The latest report from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in relation to progress in emissions reductions has mixed news for farming. The bad news, is that we are not on target to meet our emissions. We are not outliers in this regard, every single sector seems to be falling short of the progress needed to hit our target.
The better news is that there has been a substantial downward revision of the annual emissions from farming. When the baseline figure of emissions for 2018 emissions was being calculated, international standardised estimates were being used to calculate the footprint of drystock cattle and sheep production.
Since then, research by Teagasc and statistical information from the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) has proven that Irish farming is more carbon efficient. Things like higher birth rates in sheep, more weight gain off outdoor grazing as opposed to indoor feeding, faster growth rates and earlier dates of slaughter have all fed into a sharper vision of the actual emissions from livestock meat production.
The reduction is significant, resulting in a cut of 1.4 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (expressed as MTCO2eq) every year. That’s a cut of 8% in the assessed annual emissions from the entire sector.
Happy days, I hear you say. That makes the overall reductions target much easier to reach, yeah? Well, not exactly. In fact, the EPA report gives no guidance as to whether the target is now lower or higher.
All it says is that “a direct comparison of emissions in the agriculture sector against its sectoral emission ceilings is no longer viable due to significant refinement of the agriculture inventory.”
So this change in assessed emissions has thrown things so much that we can’t be told where we stand. This is disappointing. I asked the EPA if they could give me a better understanding of what exactly this means. I think the simplest thing to do is to publish their response in its entirety.
Response
“The emissions ceilings (Mt CO2eq) are legislatively provided for under the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development (Amendment) Act 2021. The agriculture sector sectoral emission ceiling is 106 Mt CO2eq in 2021-2025 and 96 Mt CO2eq from 2026-2030. The associated indicative percentage emissions reduction target of 25% is set out [here].
“The EPA incorporates the latest scientific information, including on new technologies, in the national greenhouse gas inventories and projections. These changes are then applied across the entire time series (most recently 1990-2023). Please see "How are national inventories updated with the latest science?" in the FAQ section.
“Updated science reflected in the agricultural inventory in 2023 reduced the agriculture sector emissions by, on average, 1.4 Mt CO2eq per annum for the years 2018 to 2023 or in total by approximately 8.5 Mt CO2eq over the six-year period. Consequently, direct comparison of emissions in the agriculture sector against its sectoral emission ceilings is no longer possible.
“The EPA projections 2025 indicate that total emissions from the agriculture sector will range from a 1% increase to a 16% decrease over the period of 2018 to 2030.
"The national climate objective of a 51% reduction by 2030 will not be achieved unless all sectors meet their indicative reductions.
“The Climate Act provides for the revision of carbon budgets and sectoral emission ceilings where “there are significant developments in scientific knowledge in relation to climate change”.
"The incorporation of updated science in the agricultural inventory is a “significant development”, this highlights the need to revise the carbon budgets and sectoral emission ceilings to support the national climate objective of a 51% reduction by 2030," the EPA statement concluded.
Targets
What I gleaned from this statement is that the target as defined is binding, but can be changed if the cumulative targets are falling short of the overall necessary reduction. And they are falling way short. What I don’t understand is what would be achieved by handing a more challenging target to any sector falling short of it’s original one.
We are in a bit of a bind. Much of the Climate Action Plan involved “magic maths”. Anyone could have predicted that we wouldn’t have a million electric cars in Ireland by 2030. And we won’t.
The lack of AD and biomethane is one of the factors that is putting pressure on our ability to meet our 2030 sectoral target
Similarly, anyone could have predicted that 1.6 terrawatt hours of biomethane was an extremely unlikely target.
In fairness, the Government has made buying an electric car (EV) more attractive. We have an EV at home, but we are a four adult household, so have more than one car. I wouldn’t tell someone not to buy an EV if they are a single car household, but I would warn them that if they are travelling long distances, they will accumulate quite a few apps on their phone. I have heading for a dozen at this stage. Quite how such an inefficient charging system for the charging network was allowed to develop is beyond me. Imagine if bank machines could only take cards from their own customers and you have an idea of how frustrating our charging network can be.
Sorry, I digress. At least we have a functional charging network, although there are a few bald patches. We do not have a functional anaerobic digestion (AD) network, it was one of the absolute failures of Eamon Ryan’s generally effective tenure as environment minister. You don’t have to like everything he did to recognise that his was an impactful ministry.
