Energy is needed in all stages of agriculture, from land preparation, water lifting, transport, and processing. Sustainable management of the natural resources of land, water, air, and biodiversity is the mantra for sustainable agriculture.

1. Energy Management in Sustainable
Agriculture
Presented by: Submitted to :
Anusha KR Dr. Kulbir Singh
L-2021-H-88-D Department of Vegetable Science

2. •Energy is constantly flowing through the ecosystem.
• It enters as solar energy and it is converted by plants into potential
energy, which is stored in the chemical bonds of organic molecules, or
biomass
•Whenever this potential energy is harvested by organisms to do work
(e.g. grow, move, reproduce), much of it is transformed into heat energy
that is no longer available for further work or transformation - it is lost
from the ecosystem.

3. Energy and Agriculture
• Energy is needed in all stages of agriculture, from land preparation, water lifting, transport, and processing.
• Agriculture is an energy-conversion process that transforms solar energy into food through photosynthesis.
• Almost 99% of the energy for primary plant growth and productivity is derived from the sun.
• Sustainable management of the natural resources of land, water, air, and biodiversity is the mantra for sustainable
agriculture.
• It is impossible to conceive of an effective food production system, processing, and distribution without adequate
energy inputs.

4. • The three-fold increase in global agricultural productivity during the last half a century
has been possible because of a parallel and exponential increase in the use of chemical
fertilizers, irrigation, and pest control measures.
• This is also the reason that the term “green revolution” itself is a euphemism (Nair 2013).
• It is more appropriate to call it an “industrial type agriculture,” rather than green
revolution, with all the concomitant adverse fallout on the environment (Nair 2013;
2014).

5. Pattern in Energy Use
• Agricultural production by itself accounts for only a relatively small proportion of the total energy used in
industrial and developing countries.
4–8% in
Developing
countries
30–35% in
Developed
countries
Production and
distribution
Processing
Transport
Trade

6. Energy use in global agriculture follows two extremes as follows:
1. The high external input and highly mechanized factory model of agriculture of the advanced countries are 50
times as energy intensive as compared to traditional agriculture.
2. The very low or nil external input agriculture which is a part of the subsistence agriculture prevalent in many
of the stressed ecosystems of the tropics depends mostly on solar energy-drive natural processes and on
human and animal draft power.
• Between these two highly contrasting energy use patterns, depicted above, fall the green revolution
technologies, especially in developing countries, which use moderate fertilizer and pest control inputs, though
the high-end farmers use unbridled quantities of fertilizers and pesticides, and, farm mechanization is of low
intensity, except on large farms.

7. Energy intensification in
agriculture

8. Advantages
• Energizing the food production chain has been an essential feature of agricultural development and a prime factor to
achieve food security.
• A direct relationship exists between energy consumption and agricultural yield.
• Traditional agricultural systems depend largely on the metabolic (endosomatic) energy of humans and animals and solar
energy, whereas the energy requirements of modern agriculture are almost completely met from fossil fuels, mostly
petroleum and to some extent diesel.
• Energy transformed outside the body (exosomatic, for example, burning gasoline in a tractor) results in much higher
productivity per unit of labor.
• Thus, a gallon of gasoline can be transformed into the equivalent of 3 weeks of human labor (Giampietro and Pimental
1994).
• The efficiency of energy conversion in humans is only 25%, and in a fit person the body can use up energy up to 250 to
300 W.

9. • The ratio of exosomatic and endosomatic energy is 4:1 in traditional agriculture, whereas it is almost 40:1 for
modern agriculture.
• This results in completely lower land and labor productivity in traditional agriculture and, consequently, in lower
socioeconomic standards in terms of income, health, education, services, and so on.
• From the early twentieth century, the global population grew at an accelerating pace, which made output from low-
energy input traditional agriculture inadequate to meet the growing need for food.
• Energy intensification of agriculture started actively in the post-II World War period as a consequence of the impact
of industrialization and accelerated economic growth.
• Heavy injections of fossil energy, in the form of chemicals and machine power, in combination with high-yielding
crop varieties, increased the productivity of land and labor enormously in comparison to primitive agriculture.
• This resulted in increasing income and standards of living for the farmer and in more labor becoming available for
other economic sectors, especially in advanced countries.

10. Disadvantages
• Large scale energy infusion into modern agriculture for land preparation and irrigation and very high fertilizer
inputs, often without adequate thought to the efficiency of their use, have created a trade-off between
productivity on the one hand and environmental quality, resource conservation, and economic viability on the
other.
• Excessive use of external inputs has resulted in multiple adverse impacts, including enormous degradation of
soil in the form of erosion, loss of organic matter and fertility, and salinization, environmental pollution from
unbridled use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides, entering surface and ground water to become a threat to
human and animal health, and, damage to and extinction of aquatic species as a result of the presence of toxic
chemicals in runoff.
• The Punjab State in India, known as the “cradle” of green revolution epitomizes all these problems (Nair
2013).

