An integrated decision support tool for more sustainable management of biomass resources in agricultural regions
type: CreativeWork
description: Agriculture currently faces a number of environmental sustainability issues. Three key issues that are the focus of this study are greenhouse gas emissions, depletion of mineral phosphorus resources and cadmium contamination in agricultural soil. Biomass can potentially be used as a renewable energy source and can also be returned to improve the nutrient and drainage structure of agricultural soils. Sustainable management of biomass and agriculture can have significant impacts on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from a region. Moreover, it reduces the demand for external energy supply, phosphorous (P) based fertilizer, and its associated Cadmium (Cd) impurity which can contaminate the soil, plant and food chains. These three issues have typically been considered separately, and managed by different agencies or organisations. The aim of this thesis is to develop an integrated decision support tool that can be used for evaluating alternative options for management and resource recovery from biomass for enhancing recovery of energy, returning carbon (C) and phosphorus (P) from biomass back to soil, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and also cadmium (Cd) contamination in an agricultural region. This research employed a combination of the tools of Material Flow Analysis (MFA), Geographic Information System (GIS) and Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA). MFA is used as the primary tool for this research. GIS and CBA are combined with MFA in later stages of the overall procedure to develop an integrated decision support tool. This integrated tool has been applied to the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area (MIA) in Australia. Tracking the flow of essential substances using MFA has identified current resource management efficiency and substances accumulation across the region. Integrating a spatial analysis tool (GIS) with MFA has provided a feedback driven monitoring tool for evaluating trends of spatial accumulation of substances on agricultural land. This enables the time remaining befo…
abstract: Agriculture currently faces a number of environmental sustainability issues. Three key issues that are the focus of this study are greenhouse gas emissions, depletion of mineral phosphorus resources and cadmium contamination in agricultural soil. Biomass can potentially be used as a renewable energy source and can also be returned to improve the nutrient and drainage structure of agricultural soils. Sustainable management of biomass and agriculture can have significant impacts on reducing greenhouse gas emissions from a region. Moreover, it reduces the demand for external energy supply, phosphorous (P) based fertilizer, and its associated Cadmium (Cd) impurity which can contaminate the soil, plant and food chains. These three issues have typically been considered separately, and managed by different agencies or organisations. The aim of this thesis is to develop an integrated decision support tool that can be used for evaluating alternative options for management and resource recovery from biomass for enhancing recovery of energy, returning carbon (C) and phosphorus (P) from biomass back to soil, reducing greenhouse gas emissions and also cadmium (Cd) contamination in an agricultural region. This research employed a combination of the tools of Material Flow Analysis (MFA), Geographic Information System (GIS) and Cost-Benefit Analysis (CBA). MFA is used as the primary tool for this research. GIS and CBA are combined with MFA in later stages of the overall procedure to develop an integrated decision support tool. This integrated tool has been applied to the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area (MIA) in Australia. Tracking the flow of essential substances using MFA has identified current resource management efficiency and substances accumulation across the region. Integrating a spatial analysis tool (GIS) with MFA has provided a feedback driven monitoring tool for evaluating trends of spatial accumulation of substances on agricultural land. This enables the time remaining befo…
author: Jakrawatana, Napat
language: EN
keywords: Nutrient, Biomass, Energy, Material Flow Analysis, Cadmium
license: https://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_abf2
license: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/3.0/au/
date published: 2009
date modified: 2026-07-24T05:32:53Z
provider: University of New South Wales
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: UNSW, Sydney

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/1959.4/44547

PropertyValue
property ID: DOI
value: 10.26190/unsworks/22837