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ORIGINAL RESEARCH

Nitrous Oxide and Ammonia Emissions from Urine-Treated Soils

Texture Effect

Dep. of Biological and Environmental Engineering, Riley-Robb Hall, Cornell Univ., Ithaca, NY 14853
^* Corresponding author (bkr2{at}cornell.edu)

Received 16 May 2006.

Urine-treated soils have been implicated as an important source of gaseous N losses to the atmosphere. The goal of our research was to quantify NH₃ and N₂O emissions from urine under different simplified and controlled soil conditions and to relate these results to urinary-N transformation processes in soil. We studied the influence of soil texture (coarse vs. fine sand), moisture distribution with depth, air-filled pore space, and rate of air movement, which affected both soil drying processes and emission rates. Laboratory experiments were performed with synthetic urine in both aerobic and anaerobic conditions. Texture was the most important factor controlling NH₃ volatilization and N₂O emission factors in urine-treated sands. Generally, the finer the sand texture, the higher the input of denitrification to the total N₂O emissions; however, the air-filled pore space threshold, below which denitrification became dominant, was greater in coarse sand. In addition, the evaporation rate of the urine water component was found to be an important parameter in total NH₃ and N₂O emissions. Ammonia volatilization occurred during the first day of the treatments, with volatilization rates closely related to evaporation rates in both sand textures. Finer sand texture caused reductions in the urine evaporation rate and therefore in NH₃ volatilization rates. Urine evaporation increased air-filled pore space, thereby improving aeration conditions in the sand that contribute to nitrification dominance of N₂O production. Moreover, evaporation of urine, enriched with dissolved N₂O, increased total N₂O emission. Results from these simplified experiments need confirmation under field soil conditions.

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