Abstract
For feasibility of carbon sequestration as well as in the mitigation of greenhouse gases for application of biochar pellet, this experiment was conducted, focusing on the adsorption characteristics of NH4-N on biochar pellet mixed with different ratios of pig manure compost. For NH4-N adsorption on biochar pellets, the loading amount of biochar pellet was 211.5 mg in 50 mL of aqueous solution, and the adsorption fitted very well with Langmuir isotherm. The maximum adsorption and removal rates were 2.94 mg g−1 and 92.2%, respectively, in the pellet that contained 90% of biochar. It was also observed, by kinetic models, that NH4-N was adsorbed fast on biochar pellet with a combination ratio of 9:1 of biochar pellet/pig manure. It was further observed that the higher the amount of biochar contained in the biochar pellet, the greater the adsorption of NH4-N. For the plant response observed for lettuce, it was shown that the leaf biomass in plots treated with a 9:1 biochar/pig manure compost increased by approximately 13% compared with the leaf biomass in plots treated with the compost alone. The leaf biomass of the other treatments was higher than that of the control. This implies that the application of biochar pellets, regardless of the biochar contents, might be useful for soil carbon sequestration and greenhouse gas mitigation for agricultural practices.
Highlights
Biomass is waste materials from agricultural products which includes agricultural residues and forest resources [1]
For released NH4-N, it was found that the NH4-N concentrations in all combination ratios of biochar pellet and pig manure were lower than that of the 100% pig manure compost pellet
The maximum adsorption rate observed was for the 9:1 ratio of biochar pellet/pig manure
Summary
Biomass is waste materials from agricultural products which includes agricultural residues and forest resources [1]. Biochar from thermal conversion technology has recently attracted attention for its potential ability of carbon sequestration, suggesting the possibility to act against climate changes through the addition of biochar into soil. Many researchers investigated the value-added biochar for soil carbon sequestration, which suggested the combination of biochar with composts before soil application [5]. The combination of biochar with organic composts for crop cultivation could be a potential soil carbon sequestration system in agricultural practices. It is necessary to create a value-added biochar that can provide major nutrients to the plants during crop cultivation with a minimum loss. The biochar pellet is a promising way to reduce the handling costs and significantly decreases the loss of biochar during soil incorporation [10]. Biochar pellet has been mostly used as alternative heating material to biomass pellet [11]
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