Friday Fun with Soil Carbon Flux Calculations
By Adam Koeppel, CEO, Agrology -
As CEO of Agrology, I don’t get to spend as much time as I’d like working on engineering. Our engineering team gets to do that good work. I also don’t get to do as much fieldwork in our customers' beautiful farms and vineyards. Sometimes the closest I get to farming is data analysis.
And, since the launch of the Arbiter Soil Carbon Monitoring System, I have spent more time looking at CO2 concentration data to refine Agrology’s flux calculation formulas. At Agrology, we know how to have fun! 😂
For those interested in carbon flux calculations here is a quick summary of my approach:
My first step is to structure the data.
Make it stand out
Whatever it is, the way you tell your story online can make all the difference.
Next, I develop equations.
The Arbiter Chamber logs chamber pressure and chamber temperature during each concentration measurement. Averaging these measurements yields the average temperature and pressure per concentration measurement interval. Applying the ideal gas law to the measurements from each interval converts volume flux to mass flux.
Our technology is based on the proven soil flux chamber lineage of fundamental physics principles and almost 100 years of field usage and study (you can read my white paper on that subject here). All Agrology calculations use ground truth measurements. There is no modeling or low-accuracy remote sensing.
Caine Thompson of Robert Hall Winery and O’Neill Vintners & Distillers recently shared that within the first two weeks of using Agrology they were able to quantify the results of their regenerative practices. “We now can confirm our intuition with ground-truth data." We love to put quantitative measurements behind the art of regenerative agriculture.
After all the fun, I need to get back to the less exciting work. Like deleting some of the 3,206 unopened spam emails I’ve received. Probably best to call me if it's urgent!
If you’re a grower interested in carbon credits, soil carbon flux monitoring, or understanding the results of your regenerative practices, reach out to us.
