Soil Acoustics Ltd Secures UK Patent (GB 2 623 382) Soil Acoustic Meter

Soil Acoustics Ltd, sister company of Derbyshire-based ecological consultancy Baker Consultants, has been granted a UK patent for its pioneering Soil Acoustic Meter (SAM), with EU and other world-wide patents pending.

The breakthrough ecoacoustics technology provides a rapid and non-invasive method for monitoring soil health. The patent follows two years of extensive research and development, part-funded by a DEFRA Farming Innovation Programme grant, in collaboration with scientists from the University of Warwick. The result is a ground-breaking tool that delivers actionable and repeatable insights, without the need to disturb or remove any soil.

Current soil assessments often require extensive manual labour, such as digging worm pits and conducting chemical tests, with no standardised method for evaluating biological diversity at scale. The SAM offers a faster, cost-effective, and non-invasive alternative. The handheld device records GPS-located sound samples for approximately three minutes, which are then analysed against an extensive soil sound database giving a Soil Acoustics Quality Index (SAQI) score.

As part of its research, Soil Acoustics Ltd. has collected and analysed data from a diverse range of farms and habitats across the UK and Europe. This has been done in collaboration with partners including Yeo Valley, First Milk, Wildfarmed, the National Trust, the Environment Bank, The Devonshire Group and Rothamsted Research. The technology is also being used to monitor biodiversity at vineyards, including for Ruinart, in France.

This essential trial research enabled the team to build a comparative database and develop an effective sampling strategy. It is also being used to train AI algorithms to explore the relationship between soil sound and the other parameters for soil health. The database allows for comparative analysis, helping land managers make data-driven decisions regarding soil treatments, fertilisation, cover crops and regenerative farming practices. The technology is applicable across various sectors, including arable and dairy farming, agro-forestry and viticulture, as well as monitoring biodiversity, rewilding & habitat restoration projects worldwide.

Andrew Baker, MD and founder of Baker Consultants said; "This is an exciting time for agriculture, with the recognition that good soil health is imperative for crop yields as well as preserving and restoring biodiversity.  But we also need new tools and technologies to allow land managers to measure the success of each intervention. We are very excited to see people start using soil acoustics to collect robust scientific data, in a cost-effective & repeatable way, so that it can directly inform their farming practices and benefit soil health."

The importance of soil health is gaining momentum globally. According to the EU Soil Observatory:

In addition to providing us with food, fibres and fuel, soils play a key role in regulating the Earth's climate, provide us with clean water, protect us from floods and preserve our cultural heritage.

A unique habitat in its own right, life within soils underpins all terrestrial ecosystems and is a potential source of new medicines.  However, soils are being degraded by unsustainable land use, together with growing population pressure, changes in consumption patterns and increasingly extreme weather events.

The recent proposal by the European Commission for a Soil Health and Food Mission - 'Caring for soil is caring for life' - has set the ambitious challenge of ensuring that, by 2030, 75% of EU soils are healthy for food, people, nature and climate.

With soil health now a key component of the UK's Sustainable Farming Incentive scheme and the soil testing market projected to reach $30 billion USD by 2030, there is an increasing demand for reliable, scalable solutions. Soil Acoustics Ltd. is at the forefront of this movement, offering an innovative and world-first ecoacoustics method that can meet the growing need for cost-effective and accurate soil health assessments.

Notes:

Soil Acoustics Ltd. is a new venture launched by Baker Consultants Ltd. in 2024 to research, design and manufacture the Soil Acoustics Meter (SAM) to record organisms in the soil and analyse these sounds to give us an indicator of the health of the soil. The technology has been researched and developed using a DEFRA Farm Improvement Programme Grant with the University of Warwick.

For more information on ecoacoustics visit www.soilacoustics.com.