Plowing Carbon Into the Fields 467
OzPeter writes "A wheat farmer in Australia has eliminated adding fertilizer to his crop by the simple process of injecting the cooled diesel exhaust of his modified tractor into the ground when the wheat is being sown. In doing so he eliminates releasing carbon into the atmosphere and at the same time saves himself up to $500,000 (AUD) that would have been required to fertilize his 3,900 hectares in the traditional way. Yet his crop yields over the last two years have been at least on par with his best yields since 2001. The technique was developed by a Canadian, Gary Lewis of Bio Agtive, and is currently in trial at 100 farms around the world."
What (Score:2, Insightful)
Not that blowing it into the atmosphere is much better, but doesn't diesel exhaust contain all sorts of nasty toxins? If he's polluting his ground water then in a few years he'll have more to worry about than his dying crops..
Re: (Score:2)
Re:What (Score:5, Informative)
Not that blowing it into the atmosphere is much better, but doesn't diesel exhaust contain all sorts of nasty toxins?
I don't recall the exact exhaust gas composition, but in my younger days working at a research lab we participated in a series of animal studies on diesel exhaust. You could pump a lot of diesel exhaust through lab animals without any serious side effects. Some of the high dose groups had lungs that looked like they had been smoking, but none of them died from toxins in the exhaust. I don't remember there being any statistical correlation to cancers or cell differentiation, either. But that was a long time ago.
My vague memory of the conclusions were that you breath a lot of diesel exhaust without harmful side effects, although the particulates would keep your pulmonary macrophage in business.
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
My vague memory of the conclusions were that you breath a lot of diesel exhaust without harmful side effects, although the particulates would keep your pulmonary macrophage in business.
We can mandate that in our next economic stimulus plan.
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Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I can't believe this unsupported crap got modded up. Citation Needed.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Not sure what diesel engines you've been dealing with, but I've never seen one without a throttle. Tractors most certainly do, changing gears is one methods of changing speeds of course, but the most certainly do have throttles in many if not all cases of engines aren't bottom of the barrel as cheap as it gets.
Even without a throttle they don't burn perfectly, ever. Its used to limit the air and fuel entering the combustion chamber. If done properly it
Re:What (Score:4, Informative)
Not sure what diesel engines you've been dealing with, but I've never seen one without a throttle.
A diesel engine receives fuel based on RPM and, you hope, load. The pedal in the car controls the maximum position of a governor which controls maximum fuel delivery. As the engine approaches this speed (as output meets load) the fuel delivery decreases until a given RPM is reached. Or in the words of a pedant, a diesel has an accelerator pedal, but no throttle. In a carbureted vehicle the throttle controls both air and fuel delivery directly. In fuel-injected gasoline vehicles, the pedal usually controls an intake restrictor butterfly valve, and a throttle position sensor which instructs the computer (in unison with the oxygen sensor.) Diesels should have as much intake air as possible.
Even without a throttle they don't burn perfectly, ever.
True.
If done properly it simply results in less than the maximum amount entering the combustion chamber. With fuel injection engines it should not result in an improper ration of air to fuel, just less of both.
In both fuel injected and carbureted engines you err on the side of richness, and during closed loop operation (e.g. cruising, idle, deceleration, or mild acceleration) the mixture continually bounces to either side of rich and lean. The catalytic converter smooths out the rich and lean spots before they become emissions, because it swings back and forth several times a second.
You think all that black you see pooring out of the engine under high load is CO? No.
No, that's partly those PAHs and partly unburned hydrocarbons, one of the primary bad guys when it comes to emissions. The NOx output of diesels is only significant in the aggregate; it's higher than that of typical gasoline-powered vehicles. Biodiesel has more NOx, but less CO. Nitric oxides are a major component of acid rain.
in smaller quantities its not a problem, the body deals with carbon monoxide in our atmosphere by simply replacing the cells that have been rendered useless by carbon monoxide.
but I was using those.
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
A petrol engine has a throttle that restricts the flow of air into the engine, because the air and fuel must be mixed in a precise ratio for the engine to run. A diesel engine doesn't have this - the air intake is wide open all the time. To control the engine power, you only turn up or down the amount of fuel injected. At all times there's an excess of air, unless you're massively overfuelling in which case you get smelly black smoke and poor performance.
