Ronny D. Harris1, Michael H. Ebinger1, Lucian Wielopolski2, Sudeep Mitra2, James B. Reeves III3, Barry Francis3, R. César Izaurralde4, Allison M. Thomson4, Aaron Rappaport5, and Charles W. Rice6. (1) Los Alamos National Laboratory, PO Box 1663, MS J495, Los Alamos, NM 87545, (2) Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY 11973, (3) EMBUL, ANRI, ARS, USDA, Beltsvlle, MD 20705, (4) Joint Global Change Research Institute, College Park, MD 20740, (5) Rappaport and Associates, Bowie, MD 20716, (6) Kansas State University, Department of Agronomy, Manhattan, KS 66506
Terrestrial carbon management and sequestration produces a variety of benefits which include reclamation of degraded lands, increasing soil productivity, reducing erosion and potentially, slowing carbon dioxide build-up in the atmosphere. However, development of advanced field technologies for measuring soil carbon is essential for the success of terrestrial carbon sequestration programs. Inelastic Neutron Scattering (INS), Mid Infra-Red Spectroscopy (MIDR) and Laser-Induced Breakdown Spectroscopy (LIBS) have been developed as rapid, accurate and cost effective field methods to measure soil carbon. Recently, a field test was conducted in Beltsville, Maryland to determine the characteristics and performance of each technology. Here we present some of the results obtained from the field study.