Tag: carbon calculator

How to get an accurate farm carbon footprint report

Posted on February 26, 2024 by - Calculator

Process of doing your carbon footprint report

When calculating the carbon footprint of a farm business, users should expect a result that is accurate, insightful, representative and replicable. However, farmers and growers can sometimes be unsure what the results from different carbon calculators mean, and why they are different. In general, it is good practice to find a carbon calculator which works for you and stick with it. Many calculators provide their methodology which demonstrates transparency and is a feature which users should look for.  In this blog we walk you through the process, and what affects the reports produced.

Inputting data into Carbon Calculators

Before starting the process of collecting data from your farm business, scoping is an important first step in understanding what’s in and what’s out of the report. For instance, a farm might have different enterprises, such as arable farming, a farm shop and some business units. Reporting on those enterprises separately makes sense from the perspective of understanding the carbon footprint of farming operations. In many instances, it is important to understand who the report is being completed for. Completing a whole farm footprint ensures that no details are overlooked and enables users to estimate farm carbon removals as well as emissions. However, increasingly the customers of farmers and growers are keen to understand the emissions associated with the products they are buying.

It should be noted, however, that producing separate reports that focus on the product can lead to overlooking important parts of a farm as a system – those parts of the farm that keep the system working but don’t directly result in a product.

Time period for the report 

This is generally over a 12-month period and can coincide with business accounting or harvest year, whichever is most convenient. It is perfectly possible to carry out emissions reporting over shorter periods to coincide with, for example, batches of livestock production. If you take this approach, be sure not to leave gaps between your reporting.

Data collection is a key part of the process and is generally undertaken by the business owner/employee. Getting this right is critical, and the quality of the data going in directly affects the accuracy of the results that come out. Our advice is quite simple – collect as much data as possible that is relevant to your business over the period to be reported on. We have a data collection spreadsheet to help with this part of the process https://calculator.farmcarbontoolkit.org.uk/resources. 

When entering data into the Calculator, it is important to ensure that data is entered correctly and in full. Users need to ensure that they’ve inputted everything collected in the data collection process and that units, decimal points and other important information are filled in correctly. There is much potential for error here, which will have a significant impact on the results!

Once data is entered and results can be viewed, interpretation of the report is very important. Is the report looking at a whole farm or enterprise footprint? Are you looking at the emissions only or the carbon balance? Are results being shown per hectare, per tonne, or for the whole business? Being clear about what has been measured, and what is being reported is crucial – particularly if comparing between different businesses or within a sector. 

Getting our bit right

As a provider of a leading carbon calculator for farmers, growers and food businesses, at Farm Carbon Calculator we take a huge amount of care in ensuring that we are getting our numbers right. 

Alongside your farm data, all Calculators will have a series of formulae and emissions factors which are used to calculate the farm’s emissions. Emissions factors tell us how much greenhouse gas is released from a certain activity – for instance using a litre of diesel in a tractor. At FCT, we do this on thousands of items! We update all our emissions factors on an annual basis, and sometimes more frequently if new and credible research comes along. 

Once we’ve entered the new emissions factors, which have to be backed up by rigorous and credible peer-reviewed science, we then test the Calculator to ensure that everything is working properly. This process is rigorous and any anomalies are corrected before the update goes live. We publish our methodology and references on our resources page. The next update is due in April 2024.

This ongoing process ensures that we are on top of the science, up-to-date, and maintaining a tool that users can expect to get accurate and reliable results from, in order to make informed decisions for their business.

Alongside getting the factors and formulae correct, there is increasing guidance on what needs to be included within any agricultural greenhouse gas audit and how the calculations should be completed. Examples of such guidance come from the draft Land Sector Removals guidance from GHG protocol which sets standards for how GHG accounting should be carried out and the Forest, Land and Agriculture Science (FLAG guidance) from the Science-based Targets Initiative (SBTi). At FCT, our Calculator has been analysed against the requirements of FLAG and our Calculator has been found to be well aligned with its requirements.

As an organisation that exists to help farmers and growers measure, understand and reduce their carbon footprint,  we always operate in the best interests of our users which includes ensuring our Calculator is as accurate as possible at all times. We are independent, providing a free carbon calculator for farmers and growers, and have a process of continual improvement in place. As a regular user of our Calculator you can always compare current and past results using the most up-to-date Calculator, allowing you to track business progress to net Zero.

