The Effects of Different Doses of Organic Waste on Prairie Cordgrass (Spartina Pectinata L.) Yield and Selected Energy Parameters

Abstract

Increasingly cultivated all over the world, energy crops, with their large biomass production, can be used to produce liquid biofuel and biogas. The aim of the research was to evaluate the yield and selected energy parameters of prairie cordgrass (Spartina pectinata L.) treated with different doses of municipal sewage sludge and mushroom substrate. Heat of combustion, calorific values and ash content were investigated in the first three years of its cultivation. Carried out between 2018 and 2020, the research was based on a field experiment established at an experimental facility in Central-Eastern Poland. Organic waste doses, each of them introducing 170 kg N ha−1, were applied once in spring 2018 before planting pieces of Spartina pectinata rhizomes. The experimental factors (organic waste doses and years of research) significantly affected the yield of prairie cordgrass. Significantly, the highest yield of its biomass was produced in response to municipal sewage sludge applied together with mushroom substrate (O25 + PP75) and in response to mushroom substrate applied on its own (SMS). Those values, averaged over three years of research, were, respectively, 4.23 and 4.18 Mg ha−1. Organic waste treatment had a significant impact on ash content in dry matter. On average, the highest ash content in dry matter was recorded in response to mushroom substrate (5.73%) and the lowest (4.98%) in plants treated with the highest dose of sewage sludge together with the lowest dose of mushroom substrate (O75 + PP25). The higher dry matter content in plant biomass was, the better the energy parameters were.