From Kansas State University, dueling statements, which I’ve highlighted in bold. Its the same sort of nonsense argument we here for Carbon Dioxide, that while essential for all life on the planet, it is also a pollutant. I see a nitrogen tax in our future if this nutty idea takes hold. – Anthony
Global nitrogen availability consistent for past 500 years, linked to carbon levels
MANHATTAN — A Kansas State University research team has found that despite humans increasing nitrogen production through industrialization, nitrogen availability in many ecosystems has remained steady for the past 500 years. Their work appears in the journal Nature.
“People have been really interested in nitrogen in current times because it’s a major pollutant,” said Kendra McLauchlan, assistant professor of geography and director of the university’s Paleoenvironmental Laboratory. “Humans are producing a lot more nitrogen than in the past for use as crop fertilizer, and there is concern because excess levels can cause damage. The mystery, though, is whether the biosphere is able to soak up this extra nitrogen and what that means for the future.”
Nitrogen is a key component of the ecosystem and the largest regulator of plant growth. It determines how much food, fuel and fiber the land can produce. It also determines how much carbon dioxide plants remove from the atmosphere, and it interacts with several components of the climate system. Excessive amounts of nitrogen in ecosystems contribute to global warming and impairment of downstream ecosystems.
McLauchlan worked with Joseph Craine, research assistant professor in biology; Joseph Williams, postdoctoral research associate; and Elizabeth Jeffers, postdoctoral research associate at the University of Oxford. The team published their findings, “Change
s in global nitrogen cycling during the Holocene epoch,” in the current issue of Nature.
In the study the team also looked at how nitrogen availability changed thousands of years ago.
Roughly 15,000 years ago, the Earth began to warm, melting many glaciers and ice sheets that covered the landscape. Researchers found that Earth experienced an 8,000-yearlong decline in nitrogen availability as temperatures rose and carbon and nitrogen became locked up in soils. According to researchers, how the nitrogen cycle responded to these ancient global changes in carbon dioxide could be a glimpse into the future.
“What happened in the past might be a dry run for Earth’s future,” Craine said. “By looking at what happened millennia ago, we can see what controlled and prevented changes in nitrogen availability. This helps us understand and predict how things will change in the future.”
The team collected and analyzed data from the sediment records of 86 lakes scattered across six continents. The lakes were distributed between tropical and temperate zones. With the data, the team was able to compare past and present cycling in various regions.
Researchers found that once most of the glaciers and ice sheets had melted around 11,000 years ago, the Earth continued to experience a global decline in nitrogen that lasted another 4,000 years.
“That was one of the really surprising findings,” Craine said. “As the world was getting warmer and experiencing higher carbon dioxide levels than it had in the past, just like we are currently experiencing, the ecosystems were starting to lock carbon in the soils and in plants, also like we are seeing today. That created a long decline in nitrogen availability, and it scrubbed nitrogen out of the atmosphere.”
McLauchlan said the most surprising finding, however, was that although humans have nearly doubled the amount of nitrogen to the ecosystems, globally nitrogen levels have remained stable at most sites for the past 500 years.
One reason may be that plants are using more nitrogen than they previously have, keeping nitrogen levels consistent with those thousands of years ago even though humans continue to add carbon dioxide and nitrogen to the atmosphere, McLauchlan said.
“Our best idea is that the nitrogen and carbon cycles were linked tightly back then and they are linked tightly today,” McLauchlan said. “Humans are now manipulating both nitrogen and carbon at the same time, which means that there is no net effect on the biosphere.”
The balance may be only temporary, McLauchlan said.
“Based on what we learned from the past, if the response of plants to elevated carbon dioxide slows, nitrogen availability is likely to increase and ecosystems will begin to change profoundly,” McLauchlan said. “Now more than ever, it’s important to begin monitoring our grasslands and forests for early warning signs.”
