Agricultural Pollution And Phosphate Biosorbents In Australia

Agricultural Pollution Causes and Effects

Essay 1: Effective handling agricultural pollution in Australia

Agricultural pollution can be defined as biotic as well as abiotic products that have taken place due to farming practices. These products generally results in contamination as well as degradation of the environment as well as the surrounding ecosystem. When it comes to agricultural pollution, several causes can be mentioned. One of the chief reason behind agricultural pollution includes pesticides and fertilizers. Since pesticides as well as fertilizers have to deal with pests that have existed for hundreds of years along with the new invasive species, the pesticides are laden with harmful chemicals. When these pesticides are sprayed on the ground some of them get absorbed by soil and thus contaminates underground water. Contaminated water used for irrigation is another major source of pollution. Water used during irrigation contains organic compounds as well a heavy metals. This impure water often gets contaminated with local water bodies. Moreover, water that is contaminated with mercury, lead, arsenic and cadmium often results in crop failure. Considering the negative consequences of agricultural pollution, Europe, like several other nations have implemented a good number of polices to control excessive emission of defuse pollutants in water an air. However, the existing schemes that have been designed by the government are imposing limited impact on the above mentioned prolusion. The chief reason behind this is a version of farmers to the responsibilities and high resistance to the rules (Collins et al., 2016). Hence, according to policy makers, voluntary uptake of on-farm mitigation measures will be more effective. However, several barriers has been detected while implementing the process that includes lack of consistent guidance to the farmers, lack of responsibility towards water and air pollution, high cost of the measures, overly rigid perception of the management. The research question of this essay includes, “How the government of Australia can effectively handle Agricultural pollution of the nation?” According to researchers, farmers are found to be more adoptable to the 29 measures. According to farmers, they are unable to implement the necessary intervention due to lack of evidence linking specific farming practices and lack of cost effectiveness of onfarming intervention. In order to eradicate the issues a DTC based program along with social science and process based models have been implemented. However, According to my opinion, mere implementation of DTC program along with social science models does not posses the potential to eradicate the issue from the core. Inspite of the fact that these models are highly efficient to address the issues, providing effective training to farmers is highly needed to minimize water and oil pollution due to agricultural process to the core. Farmers need to be educated about the negative impacts of water and air pollution due to agricultural wastes. Apart from that, periodic investigation of the effectivenessof DTC program needs to be carried out. Assessment of the attitude of farmers regarding the process of elimination of agricultural wastes is required in order to assess the loopholes and eradicate the issues. Along with that it is highly crucial to keep the farmers engaged with handling their environmental impact on water and air.

Effective Handling of Agricultural Pollution in Australia

While in the above mentioned paragraphs we have discussed about the procedures by which the emission of agricultural waste can be reduced, in this paragraph, we will put emphasis on how agricultural byproducts can be used as phosphate biosorbents. According to researchers, the global phosphate rock reserve, due to overexploitation will get exhausted within the next 100 years from now. Considering the fact that that phosphorous plays a highly crucial role in the development of plants and animals along with the industrial manufacture, it has become highly crucial to retain phosphorus (Nguyen et al., 2014). Extraction of phosphorous from agricultural wastes, as per my opinion, is highly helpful since it will help in maintaining the phosphorous level as well as reduce the amount of phosphorous in water. The quality of water gets deterioratedif the amount of phosphorous level in water is more than 0.02 mg/L. While there are several methods of controlling phosphorous pollution, majority of the methods are either too expensive or inefficient. In contrary, extraction of phosphorous from Agricultural wastes and byproducts have been found to beboth affordable as well as effective. Several methods of modification of AWB (Agriculturalwastes and Byproducts) have been invented in order to remove phosphate. The method can be grouped into three parts namely, cationization, anionization and activation. While the process of cationaltion includes metal loading, grafting, an ammonium type chemicals, activation processes includes thermal, chemical and steam activation. The process of  anionization includes surface coating with sulphate.Among the above mentioned procedures, queternization and metal loading are considered to be two of the mostly used procedures. The extraction of phosphorous from AWB posses high potential to fulfill the enhancing demand for phosphorous for fertilizersalong with commercial products like detergents. Thus, phosphorous extracted from AWBs can prevent over exploitation of phosphorous. Moreover, the side products of the phosphorous extraction process are used as additives for cement manufacturing. Thus, it can be clearly understood by modifying AWBs, it is easier to prevent awater as well as air pollution. However, it has been found that the process of recyclability of modified AWB impose several negative impacts on the environment. The chief reason behind this is the huge amount of chemicals needed for the modification process. Considering the fact that modified AWB is found to be better phosphorus absorbents compared to several other commercial adsorbents, it is highly crucial to eradicate the limitations of recyclability of modified AWBs. As per my opinion, more researches are needed to be conducted in order to invent methods so that the usage of the huge number of chemicals while extracting phosphorous from modified AWB can be reduced. Along with that, more literatures are neededto be published in order to raise the awareness about the benefits of phosphorus extraction from modified Agricultural wastes.

