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Wheat straw and its biochar differently affect soil properties and field-based greenhouse gas emission in a Chernozemic soil

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Abstract

A 2-year field study was conducted to compare the effect of wheat straw, its biochar, and wheat straw plus biochar addition on soil fluxes of CO2, CH4, and N2O during the growing season, and soil properties and crop yield in a Black Chernozemic soil planted to barley (Hordeum vulgare L.) in central Alberta, Canada. The objective was to assess the benefit of applying biochar instead of its feedstock, wheat straw, in improving environmental sustainability. Biochar addition did not affect soil CH4 oxidation, but decreased CO2 and N2O emissions as compared with both wheat straw applied alone and wheat straw and biochar applied together in 2010 and 2011 (p < 0.001), and resulted in a lower global warming potential, indicating that the biochar was effective in mitigating greenhouse gas (GHG) emission from the agricultural soil, as a result of biochar suppressing soil microbial activity and reducing soil N availability. Biochar application reduced N2O emission over 2 years, indicating its longer-term impact. Biochar application alone increased barley yield by 9.9 to 20.4% as compared to the other three treatments, thus reducing yield-scaled greenhouse gas emission intensity by 27.2 to 50.9% (p = 0.013 for the control and p < 0.001 for both wheat straw–amended treatments), with an average reduction of 3.43 t CO2-eq t−1 grain. The application of both wheat straw and its biochar reduced the temperature sensitivity of soil CO2 emission (Q10, p < 0.001), but the application of wheat straw or its biochar alone did not affect Q10, indicating that biochar application reduces the sensitivity to temperature changes of the decomposition of the new organic matter added to the soil. We conclude that (1) the application of wheat straw–derived biochar was preferred to raw wheat straw in mitigating GHG emission and (2) biochar can be an effective management strategy for properly handling crop residues in sustainable agriculture.

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Acknowledgments

We would like to thank Tim Anderson, Jin Tak, and Rob Hughes at Alberta Innovates-Technology Futures for providing the biochar. We also thank Donna Friesen and Pak Chow in the Department of Renewable Resources at the University of Alberta for providing technical support. The assistance from Sawyer Desaulniers, Drs. Beibei Zhang, Yang Lin, and Zheng Shi during the experiment is appreciated.

Funding

This work was financially supported by the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC), the China Scholarship Council, and Alberta Innovates-Technology Futures.

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Author notes

  1. Min Duan and Fengping Wu contributed equally to this work.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Key Laboratory of Ecology of Rare and Endangered Species and Environmental Protection (Guangxi Normal University), Ministry of Education, Guilin, 541004, China

    Min Duan

  2. Service Center for Agricultural Comprehensive Technique Extension of Gangxi Town, Chongming, 202154, China

    Fengping Wu

  3. Department of Renewable Resources, University of Alberta, Edmonton, T6G 2E3, Canada

    Min Duan, Fengping Wu & Scott X. Chang

  4. Research Center of Dryland Farming in Arid and Semiarid Areas, Northwest A&F University, Yangling, 712100, China

    Fengping Wu & Zhikuan Jia

  5. Woodsun Panel Board Co. Ltd., Hejiao Industry Zone, Foshan, 528061, China

    Sunguo Wang

  6. State Key Laboratory of Subtropical Silviculture, Zhejiang A & F University, Hangzhou, 311300, China

    Yanjiang Cai & Scott X. Chang

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ESM 1

Fig. S1 Dynamics of mean diurnal soil temperature at (a and b) 5 cm and (c and d) 15 cm below the soil surface during the barley growing season in 2010 and 2011 after addition of wheat straw (St), wheat straw-derived biochar (Bc), and wheat straw plus its biochar (StBc) to the soil, as compared to the control (CK) (n = 4). Fig. S2 Mean soil moisture in the (a and b) 0–10 cm and (c and d) 10–20 cm layers during the barley growing season in 2010 and 2011 after addition of wheat straw (St), wheat straw–derived biochar (Bc), and wheat straw plus its biochar (StBc) to the soil, as compared to the control (CK). Different letters indicate significant differences (p < 0.05) among treatments within a year. Error bars are standard errors of the means (n = 4) (DOCX 107 kb)

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Duan, M., Wu, F., Jia, Z. et al. Wheat straw and its biochar differently affect soil properties and field-based greenhouse gas emission in a Chernozemic soil. Biol Fertil Soils 56, 1023–1036 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00374-020-01479-4

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