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http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1566471/
Our meta-analysis of the low-exposure data in rats does not support a lung cancer risk for DEP exposure at nonoverload conditions.
Effects on fetus development are less well understood. Development of tumors in humans routinely exposed to diesel exhaust had not, at that time, been corrected for secondary environmental conditions (like smoking and air quality). Those studies may have been updated since then.
The rodents in our experiments got a lot o
Re:Overpopulation (Score:5, Interesting)
(Currently, California has no additional land for farming or ranching to meet the needs of the ballooning population.)
California has plenty of land for farming. All along the back of the Sierra Nevada there is a huge valley full of decent land; the problem is water. All the water is being diverted into LA for drinking. If LA starts getting their water from the ocean, then we can begin to grow stuff there. The foothills would be another potential place to start growing, if the water were there. Also, if we really need to, we can switch from crops like almonds to crops like wheat or oats.
Wait. Now, you ask, "How will banning immigration help?"
Anti-immigration laws are like the war on drugs: neither one works. You may not realize it, but after drugs, one of the best sources of income for organized crime is human-trafficking: sneaking poor people into rich countries. If you continue to support anti-immigration laws, you will continue to support violence, human exploitation, and all the other problems that come with organized crime. There is no way to stop it. The only thing to do is legalize it.
People who worry about overpopulation don't realize that if we increase women's rights and reduce poverty in developing nations, the problem will take care of itself.
Re:Overpopulation (Score:4, Insightful)
Anti-immigration laws are like the war on drugs: neither one works. You may not realize it, but after drugs, one of the best sources of income for organized crime is human-trafficking: sneaking poor people into rich countries. If you continue to support anti-immigration laws, you will continue to support violence, human exploitation, and all the other problems that come with organized crime. There is no way to stop it. The only thing to do is legalize it.
All you need to do to end it is require proof of citizenship(that's actaully checked out) to get hired in this country. Then charge companies who don't comply with rico laws (sieze their assests etc) . This will never happen since companies make too much money off the backs of illegal immigrants working for less than minimum wage.
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I would agree with you except I've known too many immigrants who've gotten fake social security cards, id's and all the papers a normal person would need to work in the US. Doing what you suggest would only make it a little harder. Just like drugs, which is actively persecuted.
Getting a fake is easy. Actually getting a real SSN that traces back to person who isn't dead is a little harder. A simple background check would eliminate a lot of the fakes.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I know some people who work in fast foods and hire a fair number of immigrants. Why? At the amount is he allowed by management to pay them, he can't get Americans with a work ethic to apply for the job. But it keeps the hamburgers cheap.
Anyway, first time he got a bad Soc card (I think they actually mis-spelled security on it) he brought it to his boss and asked him what to do about it. Boss said "I'm not trained in identifying legitimate social security cards, are you?" and told him to put down that they p
Re:Overpopulation (Score:4, Interesting)
Well, self-service is a gain, IMHO. I avoid filling up in Weymouth, MA, and I fill up right before entering Jersey. Why? "Full Service" is no longer full-service staffed by entry-level mechanics or senior mechanics manning the pumps during slow times; it's now mouth breathers, and NOT full service. They don't clean your windshield, check your fluids, or the air pressure in your tires. What they do is top off the tank, keep clicking the pump until they can't get any more in (often times damaging your charcoal canister), scratch your paint, and be rude to you. Why should I pay a premium to damage my car?
In SOME rare cases a "loss" in service is actually a net gain. I'd rather get out, fill it myself, taking care to not overfill, not scratch the paint, and clean the window without leaving streaks, and clean the back window if it needs it. The ONLY drawbacks are my hands smelling like gasoline for a short while, and dealing with cold in the winter.
Now, if "full service" were the full service that used to be in place through the '70s, I'd agree.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
All you need to do to end it is require proof of citizenship(that's actaully checked out) to get hired in this country. Then charge companies who don't comply with rico laws (sieze their assests etc) . This will never happen since companies make too much money off the backs of illegal immigrants working for less than minimum wage.
This is how it is in this country (DK), and it hasn't stopped illegal immigration. It beats me how anyone can live in DK without a CPR (roughly eq. to US social security number), yet it is a well-known fact that it happens. Besides, I don't think a democratic population could live without allowing some kind of immigation/emmigration; e.g. in the case of marriage.
