Manipulation of Microbial Metabolic Pathways for the Reduction of Sulfide Production

A bacterial additives treatment experiment was conducted to assess the microbial and biochemical changes in stored swine manure. Nitrate salt was added to a slurry of swine waste collected from a waste storage pit to identify the effects of varying levels of nitrate upon the microbial community and the resulting metabolic changes. This research was an attempt to reduce the formation of odorous sulfur-containing compounds and to increase the formation of odorless nitrogen gas by manipulating the metabolic pathways in anaerobic decomposition of the organic matter within manure. Sulfide production from swine wastewater was reduced approximately 45 percent with the addition of 1500 mg/l or more of nitrate to the wastewater

Crop Residue Burning in India: Potential Solutions

With its second-largest agro-based economy and year-round crop production, India produces a lot of agricultural waste, including crop residues. Because India lacks effective sustainable management methods, an estimated 92 seems like a very small quantity of metric tons of crop waste burned each year, causing excessive particulate matter emissions and air pollution. Burning crop residue has grown into a serious environmental problem that threatens human health and causes global warming. Composting, making biochar, and mechanization are a few effective sustainable solutions that can assist in resolving the issue while maintaining the nutrients found in the agricultural residue in the soil. In order to promote environmentally friendly management practices, the Indian government has launched a number of programs and campaigns

Full Carbon Account for Russia.

The Forestry Project (FOR) at IIASA has produced a full carbon account (FCA) for Russia for 1990, together with scenarios for 2010. Currently, there are rather big question marks regarding the existing carbon accounts for Russia, and Russia is critical to the global carbon balance due to its size. IIASA is in a position to perform solid analysis of Russia because of the databases that the Institute has built over the years. FOR based this work on a comprehensive geographic information system comprising georeferenced descriptions of the environment and land of Russia, which in turn are based on a number of thematic, digitized maps and databases. For the Russian energy sector and other industrial sectors (except the forest industry), the project used emissions estimates from the recent IIASA study "Global Energy Perspectives" (1998). The project carried out a separate substudy for the Russian forest industry sector. According to FOR's estimate, the total fluxes (including energy and industry sectors) in Russia were a net source of 527 teragrams of carbon (Tg C) in 1990. To illustrate the possible development of the carbon pools and fluxes over the next 10 years, FOR developed three different scenarios for the period 1990-2010, reflecting different assumptions regarding Russia's GDP growth. According to these scenarios, Russia will continue to be a net source of carbon to the atmosphere with 156-385 Tg C in 2010, including the emissions from energy and other industrial sectors. However, analysis of the FCA also shows considerable uncertainties involved in the carbon accounting. These uncertainties exceed the calculated changes in the full flux balance for the period 1990-2010. At present, this raises grave questions regarding the reliability of any accounting system used to measure terrestrial ecosystems for compliance with the Kyoto Protocol.

A Review on: Management of Carbon in Dry Land Agriculture

Dry land areas are defined as regions in which the ratio of total annual precipitation to potential evapotranspiration (P:ET or the Aridity Index, AI) ranges from 0.05 to 0.65. Dry lands have a strong impact on the global C cycle, in which Land-use changes, land degradation and desertification holds the major share on emission of CO2 into the atmosphere. Carbon sequestration is the long-term storage of carbon in oceans, soils, vegetation (especially forests), and geologic formations. C Management and land use can be used to mitigate greenhouse gas emissions by encouraging practices that sequester carbon (C) in the soil, thus creating a C sink for atmospheric CO2. Plowing native lands in dry land leads to dramatic losses of SOC through intensive soil disturbance that disrupts soil structure and enhances decomposition, in addition to accelerating soil erosion. Converting degraded lands to perennial vegetation, increasing net primary productivity (NPP) of agricultural ecosystems, and converting plow tillage to conservation reserve program and/or no-till farming are the most principal options to achieve carbon balance. Fruit tree based cropping systems in which the tree–cereal or tree- vegetable combination is useful strategy for mitigating the atmospheric CO2 in both plant as well as in the soil pools. And has maximum CO2 mitigation potential. Converting degraded lands to perennial vegetation and /or protected natural fallow, converting conventional tillage system to conservation reserve program and/or no-till farming system and application of integrated soil management are also use full agricultural practices for dry land carbon management. Keywords: dry land areas, Carbon sequestration, greenhouse gases, SO

Integration of LCC and LCA results to higher system levels : The German meat and EU tomato cases

This report aims to highlight the potential contribution of food waste reduction to improving the sustainability of agri-food sector, by integrating the Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) and Life Cycle Cost (LCC) results and upscaling them to a higher system level, using Germany meat and EU tomatoes as examples

Investigation of a Photosynthetically Aerated Cathode in a MFC

A microbial fuel cell (MFC) creates an environment that facilitates the conversion of electron donor compounds into electrical current through the oxidizing powers of microbial growth. Within the anode of a MFC bacteria grow oxidizing organic compounds while in the cathode oxygen is reduced. The goal of a MFC is to achieve respiration under anaerobic conditions having electrodes serve as intermediate electron acceptor for bacteria in the anode and shuttle electrons through a circuit to the cathode reducing a terminal electron acceptor. Waste from the biological production of hydrogen from agricultural peach was explored for use within the anode of a MFC Bacteria for use within the anode chamber were cultured from anaerobic sludge. Photosynthetic aeration by wild type algae cultured in the cathode was compared to active mechanical aeration. Peak power density achieved by mechanically aerated trials was 78.3mW/m3 (0.482 volts at 989 ohms at an initial mean soluble COD of 747.3 mg COD/L) and the peak power density achieved by photosynthetically aerated trials was 108.0 mW/m3 (0.129 volts at 220 ohms at an initial mean soluble COD of 925.8 mg /L COD). Soluble COD was decreased in all trials and soluble COD removal was above 80% in 19 out of 24 trials (8 mechanically aerated and 11 photosynthetically aerated). At an initial soluble COD of 218.9 mg/L a photosynthetically aerated cathode MFC obtained 123 mW/m3 (0.234 volts at 150 ohms)