Sources for CH4 Emissions in the Algae Pathway, AD Process, and Biogas Clean-up

These compounds are taken up by plants as nutrients from the soil and converted into plant proteins (amino acids). Plant proteins become animal proteins when eaten and metabolized by herbivorous animals, and when carnivorous animals eat the herbivorous. These proteins return to the soil through animal excrement and the decomposition of dead animals and plants, and are converted into carbon dioxide, water, and ammonia (gaseous compound of nitrogen and hydrogen) by a set of bacteria in the soil. A portion of this ammonia is converted into soil nitrogen (fixed nitrogen) by another set of bacteria and the balance is released into the atmosphere as free nitrogen (N2).” (nitrogen cycle, n.d.) Human impact on this cycle is very significant. Farmers plant crops such as; peas, beans, and alfalfa. These crops pull nitrogen from the air which helps raise the rate of nitrogen fixation on the land. Farmers also plant corn and wheat which are sprayed with nitrogen derived from industrial fixation. All of these crops help humans to survive. Having these crops benefiting humans we are more than doubling the amount of nitrogen that’s moved from the atmosphere to the land. When sulfur is released by burning fossil fuels, which humans do, this is killing and polluting our lakes and ponds and killing our forests. With these and other chemicals being put into our land, these are reaching our oceans and big areas of water and this will

In today’s society we face many problems as a nation and as a world, from economics, to war, to famine. These issues often cause us to overlook the most basic need: to look out for our planet's well being. Our main goal should be to conserve our natural resources such as soil and water. Agriculture, ironically, is often one of the factors that is contributing to the destruction of our soil and water. Farmers apply fertilizer, pesticides and many other chemicals to use on their fields. Fertilizer stimulates soil microbes, which consume organic

The excess use of fertilizers can result in soil erosion and can lead to land pollution.

In this experiment, algae solutions of different concentrations of carbon dioxide, on algal growth are tested to determine the effect of varying concentrations of carbon dioxide, on algal growth over a period of nine days. The rate of photosynthesis was deduced from the change in turbidity levels of the solution.

Natural sources account for 62% of total nitrous oxide emission globally. Apart from natural sources, nitrous oxide can also be emitted from anthropogenic activities include: agriculture, industrial, fuel and biomass combustion, and sewage treatment (Sutton et al., 2014; Scheehle and Kruger, 2006; Tsai and Chyan, 2006). Among all sources, agriculture contributes the largest proportion (60%) around the world in recent years (IPCC-Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2008).

Methane is from the digestive of almost all livestock and from manure management. Cows themselves produce 150 billion gallons of methane per day. Methane is 50 times more destructive than carbon dioxide. All the greenhouse gases being emitted causes climate change and with the rate we are going at, by 2050 there will be 80% of emissions into the atmosphere. Manure is also plays a part in pollution and 7 million pounds of it is being produced a day. With feces comes toxic gases like ammonia, 80% of ammonia is produced from feces. The problem with ammonia is that it causes breathing issues. Reducing methane and manure production would have benefits to the Earth almost

The data does not support the hypothesis, since the products that produced more biogas were not the vegetable peelings and the cow manure. The average difference between the vegetable peelings (approximately 0.6 cm) and the mashed bananas (approximately 2.5 cm) were 1.9 cm

The article explains how biofuels isn’t something that is just discovered, hence, the algae biofuel has been put in a place of fossil fuel today. There have be a lot of companies as well as government agencies that are finding several ways in reducing the cost of producing algae biofuel to make profit from the source of fuel.

Although dredging can be expensive, this price can stop algal blooms before they occur. Some mitigation measures could also be taken to stop HAB’s these include; physical removal of the plant and adding algaecides to the water and changing the aquatic food web in the lake or pond. Flocculation, coagulation, sedimentation and filtration are basic ways to make our drinking water clean and free of toxins but although they work most filtration and cleaning techniques have problems. The issue that we need to research and find new ways to prevent the algae from forming in the first place. This is because although there are ways of fixing it, it does not get the job entirely done. ("Control And

In recent decades humans have been playing an increasingly large role in the nitrogen cycle. Not all of the ways humans have been affecting the cycle have been negative, but the vast majority have been. One key thing that has human activity that has been disrupting the nitrogen cycle is the burning of fossil fuel. This burning releases carbon into the air at unnatural rate, and thus alters the amount of nitrogen in the atmosphere. This has had far reaching effects that no one first thought of and is now affecting the plant and animals in Acadia National Park. Another human activity that has increased massively over the past few years is industrial nitrogen fixation. This process is used to create fertilizer with high amount of nitrogen in it.

