A41A-0032
Development of an Open-Path N2O Flux Measurement System for Understanding Agricultural and Soil Emissions

Thursday, 17 December 2015
Poster Hall (Moscone South)
Anthony Gomez, Joel Silver, Steve Massick, Edwin Ochoa and Alan C Stanton, Southwest Sciences Inc., Santa Fe, NM, United States
Abstract:
Nitrous oxide is the third most important greenhouse gas, with an atmospheric lifetime of ~114 years and a global warming impact ~300 times greater than that of CO2. The main cause of nitrous oxide’s atmospheric increase is anthropogenic emissions, and over 80% of the current global anthropogenic flux is related to agriculture, including associated land-use change. An accurate assessment of N2O emissions from agriculture is vital not only for understanding the global N2O balance and its impact on climate and also for designing crop systems with lower GHG emissions. This work focuses on the early development of an open path N2O instrument for field deployment, based on quantum cascade laser absorption. With a targeted precision of 0.1 ppb at 10 Hz, this instrument will enable eddy covariance measurements to determine vertical fluxes of N2O. Details of the instrument design, which emphasizes ruggedness and high thermal stability, will be presented along with initial results from outdoor testing of the instrument.