 Assessment of gains in productivity and water-energy-carbon nexus with tillage, trash retention and fertigation practices in drip irrigated sugarcaneG.C. Wakchaure, P.S. Minhas, A.K. Biswas, Kamlesh K. Meena, Aliza Pradhan, B.J. Gawhale, R.L. Choudhary, Satish Kumar, Ram K. Fagodiya, K. Sammi Reddy and H. Pathak Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 2025, vol. 211, issue C Abstract: Sugarcane is a major contributor to bioenergy production in India and its share is expected to rise further. However, the productivity of sugarcane is not only low, but it is also water-energy-carbon extensive. To work out energy and emission-centric strategies, effects of conservation agriculture-based tillage, surface trash retention, and nutrient management were monitored in drip irrigated sugarcane experiment (2016–22). Six treatments imposed on the plant crop consisted of: three tillage levels viz., CT (conventional tillage i.e. sub-soiling plus cultivating twice followed by rotovator), RT1 (reduced tillage cultivating twice) and RT2 (reduced tillage single cultivation) before preparing ridges for planting in main-plots and two trash management practices viz., M (trash mulching) and NM (non-mulching) in subplots. RT2 and RT1 rather increased plant crop productivity by 13.3 % and 8.2 % over CT, while the increase with M was 5.3, 7.9, and 10.1 %, respectively under CT, RT1 and RT2. The sub-sub plots for the following four ratoon crops included three modes of nutrient management as varied using both a multi-functional (stubble shaving, off-barring, root pruning and band placement of fertilisers) ratoon drill (MRD) for basal dose and fertigation with drippers during crop growth. These consisted of: N1 (25 % recommended fertilisers, RDF as basal and rest through fertigation); N2 (50 % with MRD and 50 % with fertigation) and N3 (75 % with MRD and 25 % with fertigation). RT2+ M + N2 enhanced tillers, cane weight, size matrices, juice quality and produced 45.4 % higher cane yield of ratoon crops compared with CT + NM + N1 (farmers practice). This reduced the yield gap from 38 to 8 % between plant and ratoon crops via its superior water productivity (16.4 kg m−3), partial factor productivity (518.1 kg N kg−1), and reduced water footprint (54.0 l kg−1). The energy consumption during ratoon crops (40.4–50.5 GJ ha−1) was considerably lesser than the plant crop (74.6–87.7 GJ ha−1). Similarly, GHG emissions monitored were 6522–7487 and 9001–10421 kg CO2-eq ha−1 during ratoon and plant crop, respectively. Reduced tillage in ratoons improved energy use efficiency (33.7–56.3 %), net energy (26.3–46.7 %) and reduced GHGs emissions by 3.6–12.9 % compared to CT + NM + N1. This enhanced carbon sequestration by 65.5–73.1 % and reduced carbon footprint by 72–88 %. Thus, integrating reduced tillage, trash retention and appropriate fertigation practices has a potential to improve sugarcane productivity vis-a-vis profitability, and sustain soil and environmental quality in sugarcane production systems, as prevalent in water scarcities regions. Keywords: Energy budgeting; Greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions; Carbon footprint; Conservation agriculture; Water productivity; Sugarcane; Trash burning (search for similar items in EconPapers) Downloads: (external link) Related works: Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:eee:rensus:v:211:y:2025:i:c:s1364032124010207 Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from DOI: 10.1016/j.rser.2024.115294 Access Statistics for this article Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews is currently edited by L. Kazmerski More articles in Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews from Elsevier |
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