Effects of Biochar and Municipal Solid Waste Compost on Soil Physical Quality and Productivity Index Under Sorghum Cultivation Irrigated with Saline Water

ABSTRACT

Amending soil with different materials is gaining acceptance as an effective and inexpensive technique for reclamation of salt-affected soils. The main idea of this study was to investigate the effects of biochar, compost of municipal solid waste and different water salinities level on soil physical quality (S_Dexter) and soil productivity index (SPI). The treatments were as followed: Control: Soil without biochar or compost and irrigated with tap water, S1: Soil without biochar or compost and irrigated with saline water (EC = 4.5 dS m⁻¹), S2: Soil without biochar or compost and irrigated with saline water (EC = 9 dS m⁻¹), B: Soil amended with 1.5%w/w biochar and irrigated with tap water, B+S1: Soil amended with 1.5%w/w biochar and irrigated with saline water (EC = 4.5 dS m⁻¹), B+S2: Soil amended with 1.5%w/w biochar and irrigated with saline water (EC = 9 dS m⁻¹), C: Soil amended with 1.5%w/w compost and irrigated with tap water, C+S1: Soil amended with 1.5%w/w compost and irrigated with saline water (EC = 4.5 dS m⁻¹), C+S2: Soil amended with 1.5%w/w compost and irrigated with saline water (EC = 9 dS m⁻¹). Soil water characteristic curve (SWCC), Field capacity (FC), Plant wilting point (PWP), Plant available water (PAW), Dexter’s index of soil physical quality (S_Dexter) and SPI were examined in a greenhouse experiment. The SPI was calculated by integrating the effects of six soil quality indices: plant available water, organic matter (OM), Electrical conductivity (EC), pH, Bulk density (BD) and Root weighting factor (RF) for all treatments were calculated. The results showed that the B treatment had a slightly higher effect on SWCC. The applied B and C treatments caused insignificant increase in PAW relative to the control. In addition, application of biochar or compost to soil significantly increased the S_Dexter. The application of C treatment had insignificantly higher value of S_Dexter compared to other treatments. Compared with the control, SPI was significantly higher for the B and C treatments. Overall, the application of biochar/compost minimized the destructive effects of saline irrigation water and improved the quality of the salt-affected fine-textured soil.

KEYWORDS:

• Biochar
• compost
• Dexter’s index of soil physical quality
• plant available water
• saline irrigation water
• soil productivity index

Acknowledgements

The author would like to thank Dr. M. R. Mosaddeghi for his detailed comments and suggestions regarding this paper.

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The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

Correction Statement

This article has been republished with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

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