Moving the goalposts
The lack of AD and biomethane is one of the factors that is putting pressure on our ability to meet our 2030 sectoral target. Perhaps the good news recounted above will be another hurdle. How? If the 2018 baseline of 23Mt CO2 Eq is reduced to account for the more exact accounting, that would see the new baseline become 21.6Mt CO2eq. And a 25% reduction on that figure would be 16.2MtCO2eq, a significant drop on the current target of 17.25Mt CO2 eq.
But the broader reality is that the 2030 target, while legally binding and all that, is actually less important than the direction of travel we are on as a sector. 2030 is not an end in itself, it is merely a checkpoint on the road. There is already a provisional target for 2035, there will be a target for 2040 and 2045, all on the road, in theory, to carbon neutrality by 2050.
Of course we need to keep a focus on the 2030 reduction targets, we must try to meet our sectoral targets. It’s part of how we play our part in making the world a safer place for all of us with a more stable climate. Farmers, more than anyone, know how important a stable and temperate climate is to what we do as farmers here in Ireland. Out climate is the kernel of our extremely successful food production systems. Why would we compromise that?
While working towards the specific sectoral target for 2030, whether it's 25% of the 23 megatonnes previously outlined, or whether that's a lower figure adjusted downwards, we must remember that it's only a mean that to an end. The 2030 goals are not an absolute. They're only a stepping stone to a sustainable planet and sustainable systems, including a sustainable food production system. The longer-term aim is to have climate neutrality by 2050.
Farmers, more than anyone, know how important a stable and temperate climate is to what we do as farmers here in Ireland
Personally, I'm sceptical that climate neutrality is possible, but I do believe that we can make huge strides towards a more sustainable world. I also believe the steps we are taking in this decade are only a first step. More will be done as we understand the possibilities that can unfold for us as food producers and custodians of the land from a combination of old learnings and new technologies.
There needs to be a broad recognition of the fundamental importance of food production to humanities survival and prosperity. We also must remember that it's not just about carbon emissions. The footprint of food production on the natural world is much broader than that.
Borris festival
I'm lucky enough this weekend to be in Borris at the Festival of Writing and Ideas. That might sound very highfalutin but it actually isn't. It's real people talking about real things which they have written about and in many cases, dedicated large parts of their life to. The vitality of what they say shines through, whether that's a human rights lawyer like Philippe Sands, a campaigning journalist like Carol Cadwallader, or whether that's someone who works in farming and the natural environment.
This weekend alone, I have listened to James Rebanks, a sheep farmer from the Lake District in Cumbria who has become a very successful author. You may know his book, The Shepherd’s Life . He spoke passionately about the traditional farming systems of his area in the uplands of the Lake District, the value of what he does as a food producer and his pride in his community.
James Rebanks' farm in Cumbria, England.
Manchán Magan interviewed him, and it was a fascinating conversation around sustainable food production and regenerative agriculture. As a tillage farmer who uses granular fertiliser, herbicides and fungicides (although never insecticides), some of what they had to say was challenging for me, but I tried to listen with an open mind, and not feel defensive.
I think too often conventional farmers, (and I use that term under protest, I don't like it) are too defensive. We need to be open to listening and to learning from people who farm in another way, or who advocate farming in another way.
On Friday, Seán Ronayne spoke. You might have seen the documentary Birdsong about his work recording birds. It’s a thing of wonder. Some 98% of the conversation he had with the like-minded Helen McDonald was about birdsong and the lives of birds.
At the end, he made a passionate appeal that everybody do what they can to preserve the natural environment so that we don't lose our native birds, many species of which are under threat. And his appeal was so genuine, so earnest and so heartfelt you'd have to be blinkered to believe it was an attack on anything or anyone.
The question we must ask of ourselves as food producers, the questions I have for myself as a food producer and a custodian of the land is “am I doing everything I can to minimise the negative impact of my farming on the natural world? Am I doing everything I can to maximise the positive impact of the land I am responsible for as a safe space for plants, insects, birds and animals? What can I do better, and why amn’t I doing it?"
I need to stop worrying about 2030 and sectoral targets, and control the controllables. And perhaps try to ensure that more farmers hear the positive message of possibility from people like Manchán Magan, James Rebanks and Seán Ronayne. We will never all agree on everything, but they are not the enemy of farmers, we’re actually all on the same side.