11. • Intensive farming techniques impact the pattern of energy flows in ecosystems.
• In general, they reduce the capacity of the ecosystem to use solar energy for evapotranspiration, gross primary
production, recycling of nutrients, and natural pest control, leading to a decrease in the efficiency of the use of
inputs.
• This renders the soil a biologically dead physico-chemical medium incapable of sustaining productivity in the long
run, as is happening in many intensively cultivated systems, such as rice-wheat systems of South Asia, Punjab State
in India, being a classic example in the former category of nations (Ladha et al 2003)
• Among the most adverse impacts of high energy agricultural systems, is their high direct and indirect share of
contribution to global warming, due to emission of gaseous emission, the nitrous oxide being the most important.
• Along with deforestation, they account for about 30% of greenhouse gas emissions, through the burning of fossil
fuel manufactured fertilizers and pesticides, and also through inefficient use of nitrogenous fertilizers, which
enhances nitrous oxide concentrations in the atmosphere.
• Thus, energy use in high external input agriculture has become ecologically, economically, and environmentally,
unsustainable.

12. Impact of Low Energy Use
in Agriculture

13. • Inadequate external energy infusion, as in the low-input traditional agricultural systems of the developing
countries, results in low land and labor productivity and a lack of food security.
• Agricultural practices based on animal and human power with inadequate use of fertilizers and pesticides and lack
of storage, preservation, and transportation facilities cannot meet the needs of the growing population.
• Low external energy input agriculture is, without doubt, environmentally friendly.
• Natural ecological processes are certainly superior to external inputs in terms of crop production because they are
regenerating, nonpolluting, practically free, and resource-conserving.
• However, they are not invariably beneficial at the societal level.
• In the low input primitive systems of production, the ratio of exosomatic to endosomatic energy is low. When a
society has a very low exosomatic/endosomatic energy ratio and uses labor-intensive techniques to save capital
and fossil energy, its per capita labor and land output remains low, resulting in a lower standard of living, health,
and education (Giampietro and Pimental 1994)

14. • Ecological processes cannot substitute completely external inputs in modern crop production because they
have their own pattern and pace of mass and energy flow and distribution.
• Although excellent sources of plant nutrients are present in organic form, such as crop residues and animal
and poultry excreta, their utilization may be constrained by their rate of mineralization and lack of synchrony
with plant growth needs.

15. Sustainable Energy Management in
High-Input Agriculture

16. • Following the principles of thermodynamics, a key indicator of sustainability is the ratio of energy
equivalents of all of the inputs and outputs (Andiscott 1995).
• The higher this ratio, the more sustainable the system.

17. • The most basic way to improve the sustainability of modern agriculture is to decrease both the direct and
embodied external energy component by increasing their efficiency of use.
• “The Nutrient Buffer Power Concept,” while emphasizing the usefulness of chemical fertilizers, aims at
moderation, enhancing the efficiency of nutrient use, while at the same time containing environmental
pollution, and, as a bonus, enhancing economy of scale (Nair 2004).
• Maintaining high productivity with an acceptable impact on resource, environment, and economics is the key
to sustainability.
• The use of non-polluting alternative sources of energy is also conducive to improving sustainability.
• Conservation tillage, integrated pest management, integrated plant nutrient supply, crop rotation,
micro irrigation techniques, and precision farming belong to this category.

18. Conservation tillage
• Conservation tillage practices
were initially introduced to reduce
the costs of mechanization, but,
• have turned out to offer several
ecological and economic benefits,
such as low soil erosion, reduced
runoff, more natural pest control,
greater water storage and
infiltration, increased cropping
intensity, and economy of scale in
input use.
• Conservation tillage has become
very popular where farms are
large.

19. Water management
• Managing water use more efficiently, using drip
and sprinkler irrigation, and using mulch to
improve water storage and reduce
evapotranspiration, are simple ways to improve
the productivity of water
• These practices not only result in energy
conservation, but also attract other bonuses such
as
• lower nutrient loss,
• higher efficiency of input use, and
• freedom from water logging and

20. • On average, about 25% of the electrical energy used for irrigation in developing countries being wasted due to poor
pump and motor efficiency.
• Properly designed systems promote correct soil moisture levels, leading to crop stress, reduced yields, wasted
water, runoff, soil erosion, and many other problems.
• Energy (and money) can be saved in many ways:
1. Efficiency irrigation pumps, including variable speed pump motors;
2. Frequent management/maintenance of irrigation systems;
3. Proper pump-sizing; and
4. Upgrade to more efficient irrigation system, e.g. from wheel lines to pivot or linear sprinkler systems.

