Skip to content
Global Nitrogen Enrichment (GANE)
Programme background
Is humankind's doubling of biologically-active nitrogen too much of a good thing?
Every organism needs nitrogen, but most can't use the abundant nitrogen gas in air. A few organisms 'fix' nitrogen into a form others can use. They have kept our ecosystems functioning for hundreds of millions of years.
- But humankind adds extra 'fixed' nitrogen to crops as fertilizer.
- Our livestock release ammonia to the air, and manure releases nitrogen into freshwaters.
- Our industries and vehicles emit massive amounts of nitrogen oxides into the atmosphere, which are later deposited back on the land and oceans in forms that plants can use.
These processes have doubled the amount of fixed, biologically active nitrogen in global circulation, with enormous consequences for natural ecosystems.
The GANE programme studied:
- sources of pollutant nitrogen in the UK, and where it goes
- movements and transformation of nitrogen in soils
- effects on freshwaters and lake biodiversity
- effects on biodiversity in terrestrial ecosystems
- early signs of changes caused by emissions of the greenhouse gas nitrous oxide
- ways of mitigating the effects of nitrogen enrichment
- whether ecosystems are likely to recover when nitrogen deposition is reduced
- the economic costs and benefits of nitrogen enrichment.
The research is helping to:
- identify the environmental damage nitrogen pollution causes in the UK
- estimate the effects of nitrogen enrichment on biodiversity
- show whether we can mitigate the damage, and help certain ecosystems recover
- fulfil international obligations on controlling pollutants and greenhouse gas emissions.
About the programme