Modeling and measurements of ammonia from poultry operations: Their emissions, transport, and deposition in the Chesapeake Bay

Abstract

The goal of this study is to determine how much ammonia/nitrogen is being deposited to the Maryland Eastern Shore land and the Chesapeake Bay from poultry operations on Maryland’s Eastern Shore. We simulated the fate of ammonia/nitrogen emitted (using emission factors from the U.S. EPA in conjunction with Carnegie-Mellon University) from 603 poultry facilities using the air quality model, AERMOD. The model domain was approximately 134 km by 230 km (and covers the full land area of Maryland’s Eastern Shore), with a horizontal resolution of 2 km by 2 km. Ammonia concentration observations were made at 23 sites across Maryland’s Eastern Shore during two periods (September and October 2017) in order to calibrate the model. An ammonia deposition velocity of 2.4 cm/sec was selected based on the sensitivity analysis of results for the simulation of a large poultry facility, and this value fell within the range of measurements reported in the scientific literature downwind of Concentrated Animal Feeding Operations (CAFOs). The ammonia deposition velocity of 2.4 cm/s leads to an estimated total annual ammonia deposition of 11,100 Megagrams/year (10,600 Mg/yr deposition to land, and 508 Mg/yr deposition to water (1 Mg = 1,000,000 g = 1.1023 US Tons)). In addition, model simulations indicate that ~72.4% of ammonia emissions from poultry animal feeding operations would be deposited within the modeling domain. However, this deposited ammonia/nitrogen may be transported through waterways from the land mass and ground water to the Chesapeake Bay. A comprehensive sensitivity analysis of the assumed ammonia deposition velocity (ranging from 0.15 to 3.0 cm/s) on estimated ammonia annual deposition is provided. Using the lower limit of an ammonia deposition velocity of 0.15 cm/s gives much smaller estimated total annual ammonia deposition of 2,040 Mg/yr (1,880 Mg/yr deposition to land and 163 Mg/yr deposition to water).