21. Pest management
• Integrated pest management combines
several virtues, including
• cost reduction,
• environmental and human safety,
• prevention of pesticide resistance and pest
resurgence,
• with a favorable energy balance.

22. Cropping system
• Biodiversity enhancement through
• Polyculture, as opposed to the monoculture system
(rice-wheat continuous cropping during the green
revolution phase in Punjab State, India),
• Crop rotation,
• Mixed cropping, and
• Strip cropping
• Has been shown to have a variety of positive effects,
such as conservation, the efficiency of use of
nutrients, and water, erosion control, biological pest
and disease control, and improvement in soil quality

23. Farm vehicles
• The biggest opportunities for energy savings from farm
vehicles can be found in tillage systems and tractor
fuel efficiency.
• Tractor fuel efficiency can be as simple as proper tire
inflation, regular vehicle maintenance, and reduced
idling.
• Such measures can not only save fuel but prolong the
life of tractor

24. Greenhouse agriculture
• Typical annual greenhouse energy usage is 75% for heating, 15% for electricity and 10% for vehicles.
• Producers who put resources where the greatest savings can be realized have clear opportunities for savings.
• Energy conservation solutions range from common-sense to extremely efficient heating, cooling and watering systems:
• Reduce Air Leaks by using door closers,
• weather stripping (doors, vents, fan openings) and
• lubricating louvers (a partially open louver may allow several air changes per hour).
• Poly with an infrared inhibitor on the inner layer can give 15% energy savings.
• Thermal Blankets can achieve 20%-50% energy savings.
• Foundation and Sidewall Insulation.

25. Sustainable Energy Management in
Low–Input Systems

26. • Access to appropriate energy can enhance productivity and food security, create livelihood opportunities,
and reduce poverty (WEC/ FAO 1999).
• Hopes to improve the lives of the rural peasants and landless poor of developing countries depend largely
on some level of energy infusion into their cultivation processes and into their daily lives.
• The realization of minimum standards of living is possible only through proper energy management (FAO
1996b).

27. • The Rio Earth Summit (UNCED 1992) highlighted the importance of efficiently managing fossil energy and
making use of other forms of renewable energy such as solar, wind, geothermal, and biomass energy in
sustainable development.
• The gist of the recommendations made with respect to agriculture is the following:
1. The process of transition to environmentally sound energy resources using structured and diversified
alternative and renewable energy sources should be initiated in rural communities
2. Energy inputs should be increased to rural households and for agro industrial needs
3. Rural programs for energy self-reliance in the sustainable development of renewable energy sources should be
implemented

28. Biomass energy
• Biomass energy from agricultural by-products can be used in small-scale
industries in rural areas, such as
• sugar, rubber, and coconut processing, rice par boiling, fish and meat drying,
brick making, lime kilns infusions of energy from biomass, such as straw for
mushroom culture and cattle waste in pisciculture, recycling of biowastes such
as banana leaves, and fodder banks
• are innovative means of livelihood creation, as seen in the Biovillage model in
Pondicherry (Union territory, India) as detailed by MSSRF (2000), ceramics,
and pottery.

29. Combined heat-power generation technologies
• Combined heat-power generation technologies have proved very effective in the sugarcane
industry, where the byproduct bagasse is used as biomass fuel.
• Recently an Australian Company “Zero Waste Ltd” has come forward with a unique
technology where bagasse (by product of sugarcane crushing) is converted into an organic
material, commercially marketed, now as “Geogreen” in India, with a collaboration of a
company, Rallis India Ltd. (A Tata Group Company).
• This material has proved to be extremely successful and useful in Indian soils highly
depleted of native carbon by the onslaught of the green revolution, which led to severe
carbon depletion in soil, leading to yield depression and degradation of soil.
• These technologies are cost-effective and can facilitate decentralized rural industrialization.

31. • Ever since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC 1996) confirmed that global warming is
due to the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, renewed efforts have been underway to
replace fossil fuel with other clean or less polluting energy sources such as solar energy, hydrogen biomass,
and natural gas.
• Solar energy, wind energy, biomass energy, and hydro and geothermal tidal energies are being evolved as
potential forms of renewable energy.
• They are non-polluting, non-emission sources and are suitable for small to medium scale operations,
especially in rural and remote areas. The growth of different energy types is depicted in the following table

33. Thank you