The Nature study is an extension of McLauchlan’s National Science Foundation CAREER Award that examines the history of nitrogen cycling in forested and grassland environments, her research on nitrogen concentrations and grasslands at the Konza Prairie Biological Station, and Craine’s research on grasslands and climate change.
We need to sound the media alarm. Headline: PLANET HAS BENDS?
“People have been really interested in nitrogen in current times because it’s a major pollutant”
NITROGEN?
That stuff that comprises 78% of the atmosphere?
According to my calendar, it’s over a week to the First of April.
Does the Kansas State University run to a different time scale or something?
Yes, it’s definitely “worse than we thought”.
Without all that “nitrogen” man is currently producing, mankind would starve! You would think someone in Kansas State University’s College of Agricultural would point this out to this idiot assistant professor of geography. Any graduates of this university following this post should immediately contact there alma mater and report this lunatic.
The nitrogen tax already exists in some European counties. In France it is called TGAP. Its effectiveness is essentially zero.
In other news, the University of Kansas was called in to help investigate exploding vegetables in supermarkets across the country.
“At first we thought it was some sort of terrorist plot,” said Professor C. Lueless of the university’s Department of Quackriculture (and off shoot of the Department of Agriculture which also studies various fowl species such as ducks). “What we suspect is that this is a pollution problem. Farmers have been using Potassium Nitrate as a fertilizer for years. Our initial investigation shows that Potassium Nitrate is used in the manufacture of gun powder, and this may be the root cause.”
The professor was quick to silence critics of his theory who pointed out that gun powder is also composed of carbon and sulfur.
“Well of course,” said Dr Lueless. “That’s why we started regulating sulfur and carbon emissions in the first place. We knew it could be hazardous to the environment, and now we have evidence of that. We’ll need more study to know for certain, but given that plants are known to uptake carbon in particular in a big way, we think we’re on the right track. Pollution may be causing these incidents of exploding vegetables.”
Reporters also pressed Dr C. Lueless on the arrest of a group of teenagers that included his son and who have been charged with the theft of several thousand fire crackers, but the professor refused to comment on the matter.
Is there anything these people would not call a pollutant? It used to be that a pollutant was a substance that harmed human health. It was something we would want to remove as completely as possible from the air we breath. By that definition CO2 and nitrogen are not pollutants because we would die without them in our atmosphere. But now the definition of “pollutant” is changing. It is beginning to mean almost the opposite of what it used to mean, and things that are beneficial to humans are now considered to be pollutants. It seems to stem from the Malthusian idea that humans are unchecked parasites. Anything that benefits such parasites is harmful to the rest of the planet and is thus a pollutant.
princessartemis says:
March 21, 2013 at 11:52 am
I’m waiting for them to deem oxygen a pollutant.
—————-
Err, that would be ozone, deemed a pollutant at ground level.
What with all of these post-doctorals writing these non-sense studies? These poor kids minds have been so badly molested by our modern Marxist school system that they can’t tell the difference between science and political activism. But I bet they all vote correctly and think the right (left) way about the issues, because they care soooo much.
There are no limits to these rent-seeking idiots venality, dishonesty and corruption. What is their next objective? Will we live to see ‘Water and Oxygen’ nominated as “major pollutants”?
Climate “science” now comes with extra dumb.
These tyrants will stop at nothing to corrupt the method, the data and the rest of humanity with their insanity.
Imprecise terminology. Is “nitrogen” molecular nitrogen, nitrogen oxide(s), ammonia or what? Is this a peer-reviewed publication? Science is a wonderful pursuit, maybe someone ought to introduce these guys to it.
Well, y’know… when the deadly Carbon combines with the deadly Nitrogen, it’s ummmm… deadly!
Nitrogen is not produced by man. It is and always was there. These people are insane.
Did someone open up a cylinder of nitrous oxide in the lab, or are they just having a laugh?
Which gas will they pick on next?
