Nitrogen fertilization raises CO₂ efflux from inorganic carbon: A global assessment

Nitrogen (N) fertilization is an indispensable agricultural practice worldwide, serving the survival of half of the global population. Nitrogen transformation (e.g., nitrification) in soil as well as plant N uptake releases protons and increases soil acidification. Neutralizing this acidity in carbonate‐containing soils (7.49 × 10 9 ha; ca. 54% of the global land surface area) leads to a CO 2 release corresponding to 0.21 kg C per kg of applied N. We here for the first time raise this problem of acidification of carbonate‐containing soils and assess the global CO 2 release from pedogenic and geogenic carbonates in the upper 1 m soil depth. Based on a global N‐fertilization map and the distribution of soils containing CaCO 3 , we calculated the CO 2 amount released annually from the acidification of such soils to be 7.48 × 10 12 g C/year. This level of continuous CO 2 release will remain constant at least until soils are fertilized by N. Moreover, we estimated that about 273 × 10 12 g CO 2 ‐C are released annually in the same process of CaCO 3 neutralization but involving liming of acid soils. These two CO 2 sources correspond to 3% of global CO 2 emissions by fossil fuel combustion or 30% of CO 2 by land‐use changes. Importantly, the duration of CO 2 release after land‐use changes usually lasts only 1–3 decades before a new C equilibrium is reached in soil. In contrast, the CO 2 released by CaCO 3 acidification cannot reach equilibrium, as long as N fertilizer is applied until it becomes completely neutralized. As the CaCO 3 amounts in soils, if present, are nearly unlimited, their complete dissolution and CO 2 release will take centuries or even millennia. This emphasizes the necessity of preventing soil acidification in N‐fertilized soils as an effective strategy to inhibit millennia of CO 2 efflux to the atmosphere. Hence, N fertilization should be strictly calculated based on plant‐demand, and overfertilization should be avoided not only because N is a source of local and regional eutrophication, but also because of the continuous CO 2 release by global acidification.