Re:Overpopulation (Score:5, Insightful)
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Re:Overpopulation (Score:4, Insightful)
Dude, I'm French and even by trying the legal way (visa lottery) I didn't get anything. Even if I had the chance to be picked by the computer, it would have taken two years before I would have been allowed to move to the USA. Fortunately being European if I want to move to a decent country I can just move to some place like Ireland (which I did).
Mexicans aren't even eligible to that visa lottery thing. That doesn't leave them a lot of solutions, unless they've got close family in the USA. Immigration law in the USA is completely absurd, and it makes illegals because it leaves so many people without any legal solution.
Think about it, a hundred years ago all you had to do was show up at Ellis Island and if you didn't have tuberculosis you were in. Now you can be Australian or English and if you manage to get in you live under the permanent threat of deportation for no good reason.
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The people that are being trafficked are not the poor, but the wealthy and/or middle classed people. After all, you have to have enough money to pay the traffickers (well, the women can work as sex slaves, but other than that...). Do you think some peasant from Zaire (or whatever it's being called these days) has enough money to get himself shipped to America, when he's l
Re:Overpopulation (Score:5, Insightful)
Here's how it works: all the family pools their money together to make the downpayment. The price varies depending on where they come from. Mexico will run around $2000 to $5000 but a trip from China will cost $20,000. Of course a Chinese peasant can't pay all that at once, so they come to America, and work, and pay it off while they are here. Of course it takes time, but they pay it off, otherwise something might happen to their family back at home.
So yes, poor people are the ones who get snuck into the US. Middle class/rich people usually have no desire to come here, at least not the ones I've talked to.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Middle class/rich people usually have no desire to come here
I second this. My wife's American and so for family reasons we moved to the US. Didn't like and so we moved on to Canada. Still close enough for family visits but with decent public education, health care and less toxic politics (only downside is that the border is pain in the buttocks).
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People have 14 kids because that way at least some of them are likely to survive to continue the line and take care of their parents in their old age. Population growth usually levels off once medicine reaches the level where surviving to adulthood is the rule rather than exception, and social services provide for you whether you have children or not.
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Perhaps Islam is, and Catholicism was, and maybe Mormon is still just a little bit, but if you read the New Testament you'll see that the first person who saw Christ resurrected was a woman. What is notable about that? A woman was not considered to be a credible witness in Roman-occupied Israel.If someone were to make up the story, he'd have chosen a man to be the witness, not a woman.
Also, it's worth noting that the feminist movement here in America didn't st
Re:Overpopulation (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Overpopulation (Score:4, Funny)
While I respect your modest proposal [wikipedia.org], I've always felt that human flesh to be a bit gamey. Even as a zombie I still prefer chicken.
Comment removed (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Earth: What Are We Saving It For? (Score:4, Insightful)
Do you really want to spend the last years of your life in an old farts' home, watching Coronation Street, waiting to die? Fuck that!
If that's your idea of "retirement", just pull the f*ing plug now and spare us your waste of oxygen.
Actually that's your idea of retirement, it certainly doesn't have to be that way and thats not just a question of money. It's not a bad thing to allow people to work beyond pensionable age if they wish too maybe volunteer work could be better than shifts in Macdonald's, finance shouldn't be the reason. Thats a key point at that age you should be able to decide what you want to do with your life and watching coronation st isn't an aim.
I've come close to dying twice this year I got out of hospital on Friday and the last thing I want is to die anytime soon. I have a lot more living to do yet. There is no good reason why I can't be doing pretty much the same range of activities in my 60's and beyond that I am capable of now. I'm a bit more focused on living and getting healthier knowing that I am only alive today thanks to modern medicine. Thirty years ago I would have died about 4 months ago.
Odds of my making it to retirement are a bit piss poor to be honest, however there is no reason to quit just yet.
Quit smoking eat less, fats especially , keep active mentally and physically and then you might get the choice of sitting in your slippers watching coronation st - you probably still wouldn't want to.
It's strange to me that 90% of the things we can buy to eat today damage us so that by the time we hit retirement age we are about ready to croak. You don't think about this till the damage is done usually but it doesn't have to be this way. It is possible to make healthier choices and thats whats going to save you from Coronation st.
