Elsevier

Journal of Cleaner Production

Volume 95, 15 May 2015, Pages 265-272
Journal of Cleaner Production

Agricultural carbon flux changes driven by intensive plastic greenhouse cultivation in five climatic regions of China

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jclepro.2015.02.083Get rights and content

Abstract

It is still controversial as to whether intensive agriculture increases or decreases carbon emissions compared to conventional farming. Carbon flux changes induced by the conversion of agricultural practices in different climatic regions have long been a scientific focus. As an intensive cultivation practice, vegetable cultivation within plastic greenhouses (PGVC) has been reported to reduce net carbon emissions following the conversion from conventional vegetable cultivation (CVC). However, it remains uncertain to what degree the carbon flux changes following the conversion in different climatic regions. Based on 637 paired soil data points and 189 vegetable data points from five major climatic regions in China, we used a full carbon cycle analysis to estimate the carbon flux changes when converting from CVC to PGVC. Results showed that the conversion reduced net carbon emissions in four climatic regions (middle temperate, warm temperate, south subtropical and north subtropical regions) but increased net carbon emissions in the Tibet Plateau region. This regional variation was attributable to the differences between soil carbon sequestration and fossil fuel emissions. The highest reduction (1.46 Mg C ha−1 yr−1) occurred in the middle temperate region while the Tibet Plateau region acted as a net carbon source (−0.24 Mg C ha−1 yr−1). This suggests that the conversion can increase carbon benefits within the four climatic regions. PGVC in these regions could be considered as a promising option for carbon-smart intensive agriculture and would be worth expanding in countries with similar weather conditions, to mitigate carbon emissions.

Introduction

To meet the increasing global demand for human food (Tilman et al., 2011), conventional agriculture has been converted to intensive agriculture to increase crop yield (Borlaug, 2007). However, it is not certain whether the conversion increases or decreases carbon emissions (Burney et al., 2010, Hirata et al., 2013). Although conservative tillage techniques have been effective in reducing carbon emissions (West and Marland, 2003, Lal, 2004, Bernacchi et al., 2005), they fail to achieve high crop yield (Zikeli et al., 2013). Sustainable carbon policies highlight the importance of carbon-friendly agricultural practices that deliver multiple benefits (Stringer et al., 2012). Therefore, new practices that can both produce sufficient food and reduce carbon emissions are needed.

Greenhouse cultivation has been found to achieve high food productivity by prolonging the growing season (Costa and Heuvelink, 2004, Chang et al., 2011), providing a promising option for intensive agricultural practices. Currently, greenhouse vegetable cultivation makes up ∼20% of the global total vegetable cultivation area (FAOSTAT, 2010, Hickman, 2011). During the past two decades, the greenhouse area has expanded five-fold (from 0.7 to 3.7 million ha), and this expansion is still accelerating (Enoch and Enoch, 1999, Hickman, 2011). Although greenhouse cultivation was generally considered to be a greater contributor to carbon emissions than conventional cultivation, a recent full carbon cycle analysis demonstrated that converting CVC to PGVC could reduce the net carbon emissions in two climatic regions (Wang et al., 2011). However, it remains unclear whether this conversion can reduce the carbon emission under other climatic conditions. Therefore, a better understanding of how different climatic conditions affect carbon fluxes during the conversion is urgently needed.

China is the largest advocate of greenhouse cultivation, accounting for ∼90% of the total greenhouse area worldwide in 2008 (Hickman, 2011). Meanwhile, China covers three major climatic regions: tropical, subtropical and temperate regions. This offers a good opportunity to test this concept. In this instance, China is used as a case study to comprehensively assess regional variations in carbon flux change following the conversion based upon a full carbon cycle analysis. The objectives of this study are to: (i) quantify the changes in carbon flux following the conversion of CVC to PGVC in the five major climatic regions in China, (ii) elaborate the effects of conversion on different components of net carbon flux, and (iii) discuss the mechanisms for regional variations in net carbon flux.

Section snippets

Research areas

The study covers all PGVC regions in mainland China, with a total area of 3.3 million ha (in 2008, Hickman, 2011, Chang et al., 2013). According to geographic climatic factors such as cumulative temperature and solar radiation (Zhang and Chen, 2006), the PGVCs in China were sorted into five climatic regions (Fig. A.1): middle temperate region, warm temperate region, north subtropical region, south subtropical region and Tibet Plateau region (Table A.1). Details about these regions are presented

Changes in the NPP and economic yield following the conversion

The NPP of PGVC was significantly higher (P < 0.05) than that of conventional cultivation in the four climatic regions (Fig. 2a). The largest difference in NPP between PGVC and CVC occurred in the middle temperate region (ΔNPP = 4.88 Mg C ha−1 yr−1), followed by the Tibet Plateau region (ΔNPP = 4.44 Mg C ha−1 yr−1) and the warm temperate region (ΔNPP = 4.14 Mg C ha−1 yr−1). In the south subtropical region, the average NPP also increased by ∼23% following the conversion, although it was not

Carbon flux change following the conversion from CVC to PGVC

Conversion from one to another agricultural practice may alter carbon dynamics through changes in carbon fixation and carbon emissions from fossil fuels (West and Marland, 2002, Bernacchi et al., 2005). Carbon fixation is greatly enhanced during the conversion to intensive agriculture because external inputs increase greatly (Burney et al., 2010). Following the conversion from CVC to PGVC, NPP increased in all five climatic regions though not significantly in the south subtropical region. About

Conclusion

Agricultural practice changes from CVC to PGVC reduced net carbon emissions in the middle temperate, the warm temperate, the north subtropical and the south subtropical regions, while they increased net carbon emissions in the Tibet Plateau region of China as demonstrated by a full carbon cycle analysis in our study. The conversion in the regions with the medium cumulative temperature (e.g. the middle temperate region) demonstrates the greatest yearly reduction compared to other colder or

Acknowledgements

We are grateful for the funding provided by the National Science Foundation of China (31270377, 31170305). We would like to thank Dr. Binhe Gu for his constructive comments as well as Anqin Liu for their help. We would also like to thank Dr. Thomas Dreschel for grammatical edits to the manuscript.

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