“Roughly 15,000 years ago, the Earth began to warm, melting many glaciers and ice sheets that covered the landscape. Researchers found that Earth experienced an 8,000-yearlong decline in nitrogen availability as temperatures rose and carbon and nitrogen became locked up in soils. According to researchers, how the nitrogen cycle responded to these ancient global changes in carbon dioxide could be a glimpse into the future.”
====================
I don’t get the “locked up” part, the glaciers just bull-dozed the biosphere into a giant compost pile being watered with glacial run-off.
I imagine a lot of it burned, and/ or flourished in the warmth.
At a glimpse, it seems like a reach.
Perhaps if we stopped being lazy, most of this silliness would go away. Nitrogen refers to N/2 gas, otherwise, what are we going to call it? Nitrate,( along with ammonia and urea) are essentials for plant growth,and if we just call them nitrogen then discussions of the complexities of nurture and pollution become mere sloganism, as in referring to processes leeching away the world’;s “nitrogen”; hey, only 80% of the atmosphere.
I have heard of eutrophication due to lack of oxygen in aquatic systems when there is an overgrowth of blue-green algae that can make their own nitrates from atm. nitrogen; overgrowth of algae on parts of the Great Barrier Reef due? to nitrates in agricultural runoff. Then there is the wonderful greening of vegetetion after fallout of nitrates formed during thunderstorms. But these are hardly global issues. This is more vexatious than using the term “carbon” for any compound containing carbon especially carbon dioxide. My students used to ask me why I used so many “big” words and my reply was that I wished to convey a precise meaning. Meaningful debates are turned into eggregious arguments by confusing terminology as much as by antagonistic attitudes. Call me a pedantic old fart, but I would love to see clear meanings and where better to start than on this most important site.
I will now add nitrogen as those dangerous things I’m avoiding like diydrogen monoxide. Both are awful pollutants. Once causes the bends, and the other, well, the other has so many bad aspects it’s amazing it’s not already banned. I’m sure it’ll be next.
http://www.dhmo.org/facts.html
I guess this idiot somehow managed to miss the CO2 bandwagon and now wants a bandwagon of his very own.
Next up: Oxygen.
I throw my arms up in the air!
Nitrogen is 79% of the atmosphere.
It is a fundamental part of life – Carbon-Hydrogen-Oxygen-Nitrogen CHON. This planet is populated by CHON lifeforms.
Nitrogen is also a member of that criminal cartel – the periodic table of elements.
It appears that many members of this criminal conspiracy must be banned.
I humbly request of the eco-scientistas what elements are acceptable.
I throw up!
Earth’s atmosphere is a tad over 78% nitrogen, by volume. We’re immersed in the gas.
These people must be really stupid. When ammonia, ammonium nitrate or urea is produced for fertilisers it is cryo concentrated from the air! If it eventually finds its way back there then there is no net gain.
MY comment didn’t seem to make it, go lost in the ether. I cannot reproduce it but can paraphrase it:
What member of the criminal periodic table are we allowed to consider benificent, oh mighty guardians of reality?
Grrr###
Nitrogen huh. Just when you thought it couldn’t get any dumber…
I mean, think about this for a second. Giving it our very capitalist greedy best, we’re only able to increase atmospheric CO2 by an apparent 2 PPM per year, or 0.0002%. So lets say for the sake of argument that we outdo ourselves, and increase atmospheric N2 by 100 times that amount every year. Somehow. Over the course of a millenia, we’d increase atmospheric CO2 by 0.2%. This impacts us exactly how again?
I don’t think anyone really believes there’d be an impact. I think Kendra and crew have realized that if they keep up a concentrated barrage of stupidity like this long enough they’ll cause people’s heads to explode, I think that’s really the masterplan. Record me as a conspiracy nut and write it down in your blue error log if you want, I don’t care. What is it the warmists say about CO2? Can’t think of any other explanation, that’s it.
This is from the Onion or Journal of Irreproducible Results, right?