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I smoked for 30 years and quitting in the end was easy. In all that time I reckon I quit for a fortnight and I quit for 2 Months.
On the 18th of July at about 6:45 I had a coronary I was strong but unfit and thats when I smoked my last cigarette waiting for an Ambulance. I probably wouldn't have smoked it had I known what was going on.
Smoking narrows the arteries and that makes it easier for blood clots to lodge and block the arteries. If the artery is feeding the heart muscle then the starvation of oxygenat
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Suppose that humankind made a concerted attempt to voluntarily produce less children. Our population declines from 6 billion to 3 billion. Then, humankind does not need so much food and so much energy. The farmer in this thread of discussion can shutdown his farm and engage in another activity.
Brilliant idea, but it falls flat due to one simple reason: evolution. Whoever doesn't go with this, whoever produces more children than they should, for whatever reason as long as it is affected by genes at least a bit, will have an evolutionary advantage.
So, whatever you do to reduce population growth, evolution will counter it. Those that were "resistant" to you method of population control will prosper and spread their "resistant" genes. Absent-minded, careless and/or uncaring people are resistant to bi
Wealth and Population: Article by "The Economist" (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I seem to recall something like 2/3 of the Earth's land cannot currently be used for crops because of salt. Enter desalination(plenty of water on the Earth) and gen
Re:Wealth and Population: Article by "The Economis (Score:4, Informative)
I found the article by "The Economist". The article debunks the claim that increasing wealth results in a decreasing population. The implications for excessive population growth are alarming.
You didn't find an article that backs your assertion. There are at least two effects to note. First, high HDI countries (which boils down to high GDP per capita countries) tend to have high immigration by more fertile populations from low HDI countries. Second, that hypothetical increased fertility rate is spread over a longer period (ie, people having children later) which results in lower population growth.
Re:Wealth and Population: Article by "The Economis (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
I don't use to feed trolls, but Picasso was a spaniard, born in Malaga (Andalucía).
Also, most of the third world is not catholic nor christian. Examples: the whole islamic world, India and China.
Was World War II really the worst? (Score:3, Interesting)
The most gruesome war ever, the IIWW, left 65 million dead
Was World War II really the -worst- war ever? Sure, in terms of numbers, it may seem that way, but if we turn to the Islamic expansion, or, any of the conquests of ancient times, we find entire civilizations and cultures were simply evaporated. After World War II, Germans were still predominantly German speaking and Christian (except for what was once called East Prussia), but, after the Islamic conquest of Egypt, the native tongue was completely e
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
Then come and tell me about a 'bunch of pussies'.
I've read about the Eastern Front quite a bit, actually, and I still say Caesar would have called Hitler's Germany Army a bunch of pussies. I'm just saying this because, well, Julius Caesar was well, a pretty tough guy.
Compare the two in France:
Hitler raised an army of three million men with which he first conquered France, before the war. Caesar did it with not more than 80,000, and he openly bragged that he killed a million gauls to do it, and all he had
Re:What if we had a big ass war... (Score:4, Interesting)
Are you off on your overpopulation maunderings again?
The world isn't overpopulated. It is likely that most of the parts of the world you think are overpopulated (with the notable exceptions of China and India) have lower population densities than the parts you think are not overpopulated.
If the world were overpopulated, we've already proved out a simple, humane solution to the problem - raise everyone's standard of living to that of the USA and Western Europe. Then birthrates will fall naturally to low enough levels that population will decline.
Course, in that case, there's not yet any reason to believe that the population decline will STOP, but that's a problem for another day.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
You've obviously not spent a lot of time looking at US Census data. Excluding immigration (and the related reproduction - immigrants don't tend to live at the standard of living of the US and Western Europe for several generations), US population has been on the decline for the last several decades.
Re:What (Score:5, Informative)
Look at all these carcinogens
All in extremely low quantities and most of which are filtered out/ broken down by modern DPF [wikipedia.org] and/or SCR. [wikipedia.org]
Diesel is not the dirty thing of yesteryear. Reports of hazardous exhaust is greatly exaggerated and outdated. Basically the only thing that comes out of the tailpipe is CO2 and H2O.
