Comparison of environmental impacts for dryland and irrigated barley agroecosystems by using Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) methodology

This study examined the environmental impacts of irrigated and rainfed barley agroecosystems of Iran based on nitrogen levels by using LCA methodology during 1999-2013. Four steps includung goal definition and scoping, inventory analysis, life cycle impact assessment and integration & interpretation were considered. Impact categories were acidification, eutrophication and global warming. Functional unit was considered as one tonne grains. The results revealed that the maximum aquatic eutrophication for irrigated and dryland barley were 2.42 and 1.64 PO4 equiv./t grain for 140-180 and 30-40 kg N ha-1, respectively. In irrigated barley agroecosystem, the maximum global warming was computed 898.24 CO2 equiv./t grain for 140-180 kg N ha-1 and it was 604.66 CO2 equiv./tgrain in dryland for 30-40 kg N ha-1. Eco-Index ranges for irrigated and rainfed agroecosystems were computed with 0.27-0.46 and 0.28-0.31 per one tonne grain for aquatic eutrophication and acidification, respectively.