IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/masfgc/v25y2020i4d10.1007_s11027-019-09880-7.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Sugarcane straw management for bioenergy: effects of global warming on greenhouse gas emissions and soil carbon storage

Author

Listed:
  • Gustavo V. Popin

    (University of São Paulo)

  • Arthur K. B. Santos

    (University of São Paulo)

  • Thiago de P. Oliveira

    (University of São Paulo
    National University of Ireland Galway)

  • Plínio B. Camargo

    (University of São Paulo)

  • Carlos E. P. Cerri

    (University of São Paulo)

  • Marcos Siqueira-Neto

    (University of São Paulo
    Federal University of Maranhão)

Abstract

Global warming can intensify the soil organic matter (SOM) turnover, damaging soil health. Crop residues left on the soil are important to maintain a positive SOM budget and nutrient cycling. But, sugarcane (Saccharum officinarum) straw has been removed from the field for bioenergy purposes. We hypothesize that global warming, together with straw removal, will negatively impact Brazil’s ethanol carbon footprint. Thus, we conducted an experiment under controlled conditions to evaluate the impacts of warming and straw removal on greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, soil carbon and nitrogen storage, and nutrient cycling. Two soils (Rhodic Acrisol and Eutric Nitisol) were tested with three rates of sugarcane straw removal (no removal (NR): equivalent to 12 Mg ha−1; medium removal (MR): 6 Mg ha−1; and total removal (TR): bare soil) and submitted to two temperatures (24 °C and 30 °C) and soil moistures (30% and 50%). Straw decomposition was stimulated by lower rates of straw removal, resulting in increases on carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions between 5 to 14 times, and N2O between 25 and 40%. There were no significant methane (CH4) fluxes. Soil carbon and nitrogen did not change due to straw removal, yet labile carbon fractions (living and non-living) were highly impacted, causing reductions of 15 to 40% on the carbon management index (CMI). Furthermore, straw removal reduced nutrient cycling between 10 and 30%. Overall, in a scenario of warming, our findings point to an intensification of SOM dynamic, resulting in increases of 35% on the GHG emissions and a CMI reduction by 20%. In practical terms, at least 6 Mg ha−1 of straw should be left in the field, guaranteeing raw-material for bioenergy, without causing major impacts on the GHG emission and soil attributes.

