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Soft Computing for Sustainability
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Soft Computing for Sustainability

A special issue of Sustainability (ISSN 2071-1050).

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (31 October 2020) | Viewed by 70763

Special Issue Editors

Dr. Maria Socorro Garcia Cascales

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Electronics, Computer Technology and Projects, Universidad Politécnica de Cartagena | UPCT
Interests: project management; multi-criteria decision-making; renewable energy; soft computing
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals
Prof. Dr. Fausto Cavallaro

E-Mail Website
Guest Editor
Department of Economics, University of Molise, Via De Sanctis, 86100 Campobasso, Italy
Interests: multi-criteria; fuzzy set; soft computing; renewable energy; sustainability; circular economy; technology assessment; hypersoft sets; sustainable development goals
Special Issues, Collections and Topics in MDPI journals

Special Issue Information

Sustainability is a concept that integrates at least three dimensions: environmental, economic, and social. Energy systems are usually evaluated as key contributors for sustainable development, and thus the methodology used for their evaluation needs to address many indicators—some are quantitative, while others are qualitative. The real scenarios in this context are associated with uncertainty and vagueness, and Soft Computing can handle this ambiguity and supply solutions to complex real-life questions. Soft Computing can be understood as a set of methodologies and techniques such as fuzzy logic, expert systems, artificial neural networks, fuzzy neural networks, and genetic algorithms that—when working together and not in isolation—can help both the industry and policymakers to make the best decisions correctly. It is therefore a challenge to choose the best methodologies to accomplish this task. The aim of this Special Issue is to show recent and novel applications of Soft Computing in the field of sustainability assessment.

Dr. Maria Socorro Garcia Cascales
Dr. Fausto Cavallaro
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Sustainability is an international peer-reviewed open access semimonthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • soft computing
  • approximate reasoning
  • multi-criteria decision making (MCDM)
  • fuzzy sets
  • genetic algorithms
  • neural network
  • fuzzy neural network
  • expert systems
  • machine learning
  • pattern recognition
  • sustainable development
  • sustainability evaluation
  • methods for sustainability assessment
  • sustainable industrial systems
  • life cycle assessment (LCA)
  • life cycle cost (LCC)
  • life cycle sustainability
  • life cycle thinking
  • sustainable project management
  • sustainable projects

Published Papers (13 papers)

