Agrecalc Cloud launched for free trial
January 17, 2025
Agrecalc has launched new and improved Free Trial version of Agrecalc Cloud, with enhanced security measures.
This month marks a year since publication of the ‘Harmonisation of Carbon Accounting Tools for Agriculture’ report commissioned by Defra and produced by ADAS.
The collaborative efforts of the three leading carbon calculators resulted in significant progress being made, especially in the area of harmonisation on methods to bring new and novel fertilisers into our Calculators.
Commissioned by Defra in 2022, the independent ADAS report sought to explore the level of divergence in carbon assessments between carbon calculators and provide recommendations for harmonisation, with the ultimate goal of ensuring comparability of results between the different providers.
As the report states, “It is not about identification of which calculator is better or worse than others. It is intended that the insights from this analysis will help inform a potential approach that will enable providers to develop their calculators in a way that creates increased comparability of results while still allowing innovation.”
"The progress in these areas is fundamental to supporting our customers to get the correct results and insights to inform their business decisions."
In response to the publication of the report, three of the UK’s major carbon calculators – Agrecalc, Cool Farm Tool, and Farm Carbon Calculator – agreed to work together in June 2024 to harmonise their calculator methodologies, on the understanding that such work would ultimately benefit all their end users.
Since that initial meeting, we are pleased to report significant progress on one area of divergence identified by ADAS between the different calculators reviewed, namely fertiliser embedded emissions. In addition we are working on Calculator interoperability to enable data transfer between Calculators.
We have recently established an Industry Fertiliser Steering Group to explore how new and novel fertilisers with lower carbon footprints should be incorporated into all carbon calculators. This work is being kindly supported by the Agriculture Industries Confederation (AIC), the UK agricultural supply industry’s leading trade association.
With a range of new and novel fertilisers being developed and introduced into the UK, it is important that any emissions reductions brought about by these products can be accurately accounted for by the calculator tools.
“We are keen to support all Calculators who wish to work together for the benefit of the agricultural sector”.
Following the successful collaboration between Agrecalc, Cool Farm Tool, and Farm Carbon Calculator, we are keen to invite other calculator providers who also publicly provide transparency in their calculator methodologies to join us on this harmonisation activity.
Liz Bowles, CEO of Farm Carbon Toolkit said: “We are keen to support all Calculators who wish to work together for the benefit of the agricultural sector.
“Our mutual goal is collaboration with industry, trade bodies, and fellow calculator providers in the UK and internationally, so that we can actively contribute to the development of more consistent approaches to on-farm carbon calculation, for the ultimate benefit of our varied customers. We look forward to hearing from you.”
This project was developed to quantify the level of divergence in calculation of farm-level emissions between a selection of the main carbon calculators on the market, understand the causes of this divergence, and determine how those differences might impact the user. By its nature, the report focuses on the differences between calculators and the challenges of providing robust estimations while making the process accessible to non-expert users.
However, as the report states, “it is important to recognise that despite these challenges the calculators are all able to provide the farmer with a baseline understanding of emissions and can facilitate the start, and ongoing development, of a decarbonisation process.”
As the report states, ”all carbon calculators are models; there is no single correct answer as they are aiming to simplify a complex biological system.” However, it is important to understand why there are differences in results between calculators and identify ways to minimise these differences.
Harmonisation of calculators aims to ensure greater levels of precision of outputs, while recognising the need to simplify data entry to support the use by non-expert users (e.g., farmers), in order to facilitate the provision of consistent guidance to farmers to support their decarbonisation efforts.
The report did not recommend any one calculator as being superior to the other calculators investigated. Indeed, what has become clear is that different calculators ask different questions and there is currently no one standard question.
It is important for farmers and growers to look at how individual calculators work for them in providing results at a product, enterprise or whole farm level and seek one which meets their specific needs. The report set out the main areas where ADAS found differences between how the calculators dealt with different types of emissions and how the boundaries for such measurements were set.
It is important for farmers and growers to look at how individual calculators work for them in providing results at a product, enterprise or whole farm level and seek one which meets their specific needs. The report set out the main areas where ADAS found differences between how the calculators dealt with different types of emissions and how the boundaries for such measurements were set.
It is clear that there is still much work to be done by all calculators to ensure they remain aligned with emerging guidance as this science develops and matures. The good news is that data standards harmonisation is underway, driven by the tool owners themselves.
While there continues to be a range of different user and supply chain requirements for a farm carbon footprint (from corporate scope 3 reporting and risk management planning to product footprinting and on-farm resilience planning) there will be an ecosystem of different tools and providers to meet this range of needs. One size does not fit all in this space!
To identify which Calculator might suit you best, AHDB has set out a useful set of questions to guide you: Carbon footprint calculators – what to ask to help you choose | AHDB
Agrecalc has launched new and improved Free Trial version of Agrecalc Cloud, with enhanced security measures.
Following a major upgrade to the platform, Agrecalc Cloud, and an ongoing migration of its users from version 1, Agrecalc has launched the new and improved Soil Carbon Module.
Agrecalc, the leading independent farm carbon calculator, is proud to announce a new collaboration with Black Bull Biochar to introduce a cutting-edge biochar module within its platform.