http://www.carbonsoil.co.ukNews from Carbon Soil UK(c)CVRC Ltd 20095Unless you’ve been living in a hole in the ground for the last few years, you’ll know that using peat-based products in your garden is decimating peatlands throughout the UK and beyond. - www.shropshirestar.comhttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=302Fri, 08 Jul 2011 www.shropshirestar.comcarbon_atk302We want you to remember the happy times and planning for the future can make a difference for the love ones you leave behind. The time for funeral planning is something we all like to avoid even though we know it happens to everyone. - www.FuneralPlans.cohttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=300Thu, 03 Feb 2011 www.FuneralPlans.cocarbon_atk300WHEN it comes to climate change, one of the answers could lie in the soil, according to a groundbreaking North East study. - www.journallive.co.ukhttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=299Sat, 08 Jan 2011 www.journallive.co.ukcarbon_atk299In search of a "magic bullet" for climate change that will simultaneously help with the growing problem of feeding the world, gurus from James Lovelock downwards have praised the potential of biochar. - www.bbc.co.ukhttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=298Thu, 23 Dec 2010 www.bbc.co.ukcarbon_atk298Desertification and land degradation is "the greatest environmental challenge of our time" and "a threat to global wellbeing", according to the UN's top drylands official, Luc Gnacadja, who says people must be paid via global carbon markets for preserving the soil. The executive secretary of UN's Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD), will today launch the UN decade for the fight against desertification in London. "The top 20cm of soil is all that stands between us and extinction," he told the Guardian. Conflicts and food price crises all stem from the degradation of land, he added. - www.guardian.co.ukhttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=297Tue, 21 Dec 2010 www.guardian.co.ukcarbon_atk297One of Earth's biggest stores of carbon dioxide sits locked within the decaying vegetation found in peatlands, which range from tropical peat swamps to Arctic permafrost. A fast-warming world could transform those peatlands into a "compost bomb" that would dump huge amounts of carbon into the atmosphere, British researchers have calculated. - www.cbsnews.comhttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=296Thu, 02 Dec 2010 www.cbsnews.comcarbon_atk296In the lead up to Cancun climate negotiations, the Bank has used a conference on agriculture and climate as a platform to expand its agricultural activities and link them to its interests in carbon markets, despite new evidence of problems with investment in the sector. - www.brettonwoodsproject.orghttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=295Mon, 29 Nov 2010 www.brettonwoodsproject.orgcarbon_atk295Small-holder farmers in Kenya are set to reap the rewards of the first soil carbon project in Africa. - www.capitalfm.co.kehttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=294Fri, 05 Nov 2010 www.capitalfm.co.kecarbon_atk294Developing genetically modified trees and plants could capture billions of tons of carbon from the atmosphere annually and reduce the impacts of global warming, a new U.S. study says. In the study, researchers from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Oak Ridge National Laboratory explore methods of enhancing the processes by which plants sequester carbon dioxide from the air and convert it into long-lived forms of carbon that can be stored inside the plants - and, ultimately, in the soil. - www.reuters.comhttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=293Wed, 06 Oct 2010 www.reuters.comcarbon_atk293First official report says burying charcoal in the soil has potential to cut greenhouse gases but scientific uncertainties remain. he idea of burying charcoal produced from microwaved wood to tackle global warming is still beset with scientific uncertainties, says the UK government's first report on "biochar". The warning comes as a separate US study published this week said that as much as 12% of global greenhouse gas emissions could be offset by biochar. Biochar involves burying cooked charcoal so that the carbon dioxide absorbed during the tree's growth remains safely locked away for thousands of years. The technique could remove billions of tonnes of CO2 from the atmosphere every year. But it has divided environmentalists, with backing from Gaia theorist James Lovelock and Nasa scientist James Hansen, but opposition from critics who say there is not enough to land carry out biochar on a large scale. - www.guardian.co.uk/environmenthttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=292Thu, 12 Aug 2010 www.guardian.co.uk/environmentcarbon_atk292Massive volumes of carbon dioxide and methane frozen in the earth's soils are a "time-bomb ticking under our feet", soil scientists say. The thawing of vast areas of frozen soils and the decay of peatlands under higher global temperatures could release massive volumes of carbon dioxide and methane into the atmosphere - potentially doubling the amount of atmospheric greenhouse gases. The World Congress of Soil Scientists in Brisbane has been told that frozen soils and peatlands in the northern hemisphere are estimated to store up to 50 per cent of the world's organic soil carbon. University of Wisconsin-Madison soil scientist Dr James Bockheim said global warming threatens to thaw these soils, some of which have been frozen for thousands of years. - news.smh.com.auhttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=291Wed, 04 Aug 2010 news.smh.com.aucarbon_atk291Biochar is a new buzz word in agriculture but, exactly, what is biochar? Biochar is a soil amendment made by converting manure, crop residue and other bio-waste materials, including sawdust, into charcoal by using pyrolysis, which is heat without oxygen. “It is made in the exact same way as charcoal. You heat the material above a certain temperature without letting any oxygen in,” said Catherine (Catie) Brewer, a PhD student in chemistry and graduate research assistant at Iowa State Univer-sity. “This is different from burning or combustion in which you add oxygen. Without oxygen you get biochar.” Biochars are attracting a lot of interest for both commercial and agricultural applications, and for small scale use. According to Brewer, chars have shown the ability to increase soil fertility, im-prove water retention, lower soil acidity and density, and increase microbial activity. Biochars also help with the carbon level of the soil. - www.theprairiestar.comhttp://www.carbonsoil.co.uk/default.aspx?atk=290Sat, 08 May 2010 www.theprairiestar.comcarbon_atk290