described grandiose and splendid, densely populated Indian garden cities and settlements in ..... composts are produced where rock powder and clay have been added. ...... Neves, E.G., Petersen, J.B., Bartone, R.N. and Silva, C.A.D. (2003).
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Combining Biochar and Organic Amendments Chapter · February 2016
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Combining biochar and organic amendments Claudia Kammann, Bruno Glaser and Hans-Peter Schmidt Published as Chapter 6 in: Simon Shackley, Greet Ruysschaert, Kor Zwar and Bruno Glaser (editors): Biochar in European Soils, Routledge, London, 2016, pp. 136-164
The ancient enigma of ‘terra preta’: the cradle of biochar concepts More than four centuries have passed since the Dominican pater Gaspar de Carvajal described grandiose and splendid, densely populated Indian garden cities and settlements in the Amazon basin. Now, four centuries later, findings of straight broad street residues and settlement places (Heckenberger et al. 2003, 2008), and in particular the patches of fertile Amazonian dark earths (ADE) or terra preta (Sombroek 1966; Glaser et al. 2004; Kern et al. 2004; Neves et al. 2003), finally reveal a true core in the Orellana’s 450-year-old ‘legend’. Thus, the Amazon basin was, up to 450 years before today, likely not the native, untouched green wilderness with just a few ‘primitive’ hunter-gatherer cultures that our textbooks taught us. In the 1960s, the famous Netherlands soil scientist Wim Sombroek published his stimulating book on soils in the Amazon basin, their properties, geology, genesis and associated vegetation (Sombroek 1966). He described the unusually fertile terra preta patches and islands that existed in an ocean of infertile, highly weathered soils (mostly Ferralsols, according to World Reference Base) within the Amazon basin (Sombroek 1966). For a long time, it was hotly debated whether ADE soils were of anthropogenic origin or the result of volcanic deposits, nutrient-rich sediments from the rivers of the Andes etc. (Glaser et al. 2004). As Glaser et al. summarised in 2001: The enhanced fertility of ‘terra preta’ soils is expressed by higher levels of soil organic matter (SOM), nutrient holding capacity, and nutrients such as nitrogen, phosphorus, calcium and potassium, higher pH values and higher moisture-holding capacity than in the surrounding soils. According to local farmers, productivity on the ‘terra preta’ sites is much higher than on the surrounding poor soils. (Glaser et al. 2001: 37) In all ADE soils (i.e. the continuum from terra preta to terra mulata, which is lighter, with enhanced fertile properties), large amounts of charred organic residues of up to 130 tonnes per hectare and one metre soil depth were found (Glaser et al. 2001). However, Glaser et al. (2001) have already suggested that these ADE soils were not formed by just putting pure charcoal/biochar into (or onto) agricultural soils but must have been amended repeatedly with fertilising organic material. In the meantime, it was scientifically proven that organic additions were involved from the start in terra preta genesis, either as nutrient-rich human kitchen and human/animal faecal waste, as forest litter debris (Glaser and Birk 2012; Glaser et al. 2001) or other forms. Although under dispute, it is believed that garbage (compost) piles surrounding the
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central village areas were occasionally burned to get rid of the waste; the smouldering likely created low-temperature biochars of all kinds (Kern et al. 2004; Neves et al. 2003), in addition to kitchen and ceramic making fire charcoal waste. After the garden-city cultures vanished, ADE patches were quickly overgrown by rainforest.Thus, the terra preta sites would on average have received dry leaf litter amounts of 8.6Mg ha−1 every year for the last 450 years (Chave et al. 2010: meta- analysis of over 81 Amazon basin study sites). Despite of the lack of anthropogenic litter inputs, the natural litter input over centuries may have either increased or sustained its original fertility (how fertile the soils were during garden-city times is unknown, but ‘demanding’ crop remains have been unearthed). Either way, the close association of biochar with organics in the enigmatic terra preta soils, as we know them today, suggests a beneficial marriage of biochar and organic litter in general, or in particular with anthropogenic nutrient-rich organic waste streams which warrants a closer look.
