SYDNEY 18 May, 2012 – GCS has won a grant with the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency for a project that will demonstrate a commercially cost-efficient method to measure rangeland soil organic carbon content and composition.
“This is a hugely important pilot project because it focuses on one of the big gaps in our ability to take advantage of soil carbon in combatting climate change – cost efficient measurement and assessment of carbon stocks at a project scale,” said GCS CEO James Schultz. “We are extremely proud of being one of the grantees, the only private enterprise among pioneering Australian organisations like CSIRO and major universities and research centres.”
The $300,000 pilot project will be undertaken on 65,000 hectares of central Australian rangeland. It will utilise remote sensing technology to improve the basis for spatially stratifying soil types or land management zones with the goal of reducing the costs and improving the efficiency with which soil carbon estimate are made.
Research outcomes funded by the Department are meant to underpin the development of new abatement methodologies that land managers can use to participate in the Carbon Farming Initiatives (CFI).
“For us this is a great addition to all the work we’re doing with landowners around Australia in agriculture and conservation management and recognition of the importance of this work to achieving Australia’s climate change objectives,” said Schultz.