“Methane has been identified as a significant contributor to global warming. It is second to carbon dioxide in contribution to global warming and is said to be 15-20% of all greenhouse gas emissions.” (Yusuf, Noor, Abba, A. Hassan, & Din., 2012, p. 1). The majority of the greenhouse gases emitted in the agricultural sector came from livestock (Yusuf et al., 2012, p. 2). Studies have shown that “cows produce more greenhouse gases than the entire

In this process about 5-15% of gross energy intake by the animals is wasted in the form of methane (Johnson and Johnson, 1995). Therefore, research efforts are needed to suppress methane emission for eco-friendly and economic livestock production. If this reducing power concentrated in the reduced cofactors is not utilized for reduction of an oxidized compound, further fermentation of carbohydrates will be stopped and no release of energy from feed will be possible. In the rumen of an adult cow/buffalo; more than 200 litres of methane is produced every day. Several laboratories in India have estimated methane emitted by livestock and their figures also vary greatly, depending upon the method used for calculation (Kamra et al., 2012; Patra, 2014). Swamy and Bhattacharya (2006) compared methane emission by Indian livestock. As per the latest calculation on the data of Deptt. of Animal Husbandry, Dairying and Fisheries, Ministry of Agriculture, Govt. of India, the country is responsible for production of methane to the tune of 14.55 Tg/year (13.27 Tg from enteric fermentation and 1.28 Tg from livestock waste management), out of which cattle (6.73 Tg/year) and buffalo (6.56 Tg/year) collectively are responsible for 91.3% of total methane emitted by the livestock in India while the rest 8.7% is emitted by goats, sheep, yak, mithun and other herbivorous animals.

United Nations Global Environmental Alert Service claims, “Livestock emissions makeup nearly 80 percent of emissions from agriculture and agricultural emissions make up an estimated 10 to 35 percent of total global emissions.” Although livestock produce a lot of emissions, their impact on the soil and people outweigh the negative effects of the emissions.

The impacts of livestock on global climate change are important to the health of the ecosystem because it causes the average global temperature to increase. Livestock contributes to the majority of methane emitted into the atmosphere because of the feces it produces. The growing population increase is not helpful to this matter because as a result, a demand of food arises. This demand for food also includes the demand for livestock because it is appropriate for the human diet. “Meat production is to double from 229 million tonnes in [2000] to 465 million tonnes in 2050” (McMichael et al. 1259). The methane emission rate is bound to increase because it is “dependent upon the population size of the [livestock], their productivity, and [handling system]” (Jose et al. 3).

Nitrogen is one of the main biogeochemical elements, around which a cycle supports life on Earth. Nitrogen can be found in many forms, one of which is nitrite, a toxic chemical that can produce severe abnormalities in animals (Binta and Mushi, 2012). Nitrite is formed from nitrate by micro-organisms and bacteria present in soil, water, saliva, and the large intestine of most animals. These micro-organisms are present in high amounts in ruminants such as cows, which poses serious implications on the dairy industry as nitrite poisoning, if nitrate levels are not closely monitored, can lead to the death of large numbers of livestock as well as birth defects in calves. In ruminants, nitrate is reduced to nitrite, and the rumen microbes utilize this nitrite by converting it into ammonia as a nitrogenous source important in DNA production and synthesis of amino acids (Robson, 2007). Though, when levels of nitrogen rise in excess, nitrite accumulates in rumen, and is then rapidly absorbed into the bloodstream, then reacting with the ferrous form of haemoglobin to form met-haemoglobin (met-Hb) (Sidhu et al., 2011). This is a serious issue as met-Hb is a poor transporter of oxygen and the animal suffers from oxygen deficiency. Nitrite poisoning has become more common over the past century as application of nitrogen fertilizer to farmland improves both quality and yield of milk produced by cattle (Sidhu et al., 2011). Nitrogen increases the levels of crude protein in forage, which