And yes I am a diesel emissions engineer.
Ok, so how is this not BS? (Score:4, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Well those nitrogen compounds being depleted is why he has to pay $500,000 for fertilizer.
But you're right that this does absolutely nothing for reducing CO2 emissions.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, except for that assuming it really saves him that much fertilizer, then the fertilizer won't have to be produced, transported and handled. How much energy is used in that process?
That being said, it sounds too good to be true.
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Re:Ok, so how is this not BS? (Score:5, Interesting)
Depends on the soil. If the soil is alkaline then the carbonic acid (which will form very easily and quickly if the soil isn't bone dry) will react and take the CO2 out.
Re:Ok, so how is this not BS? (Score:5, Insightful)
I too am calling bullshit on this entire idea. There is simply not enough exhaust to do anything like what was claimed.
No matter how you work the chemical reactions, the amount of diesel required to plow a field combined with the air of combustion will never equal the amount of CO2 and nitrogen found in the proper amount of fertilizer. By sheer weight of the components alone you can deduce this is nonsense.
Plants do consume CO2. Merely plowing under his crop, or the chaff thereof would sequester come CO2, perhaps as long as the next growing season.
Sooner or later you have to add something back in, or plant some other crop that fixes nitrogen or you deplete the soil. His experiment hasn't run long enough to even account for changes in weather, let alone long term damage to the fields.
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It's great but (Score:3, Interesting)
If he can really go without fertilizer in the long term, then it may also help with the human impacts on the nitrogen cycle [wikipedia.org].
What kind of fuel non-efficiency is he getting (Score:2)
1100 Kg of air per hectare... (Score:2)
Someone a few posts lower linked to a blog with more info. It says "Mr Lewis calculates a zero-till rig will put 1100 kilograms of air through the tractor engine to work a hectare."
I still don't see how this works, but I'm sure enough people will test it eventually.
Re: (Score:2)
> I still don't see how this works, but I'm sure enough people will test it eventually.
This was done in a far off place. Australia. You and I can't afford go there and watch, and can't be sure of what he put on the field.
It was developed by someone in yet another country. Canada. Why wasn't it tested in Canada?
So we have the experiment performed in a place where it can't be verified, and developed in a place where it wasn't even tested.
Brilliant. Now lets make the infomercial and get down to business.
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Resident expert (Score:5, Funny)
Having absolutely no experience with any farming techniques, any real knowledge of the chemical composition of cooled diesel exhaust or even having read the article, I still somehow feel confident enough to give a vague denouncement of this farming technique.
AHEM.
This will never work because the gas will escape/it will poison the ground/I am so much smarter than whoever came up with this.
Thank you, thank you. Love ya Slashdot. Never change.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
I am no expert in chemistry or toxicology, so that take my comment with heaps of salt
The major composition of emission(CO, CO2, NO2, SO2 gases) will no way get collected during condensation. The condensed liquid/solid will contain all sort of hydrocarbons with various amounts of nitrogen, sulfur and their oxides. It should be an interesting mixture/tar (which I am not really sure will be consistent), which is very likely to not fall under any category of pos
It is funny (Score:4, Interesting)
It seems to be these days that there are a lot of people that can't possibly believe there are any ecological solutions that don't involve the massive reduction in human emissions. When the talk is about global warming and reducing carbon output, they are on board and scream "You aren't a scientist, you have to listen to the scientists!" to anyone who questions it. However, when scientists have any other solution, one that DOESN'T involve an emission reduction, they get pissed off, and denounce those scientists. Suddenly they are experts in all the reasons that must be wrong.
A good example of this is what has happened with the new book Super Freakonomics. Levitt does the same thing he does in the original Freakonomics of stripping away morality from various issues and applying economics. His original book drew ire from conservative types because it presented a convincing argument that legalized abortion has lead to a reduction in crime, but liberal types were generally ok with it.
Well, now he's become someone high up on the enemies list because in Super Freakonomics he analyzes the economics of combating global arming through geoengineering methods, rather than reducing emissions. Note that he doesn't say it isn't real or isn't a problem, just looks at different solutions as being more economically feasible. Yet that has drawn massive ire from the environmentalist types.
