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- Air quality is an increasingly important issue for agriculture and natural resources conservation.
- Leading agricultural air quality issues include particulate matter, ozone precursors, odors, ammonia and greenhouse gases.
- It is estimated that since 1998 air quality projects in the San Joaquin Valley have reduced more than 10,500 tons of PM10, VOCs and NOx emissions.
- NRCS developed a web-based tool for farmers, the COMET-VR, that estimates greenhouse gas emissions and for voluntary reporting of GHG savings with conservation systems.
- In 2003, estimates of wind erosion form cropland was reduced to 56% of levels present in 1982.
- Regulatory agencies are taking a more detailed look at agricultural air quality.
More information on NRCS air quality information is available at this link: http://www.airquality.nrcs.usda.gov/
References:
1Conservation Resource Brief, Air Quality, Feb. 2006, Number 0605. USDA, NRCS. Available on-line from: http://www.nrcs.usda.gov/feature/conservationresourcebriefs.html
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