You can find all you need to know about the Farm Carbon Calculator here If you need more information please contact us at calculator@farmcarbontoolkit.org.uk or phone us on 07541 453413 

In the next blog we focus on how we get externally reviewed, and are engaged with industry and Government to improve accuracy and standards.

Your beef enterprise: how to accurately estimate emissions and sequestration

Posted on February 13, 2024 by - Calculator, Insights

To accurately estimate the emissions and sequestration from your beef enterprise, you will need to add data to the following sections of the Calculator:

  • When setting up the report, make sure you enter the area of grazing (grassland) as well as any non-agricultural land area and cultivated land (arable or horticultural)
  • Use the Livestock section and select beef cattle. Add as many entries as you need to cover your herd. For example, you may have two groups of steers with different liveweights or kept on the farm for different lengths of time. In which case, enter the steers from the first group with one liveweight and then the steers from the second group as a separate entry with their own liveweight. This will give you more accurate emissions from their enteric fermentation (gut methane).
  • To calculate the average head of livestock on the farm over a 12 month period, take the number in a particular livestock category per month (so you have 12 “snapshots”) add these together and then divide by 12. Our data collection sheet has a help sheet for this. For growing animals, you may want to use the same approach for calculating average liveweight (our defaults assume a midpoint liveweight through the year for growing cattle but growth rates won’t be linear so using the snapshot approach may be more accurate)
  • Livestock entries also capture the CO2 equivalent (CO2e) of the methane emissions from enteric fermentation and of the nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions from the animals’ manure over the course of the year. The Calculator asks you how this manure is managed as this has an impact on the N2O emissions
  • You have the option to input the average dry matter intake (DMI) per animal per day (kgDM/head/day). The DMI can be used to more accurately calculate the enteric emissions of the cattle, and if left blank, a simpler algorithm will be used that does not consider DMI
  • You will need to account for any supplemental feeding via the Livestock > Animal feeds option – this is for brought-in feeds that were produced off-farm
  • Account for all your fuel use, electricity use, consumables, inventory items and waste produced using the relevant sections (Fuels, Materials,  Inventory, Waste). However, if you also have a dairy herd or arable operation, you may prefer to create a separate report and use this as an Overheads report to apportion shared capital items and energy usage emissions between your enterprises. Watch our video to see how this works in practice.
  • We recommend getting your soil sampled and have a guide on how to do this effectively and affordably. By monitoring your soil organic matter or soil organic carbon over time you can begin to log sequestration rates in your grazed (or other) soils. Once you have two years’ worth of soil sample results, you can enter these in the Calculator under Sequestration > Soil Organic Matter (you will also need bulk density measurements and a record of the depth of the sample).
  • If you don’t have directly sampled soil data for all your soils, you can use our range of proxy values for different Countryside Stewardship and habitat classes to estimate how much carbon your soils may be sequestering year-on-year. You can also measure the length of any hedgerows and field margins (ungrazed) and enter these to estimate the carbon sequestered in them on a yearly basis.

Special Bulletin: PhD congratulations!

Posted on January 11, 2024 by - News

Lizzy Parker, our Carbon Calculator Manager, graduated her PhD from the University of Sheffield on Monday 8th January. Her thesis was on the role of the arbuscular mycorrhizal symbiosis in the physiological and metabolomic drought response of barley (how symbiotic root fungi can alter the barley plants’ chemistry and whether this helps them survive droughts – although she found that it didn’t help all that much actually).

Congratulations to Lizzy from all of us at FCT!

A Day in the Life – Michael Brown, Calculator Customer Service Officer

Posted on October 28, 2024 by - Insights, News

A little challenge every day

Chances are, if you’re interested in measuring the carbon footprint of your farm you know a bit about what my job entails. I’m here to support you and help more and more farmers measure the carbon footprint of their farm. Each day, I’m immersed in both the challenges and rewards of what this involves:

We get it – carbon footprinting a farm can be hard, every farm is different, time is short and sometimes we all face problems fitting the farm information we have into an online carbon calculator.

Rising to the challenge

Behind our calculator is an approachable team who benefit from a two-way process where we help you and the more we do this, the more we learn and can improve the calculator in the long term.

We put together online resources; we generate and record ideas which guide ongoing research into methodologies of calculating GHG emissions in agriculture; and we contribute to the development and testing of our software.

When we develop, and when we test – we’re looking to see if things are getting better – and since starting in April 2024 we’ve already seen some great improvements rolled out to the calculator. My role contributes toward this on an average day.