It just seems to be an article of faith these days that the only thing good for the environment is to use less. Any solutions that involves anything else is shouted down. This being the same sort of thing. People point to science as the ultimate bastion of truth... so long as what it shows agrees with their world view. Any time something contrary comes out, all of a sudden they are the experts instead of the scientists.
Re:It is funny (Score:4, Insightful)
um no. But it does seem "these days" that more and more people who, despite obviously knowing fuck all about science or how evidence bound scientific inquiry functions, nonetheless feel entitled to pontificate endlessly on whatever heavily scientifically related subject they like in total blissful, laughable ignorance.
Re:It is funny (Score:4, Informative)
There was a critique of the chapter in Super Freakonomics on realclimate.org:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/10/why-levitt-and-dubner-like-geo-engineering-and-why-they-are-wrong/ [realclimate.org]
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/10/an-open-letter-to-steve-levitt/ [realclimate.org]
I think it's worth reading.
Anyway, I don't believe any geo-engineering solution will help combat GW, for a simple reason: conservation of energy. Fossil fuels are so important because we can use energy at faster rate than we could obtain it from the sun (their EROI is higher), because it has been accumulating for millions years. So any solution to CO2 reduction different from plain reduction of fossil fuel usage will have to ultimately convert excess CO2 somehow, and this will cost same amount of energy (or more) as it would just use a renewable resource (which there is ultimately only one, the Sun) for energy. Basically, the problem is that the rate at which we consume energy is not sustainable; we will have to match our rate to that of what we can get from the Sun.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Hydroelectric power sort of depends on the sun to evaporate the water involved (that's where the water gets the potential energy it has, the sun does the initial work against gravity, and then later we harvest that energy).
Correct - the sun is the source of the energy.
I'm not sure about tidal, but I think the sun is at least involved in the tides.
No, it's the moon. The source was the supernova explosion that gave rise to the solar system, and kinetic/potential energy to the earth-moon system.
The winds also get their energy primarily from the sun.
Correct.
Geothermal is probably not dependent on the sun.
Correct - this time the energy comes from heating caused by radioactive decay of elements (and their decay products) created in the supernova explosion.
Questions (Score:2)
Fertilizer is nitrogen and phosphorus. Exhaust is carbon and oxygen. Can one pair really be replaced by the other?
What keeps the injected CO2 from leaking back out?
Why doesn't the CO2 in the air already do the same thing?
I suspect bad journalism (Score:2)
I think it has more to do with the NOx from the exhaust. Not that I have any clue how nitrous oxide could be made into something useful like niter by pumping it into the ground. My issue is that this article claims it has something to do with carbon, which makes even less sense.
Most journalists are worse at science than I am.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
As to the other contaminants, there are already put in the ground. Those that sink in the air will simply land on the ground and soak in. IOW, injecting this in the ground, PRO
Re:I suspect bad journalism (Score:5, Informative)
Re:I suspect bad journalism (Score:4, Insightful)
I believe that the previous poster may have made the same brilliant intellectual leap that I independently made, and went to the Company's web page.
There you will find a video:
http://www.bioagtive.com/index.php?p=0&videoID=852 [bioagtive.com]
that is full of fascinating information about the process, and explains it much more coherently than 4th person version of the events that we get from Slashdot's summary.
Re:Questions (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Questions (Score:4, Informative)
Fertilizer is nitrogen and phosphorus. Exhaust is carbon and oxygen. Can one pair really be replaced by the other?
"The exhaust gases are believed to stimulate microbial activity and root growth, allowing the plants to more efficiently extract nutrient and moisture from the soil."
What keeps the injected CO2 from leaking back out?
"The system relies on attraction between negatively-charged ions in the gases and the soil’s positively charged alkaline component to hold the gases in the soil, as well as sealing it in."
http://abovecapricorn.blogspot.com/2009/10/soil-carbon-may-come-from-tractor.html [blogspot.com]
Typical (Score:4, Insightful)
So few facts, so many opinions.
It can't possibly be enough... (Score:2, Redundant)
Let's ignore for the moment the problem that carbon isn't fertilizer.
He can't possibly be getting enough exhaust to make a difference. There's just not enough carbon in the tank of Diesel to make a difference when spread across the field in the amounts he burns it during tilling/planting.