Agricultural Byproducts as Phosphate Biosorbents

In this paragraph we will analyze the effectiveness management of environmental system in Australian agriculture. The term Environmental management system can be defined as the process,which isput into operation to manage the environmental impacts along with the risks associated withthe business. Researchers have found that enough public benefits are unlikely to occur at adequate scale for significant environmental impact. When it comes to prevention of pollution resulting from agricultural wastes, farmers are found to accept methods that are financially beneficial readily compared to methods that have better environmental benefits. In western countries, enforcement of voluntary market based programs as a method of environmental management is much popular compared to implementation of rules and regulation. However, as per my opinion, implementation of rules and regulations is highly required in order to reduce the pollution of land water and air due to agricultural wastes. Along with that, Ecological outcomes could be achieved more effectively by directendowment of land management process, which have maximum public net benefits. According to a group of researchers, while a good number of advantages of EMS can be evidenced, the mentioned system lacks efficient market drivers in the Agricultural industry of Australia (Cary& Roberts, 2011). The investment of government in likely to be more effective in case of direct funding ofland management practice which have the highest public net benefits.Researchers stated that EMS is highly useful to agriculture and can be implemented on-firm with a minimum amount of changes. The Ems provides th farmers with the aflexible tool and a diverse range of business consideration. Along with that the mentioned system also provides a credible as well as transparent link to the information desired by management agencies. Along with encouraging and embedding innovation, the EMS process strengthens changes in social domain. This, in turn, increases communication as well as interactions. While some of the benefits of EMS in the agricultural system can be measured, others are found to be less tangible and hence are more difficult to assess. When it comes to motivation of farmers in order to implement the EMS, some farmers are found to intrinsically motivatedwhile others are extrinsically. For farmers who are intrinsically motivated, the beneficial impact of EMS on the environment is the factor that matters the most. However, the positive impact of EMS on the financial benefits is the factor that enhances the motivation of the farmers who are extrinsically motivated. In terms of agencies evaluating the success of programs to encourage the use of EMS, a typical indicator is the number of participants in a program.

Limitations of Phosphate Biosorbents and Future Directions

As being discussed earlier, lack of market drivers forwidespread adaptation of the EMS system in the Agricultural sectors of Australia can be considered as a major limitation. Along with that the cost of achieving environmental outcomes by implementing EM is also huge. Hence the government of Australia needs to implement several strategies for enhancing the implementation of the EMS system in the mentioned agricultural sector. For this, it is highly crucial to implement efficient policies in all countries, especially those countries with a lower tax payer base like New Zealand, Australia and Canada. Direct investment is required to protect environmental assets which are of high significance and causes environmental threats.

Essay 2: Role of life cycle assessment in agricultural sector and food industry in Australia 

Life Cycle Assessment also called the life cycle analysis is defined as a technique of analyzing the environmental impacts related to all the phases of the product life starting from raw material extraction, material processing, manufacturization, distribution, usage, repair, maintenance, disposal and recycling. LCA has the potential to narrow down the outlook on environmental concerns by the bellow mentioned methods. The research question of this essay is what the role of life cycle assessment in agricultural sector and food industry in Australia?

