2014 National Sustainable Strawberry Initiative Project Leader Meeting

1. Developing Life Cycle Inventory Data
for Science-Based Strawberry
Production Sustainability Metrics
Presenter
Ezra Kahn
USDA- National Agricultural Library
Knowledge Services Division
Principal Investigator: Ganti S. Murthy
Associate Professor, Biological and Ecological Engineering
Oregon State University

2. The Team
Project Team
• Ganti Murthy- PI, OSU
• S.M. Hossein Tabatabaie- Graduate Student- OSU
• Peter Arbuckle- USDA-NAL
• Ezra Kahn- USDA-NAL
• Susan McCarthy- USDA NAL
• Ashley Loneman- Contract research
Project Advisory Group
• Kathy Demchak- Penn State University
• Jayson Harper- Penn State University
• Dan Legard- California Strawberry Commission
• Joyce Cooper- University of Washington

3. Objectives
Develop “meaningful and constructive metrics
for strawberry production sustainability.”
• Develop unit process/life-cycle inventory data
for U.S. strawberry production
– Demonstrate the use of crop budgets for LCIs
• Propose sustainability metrics
• Peer review results
• Release results publicly through USDA LCA
Commons

4. Project Deliverables
Deliverable Task/Month
Quarterly progress reports Quarterly
Peer reviewed LCA extended
crop budgets
Task 3/June
Automated software tool to
convert excel-based LCI data
from crop budgets to common
global LCI format
Task 4/June
Peer reviewed life-cycle
inventories made publically
available through USDA-NAL
LCA Commons.
Task 4/June
Final report with LCA results
and sustainability metrics
Task 7/June
Project video and public
relations products
TBD

5. Project Status
• Project results currently in peer review
• Sustainability metrics proposed, work still in
progress
• Use peer review to improve methods and
results

6. Peer Review Panel
– Dr. Marvin Pritts (Cornell U., Dept. of Horticulture)
– Kathy Demchak (Penn State U.)
– Karen Klonsky (UC Davis, Agricultural and Resource Economics)
– Dr. Bielinski Santos (U of Florida, Gulf Coast Research and
Education Center)
– Dr. Barclay Poling (N. Carolina State U., Department of
Horticulture Science)
– Dr. Oleg Daugovish (UC Cooperative Extension Ventura County)
– Curt Gaines (UC Davis)
– Tom Sjulin (Driscoll Strawberry Associates)
– Ted Campbell (Florida Strawberry Growers Association)

7. Cradle to gate life cycle analysis
California, Florida and North Carolina Plasticulture
Functional Unit: 1 kg ripe strawberry

8. Cradle to gate life cycle analysis
System Boundaries
California, Florida and North Carolina Plasticulture
Functional Unit: 1 kg ripe strawberry

9. LCA results (under review):
Impact contribution -- California
-40
-20
0
20
40
60
80
100
120
140
Materials Agricultural Machinery Fertilizers Chemicals Fuels

10. Project Results:
Life Cycle Inventory Data Collection
– LCA Extended Enterprise Budget excel sheet
• Collected primary data from 3 producers
• Published Enterprise budget sheets
Unit Operations Resource Category
Name Remark Name
Field Preparation Only Establishment
year
Prime Movers
Planting Operations Farm Machinery
Analysis/Assessment
All years
Fuels
Cultivation/Weeding Fertilizers
Irrigation Fixed Expenses
Nutrient Application
Only production
years
Pesticides
Harvesting Herbicides
Post-Harvest
operations
Insecticides
Transportation Fungicides
Fixed Expenses
All years
Materials
Labor
Water
Yield

11. Findings:
Life Cycle Inventory Data Collection
– LCA Extended Enterprise Budget excel sheet
• Generated LCA unit processes
• Challenges for data collection:
– Inflexible to user inputs
– Communicating LCA terminology to Ag Economists
– Inconsistent data among states
• Statistical representation vs. expert judgement
• Planning vs. historical representation
– Nursery process not included
– Expertise in LCA and Strawberry production still
necessary

12. Strawberry metrics
• Strawberry Fossil Energy productivity (SFEP) and
strawberry phosphorous productivity (SPP) can be
defines as follow:

13. Tasks and Timeline

14. Ezra Kahn
ezra.kahn@ars.usda.gov
301-504-9831
Q&A