Turning electricity into food: the role of renewable energy in the future of agriculture
Turning electricity into food: the role of renewable energy in the future of agriculture
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DOI：
10.1016/j.jclepro.2013.04.014
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发表时间：
2013-08-15
影响因子：
11.1
通讯作者：
Lavacchi, Alessandro
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
Bardi, Ugo;El Asmar, Toufic;Lavacchi, Alessandro
现代农业在很大程度上依赖于主要来自化石燃料的能源供应。从这个意义上说，它可以被定义为一种将化石燃料转化为食品的技术。然而，化石碳氢化合物的可用数量并不是无限的，气候变化正在创造减少其使用的迫切必要性。因此，现在开始考虑农业如何适应不会造成气候变化的可持续能源并不为时过早。在本文中，我们讨论了如何调整农业结构，以利用风能和光伏等可再生能源技术提供的电力。从这个意义上说，这个问题可以说是需要开发能够将电力转化为食品的技术。在我们的分析中，我们发现可再生电力可以为今天由化石燃料生产的农场提供一些服务，成本不超过合理范围。然而，并不是所有的现代农业问题都能简单地从一种能源转换到另一种能源，而磷酸盐等矿物质肥料的有限供应仍然是一个根本限制。我们的结论是，农场的可再生电力应被视为更广泛过渡的一部分，这将需要对目前的农业进程进行相当大的改造和调整，以发展真正可持续的农业。(C)2013爱思唯尔有限公司。保留所有权利。
Modern agriculture is heavily based on the energy supply obtained mainly from fossil fuels. In this sense, it can be defined as a technology that transforms fossil fuels into food. However, the available amount of fossil hydrocarbons is not infinite and climate change is creating a critical necessity of reducing their use. Therefore, it is not too early to start considering how agriculture could be adapted to sustainable sources of energy which do not cause climate change. In the present paper, we discuss how agriculture could be restructured in order to utilize the electric power provided by renewable energy technologies such as wind and photovoltaics. In this sense, the problem can be stated as the need of developing technologies able to turn electricity into food. In our analysis, we find that renewable electric power could provide some of the services for the farm produced today by fossil fuels at costs which are not outside reasonable ranges. However, not all the problems of modern agriculture can be solved simply shifting from one power source to another and the limited availability of mineral fertilizers, such as phosphates, remains a fundamental limitation. We conclude that renewable electric power in the farm should be seen as part of a more general transition that will require considerable transformations and adaptation of the current agricultural process in order to develop a truly sustainable agriculture. (C) 2013 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.