Suggested Citation

  • Gustavo V. Popin & Arthur K. B. Santos & Thiago de P. Oliveira & Plínio B. Camargo & Carlos E. P. Cerri & Marcos Siqueira-Neto, 2020. "Sugarcane straw management for bioenergy: effects of global warming on greenhouse gas emissions and soil carbon storage," Mitigation and Adaptation Strategies for Global Change, Springer, vol. 25(4), pages 559-577, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:masfgc:v:25:y:2020:i:4:d:10.1007_s11027-019-09880-7
    DOI: 10.1007/s11027-019-09880-7
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s11027-019-09880-7
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s11027-019-09880-7?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Johannes Lehmann & Markus Kleber, 2015. "The contentious nature of soil organic matter," Nature, Nature, vol. 528(7580), pages 60-68, December.
    2. Alkimim, Akenya & Clarke, Keith C., 2018. "Land use change and the carbon debt for sugarcane ethanol production in Brazil," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 72(C), pages 65-73.
    3. Deepak Jaiswal & Amanda P. De Souza & Søren Larsen & David S. LeBauer & Fernando E. Miguez & Gerd Sparovek & Germán Bollero & Marcos S. Buckeridge & Stephen P. Long, 2017. "Brazilian sugarcane ethanol as an expandable green alternative to crude oil use," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 7(11), pages 788-792, November.
    4. Francisco F. C. Mello & Carlos E. P. Cerri & Christian A. Davies & N. Michele Holbrook & Keith Paustian & Stoécio M. F. Maia & Marcelo V. Galdos & Martial Bernoux & Carlos C. Cerri, 2014. "Payback time for soil carbon and sugar-cane ethanol," Nature Climate Change, Nature, vol. 4(7), pages 605-609, July.
    5. Jurandir Zullo & Vânia Rosa Pereira & Andrea Koga-Vicente, 2018. "Sugar-energy sector vulnerability under CMIP5 projections in the Brazilian central-southern macro-region," Climatic Change, Springer, vol. 149(3), pages 489-502, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ivan Vera & Birka Wicke & Floor van der Hilst, 2020. "Spatial Variation in Environmental Impacts of Sugarcane Expansion in Brazil," Land, MDPI, vol. 9(10), pages 1-20, October.
    2. Luis Ramirez Camargo & Gabriel Castro & Katharina Gruber & Jessica Jewell & Michael Klingler & Olga Turkovska & Elisabeth Wetterlund & Johannes Schmidt, 2022. "Pathway to a land-neutral expansion of Brazilian renewable fuel production," Nature Communications, Nature, vol. 13(1), pages 1-10, December.
    3. Salih Demirkaya & Abdurrahman Ay & Coşkun Gülser & Rıdvan Kızılkaya, 2025. "Enhancing Clay Soil Productivity with Fresh and Aged Biochar: A Two-Year Field Study on Soil Quality and Wheat Yield," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 17(2), pages 1-18, January.
    4. Elena A. Mikhailova & Garth R. Groshans & Christopher J. Post & Mark A. Schlautman & Gregory C. Post, 2019. "Valuation of Soil Organic Carbon Stocks in the Contiguous United States Based on the Avoided Social Cost of Carbon Emissions," Resources, MDPI, vol. 8(3), pages 1-15, August.
    5. Rolinski, Susanne & Prishchepov, Alexander V. & Guggenberger, Georg & Bischoff, Norbert & Kurganova, Irina & Schierhorn, Florian & Müller, Daniel & Müller, Christoph, 2021. "Dynamics of soil organic carbon in the steppes of Russia and Kazakhstan under past and future climate and land use," EconStor Open Access Articles and Book Chapters, ZBW - Leibniz Information Centre for Economics, vol. 21(3).
    6. Meiting Li & Keqin Wang & Xiaoyi Ma & Mingsi Fan & Biyu Li & Yali Song, 2025. "Relationship Between Soil Aggregate Stability and Associated Carbon and Nitrogen Changes Under Different Ecological Construction Measures in the Karst Region of Southwest China," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 15(2), pages 1-23, January.
    7. Berazneva, Julia & McBride, Linden & Sheahan, Megan & Güereña, David, 2018. "Empirical assessment of subjective and objective soil fertility metrics in east Africa: Implications for researchers and policy makers," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 367-382.
    8. Héctor Iván Bedolla-Rivera & María de la Luz Xochilt Negrete-Rodríguez & Miriam del Rocío Medina-Herrera & Francisco Paúl Gámez-Vázquez & Dioselina Álvarez-Bernal & Midory Samaniego-Hernández & Alfred, 2020. "Development of a Soil Quality Index for Soils under Different Agricultural Management Conditions in the Central Lowlands of Mexico: Physicochemical, Biological and Ecophysiological Indicators," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(22), pages 1-24, November.
    9. Kargbo, Hannah & Harris, Jonathan Stuart & Phan, Anh N., 2021. "“Drop-in” fuel production from biomass: Critical review on techno-economic feasibility and sustainability," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 135(C).
    10. Jakub Bekier & Elżbieta Jamroz & Karolina Walenczak-Bekier & Martyna Uściła, 2023. "Soil Organic Matter Composition in Urban Soils: A Study of Wrocław Agglomeration, SW Poland," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(3), pages 1-12, January.
    11. Carine Naba & Hiroshi Ishidaira & Jun Magome & Kazuyoshi Souma, 2024. "Exploring the Potential of Soil and Water Conservation Measures for Climate Resilience in Burkina Faso," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 16(18), pages 1-20, September.
    12. Liudmila Tripolskaja & Asta Kazlauskaite-Jadzevice & Eugenija Baksiene & Almantas Razukas, 2022. "Changes in Organic Carbon in Mineral Topsoil of a Formerly Cultivated Arenosol under Different Land Uses in Lithuania," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 12(4), pages 1-19, March.
    13. Yongkang Wang & Junfeng Dai & Fan Jiang & Zupeng Wan & Shuaipu Zhang, 2025. "Coupled Effects of Water Depth, Vegetation, and Soil Properties on Soil Organic Carbon Components in the Huixian Wetland of the Li River Basin," Land, MDPI, vol. 14(3), pages 1-20, March.
    14. José Manuel Rato Nunes & António Bonito & Luis Loures & José Gama & Antonio López-Piñeiro & David Peña & Ángel Albarrán, 2017. "Effects of the European Union Agricultural and Environmental Policies in the Sustainability of Most Common Mediterranean Soils," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(8), pages 1-16, August.
    15. Jianghua Tang & Lili Su & Yanfei Fang & Chen Wang & Linyi Meng & Jiayong Wang & Junyao Zhang & Wenxiu Xu, 2023. "Moderate Nitrogen Reduction Increases Nitrogen Use Efficiency and Positively Affects Microbial Communities in Agricultural Soils," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-24, March.
    16. Umanath Malaiarasan & R. Paramasivam & K. Thomas Felix & S. J. Balaji, 2020. "Simultaneous equation model for Indian sugar sector," Journal of Social and Economic Development, Springer;Institute for Social and Economic Change, vol. 22(1), pages 113-141, June.
    17. García, Antonio & Monsalve-Serrano, Javier & Martínez-Boggio, Santiago & Rückert Roso, Vinícius & Duarte Souza Alvarenga Santos, Nathália, 2020. "Potential of bio-ethanol in different advanced combustion modes for hybrid passenger vehicles," Renewable Energy, Elsevier, vol. 150(C), pages 58-77.
    18. Guillermo Martínez Pastur & Marie-Claire Aravena Acuña & Jimena E. Chaves & Juan M. Cellini & Eduarda M. O. Silveira & Julián Rodriguez-Souilla & Axel von Müller & Ludmila La Manna & María V. Lencinas, 2023. "Nitrogenous and Phosphorus Soil Contents in Tierra del Fuego Forests: Relationships with Soil Organic Carbon, Climate, Vegetation and Landscape Metrics," Land, MDPI, vol. 12(5), pages 1-18, April.
    19. He, Qinsi & Liu, De Li & Wang, Bin & Li, Linchao & Cowie, Annette & Simmons, Aaron & Zhou, Hongxu & Tian, Qi & Li, Sien & Li, Yi & Liu, Ke & Yan, Haoliang & Harrison, Matthew Tom & Feng, Puyu & Waters, 2022. "Identifying effective agricultural management practices for climate change adaptation and mitigation: A win-win strategy in South-Eastern Australia," Agricultural Systems, Elsevier, vol. 203(C).
    20. Nariê Rinke Dias de Souza & Bruno Colling Klein & Mateus Ferreira Chagas & Otavio Cavalett & Antonio Bonomi, 2021. "Towards Comparable Carbon Credits: Harmonization of LCA Models of Cellulosic Biofuels," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(18), pages 1-17, September.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:masfgc:v:25:y:2020:i:4:d:10.1007_s11027-019-09880-7. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.