Abstract
Sustainable agriculture is currently trendy. It is supported not only for the urban environment but also as an innovation of conventional practices in order to increase the efficiency and quality of agricultural production. This study presents the results achieved within selected soil-less (hydroponic and aeroponic) systems. Then, it compares them, using the tool of comparative life cycle assessment (LCA), with the results of soil cultivation. The attention is directed towards biomass production and the content of bioactive substances, which can compensate for higher operating costs of soil-less cultivation systems. Coffea arabica has shown a significant increase of caffeine and theobromine contents, both in leaves and roots, as well as higher biomass yield during the aeroponic cultivation. On the contrary, Senecio bicolor evinced the results of a considerably increased growth in the hydroponic system, with no higher contents of alkaloid or flavonoids, except for the rutin concentration. The LCA results of the compared soil and soil-less systems showed that the consumption of fertilizers, diesel, and water in soil systems and of conventional electricity in aeroponics and hydroponics contributed mostly to their environmental burden. The major environmental impact categories are terrestrial ecotoxicity, human non-carcinogenic toxicity, and global warming. Therefore, in order to make the soil-less cultivation systems sustainable, these environmental aspects need to be considered deeply.
Highlights
This paper presents the results achieved during the model aeroponic, hydroponic, and soil cultivations of bioactive substance producing plants such as Cannabis sativa, Coffea arabica, and Senecio bicolor
S. bicolor grown in the hydroponic system showed neither an Unlike coffee plants, S. bicolor grown in the hydroponic system showed neither an increase in the contents of alkaloids and flavonoids increase in the contents of alkaloids and flavonoids nor in the leaves and roots, except for the rutin concentration in the leaves of hydroponically cultivated plants (Table 5)
Concerning the soil cultivation, for both compared function units (FU), the main inputs contributing to the process with the greatest environmental impacts on human non-carcinogenic toxicity, terrestrial ecotoxicity, global warming, and water consumption are related to the use of fertilizer, diesel oil, and water
Summary
Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. Agricultural production systems worldwide have been facing unprecedented challenges: from an increasing demand related to growing population, rising hunger and malnutrition, to adverse climate change effects, such as droughts or floods, overexploitation of natural resources, loss of biodiversity in arable land areas, and food loss and waste. Sustainable agriculture should go beyond its economic aspects, which means paying attention to environmental and social impacts It should regard increasing yields, and provide new job opportunities for women, men, and youth in crop. This paper presents the results achieved during the model aeroponic, hydroponic, and soil cultivations of bioactive substance producing plants such as Cannabis sativa (technical), Coffea arabica, and Senecio bicolor It shows a comparative assessment of these systems and provides information on major environmental impacts of operations of these cultivation systems.
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