The latest report from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in relation to progress in emissions reductions has mixed news for farming. The bad news, is that we are not on target to meet our emissions. We are not outliers in this regard, every single sector seems to be falling short of the progress needed to hit our target.
The better news is that there has been a substantial downward revision of the annual emissions from farming. When the baseline figure of emissions for 2018 emissions was being calculated, international standardised estimates were being used to calculate the footprint of drystock cattle and sheep production.
Since then, research by Teagasc and statistical information from the Irish Cattle Breeding Federation (ICBF) has proven that Irish farming is more carbon efficient. Things like higher birth rates in sheep, more weight gain off outdoor grazing as opposed to indoor feeding, faster growth rates and earlier dates of slaughter have all fed into a sharper vision of the actual emissions from livestock meat production.
The reduction is significant, resulting in a cut of 1.4 megatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (expressed as MTCO2eq) every year. That’s a cut of 8% in the assessed annual emissions from the entire sector.
Happy days, I hear you say. That makes the overall reductions target much easier to reach, yeah? Well, not exactly. In fact, the EPA report gives no guidance as to whether the target is now lower or higher.
All it says is that “a direct comparison of emissions in the agriculture sector against its sectoral emission ceilings is no longer viable due to significant refinement of the agriculture inventory.”
So this change in assessed emissions has thrown things so much that we can’t be told where we stand. This is disappointing. I asked the EPA if they could give me a better understanding of what exactly this means. I think the simplest thing to do is to publish their response in its entirety.
Response
“The emissions ceilings (Mt CO2eq) are legislatively provided for under the Climate Action and Low Carbon Development (Amendment) Act 2021. The agriculture sector sectoral emission ceiling is 106 Mt CO2eq in 2021-2025 and 96 Mt CO2eq from 2026-2030. The associated indicative percentage emissions reduction target of 25% is set out [here].
“The EPA incorporates the latest scientific information, including on new technologies, in the national greenhouse gas inventories and projections. These changes are then applied across the entire time series (most recently 1990-2023). Please see "How are national inventories updated with the latest science?" in the FAQ section.
“Updated science reflected in the agricultural inventory in 2023 reduced the agriculture sector emissions by, on average, 1.4 Mt CO2eq per annum for the years 2018 to 2023 or in total by approximately 8.5 Mt CO2eq over the six-year period. Consequently, direct comparison of emissions in the agriculture sector against its sectoral emission ceilings is no longer possible.
“The EPA projections 2025 indicate that total emissions from the agriculture sector will range from a 1% increase to a 16% decrease over the period of 2018 to 2030.
"The national climate objective of a 51% reduction by 2030 will not be achieved unless all sectors meet their indicative reductions.
“The Climate Act provides for the revision of carbon budgets and sectoral emission ceilings where “there are significant developments in scientific knowledge in relation to climate change”.
"The incorporation of updated science in the agricultural inventory is a “significant development”, this highlights the need to revise the carbon budgets and sectoral emission ceilings to support the national climate objective of a 51% reduction by 2030," the EPA statement concluded.
Targets
What I gleaned from this statement is that the target as defined is binding, but can be changed if the cumulative targets are falling short of the overall necessary reduction. And they are falling way short. What I don’t understand is what would be achieved by handing a more challenging target to any sector falling short of it’s original one.
We are in a bit of a bind. Much of the Climate Action Plan involved “magic maths”. Anyone could have predicted that we wouldn’t have a million electric cars in Ireland by 2030. And we won’t.
The lack of AD and biomethane is one of the factors that is putting pressure on our ability to meet our 2030 sectoral target
Similarly, anyone could have predicted that 1.6 terrawatt hours of biomethane was an extremely unlikely target.
In fairness, the Government has made buying an electric car (EV) more attractive. We have an EV at home, but we are a four adult household, so have more than one car. I wouldn’t tell someone not to buy an EV if they are a single car household, but I would warn them that if they are travelling long distances, they will accumulate quite a few apps on their phone. I have heading for a dozen at this stage. Quite how such an inefficient charging system for the charging network was allowed to develop is beyond me. Imagine if bank machines could only take cards from their own customers and you have an idea of how frustrating our charging network can be.
Sorry, I digress. At least we have a functional charging network, although there are a few bald patches. We do not have a functional anaerobic digestion (AD) network, it was one of the absolute failures of Eamon Ryan’s generally effective tenure as environment minister. You don’t have to like everything he did to recognise that his was an impactful ministry.
