Collaborative Research: RII Track-2 FEC: Promoting N2O- and CO2-Relieved Nitrogen Fertilizers for Climate Change-Threatened Midwest Farming and Ranching

Iowa State University, Ames IA

Investigators

Abstract

With approximately 300 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide (CO2), nitrous oxide (N2O) contributes to 7% of U.S. greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions in 2020. 74% of N2O emissions come from agricultural fertilizer applications. Despite the strong link to fertilization, N2O emission remains to be a complex problem arising from scientific, technological, economical, ecological, and societal factors. This NSF EPSCoR FEC project brings together a multidisciplinary team of scientists from Iowa State University (ISU) and Wichita State University (WSU) to explore and examine green urea that could enable the paradigm shift of fertilization towards N2O- and CO2-relieved farming and ranching. This project has the potential to set the foundation of fostering collaborations and associations in both GHG N2O reduction and green fertilizer promotion across academia, government, industries, agriculture, and communities, therefore strengthening the sustained R&D capacity and competitiveness. While producing green fertilizers, the capture of waste nitrogen and CO2 will also help protect ecological and environmental systems in Midwest areas from being stressed by existing non-sustainable practices, ensuring longer-term economic thriving and prosperity. The distributed feature of green fertilizer technology holds great potential to create higher-wage jobs for local farming/ranching regions. The overarching objective of this collaborative project is to promote N2O- and CO2-relieved nitrogen fertilizers (green urea as the focus) with economic resilience and environmental consciousness as an innovative way to mitigate the challenges in Midwest farming and ranching communities. Two EPSCoR jurisdictions, ISU in Iowa and WSU in Kansas, will work side-by-side to channel concerted efforts into the following research themes: i) the advanced separation for waste nitrogen capture and product purification; ii) the innovative electrolysis for synthesizing green urea; iii) the synergistic investigation of nitrogen sensing, modeling, and fertilizer utilization; and iv) the societal examination for community acceptance and policy changes towards green fertilizers. The success of this project will enable an electro-manufacturing system powered by renewable energy to produce green nitrogen fertilizers that are fundamentally different from the current thermo-manufacturing processes that consume non-renewable fossil energy. The research outcome will lead to deep understanding of N2O emission, nitrate upcycling, urea synthesis, CO2 capture and conversion, and nitrogen fertilizer utilization in agriculture. It will also open a new avenue for new generations of technologies for N2O and nitrate sensing, anion-selective membrane, and efficient chemical manufacturing. Simultaneously, the project execution enhances research competitiveness and develops research capacity and infrastructure in Kansas and Iowa. Based on great synergy between Kansas and Iowa in shared common problems and united interest in agricultural prosperity, two EPSCoR universities will offer a unique educational platform that aims at raising general public awareness in the Midwest on nitrogen-cycle management, as well as training next-generation of workforce for sustainable agriculture. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.