As spreading got underway this week I spent time with a slurry spreading specialist who may have a working solution. Listen: 👉 https://t.co/axlNZf9ZcO

With the Agri sector having so far cut just 10% of the 25% emissions that it is legally required to by 2030, continuing with the old splash plate method of spreading is not sensible (or legally allowable). So what is to be done?

Low Emissions Slurry Spreading tech can reduce GHGs by anywhere between 30% and 60%. Since January farms with lower animal numbers (100 kg N/ha) have to use LESS. But there are many fields just not suited to the bulky kit involved.

Slurry spreading. Since Jan 1st more farms than ever before are now required to use low emissions technology to spread. But there’s a problem. But there’s also a solution. 🧵 Listen: 👉 https://t.co/axlNZf9ZcO

This could not only erode already shaken confidence in forestry, but it will be very bad for Ireland’s GHG emissions. Forestry was well on its way from being a carbon sink to becoming a net emitter. Eowyn will drastically accelerate that. #climate #extremeweather

The extent of Storm #Eowyn’s impact on conifer plantations cannot be seen properly from the ground. This drone footage taken today above a stand I visited in Meath shows how wind hardened trees around the edge remain standing while the centre has been flattened.

And I also talked to the new Agriculture Minister, Martin Heydon, about what is and isn’t in the Programme For Government. https://t.co/cFpGjmUL4s

Talked to two men with big roles in shaping the next 5 years on #farms and in #environment. #WaterQuality, #Mercosur, #Climate emissions and #NatureRestoration. First the self described “boots on the ground” new Agri Commissioner, Christophe Hansen. https://t.co/J9VTNiZogF

Full report below. To be clear - I’m not suggesting that Storm Eowyn has been caused by AMOC shutdown. I’m just sharing the research which suggests AMOC slowdown might be considered as a contributor to the violence of these storms. https://t.co/ZNzePpNuOV

In one report’s words …

The studies suggest these increased winds are as a consequence of AMOC slowdown today, not after a tipping point is passed, or after some future shutdown, but in the present.

The cold blob in the North Atlantic associated by leading climate scientists with #AMOC slowdown, has also been linked in some studies to more intense winter storm tracks.

Storm #Eowyn is being forecast as one of the most intense wind storms to ever hit Ireland. We will have to wait for attribution studies to assess what role #climate change did or didn’t play. By coincidence I have been reading papers on current impacts of AMOC slowdown. 🧵

All clips taken from #RisingTides https://t.co/BLqDISLVx9

The thing researchers in this area find very frustrating is that the scale of what is unfolding is almost completely ignored in the climate debate. 👇

As the atmosphere warms frozen peat thaws, reanimating microbes dormant for millennia. They start consuming the carbon in the peat and excreting it as CO₂ₑ. Thawing the top three metres of permafrost is the same as burning every forest in the world three times over.

This is from NOAA’s 2024 Arctic Report published yesterday. In a nutshell - a lot warmer, a lot more rain, shorter snow season and many more wildfires. Of all the things underway permafrost thaw is the least talked about. https://t.co/3Dtzl6h0St

We are poking the sleeping bear of permafrost thaw with a short stick. Last year in the Arctic Circle was the 2nd warmest since 1900. The nine warmest years have been the last nine years. The Arctic tundra is now a net emitter of greenhouse gases, not a sink.

Judges remarks commending Rising Tides at this year’s Association of International Broadcasting awards. Ep 2 repeated tonight on @RTEOne at 10.35 #Climate

“We can have a really uncomfortable conversation now about the places that are going to be too costly to defend in thirty years time. Or we can pay a much higher bill when evacuation is the only option” Fairbourne sequence is from Ep 2 of Rising Tides, repeated on RTÉ One on Wed