Journal
ECOLOGY LETTERS
Volume 12, Issue 10, Pages 1103-1117Publisher
WILEY
DOI: 10.1111/j.1461-0248.2009.01351.x
Keywords
Agricultural system; carbon dioxide; carbon sequestration; emission; uptake factor; forest; global GHG budget; methane; N deposition; N saturation; nitrous oxide; wetland
Categories
Funding
- Research Participation Fellowship Program
- National Center for Environmental Assessment
- U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
- Oak Ridge Institute for Science and Education
- U.S. Department of Energy and EPA
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Anthropogenic nitrogen (N) enrichment of ecosystems, mainly from fuel combustion and fertilizer application, alters biogeochemical cycling of ecosystems in a way that leads to altered flux of biogenic greenhouse gases (GHGs). Our meta-analysis of 313 observations across 109 studies evaluated the effect of N addition on the flux of three major GHGs: CO2, CH4 and N2O. The objective was to quantitatively synthesize data from agricultural and non-agricultural terrestrial ecosystems across the globe and examine whether factors, such as ecosystem type, N addition level and chemical form of N addition influence the direction and magnitude of GHG fluxes. Results indicate that N addition increased ecosystem carbon content of forests by 6%, marginally increased soil organic carbon of agricultural systems by 2%, but had no significant effect on net ecosystem CO2 exchange for non-forest natural ecosystems. Across all ecosystems, N addition increased CH4 emission by 97%, reduced CH4 uptake by 38% and increased N2O emission by 216%. The net effect of N on the global GHG budget is calculated and this topic is reviewed. Most often N addition is considered to increase forest C sequestration without consideration of N stimulation of GHG production in other ecosystems. However, our study indicated that although N addition increased the global terrestrial C sink, the CO2 reduction could be largely offset (53-76%) by N stimulation of global CH4 and N2O emission from multiple ecosystems.
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