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Afforestation is an important greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation strategy but the efficacy of commercial forestry is disputed. Here, we calculate the potential GHG mitigation of a UK national planting strategy of 30,000 ha yr −1 from 2020 to 2050, using dynamic life cycle assessment. What-if scenarios vary: conifer-broadleaf composition, harvesting, product breakouts, and decarbonisation of substituted energy and materials, to estimate 100-year GHG mitigation. Here we find forest growth rate is the most important determinant of cumulative mitigation by 2120, irrespective of whether trees are harvested. A national planting strategy of commercial forest could mitigate 1.64 Pg CO 2 e by 2120 (cumulative), compared with 0.54–1.72 Pg CO 2 e for planting only conservation forests, depending on species composition. Even after heavy discounting of future product substitution credits based on industrial decarbonisation projections, GHG mitigation from harvested stands typically surpasses unharvested stands. Commercial afforestation can deliver effective GHG mitigation that is robust to future decarbonisation pathways and wood uses. Afforestation is an important greenhouse gas (GHG) mitigation strategy but the efficacy of commercial (harvested) forestry is disputed. Here the authors apply dynamic life cycle assessment to show that new commercial conifer forests can achieve up to 269% more GHG mitigation than semi-natural forests, over 100 years.

Predominantly linear use of wood curtails the potential climate-change mitigation contribution of forestry value-chains. Using lifecycle assessment, we show that more cascading and especially circular uses of wood can provide immediate and sustained mitigation by reducing demand for virgin wood, which increases forest carbon sequestration and storage, and benefits from substitution for fossil-fuel derived products, reducing net greenhouse gas emissions. By United Kingdom example, the circular approach of recycling medium-density fibreboard delivers 75% more cumulative climate-change mitigation by 2050, compared with business-as-usual. Early mitigation achieved by circular and cascading wood use complements lagged mitigation achieved by afforestation; and in combination these measures could cumulatively mitigate 258.8 million tonnes CO 2 e by 2050. Despite the clear benefits of implementing circular economy principles, we identify many functional barriers impeding the structural reorganisation needed for such complex system change, and propose enablers to transform the forestry value-chain into an effective societal change system and lead to coherent action. Cascading and especially circular wood uses enhance climate-change mitigation achieved by forestry. In combination, these measures could cumulatively mitigate 258.8 million tonnes CO 2 e by 2050 in the UK but implementation barriers must be overcome.

Global wood demand is expected to rise but supply capacity is questioned due to limited forest resources. Additionally, the global warming potential (GWP) impact of increased wood supply and use is not well understood. We propose a framework combining forest carbon modelling and dynamic consequential life-cycle assessment to evaluate this impact. Applying it to generic temperate forest, we show that afforestation to double productive forest area combined with enhanced productivity can meet lower-bound wood demand projections from 2058. Temperate forestry value-chains can achieve cumulative GWP benefit of up to 265 Tg CO 2 -equivalent (CO 2 e) by 2100 per 100,000 ha of forest (if expanded to 200,000 ha through afforestation). Net GWP balance depends on which overseas forests supply domestic shortfalls, how wood is used, and the rate of industrial decarbonisation. Increased wood-use could aid climate-change mitigation, providing it is coupled with a long-term planting strategy, enhanced forest productivity and efficient wood use. This paper analyzes climate change mitigation potential of forest management practices under wood demand scenarios, finding that increasing wood use can be beneficial only with increased productivity and use efficiency.

Evaluation of agricultural intensification requires comprehensive analysis of trends in farm performance across physical and socio-economic aspects, which may diverge across farm types. Typical reporting of economic indicators at sectorial or the \"average farm\" level does not represent farm diversity and provides limited insight into the sustainability of specific intensification pathways. Using farm business data from a total of 7281 farm survey observations of English and Welsh dairy farms over a 14-year period we calculate a time series of 16 key performance indicators (KPIs) pertinent to farm structure, environmental and socio-economic aspects of sustainability. We then apply principle component analysis and model-based clustering analysis to identify statistically the number of distinct dairy farm typologies for each year of study, and link these clusters through time using multidimensional scaling. Between 2001 and 2014, dairy farms have largely consolidated and specialized into two distinct clusters: more extensive farms relying predominantly on grass, with lower milk yields but higher labour intensity, and more intensive farms producing more milk per cow with more concentrate and more maize, but lower labour intensity. There is some indication that these clusters are converging as the extensive cluster is intensifying slightly faster than the intensive cluster, in terms of milk yield per cow and use of concentrate feed. In 2014, annual milk yields were 6,835 and 7,500 l/cow for extensive and intensive farm types, respectively, whilst annual concentrate feed use was 1.3 and 1.5 tonnes per cow. For several KPIs such as milk yield the mean trend across all farms differed substantially from the extensive and intensive typologies mean. The indicators and analysis methodology developed allows identification of distinct farm types and industry trends using readily available survey data. The identified groups allow the accurate evaluation of the consequences of the reduction in dairy farm numbers and intensification at national and international scales.