Firstly, LCA helps in compiling the inventory of relevant energy as well as environmental releases. Secondly, LCA facilitates evaluation of the potential impacts related to identified releases as well as inputs. Lastly, it helps the management to make a more informed decision by interpreting the results. The concept of life cycle assessment is increasingly implemented by the agricultural sectors and food production organizations in austrailia in order to ensure a changeover towards further sustainable production as well as consumption patterns. The fact that agricultural production system and consumption imposes a high impact on the environment it is highly crucial to enhance the supply chain associated with food. The Life Cycle assessment has been in use for several years in order to identify and analyze the agricultural system, food processing as well as the manufacture activities. However, several changes are required in order to ensure better decision making in both business as well as the policy maker’ concepts. According to researchers several challenges associated with the Life cycle Assessment have been evidenced due to enhanced complexity in the food system. Several other issues can be pointed out which is imposing adverse impact on the enhancement of the life cycle assessment in agricultural sector. Firstly, the misconception that additional output per hectare is adequate to ensure eco-efficiency needs to be avoided. The current LCA is unable to access the increasing difficulty on agricultural land as well as purposes other than food production, like bio-energy, urbanization and desertification. Along with that, the variability of the agricultural system can be considered as an element that affects the LCA adversely. This is because, the variability of the food system is more compared to other systems when it comes to inventor data, as well as impact on biodiversity. Thus it can be clearly understood that a more dedicated approach is required in order to address the issue associated with the distinction between techno sphere and ecosphere, the multifunctional biologicalsystem as well as the modeling of emissions.  In order to assess and evaluate the occurring of the field, the LCA modeling system should be complemented by other approaches. The implementation of additional approaches will also help the management to assess the background system and which is influenced by the dependability of datasets. For instance, For impacts associated with eco-toxicity, it is observed that the impacts associated with substances applied on the field is limited compare to the substances usedin background system which are at off-field. According to researchers, the current LCA system does not possess the potential to address the environmental threats. Thus, the need to enlarge as well as enhance the Life cycle impact assessment is clearly evidenced. The fact that the structure off agricultural  system is highly influenced by the choices and behavior of the consumer cannot be ignored.However a LCA model that has the capability to assess the consumer behavior associated with the food system needs to be developed.

Effectiveness of Environmental Management Systems in Australian Agriculture

In this paragraph, the degree to which life cycle assessment is able to prevent the high industrial waste of the olive oil industry will be discusses. The olive oil industry is an emerging industry in Australia and the mentioned industry is evolving at a rate of 9 percent per year. However, the high rate of solid as well as liquid waste produced from the mentioned industry is imposing highly negative impact on the environment. In order to deal with such condition, five alternatives for managing the wastes generated from the mentioned industry have been discussed. The five alternative options aremanufacturization of briquettes as solid fuel for home heating, pyrolysis and composting and manufacturing pellets as a source of domestic or industrial water heating. According to researchers, the harmful impacts of olive oil manuacturization on the environment include ozonelayer depletion, human toxicity, eutrophication, acidification, fossil fuel depletion and others (El Hanandeh, 2015). The waste obtained during the production of olive oil can be made harmless. However, considering the fact thatordinary waste water or solid waste treatment facilities are unable to mke the waste harmless, especially when it comes to liquid waste, lots of wastewater is dumped on the surface of the sea. Since majority of olive oil mills in Australia are too small to build a waste water treatment plan for their own, lots of waste water from olive oil mills end up at sea.In order to deal with that issue, composting is currently considered to be the best practice. However, it can be argued that several other methods are there which has the potential to impose better environmental impact. For instance, the production of pallets for using in domestic hot water boilers that displace electricity from the chief grid has greater potential to deliverbetter result compared to composting. In this article, the option of energy utilization from solid olive oil waste have been using living cycle assessment instead of using the current best method that is composting has been evaluated.While composting has the ability to decomposing the wastes only, using the wastes for manufacturing pallets for domestic water heating will reduce the usage of electricity. This it can be clearly understood that the second method will not only prevent further environmental hazard but will also act as a source of energy. While composting, which is considered to be thecurrent bestpractice have ranked fourth, the concepts of manufacturing briquettes for using in domestic stoves has ranked 2^nd.