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Research

23 pages, 1279 KiB  
Article
Examination of the Sustainable Rural Tourism Potential of the Brčko District of Bosnia and Herzegovina Using a Fuzzy Approach Based on Group Decision Making
by Adis Puška, Dragan Pamucar, Ilija Stojanović, Fausto Cavallaro, Arturas Kaklauskas and Abbas Mardani
Sustainability 2021, 13(2), 583; https://doi.org/10.3390/su13020583 - 09 Jan 2021
Cited by 28 | Viewed by 4325
Abstract
Tourism is an economic activity with great contribution for the development of many countries. To develop rural areas, tourism is especially important and need to be improved in these areas. The Government of Brčko District of Bosnia and Herzegovina has decided to have [...] Read more.
Tourism is an economic activity with great contribution for the development of many countries. To develop rural areas, tourism is especially important and need to be improved in these areas. The Government of Brčko District of Bosnia and Herzegovina has decided to have tourism improvement as one of main objectives in their development strategy focusing on better conditions for development of tourism. Investments in tourism should be applied to the entire area of the Brčko District. Since Brčko District mainly consists of rural areas, it is necessary to invest in rural tourism. The first step of this study was to determine the tourist potential of rural areas. The determination of rural tourist potential in Brčko District was carried out with the assistance of the Brčko District Government. For this purpose, the method of expert decision-making was used, and three experts were selected who evaluated six rural settlements. To obtain results based on expert evaluation, two multi-criteria methods were used: the Full Consistency Method (FUCOM) for determining the importance of criteria and the fuzzy Measurement Alternatives and Ranking according to the COmpromise Solution (MARCOS) method to rank rural settlements in terms of their tourism potential. The results showed that the settlement of Bijela has the best rural tourist potential, while the settlement of Grbavica has the least potential. The results obtained by applying this model showed how rural tourism in Brčko District can be improved. The research model for testing the tourism potential has shown good results and can be applied in other branches of tourism with some adaptation to certain branches of tourism. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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17 pages, 1722 KiB  
Article
Gendered Beliefs in STEM Undergraduates: A Comparative Analysis of Fuzzy Rating versus Likert Scales
by Ana M. Castaño, M. Asunción Lubiano and Antonio L. García-Izquierdo
Sustainability 2020, 12(15), 6227; https://doi.org/10.3390/su12156227 - 03 Aug 2020
Cited by 7 | Viewed by 3959
Abstract
Women are underrepresented in growing positions such as those related to STEM field careers (i.e., science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). One of the causes for remaining out of that field could lie on gender stereotypes. Undergraduate stereotypes and beliefs are important as could [...] Read more.
Women are underrepresented in growing positions such as those related to STEM field careers (i.e., science, technology, engineering, and mathematics). One of the causes for remaining out of that field could lie on gender stereotypes. Undergraduate stereotypes and beliefs are important as could easily uphold future gender segregation at the workplace. In the research arena the measurement of those biased beliefs is important as most commonly used Likert scales (LS) could raise problems in terms of accuracy. As fuzzy rating scales (FRS) are a promising measurement alternative, the aim of this study is to compare the properties of FRS against LS. We conducted a cross-sectional study with 262 STEM and non-STEM participants who answered to a questionnaire that, besides gendered beliefs and injustice perception towards the situation of women at the workplace, included personal characteristics as coursed degree and working experience. Results pointed out, on one hand, that FRS allowed for a better capture of the variability of individual responses, but on the other hand, that LS were better valued than FRS in what is concerned with satisfaction and ease of response. Advantages of FRS for psychosocial measurement are discussed to facilitate the study around causes of segregation that excludes women from the STEM labour market. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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16 pages, 768 KiB  
Article
Novel Multi-Criteria Intuitionistic Fuzzy SWARA–COPRAS Approach for Sustainability Evaluation of the Bioenergy Production Process
by Arunodaya Raj Mishra, Pratibha Rani, Kiran Pandey, Abbas Mardani, Justas Streimikis, Dalia Streimikiene and Melfi Alrasheedi
Sustainability 2020, 12(10), 4155; https://doi.org/10.3390/su12104155 - 19 May 2020
Cited by 85 | Viewed by 4767
Abstract
Bioenergy is a kind of renewable energy that can potentially contribute to a broad spectrum of economic, environmental, and societal objectives and aid sustainable development. The assessment, management, and monitoring of the diverse bioenergy production technology alternatives are complex in nature and deliver [...] Read more.
