Soode-Schimonsky Eveli, Richter Klaus, Weber-Blaschke Gabriele
Technical University of Munich, Chair of Wood Science, Winzererstraße 45, 80797 Munich, Germany.
Technical University of Munich, Chair of Wood Science, Hans-Carl-von-Carlowitz-Platz 2, 85354 Freising, Germany.
J Environ Manage. 2017 Dec 1;203(Pt 1):564-577. doi: 10.1016/j.jenvman.2017.03.090. Epub 2017 Apr 5.
The environmental impacts of strawberries have been assessed in several studies. However, these studies either present dissimilar results or only focus on single impact categories without offering a comprehensive overview of environmental impacts. We applied the product environmental footprint (PEF) methodology to broadly indicate the environmental impacts of various strawberry production systems in Germany and Estonia by 15 impact categories. Data for the 7 case studies were gathered from two farms with organic and two farms with conventional open field production systems in Estonia and from one farm with conventional open field and one farm with a polytunnel and greenhouse production system in Germany. The greenhouse production system had the highest environmental impact with a PEF of 0.0040. In the field organic production systems, the PEF was 0.0029 and 0.0028. The field conventional production systems resulted in a PEF of 0.0008, 0.0009 and 0.0002. Polytunnel PEF was 0.0006. Human toxicity cancer effects, particulate matter and human toxicity non-cancer effects resulted in the highest impact across all analysed production systems. The main contributors were electricity for cooling, heating the greenhouse and the use of agricultural machinery including fuel burning. While production stage contributed 85% of the total impact in the greenhouse, also other life cycle stages were important contributors: pre-chain resulted in 71% and 90% of impact in conventional and polytunnels, respectively, and cooling was 47% in one organic system. Environmental impact from strawberry cooling can be reduced by more efficient use of the cooling room, increasing the strawberry yield or switching from oil shale electricity to other energy sources. Greenhouse heating is the overall impact hotspot even if it based on renewable resources. A ranking of production systems based on the environmental impact is possible only if all relevant impacts are included. Future studies should aim for detailed results across a variety of impact categories and follow product category rules in defining the life cycle stages.
多项研究对草莓的环境影响进行了评估。然而，这些研究要么给出的结果不同，要么仅关注单一影响类别，并未全面概述环境影响。我们应用产品环境足迹（PEF）方法，通过15个影响类别广泛地表明德国和爱沙尼亚不同草莓生产系统的环境影响。7个案例研究的数据分别来自爱沙尼亚的两个有机农场和两个传统露天生产系统农场，以及德国的一个传统露天农场和一个采用塑料大棚及温室生产系统的农场。温室生产系统的环境影响最大，产品环境足迹为0.0040。在露天有机生产系统中，产品环境足迹分别为0.0029和0.0028。传统露天生产系统的产品环境足迹为0.0008、0.0009和0.0002。塑料大棚的产品环境足迹为0.0006。在所有分析的生产系统中，人类毒性癌症影响、颗粒物和人类毒性非癌症影响造成的影响最大。主要因素包括温室冷却、加热用电以及包括燃油燃烧在内的农业机械使用。虽然生产阶段在温室总影响中占85%，但其他生命周期阶段也是重要因素：在传统生产系统和塑料大棚中，链前阶段分别造成71%和90%的影响，在一个有机系统中冷却阶段占47%。通过更高效地使用冷藏室、提高草莓产量或从油页岩发电转向其他能源，可以减少草莓冷却对环境的影响。即使温室加热基于可再生资源，它仍是整体影响热点。只有纳入所有相关影响，才有可能根据环境影响对生产系统进行排名。未来的研究应致力于在各种影响类别中得出详细结果，并在定义生命周期阶段时遵循产品类别规则。