This study critically examines the use of ‘no additional warming’ approaches, such as temperature neutrality (TN), to determine national climate policy on agricultural methane (CH4). The reduced-complexity climate model MAGICC was used to quantify future national warming contributions for Ireland (a country with high per-capita CH4 emissions driven by large-scale dairy and beef production) under a business-as-usual pathway and three alternative scenarios: (1) TN, (2) a split-gas emission target, or (3) net-zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050. TN implicitly ‘grandfathers’ CH4 emissions, ‘rewarding’ modest emission reductions even when per capita warming remains high, thereby shifting the mitigation burden and constraining the developmental space for low-income, food-insecure countries. Weaker CH4 emission reduction ambition, i.e. use of TN at the national level, is often justified on the basis of protecting global food security, because it can avoid ‘emission leakage’ from countries that export livestock products with below-average GHG intensities. However, this study demonstrates such justifications have little merit given that global trade in animal-sourced foods largely benefits wealthy markets, and often relies on imported feed, contributing to indirect land use change. The study concludes that the TN approach is not a robust basis for fair and effective national climate policy, and risks a potentially costly underestimation of both long-term CH4 mitigation and carbon dioxide removal in the context of national planning for an equitable, sustainable, food secure future.

This paper responds to a comment on our study of national “temperature neutrality” (TN) as a basis for climate policy, using Ireland as a case study. The comment mischaracterises our original analysis in several respects; we correct these mischaracterisations and engage with the substantive arguments raised. We demonstrate that the comment constructs a false dichotomy between national TN and net-zero greenhouse gas emissions (NZ-GHG), overlooking the split-gas compromise pathways explicitly evaluated in our original study. In addition, the EU effort-sharing framework is based on absolute GHG emissions reductions, not temperature contributions, and Ireland’s obligations under Regulation (EU) 2018/842 and the Paris Agreement require economy-wide absolute reductions. A national TN approach is therefore incompatible with these existing frameworks. We further show that widespread adoption of national TN would create a proliferation dynamic, a “race to the bottom”, in which the mitigation gap left by TN-adopting states increases pressure on remaining states, collectively undermining the EU and global mitigation effort. We also rebut the assertion that GWP100 lacks scientific rigour: it is grounded in the same physical climate modelling as TN-based approaches and benefits from a standardised, internationally accepted accounting protocol. Finally, we highlight the equity implications identified in our original study: national TN grandfathers disproportionately high per-capita agricultural CH 4 emissions in Ireland, appropriating emissions space needed by food-insecure developing countries. We conclude that TN is not an effective, fair, transparent, or robust basis for national climate policy.

Europe imports large amounts of soybean that are predominantly used for livestock feed, mainly sourced from Brazil, USA and Argentina. In addition, the demand for GM-free soybean for human consumption is project to increase. Soybean has higher protein quality and digestibility than other legumes, along with high concentrations of isoflavones, phytosterols and minerals that enhance the nutritional value as a human food ingredient. Here, we examine the potential to increase soybean production across Europe for livestock feed and direct human consumption, and review possible effects on the environment and human health. Simulations and field data indicate rainfed soybean yields of 3.1 ± 1.2 t ha −1 from southern UK through to southern Europe (compared to a 3.5 t ha −1 average from North America). Drought-prone southern regions and cooler northern regions require breeding to incorporate stress-tolerance traits. Literature synthesized in this work evidenced soybean properties important to human nutrition, health, and traits related to food processing compared to alternative protein sources. While acknowledging the uncertainties inherent in any modelling exercise, our findings suggest that further integrating soybean into European agriculture could reduce GHG emissions by 37–291 Mt CO 2e year −1 and fertiliser N use by 0.6–1.2 Mt year −1 , concurrently improving human health and nutrition.