Bioenergy is a kind of renewable energy that can potentially contribute to a broad spectrum of economic, environmental, and societal objectives and aid sustainable development. The assessment, management, and monitoring of the diverse bioenergy production technology alternatives are complex in nature and deliver different benefits due to the lack of precise and comprehensive data. Selection of an optimal bioenergy production technology (BPT) alternative is considered a complex multi-criteria decision-making (MCDM) problem that involves many incompatible tangible and intangible as well as qualitative and quantitative criteria. The procedure of defining and evaluating the weights of the criteria is an important concern for decision experts because the assessment and the final selection of the BPT alternative are carried out on the basis of the defined set of criteria. Intuitionistic fuzzy sets (IFSs) have received considerable attention due to their ability to handle the imprecision and vagueness that can arise in real-life situations. Thus, this study presents an integrated approach, based on stepwise weight assessment ratio analysis (SWARA) and complex proportional assessment (COPRAS) approaches, for the selection of BPT alternatives. In the integrated framework, criteria weights are determined by the SWARA procedure, and the ranking of BPT alternatives is decided by the COPRAS method using IFSs. The criteria weights evaluated by this approach involve the imprecision of experts’ opinions, which makes them more comprehensible. To express the efficiency and applicability of the integrated framework, a BPT selection problem is presented using IFSs. In addition, this study involved sensitivity analysis with respect to various sets of criteria weights to reveal the strength of the developed approach. The sensitivity analysis outcomes indicate that the agricultural and municipal waste of biogas (S3) consistently secures the highest rank, despite how the criteria weights vary. Finally, a comparative study is discussed to analyze the validity of the obtained result. The findings of this study confirm that the proposed framework is more useful than and consistent with previously developed methods using the IFSs environment. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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28 pages, 5199 KiB  
Article
Fog BEMS: An Agent-Based Hierarchical Fog Layer Architecture for Improving Scalability in a Building Energy Management System
by Uikyun Na and Eun-Kyu Lee
Sustainability 2020, 12(7), 2831; https://doi.org/10.3390/su12072831 - 02 Apr 2020
Cited by 9 | Viewed by 3272
Abstract
It has been found that a cloud building energy management system (BEMS) alone cannot support increasing numbers of end devices (e.g., energy equipment and IoT devices) and emerging energy services efficiently. To resolve these limitations, this paper proposes Fog BEMS, which applies an [...] Read more.
It has been found that a cloud building energy management system (BEMS) alone cannot support increasing numbers of end devices (e.g., energy equipment and IoT devices) and emerging energy services efficiently. To resolve these limitations, this paper proposes Fog BEMS, which applies an emerging fog computing concept to a BEMS. Fog computing places small computing resources (fog nodes) just next to end devices, and these nodes process data in real time and manage local contexts. In this way, the BEMS becomes distributed and scalable. However, existing fog computing models have barely considered scenarios where many end devices and fog nodes are deployed and interconnected. That is, they do not scale up and cannot be applied to scalable applications like BEMS. To solve the problem, this paper (i) designs a fog network where a list of functionally heterogeneous nodes is deployed in a hierarchy for collaboration and (ii) designs an agent-based, modular programming model that eases the development and management of computing services at a fog node. We develop a prototype of a fog node and build a real-world testbed on a campus to demonstrate the feasibility of the proposed system. We also conduct experiments, and results show that Fog BEMS is scalable enough for a node to connect up to 900 devices and that network traffic is reduced by 27.22–97.63%, with varying numbers of end devices. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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18 pages, 3221 KiB  
Article
A Characterization of Metrics for Comparing Satellite-Based and Ground-Measured Global Horizontal Irradiance Data: A Principal Component Analysis Application
by Maria. C. Bueso, José Miguel Paredes-Parra, Antonio Mateo-Aroca and Angel Molina-García
Sustainability 2020, 12(6), 2454; https://doi.org/10.3390/su12062454 - 20 Mar 2020
Cited by 6 | Viewed by 2198
Abstract
The increasing integration of photovoltaic (PV) power plants into power systems demands a high accuracy of yield prediction and measurement. With this aim, different global horizontal irradiance (GHI) estimations based on new-generation geostationary satellites have been recently proposed, providing a growing number of [...] Read more.
The increasing integration of photovoltaic (PV) power plants into power systems demands a high accuracy of yield prediction and measurement. With this aim, different global horizontal irradiance (GHI) estimations based on new-generation geostationary satellites have been recently proposed, providing a growing number of solutions and databases, mostly available online, in addition to the many ground-based irradiance data installations currently available. According to the specific literature, there is a lack of agreement in validation strategies for a bankable, satellite-derived irradiance dataset. Moreover, different irradiance data sources are compared in recent contributions based on a diversity of arbitrary metrics. Under this framework, this paper describes a characterization of metrics based on a principal component analysis (PCA) application to classify such metrics, aiming to provide non-redundant and complementary information. Therefore, different groups of metrics are identified by applying the PCA process, allowing us to compare, in a more extensive way, different irradiance data sources and exploring and identifying their differences. The methodology has been evaluated using satellite-based and ground-measured GHI data collected for one year in seven different Spanish locations, with a one-hour sample time. Data characterization, results, and a discussion about the suitability of the proposed methodology are also included in the paper. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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21 pages, 3646 KiB  
