• Energy Research

The characteristic “high input and output” in protected production has caused some environmental and ecological issues. Hence, emergy-based sustainability assessments are necessary and valuable. However, traditional emergy analysis is time consuming, tedious, and inefficient. Such disadvantages can be addressed by the integration of emergy analysis with information technology. This paper reports the development of the emergy-based sustainability decision assessment system (ESDAS) for protected grape cultivation systems. This system was established by first analyzing the business process, users, and requirements through survey, and the findings of which were used to design the system’s function, architecture, database, model base, and knowledge base with a combination of emergy methods. The results showed that ESDAS passed the system test and achieved the real-time calculation of emergy data and the automatization of emergy analysis. Therefore, this research is a beneficial attempt to apply information technology in improving the efficiency of sustainability assessments. The results also revealed that the protected grape cultivation system is characterized by a heavy dependence on purchased and non-renewable resource emergy, lower emergy yield ratio, higher emergy investment rate and environmental loading ratio, and lower emergy sustainability index. Some suggestions were made to improve the sustainability of the protected grape system.

Earthworm distribution in global soils Earthworms are key components of soil ecological communities, performing vital functions in decomposition and nutrient cycling through ecosystems. Using data from more than 7000 sites, Phillips et al. developed global maps of the distribution of earthworm diversity, abundance, and biomass (see the Perspective by Fierer). The patterns differ from those typically found in aboveground taxa; there are peaks of diversity and abundance in the mid-latitude regions and peaks of biomass in the tropics. Climate variables strongly influence these patterns, and changes are likely to have cascading effects on other soil organisms and wider ecosystem functions. Science , this issue p. 480 ; see also p. 425

Grape production is associated with some negative environmental externalities. However, they are not considered in the traditional data envelopment analysis (DEA) efficiency assessment models and the research literature. Hence, the assessment results cannot correctly reflect the technical efficiency level of open-field grape production. We measured the environmental efficiency of China’s open-field grape production under the constraint of carbon emissions using the slacks-based measure (SBM) model, including the undesirable outputs. In addition, spatial relations of environmental efficiency in different open-field grape production areas in China were evaluated by adopting spatial econometric methods. The results indicate that the average environmental efficiency score of grape production in China is at a low level of 0.651. Overall, the average environmental efficiencies in southern, southwest, and northeast regions are lower than the average levels, which implies the imbalance in economic outputs, resource consumption, and environmental efficiency in open-field grape cultivation. Moreover, the spatial autocorrelation results show that the environmental efficiency of grape production has obvious continuity in neighboring regions and spatial correlation.

Abstract Anthropogenic material and energy flows are considered to be the major cause of many environmental problems humans face today. In order to measure material and energy flows, and to mitigate related problems, the technique of material flow and energy flow analysis has been conceived. The aim of this article is to use material and energy flow accounting approaches to quantify the amount of biomass that is available, but that so far has not been used for energy purposes in Slovakia and the Czech Republic and to calculate how much consumed fossil fuels and corresponding CO2 emissions can be saved by utilising this biomass. Based on the findings presented, 3544 kt/yr of the total unused biomass in Slovakia could replace 53 PJ/yr of energy from fossil fuels and 6294 kt/yr of the total unused biomass in the Czech Republic could replace 91 PJ/yr of energy. Such replacement could contribute to a decrease in total CO2 emissions by 9.2% in Slovakia and by 5.4% in the Czech Republic and thus contribute to an environmental improvement with respect to climate change.

Earthworms are a major component of soil fauna communities. They influence soil chemical, biological, and physical processes and vice versa, their abundance and diversity are influenced by natural characteristics or land management practices. There is need to establish their characteristics and relations. In this study earthworm density (ED), body biomass (EB), and diversity in relation to land use (arable land—AL, permanent grasslands—PG), management, and selected abiotic (soil chemical, physical, climate related) and biotic (arthropod density and biomass, ground beetle density, carabid density) indicators were analysed at seven different study sites in Slovakia. On average, the density of earthworms was nearly twice as high in PG compared to AL. Among five soil types used as arable land, Fluvisols created the most suitable conditions for earthworm abundance and biomass. We recorded a significant correlation between ED, EB and soil moisture in arable land. In permanent grasslands, the main climate related factor was soil temperature. Relationships between earthworms and some chemical properties (pH, available nutrients) were observed only in arable land. Our findings indicate trophic interaction between earthworms and carabids in organically managed arable land. Comprehensive assessment of observed relationships can help in earthworm management to achieve sustainable agricultural systems.