Black carbon-rich soils: soil organic matter build-up beyond biochar? Soils containing condensed aromatic black carbon (BC) are often richer in total organic carbon (OC) than soils without BC (i.e. in OC besides BC; Glaser and Amelung 2003). The close correlation of OC content with increased BC content has been observed in a variety of different soils of completely different texture and genesis, climate and with different organic matter inputs. For example, this close correlation occurs in Amazonian dark earths (Glaser et al. 2001), in temperate chernozem or chernozemic soils (Glaser and Amelung 2003; Rodionov et al. 2010), or in old charcoal-making sites in Germany compared to the surrounding calcareous or acidic forest soils (Borchard et al. 2014). (Glaser et al. 2001) investigated five different terra preta sites (two sandy and three clayey) and found mean BC contents of 11g kg–1, corresponding to 50Mg ha–1, which is 70 times higher compared to surrounding soils, while the mean soil organic carbon (SOC) stocks were ‘only’ 2.7 times higher than in the respective adjacent soils. In the five terra preta sites that were investigated, a significantly larger percentage of the organic matter was aromatic BC (on average 20 per cent but up to 35 per cent versus 9 per cent in the topsoil; Glaser et al. 2001). Chernozem (Russian for ‘black earth’) in temperate climates is thought to have developed without direct human influence (i.e. waste nutrient inputs) under steppe vegetation; these BC-rich soils are among the most fertile agricultural soils in, for example, the Hildesheimer and Magdeburger Börde in Germany. In chernozem, BC also comprises the oldest and most recalcitrant carbon fraction (Rodionov et al. 2010; Schmidt et al. 1999). It can amount to 45 per cent of the total OC fraction, with up to 8g kg–1 of BC (Schmidt et al. 1999). In old charcoal-making places, the biochar application over time was not associated with nutrient-rich human waste inputs. However, decade- to century- old former kiln sites with regrown forest, or surrounded by forest, have also received continuous leaf litter deposition. European forests are spotted with such ancient charcoal-making (kiln) sites that they are more readily found now via satellite imaging. These places have mostly been investigated for archaeological purposes rather than for effects of the BC contents on SOC accumulation. Borchard et al. (2014) investigated five former charcoal-making sites that had been unused for decades, located on acidic soils (in the German Siegerland region) or base-rich carbonaceous soils (in the German Eifel region) in western Germany, respectively. Both reported mean BC concentrations of 25g kg–1 and 10g kg–1 in the top 0–20cm of the charcoal-making sites,
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respectively, compared to nearly zero in the adjacent sites surrounding the kiln places. In both instances, increased BC contents significantly correlated with higher mean non-BC OC stocks at the kiln sites, which were 4.0 and 2.9 times larger than those of the corresponding adjacent nonkiln locations in the acidic or carbonaceous places in the Siegerland and Eifel regions. A striking feature of the terra preta soils is their significantly elevated nutrient content, which is significantly correlated to the SOC content (Sombroek 1966). In terra preta, tremendous inputs of kitchen waste including fish and chicken bones, partly composted biomass residues, including forest litter and human excrement, would have contributed to the increase in nutrient stocks, in particular phosphorus (P) (Glaser and Birk 2012). However, the acidic German charcoal-making soil site revealed increased P concentrations as well as P stocks, despite the significantly lower bulk densities (Borchard et al. 2014). Here, far away from settlements, kitchen waste inputs are highly unlikely; leaf litter could have contributed over decades to this P stock build-up. The mechanisms behind the phenomenon clearly need further research. OC stocks in soils are the result of two carbon (C) flows, namely the magnitude of the net input (gross primary production or GPP) and the net output by ecosystem respiration (Chapin et al. 2006). About 50 per cent of GPP is auto- trophic plant respiration; the remainder, NPP (net primary productivity), is in mature ecosystems in balance with decomposition processes. Microbial decompo- sition of organic material by aerobic and anaerobic heterotrophic processes is the result of soil, climate, vegetation and biological soil activity (based on physico- chemical redox soil properties (Briones 2012). The increased OC stocks (C pool size) in terra preta soils besides the BC may thus be the result of changes in the C input–output flows; that is, theoretically increased C inputs (NPP increase due to more fertile soils), combined with reduced litter decomposition (reduced output), or reduced output only. A lower rate of C loss may be caused by a more efficient SOC use by soil microorganisms (Briones 2012; Chen et al. 2014).This may be due to external electron transport by biochar-mineral humic complexes or by an increased partitioning of catabolic C flows during decomposition into stable humic compound formation. The natural reforestation that took place after the decline of the Amazon civili- sation may have enhanced the NPP input in the ADE and non-ADE soils alike, up to the stage where litter C inputs balanced outputs under the respective soil conditions (equilibrium). Therefore, it is not likely that forming biochar-mineral- organic complexes (Lin et al. 2012) enhanced the retention of forest litter C in the long run, generating a higher SOC level in the ADE soils. However, during the