Towards circular economy: Sustainable soil additives from natural waste fibres to improve water retention and soil fertility.

Autor: Marczak D; Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Institute of Environmental Engineering, Wrocław 50-363, Poland., Lejcuś K; Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Institute of Environmental Engineering, Wrocław 50-363, Poland. Electronic address: krzysztof.lejcus@upwr.edu.pl., Kulczycki G; Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Department of Plant Nutrition, Wrocław 50-363, Poland., Misiewicz J; Wrocław University of Environmental and Life Sciences, Institute of Environmental Engineering, Wrocław 50-363, Poland.
Jazyk: angličtina
Zdroj: The Science of the total environment [Sci Total Environ] 2022 Oct 20; Vol. 844, pp. 157169. Date of Electronic Publication: 2022 Jul 04.
DOI: 10.1016/j.scitotenv.2022.157169
Abstrakt: Human activity is accompanied by the introduction of excessive amounts of artificial materials, including geosynthetics, into the environment, causing global environmental pollution. Moreover, climate change continues to negatively affect global water resources. With the intensification of environmental problems, material reusability and water consumption limitations have been proposed. This study replaced synthetic soil additives with biodegradable materials and analysed the potential and sustainable processing of natural fibrous materials, which form problematic waste. Waste fibres are the basis of innovative soil water storage technologies in the form of biodegradable and water-absorbing geocomposites (BioWAG). We analysed the influence of BioWAGs on plant vegetation and the environment through a three-year field experiment. Furthermore, biomass increases, drought effect reductions, and biodegradation mechanisms were analysed. Natural waste fibres had a positive influence, as they released easily accessible nutrients into the soil during biodegradation. BioWAGs had a positive influence on the biometric parameters of grass, increasing biomass growth by 430 %. Our results indicated that this is an effective method of waste fibre management that offers the possibility to manufacture innovative, environmentally friendly materials in compliance with the objectives of circular economy and the expectations of users.
Competing Interests: Declaration of competing interest The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.
(Copyright © 2022 The Authors. Published by Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.)
Databáze: MEDLINE
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