What About Nitrogen ?

The Nitrogen Cycle

Nitrogen pollution poses a large risk to our environment but it is not talked about enough. While nitrogen has a lot of social and economic benefits it also heavily contributes to climate change. Over half of the food we eat today is grown using nitrogen fertilizers and we have doubled the availability of reactive nitrogen in the atmosphere since the industrial revolution. Even though there are policies put into place in order to limit the amount of nitrogen pollution, it is only getting worse.

The increasing amount of nitrous oxide in the atmosphere is contributing to climate change. Natural disasters are becoming more frequent and more dangerous than ever before. The globe is warming at an unprecedented rate and our ecosystems are collapsing. We need stricter international agreements to limit the amount of nitrogen emissions. While the Paris agreement was a great start, it is missing an individualized reduction target of greenhouse gas emissions for every country. Progress must be reported and monitored at the national level.

The Gothenburg Protocol was the first legally binding international agreement that deals with air pollution. This protocol is concerned with the effects of sulphur dioxide, nitrogen oxides, ammonia and volatile organic compounds (VOCs) and ozone. Participating members of the protocol include the EU, Canada, the United States and several Asian countries. The members have committed to establishing nitrogen budgets. These nitrogen budgets estimate the excess of nitrogen in their economy in order to inform policy makers. They also calculate where to focus action as well as monitoring the effectiveness of the policies put into place. This also gives countries the opportunity to compare the effectiveness of different measures to reduce air pollution to find the best option. 

I had no idea that nitrogen pollution was such a large problem, we always hear about CO2 emissions but hardly anyone discusses nitrogen. We are so used to living the way that we do that we don’t even realize how disconnected from nature we have become. It is so difficult to live sustainably in this society, everything we do contributes to climate change and it seems like such a hard loop to break.

In order to limit this pollution we can learn to better manage the nitrogen cycle to avoid inefficiencies and waste. But, we as individuals have power to limit this pollution as well. By consuming less meat, dairy or eggs we can limit the amount of nitrogen pollution we emit. It is also best to avoid food waste, composting is a great way to do this. 

Thank ya ! Love ya <3

-AJ

3/17/25