Long Term Sugarcane Crop Residue Retention Offers Limited Potential to Reduce Nitrogen Fertilizer Rates in Australian Wet Tropical Environments.

ABSTRACT: The warming of world climate systems is driving interest in the mitigation of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions. In the agricultural sector, practices that mitigate GHG emissions include those that (1) reduce emissions [e.g., those that reduce nitrous oxide (N2O) emissions by avoiding excess nitrogen (N) fertilizer application], and (2) increase soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks (e.g., by retaining instead of burning crop residues). Sugarcane is a globally important crop that can have substantial inputs of N fertilizer and which produces large amounts of crop residues ('trash'). Management of N fertilizer and trash affects soil carbon and nitrogen cycling, and hence GHG emissions. Trash has historically been burned at harvest, but increasingly is being retained on the soil surface as a 'trash

SUBMITTER: Meier EA 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4940410 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature