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Capturing the externalities: National and watershed scale damages from release of reactive nitrogen beyond the farm, factory, tailpipe and table
Citation:
Compton, J., D. Sobota, M. McCrackin, AND J. Harrison. Capturing the externalities: National and watershed scale damages from release of reactive nitrogen beyond the farm, factory, tailpipe and table. AGU, San Francisco, CA, December 15 - 19, 2014.
Impact/Purpose:
Human needs for food, fuel, and industrial products requires the intentional fixation of dinitrogen from the atmosphere, converting the nitrogen into forms that can be used by most plants and animals. Unfortunately, nitrogen is not completely used up in producing food, fuel and products, and approximately 60 percent of the fixed anthropogenic N leaks back into US air, land and waterways where it can cause respiratory problems, drinking water contamination, eutrophication and contribute to climate change and ozone depletion. EPA researcher Jana Compton along with former post-docs Dan Sobota and Michelle McCrackin and WSU faculty John Harrison tracked this leaked nitrogen into the environment in order to account for the damages to social, economic and environmental systems. For the US, annual damage costs of anthropogenic N leaked to the environment in 2000 totaled $289 billion USD, which is 2% of current Gross Domestic Product and is comparable to annual farm profits in the US. Over half of the damages were associated with fossil fuel combustion, because N released from those activities can cause respiratory illness that results in hospital visits and deaths. Damages associated with agriculture were $85.5 billion, largely through eutrophication and harmful effects on aquatic habitat. It is possible, however, to reduce these impacts by making tangible improvements in atmospheric emissions, agricultural N use and wastewater treatment. These actions could reduce N export to the coast by nearly 25% within 30 years, and would reduce the externalities associated with the leakage of N beyond its intended uses in agriculture, transportation and energy with limited harm to agriculture or technologies dependent on anthropogenic N fixation.
Description:
Human demand for food, fuel, and industrial products results in the release of 61% of newly fixed anthropogenic N to the environment in the US each year. This 15.8 Tg N yr-1 release to air, land and water has important social, economic and environmental consequences, yet little research clearly links this N release to the full suite of effects. Here we connect the biogeochemical fluxes of N with existing data on N-associated damages in order to quantify the externalities of N release related to human health, ecosystems and climate regulation for the US at national and watershed scales. Release of N to the environment was estimated circa 2000 with models describing N inputs by source, nutrient uptake efficiency, leaching losses, and gaseous emissions at the scale of 8-digit US Geologic Survey Hydrologic Unit Codes (HUC8s). We estimated annual damage cost ($USD in 2008 or as reported) of anthropogenic N leaked to the environment by scaling specific N fluxes with the costs associated with human health, agriculture, ecosystems, and the climate system. For the US, annual damage costs of anthropogenic N leaked to the environment in 2000 totaled $289 billion USD. Approximately 57% of the total damages were associated with fossil fuel combustion, driven by the human respiratory health impacts of NOx as a precursor of ozone and a component of particulates. Another 37% of the damage costs were associated with agricultural N. Damages associated with agriculture were $85.5 billion, largely through eutrophication and harmful effects on aquatic habitat. Through aggressive but tangible improvements in atmospheric emissions, agricultural N use and wastewater treatment, we could reduce N export to the coast by nearly 25% within 30 years. These improvements would reduce the externalities associated with the leakage of N beyond its intended uses in agriculture, transportation and energy without harm to agriculture or technologies dependent on anthropogenic N fixation.