Martin Browne (Tipperary, Sinn Fein)
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2028. To ask the Minister for Agriculture, Food and the Marine the estimated amount of emissions such as carbon that is sequestered back into farming grassland; the way in which those figures are determined; his views on whether these figures show the actual level of sequestration; and if he will make a statement on the matter. [15617/21]

Charlie McConalogue (Donegal, Fianna Fail)
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The ability of grasslands to absorb CO2 is influenced by a number of site-specific factors such as elevation, soil type, management practices, climate and climatic variability. European studies have shown that temperate grasslands have annual sequestration rates of approximately 1 tonne C per hectare. It is, however, important to note that currently, due to large areas of drained carbon rich soils under agricultural management, grasslands act as a net source or emmitter of GHG emissions in Ireland.

In the past, the lack of long-term observational data and field experiments (under Irish conditions) to quantify the effects of the key drivers of management and climate variability has been recognised as a barrier to maximising the potential GHG savings available through grassland sequestration. To address this information deficit, my Department has recently announced significant investment for the establishment of a National Agricultural Soil Carbon Observatory. This investment will facilitate the purchase of up to ten carbon flux towers which will be used to accurately monitor GHG emissions and sequestration on a range of agricultural systems and soil types.

The potential benefits of this project are many but of particular relevance to Irish agriculture will be our increased ability to better quantify and model soil carbon emissions and sinks from agricultural land and to include this data in the National Inventory Reporting framework.