Net Zero Agriculture and Carbon

Our Research

Our research is considering the impact of carbon sequestration and ways in which soil health might be measured using applied technologies and data sciences.

Research Projects

Lapwing Energy Reverse Coal GGR Phase 2

Reverse Coal is an engineered natural solution to remove CO2 from the atmosphere and bury it back into the geological reserve. This can be scaled and deliver significant social and environmental benefits.

Project Lead: Dr Amir Badiee

Co-Investigator: Simon Pearson

Funder: Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

HiRes-Soils: Robotic platforms for high resolution maps of soil carbon and GHG emissions

HiRes-Soil aims to massively increase the current capacity to map and understand the active part of the soil carbon cycle and NO2 emissions. It will do this by developing a field capable autonomous platform to map soil carbon flux, NO2 soil emissions, and soil cores for lab analysis. This would lead to cost effective and widespread direct measurement of soil carbon, the flux of GHGs CO2 and NO2 out of the soil, enabling carbon credits (private or government backed) to be directly audited, and land managers to learn what management practices increase carbon storage and reduced GHG soil emissions on their land.

Project Lead: Dr Shaun Coutts

Co-Investigator: Iain Gould

Funder: Innovate UK

Developing practical guidance and evidence of sustainable practices, working towards a net-zero potato supply chain – TuberNetZero

The aim is to investigate and quantify the effect that different cropping techniques have on soil greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions to produce net zero carbon potatoes.

Project Lead: Dr Sandra Varga

Co-Investigator: Iain Gould

Funder: Innovate UK

Optimising Miscanthus Establishment through improved mechanisation and data capture to meet Net Zero targets (OMENZ)

Terravesta, a world­ leading expert on Miscanthus with a consortium of academic and industrial partners, aims to improve our existing technology to deliver Miscanthus planting at a scale not achievable with current approaches.

Project Lead: Professor Simon Pearson

Co-Investigators: Iain Gould, Oorbessy Gaju, Shaun Coutts, Leonidas Rempelos

Funder: Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy

UKRI AI Centre for Doctoral Training in Sustainable Understandable agri-food Systems Transformed by Artificial INtelligence (SUSTAIN)

SUSTAIN imagines a system where data-driven AI transforms the production of crops (selective harvesting and weeding through precision agriculture) and raising of animals (livestock monitoring, reducing animal GHG emissions and improving animal welfare); enhances plant and animal breeding (AI informed genomics); stabilises supply chains (mechanism design and agent-based modelling); reduces food waste and loss (supply and demand matching) and enables fairer sharing of economic gains and understanding of environmental impacts (ethical and trustworthy AI). All the underlying methods need to be understandable by people so that decisions are trusted (explainable AI).

Project Lead: Professor Simon Parsons

Co-Director: Professor Elizabeth Sklar

Co-Investigator: Louise Manning

Funder: Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council

Collaborative Fruit Retrieval Using Intelligent Transportation

The aim is to create an innovative approach for soft fruit producers that drives labour productivity, reduces waste, and increases marketable yield. It will help to de-link the sector from critical dependencies on seasonal labour and drives towards net-zero by reducing farm waste.

Project Lead: Professor Elizabeth Sklar

Co-Investigator: Marc Hanheide

Funder: Innovate UK

AgriFood4NetZero: Plausible Pathways, Practical and Open Science for Net Zero Agrifood

The AgriFood4NetZero Network+ brings together key research leaders and their organisations and networks in a mission-led collaboration. The Network adopts a co-development approach to engage scientists and stakeholders to progress and prioritise UKRI and other research to support the agri-food system’s contribution to transitioning to a net zero UK by 2050.

Project Lead: Professor Simon Pearson

Funder: UK Research and Innovation

Plant selection and breeding for Net Zero

The outputs of this project will provide a pipeline to accelerate selection of biofuel crops with high yields that are climate resilient and minimise environmental impact.

Project Lead: Professor Simon Pearson

Co-Investigators: Elizabeth Sklar, Oorbessy Gaju

Funder: UK Research and Innovation

Decarbonising agriculture: synergistic nitrogen-fixing bacteria and photocatalyst to maximize fertilizer efficiency and improve air quality

This project will upscale the material manufacturing process (target capacity: 15 tons to cover 15,000 hectares of crop land) to meet the requirement for commercial application of R-Leaf to achieve and optimise the expected benefits and impacts. R-Leaf can capture atmospheric NOx and convert it into nitrate directly on crop-foliage to improve crop-growth and yield. The project aims to optimise the recommendation of the solution for a maximum output through efficacy testing, develop quality control measures for consistency of production, quantify the impact of the technology, and reflect the carbon credit value potential to support adoption.

Project Lead: Dr Taghread Hudaib

Co-Investigators: Iain Gould, Ravi Valluru

Funder: Innovate UK

Climate SAFE

Climate SAFE is a radical and transformative whole systems approach that transitions from traditional organic farming on degraded lowland peat, towards climate resilient, controlled environment agriculture with a broad array of interlinked societal, environmental, and economic benefits.

Project Lead: Professor Simon Pearson

Co-Investigator: Amir Badiee

Funder: Innovate UK