Article
Computer Modeling for the Operation Optimization of Mula Reservoir, Upper Godavari Basin, India, Using the Jaya Algorithm
by Vartika Paliwal, Aniruddha D. Ghare, Ashwini B. Mirajkar, Neeraj Dhanraj Bokde and Andrés Elías Feijóo Lorenzo
Sustainability 2020, 12(1), 84; https://doi.org/10.3390/su12010084 - 20 Dec 2019
Cited by 12 | Viewed by 2874
Abstract
In this paper, an application of the Jaya Algorithm (JA) is presented, to develop an operation optimization model for the Mula reservoir, located on the upper Godavari Basin, in India. The mentioned algorithm is a relatively new optimization technique, which is algorithm-specific and [...] Read more.
In this paper, an application of the Jaya Algorithm (JA) is presented, to develop an operation optimization model for the Mula reservoir, located on the upper Godavari Basin, in India. The mentioned algorithm is a relatively new optimization technique, which is algorithm-specific and parameterless. In JA, there is no need for algorithm-specific parameter tuning, unlike with other heuristic techniques. To test its applicability, the model performance has been compared with that of other models for hypothetical four reservoir system studies available in the literature. Simulations for hypothetical four reservoir system have proven that JA is a better solution for a number of Function Evaluations when compared with the results obtained by means of other evolutionary methods such as Genetic Algorithms, Particle Swarm Optimization, Elitist Mutated Particle Swarm Optimization, and Weed Optimization Algorithm models reported in previous studies. Simulations have been carried out for real time operation of the Mula reservoir, and have revealed its superior performance when comparing the water releases proposed by it and the ones proposed by existing policy. Hence, from the two case studies presented, it can be concluded that the JA has potential in the field of reservoir operation and can be further explored to operation optimization of existing multi-reservoir system, with lower computations. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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11 pages, 912 KiB  
Article
Fuzzy Evaluation of Change Management Processes in the Context of Enterprise Sustainability
by Tetiana Vlasenko, Anatolii Hatsko, Tetiana Larina, Yevhen Hryn, Dalia Streimikiene and Tomas Balezentis
Sustainability 2019, 11(22), 6310; https://doi.org/10.3390/su11226310 - 10 Nov 2019
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 2856
Abstract
Enterprise sustainability can only be ensured by taking into account the dynamics of the environment, which requires effective implementation of changes. Organizational change management is seen as the interaction of the groups of processes: direct implementation and the processes of managerial influence on [...] Read more.
Enterprise sustainability can only be ensured by taking into account the dynamics of the environment, which requires effective implementation of changes. Organizational change management is seen as the interaction of the groups of processes: direct implementation and the processes of managerial influence on their implementation. The article seeks to develop a framework for evaluation of change management processes based on the fuzzy logics. The expert analysis was carried out to develop fuzzy rules based on the linguistic terms (high, medium, and low). The database of rules for assigning an enterprise to the appropriate level of organizational change management has been developed (243 rules). The proposed model was applied to the case of Ukrainian agricultural machinery companies. The results allowed identifying the bottlenecks for the companies under analysis in seeking sustainable change management. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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15 pages, 503 KiB  
Article
Time Variant Multi-Objective Interval-Valued Transportation Problem in Sustainable Development
by Gurupada Maity, Sankar Kumar Roy and Jose Luis Verdegay
Sustainability 2019, 11(21), 6161; https://doi.org/10.3390/su11216161 - 04 Nov 2019
Cited by 30 | Viewed by 4008
Abstract
Sustainable development is treated as the achievement of continued economic development without detriment to environmental and natural resources. Now-a-days, in a competitive market scenario, most of us are willing to pay less and to gain more in quickly without considering negative externalities for [...] Read more.
Sustainable development is treated as the achievement of continued economic development without detriment to environmental and natural resources. Now-a-days, in a competitive market scenario, most of us are willing to pay less and to gain more in quickly without considering negative externalities for the environment and quality of life for future generations. Recalling this fact, this paper explores the study of time variant multi-objective transportation problem (MOTP) with consideration of minimizing pollution. Time of transportation is of utmost importance in reality; based on this consideration, we formulate a MOTP, where we optimize transportation time as well as the cost function. The parameters of MOTP are interval-valued, so this form of MOTP is termed as a multi-objective interval transportation problem (MOITP). A procedure is taken into consideration for converting MOITP into deterministic form and then for solving it. Goal programming is applied to solve the converted transportation problem. A case study is conducted to justify the methodology by utilizing the environmental impact. At last, conclusions and future research directions are included regarding our study. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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23 pages, 3585 KiB  
Article
Aligning the Criteria of Green Economy (GE) and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to Implement Sustainable Development
by Seyed Meysam Khoshnava, Raheleh Rostami, Rosli Mohamad Zin, Dalia Štreimikienė, Alireza Yousefpour, Wadim Strielkowski and Abbas Mardani
