Search results for "Soil formation"
showing 3 items of 3 documents
Pedogenesis and carbon sequestration in transformed agricultural soils of Sicily
2021
The increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration is a consequence of human activities leading to severe environmental deteriorations. Techniques are thus needed to sequester and reduce atmospheric carbon. One of the proposed techniques is the transformation or construction of new soils into which more organic carbon can be sequestered and CO2 be consumed by increased weathering. By using a chronosequence of new and transformed soils on crushed limestone (0–48 years) in a Mediterranean area (Sicily), we tried to quantify the amount of organic carbon that could be additionally sequestered and to derive the corresponding rates. A further aim was to trace chemical weathering and related CO2 consump…
Soil development on sediments and evaporites of the Messinian crisis
2020
Abstract Vast areas in the Mediterranean are characterised by evaporite deposits of the Messinian crises (c. 6–5.3 Ma BP). During this period, large deposits were built up in shallow lagoon-like systems and are now found in southern Italy, Albania, Cyprus and Turkey. So far, soil formation on evaporites has been studied predominantly in subarid to arid environments. Although the formation of soils has received new significance, little is known about the evolutional trajectories on evaporites of the Mediterranean. We therefore studied soil formation in the Caltanissetta basin (Sicily) where evaporites are most widespread. The lithologies included the sequence: marine clay deposits, laminated…
The Soil Erosion Risk Map of the Sicilian Region (1:250,000 Scale)
2014
Assessing the risk areas of soil erosion by water at the regional level is relevant for current and future land planning of environmental actions to combat land degradation. The gravity of the risk is not only depending on the rate of soil erosion by water, but also on other factors, primarily soil depth and rock weatherability. The map of the soil erosion risk in the Sicilian region, expressed in terms of years to a complete loss of the fertile soil cover, is here presented as a methodological model. The degree of risk was not only estimated in function of the rate of soil erosion by water, but also of the depth of the fertile part of the profile, and of the weatherability degree of the un…