The potential of nature-based solutions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from US agriculture

Abstract

Climate change is the main environmental challenge of the twenty-first century. The United States is the world’s second-largest producer of annual greenhouse gases (GHGs), and agriculture contributes about 10% of the USA’s emissions. This study evaluates the literature and potential of nature-based solutions to reduce GHG emissions from US agriculture, which has been characterized as “industrial agriculture.” The US experience has global relevance. Nature-based solutions in US agriculture include: (1) changing the crops and livestock that farmers produce; (2) changing how farmers grow food by using regenerative or climate-smart agriculture practices, such as soil and water conservation and improved manure and fertilizer management to build up soil carbon and enhance productivity; (3) changing where food is grown; (4) enabling the sale of carbon offset credits from farmland owners to GHG emitters; and (5) enabling the sale of development rights by farmland owners to “preserve” farmland for agricultural uses and avoid the conversion of farmland to residential and commercial development. The potential reductions in GHG emissions from nature-based solutions appear to be 40–50%. So, nature-based solutions will not eliminate all GHGs from US agriculture. But the reduction in methane and nitrous oxide are especially important. The global challenge is how to profitably produce more food to feed a growing population while sustainably reducing GHGs and improving soil carbon health within a changing climate.