3 ms·
The basic problem is one of non-closed loops: Each harvest takes minerals out of the soil (as well as some soil). Regenerative farming may help the soil to rep
by RetroTechie 3y ago
The basic problem is one of non-closed loops:
Each harvest takes minerals out of the soil (as well as some soil). Regenerative farming may help the soil to replenish some of those minerals by freeing them from the rock portion of soils. But not at the rate harvest-after-harvest removes those.
So you need to replace minerals taken out. Industrialized farming does this through minerals mined elsewhere. Which is hardly sustainable or eco-friendly.
A solution would be to recover minerals from poop & urine. Probably this is done in the case of animals (their poop & urine back onto fields). But not in the case of human food.
Human excrements are processed in wastewater facilities, and -due to a variety of reasons- minerals may be recovered, but rarely end up back on fields.
Small substinence farmers can close those loops. Modern industrialized society can't (or at least, doesn't have good ways to do so).
This is ignoring nitrogen. Which can be produced on-site if needed (eg. by rotation with nitrogen-fixating crops). Or specific trace minerals that may require a different approach.
- Waterluvian 3y agoMade me curious so I went looking for information. Incredibly frustrating that almost every high-level source focuses on how the water is cleaned and solids are removed. Removed where? Doesn’t say. Eventually I found one local source that says it’s incinerated. So the human biological cycle doesn’t return the solids to the earth but puts it into the atmosphere? That’s pretty crappy.
- whatshisface 3y agoThe heavier elements would be in the ash.