The nitrogen footprint of Ukraine: why personal consumption matters

Unintended reactive nitrogen (N) losses from agriculture, energy and transportation pose significant environmental hazards, including eutrophication, acidification, water and air pollution, biodiversity loss, human health risks and climate change. The concept of a Nitrogen Footprint (NF) emerges as a pivotal metric, reflecting potential N losses in the entire production-consumption chain of goods and services used by an individual within a defined timeframe. In a pioneering assessment of per capita NF in Ukraine, key factors, such as the food production chain, consumption patterns, connection to wastewater treatment (WWT) system and the efficacy of WWT facilities, were identified as critical components. Addressing specific challenges, such as data availability, soil N depletion and manure waste, was found to be particularly complex. The apparent high nitrogen use efficiency (NUE) in Ukrainian cropping systems was highlighted to be actually reflected in the elevated N mineralization rate in Ukrainian soils characterized by high organic matter content. The individual Ukraine NF (22.1 kg N cap-1 yr-1 as of 2017) was found to be much lower than that of the US and Australia being comparable to Western European countries. Even so, significant opportunities for reduction remain through a wide range of options towards healthier and more sustainable dietary choices. Potential reductions, ranging from 22% to 69%, were shown for omnivore, reduced red meat, no red meat, half meat products, vegetarian and vegan diets. In the absence of proper manure management in Ukraine, even greater reductions of an ‘actual’ NF can be achieved if wasted N manure is considered. The war's impact is assumed to result in a slight increase or no changes in individual food consumption NFs and an increase in food production NFs for local products, while reductions in individual transport and energy NFs were likely across Ukraine. Nonetheless, refugees massively displaced to less affected regions overload a largely outdated civilian infrastructure, leading to higher N losses. Looking ahead, sustained support, capital investments, legislative enhancements and regulatory frameworks, especially upon post-war renovation of Ukraine, are imperative for reducing the individual NF. This involves enhancing nitrogen use efficiency in agriculture, establishing efficient manure management, upgrading WWT facilities, promoting renewable energy adoption, bolstering requisite infrastructure and raising public awareness on environmental sustainability

The impact of management and climate on soil nitric oxide fluxes from arable land in the southern Ukraine

NO fluxes from soils are a significant source for tropospheric NOx, though global and regional estimates of the soil source strength are constrained by the paucity of measurements. In a continuous 18 month effort (2012–2014) soil NO fluxes from an intensively managed arable site in the black soil region of the Southern Ukraine (Odessa region) were measured using an automated dynamic chamber system. Measurements revealed three periods of peak NO emissions (fertigation, re-wetting of soils, and to a lower extend during winter), with a pulse emission peak during soil re-wetting in summer of 88.4 μg N m−2 h−1. The mean annual NO flux was 5.1 ± 8.9 μg N m−2 h−1 and total annual NO emissions were 0.44 ± 0.78 kg N ha−1 yr−1. The fertilizer induced emission factor for NO was 0.63% under beetroot. The combined effect of soil temperature, soil moisture and soil DIN (NH4+ and NO3−) concentrations were identified as drivers of the temporal and spatial variability of soil NO fluxes. This work shows that long-term measurements are needed for estimating annual fluxes and the importance of soils as a source for tropospheric NOx as the contribution of different seasons and crop growing periods to the annual budget differed markedly

Machine learning for identifying emergent and floating aquatic vegetation from space: a case study in the Dniester Delta, Ukraine

Monitoring aquatic vegetation, including both floating and emergent types, plays a crucial role in understanding the dynamics of freshwater ecosystems. Our research focused on the Lower Dniester Basin in Southern Ukraine, covering approximately 1800 square kilometers of steppe plains and wetlands. We applied traditional machine learning algorithms, specifically random forest and boosting trees, to analyze Sentinel-2 satellite imagery for segmenting aquatic vegetation into emergent and floating types. Our methodology was validated against detailed in-situ field measurements collected annually over a 5-year study period. The machine learning classifiers achieved an F1-score of 0.88 ± 0.03 in classifying floating vegetation, outperforming our previously suggested histogram-based thresholding methodology for the same task. While emergent vegetation and open water were easily identifiable from satellite imagery, the robustness and temporal transferability of our methodology included accurately delineating floating vegetation as well. Additionally, we explored the significance of various features through the Minimum Redundancy - Maximum Relevance algorithm. This study highlights advancements in aquatic vegetation mapping and demonstrates a valuable tool for ecological monitoring and future research endeavors

Weakened growth of cropland‐N2O emissions in China associated with nationwide policy interventions

This study was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (41671464; 7181101181), the National Key Research and Development Program of China (2016YFD0800501; 2018YFC0213304), 111 Project (B14001), the GCP-INI Global N2O Budget and the INMS Asia Demo Activities. The input of P.S. contributes to the UK-China Virtual Joint Centre on Nitrogen ìN-Circleî funded by the Newton Fund via UK BBSRC/NERC (BB/N013484/1). We acknowledged Eric Ceschia, Kristiina Regina, Dario Papale, and the NANORP for sharing a part of observation data.Peer reviewedPostprin

A MSFD complementary approach for the assessment of pressures, knowledge and data gaps in Southern European Seas : the PERSEUS experience

