Can farming ever be truly sustainable and stop using fossil fuels?
Stuart and David Oates two of our field lab triallists, are running a fossil free farming event at their farm in Cornwall. Among other things they will talk about their involvement in both the Plastic free, sisal baling field lab and the Seaweed field lab.
Both brothers are Nuffield scholars, Stuart studying fossil free farming and David studying land use stacking for profitability and sustainability.
The agenda includes
- New Holland - Methane tractor demo
- Bennemann - Talk and discussion of methane capture from slurry
- Tama - demo of their new EZ-web recyclable bale net replacement
- Polaris - Lithium electric Ranger UTV demo
- Mitchell and Webber - HVO discussion and demo tractor
- Farm Carbon Toolkit - Hannah Jones will talk about soil carbon, microbiology and the potential for carbon uptake, alongside reporting on our combined Innovative Farmers' field trial of homebrew seaweed bio-stimulant
- Stuart Oates - Discussion and demo of Innovative Farmers' trial using sisal twine for round bales. Also covering his global research into the potential Fossil Free Farming
- Brazilian Nuffield scholar, João Lopes - Global biofuel production and the role of Brazil in a fossil-free future
- Brazilian Nuffield Scholar, Alex Melotto - Reduction of inputs, nitrogen balance, cover crops and the development of biological controls in mass-scale agriculture
- Nuffield scholar, Dave Oates - stacking land uses for profitability and sustainability. Focussing on inter-cropping, rotations, agroforestry, the potential for agri-solar and maximising profits without damaging nature
- Greengen - discussion on on-farm solar, battery storage and heating pump options
- Forest for Cornwall - discussion and farm walk on agro-forestry
- Alt-soy FIPL funded farmer group - discussion into home-grown protein options for animal feed
We'll also be talking about environmental auditing, future government policy, geothermal, and fossil-free production of ammonia fertilisers.
Lunch and dinner will be available - freshly made from our organic farm and seasonal local produce
Discussions will carry on into the evening over a drink, so camping is encouraged.
