Journal of Geographical Sciences >
Global prioritisation of renewable nitrogen for biodiversity conservation and food security
Author: Eisner Rowan, E-mail: re338@cam.ac.uk
Received date: 2017-02-20
Accepted date: 2017-09-15
Online published: 2018-11-20
Copyright
The continuing use of petrochemicals in mineral nitrogen (N) production may be affected by supply or cost issues and climate agreements. Without mineral N, a larger area of cropland is required to produce the same amount of food, impacting biodiversity. Alternative N sources include solar and wind to power the Haber-Bosch process, and the organic options such as green manures, marine algae and aquatic azolla. Solar power was the most land-efficient renewable source of N, with using a tenth as much land as wind energy, and at least 100th as much land as organic sources of N. In this paper, we developed a decision tree to locate these different sources of N at a global scale, or the first time taking into account their spatial footprint and the impact on terrestrial biodiversity while avoiding impact on albedo and cropland, based on global resource and impact datasets. This produced relatively few areas suitable for solar power in the western Americas, central southern Africa, eastern Asia and southern Australia, with areas most suited to wind at more extreme latitudes. Only about 2% of existing solar power stations are in very suitable locations. In regions such as coastal north Africa and central Asia where solar power is less accessible due to lack of farm income, green manures could be used, however, due to their very large spatial footprint only a small area of low productivity and low biodiversity was suitable for this option. Europe in particular faces challenges because it has access to a relatively small area which is suitable for solar or wind power. If we are to make informed decisions about the sourcing of alternative N supplies in the future, and our energy supply more generally, a decision-making mechanism is needed to take global considerations into account in regional land-use planning.
Key words: concentrated solar; ammonia synthesis; biofixation
Eisner ROWAN , SEABROOK Leonie , MCALPINE Clive . Global prioritisation of renewable nitrogen for biodiversity conservation and food security[J]. Journal of Geographical Sciences, 2018 , 28(11) : 1567 -1579 . DOI: 10.1007/s11442-018-1561-2
Table 1 Data sources used for mapping N source prioritisation. |
Variable | Reason for inclusion | Data | Threshold | Reference |
---|---|---|---|---|
Biodiversity | To assess impact | Ecoregional biodiversity indices | 0.1064 | Kier et al., 2009 |
Commercial cropland | Space constraint for N production | Cropland-yield gap | >20% | Monfreda et al., 2008 |
Green manure | Farm income to purchase fertilisers. Yield gap > area required to grow N | Yield gap | 0.513 | Monfreda et al., 2008 |
Sun | Most land efficient | DNI for concentrated solar NASA SWERE | 4.93 | NASA, 2011 Deign, 2012 |
Wind | Second most land efficient | NASA SSE | 5.5 ms-1 | NASA, 2005 Blankenhorn and Resch, 2014 |
Albedo | Solar power can contribute to global warming at high albedo sites | Albedo (1 month) | Reflectance values lowest 20% (albedo 0.35) | NASA Earth Observations, 2016 Nemet, 2009 |
Wetland rice | Azolla valuable N source, no land cost | Presence/absence | Salmon et al., 2015 | |
Aquaculture | Data not found | N.A. | ||
Seaweed | No land cost | Coastal zone | 40km | Natural Earth, 2016 |
Figure 1 Process for developing maps for selecting sources of N production most suitable at each location |
Figure 2 Decision matrix (a) and decision trees (b) for siting N sources |
Figure 3 Sites most suitable for solar power, and the location of existing solar power stations |
Figure 4 Sites most suitable for wind power. These are mostly at very high and very low latitudes. |
Figure 5 Locations suitable for organic nitrogen sources: green manures, seaweed and azolla |
Figure 6 Regions where it is preferable to import N rather than compete with crops or biodiversity, or where high biodiversity makes N production unsuitable |
Figure 7 Sources of N for cropping prioritised for biodiversity and cropland conservation. Solar is the most land-efficient option, but is highly suitable in relatively few regions due to completion with biodiversity or cropping or reducing the albedo of the site, contributing to global warming. Organics are very land inefficient for N production so are only suited for use on land with low productivity and low biodiversity. |
Figure 8 Three regions with a wide range of options for sourcing N, a) Caucasia and surrounding region, b) Japan, China, Koreas and c) Uruguay region. In contrast, Europe (d) has a paucity of options. Europe has little area highly suitable for solar or wind because of competing land use and biodiversity and lack of solar resource. The Sahara desert is not selected for solar power because the decrease in albedo would contribute to global warming. |
The authors have declared that no competing interests exist.
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