The Nitrogen Fertilizer Industry: Integrating Industrial Ecology and Political Ecology Approaches

氮肥行业：工业生态学与政治生态学的结合

• 批准号: 1437248
• 负责人: Matthew Huber
• 金额: $ 19.28万
• 依托单位: Syracuse University
• 依托单位国家: 美国
• 项目类别: Standard Grant
• 财政年份: 2014
• 资助国家: 美国
• 起止时间: 2014-07-01 至 2016-12-31
• 项目状态: 已结题
• 来源: https://www.nsf.gov/awardsearch/showAward?AWD_ID=1437248&HistoricalAwards=false
• 关键词: Nitrogen; Fertilizer; Industry; Integrating; Industrial

This research project will examine the synthetic nitrogen production industry by combining an industrial ecological focus on metabolism to trace inputs and outputs of the industrial process with a political ecology focus on politics, history, and culture to ascertain the complex relationships among natural and human systems. The project will consider the evolution and operation of a major economic sector from new perspectives. It will expand on the consideration of metabolism by moving beyond traditional considerations that focus on industrial process to consider inputs and outputs among a broader suite of natural and human systems, thereby permitting consideration of the role of natural systems in terms of impacting on and receiving outputs from industrial processes. The project will provide a more comprehensive understanding of the processes though which atmospheric nitrogen has been transformed into a commodity as well as they ways in which this economic enterprise has evolved and interacted with various natural and human systems. The project therefore will expand knowledge about the role of social and other human factors in the transformation of global biogeochemical flows. The project is expected to result in a range of products that will enhance fundamental theoretical understandings and yield practical benefits. A book and other publications will be disseminated to groups like the Fertilizer Institute, the Food and Agriculture Organization, The Earth Institute, the Center for Industrial Ecology, and the National Coalition for Sustainable Agriculture among other organizations in civil society and industry, The investigators also will develop special educational materials, including teaching modules that deal with the social and natural aspects of the nitrogen cycle and illustrate the technical process of taking fossil fuel and creating nitrogen fertilizer in industrial facilities as well as the larger relationships this industry has with society and the environment.Scientists consider the "Haber-Bosch Process" of synthetic nitrogen production to be one of the most fundamental innovations of the 20th century. The process revolutionized global food production by lifting previous limitations on natural sources of nitrogen fertilizer, usually manure. The process has several sustainability concerns, however, because of its reliance on nonrenewable inputs, especially natural gas, water pollution, and excessive flows of nutrients into water bodies that can lead to eutrophication and phenomena like marine "dead zones." The process also yields significant levels of carbon emission and raises thorny questions regarding relationships between levels of food production and population growth. As such, nitrogen cuts across the energy-water-food nexus of environmental challenges. The investigators will combine an "input-output" analysis more traditionally employed in industrial ecology with a three-step research design focused on the historical and social dynamics of the primary "input" (natural gas), the industrial and related processes occurring at a representative site (Donaldsonville, Louisiana), and the primary "outputs" (nitrogen fertilizer and carbon dioxide). They will employ a range of methodological approaches, including archival research, interviews, and field-based observations.

该研究项目将通过结合以新陈代谢为重点的工业生态学（追踪工业过程的输入和输出）和以政治、历史和文化为重点的政治生态学（以确定自然与人类系统之间的复杂关系）来研究合成氮生产行业。 该项目将从新的角度考虑一个主要经济部门的演变和运作。 它将超越关注工业过程的传统考虑因素，扩大对新陈代谢的考虑，以考虑更广泛的自然和人类系统中的输入和输出，从而允许考虑自然系统在影响和接收输出方面的作用来自工业过程。 该项目将更全面地了解大气中的氮转化为商品的过程，以及这一经济企业的演变方式以及与各种自然和人类系统相互作用的方式。 因此，该项目将扩大关于社会和其他人为因素在全球生物地球化学流转变中的作用的知识。 该项目预计将产生一系列产品，这些产品将增强基本理论理解并产生实际效益。 一本书和其他出版物将分发给肥料研究所、粮食及农业组织、地球研究所、工业生态中心、全国可持续农业联盟以及其他民间社会和工业组织等团体，调查人员还将开发特殊的教育材料，包括涉及氮循环的社会和自然方面的教学模块，并说明在工业设施中使用化石燃料和制造氮肥的技术过程，以及该行业与社会和公众的更大关系环境。科学家认为合成氮生产的“哈伯-博世工艺”成为 20 世纪最基本的创新之一。这一过程解除了之前对氮肥（通常是粪便）天然来源的限制，彻底改变了全球粮食生产。 然而，该过程存在一些可持续性问题，因为它依赖不可再生的投入，特别是天然气、水污染以及营养物质过量流入水体，从而导致富营养化和海洋“死亡区”等现象。 这一过程还会产生大量碳排放，并引发有关粮食生产水平和人口增长之间关系的棘手问题。因此，氮切断了环境挑战的能源与水食品之间的联系。 研究人员将把工业生态学中更传统地采用的“输入-输出”分析与三步研究设计相结合，该设计重点关注主要“输入”（天然气）的历史和社会动态、发生在某个特定位置的工业和相关过程。代表性地点（路易斯安那州唐纳森维尔）和主要“产出”（氮肥和二氧化碳）。 他们将采用一系列方法论，包括档案研究、访谈和实地观察。