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The monitoring of the transport of manure and its content is a cornerstone in the implementation of water quality objectives in nutrient management in agriculture. This paper uses a spatial price equilibrium model, applied to the market of manure in livestock dense regions, to assess the impact of an inflated stated nutrient content of transported manure. This paper shows that, due to the varying composition of manure, it is very difficult to monitor the real content of transported manure. The spatial price equilibrium model suggests that the inability of monitoring this nutrient content could be an important explaining factor for bad measured surface water quality. In addition, the paper also illustrates that monitoring the actual use of synthetic fertilizer does not function in the Flemish case study region. As an alternative policy approach we propose that a total ban on synthetic nitrogen fertilizer would be justified in region with manure nutrient surpluses. The total ban on synthetic nitrogen fertilizer could be complemented by a correction mechanism financed by a tax on livestock to compensate foregone revenues of reduced fertilizer availability for arable farms.

Dit Standpunt is een aanvulling op de bevindingen en aanbevelingen van de buitenlandse onafhankelijke Denkers die in opdracht van de Academie Vlaanderen hebben bezocht en met betrokken academische, industriële en politieke actoren overleg hebben gepleegd. Op basis van een ruim overleg met de hele watersector en de beleidsstructuren zijn aansluitend actielijnen uitgewerkt die de transitie naar een toekomstgericht waterbeheer in Vlaanderen mogelijk moeten maken.

Corn stover gains attention as a valuable biomass resource for the bio-economy. However, today, the corn stover is hardly harvested and a market is yet to be developed. Hence, potential investors in processing plants face large investment risks, as they are not sure sufficient corn stover will be available for their activities, nor what the corn stover prices may be. With the help of an agent-based model, we investigated whether competition for corn stover between one large scale centralized cellulosic sugar production plant and multiple decentralized small scale biogas plants could encourage the emergence of a corn stover value chain in Flanders. This papers details the results of simulations for three scenarios. We found that competition lowers the volumes of corn stover that can be acquired by the cellulosic sugar production plant and increases the corn stover prices. However, we also found that competition increases the involvement of the corn stover suppliers and allows for an easier emergence of the corn stover value chain. Our findings provide crucial insights, allowing potential stakeholders in the corn stover value chain to better understand how this value chain could develop under different circumstances., Proceedings of the 24th European Biomass Conference and Exhibition, 6-9 June 2016, Amsterdam, The Netherlands, pp. 1431-1440

Historically concentrated livestock production and, consequently, manure production and management in Belgium have resulted in severe environmental impacts. One major impact, nitrate leaching from soil to surface water, is being tackled through the European Nitrates Directive by imposing strict fertilization standards. However, another significant impact of manure management is the emission of greenhouse gasses (GHG - CO2, CH4, NH3 and N2O) into the air, thereby contributing to global warming. Calls have been made to reduce the high manure pressure and related environmental effects in Belgium by relocating and more evenly spreading livestock production. This paper explores the spatial spreading of CO2-equivalent emissions from livestock production in Belgium and attempt to answer the following question: ‘Can spatial reallocation of livestock production in Belgium reduce the impact of GHG emissions?’. This question is translated into several research objectives: 1) conduct an economic (cost minimization) and environmental (GHG minimization) optimization for 3 manure management scenarios, 2) determine the main differences between both approaches, and 3) determine the marginal spatial impact on CO2 emissions of a decrease in manure pressure (i.e., increased spreading of pig production). To conduct the analysis, a model was developed that builds on the spatial mathematical programming multi-agent manure allocation model developed by Van der Straeten et al. (2010). Three options for manure management are inserted: transport of raw manure from nutrient excess to nutrient deficit areas, biological treatment of manure (manure processing) and manure separation. The model optimizes, at municipal level, either the cost-efficiency, either the environmental effect of the manure market in Belgium based on Belgian fertilization standards. While cost-efficiency is calculated based on transport distances and cost of manure separation and processing, GHG emissions, and hence, carbon footprint, are determined based on a life cycle analysis type calculation. The results of the model simulations show that, while the economic optimum is reached by maximizing the transport of raw manure until fertilization standards are fulfilled and subsequently separating and processing the excess manure, the environmental optimum, from a carbon footprint point of view, is reached by separating all manure as this option has the lowest CO2 emissions, mainly due to the limited manure storage time. Moreover, the analyses indicate that rearrangement of the spatial spreading of livestock production in Belgium will not substantially decrease CO2 emissions. As manure storage is the main contributor to the carbon footprint, solutions should rather lie in changing these storage systems.

