TY - JOUR

T1 - High nitrous oxide emissions from temporary flooded depressions within croplands

AU - Elberling, Bo

AU - Kovács, Gyula M.

AU - Hansen, Hans Frederik E.

AU - Fensholt, Rasmus

AU - Ambus, Per

AU - Tong, Xiaoye

AU - Gominski, Dimitri

AU - Mueller, Carsten W.

AU - Poultney, Daniel M. N.

AU - Oehmcke, Stefan

N1 - Funding Information: This work is funded by The Danish National Research Foundation (CENPERM DNRF100) and the Pioneer Centre for Landscape Research in Sustainable Agricultural Futures (Land-CRAFT). Additional support came from two additional projects funded by the Independent Research Fund Denmark “Limiting NO emission from hot spots in Danish agricultural soils—linking crop roots and nitrate dynamics to develop new strategies to mitigate trace gasses” and “UV-stimulated nitrous oxide emissions, the ignored impact on atmospheric warming (UVwarm)”. Many thanks to farmers for allowing the work on private fields and to journal reviewers for very constructive revision comments. 2 Publisher Copyright: © 2023, The Author(s).

PY - 2023

Y1 - 2023

N2 - Nitrous oxide is an important greenhouse gas and emissions from managed ecosystems are directly correlated to anthropogenic nitrogen input. Here we have measured nitrous oxide emissions from flooded depressions within croplands and from incubated soil samples. We scaled emissions to >20,000 comparable flooded depressions across Zealand in Denmark using a deep-learning approach based on aerial photos and satellite images. We show that flooded depressions within cultivated fields, representing less than 1% of the total cultivated area, can release 80 times more nitrous oxide compared to rest of the fields. Fluxes can remain high for more than two months after fertilisation and can account for 30 ± 1% of the nitrous oxide budget during that period. This highlights the urgent need for assessment of nitrous oxide hotspots, as managing these hotspots appear to represent an important part of the overall greenhouse gas emissions from managed croplands and an efficient mitigation action.

AB - Nitrous oxide is an important greenhouse gas and emissions from managed ecosystems are directly correlated to anthropogenic nitrogen input. Here we have measured nitrous oxide emissions from flooded depressions within croplands and from incubated soil samples. We scaled emissions to >20,000 comparable flooded depressions across Zealand in Denmark using a deep-learning approach based on aerial photos and satellite images. We show that flooded depressions within cultivated fields, representing less than 1% of the total cultivated area, can release 80 times more nitrous oxide compared to rest of the fields. Fluxes can remain high for more than two months after fertilisation and can account for 30 ± 1% of the nitrous oxide budget during that period. This highlights the urgent need for assessment of nitrous oxide hotspots, as managing these hotspots appear to represent an important part of the overall greenhouse gas emissions from managed croplands and an efficient mitigation action.

U2 - 10.1038/s43247-023-01095-8

DO - 10.1038/s43247-023-01095-8

M3 - Journal article

AN - SCOPUS:85178966889

VL - 4

JO - Communications Earth and Environment

JF - Communications Earth and Environment

SN - 2662-4435

IS - 1

M1 - 463

ER -