Wood vinegar and biochar co-application mitigates nitrous oxide and methane emissions from rice paddy soil: A two-year experiment

Environ Pollut. 2020 Dec:267:115403. doi: 10.1016/j.envpol.2020.115403. Epub 2020 Sep 8.

Abstract

Both biochar (BC) and wood vinegar (WV) influence the nitrous oxide (N2O) and methane (CH4) emissions from agricultural systems. However, the impacts of BC and WV co-application on rice production, N2O and CH4 emissions are not well documented. We here conducted a two-year soil columns experiment with four treatments: WV (5 t WV ha-1), BC (7.5 t BC ha-1), WV + BC (5 t WV ha-1 +7.5 t BC ha-1) and a control (no treatment). The results showed that BC and WV + BC produced higher rice grain yield than the control by 14.1-15.9% in 2016 and by 4.1-5.2% in 2017, respectively. While WV increased rice grain yield by 11.2% in 2016, it had no significant influence on yield in 2017. Both WV and BC significantly mitigated N2O emissions by 22.4-41.8% in 2016 and 22.4-36.9% in 2017, respectively. Interestingly, WV + BC treatment showed the highest N2O mitigation efficiency, with a 52.9-62.8% mitigations in 2016 and 2017. Furthermore, the co-application of WV and BC significantly mitigated CH4 emissions by 42.6% in 2016 and 35.3% in 2017, respectively, while applying WV or BC alone had no annually-consistent mitigation effect on CH4 emissions. Overall, GWPt of rice growth cycle was most significantly suppressed by WV + BC with a 48.7-56.1% reduction, followed by WV and BC with 20.4-28.0% and 19.7-35.7% reductions, respectively. Consequently, the WV + BC treatment had the highest GHGI mitigation effect, averaging with 56.7% over two consecutive rice growth cycles. In conclusion, co-application of WV and BC is recommended for rice cultivation, which can both improve rice yield and minimize GHG emissions.

Keywords: Atmospheric environment; Biochar; GHGI; Greenhouse gases; Pyroligneous acid; Waste recycle and reuse.

MeSH terms

  • Acetic Acid
  • Agriculture
  • Charcoal
  • Methane
  • Methanol
  • Nitrous Oxide*
  • Oryza*
  • Soil

Substances

  • Soil
  • biochar
  • Charcoal
  • wood vinegar
  • Nitrous Oxide
  • Methane
  • Acetic Acid
  • Methanol