Nitrous oxide emission factors of mineral fertilisers in the UK and Ireland (1999-2019)

Data from 38 experimental sites across the UK and Ireland were collated resulting in 623 separate mineral fertiliser N2O emission factors (EF) estimates derived from field measurements. Data were either i) extracted from published studies in which one aim of the experimentation was to explicitly measure N2O and report EFs after a mineral fertiliser application, or ii) raw data were used from the Agricultural and Environmental Data Archive (AEDA).

To find the published data, a survey of literature was conducted using Google Scholar for articles considered ‘recent’ (20 years or fewer), i.e. published after January 1998 and submitted before April 2019. The following search terms and their variations were used: N2O, nitrous oxide, emission factor, mineral fertiliser, ammonium nitrate, urea, nitrification inhibitor, nitrogen use efficiency, agriculture, greenhouse gas, grassland and arable. This search based on keywords was complemented with a search through the literature cited in the articles found and known previous research.