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Regional nitrogen budgets for China and its major watersheds

  • Chapter
The Nitrogen Cycle at Regional to Global Scales

Abstract

Since the Changjiang River, Huanghe River and Zhujiang River are the three major rivers in China that are flowing into the Pacific Ocean, this paper addresses nitrogen budgeting, source (input) and sink (output and storage), in these three river valleys, and the China watershed as well. In the China watershed, the anthropogenic reactive N has far exceeded the terrestrial bio-fixed N in nature, and human activities have significantly altered the N cycling in this region. In 1995, the total amount of anthropogenic reactive N in China reached 31.2 Tg with 22.2 Tg coming from synthetic fertilizers and 4.18 Tg from NOx emission from fossil fuel combustion, and the input of recycling N amounted to 30.5 Tg, consisting mainly of human and animal excrement N, reflecting the intensity of the human activity. The sink of N includes N in the harvested crop, denitrification and storage in agricultural soils, transportation into waterbodies and volatilization of NH3. N output and storage in soil reached up to 48–53 Tg. Of this amount, 14 Tg was in the harvested crops, 12 Tg stored in agricultural soils, 11 Tg transported into waterbodies, 5 – 10 Tg denitrified in the soils and a limited amount exported through food/feed.

In this paper — besides the N budget in the China watershed — the N budgets and especially N transports into waterbodies in the Changjiang, Huanghe and Zhujiang river valleys are estimated.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Institute of Soil Science, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Nanjing, 210008, P.R. China

    G. X. Xing & Z. L. Zhu

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  1. G. X. Xing
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  2. Z. L. Zhu
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Editors and Affiliations

  1. State University of New York, Syracuse, New York, USA

    Elizabeth W. Boyer (Co-Editor) (Co-Editor)

  2. The Ecosystems Center, Marine Biological Lab, Woods Hole, Massachusetts, USA

    Robert W. Howarth (Co-Editor) (Co-Editor)

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© 2002 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

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Xing, G.X., Zhu, Z.L. (2002). Regional nitrogen budgets for China and its major watersheds. In: Boyer, E.W., Howarth, R.W. (eds) The Nitrogen Cycle at Regional to Global Scales. Springer, Dordrecht. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-3405-9_13

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-94-017-3405-9_13

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Dordrecht

  • Print ISBN: 978-90-481-6086-0

  • Online ISBN: 978-94-017-3405-9

  • eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive

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