While experts discuss whether extreme weather conditions, for instance this summer’s rainfall can be elucidated by climate change, geographers from University of Leicester are exploring whether extreme weather affects climate change or not.
The monitoring station situated in Norfolk
A research team from the University of Leicester’s Department of Geography and Centre for Landscape and Climate Research built a new monitoring station last month to determine greenhouse gas emissions from cultivated and drained peatlands in the East Anglian Fens. The researchers will calculate over a long period to document carbon emissions across a broad range of weather conditions.
The research is being conducted with support from the Natural Environment Research Council. It will provide the direct measurement of carbon dioxide emissions derived from degraded peat soils in the English Fens that are intensively farmed. This area is widely recognized as the largest source of greenhouse gas in the UK.
The project results will notify national reports on carbon emissions and the research findings will enhance the way carbon emissions are revealed to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. This study is being carried out at a crucial time as the UK is preparing for the second carbon budgeting under the UK’s Climate Change Act 2008.
Tower-based micrometeorological techniques are being used in the research to examine greenhouse gas emissions. Initial findings will be published following the completion of the first crop rotation cycle and the results of the research will provide significant information to consumers and retailers who are focusing on the carbon cost of vegetables and cereals produced on peat soils.
The project assesses water, carbon and energy fluxes from cultivated, restored and natural peatlands in the Fens. It is part of a wider joint effort between the NERC Centre for Ecology & Hydrology, the University of Leicester and a team of researchers from other Universities.
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