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A new data-driven approach looks at practices that are good for the earth and profitable for farmers:
[T]he agricultural industry contributes about 10% of U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. Because the amount of land dedicated for agriculture is limited, farmers need to find more ways to operate efficiently, sustainably and profitably while also reducing GHG emissions. With new practices, farmers can make farms a net sink of CO2, helping the U.S. reach its goal of achieving net zero emissions by 2050.
Sustainable intensification is a two-prong approach many think could help. It tries to optimize land use and management practices for maximum farmland productivity at the same time it tries to minimize associated environmental impact. The trick is finding the right balance between the two objectives.
[...] "The concept of sustainable intensification of farming was applied into more broadscale landscape application," said one of the article's co-authors, Hoyoung Kwon, a principal environmental scientist in Argonne's Energy Systems and Infrastructure Analysis (ESIA) division. "We considered productivity and GHG emissions, attempted to optimize land management tactics and products, and investigated different trade-offs that improve the land and land productivity."
For example, farmers can clear and repurpose corn crop residue (or "stover") for biofuel, but a percentage of stover can remain in the soil for valuable nutrient and carbon sources for future crops. Farmers can plant cover crops during the winter (or "fallow") season, to supplement removed stover. The authors took into account energy, which has an emissions cost of planting of cover crops to holistically address net benefits of stover removal and cover crop planting. Farmers can also reduce how much land they till after a growing season ends, which lessens decay and reduces the amount of CO2 that emanates from the soil. However, the farmer has to till some of the land to be ready for the next growing season.
[...] According to the study, harvesting 30% of the corn stover for biofuel production would increase farm revenues, double net profitability and increase overall biofuel production from the landscape by 17–20%. Removal of the stover would also mitigate GHGs somewhat, but it reduced the baseline amount of good carbon in the soil by 40%. In comparison, integrated approaches that include winter cover cropping and/or tillage intensity reduction would increase carbon in the soil, improve farm profitability and mitigate more GHGs.
"We focused on corn and soy but our approach could be extended to other crops," said Hawkins. "Many farms today are large, industrial farms that are high-tech and rely much more on high resolution data. We want to give farmers, regional planners and others in agricultural management a tool to calculate how to use land sustainably and get the most value out of the land. This will further both profitability and environmental goals."
Journal Reference:
Trung H.Nguyen et al., A multi-product landscape life-cycle assessment approach for evaluating local climate mitigation potential [open], JCleanProd, 354, 2022. DOI: 10.1016/j.jclepro.2022.131691
(Score: 4, Touché) by khallow on Tuesday June 21 2022, @01:10PM (4 children)
Not if the inefficiency isn't the bottleneck to use of the good or service. For example, suppose I design a car with easier to open doors. There might be a slight preference for that car over another car that is identical in every aspect except those doors. But in practice, there's a lot more to a car than how easy it is to open the doors.
Here, there's some slight economic differences to how stover is used, but it doesn't change the fundamental economics of growing corn. People aren't going to grow a lot more corn just because its effect on AGW has declined significantly.
I wonder if that Ukrainian gobbledygook was the purpose of your post.
Another butt hurt Russian apologist?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 21 2022, @03:10PM (3 children)
Independent of how the stover is used, tfa doesn't mention anything about all the diesel that goes into farm tractors and other farm equipment.
I've mentioned before a small dairy operation (western NY State) that runs their tractors on half soybean oil extracted from the soy they feed to their cows. Cut 50-50 with regular diesel, this cuts their fossil fuel use roughly in half with no further processing required (making "biodiesel" needs a bit more processing). But I believe that 50-50 is about as far as they can go with this fuel and their older, non-computer-controlled diesels. The cows do better on the feed too, the soy oil doesn't agree with cows very well, better to remove it anyway.
Could shade crops be planted under a solar farm, with the solar electricity used to power tractors?
(Score: 2) by Freeman on Tuesday June 21 2022, @03:22PM
That may work for a small scale farm that's big on solar and small on space. Otherwise, that's just making things harder on you than they need to be.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 21 2022, @03:31PM
You would have to elevate the panels to grow stuff in the shade under them. Seems expensive.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday June 21 2022, @03:38PM
Why should it?
120hp tractor = 90kW.
20% efficient solar panels (typical nowadays), 1kW/sqm solar constant, an area of 30mx30m generates at full sun 900/5 = 180kW. I bet half of it can be set on available rooftops (home/barn).
Average land area for a farm in US is 444acres [usda.gov] = 1.797e+6sqm. We are talking less than 0.1% of land here.