Plant materials that lie to rot in soil makes good compost and play a key role in sequestering carbon, research finds.

For quite some time, farmers and researchers have been focusing on how to bind carbon to soil. Doing so makes food crops more nutritious and increases yields. However, because carbon is converted into CO2 when it enters the atmosphere, there is a significant climate benefit to capturing carbon in soil as well.

Sequestering carbon is vital for reducing global CO2 emissions. Too much carbon finds its way into the atmosphere. Should we fail to reduce how much carbon ends up in the atmosphere, we will fail to achieve the Paris Agreement’s goal of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 40% by 2030, according to CONCITO, Denmark’s Green Think Tank.

Organic matter contains carbon and nutrients that are important for crops to grow, including nitrogen and phosphorus. Whereas synthetic fertilizers are readily absorbed by plant roots and also quick to run off into groundwater, carbon has a slower cycle that provides more nutrients to a plant. Furthermore, carbon in organic matter enhances soil aeration and helps soil retain water, which increases biodiversity as more microbes and fungi are able to thrive in soil.

“Fragments of dead plants in soil are often considered as fast food for microbes and fungi. But our study demonstrates that plant residues actually play a more significant role in forming and sequestering carbon in soil than what was once thought,” explains Kristina Witzgall, a PhD Candidate at the Technical University of Munich and lead author of the paper in Nature Communications.

Read the full article about carbon sequestration by Ida Eriksen at Futurity.