IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/agiwat/v297y2024ics0378377424001677.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

A novel smart fertigation system for irrigation with treated wastewater: Effects on nutrient recovery, crop and soil

Author

Listed:
  • Odone, Giordano
  • Perulli, Giulio Demetrio
  • Mancuso, Giuseppe
  • Lavrnić, Stevo
  • Toscano, Attilio

Abstract

Both southern and northern regions of Italy are experiencing reduced precipitation and increased heat waves due to climate change, negatively affecting agricultural sector. Urban wastewater could be a solution to this problem, providing a constant source for irrigation and reducing synthetic fertilizer use. This research presents a two-year field study on using tertiary treated wastewater for processing tomato crop irrigation through an innovative smart fertigation system, designed to supply the exact doses of NPK nutrients considering those already delivered to the plants via the irrigation water. With the aim of studying the effects of irrigation with treated wastewater, three water sources were compared: fresh water added with chemical fertilizer, tertiary treated wastewater added with chemical fertilizer and tertiary treated wastewater without addition of fertilizer. The proposed system was efficient and consistent with the design, it saved considerable amounts of fertilizers, handling nutrient fluctuations in wastewater. Of the three irrigation water types that have been tested, only the one that used tertiary treated wastewater alone without additional fertilizers was not capable of meeting tomato nutritional needs, despite the fact that significant macronutrient savings were achieved. No negative effects on soil or plant physiological performances were observed. Plants irrigated with wastewater showed similar growth and productivity to those irrigated with fresh water and no significant differences in fruit quality were found, highlighting the benefits of wastewater reuse for crop irrigation.

