Intensify production, transform biomass to energy and novel goods and protect soils in Europe (INTENSE): Progress in year 2
Résumé
The European INTENSE project is responding to three “Great Challenges”: global food security, use of renewable raw materials and production of energy from biomass. Its contributes to reconvert poor, abandoned and polluted lands, e.g. grassland, set aside land, brownfields, and other marginal lands, into high, sustainable crop production. INTENSE sites are located throughout Europe from Spain in the south up to Norway in the north. Regarding precision agriculture, modeling tools and soil amendments, field plots are assessed using unmanned aerial vehicles and data crossed with those from crop production and soil microbial communities. This provides information on field heterogeneity to adapt soil management, seeding, fertilizing, and fungicide and herbicide application, allowing site-specific farming. At the Martlhof farm, Germany, increase in photosynthetic activity of barley was observed after incorporation of digested pig manure (solid fraction alone and with biochar) and compost although N uptake was similar. At Buendia and Casasana, Spain, barley plots with mineral N combined with compost pellets and biochar showed increased GNDVI (i.e. (NIR – green)/(NIR + green). Field data and image spectroscopy evidenced differences across plots, cultivars, plant performance and health. At Polish sites, compost combined with mineral N increased barley and maize yields. Suitable production systems are developed and implemented for land amelioration in complex degradation situations. At Martlhof, chestnut wood chips are pyrolysed to produce and use biochar. Extensive livestock farming is transformed to ecological intensive farming including livestock with monogastric animals, intercropping (Fabaceae), agroforestry, terraforming, and increased biodiversity (landscape ecology). Soil nutrients and biological functionality (FDA hydrolysis, community-level physiological profiling, and microbial DNA extractions) are analyzed at the beginning and after each growing season, showing high nutrient turnover, and increase in soil N and P contents. Organic amendments more influence overall microbial activity than functional diversity. Overall, the more organic matter, the higher the microbial activity. At French sites, long-term phytomanagement of contaminated soils with high yielding crops and short rotation coppices, combined with soil amendments, improved soil fertility, C sequestration, can stimulate microbial activity, and limited pollutant linkages. Weed control, reduced invasive vegetation, pest control, effect of soil mycorrhizae on nutrient cycling, and shelter belts are investigated. At Spanish sites, farming systems can be adapted by limiting wind erosion and water runoff, shaping stony fields, tree planting, soil amendment, winter crops and intercropping. At the farm level, environmental education, direct marketing, and (bio)energy production can add values