The role of life cycle assessment is also very important in conserving energy displaced by the product and plays a significant role in the performance of the energyalternatives. However, several barriers can be pointed out that are adversely affecting the performance of the mentioned methods. Two of the chief barriers include transportation distance and future energy scenario. Hence, further research is needed in order to deal with the above mentioned issues. Moreover, more literatures are needed to be written on the social, environmental and economic impact of advanced energy utilization alternative for managing wastes associated with olive oil production. In this paragraph, the methods that should be implemented by organizations in order to maximize their environmental performance by performing an accurate LCA have been discussed. Environmental performance of an organization imposes a highly positive impact on the economic and market performance. Considering the fact that majority of the organizations have been working on implementing the cleaner production for enhancing their environmental performance, in this paragraph the contribution of the cleaner project to comply with ISO 14001 requirements have been analyzed.According to researchers, the Cleaner production system has enhanced the environmental performance of a good number of Brazilian companies. It has been found that organizations who have implemented the cleaner project are morelikely to get the ISO certification in full scope of its environmental management system. Companies that have adopted practices associated with the cleaner project at different level of priorities have developed better environmental maturity and are more capable of achieving the ISO 14001 certification. Moreover, companies who have adopted the Cleaner project practices does not require external advice in order to implement their Environmental management system keeping accordance to the requirements of ISO 14001. This has been possible since CP contributes greatly to the fulfillment of most of the ISO 14001 ( de Oliveira et al., 2017). However, assistance of the external advice is required for certain special cases since these formalities and documentations are not covered by the cleaner project scope. Some of the major example of such documentation includes standards associated with legal compliance, records of environmental control and methods of preparation and responsibilities to emergency. In such cases, companies, till now, needs the help of external organization to successful fulfill the bureaucratic requirements of the standards. According to the researchers, less time to adequate their processes to the requirements of ISO 14001 are needed by companies that adopt to the cleaner project practices. Thu it can be conluded that organizations which have implemented cleaner project to meet the requirements of ISO 14001 does posses a good opportunity to gain competitive advantages and it is not possible without an accurate LCA Competitive advantage in turn, helps the management of the companies to export there products to the marketers of the countries where the environmental concerns are high. Apart from that, being an organization with high environmental performance also enhances their reputation and image in the eyes of the consumers. This in turn, enhances the consumer loyalty of the organizations and imposes positive impact on the overall revenue of the organization.However, lack of literature has been evidenced whenconductingthe research about effectiveness of CP. A major limitation of the research includes that the conclusion that CP impose a highly positive impact on the environmental performance off organization have den derived by conducting research on a single country. More literatures need to be written on the impact of CP on environmental performance of organizations.

Essay 3:  Enhancing Environmental management and importance of renewable energy alternatives in agricultural sector in Australia.

The environmental management systemsis referred to the management of environmental program of an organization in a systematic, planned and documented manner. An appropriate environmental management system includes structure of the organization, planning and resources for developing the policies for environmental protection. The mostly used standard on which the EMS based on is the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 2004 (Lewandowska, 2011). The research question of this essay includes what are the methods of enhancing Environmental management and importance of renewable energy alternatives in agricultural sector in Australia? 

