Nitrogen Fertilizers Deplete Soil Organic Carbon

Interesting. This is somewhat parallel to the view that much superphosphate goes to waste as it is not necessarily useful for all the situations whee it is used.

I wonder why they authors do not advance a mechanism for why excesive use of nitrogenous fertiliser depletes organic carbon in soils.

David

My guess would be that the chemical fertilizers kill the microbial life and that rain water and watering flush the nutrients away.

This may be in the same vein as the Reagan (Governator of California, then President of US) administration asserting that "trees" were responsible for "air pollution". I don't recall all the wherefores and whereasses, but the argument definitely mentioned "Oxygen" as one of the culprits ... Probably because without it nitrous oxide, nitrogen dioxide, the various sulfur oxides, and even ozone, cannot form. Duh. Neither can politicians.

This got me looking up Ronny Rayguns quotes. He could have given GWB a run for his money. Amazing.

David

No, I won't have it. Governor Ray-gun (of "taxes should hurt", but didn't pay any, and Star Wars Defense [read boondoggle] fame) isn't the Governator (Grop-pen-nator, whatever). That honor falls to Ah-nold, a putative Republican, but with real "wacko" Republicans as contrast, it is hard to tell.

It was probably from James Watt, a religion nutcase whose idea of ecological conservation was to loot the environment for all it was worth while waiting for the second coming of jeezuz.

The statement went along the lines that a forest rotting produced as much polution as one being burned. Clear the idiot didn't understand that forests take carbon from the air while growing and that it isn't cumulative.

Don't get me started on James Watt and his "Sage Brush Rebellion". "Sage Brush Rip Off" would be appropriate. The Department of the Interior sold the country's mineral resources off at pennies on the dollar. Grrrrr