Suggested Citation

  • Odone, Giordano & Perulli, Giulio Demetrio & Mancuso, Giuseppe & Lavrnić, Stevo & Toscano, Attilio, 2024. "A novel smart fertigation system for irrigation with treated wastewater: Effects on nutrient recovery, crop and soil," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 297(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:agiwat:v:297:y:2024:i:c:s0378377424001677
    DOI: 10.1016/j.agwat.2024.108832
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378377424001677
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.agwat.2024.108832?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Chojnacka, K. & Witek-Krowiak, A. & Moustakas, K. & Skrzypczak, D. & Mikula, K. & Loizidou, M., 2020. "A transition from conventional irrigation to fertigation with reclaimed wastewater: Prospects and challenges," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 130(C).
    2. Pedrero, Francisco & Kalavrouziotis, Ioannis & Alarcón, Juan José & Koukoulakis, Prodromos & Asano, Takashi, 2010. "Use of treated municipal wastewater in irrigated agriculture--Review of some practices in Spain and Greece," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 97(9), pages 1233-1241, September.
    3. Aiello, Rosa & Cirelli, Giuseppe Luigi & Consoli, Simona, 2007. "Effects of reclaimed wastewater irrigation on soil and tomato fruits: A case study in Sicily (Italy)," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 93(1-2), pages 65-72, October.
    4. Nikolaos Tzortzakis & Christos Saridakis & Antonios Chrysargyris, 2020. "Treated Wastewater and Fertigation Applied for Greenhouse Tomato Cultivation Grown in Municipal Solid Waste Compost and Soil Mixtures," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(10), pages 1-21, May.
    5. Cirelli, G.L. & Consoli, S. & Licciardello, F. & Aiello, R. & Giuffrida, F. & Leonardi, C., 2012. "Treated municipal wastewater reuse in vegetable production," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 163-170.
    6. Zhang, Xianbo & Yang, Hui & Shukla, Manoj K. & Du, Taisheng, 2023. "Proposing a crop-water-salt production function based on plant response to stem water potential," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 278(C).
    7. Jeet Chand & Guna Hewa & Ali Hassanli & Baden Myers, 2020. "Evaluation of Deficit Irrigation and Water Quality on Production and Water Productivity of Tomato in Greenhouse," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-18, July.
    8. Al-Lahham, O. & El Assi, N. M. & Fayyad, M., 2003. "Impact of treated wastewater irrigation on quality attributes and contamination of tomato fruit," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 61(1), pages 51-62, June.
    9. Giuseppe Mancuso & Monica C. M. Parlato & Stevo Lavrnić & Attilio Toscano & Francesca Valenti, 2022. "GIS-Based Assessment of the Potential for Treated Wastewater Reuse in Agricultural Irrigation: A Case Study in Northern Italy," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(15), pages 1-17, July.
    10. Libutti, Angela & Gatta, Giuseppe & Gagliardi, Anna & Vergine, Pompilio & Pollice, Alfieri & Beneduce, Luciano & Disciglio, Grazia & Tarantino, Emanuele, 2018. "Agro-industrial wastewater reuse for irrigation of a vegetable crop succession under Mediterranean conditions," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 196(C), pages 1-14.
    11. Toze, Simon, 2006. "Reuse of effluent water--benefits and risks," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 80(1-3), pages 147-159, February.
    12. Anna Berti Suman & Laura García-Herrero & Stevo Lavrnić & Maria Chiara Sole & Attilio Toscano & Matteo Vittuari, 2023. "The advent of EU water reuse regulation in the Mediterranean region: policy and legislative adaptation to address non-conventional water resources utilization in agriculture," Water International, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 48(7), pages 839-860, October.
    13. Perulli, Giulio Demetrio & Bresilla, Kushtrim & Manfrini, Luigi & Boini, Alexandra & Sorrenti, Giovambattista & Grappadelli, Luca Corelli & Morandi, Brunella, 2019. "Beneficial effect of secondary treated wastewater irrigation on nectarine tree physiology," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 221(C), pages 120-130.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Gatta, Giuseppe & Libutti, Angela & Gagliardi, Anna & Beneduce, Luciano & Brusetti, Lorenzo & Borruso, Luigimaria & Disciglio, Grazia & Tarantino, Emanuele, 2015. "Treated agro-industrial wastewater irrigation of tomato crop: Effects on qualitative/quantitative characteristics of production and microbiological properties of the soil," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 149(C), pages 33-43.
    2. Nicoleta Ungureanu & Valentin Vlăduț & Gheorghe Voicu, 2020. "Water Scarcity and Wastewater Reuse in Crop Irrigation," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(21), pages 1-18, October.
    3. Mahmoud S. Hashem & Wei Guo & Xuebin Qi & Ping Li, 2022. "Assessing the Effect of Irrigation with Reclaimed Water Using Different Irrigation Techniques on Tomatoes Quality Parameters," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(5), pages 1-19, March.
    4. Libutti, Angela & Gatta, Giuseppe & Gagliardi, Anna & Vergine, Pompilio & Pollice, Alfieri & Beneduce, Luciano & Disciglio, Grazia & Tarantino, Emanuele, 2018. "Agro-industrial wastewater reuse for irrigation of a vegetable crop succession under Mediterranean conditions," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 196(C), pages 1-14.
    5. Jemal Fito & Stijn W. H. Hulle, 2021. "Wastewater reclamation and reuse potentials in agriculture: towards environmental sustainability," Environment, Development and Sustainability: A Multidisciplinary Approach to the Theory and Practice of Sustainable Development, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 2949-2972, March.
    6. Oliver Maaß & Philipp Grundmann, 2018. "Governing Transactions and Interdependences between Linked Value Chains in a Circular Economy: The Case of Wastewater Reuse in Braunschweig (Germany)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-29, April.
    7. Nikolaos Tzortzakis & Christos Saridakis & Antonios Chrysargyris, 2020. "Treated Wastewater and Fertigation Applied for Greenhouse Tomato Cultivation Grown in Municipal Solid Waste Compost and Soil Mixtures," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(10), pages 1-21, May.
    8. Gao, Yang & Shao, Guangcheng & Wu, Shiqing & Xiaojun, Wang & Lu, Jia & Cui, Jintao, 2021. "Changes in soil salinity under treated wastewater irrigation: A meta-analysis," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 255(C).
    9. Maaß, Oliver & Grundmann, Philipp, 2016. "Added-value from linking the value chains of wastewater treatment, crop production and bioenergy production: A case study on reusing wastewater and sludge in crop production in Braunschweig (Germany)," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 107(C), pages 195-211.
    10. Carmelo Maucieri & Valeria Cavallaro & Caterina Caruso & Maurizio Borin & Mirco Milani & Antonio C. Barbera, 2016. "Sorghum Biomass Production for Energy Purpose Using Treated Urban Wastewater and Different Fertilization in a Mediterranean Environment," Agriculture, MDPI, vol. 6(4), pages 1-15, December.
    11. Christou, Anastasis & Maratheftis, Grivas & Elia, Michael & Hapeshi, Evroula & Michael, Costas & Fatta-Kassinos, Despo, 2016. "Effects of wastewater applied with discrete irrigation techniques on strawberry plants’ productivity and the safety, quality characteristics and antioxidant capacity of fruits," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 173(C), pages 48-54.
    12. Pedrero, Francisco & Grattan, S.R. & Ben-Gal, Alon & Vivaldi, Gaetano Alessandro, 2020. "Opportunities for expanding the use of wastewaters for irrigation of olives," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 241(C).
    13. Feder, Frédéric, 2021. "Irrigation with treated wastewater in humid regions: Effects on Nitisols, sugarcane yield and quality," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 247(C).
    14. Suhad A.A.A.N. Almuktar & Miklas Scholz, 2016. "Experimental Assessment of Recycled Diesel Spill-Contaminated Domestic Wastewater Treated by Reed Beds for Irrigation of Sweet Peppers," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 13(2), pages 1-20, February.
    15. Licciardello, F. & Milani, M. & Consoli, S. & Pappalardo, N. & Barbagallo, S. & Cirelli, G., 2018. "Wastewater tertiary treatment options to match reuse standards in agriculture," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 210(C), pages 232-242.
    16. Garcia, X. & Pargament, D., 2015. "Reusing wastewater to cope with water scarcity: Economic, social and environmental considerations for decision-making," Resources, Conservation & Recycling, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 154-166.
    17. Cirelli, G.L. & Consoli, S. & Licciardello, F. & Aiello, R. & Giuffrida, F. & Leonardi, C., 2012. "Treated municipal wastewater reuse in vegetable production," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 163-170.
    18. Jeong, Hanseok & Bhattarai, Rabin & Adamowski, Jan & Yu, David J., 2020. "Insights from socio-hydrological modeling to design sustainable wastewater reuse strategies for agriculture at the watershed scale," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 231(C).
    19. Ricart, Sandra & Rico, Antonio M., 2019. "Assessing technical and social driving factors of water reuse in agriculture: A review on risks, regulation and the yuck factor," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 217(C), pages 426-439.
    20. Alrajhi, A. & Beecham, S. & Bolan, Nanthi S. & Hassanli, A., 2015. "Evaluation of soil chemical properties irrigated with recycled wastewater under partial root-zone drying irrigation for sustainable tomato production," Agricultural Water Management, Elsevier, vol. 161(C), pages 127-135.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:agiwat:v:297:y:2024:i:c:s0378377424001677. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/agwat .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.