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Nitrous oxide emissions and nitrate leaching from a rain-fed wheat-maize rotation in the Sichuan Basin, China

Plant and Soil volume 362, pages 149–159 (2013)Cite this article

Abstract

Aims

A 3-year field experiment (October 2004–October 2007) was conducted to quantify N2O fluxes and determine the regulating factors from rain-fed, N fertilized wheat-maize rotation in the Sichuan Basin, China.

Methods

Static chamber-GC techniques were used to measure soil N2O fluxes in three treatments (three replicates per treatment): CK (no fertilizer); N150 (300 kg N fertilizer ha−1 yr−1 or 150 kg N ha−1 per crop); N250 (500 kg N fertilizer ha−1 yr−1 kg or 250 kg N ha−1 per crop). Nitrate (NO −3 ) leaching losses were measured at nearby sites using free-drained lysimeters.

Results

The annual N2O fluxes from the N fertilized treatments were in the range of 1.9 to 6.7 kg N ha−1 yr−1 corresponding to an N2O emission factor ranging from 0.12 % to 1.06 % (mean value: 0.61 %). The relationship between monthly soil N2O fluxes and NO -3 leaching losses can be described by a significant exponential decaying function.

Conclusions

The N2O emission factor obtained in our study was somewhat lower than the current IPCC default emission factor (1 %). Nitrate leaching, through removal of topsoil NO −3 , is an underrated regulating factor of soil N2O fluxes from cropland, especially in the regions where high NO -3 leaching losses occur.

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Acknowledgments

This study was gratefully supported by the National Program on Key Basic Research Plan of China (Grant No. 2012CB417101), National Science & Technology Pillar Program (Grant No. 2011BAD31B03), Helmholtz-CAS Joint Laboratory ENTRANCE and the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 40901134). We sincerely thank Dr. Louise Barton of the University of Western Australia and Prof. Dr. Nicolas Brüggemann of the Institute of Bio- and Geosciences, Agrosphere (IBG-3) for their valuable comments to improve the quality of previous manuscript. Furthermore, we sincerely thank the staff at Yanting station for their support in the field measurements.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Mountain Environment Evolvement and Regulation, Institute of Mountain Hazards and Environment, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 610041, Chengdu, China

    Minghua Zhou, Bo Zhu, Tao Wang & Yanqiang Wang

  2. Institute for Meteorology and Climate Research, Atmospheric Environmental Research (IMK-IFU), Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, 82467, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany

    Minghua Zhou & Klaus Butterbach-Bahl

  3. State Key Laboratory of Atmospheric Boundary Layer Physics and Atmospheric Chemistry, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, 10083, Beijing, China

    Xunhua Zheng

Authors
  1. Minghua Zhou
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  2. Bo Zhu
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  3. Klaus Butterbach-Bahl
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  4. Xunhua Zheng
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  5. Tao Wang
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  6. Yanqiang Wang
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Correspondence to Bo Zhu.

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Responsible Editor: Ute Skiba.

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Zhou, M., Zhu, B., Butterbach-Bahl, K. et al. Nitrous oxide emissions and nitrate leaching from a rain-fed wheat-maize rotation in the Sichuan Basin, China. Plant Soil 362, 149–159 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-012-1269-5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11104-012-1269-5

Keywords

  • Nitrous oxide
  • Nitrate leaching
  • Rain-fed agriculture
  • Purple soil

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