Evaluation of Alternative Nitrogen Fertilizers for Corn and Winter Wheat Production

Abstract

As natural gas, and thus N fertilizer, prices increase, farmers are looking for ways to decrease N costs in farming operations. To potentially alleviate this cost burden, alternative synthetic N fertilizers are available as potential management tools for increasing crop yields and N use efficiency, and decreasing volatilization. In North Carolina specifically, little data exists on these new, synthetic N fertilizer products being marketed to farmers. Therefore, we undertook a study to compare them with aqueous urea ammonium nitrate (UAN) [(NH2)2CO, NH4NO3] during a 2‐yr field experiment. Corn (Zea mays L.) and wheat (Triticum aestivum L.) were grown in the three physiographic regions of North Carolina with four fertilizer sources (NutriSphere [Specialty Fertilizer Products, Leawood, KS], Environmentally Smart Nitrogen Polymer Coated Urea or ESN [Agrium Inc., Alberta, Canada] UCAN‐23 [Yara, Tampa, FL], and UAN) at up to six fertilizer rates. The use of the alternative products did not regularly produce more corn or wheat grain compared to UAN, while wheat straw yield was greater with NutriSphere, UCAN, and UAN compared to ESN in three of four site years. Also, an aerobic incubation experiment was performed to evaluated N release profiles of the fertilizers at 25°C. The study found that NutriSphere and UCAN release time was similarly to UAN, while ESN showed a slower release profile. However, any difference in release did not affect yields of spring planted corn, NutriSphere and ESN increased corn stover yields in 3 of 6 site‐years. In determining whether to use these alternative N fertilizer products, farmers should consider location, climatic conditions, and fertilizer costs in comparison to UAN.

An economic study of controlled release urea and split applications of nitrogen as compared with non-coated urea under conventional and reduced tillage management

“…The lack of differences was attributed to the limited loss of N under the climatic and management conditions during the experimental years and therefore they concluded the agronomic benefits of CRU might not be expressed in all climatic and management conditions. Cahill et al (2010) evaluated several alternative N fertilizer products, including Environmentally Smart Nitrogen (ESN TM ) a CRU produced by Agrium (Agrium Inc., Calgary, AB), to determine if they produced a significant yield and N use efficiency (NUE) improvement over urea ammonium nitrate (UAN) on corn and winter wheat crops in the Coastal Plain region. There was generally no corn or wheat yield benefit to using the alternative fertilizer products.…”

“…The intent is to reduce the risk of N losses, thus improving N use efficiency and reducing potential negative environmental damage. Several studies have examined the environmental and agronomic impacts of using CRU with varied results (Nelson et al 2008Beres et al 2010;Cahill et al 2010;Hyatt et al 2010;Malhi et al 2010;Mckenzie et al 2010;Blackshaw et al 2011;Ziadi et al 2011;Yang et al 2011).…”

Volatilization of ammonia in stabilized slow-release nitrogen fertilizer under controlled conditions

“…However, contradictory results can be found in the literature, indicating advantages in the use of polymer coated urea (Wang et al, 2015;Nash et al, 2015) and others that report low efficiency compared with the common urea (Cahill et al, 2010;Carneiro et al, 2014). This study was conducted in order to quantify the N volatilized as NH 3 after application of higher efficiency nitrogen fertilizer at different times and under different soil application managements.…”

Corn Development and Production in Function of Sources of Nitrogen Fertilizers and Doses

“…A potential alternative is the use of controlled -release fertilizers, such as coated urea, which has been used to decrease losses and, thus, provide more N for plants (CAHILL et al 2010). Although these fertilizers are promising in agriculture, the results have been inconsistent.…”

“…Although these fertilizers are promising in agriculture, the results have been inconsistent. While Noellsch et al (2009), demonstrate advantages of using coated urea polymers in corn, others highlight the inefficiency compared with common urea (NELSON et al 2009, CAHILL et al 2010, CIVARDI et al 2011CAZETTA;FUKUDA, 2014).…”