Understanding the contribution of humalite for soil health and crop production

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There is growing awareness of soil health by farmers for sustainable crop production. Humalite is a naturally occurring organic substance containing high concentrations of humic acid, and low heavy metals due to its unique freshwater depositional environment. Humic-based substances are well known for improving the physical, chemical, and biological properties of the soil. Therefore, humalite may be a cost-effective and environmentally friendly soil amendment with a wide variety of end uses. Large deposits of humalite were found in Southern Central Alberta that may have great potential to commercialize for improving soil health and sustainable agricultural production. In recent years, local farmers have brought and applied humalite in their fields, but there is limited scientific data which has left both agronomists and farmers with several unanswered questions such as: what application rates should be applied for a given crop? what are the effects on soil nutrient availability, soil health, drought tolerance, plant-microbial symbiotic associations, plant growth and yield? Therefore, supportive research is needed to discover the potential benefits of humalite and make it commercially available to Canadian and international users. We partner with the Prairie Mines & Royalty ULC (PMRU) to answer many of the basic questions raised by farmers but also establish baseline information that will be used by PMRU for commercialization of humalite. In this proposed project, we will evaluate potential benefits of humalite for 1) improving soil nutrient availability and plant nutrient uptake, 2) improving soil microbial population and diversity, 3) improving plant growth, yield, and nutritional quality, 4) improving symbiotic nitrogen fixation in legume crops, and 5) alleviating drought stress on crop production. We expect to test humalite with diverse crops for the above research avenues. The major potential outcome of this research project is to develop humalite-based marketable products for the diverse agricultural industries, which are economical and environmentally friendly to the end users. Additionally, we expect that humalite has the potential to improve nitrogen use efficiency and reduce synthetic fertilizer application in agricultural systems, thereby protecting water bodies from contamination and the emission of greenhouse gases while promoting carbon sequestration by promoting soil microbial activities. The project will train one postdoc, three undergraduate summer students, and three part-time undergraduate research assistants.