The chief goal of EMS is to reduce waste by increasing compliance. Compliance can be defined as the act ofreaching as well as maintaining minimal legal standards. Absence ofcompliance with the legal standards may result in major fines, government intervention and seize of the operation of the company. In this paragraph, the potentialities of utilizing the life cycle evaluation for identifying along with assessing environmental aspects in the environmental management system dependenton the requirement of ISO 4001 have been performed.  Considering the fact that the scope of system analyzed in LCA and EMS are different, adjustment of the LCA methodology to EMS specificity needs to done in the agricultural sector. While performing the modification it has been found that there prevails several disproportions linking the input as well as the output-related aspects of environmentthat is included in the majority of the analyzed registers. The probable reason behind such imbalance includes the truth that the outputs related to the environmental aspects areless complex for the organizations to manage since they are regulated by rule and regulation. According to researches, implementing LCA for enhancing the effectiveness of EMS has both positive and negative impacts. Some of the major advantages associated with LCA includestandardized methodology, existenceof some methodological phaseallowing the authentication ofthe collected data, possibilityof inclusion of the quantitative information and capability to produce of reproducibleoutcomes. However, the major disadvantages of implementing LCA to the EMS  includeshigher complexity in the procedure, higher time and cost needs specially during the phase of Inventory, difficulties to access the environmental aspects associated with emergency situations and limitations associated with the insufficientrelevantfactors within the presently used LCIA method. Which is not favorable for the small and medium agricultural land owners Finally, it can be concluded that since LCA is considered to be an effective tool for identification as well as evaluation of ecological aspects in the EMS, the implementation of the tool for EMS should not be disqualified for the above mentioned limitations. The fact that Life Cycle assessment enables a good number ofpossibilities like the capturing of the indirect aspect and relate them with the environmental impacts should not be ignored. Thus in order to implement the mention system in EMS, it is crucial to eradicate the limitationsassociated with LCA. In order to eradicate the issue associated with time management it is crucial for the agri-industry to enhance their manpower resources. Along with that by enhancing the financial resources, LCA can be used as a valuable alternative to the methodologies currently used by majority of the organization in australia. Considering the fact that by implementing LCA, classification and evaluation of the ecological aspects will be carried downrecurrently, carrying out the assessment and providing effective training to the farmers will be the sections where financial resource needs to be implemented.

In this paragraph the impact of institutional pressure on the effectiveness of environmental management system has been discussed. The mentioned topic is a widely debated one. While according several researchers the key rivers of EMS in organization are the rule and regulations, according to another group of researchers, enhancement of competitive advantages can be considered as the driving force of the environmental strategies (Daddi et al., 2016). Different types of organizational pressure have the potential to affect the environmental strategies of the company. The fact that environmental strategiesof a company depends on the internal features, organizational structure and management style of the organization cannot be ignored. Along with that, extrinsic and intrinsic motivation within an organization also plays a major part in enhancing the efficiency of environmental strategies of an organization. while the internal or intrinsic motivations includesimproving the management in areas like environmental performance, environmental compliance and resource efficiency, the extrinsic motivation includes the requirement to obtain a third party certification in order to enhance the image and reputation of the organization in the eyes of the consumers as well as the clients, public institutions, local communities, trade associationsand NGOs. We will analyze the role played by the mimetic, coercive and normative forces in stimulating the competitive as well as innovative responses of organizations those posses an environmental certification. According to researchers, several positive impacts of mimetic and normative pressure on the environmental management system of the organizations have been evidenced. However, the coercive pressure has several limitations. This is because the coercive isomorphism lacks clear relation with the adaptation of innovative practices associated with the environmental practices in an organization. Thus it can be clearly understood that in a scenario where an organization is not intrinsically motivated to adopt environmental management practice but have been forced to be the same by rules and regulation, the effectiveness o the proactive will get highly reduced. On contrary, the mimic as well as normative pressures are considered to enhance the intrinsic motivation of the management to implement the EMS system in the organization. Mimetic isomorphism is the result of the previous success of the organizations. Organizations, which have already implemented several strategies like including LCA for developing environmental strategies, are more likely to experience higher competitive advantage and consumer loyalty. This in turn, enhances their urge to enforce the pressure so that more beneficial effects by implementing environmental strategies, can be obtained. Finally, it can be concluded that managers needs to determine the specific approaches associated with the environmental studies keeping in mind the institutional pressure they decides to response through. WhileCoercive pressure doesnot leave much room for flexibility and voluntary choices bymanagers,mimeticpressure provides stimulus to the companytowardsproactive environmental strategies. Managers needs to be aware of the fact that the Ems they will set up will provide competitiveadvantage  both in terms of being the pioneer and convincing share of the market to their preferred products.

