Every week for the next few months, we will be posting a new chapter from our book Fleeing Vesuvius on this site so that people have the chance to discuss the ideas it contains. We are doing this because many people find it helpful to debate and analyse unfamiliar ideas with others before deciding whether to accept them or not. Previous chapters can be found here.
In this week’s chapter, Corinna Byrne describes how farming and other land-based activities could do a lot to mitigate global warming. Ireland needs new policies to get its land to absorb CO2 rather than release it. The large amounts of carbon locked up in the country’s peatlands must be safeguarded and damaged bogs restored so that they can sequester carbon again. In addition, the use of biochar could reduce methane and nitrous oxide emissions and build up the fertility and carbon content of the soil.
