AMMONIAIN THE NITROGEN CYCLE

Stephanie Lopez

What is Ammonium Nitrate ?

• Colorless gas, strong stench• ammonia is a toxic waste-product, coming

from anything that has been decomposed.• Most ammonia made goes into fertilizers

(ammonium nitrate)• And many war bombs

bacteria to produce ammonia

• ammonia is essential in fertilizer, plants can absorb it freely and combine ammonia with their own amino acids.

• by nitrogen fixation; when nitrogen (N2) in the air is converted into ammonium (NH4) for the plants.

• a natural cycle known as “Biological nitrogen fixation.”• Nitrogen is usually made when an organism (animal or plant)

dies and decomposes in the atmosphere and ground, where it is later absorbed by plants.

VS. industrial process • “Industrial nitrogen fixation” is when we as humans have made our own

ammonium nitrate. • Our most common method, The Haber Process: pulling nitrogen out of the air and

placing it in to our fertilizers• It also requires a great amount of natural gas.• because of the fast growing human population we use “synthetic nitrogen

fertilizers” made in factories. (Ammonium Nitrate) These fertilizers are to help grow plants and crops on a large scale.

• This process was discovered by the German chemists Fritz Haber• the price of natural gas, which tracks the price of oil very closely, was once low.

Now, with oil over $120 a barrel, natural gas prices have doubled • the cost of ammonia has tripled.

A possible alternative?

• Ammonium nitrate is commonly used to make powerful bombs

• Kevin Fleming used iron sulfate, a compound that steel foundries throw away, can be mixed with ammonium nitrate

• the iron ion “grabs” the nitrate and the ammonium ion takes the sulfate ion.

• Iron sulfate becomes iron nitrate and ammonium nitrate becomes ammonium sulfate.

• takes alkaline soil and makes it neutral, closer to an ideal pH

level

Sites Creditedhttp://peakenergy.blogspot.com/2008/05/getting-cheaper-nitrogen-fix.htmlhttp://jb.asm.org/content/19/3/223.full.pdfhttp://www.technologyreview.com/view/514046/fertilizer-you-cant-make-bombs-out-of/https://share.sandia.gov/news/resources/news_releases/ied_fertilizer/#.UuhUg9Ln_s0