PERSEUS project aims to identify the most relevant pressures exerted on the ecosystems of the Southern European Seas (SES), highlighting knowledge and data gaps that endanger the achievement of SES Good Environmental Status (GES) as mandated by the Marine Strategy Framework Directive (MSFD). A complementary approach has been adopted, by a meta-analysis of existing literature on pressure/impact/knowledge gaps summarized in tables related to the MSFD descriptors, discriminating open waters from coastal areas. A comparative assessment of the Initial Assessments (IAs) for five SES countries has been also independently performed. The comparison between meta-analysis results and IAs shows similarities for coastal areas only. Major knowledge gaps have been detected for the biodiversity, marine food web, marine litter and underwater noise descriptors. The meta-analysis also allowed the identification of additional research themes targeting research topics that are requested to the achievement of GES. 2015 The Authors. Published by Elsevier Ltd. This is an open access article under the CC BY license.peer-reviewe

Global maps of soil temperature

Research in global change ecology relies heavily on global climatic grids derived from estimates of air temperature in open areas at around 2 m above the ground. These climatic grids do not reflect conditions below vegetation canopies and near the ground surface, where critical ecosystem functions occur and most terrestrial species reside. Here, we provide global maps of soil temperature and bioclimatic variables at a 1-km2 resolution for 0–5 and 5–15 cm soil depth. These maps were created by calculating the difference (i.e. offset) between in situ soil temperature measurements, based on time series from over 1200 1-km2 pixels (summarized from 8519 unique temperature sensors) across all the world\u27s major terrestrial biomes, and coarse-grained air temperature estimates from ERA5-Land (an atmospheric reanalysis by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts). We show that mean annual soil temperature differs markedly from the corresponding gridded air temperature, by up to 10°C (mean = 3.0 ± 2.1°C), with substantial variation across biomes and seasons. Over the year, soils in cold and/or dry biomes are substantially warmer (+3.6 ± 2.3°C) than gridded air temperature, whereas soils in warm and humid environments are on average slightly cooler (−0.7 ± 2.3°C). The observed substantial and biome-specific offsets emphasize that the projected impacts of climate and climate change on near-surface biodiversity and ecosystem functioning are inaccurately assessed when air rather than soil temperature is used, especially in cold environments. The global soil-related bioclimatic variables provided here are an important step forward for any application in ecology and related disciplines. Nevertheless, we highlight the need to fill remaining geographic gaps by collecting more in situ measurements of microclimate conditions to further enhance the spatiotemporal resolution of global soil temperature products for ecological applications

Global maps of soil temperature

Research in global change ecology relies heavily on global climatic grids derived from estimates of air temperature in open areas at around 2 m above the ground. These climatic grids do not reflect conditions below vegetation canopies and near the ground surface, where critical ecosystem functions occur and most terrestrial species reside. Here, we provide global maps of soil temperature and bioclimatic variables at a 1-km² resolution for 0–5 and 5–15 cm soil depth. These maps were created by calculating the difference (i.e., offset) between in-situ soil temperature measurements, based on time series from over 1200 1-km² pixels (summarized from 8500 unique temperature sensors) across all the world’s major terrestrial biomes, and coarse-grained air temperature estimates from ERA5-Land (an atmospheric reanalysis by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts). We show that mean annual soil temperature differs markedly from the corresponding gridded air temperature, by up to 10°C (mean = 3.0 ± 2.1°C), with substantial variation across biomes and seasons. Over the year, soils in cold and/or dry biomes are substantially warmer (+3.6 ± 2.3°C) than gridded air temperature, whereas soils in warm and humid environments are on average slightly cooler (-0.7 ± 2.3°C). The observed substantial and biome-specific offsets emphasize that the projected impacts of climate and climate change on near-surface biodiversity and ecosystem functioning are inaccurately assessed when air rather than soil temperature is used, especially in cold environments. The global soil-related bioclimatic variables provided here are an important step forward for any application in ecology and related disciplines. Nevertheless, we highlight the need to fill remaining geographic gaps by collecting more in-situ measurements of microclimate conditions to further enhance the spatiotemporal resolution of global soil temperature products for ecological applications

Global maps of soil temperature.

Research in global change ecology relies heavily on global climatic grids derived from estimates of air temperature in open areas at around 2 m above the ground. These climatic grids do not reflect conditions below vegetation canopies and near the ground surface, where critical ecosystem functions occur and most terrestrial species reside. Here, we provide global maps of soil temperature and bioclimatic variables at a 1-km2 resolution for 0-5 and 5-15 cm soil depth. These maps were created by calculating the difference (i.e. offset) between in situ soil temperature measurements, based on time series from over 1200 1-km2 pixels (summarized from 8519 unique temperature sensors) across all the world's major terrestrial biomes, and coarse-grained air temperature estimates from ERA5-Land (an atmospheric reanalysis by the European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts). We show that mean annual soil temperature differs markedly from the corresponding gridded air temperature, by up to 10°C (mean = 3.0 ± 2.1°C), with substantial variation across biomes and seasons. Over the year, soils in cold and/or dry biomes are substantially warmer (+3.6 ± 2.3°C) than gridded air temperature, whereas soils in warm and humid environments are on average slightly cooler (-0.7 ± 2.3°C). The observed substantial and biome-specific offsets emphasize that the projected impacts of climate and climate change on near-surface biodiversity and ecosystem functioning are inaccurately assessed when air rather than soil temperature is used, especially in cold environments. The global soil-related bioclimatic variables provided here are an important step forward for any application in ecology and related disciplines. Nevertheless, we highlight the need to fill remaining geographic gaps by collecting more in situ measurements of microclimate conditions to further enhance the spatiotemporal resolution of global soil temperature products for ecological applications