COP31: Report alerts soil release more CO2 than cars

Othe world's soils, at the current rate of degradation, can release more carbon dioxide (CO2) per year than all cars on the planet, warns a report today released at the United Nations climate conference (COP31).

The document, the responsibility of the international organization “Save Soil”, specifies that, if nothing is done, the world’s soils can release up to 4.81 billion tons of CO2 per year, more than all the cars and vans on the planet and about 90 times the emissions from Portugal.

However, the recovery of degraded agricultural land can ensure up to 27% of the emission reductions needed to keep heating below 2°C compared to the pre-industrial season, without prejudice to harvests, the document published in COP31, which runs until 20 November in Antalia, Turkey.

Under the title “How Soil Can Save the Paris Agreement” (How the soil can save the Paris Agreement), published by “Save Soil” and the international initiative “4 per 1000” (promoting the increase in organic carbon in agricultural soils, created in 2015), the document warns of the consequences of doing nothing but also explains the importance of soil for the fight against climate change.

If nothing is done in the next 20 years the soil will release more CO2 than two whole years of global emissions, the report states, which says that the soil stores more carbon than the atmosphere and all the vegetation together.

“ The plants remove CO2 from the air and store it underground through the roots. When the soil is plowed, left unearthed or eroded, much of that carbon returns to the atmosphere in the form of CO2”, says the document.

The report explains the importance of the recovery of degraded agricultural land through “regenerative” agricultural practices, returning CO2 to the ground, and says it is an urgent measure because “up to 40% of the planet’s land is already degraded according to the UN”.

The report also notes that in COP31, which runs until the 20th, more than 70% of countries did not include soil recovery as a mitigation solution in their climate plans.

Portugal’s plans, notes the international organization, predict that the country will overcome the European Union’s target of carbon absorption in land use and forests for 2030, “but the territory fell short between 2021 and 2023 and 58% of mainland Portugal is susceptible to desertification”.

Save Soil quotes the European Environment Agency to say that overall EU soils are losing carbon, i.e. they are issuing CO2 instead of absorbing it, because 60% to 70% of European soils are in a bad state, according to the European Commission.