Land availability for greenhouse gas removal by afforestation and Biomass Energy with Carbon Capture and Storage (BECCS)

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To meet the aspirations of the UNFCCC Paris Climate Agreement to limit increases of global mean temperature to well below 2C, future scenarios assume the large-scale use of afforestation and biomass energy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) to remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. The availability of land and biomass residue streams (e.g. waste material from harvest) are key constraints on the ability to deliver these negative emission technologies at scale, given a context of global dietary trends and the inefficiencies in the global food system. In this directly-funded NERC PhD the student will critically assess the land use and residue stream assumptions used in future scenarios. You will start by critically examining the land-use scenarios from existing integrated assessment model studies used of the Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSPs). The next stage will involve a global spatial analysis of land-use and residue streams under a range of dietary and food system efficiency scenarios, using historical data and future UN projections of demand for food and other plant and animal products. Within this, the student will explore alternative scenarios of how demand for food and fibre is met and how it translates into land-use, which depends on factors such as crop yield, type of meat consumed, meat production systems and levels of waste within the food system. There will be opportunities to extend the analysis to consider economic trade-offs.