transition from human inhabitation to secondary forest, increased NPP litter input through trees and understory plants may have contributed to the higher equilibrium SOC content we find today. For chernozem (prior to human cultivation), it is unknown if a positive input feedback loop existed, but we can assume that it did. Continued organic inputs are always necessary to prevent depletion of SOC stocks in agricultural soils. In Russian chernozem, more than 30 per cent of the non-BC OC compounds were lost during 55 years of bare fallow soil cultivation, compared to the non-BC OC content of mown steppe which followed a suppressed fire regime (Vasilyeva et al. 2011). The BC, however, was hardly diminished, and its quality (aromaticity) remained unchanged. Thus, the aromatic backbone of the biochar, its black carbon content, seems to be quite stable. However, biochar itself is not completely inert to decomposition over decades (Abiven et al. 2011); in particular the heterocyclic nitrogen (N) of grassy biochar can be prone to solubilisation (de la Rosa and Knicker 2011). Lately, an extensive study on the export of the soluble fractions of charcoal, dissolved black carbon (DBC), within major waterways around the
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globe, indicated that DBC represents a major pathway of C export to the oceans (Jaffé et al. 2013). However, the functioning and effects of the soluble aromatic DBC fractions derived from charcoal (or biochar) are not yet fully understood. Mechanistic understanding will be crucial for the safe implementation of biochar as a tool for environmental management (Jaffé et al. 2013; Masiello and Louchouarn 2013), either to avoid unwanted negative effects, or to understand if the soluble DBC compounds may even be a prerequisite for the genesis of fertile black earth soils. Thus, the fate and functioning of DCB in soils will be a hot topic for future research. In the two studied charcoal-making site regions in Germany, increased NPP could be excluded as a cause for the SOC build-up because the kiln places were small, and sparsely covered by the same vegetation as the surrounding forest (if covered at all; Borchard et al. 2014). However, the mechanisms of reduced decomposition (i.e. reduced C output) by more efficient microbial metabolism or increased partitioning in stable fractions, or a role of the soluble DBC in litter-C cycling, may have contributed to the non-BC stock increase. In terra preta, such mechanisms are suggested by the results of Liang et al. (2010). The authors observed that in terra preta soils in three different sites, fresh organic litter inputs decomposed 25 per cent slower.This resulted in a larger fraction of the fresh litter being incorporated into more stable fractions in the terra preta, as compared with the adjacent soils amended with the same litter; moreover, the pre-existing SOC was less severely primedi in terra preta (i.e. less native SOC was decomposed by the ‘C-fuel’ addition of fresh litter; Liang et al. 2010). A similar observation was made earlier by Glaser (1999) who compared five terra preta topsoils with the respective adjacent soils in a laboratory incubation. Steiner et al. (2008b) observed a higher respiratory efficiency in ADE soils; it is possible that the decomposer microbiology of BC soils shifts towards a higher fungi:bacteria ratio (Glaser and Birk 2012). Recent investigations in one of the kiln site soils also revealed a significant shift towards fungi via phospholipid fatty acid analyses (C. Bamminger and S. Marhan, personal communication; Kammann et al. 2015). Taken together, there are indications of an improved stabilisation of SOM and plant nutrients that serve soil fertility in ancient biochar-containing soils. One large unknown remains: the size of the original biochar/charcoal inputs and their decomposability over centuries. How much of today’s non-BC SOC has its origin in the biochar inputs? Is their transformed decomposition product probably DBC that was incorporated into complexes with humus-forming litter? And how much is actually derived from subsequently humified (increased) litter inputs? In other words, the crucial question is if biochar will, in the long term or under certain conditions, aid in the build-up of additional stable organic matter fractions besides those derived from biochar? In the best case, biochar-C ‘investments’ may enlarge beneficial SOC pool ‘returns’ via increased NPP, reduced decomposition, and larger partitioning into stable humus fractions during decomposition. However, this may vary greatly in different types of soil, litter inputs, biochars, climate etc. In the worst case, native SOC would be faster mineralised as observed with needle litter rich in phenolics over 10 years in boreal forest (Wardle et al. 2008). To sequester C in SOM, for each quantity of carbon, stoichiometric quantities of nitrogen and other nutrients are required, which are bound in humic fractions (C:N ratio of 10–15). Therefore, to balance an increase in the SOC content in the top 30cm per hectare by 1 per cent, about 2000kg N is necessary.The C:N ratio of BC- rich soils is in most cases higher than that of adjacent soils (Glaser 2007; Glaser et al. 2004; Oguntunde et al. 2004). Although the exact cultural practices that led to terra preta genesis are not completely understood, it is evident that charcoal was not the sole ingredient. Rather, it was applied alongside organic wastes (Kern et al. 2004; Neves et al. 2003) rich in calcium (Ca) and P, for example, from fish bones and human faeces (Glaser and
