The Australian sugar industry can be a positive force for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions for climate stabilisation

As the effects of climate change due to greenhouses gas (GHG) emissions are being felt more strongly, the need for emission reductions has become more pronounced. This paper aims to show that the Australian sugar industry can be a positive force in climate stabilisation through GHG 'mitigation' at the farm and GHG 'abatement' at mills/bio-refineries. This was done by compiling findings from previous environmental life-cycle assessment studies that have quantified the GHG emissions and savings for different Australian sugarcane systems. GHG 'mitigation' at the farm can occur through best-practice cane growing (in particular the efficient use of nitrogen, pesticide and fuel), and energy-efficient irrigation. It was interesting to observe that mitigation has been a by-products of other environmental stewardship initiatives aimed at protecting water quality and soil health. More significant scales of GHG 'abatement' can be achieved at sugar mills/bio-refineries by producing bio-electricity, bio-fuels and bio-materials that displace products derived from fossil fuels. An important condition for future dedicated bio-production is the avoidance of an up-front 'GHG debt' due to land-use change. The estimated scales of GHG reductions show that both mitigation and abatement are important, and that the industry is already on a good trajectory of emissions reduction.