As much as we talk about carbon emissions, the exhaust coming out of his equipment is barely changed from what went in. If pumping in the exhaust from his equipment had a noticeable effect, then pumping in twice as much jus
Re:It can't possibly be enough... (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
No scientists in this story, only farmers.
As to these bacteria you speak of, they are going to be in bad shape due to the presence of massive amounts of oxygen in this exhaust due to the incomplete combustion typical of Diesels (they do not have throttle plates, and thus do not burn all the oxygen drawn in unless operated at full throttle).
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No, it doesn't contain a ton of NOx. The NOx in Diesel exhaust, high as it may be for vehicle exhaust, can be measured in the parts per million.
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No, it doesn't contain a ton of NOx. The NOx in Diesel exhaust, high as it may be for vehicle exhaust, can be measured in the parts per million.
While that's undoubtedly true, it doesn't actually convey much useful information. After all, the silicon content of a wafer as delivered to a chip plant "can be measured in the parts per million," too.
(Hint: It's really, really close to 1,000,000 ppm.)
My guess is that NOx content of diesel exhaust is in the tens or hundreds of ppm and is therefore not comparable to the usable N content of fertilizer, but you didn't tell me that.
It's not bunk, just unexplained (Score:3, Interesting)
You're right that NOx is a tiny fraction of the output, still N2 makes up over 75% of the fumes. It is thought diesel particulates can act as microscopic sponges and help soil absorbtion of nitrogen and other compounds. Still, little is known as to why this works which is why it is in a controlled trial development stage so scientists can study it. They've found reduced soil pH, increased nitrogen absorbtion and other good things, so the question isn't if it works but why it works.
Another thing for Mythbusters? (Score:3, Funny)
What a load of bunk. Let's see if Mythbusters would be willing to bust this myth.
Re:Another thing for Mythbusters? (Score:4, Funny)
They'll just blow up the tractor and use a photo-spectrometer to measure the emissions.
If it can't be blown up, then it don't belong on Mythbusters.
Making Local Fertalizer (Score:4, Insightful)
I think the argument to this mechanism is that he is providing an extra carbon source for the nitrogen fixers natively present in the soil. These bacteria convert N2 into ammonia, which can then be absorbed by the plants. Essentially drives the nitrogen cycle more quickly than would occur otherwise. Alternatives in place are to do alternate plantings with plants that have rhizobiums such as legumes.
As to the people saying this is not carbon neutral, I think you should read up on the Haber-bosch process - how ammonia is made for fertilizer. Unlike microbes which can do this at room temperature and pressure, it takes something like 400 C at several times Earth's pressure. This is a very expensive process, and cutting down ammonia production will save a lot of energy.
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
Synthesizing nitrogen is very expensive (in energy and in monetary price). If this exhaust idea worked you can be sure farmers would snatch it up. Unfortunately it is snake oil. AFAIK, there is no serious study showing any effect.
Using legumes to fixate nitrogen is something that *does* work and farmers are happy to do so if there is a market for the crop (we grow yellow peas as much as reasonably possible). Because organic farmers can get a premium for their other crops, they sometimes grow legumes purely
The Canadian story ... (Score:5, Informative)
Re:The Canadian story ... (Score:5, Informative)
Makers tout exhaust as nutrient, despite critics
http://www.agweek.com/articles/index.cfm?article_id=13745&property_id=41 [agweek.com]
Recycled tractor exhaust appears to improve farmland: farmer
http://www.cbc.ca/canada/manitoba/story/2007/08/28/tractor-emissions.html [www.cbc.ca]
Tractor exhaust fertilization system causing dispute
http://www.minotdailynews.com/page/content.detail/id/514706.html?nav=5010&showlayout=0 [minotdailynews.com]
What a bunch of Bullshit (Score:2, Informative)
Re:What a bunch of tractor exhaust (Score:2)
I agree with the junk science bit. As for the price of fertilizer, it's highly variable and is doubtlessly different across the world, depending on the price of natural gas usually, or shipping costs if it's imported. Given that two seasons ago in Alberta, Canada our fertilizer bill was about $200k for 2500 irrigated acres (this season was about $100k), it's not inconceivable that prices could double, triple, or even quadruple, depending on oil prices. Not sure what kind of farm you have, but if it's hig
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
I don't know which part of Canada you farm in but we probably spend more than that figure. It comes out to 52 $/acre. Using some spring 2009 prices: 60 lbs/acre of N, 25 lbs of P2O5, and 9 lbs of K comes to about 59 $/acre.
