Ammonia emission from agricultural synthetic nitrogen fertilizer use in the contiguous U.S. during 1900-2015: a set of gridded time-series data

The increasing demands of food and biofuel promote century-long cropland expansion and nitrogen (N) fertilizer management development in the United States. However, the role of such long-term reshaping agricultural system in influencing the spatiotemporal and seasonal pattern of Ammonia (NH₃) emission remains poorly understood. By using an empirical model driven by time-series data sets of environmental forcing, such as climate variability, soil properties, land use and cover changes, and agricultural N fertilizer management practices, we have estimated monthly ammonia emissions from synthetic nitrogen fertilizer uses in the contiguous U.S. during 1900 to 2015. For ease of access, we have resampled the original 1km × 1 km data set to a resolution of 5 km × 5 km. This data set can serve to facilitate national and regional air quality modeling and nitrogen budget assessment.