Starting the Day: Checking in with the users

The day kicks off with a review of support requests from users across the UK and farms around the world. Our users vary widely, from small family farms to large agricultural enterprises, and their technical needs are just as diverse. Questions cannot be predicted but range from understanding how to input specific data into the calculator to interpreting their carbon footprint results.

I love interacting with those farmers taking the important step of calculating a footprint. There are many reasons for doing this – and all are inspiring, so it is great to hear from those involved. By solving problems or helping guide users my small but crucial role builds our understanding of carbon data. 

Mid-Morning: Developing resources for sustainable agriculture

A big part of my role is creating and updating online resources that help users maximize the calculator’s potential. I’ll work on developing these resources – which you can view in our FAQ’s, downloadable resources, instructional videos, or during training sessions. 

We think many farmers work long hours and appreciate a well-organized, easy-to-navigate guide that helps self-starters make the most of the Calculator – we believe it should be possible to use the tool yourself and feel that satisfaction of having achieved something.

Afternoon: Finding a solution for businesses or environmental professionals

The afternoon usually involves working closely with our Calculator Manager and other team members to ensure the Farm Carbon Calculator continues to deliver for our professional and commercial users. 

We rely on the legion of professionals, organisations, and partners who pay to use our software through licences, our excellent API, or in other ways to reach ever more farmers. Their fees support the work we do in all senses and this is clear in all our approaches to commercial work.

Staying informed in this area is critical for our relevance as the opportunities for us to help those working in carbon management and agricultural sustainability are constantly evolving.

With Lizzy Parker, Calculator Manager, at FCT’s Annual Field Day 2024

Wrapping up: Reflecting on progress and user feedback

Toward the end of the day, I might be reviewing feedback from users on recent updates or features, and discussions from the morning. Positive feedback is always motivating, and constructive suggestions are tracked to help us improve.

Without farmers and others working hard on their footprints and their sustainability I either wouldn’t have a job, or wouldn’t have the inspiration to know what to do next. With that in mind – throughout the day you can reach me at the end of the phone or on email – so give me a call. 

If you are an agricultural professional or large organisation you may want to see the services available for you, book a demo with us, or let me know if you want to learn more. Everyone else using the tool – just get started, create an account, or get in touch. You can reach us Monday to Friday 9am to 5pm on calculator@farmcarbontoolkit.org.uk 

A Day in the Life of…James Pitman, Calculator Development Officer

Posted on April 17, 2024 by - Insights, News

The day-to-day responsibilities of a carbon calculator development officer are a little more sedentary than those of our farmers or my advisory colleagues, but the intricacies of the job mean my life is far from mundane.

My primary objective is to continuously work on refining and enhancing our carbon calculator, ensuring it remains an accurate, trusted, and invaluable tool for UK farmers. 

A significant portion of my time is dedicated to the core emissions factors that underpin the calculator. This can mean verifying or updating our existing factors, researching new factors, or addressing the requests from users and advisors about factors they want on the calculator. In the last couple months I have been working closely on the Version 1.6.0 update to the calculator, which required a comprehensive review of all the emissions factors we use. This was a formidable task, and I have spent countless hours scouring through spreadsheets, deep in research papers, and having lively video calls with the team and our software developers. For all this work we have been able to add great functionality to the calculator and made really exciting plans for what is in the pipeline (no spoilers!), so the toil has paid off and I am very satisfied with the extent of new data and functionality we have been able to add in such a short window of time.

Since starting with FCT in December 2023, I have also been fortunate enough to help in the creation of the Equine Carbon Calculator, an industry-leading initiative aimed at quantifying emissions from the equine sector. During this development process you could have found me doing a myriad of tasks, from researching how the emissions would vary between different horse breeds, to calculating the materials needed for stable buildings and their embedded emissions, or beta-testing the new website and calculator. The opportunity to be involved with the Equine Carbon Calculator was fantastic and I have been thrilled to see how many reports have been built in it since it went live in March 2024.

The enthusiasm and passion FCT and its community have for sustainable agriculture is inspiring, and as a new member of the company I have never felt so welcome and excited about a new job. I hope that my work with the calculator team will create an efficient and effective tool for you all, and with that I am going to dive back into the research papers!

A Day in the Life of… Liz Bowles, Chief Executive

Posted on January 11, 2024 by - Insights, News

Being Chief Exec of the Farm Carbon Toolkit is a privilege. I have a team of committed, enthusiastic and supremely knowledgeable people working with me who are dedicated to supporting farmers to understand their farm carbon footprint and to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and increase carbon sequestration, whilst maintaining thriving, biodiverse businesses.  

