Developing alternative net-zero Nitrogen fertilisers with no losses to groundwater and lower cost of N nutrient reaching the crop

粮食生产依赖于在田地、温室和花园中种植的作物，所有的种植者都使用某种形式的化肥或“植物食品”。含有氮的化肥可以通过让空气通过一个巨大的、连续的电弧来制造(高温迫使空气中的氮与氧气反应，这样氮就可以用作肥料)-这需要大量的电力，目前至少是通过燃烧化石燃料来制造的。这些制造的肥料还有另一个问题，如硝酸铵和尿素(英国最广泛使用的)，那就是它们是水溶性的，30%到50%可能会流失到地下水中。这是一项经济损失和污染风险。许多塑料含有氮，最初也是以同样的方式从空气中获得的。在原始使用寿命结束时对这些塑料进行向上循环，可以在不产生原始能源消耗的情况下重新利用氮气。初步调查表明，其中一个这样的来源含有22%的氮，当它并入土壤中时，可以释放到作物中，而不会损失地下水。这是一种由土壤真菌释放的有机生物。初步的田间试验表明，这种材料必须粉碎，然后可以造粒才能处理它，但颗粒一旦进入土壤，就必须迅速分解。因此，第一步是研究造粒材料，并在土壤应用的背景下这样做。由于许多其他原因，包括能源消耗和种植作物的天气窗口越来越窄(由于气候变化)，这种应用方法将采用直接钻探。因此，概要计划是开发一种颗粒，这种颗粒将经得起搬运并通过选择的常见直接钻头，在略低于播种深度的条带中进行定量应用，并使颗粒分解以释放氮含量，以支持作物生长。这一增长将受到监控，尽管是在收获期间。旁边将是使用硝酸铵等传统矿物肥料的对照地块。

Food production depends on crops grown in fields, glasshouses and gardens and all growers use some form of fertilisers or "plant foods". Fertilisers containing Nitrogen can be manufactured by passing air through a large, continuous electric arc (the high temperature forces the Nitrogen in the air to react with the Oxygen so that the Nitrogen can then be used as a fertiliser) - it takes enormous amounts of electricity which, currently at least, is made by burning fossilised fuels. There is another problem with these manufactured fertilisers such as ammonium nitrate and urea (the mostly widely used in the UK) and that is that they are water soluble and 30 to 50 % are likely to be lost to groundwater. That is a financial loss and a pollution risk.Many plastics contain Nitrogen, originally sourced from air the same way. Up-cycling these plastics at end-of-life of original use can re-use that Nitrogen without incurring the original energy consumption. Initial investigations have shown that one such source contains 22% Nitrogen and that it is, when incorporated into the soil, released to the crop without loss to groundwater. This is an organic, bio-release by the soil fungi.Initial field trials have shown that the material must be ground up and then could be pelleted in order to handle it but that the pellet must break down rapidly as soon as it gets into the soil. So, the first step is to investigate pelleting the material and to do so within the context of application to the soil . That application method, for many other reasons including energy use and the increasingly narrow weather windows to planting a crop (because of climate change), will be by direct drilling.The summary plan, then, is to develop a pellet that will stand handling and passage through a selection of common direct drills, to be applied in a measured quantity in a strip just below seed planting depth, and that the pellet breaks down so as to release the Nitrogen content to support crop growth. That growth will be monitored though to harvest . Alongside will be control plots using a conventional mineral fertiliser such as ammonium nitrate.