Adsorption characteristics of ammonium nitrogen and plant responses to biochar pellet

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.