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Agricultural nitrogen pollution is global threat, but circular solutions await

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As the world grapples with escalating climate change, policymakers remain laser-focused on CO2, with humanity striving to decarbonize energy systems, capture carbon, issue carbon credits, and plant millions of trees to absorb emissions. But carbon dioxide is just one of several powerful greenhouse gases destabilizing the global climate, and just one of the human-produced pollutants severely impacting the natural world and threatening to push Earth out of its current habitable state. Another substance that rarely enters the limelight, but arguably has an even greater impact on our planet’s life support systems, is nitrogen. “Nitrogen is everywhere and invisible,” and its influences are many, says Mark Sutton, an environmental physicist at the UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology. Massive imbalances in Earth’s natural nitrogen cycle, brought about by humanity’s agri-food, industrial and transport systems, have caused scientists to sound multiple alarms — especially over the last two decades – warnings that have gone largely unheeded. But analysts say circular economy solutions await, though they’ll require sweeping agricultural and societal changes. Nitrogen has been a limiting factor in crop growth since the dawn of agriculture. Historically, farmers planted legumes to fix nitrogen into the soil, and applied livestock manure to recycle nitrogen waste back into the system. Image by Farm Watch via Flickr (CC BY 2.0). Haber-Bosch: A double-edged sword Nitrogen is essential. “Without nitrogen, there is no life. It’s the building blocks of DNA, amino acids, and proteins. It’s in chlorophyll that fuels photosynthesis,” explains David Kanter, an environmental scientist at…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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