Protected urea is “low-hanging fruit” for farmers to reduce emissions on farms, according to Jonathan Herron, a researcher from Teagasc Moorepark.

The agriculture sector has been set a target of 25% reduction in the sectors emissions based on 2018 levels. Overall, Ireland has committed to a 51% reduction of its 63.4MT carbon dioxide (CO2) equivalent and agriculture currently contributes 37.5% of total emissions from Ireland.

For the agricultural sector to achieve its emissions reduction targets, farmers will need to adopt a number of measures.

At the open day on the Shinagh Estate demonstration farm, Herron outlined some of the measures that farmers can use to reduce emission on their farms.

Jonathan Herron speaking at Shinagh Estate open day

“One of lowest-hanging fruits available to farmers is protected urea. For the same quantity of nitrogen (N) compared to Calcium Ammonium Nitrate (CAN) you are reducing Nitrous Oxide (N20) emission by 75%,” he said.

“It is also more cost effective, in comparison to CAN-based fertilisers.”

He added that protected urea also helps to reduce ammonia emissions, of which agriculture currently contributes 99% of Ireland’s total emissions.

By moving to protected urea from standard urea, ammonia emissions are reduced by 78% he said.

Other areas that Jonathan said farmers can look at include reducing the reliance on chemical fertiliser by correcting soil pH, along with phosphorus (P) and potassium (K) indexes and incorporating clover into swards.

Farmers can also look at using low emission slurry spreading (LESS) as it increases the fertiliser potential of slurry.

Using LESS methods, the amount of ammonia lost is reduced and thus more N is available to the plant.

Age of slaughter

The increased use of sexed semen that is expected in the coming years will lead to an increased number of beef-sired calves being born on dairy farms.

“Although the age of slaughter is not directly related to the dairy sector, it is indirectly,” Jonathan said.

“The decision made on dairy farms influences the type of animal entering the beef herd and the emissions from those animals.

“Age of slaughter can be reduced by dairy farms using the tools available to them, such as the Dairy Beef Index (DBI).”

There are also a number of other technologies available to farmers such as feed additives, with Jonathan stating that some work and some don’t.

“The question is around how we get these additives into a grass-based dairy system, which is easier said than done,” he said.

The final area is breeding with Jonathan stating that Teagasc is doing ongoing research into emissions of individual cows and looking at breeding lower-emission producing cows.

Evolving science

“This is an evolving science, research is underway around the world looking at how we understand greenhouse gas emissions,” Jonathan said.

“The more we can understand about greenhouse gas emissions, the more we can influence them and reduce them.”

“We need to change the narrative and show that we are contributing to reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

“The way we do this is by adopting some of these measures on farms, with protected urea being the low-hanging fruit.”