Depends on location, soil type, climate, and weather conditions.

Long term soil sterilization is not a viable alternative for gardeners or even farmers, in my opinion. Certainly not in much of the temperate world.

"Depends on location, soil type, climate, and weather conditions."

Addressed in the article and it was not long term affects they were looking for.

I have some experience with this. I had a terrible time with witch grass in my first vegetable plot. Being inexperienced, I went at it with a rototiller and all I managed to do was break the roots up into little pieces that all began to grow. It was a nightmare. I am an organic grower and would not use a chemical on it. I could not dig it out successfully. I abandoned the vegetable plot for 2 years and then I got the idea to cover the whole mess over with 3ml plastic that we had in the garage from an old ice skating rink. It was really big so it covered the whole plot. I left it on there for a solid year weighed down with bricks. And I never had another problem again. I don't know if I just got lucky that it was a particularly hot and dry summer that year, but it worked. I had a few spots left around one edge that was in a shady area and I think I just covered that over with cardboard a few times and it disappeared. I did not attempt to dig it out. [g]. So, in certain situations, I think it might not be the fastest way to solve a problem, but for me at the time, it was exactly what I needed.

One should also be aware that that solarization processes kill off soil biology as well as weeds. So one will need to reintroduce the soil fauna and allow sufficient time for it to repopulate the area before any new planting.

And that has been my experience. The area I treated with year long solarization was better than it was before, very quickly, without the offending weeds.

I have done this to kill perennial grass, it worked well.

I planted tomatoes & garlic the next season with not problem or weeds.

I did not know about the soil fauna & now I would work up extra compost pile to put down after the treatment.