Resources Environment and Sustainability最新文献

Climate change poses significant challenges to small-scale farmers in developing countries, who often have low adaptive capacity and capability. This study examines the factors influencing climate adaptation behaviors among small-scale sugarcane farmers in Indonesia. Using a multivariate probit model and data from a survey of 209 farm households, this study analyzes the association of climate risk behaviors, farmers’ support systems, and sugarcane–cattle integration with climate adaptation practices. The results reveal that farmers perceive climate change as a significant threat to sugarcane productivity, and their risk behaviors, such as climate risk perception and risk preference, influence their adaptation practices. The study also finds that sugarcane–cattle integration and farmers’ support systems, such as extension and training programs, farmers’ institutions, and information access, are crucial for farmers to adapt to climate issues. These findings can help policymakers design targeted and inclusive programs and strategies to support small-scale farmers in adapting to climate change.

The Sustainability Assessment of Food and Agriculture System (SAFA) is a multi-criteria sustainability assessment tool developed by the Food and Agriculture Organization in 2014. This study aims to contribute to the debate on multi-criteria sustainability assessments by applying the SAFA to a test case of an agricultural supply chain, including production, processing, distribution, and marketing. The study case of the maize monoculture value chain in the Mae Chaem District of Chiang Mai Province was selected as a typical highland maize monoculture in northern Thailand. The study area is the site of a rapidly expanding peasant farmer boom of maize production and global livestock feed industry. This qualitative research employs in-depth interviews and questionnaires of all participants along the value chain of the study area. Multiple social sustainability dimensions including decent livelihood, fair trading practices, labor rights, equity, human safety and health, and cultural diversity were assessed using the SAFA tool. The analysis results were moderately favorable in terms of social sustainability, which to a notable extent contrasts with sustainability issues surrounding maize monoculture in Northern Thailand. In terms of the social sustainability dimensions of fair trading practices and of decent livelihood, the results suggest that the contract farming system usually employed in the highland maize monoculture in northern Thailand is unsustainable. Finally, we discussed the limitations of the SAFA tool.

The carbon footprint of rural household consumption in China has a substantial scale and unique characteristics compared to urban areas. However, there remains a lack of studies that clarify the sources and potential of rural household carbon footprint in China. In this study, we estimated the rural household carbon footprint of 30 provinces in China’s mainland in 2007, 2012, and 2017 based on the Multi-Regional Input-Output model, and investigated the transition patterns with a consideration of the trends, regional differences, driving forces, and structural changes. Results revealed that the carbon footprint of rural household consumption in China grew by 83% from 2007 to 2017 and displayed a weak decoupling from income growth. The transition patterns were observed from three perspectives: Firstly, the primary driving force behind the growth was income increase, while the decrease in carbon footprint intensity slowed down the growth significantly. Secondly, housing and direct emission contributed to 62% of the growth in rural household carbon footprint, while health care, transportation, and other services showed increasing contributions. Lastly, there were notable “higher in the north, lower in the south” regional differences in the per capita rural household carbon footprint, and the gap tended to increase. The main reasons for the regional differences were intensity change, income increase, housing consumption, and direct emission. Our findings can offer decision-making support to guide rural household consumption towards achieving carbon peaking and carbon neutrality goals.

According to the US Environmental Protection Agency, around 11 million tons of post-consumer textile waste (PCTW) are disposed in U.S. landfills annually, which is 8% of all municipal solid waste. PCTW is landfilled because it contains complex blends of natural and synthetic fibers that are not easy to separate, and dyes and finishing chemicals on the fabrics interfere with recycling. The goal of this work was to develop a laboratory scale process for deconstructing and separating cut fabrics into different fiber fractions to create purified product streams that could promote textile recycling. Method parameters were selected from preliminary tests on various fabric types, followed by parametric evaluation with a set of rationally prepared model textile wastes. The combination of aggressive mechanical agitation together with cellulase catalyzed hydrolysis caused 100% cotton fabrics to disintegrate completely into a slurry of < 2 mm small solids and water soluble degradation products. The presence of reactive dyes on the model fabrics inhibited degradation, with the bifunctional reactive dye creating larger barriers to degradation than the monofunctional dye. Dye induced barriers were overcome with sufficient time, enzyme amount, and repeated treatment. Even though its collateral impact was a decrease in initial fabric burst strength, the presence of durable press (DP) finish on cotton presented a large obstacle to enzymatic degradation. This was overcome by including acid/alkali pretreatments to DP fabric before applying enzyme. The presence of polyester fiber in a cotton/polyester blend caused the fabric to retain its macroscopic knitted structure, while enzymatically degraded cotton was removed by washing and filtration to yield clean polyester. In all cases, fabric degradation products were separated by filtration into – depending on the severity of the treatments – residual large solids and small solids fractions and a clarified process liquid that contained soluble components. These three fractions were quantified gravimetrically and were characterized using high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC), x-ray diffraction (XRD), differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), viscometry, scanning electron microscopy (SEM) and optical microscopy. The small solids present in the slurries after cotton degradation could be valuable as additives for paper, composites and other products, while the glucose-rich process syrups could be used to produce fuels and chemicals by fermentation, all of which would help divert PCTW from landfills. Importantly, even when cellulosic textile components were not fully degraded to soluble compounds, their conversion to pumpable slurries enabled easy handling of the degraded material and allowed recovery of non-degraded synthetic fibers by simple filtration and washing.