Sustainability 2019, 11(17), 4615; https://doi.org/10.3390/su11174615 - 25 Aug 2019
Cited by 65 | Viewed by 8098
Abstract
Global economic trends have shown the progression of social inequalities and environmental deterioration in the grey economy. New economic practices and policies need to be developed in order to achieve the sustainable development goals (SDGs). A green economy (GE) has a correlative role [...] Read more.
Global economic trends have shown the progression of social inequalities and environmental deterioration in the grey economy. New economic practices and policies need to be developed in order to achieve the sustainable development goals (SDGs). A green economy (GE) has a correlative role with the implementation of sustainable development (SD), which could revive the grey economy, human well-being, and social equity, as well as substantially decrease environmental risks and ecological scarcities. This study aims to develop a hybrid methodological and mathematical approach to prioritize the most effective variables from classified GE and SDGs criteria (23 criteria) to implement SD. This study has deliberated over the Decision making trial and evaluation laboratory (DEMATEL) technique for considering interconnections among numerous criteria to collect the most effective variables (12 criteria) based on three pillars (3Ps) of SD. Likewise, the analytic network process (ANP) technique ranked these effective variables by considering their network relations based on three indicators. Lastly, integration was used to finalize and prioritize the most effective variables based on their weight from the ANP technique. This study will highlight the green economy with exclusive environmental issues and sustainable growth as the greatest effective variables among GE and SDGs criteria for SD implementation. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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40 pages, 1911 KiB  
Article
Effectiveness of Online Digital Media Advertising as A Strategic Tool for Building Brand Sustainability: Evidence from FMCGs and Services Sectors of Pakistan
by Rizwan Raheem Ahmed, Dalia Streimikiene, Gerhard Berchtold, Jolita Vveinhardt, Zahid Ali Channar and Riaz Hussain Soomro
Sustainability 2019, 11(12), 3436; https://doi.org/10.3390/su11123436 - 21 Jun 2019
Cited by 18 | Viewed by 24019
Abstract
The purpose of the undertaken study is to examine the effectiveness of online digital media advertising as a strategic tool for building brand sustainability. For this purpose, we investigate the impact of different channels of online media, such as email marketing, mobile phone [...] Read more.
The purpose of the undertaken study is to examine the effectiveness of online digital media advertising as a strategic tool for building brand sustainability. For this purpose, we investigate the impact of different channels of online media, such as email marketing, mobile phone marketing, search engine optimization and companies’ websites, and social media marketing for the effectiveness of online digital media advertising. Moreover, the researchers have introduced eight mediating variables and six moderating variables to examine the impact between exogenous variables and online digital media advertising (endogenous). The researchers have taken 910 responses through a modified questionnaire and employed quantitative research methods, such as the structural equation modeling, exploratory factor and confirmatory factor analyses, and Hayes process approach for examining the mediation and moderation amongst the variables. The results of direct impact have demonstrated that all of the channels of digital media advertising have a positive and significant influence on the effectiveness of online digital media that creates brand sustainability for fast moving consumer goods (FMCG) and services sectors of Pakistan. The outcomes of hypotheses pertaining to the mediating and moderating effects of different variables have shown the significant influence between exogenous variables and endogenous variable. The results of the undertaken study are beneficial for the existing literature that provides the basic foil for future research studies. Moreover, the results have significant industrial implications for the marketers and digital media managers that they can devise effective media and marketing strategies to maintain optimum market share and competitive advantages. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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18 pages, 2931 KiB  
Article
Application of Sustainability Principles for Harsh Environment Exploration by Autonomous Robot
by Romualdas Bausys, Fausto Cavallaro and Rokas Semenas
Sustainability 2019, 11(9), 2518; https://doi.org/10.3390/su11092518 - 30 Apr 2019
Cited by 21 | Viewed by 3241
Abstract
Currently, the European Union (EU) is focusing on a large-scale campaign dedicated to developing a competitive circular economy and expanding the single digital market. One of the main goals of this campaign is the implementation of the sustainability principles in the development and [...] Read more.
Currently, the European Union (EU) is focusing on a large-scale campaign dedicated to developing a competitive circular economy and expanding the single digital market. One of the main goals of this campaign is the implementation of the sustainability principles in the development and deployment cycle of the new generation technologies. This paper focuses on the fast-growing field of autonomous mobile robots and the harsh environment exploration problem. Currently, most state-of-the-art navigation methods are utilising the idea of evaluating candidate observation locations by combining different task-related criteria. However, these map building solutions are often designed for operating in near-perfect environments, neglecting such factors as the danger to the robot. In this paper, a new strategy that aims to address the safety and re-usability of the autonomous mobile agent by implementing the economic sustainability principles is proposed. A novel multi-criteria decision-making method of Weighted Aggregated Sum Product Assessment—Single-Valued Neutrosophic Sets, namely WASPAS-SVNS, and the weight selection method of Step-Wise Weights Assessment Ratio Analysis (SWARA) are applied to model a dynamic decision-making system. The experimental evaluation of the proposed strategy shows that increased survivability of the autonomous agent can be observed. Compared to the greedy baseline strategy, the proposed method forms the movement path which orients the autonomous agent away from dangerous obstacles. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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21 pages, 3505 KiB  