Over the years, the Internet has become a central tool for society. The extent of its growth and usage raises critical issues associated with its design principles that need to be addressed before it reaches its limits. Many emerging applications have increasing requirements in terms of bandwidth, QoS and manageability. Moreover, applications such as Cloud computing and 3D-video streaming require optimization and combined provisioning of different infrastructure resources and services that include both network and IT resources. Demands become more and more sporadic and variable, making dynamic provisioning highly needed. As a huge energy consumer, the Internet also needs to be energy-conscious. Applications critical for society and business (e.g., health, finance) or for real-time communication demand a highly reliable, robust and secure Internet. Finally, the future Internet needs to support sustainable business models, in order to drive innovation, competition, and research. Combining optical network technology with Cloud technology is key to addressing the future Internet/Cloud challenges. In this context, we propose an integrated approach: realizing the convergence of the IT- and optical-network-provisioning models will help bring revenues to all the actors involved in the value chain. Premium advanced network and IT managed services integrated with the vanilla Internet will ensure a sustainable future Internet/Cloud enabling demanding and ubiquitous applications to coexist.

The European Integrated Project GEYSERS - Generalised Architecture for Dynamic Infrastructure Services - is concentrating on infrastructures incorporating integrated optical network and IT resources in support of the Future Internet with special emphasis on cloud computing. More specifically GEYSERS proposes the concept of Virtual Infrastructures over one or more interconnected Physical Infrastructures comprising both network and IT resources. Taking into consideration the energy consumption levels associated with the ICT today and the expansion of the Internet in size and complexity, that incurring increased energy consumption of both IT and network resources, energy efficient infrastructure design becomes critical. To address this need, in the framework of GEYSERS, we propose energy efficient design of infrastructures incorporating integrated optical network and IT resources, supporting resilient end-to-end services. Our modeling results quantify significant energy savings of the proposed solution by jointly optimizing the allocation of both network and IT resources.

The growing water scarcity worldwide puts pressure on irrigation systems as main consumptive user to improve performance. In developing countries, where today agricultural water use is often still heavily subsidised, a tendency exists of introducing water pricing policies to stimulate rational water use. The exact impact of water pricing policies in terms of water saving or its effect on the farmers¿ production systems remains unknown. This study introduces a new two-stage method that allows estimating at farm level the effects on the agricultural production process and water demand of introducing or raising a water price. In the first stage the technical efficiency frontier is constructed and the technical and allocative efficiency levels of each farm are calculated. This representation of the technology is used in the second stage in a profit maximization model. Applying the method to small-scale irrigators in South Africa, it is shown that water demand of farmers is quite responsive even to small changes in the water price. Furthermore, introduction of a water price is found to significantly decrease farm profit, which is particularly problematic for poor farmers.

In South Africa water law has recently changed, adopting the principle of water as an economic good, thus levying charges on its use. For small-scale irrigators this is an important change, because currently their water use is entirely subsidized. In the coming years, subsidies will gradually decrease and an essential expected benefit of this policy change is that water use efficiency will rise, leading to reduced consumption and possible reallocation of the water saved. The exact impact of the water pricing policy on the irrigation water use or on the farmers' production system is however unclear. This study introduces a new methodology, based on data envelopment analysis, that allows estimating the effects on the agricultural production process and water demand of introducing or raising a water price. It is revealed that a large majority of the farmers does not adjust water use. Production costs however were shown to increase significantly.