Project Description
The world needs a range of measures to limit carbon dioxide emissions, while meeting rising energy demand. They include the protection and restoration of natural ecosystems such as forests, grasslands and wetlands. Nature-based solutions (NBS), are projects which protect, transform or restore land, to facilitate greater atmospheric CO2 absorption. NBS projects also have extra benefits, including offering alternative sources of income to local communities, improving soil productivity, cleaning air and water, and maintaining biodiversity.
This PhD project will provide some of the very first assessments of the carbon stocks and sequestration potential of Brazil’s native savannahs (cerrado). Covering >200 million ha, these savannahs supply ~43% of Brazil’s surface water, which sustains Brazil’s largest and most profitable agricultural areas. However, land use change in Brazil’s cerrado is 2.5 times that of the Amazon and now <20% of this important ecosystem remains intact.
This PhD will compliment an existing NERC funded project – also led by the lead-supervisor – researching the vital services this ecosystem provides and how to restore these areas. This existing project focuses on water cycling, biodiversity and restoration success. This PhD will add to this knowledge by quantifying the carbon stocks and fluxes of native, degraded and restored land using novel low-cost eddy covariance measurements complimented by conventional carbon stock estimates.
The PhD will conduct experiments at Brazil’s largest restoration experiment located in Goiás state. A novel low cost eddy covariance approach (developed by the co-supervisor) will be used to measure carbon and water fluxes in key land-use types including: 1) native cerrado; 2) restored cerrado; 3) abandoned pasture and; 4) active pasture. Carbon and nutrient stocks will also be measured. This data will be the first assessment of the carbon sequestration potential of cerrado restoration projects: This evidence base is essential to the investment of industrial and public bodies into cerrado restoration.
The PhD will be supported by existing collaborations with Brazil’s national reserve service (ICMBio), University of Brasilia and University of Campinas. Shell will add significant scientific and financial support to this project, including a generous research budget.
The studentship would suite a candidate passionate about environment and environmental change, excited by developing new research methods and travel to remote field sites. The candidate should expect to undertake extended field campaigns in Brazil and to learn how to develop scientific questions, experimental designs and conduct a wide range of field measurements. In particular, the successful candidate will demonstrate an ability to develop – with appropriate supervision and training – the skills to build, deploy and analyse eddy covariance. Numerical data analysis skills are essential.
The studentship will be awarded on the basis of merit for 4 years of full-time study to commence in January 2020.
Funding Notes
The University of Exeter’s College of Life and Environmental Sciences, in partnership with Shell, is inviting applications for a fully-funded PhD studentship to commence in January 2020 or as soon as possible thereafter. For eligible students the studentship will cover tuition fees plus an annual tax-free stipend of at least £15,009 for 4 years full-time, or pro rata for part-time study. The student would be based in Geography in the College of Life and Environmental Sciences at the Streatham Campus in Exeter.