Article
A Hybrid GA with Variable Quay Crane Assignment for Solving Berth Allocation Problem and Quay Crane Assignment Problem Simultaneously
by Hsien-Pin Hsu, Tai-Lin Chiang, Chia-Nan Wang, Hsin-Pin Fu and Chien-Chang Chou
Sustainability 2019, 11(7), 2018; https://doi.org/10.3390/su11072018 - 04 Apr 2019
Cited by 15 | Viewed by 3266
Abstract
Container terminals help countries to sustain their economic development. Improving the operational efficiency in a container terminal is important. In past research, genetic algorithms (GAs) have been widely used to cope with seaside operational problems, including the berth allocation problem (BAP) and quay [...] Read more.
Container terminals help countries to sustain their economic development. Improving the operational efficiency in a container terminal is important. In past research, genetic algorithms (GAs) have been widely used to cope with seaside operational problems, including the berth allocation problem (BAP) and quay crane assignment problem (QCAP) individually or simultaneously. However, most GA approaches in past studies were dedicated to generate time-invariant QC assignment that does not adjust QCs assigned to a ship. This may underutilize available QC capacity. In this research, three hybrid GAs (HGAs) have been proposed to deal with the dynamic and discrete BAP (DDBAP) and the dynamic QCAP (DQCAP) simultaneously. The three HGAs supports variable QC assignment in which QCs assigned to a ship can be further adjusted. The three HGAs employ the same crossover operator but a different mutation operator and a two-stage procedure is used. In the first stage, these HGAs can generate a BAP solution and a QCAP solution that is time-invariant. The time-invariant QC assignment solution is then further transformed into a variable one in the second stage. Experiments have been conducted to investigate the effects of the three HGA and the results showed that these HGAs outperformed traditional GAs in terms of fitness value. In particular, the HGA3 with Thoros mutation operator had the best performance. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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8 pages, 1172 KiB  
Article
Seasonal Net Carbon Exchange in Rotation Crops in the Temperate Climate of Central Lithuania
by Ligita Baležentienė, Ovidijus Mikša, Tomas Baležentis and Dalia Streimikiene
Sustainability 2019, 11(7), 1966; https://doi.org/10.3390/su11071966 - 02 Apr 2019
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 2622
Abstract
Intelligent agricultural solutions require data on the environmental impacts of agriculture. In order for operationalize decision-making for sustainable agriculture, one needs to establish the corresponding datasets and protocols. Increasing anthropogenic CO2 emissions into the atmosphere force the choice of growing crops aimed [...] Read more.
Intelligent agricultural solutions require data on the environmental impacts of agriculture. In order for operationalize decision-making for sustainable agriculture, one needs to establish the corresponding datasets and protocols. Increasing anthropogenic CO2 emissions into the atmosphere force the choice of growing crops aimed at mitigating climate change. For this reason, investigations of seasonal carbon exchange were carried out in 2013–2016 at the Training Farm of the Vytautas Magnus University (former Aleksandras Stulginskis University), Lithuania. This paper compares the carbon exchange rate for different crops, viz., maize, ley, winter wheat, spring rapeseed and barley under conventional farming. This study focuses on the carbon exchange rate. We measure the emitted and absorbed CO2 fluxes by applying the closed chamber method. The biomass measurement and leaf area index (LAI) calculations at different plant growth stages are used to evaluate carbon exchange in different agroecosystems. The differences in photosynthetically assimilated CO2 rates were significantly impacted by the leaf area index (p = 0.04) during the plant vegetation period. The significantly (p = 0.02–0.05) strong correlation (r = 0.6–0.7) exists between soil respiration and LAI. Soil respiration composed only 21% of the agroecosystem carbon exchange. Plant respiration ranged between 0.034 and 3.613 µmol m−2 s−1 during the vegetation period composed of a negligible ratio (mean 16%) of carbon exchange. Generally, respiration emissions were obviously recovered by the gross primary production (GPP) of crops. Therefore, the ecosystems were acting as an atmospheric CO2 sink. Barley accumulated the lowest mean GPP 12.77 µmol m−2 s−1. The highest mean GPP was determined for ley (14.28 µmol m−2 s−1) and maize (15.68 µmol m−2 s−1) due to the biggest LAI and particular bio-characteristics. Due to the highest NEP, the ley (12.66 µmol m−2 s−1) and maize (12.76 µmol m−2 s−1) agroecosystems sank the highest C from the atmosphere and, thus, they might be considered the most sustainable items between crops. Consequently, the appropriate choice of crops and their area in crop rotations may reduce CO2 emissions and their impact on the environment and climate change. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Soft Computing for Sustainability)
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