If that exhaust system worked it would be nice. Unfortunately there are no studies that show that it does. Probably the manufacturers are making out okay at $40,000 per system. Hmm.
Re: (Score:2)
The fertilizing conspiracy explains EVERYTHING, even the alien abductions we've been hearing about for decades.
I am amazed at some of the replies. (Score:3, Interesting)
This approach makes good sense ASSUMING that you are using a diesel tractor. I am guessing that this will be the norm in another 5 years.
Plough (Score:2, Offtopic)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, increasingly we don't plough or plow in Australia as a large proportion of dryland agriculture has shifted to no till / direct drill. Which has massively improved soil health.
A consequence of which is that injecting exhaust would be difficult for many arable farmers here.
Incidentally, I lived for a number of years within a few miles of where this guy is. In that region generally no nitrogen fertiliser is used and phosphorous is a) only applied every couple of years or so, and b) generally applie
Something very wrong here. (Score:2)
The second problem with this FTA, it that fertiliser does not cost $1200 a tonne.
unless TFA is grossly wrong, this sounds a lot like the "magnetic water" bullshit sold to people.
Coal fire power plants (Score:2)
We have a lot of coal power here in Victoria, Australia and I have long thought that instead of pumping it straight up into the atmosphere we should pump it sideways into huge glasshouses. They could be built as automated food factories because the air in there would not be healthy for humans. The gas venting at the far end should have much less CO2 than when it goes in.
Won't do (Score:3, Insightful)
I don't buy it (Score:4, Insightful)
Doing the math, he's claiming that he saves on about 400 tons of fertilizer for a 3900 hectare farm by pumping roughly 4,000 tons of diesel exhaust into the soil. At a glance, most of this is water, carbon dioxide, and carbon monoxide. There's a little bit of nitrogen oxides and sulfur. But I don't see the advantage. I'm wondering, if he's getting some nitrogen and other elements from the death of necessary fauna in his soil. That is, he might be getting a couple of good years of crops by killing off most of his earthworms, nematodes, and other animals in the soil who would be poisoned by excess CO2 and CO levels.
Re:Diesel exhaust in your bread? (Score:4, Insightful)
Considering this stuff normally goes into the air and can be brought back down by rainfall... it probably is already in your bread.
Re:Diesel exhaust in your bread? (Score:5, Insightful)
massive outbreaks say otherwise (Score:2)
And they actually use that stuff to grow food. I mean it's the feces of animals, and they're dumping it on our food to make it grow. But somehow the food is okay and safe to eat. http://www.google.com/search?&q=Salmonella+Contamination [google.com]
Spinach, romaine lettuce, pistachios, peanuts, tomatoes, onion sprouts, cantaloupes, alfalfa sprouts, and that's when I stopped looking around page 2-3.
Funny definition of "okay and safe to eat."
BS (Score:5, Funny)
Have you even seen what's in pig, chicken, cow, and sheep manure?
Bullshit.
Re: (Score:2)
You joke, but plants do take up toxins and put them in food. Arsenic and lead in the soil isn't exactly a good thing. Dioxins are also present in diesel exhaust. Are any of those in pig manure in appreciable amounts?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
Read the thread to see why your complaint about nitrogen isn't valid. You can't make up for your slight knowledge of the subject by more aggressively declaring yourself correct.
Re: (Score:2)
1) Pollution by releasing unauthorized elements- never mind that larger corporates do it all the time.
Ok, yes, people and businesses can be fined for dumping certain chemicals.
2) Poisoning the food deliberately- never mind the frequent salmonella outbreaks are because of unsafe corporate practices.
Could you give an example of this?
3) Conspiracy against State - with a view to reduce tax income from corporates by using alternate stuff - ???
Could you give an example of this?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Okay, I'm game.
Let's see... It would prevent haphazard release of CO2 into the atmosphere during periods where it is not needed, and perhaps even destructive, and will be slowly be taken out of the environment by natural processes. Thus, allowing us the luxury of controlled release of the CO2 when it can be the most beneficial.