Cassava’s transformation into an industrial raw material necessitates new processing techniques that improve quality while lowering processing costs. Drying has been identified as a major bottleneck in the production of high-quality cassava flour (HQCF) and expansion of its industrial application in Sub-Sahara African. This has triggered efforts towards developing an energy-efficient flash dryer for cassava flour/starch production at a small scale. A scaled-up version of the prototype flash dryer installed at the International Center for Tropical Agriculture (CIAT), Cali, Colombia, was built at the Federal Institute of Industrial Research, Oshodi, (FIIRO), Lagos, Nigeria based on numerical modeling.​ Excel tools developed by the CGIAR (RTB) scientists were used to design the components and built using locally sourced materials. The automation system of the flash dryer allows for operational flexibility, increased energy efficiency and reduced cost. It features a longer drying tube (22.5 m), a compact and improved heat exchanger, a larger blower for higher air velocity, and a high air/product ratio, thereby optimizing the drying efficiency. The dryer was evaluated with mechanically dewatered cassava mash (wet cake) dried into high quality cassava flour at air temperature of 180 °C and velocity of 13 m/s. The initial moisture content of the wet cake was 47.06 % wb, which was reduced to 9.6 % wb of dried product. Using a capacity of 298.0 kg of wet cake per hour, an output of 186.34 kg of dried product was achieved, resulting in an energy efficiency of 80.8 % and specific energy consumption of 2570 kJ/kg product of final product and 4560 kJ/kg water of evaporated water. These results revealed that the dryer is efficient and suitable for small-scale enterprises. Its use can reduce the production costs and expand the global market opportunity for cassava flour.

The industrial dynamics of vanadium was simulated using the integrated assessment model WORLD7. The vanadium market may see strongly increased demand in the near future, and a pertinent question is if the new demands can be met. The WORLD7 model was used to assess the risk for future supply shortages. The global presence of vanadium in geological deposits was found to be about 710 million ton of vanadium. The extractable part was estimated to be about 60–70 million ton of vanadium, the rest being technically or economically inaccessible. Vanadium extraction is dominated by secondary extraction from primary metal production. The simulations suggests that there will be physical scarcity under business-as-usual for vanadium in after 2040. The vanadium price increases after 2030 according to the simulations, as a response to the scarcity. The introduction of a large-scale use of vanadium in battery technologies in the near future would aggravate future scarcity, even with more efficient recycling. Large scale use of vanadium for batteries, may keep vanadium prices high and require enhanced recycling to counter the threat of physical shortage after 2030.

This article has been retracted: please see Elsevier Policy on Article Withdrawal (https://www.elsevier.com/locate/withdrawalpolicy).

This article has been retracted at the request of the Editors-in-Chief and Authors.

Due to the lack of agreement on affiliation format between authors and the owner of the journal, this article has been retracted at the request of all authors, the Editors-in-Chief and the owner of the journal.

Anaerobic digestion (AD) is an effective method for treating organic waste. However, the performance of anaerobic reactors needs to be improved and comprehensively analyzed. This study proposed a ternary co-feedstock strategy for thermophilic anaerobic co-digestion of tomato plant residue, cattle manure, and food waste. The effects of changing the feedstock composition, feedstock-to-inoculum ratio, and total solids (TS) content were investigated. Among the tested mixtures, a ternary mixture of 60% tomato plant residue, 20% cattle manure, and 20% food waste with a feedstock-to-inoculum ratio of 0.7 gave the highest cumulative biogas (3.230 L), methane yield (2.575 L), methane content (79.71%), co-digestion performance index (1.65) and volatile solids (VS) removal rate (60.59%). Changing the feedstocks compositions caused changes in the specific biogas yield and specific methane yield. In tests with TS contents of 5%, 10%, 15%, and 20%, a higher TS content increased biogas and methane production because of increases in the amount of the biodegradable fraction in the reactor. However, there was a risk of volatile fatty acid overloading and a decrease in the VS removal rate because of inefficient decomposition of the high total solids content by microbes in the inoculum.

This study investigated the effects of soil amendment on potato yield and incidences of bacterial wilt caused by Ralstonia solanacearum that can cause up to 80% yield loss in potato. The research was conducted at four research stations in Malawi during the 2020/21 and 2021/22 growing seasons, using a randomized complete block design (RCBD) with six treatments: lime, four Calciprill rates (CALC25%, CALC50%, CALC100%, and CALC150%), and NPK fertilizer (control). Data on soil properties, bacterial wilt incidence, and potato tuber yield were collected and analyzed using R programming. Soil fertility was found to be low, with a pH range of 4.4–6.05. Control resulted to significantly higher incidences of bacterial wilt at Kandiyani during 2020/21 (63.6%) and 2021/22 (34.6%) and at Lunyangwa during 2021/22 (20.4%) while lime and all levels of Calciprill led to relative incidence reduction (4%–89%) across sites and season, except CALC25% at Bembeke. Marketable yield showed interaction between amendments and season at Bvumbwe (p = 0.04), highest being 10.02 tha⁻¹ in CALC150% during 2020/21 while non-marketable yield showed interaction at Lunyangwa (p = 0.02) highest being 3.9 tha⁻¹ recorded in CALC150% during 2021/22. A significant negative correlation between bacterial wilt incidences and yield at all sites except Bembeke highlighted the importance of controlling bacterial wilt for yield improvement. The findings suggest that soil amendment through liming is an effective and sustainable approach for managing bacterial wilt and increasing potato yields. Further research on-farm conditions required to ensure the applicability of the findings for different sites.