AGROECOLOGICAL ASSESSMENT OF ENERGY POTENTIAL OF SOILS

Abstract

The energy assessment of various technologies for the production of crop products and agricultural systems is relevant, because it allows to conduct an analysis of a complex process based on the application of aggregated data, and to compare different processes or stages of production according to a unified calculation indicator or coefficient. It consists in determining the ratio of energy costs for the production of plant products to the amount of energy obtained with the harvest at the level of agroecosystems. The production technology should be considered effective if the energy efficiency ratio is higher than 1, since the output of gross energy exceeds the total non-renewable energy consumed. The main idea of this work is to carry out an agroecological assessment of the consequences of conducting modern agriculture for a long time based on the change in the energy potential of soils as the main means of agricultural production. The relevance of conducting agroecological research and the presented results is to determine the energy consumption of humus as a natural reserve and resource for the formation and preservation of the energy potential of the soils of Ukraine in the process of growing agricultural crops. The humus balance of the arable soil layer, the gross energy accumulated by the economically valuable part of the harvest of the main agricultural crops, the change in the energy intensity of the soil according to the content of organic carbon and the amount of manure, energetically equivalent to the indicator of the decrease in the energy intensity of the soil during 1990–2021 on the scale of the country and administrative regions, were determined. An informative indicator that characterizes the agroecological efficiency of farming is proposed – the coefficient of change in the energy potential of the soil in relation to the formation of crop yields (КΔеs). This is the ratio of the change in the energy capacity of the soil to the gross energy of the crop of the studied crops, including the main and by-products of crop production, expressed in %. Also, the energy of the main and secondary products of plants, which is removed from the soil, is separately allocated. It has been established that currently in most regions of Ukraine, the production of crop products is ineffective in the context of preserving the energy potential of the soil. During 2000–2021, the energy density of soils in Ukraine decreases annually by 11.0–39.9 GJ/ha. Only in 1990, a positive balance of humus was found – 115.8 kg/ha, or in energy equivalent – 2.5 GJ/ha. The negative value of KΔes on the formation of the crop of the studied crops was revealed in all administrative regions of Ukraine. The lowest rate is in Chernihiv (–48%), Zhytomyr (–45%) and Ivano-Frankivsk (–39%) regions. The amount of manure, which is energetically equivalent to the indicator of the decrease in energy intensity of the soils per unit area, is 26.3–95.0 t/ha/year.