Adaptive multi-paddock grazing increases soil carbon stocks and decreases the carbon footprint of beef production in Ontario, Canada

Initial evidence from beef LCAs incorporating AMP grazing induced SOC accrual suggests substantial GHG mitigation potential, with reported reductions from 65 to 169% lower relative to footprints without SOC offsets.

“Initial evidence from beef life cycle assessments (LCAs) incorporating AMP grazing induced SOC accrual suggest substantial GHG mitigation potential.Relative to GHG footprints calculated without considering offsets from SOC accrual, reported GHG footprints incorporating measured SOC accrual suggested reductions from 65 to 169% lower (Mehre et al., 2024;Rowntree et al., 2020;Stanley et al., 2018).”

Existing studies on AMP and SOC have generally relied on space-for-time comparisons rather than longitudinal data.

“Existing studies on AMP and SOC have generally relied on space-for-time comparisons rather than longitudinal data (Machmuller et al., 2015;Mehre et al., 2024;Rowntree et al., 2020;Wang et al., 2015), focused on cropland-to-pasture transitions (Machmuller et al., 2015;Mehre et al., 2024;Rowntree et al., 2020), or evaluated only short-term shifts from conventional grazing (Stanley et al., 2018).”

Existing studies on AMP and SOC have focused on cropland-to-pasture transitions.

“focused on cropland-to-pasture transitions (Machmuller et al., 2015;Mehre et al., 2024;Rowntree et al., 2020)”

Attempts to measure grazing-induced changes in SOC and incorporate them into LCAs have been sparse in the literature and have yielded widely variable results.

“Attempts to measure grazing-induced changes in SOC and incorporate them into LCAs have been sparse in the literature and have yielded widely variable results (Lupo et al., 2013;Mehre et al., 2024;Pelletier et al., 2010;Rowntree et al., 2020; see SI Section A.3.4 for a direct comparison with these studies).”