We are a relatively small organisation, but I always love it when people tell me that they keep coming across the team as this means we are being noticed and, even more importantly, that people like what we are doing. Last week was just such an example. We were involved in a number of sessions at the Oxford Farming Conference including showcasing Farm Net Zero Cornwall and the great strides farmers involved in the group are making towards Net Zero. We also featured in the premiere of the film “Six Inches of Soil”  and were mentioned by a number of other speakers at the conference whom we work with.

There is no such thing as a typical day for me.

I do start off with a list of what I would like to get done during the day and highlight the tasks which are important/ urgent, but then things happen, such as people making contact with me to discuss exciting new activities with which we could get involved. It is just about impossible to know which opportunities are the best to take forward from the great number which come our way every day, but my watch word is to pursue working with like-minded organisations whose first instinct is to think about what they can do to support reducing the greenhouse gas emissions from agriculture and who, like us, believe that farmers are supremely well-placed to remove carbon from the atmosphere through how they farm.

Over the last few months I have been developing relationships with other popular Carbon Calculators to enable us to work together where possible to harmonise Calculator methodologies, so that farmers’ Carbon Calculator results will be more comparable in future. This, I believe, will increase the uptake of their use. We know that the requirement to provide information on farm emissions and removals will increase over time and we are committed to continually improving our Calculator so that farmers who are taking action to reduce their carbon footprint can see this fully reflected in their reporting. We are also committed to providing our Calculator directly to farmers for free.

Carbon Trust Reviews FCT Calculator

Posted on January 4, 2024 by - Calculator, News

Our role in helping to decarbonise agriculture brings many challenges, not least making sure that our underlying data and methodology are the best they can be, aligning with the latest science. We’re always striving to improve this, which is why, every year, we conduct an independent review of our Calculator to ensure we’re giving the most robust agricultural carbon footprints possible.

This year, the review of our Calculator methodology was conducted by the Carbon Trust and we’re pleased to be able to share their findings and keep our users updated as we update the Calculator in response.

Summary of the Carbon Trust Calculator Review

In October 2023, The Carbon Trust conducted an independent review and gap analysis of the Farm Carbon Calculator against:

  • The GHG Protocol standard (GHG Protocol);
  • The WRI Land-Use Change and Removals Draft Guidance (WRI LSRG);
  • SBTi Forest Land and Agriculture Guidance (SBTi FLAG)

The following aspects of the Farm Carbon Calculator were covered by the review:

  • User interface
  • Quality Control procedures
  • Emissions factors
  • Calculation methodologies
  • Approach to land-use change

The review identified several strengths and areas for improvement to support the alignment of the tool with the above standards and guidance.

The Carbon Trust has received a detailed action plan of how FCT will enact these recommendations over the next 12 months (with the majority of improvements scheduled for release in April 2024). The Carbon Trust considers that the action plan addresses the points raised in the review. 

A Day in the Life of… Emma Adams, Senior Farm Carbon and Soils Advisor

Posted on March 20, 2024 by - Insights, News

This January I was very fortunate to attend the 27th Challenge in Rural Leadership course, run by the Worshipful Company of Farmers and Duchy College, with my place supported by the Henry Plumb Foundation and FCT. Throughout the course, I was able to work alongside other industry leaders, understand why they succeed and practically improve my expertise. However, it was also very clear that leadership is not inherited through attaining a particular job title or level of responsibility. There were many insightful and poignant moments from the course, but one of my favourites was from Mary Quicke, of Quicke’s Cheese in Devon – “No one has ‘Spent a long time in the office’ on their grave”. So with that, what am I getting up to?

FCT operates on an incredibly diverse scale, whereby we have the great privilege of working with farmers and growers across all sectors and corners of the UK and beyond. This is brilliant and makes each day highly varied but does mean that many lists are made in a day of the tasks arising. Today for example started by packaging up soil samples heading for analysis from a wonderful project we have up in the Lake District (thank you West Cumbria Rivers Trust and the lovely farmers involved) looking at baselining the soil health and carbon status of the farms. This quickly proceeded into finalising proposals for upcoming projects with Lamb Weston and First Milk – two brilliant companies who although operating in different sectors (potatoes and milk production) are both passionate about producing sustainable food to the highest standard.

