from Accurate Field Scale Measurements? • Use conservation tillage adoption model combined with EPIC to empirically study alternative targeting strategies in Iowa • Questions: • What is the marginal cost of sequestering C if adoption occurs in most cost-effective locations first? • What are the cost savings of having the information needed to identify the cost-effective locations? How much more would a straight practice-based system cost to get the same benefits? • What are the cost savings of targeting at crop reporting districts, or counties, but not field-level?

  7. Problem Facing Program Designer • Wants to minimize costs of achieving a given level of carbon sequestration cn = cost of enrolling farm n (bids) X= ΣXn = total amount of carbon from n farms • Which bids should be accepted? Compute cn/Xn = cost per ton of carbon sequestered • Rank order cn/Xn lowest to highest, enroll fields until you get your desired level of carbon • Performance-based subsidy or C market can achieve this

  8. Simple Numerical Example Region1Cost/Ton Region 2 Cost/Ton Point A 4 Point C 5 Point B 2 Point D 2 Mean 3 3.5 Least Cost to Achieve 2 tons: Pt B, Pt D = $4 Cost with only means: Pt A, Pt B = $6

  9. Conservation Tillage in Iowa • Econometric model of adoption of conservation till • EPIC for environmental indicators, including Carbon, • Adoption model and EPIC runs predict at NRI points (~13,000 points in Iowa)

  10. Marginal Cost Under Field-Level Targeting

  11. Cost Savings: From State -, CRD -, and County - Level to Field - Level Targeting

  12. Cost savings per ton of Improved Targeting

  13. Final Remarks • Accurate field-scale measurement technology key for policy implementation • Value is high for field-scale measurement

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