Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Harmonising conflicts between science, regulation, perception and environmental impact
T2 - the case of soil conditioners from bioenergy
AU - Riding, Matthew J.
AU - Herbert, Ben M. J.
AU - Ricketts, Lois
AU - Dodd, Ian
AU - Ostle, Nick
AU - Semple, Kirk T.
PY - 2015/2
Y1 - 2015/2
N2 - As the global population is expected to reach 9 billion by 2050, humanity needs to balance an ever increasing demand for food, energy and natural resources, with sustainable management of ecosystems and the vital services that they provide. The intensification of agriculture, including the use of fertilisers from finite sources, has resulted in extensive soil degradation, which has increased food production costs and CO2 emissions, threatening food security. The Bioenergy sector has significant potential to contribute to the formation of a circular economy. This paper presents the scientific, regulatory and socioeconomic barriers to the use of the nutrient waste streams from biomass thermal conversion (ash) and anaerobic digestion (digestate) as sustainable soil amendments for use in place of traditional fertilisers. It is argued that whilst the ability of combined ash and digestate to remedy many threats to ecosystems and provide a market to incentivise the renewable bio-energy schemes is promising, a step-change is required to alter perceptions of 'waste', from an expensive problem, to a product with environmental and economic value. This can only be achieved by well-informed interactions between scientists, regulators and end users, to improve the spread and speed of innovation with this sector.
AB - As the global population is expected to reach 9 billion by 2050, humanity needs to balance an ever increasing demand for food, energy and natural resources, with sustainable management of ecosystems and the vital services that they provide. The intensification of agriculture, including the use of fertilisers from finite sources, has resulted in extensive soil degradation, which has increased food production costs and CO2 emissions, threatening food security. The Bioenergy sector has significant potential to contribute to the formation of a circular economy. This paper presents the scientific, regulatory and socioeconomic barriers to the use of the nutrient waste streams from biomass thermal conversion (ash) and anaerobic digestion (digestate) as sustainable soil amendments for use in place of traditional fertilisers. It is argued that whilst the ability of combined ash and digestate to remedy many threats to ecosystems and provide a market to incentivise the renewable bio-energy schemes is promising, a step-change is required to alter perceptions of 'waste', from an expensive problem, to a product with environmental and economic value. This can only be achieved by well-informed interactions between scientists, regulators and end users, to improve the spread and speed of innovation with this sector.
KW - Digestate
KW - Biomass ash
KW - Soil conditioner
KW - Environmental impact
KW - Ecosystems
KW - Regulation
U2 - 10.1016/j.envint.2014.10.025
DO - 10.1016/j.envint.2014.10.025
M3 - Journal article
C2 - 25461414
VL - 75
SP - 52
EP - 67
JO - Environment International
JF - Environment International
SN - 0160-4120
ER -