This week I am also participating in some filming for a project we have recently launched with the Royal Countryside Fund titled ‘Savings in Soil’. It is a brilliant project looking to help farmers measure and manage their grassland’s soil health to benefit future farm resilience. As ever, soil underpins a healthy and productive grassland system, capable of producing healthy pastures and livestock, which in turn supports a profitable farming system. 

I am very lucky to facilitate the Soil Farmer of the Year competition, as such the day also bought liaison for this year’s application process. The competition aims to find and champion UK farmers who are engaged with and managing their soils to the benefit of their farming system and the wider environment. We are supported again this year by Hutchinsons and Cotswold Seeds, so again an opportunity to say thank you to their teams! 

So, despite a little bit of time in the office today – we have managed to work with a huge variety of topics and geographies, continuing to assist the fabulous farmers, communities and industries of UK agriculture.

A Day in the Life of… Becky Willson, Technical Director

Posted on February 13, 2024 by - Insights, News

One of the wonderful things about working for FCT is that no two days are the same. I am incredibly lucky that I get to work with such a brilliant group of colleagues and some fantastic farmers.  Everyone brings new skills, knowledge and interests, which allow us to learn from each other and share ideas which is really rewarding. 

This week has been an interesting week. I am currently delivering a new course which is being run by the University of Cumbria entitled Upland Farming for Net Zero. We have a great cohort of 15 students who are either directly farming or involved in supporting our upland farmers in the South West. This week, we have had online sessions focussing on storing more carbon in upland environments and measuring emissions from livestock, alongside a farm visit on Monday to discuss what it all means in practice.  What’s great about this course is that it also feeds into a project we are just completing, which has built a version of the carbon calculator specifically for upland farmers to be able to take account of carbon on-commons, which is a welcome step forward. 

I have also run a couple of training sessions for groups within the Royal Countryside Fund, providing an introduction to managing carbon on the farm. Although I do a lot of these types of talks, they never get boring as each session yields a different set of questions. What I get most enjoyment from is the interaction with the farmers and helping them to see how what I’m saying could be put into practice. It’s so rewarding to be able to help in some small way, even if it is just to help empower them to feel part of delivering the solutions. 

Alongside talks, I have been finishing off a couple of reports for projects that are coming to an end: a dairy footprinting project combining farm footprints for the supplier farms with the operational footprint of the processing site, and writing some factsheets for farmers around the importance of managing manures and the opportunities with cultivation. There is always more to do and new projects and ideas to explore.

How do we measure peatland?

Posted on December 7, 2023 by - Insights, News

Understanding the carbon dynamics of peatland is a complicated process that is ever-changing for land managers and farmers. Historically, peat soils and habitats have been understood as a carbon store, with peat itself being of extremely high carbon content. However, in the process of carbon footprinting it is required to understand all greenhouse gases associated with peatland (carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide) and the additional storage of carbon into these soils, a process known as sequestration. 

Sequestration is the process of capturing carbon from the air and storing it within the land, through the process of photosynthesis. Within peatland soils there are additional layers of complexity when thinking of carbon storage. The waterlogged conditions of peat soils allow decomposing plants to accumulate, storing the carbon in the form of peat; this means that not only is carbon captured and stored via photosynthesis, but that there are direct carbon additions from the plant structures themselves. 

Consequently, measuring peatland within the Farm Carbon Calculator or any carbon calculator can be complex – knowledge in the scientific community alongside methods of accounting are rapidly developing. However, the following methods can be used:

  • Direct Measurement: soil sampling the peatland soil to understand the carbon content (Soil Organic Matter or Soil Organic Carbon testing) provides a figure of the carbon stock within an area. Carbon stock is the quantity of soil contained within a soil at the time of measurement and is calculated in combination with a Bulk Density sample. To understand if your peatland is sequestering carbon (capturing more, additional carbon) this sampling needs to be repeated to understand whether the figure measured in the first instance is increasing or decreasing. Soil sampling can be conducted annually, but there is often concern around carbon flux so the Farm Carbon Toolkit would usually recommend sampling every 3-5 years. More can be found out about how to sample soil in our free online guide to monitoring soil carbon on the FCT website here.
  • Modelled Measurement: if however direct measurement is unsuitable or you would like a faster indication of the carbon dynamics of your peatland soil you can use modelled figures embedded within the Farm Carbon Calculator. Using data from the Peatland Carbon Code 2.0 there is the ability to account for peatland areas of the landscape through selecting the type of peat you have and the area (hectares). The calculator will then provide a modelled suggestion of the likely dynamics of the different greenhouse gases associated with the different peat classifications.