Help - Getting Started | Close X

Select the State and County where your parcel is located using the State/County list. The State and County are used to determine which MLRA (Major Land Resource Area) contains your parcel. The MLRA, in turn, determines the set of climate and land management information appropriate for your area.

If your parcel is in more than one county/state, we recommend you separate your land into several parcels, using the approximate area in each county/state.

Help - Getting Started with Your Management | Close X

The cropping systems used in the Comet 2.0 tool were identified as having the greatest harvested crop acreage in each county using production data from the National Agricultural Statistics Service and the NRCS Natural Resource Inventory (NRI). They may not be the most common cropping systems in your county but are the most significant cropping systems in each county.

The Comet 2.0 tool has four time periods: the Historical Management Period, the Modern Management Period from 1970's through mid-1990's, the Current Management Period from mid-1990's to Present, and the Projection Management Period, the next decade.

Under the management history screen, specify the general cropping history for your parcel by selecting the bar that represents the time period. Then select the general category that best represents your cropping system from the tabs. Finally select the management system that comes closest to describing your management practice and produces a similar residue.

Help - Getting Started with the Carbon Report | Close X

The Carbon Storage Report describes the BASELINE, PROJECTED, and change in soil organic carbon stocks over the report period (the next decade). These calculations are based upon the climate, soil type, and past and current management histories which you provided on the Comet 2.0 data collection screens and is provided as a Yearly average value.

The table has several important parts:

• Summary of the site location, description, and site history.
• Carbon FLUX: The BASELINE Senario, the PROJECTION Senario, and the change in the amount of soil carbon stored on the parcel between the BASELINE and PROJECTION senarios. This difference shows the impact of the projected management change on the carbon stored in the soil or released to the atmosphere. This value is provided in units of soil carbon, and as CO2
• Biomass FLUX: The woody biomass for the BASELINE Senario, the PROJECTION Senario, and the change in the amount of biomass carbon stored on the parcel between the BASELINE and PROJECTION Senario.
• N2O FLUX: The N2O Emissions for the BASELINE Senario, the PROJECTION Senario, and the annual change between the continuation of the "Current" management and the "Projected" or "new" management.
• Emissions/Removals: Emissions or Removals of carbon, biomass, and N2O as CO2 equivalents.
• Uncertainty: The uncertainty is the percent uncertainty in the average annual change in soil carbon stocks and the associated CO2 or N2O flux. The uncertainty shows how well the modeled values relate to measured values.