This paper provides a systematic review of food-environment interactions in catchment models, focusing on the complex relationships between land use, ecosystem services, and agricultural production. The review highlights the importance of catchment-scale models in understanding the impact of land use on local ecosystems, particularly in relation to water quality, biodiversity, and soil services. By examining various international catchment-scale models, with an emphasis on the micro and macro disparities, the paper identifies key methodological lessons and future opportunities to enhance these frameworks for more effective policy design and environmental management. The review is structured around a conceptual framework that categorises models into environmental models, which focus on ecosystem dynamics, and physical models, which examine structural and material aspects of land use systems, as well as human dimensions, with a specific focus on reducing net emissions and improving land productivity. This relationship is described through a conceptual framework. The paper also emphasises the significance of spatial and temporal factors in these models, noting gaps in the literature limited integration of food production into catchment models, underrepresentation of localised/catchment-level modelling, data limitations, particularly lack of georeferenced micro-level data, inadequate incorporation of climate change scenarios and temporal variability, weak integration of biophysical, economic, and social factors, insufficient analysis of policy and governance impacts at catchment scale and lack of farm-specific, actionable recommendations. The research highlights the critical need for enhanced data accessibility, environmental model maintainability, standardised land use variable definitions, and improved georeferencing in land use modelling. The findings emphasise the importance of long-term projections, integration of social, economic, and biophysical factors, and open data initiatives to bolster essential research infrastructure and foster stakeholder engagement for more effective agricultural policy and environmental management.

Introducing legumes to crop rotations could contribute toward healthy and sustainable diet transitions, but the current evidence base is fragmented across studies that evaluate specific aspects of sustainability and nutrition in isolation. Few previous studies have accounted for interactions among crops, or the aggregate nutritional output of rotations, to benchmark the efficiency of modified cropping sequences. We applied life cycle assessment to compare the environmental efficiency of ten rotations across three European climatic zones in terms of delivery of human and livestock nutrition. The introduction of grain legumes into conventional cereal and oilseed rotations delivered human nutrition at lower environmental cost for most of the 16 impact categories studied. In Scotland, the introduction of a legume crop into the typical rotation reduced external nitrogen requirements by almost half to achieve the same human nutrition potential. In terms of livestock nutrition, legume-modified rotations also delivered more digestible protein at lower environmental cost compared with conventional rotations. However, legume-modified rotations delivered less metabolisable energy for livestock per hectare-year in two out of the three zones, and at intermediate environmental cost for one zone. Our results show that choice of functional unit has an important influence on the apparent efficiency of different crop rotations, and highlight a need for more research to develop functional units representing multiple nutritional attributes of crops for livestock feed. Nonetheless, results point to an important role for increased legume cultivation in Europe to contribute to the farm and diet sustainability goals of the European Union's Farm to Fork strategy.

European bioeconomy policies stress the need for responsible, efficient feedstock use and timely, comprehensive data on ecosystems and bioeconomic activities. This paper addresses the data gap by: (i) providing holistic county-level (sub-NUTS3) biomass maps for the Republic of Ireland (RoI), covering primary feedstocks (PFs) and secondary feedstocks (SFs, i.e., by-products and waste); (ii) identifying feedstock uses during the study period. In total, 221 feedstocks were mapped: 85 solid PFs (approx. 43 million tonnes dry matter (tDM) nationally) and 136 solid SFs (approx. 6 million tDM nationally), plus 6 liquid PFs (approx. 18 thousand million m3 nationally) and 8 liquid SFs (approx. 39 thousand million m3 nationally). The mapping indicates that environmentally sustainable bio-based value chains (BBVCs) requiring large amounts of solid or liquid SF should prioritise processing sites near major feedstock sources in the southeast and southwest of the RoI. The northwest and east coast have the lowest availability, while the west and midlands have the most variety in quantity and type of feedstock. Counties with abundant feedstocks do not necessarily have high feedstock diversity, except for Cork. Granular sub-NUTS3 mapping of quantities and fate provides a powerful foundation for future feedstock strategies and empowers stakeholders to design innovative BBVCs.