Moving the goalposts
The lack of AD and biomethane is one of the factors that is putting pressure on our ability to meet our 2030 sectoral target. Perhaps the good news recounted above will be another hurdle. How? If the 2018 baseline of 23Mt CO2 Eq is reduced to account for the more exact accounting, that would see the new baseline become 21.6Mt CO2eq. And a 25% reduction on that figure would be 16.2MtCO2eq, a significant drop on the current target of 17.25Mt CO2 eq.
But the broader reality is that the 2030 target, while legally binding and all that, is actually less important than the direction of travel we are on as a sector. 2030 is not an end in itself, it is merely a checkpoint on the road. There is already a provisional target for 2035, there will be a target for 2040 and 2045, all on the road, in theory, to carbon neutrality by 2050.
Of course we need to keep a focus on the 2030 reduction targets, we must try to meet our sectoral targets. It’s part of how we play our part in making the world a safer place for all of us with a more stable climate. Farmers, more than anyone, know how important a stable and temperate climate is to what we do as farmers here in Ireland. Out climate is the kernel of our extremely successful food production systems. Why would we compromise that?
While working towards the specific sectoral target for 2030, whether it's 25% of the 23 megatonnes previously outlined, or whether that's a lower figure adjusted downwards, we must remember that it's only a mean that to an end. The 2030 goals are not an absolute. They're only a stepping stone to a sustainable planet and sustainable systems, including a sustainable food production system. The longer-term aim is to have climate neutrality by 2050.
Farmers, more than anyone, know how important a stable and temperate climate is to what we do as farmers here in Ireland
Personally, I'm sceptical that climate neutrality is possible, but I do believe that we can make huge strides towards a more sustainable world. I also believe the steps we are taking in this decade are only a first step. More will be done as we understand the possibilities that can unfold for us as food producers and custodians of the land from a combination of old learnings and new technologies.
There needs to be a broad recognition of the fundamental importance of food production to humanities survival and prosperity. We also must remember that it's not just about carbon emissions. The footprint of food production on the natural world is much broader than that.
Borris festival
I'm lucky enough this weekend to be in Borris at the Festival of Writing and Ideas. That might sound very highfalutin but it actually isn't. It's real people talking about real things which they have written about and in many cases, dedicated large parts of their life to. The vitality of what they say shines through, whether that's a human rights lawyer like Philippe Sands, a campaigning journalist like Carol Cadwallader, or whether that's someone who works in farming and the natural environment.
This weekend alone, I have listened to James Rebanks, a sheep farmer from the Lake District in Cumbria who has become a very successful author. You may know his book, The Shepherd’s Life . He spoke passionately about the traditional farming systems of his area in the uplands of the Lake District, the value of what he does as a food producer and his pride in his community.
James Rebanks' farm in Cumbria, England.
Manchán Magan interviewed him, and it was a fascinating conversation around sustainable food production and regenerative agriculture. As a tillage farmer who uses granular fertiliser, herbicides and fungicides (although never insecticides), some of what they had to say was challenging for me, but I tried to listen with an open mind, and not feel defensive.
I think too often conventional farmers, (and I use that term under protest, I don't like it) are too defensive. We need to be open to listening and to learning from people who farm in another way, or who advocate farming in another way.
On Friday, Seán Ronayne spoke. You might have seen the documentary Birdsong about his work recording birds. It’s a thing of wonder. Some 98% of the conversation he had with the like-minded Helen McDonald was about birdsong and the lives of birds.
At the end, he made a passionate appeal that everybody do what they can to preserve the natural environment so that we don't lose our native birds, many species of which are under threat. And his appeal was so genuine, so earnest and so heartfelt you'd have to be blinkered to believe it was an attack on anything or anyone.
The question we must ask of ourselves as food producers, the questions I have for myself as a food producer and a custodian of the land is “am I doing everything I can to minimise the negative impact of my farming on the natural world? Am I doing everything I can to maximise the positive impact of the land I am responsible for as a safe space for plants, insects, birds and animals? What can I do better, and why amn’t I doing it?"
I need to stop worrying about 2030 and sectoral targets, and control the controllables. And perhaps try to ensure that more farmers hear the positive message of possibility from people like Manchán Magan, James Rebanks and Seán Ronayne. We will never all agree on everything, but they are not the enemy of farmers, we’re actually all on the same side.
SHARING OPTIONS