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Birk 2012; Lehmann et al. 2004). It is therefore imperative that biochar should be co-applied together with nutrient-rich organic amendments if we do not want to wait for decades, and under forest, for the build-up of nutrient pools to balance the recalcitrant C inputs. In particular, composting, with its thermophilic heat rotting phase with up to 65–70°C, may thus accelerate the desired changes of properties in biochar (Fischer and Glaser 2012). Biochar as composting additive: a way forward? Aerobic composting Composting of organic wastes is a bio-oxidative process involving the minerali- sation and partial humification of organic matter, leading to a stabilised final product with certain humic properties which should be free of phytotoxicity and pathogens (Bernal et al. 2009). Composting releases part of the carbon fixed during photosynthesis back into the atmosphere, while part of the input carbon is transferred into more stable humic compounds (Amlinger et al. 2005, 2008; Bernal et al. 2009; Fischer and Glaser 2012). Composting techniques may vary from simple approaches such as waste collection in rotting heaps around settlements to sophis- ticated industrial-scale facilities, and from small-scale household or open windrow composting to large encapsulated composting systems, including waste air treatment (NH3 stripping) and mechanical biological waste treatment. Input feedstock materials may be green waste, biowaste, sewage sludge or animal manures. New livestock production systems, based on intensification in large farms, produce huge amounts of manures and slurries, without enough agricultural land for their direct application as fertilisers (Bernal et al. 2009).The same is true for sludge from wastewater treatment plants close to large cities in China, for example (Chen et al. 2010; Hua et al. 2009, 2012; Park et al. 2011). Here, composting is increasingly considered a beneficial pathway for recycling surplus manures as a stabilised and sanitised end product for agriculture. However, this end product needs to be a high quality substrate or soil conditioner/fertiliser to overcome the costs associated with its production (Bernal et al. 2009). Biochar use during composting can be a strategy to achieve high quality compost end products for agricultural or horticultural use with added economic value. However, simply adding biochar to compost does not guarantee that badly made composts (comparable to ‘raw humus’) will turn into a miraculous fertile substrate.The main principles of quality composting are: • • • • • • •
To start with a balanced C/N of the feedstock blend of around 35. To add sufficient amounts of clay (~5 per cent vol.) and rock powder (>1 per cent weight) to promote aggregate formation. To avoid anaerobic conditions for more than one to three days to minimise putrescence and prevent detrimental shifts in the decomposing and humifying microbial community. To achieve this, compost windrows should not have diameters of more than 3m (see Figure 6.1). Windrows should be turned at least every three days during the heat rotting phase for oxygenation (Figure 6.1). Low bulk density materials such as lignin-rich green clippings, sawdust or biochar (also known as ‘bulking agents’) should be added for aeration and liquid absorption. The water content should be controlled and remain at about 40 per cent.
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Figure 6.1 Example of optimal windrow size permitting highly aerobic composting with regular turning.
Actually only few composts are produced following these guidelines. The majority of composts are piled on huge heaps (up to 5 m high, covering hundreds of m2), are turned only two or three times and rot partly or completely anaero- bically for half a year or longer. Odours of butyric acid and ammonia are typical for these types of compost piles, with high losses of carbon, nitrogen and nitrous oxide and methane (greenhouse gas or GHG) emissions. To illustrate the importance of the intrinsic compost quality we report an experi- mental example: Kammann et al. (2010), grew radish in 500ml pots where a poor coarse sand was mixed 1:1 (vol/vol) with either one of two different commercial horticultural peat substrates (ED73 and Compo Sana), or a German commercial green waste compost or a high quality Austrian compost produced for organic farming (Bionica), and compared to a control where the sandy substrate was not blended with organics. Within the different organic amendments, woody biochar (produced at about 600°C by Pyreg GmbH, Germany) was added at different rates or blended with the greenwaste compost before (BC compost) or after composting (compost plus BC; Bionica compost always plus BC). The pots were wick-watered from water reservoirs containing either pure water or a full fertiliser nutrient solution. The differences between the German commercial greenwaste compost and the Austrian Bionica compost were considerable, and it was only to some extent ameliorated by providing nutrients (Figure 6.2, top and bottom). Adding biochar to the low-quality compost during composting increased the (very low) radish yield by about 20 per cent compared to the compost alone (Figure 6.2 top), but yields were tiny compared to a highquality compost without biochar (Bionica). In the latter, just mixing in biochar did not further boost radish growth.
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Figure 6.2 Mean radish yield (red + green) + standard deviation (n = 4) in poor sandy, wick- watered substrate mixed 1:1 with different organic amendments.The grey shaded area indicates the range of responses obtained with commercial peat substrates. Hatched patterns indicate biochar addition. Different letters within a figure indicate significant differences between treatments (One-way ANOVA;p