In this paragraph the environmental development of wind energy and its impact on the environment have been discussed. Wind energy is commonly known to be one of the most cleanly and environment friendly source of energy that has the potential to reduce the dependency of the world on fossil fuels. The mature technology and low cost of manufacturization makes wind energy a promising as well as crucial primary source. However, the fact that installation as well as operation of the wind turbines does impose a highly negative impact on the environment cannot be ignored. The rate of installation of wind turbines have got enhanced highly within the last 4 decades. The top five market contributors of the globally installed wind energy capacity include china, Germany, US, Spain and India. However, one of the major issues faced by the mentioned countries while implementing wind turbines is the scarcity of spaces of installing the same. However, offshore wind can be considered to be an effective solution to the mentioned issue. Apart from that, in order to deal with the issue associated with the scarcity of land, floating wheel can be considered as a majorsolve of the problem. According to study, no differences in the efficiency of land wind turbine and floating wind turbine have been evidenced (Leung& Yang, 2012). While fossil fuels and nuclear power actively pollute the environment through greenhouse gases or through radioactive wastes, wind energy does not impose such negative impact on the environment. However, wind turbines have the potential to imposelong-term negative impact on human life. For instance, the excessive sound pollution caused by the onshore wind turbines and the visual impact on the same has the potential to adversely affect the visual and hearing of human beings if they are exposed to such effect for a prolonged period of time. Wind turbines originate noise in two different ways namely mechanicalnoise and noise from aerodynamic effect.Both the noise has the potential to cause headache and serious hearing issues to individuals residing close to wind firms. When it comes to the visual impact of wind turbines, according to majority of the individual, wind turbines are pleasant to watch and do notposses any adverse impact. The impact of wind turbines on visual effect is the most difficult component to assess. However, according to several researchers, implementati0n of wind energy have adversely affected the tourism industry of that country this is because, wind turbines, several times have been an obstacle for the tourists. While the above mentioned factors are the chief factors associated with impact of wind energy on human beings, wind turbines are considered to be major risks for birds and animals. When it comes to offshore or floating wind turbines, construction of the wind turbines can adversely affect aquatic animals. In order to eradicate the issue associated with birds and animals radar have en implemented in several countries that enables the wind turbines to stop automatically while a bird is flying away.

Reference List

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Daddi, T., Testa, F., Frey, M., &Iraldo, F. (2016). Exploring the link between institutional pressures and environmental management systems effectiveness: an empirical study. Journal of environmental management, 183, 647-656.

de Oliveira, J. A., Silva, D. A. L., Guardia, M., do Nascimento Gambi, L., de Oliveira, O. J., &Ometto, A. R. (2017). How can Cleaner Production practices contribute to meet ISO 14001 requirements? Critical analysis from a survey with industrial companies. Clean Technologies and Environmental Policy, 19(6), 1761-1774

El Hanandeh, A. (2015). Energy recovery alternatives for the sustainable management of olive oil industry waste in Australia: life cycle assessment. Journal of Cleaner Production, 91, 78-88.

Leung, D. Y., & Yang, Y. (2012). Wind energy development and its environmental impact: a review. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, 16(1), 1031-1039.

Lewandowska, A. (2011). Environmental life cycle assessment as a tool for identification and assessment of environmental aspects in environmental management systems (EMS) part 1: methodology. The international journal of life cycle assessment, 16(2), 178-186.

Nguyen, T. A. H., Ngo, H. H., Guo, W. S., Zhang, J., Liang, S., Lee, D. J., … & Bui, X. T. (2014). Modification of agricultural waste/by-products for enhanced phosphate removal and recovery: potential and obstacles. Bioresource technology, 169, 750-762.

Notarnicola, B., Sala, S., Anton, A., McLaren, S. J., Saouter, E., &Sonesson, U. (2017). The role of life cycle assessment in supporting sustainable agri-food systems: A review of the challenges. Journal of Cleaner Production, 140, 399-409.