Characterization of Nitrogen Release in Modified Controlled-Release-Fertilizer using Rice Husk Biochar
Corresponding email: bayupetrus@ugm.ac.id
Published at : 16 Oct 2020
Volume : IJtech
Vol 11, No 4 (2020)
DOI : https://doi.org/10.14716/ijtech.v11i4.3520
Petrus, H.T.B.M., Putera, A.D.P., Wangi, I.P., Ramadhian, M.A., Setiawan, H., Prasetya, A., 2020. Characterization of Nitrogen Release in Modified Controlled-Release-Fertilizer using Rice Husk Biochar. International Journal of Technology. Volume 11(4), pp. 774-783
| Himawan Tri Bayu Murti Petrus | Sustainable Mineral Processing Research Group, Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jl. Grafika 2, Yogyakarta 55281, Indonesia |
| Andreas Diga Pratama Putera | Sustainable Mineral Processing Research Group, Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jl. Grafika 2, Yogyakarta 55281, Indonesia |
| Inasanti Pandan Wangi | Sustainable Mineral Processing Research Group, Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jl. Grafika 2, Yogyakarta 55281, Indonesia |
| Muhammad Aulia Ramadhian | Sustainable Mineral Processing Research Group, Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jl. Grafika 2, Yogyakarta 55281, Indonesia |
| Hendrik Setiawan | Sustainable Mineral Processing Research Group, Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jl. Grafika 2, Yogyakarta 55281, Indonesia |
| Agus Prasetya | Sustainable Mineral Processing Research Group, Department of Chemical Engineering, Faculty of Engineering, Universitas Gadjah Mada, Jl. Grafika 2, Yogyakarta 55281, Indonesia |
Rice husk
biochar was added to modify ureic fertilizer in order to control nitrogen
release in two methods: (1) mixed-granule and (2) as a coating. The mixed-granule
fertilizer was made of varied compositions of rice husk biochar, ureic fertilizer,
and clay as a binder, whereas the coating model was formulated from ureic
fertilizer, biogas sludge, and clay as a core and coated with various
compositions of biochar and clay. All of the samples were leached by 100 mL of
water once every three days, and the leachate was analyzed for its nitrogen
content. Of all
samples, coated fertilizer with a composition of 20% biochar and 80% clay showed
the slowest nutrient diffusion with an effective diffusivity (De) number of
2.85×10-8 cm/s2. The results show that both models
increase fertilizer’s ability to hold nitrogen longer than pure fertilizer.
Both methods, mixed-granule and coated, showed slow release rate patterns,
particularly at the beginning of the leaching process, and held the nitrogen
content longer. Both models’ release rates enable the modification of nitrogen
release to meet the need for nitrogen in certain plantations.
Coated fertilizer; Granule fertilizer; Nitrogen release; Rice husk biochar
As an agrarian country
with rice as its main staple, Indonesia is one of the main rice producers. Rice
production has been increasing each year. This paddy
grain is constituted by 20–30% husk, with
rice husk waste amounting to the range of 11,000,000–14,000,000 tons every year
(Pode, 2016).
However, rice husk can also be a valuable material if it is well processed. One
example is to convert rice husks into biomass charcoal in the form of a briquette used for solid fuel combustion and
gasified to produce syn-gas (Dafiqurrohman et al.,
2016). The other example is for soil remediation, usually applied for
clay or limestone (Shen et al., 2014)
and the extraction of amorphous silica (Dhaneswara
et al., 2020). In this work, we study the use of biochar from rice husk
as a slow-release fertilizer agent.
One of the most popular methods to produce biomass is the slow pyrolisis method that turns biomass into charcoal. Charcoal’s
characteristically porous body provides an
ideal habitat for soil microbes, but it is not
consumed like other organic compounds. It can also hold the water and
nutrients needed for crops (Shen et al., 2014).
Biochar as a soil enhancer
provides better humidity and fertility to the soil. This application also supports the carbon-negative concept that minimizes the amount of carbon accumulation in the open air by adding it into the soil. Biochar also acts as a repair agent in the soil that changes its physical, chemical, and biological characteristics (Manyà et al., 2018; Zhu et al., 2019).
The usage of agricultural fertilizer in Indonesia is currently dominated by urea. Due to its ease of use, a high
level of crop production and government subsidies further increase farmers’ consumption of this nitrogen-based fertilizer (Winanto,
2018).
Although currently, the government has
started to promote the use of organic fertilizer
due to its production limitation and higher price, urea remains the most-used fertilizer, providing about 60% of the total
fertilizer needs in Indonesia each year.
Urea is specially created to supply nitrogen to
crops, but unfortunately, there is a lack
of efficiency in nitrogen supplying crops. From the amount of fertilizer shown, about 20–65% of the urea is wasted.
The nitrogen loss in the fertilizer used occurs because of evaporation as NH3,
immobilization in soil pores or being carried
away along with water. These inefficiencies cause adverse effects to the environment
as excess nitrogen changes soil pH, which kills microbes in the soil, and leached fertilizer
can poison water that may be consumed by human
and animals. To fulfil the nitrogen supply to crops and increase harvests, many farmers have increased
their use of urea, which results in worse pollution and excessive use of fertilizer (Bari et al.,
2007; Nardi et al., 2018).
To decrease the adverse effect of urea and reduce the
consumption of urea, there is a need to
increase usage efficiency. Several experiments have
shown that one of the most efficient methods
is controlling the release of various fertilizer
constituents, like nitrogen, into the soil.
An experiment by Zhang et al. (2018) revealed that, using controlled-release urea,
the urea needed was decreased by 50%, but the crop yield increased by 20–28%. Another
experiment examining the effect of controlled-release urea by Nardi et al. (2018)
showed that the use of slow-release urea promoted higher microbial activity and
lower-pH soil, which reduces the harmful effect of urea on the soil. The method
of producing slow-release fertilizer has itself
been researched extensively, with Lateef et al. (2016) using nano-zeolite to encapsulate fertilizer,
resulting in soil’s increased water retention and promoting fertilizers’ absorption
efficiency into the soil. An experiment by Zhang et al. (2014)
used graphene oxide (GO) as the coating for a potassium-based
fertilizer. The release of potassium ions took place after seven to eight hours, with
about 93.8% of potassium ions released from the fertilizer.
An experiment using GO was also conducted
by Andelkovic et al.
(2018) for P-based fertilizer,
which resulted in fertilizer absorption
into the soil increasing to 99%. Moreover, GO can be produced from graphite
waste, providing a circular economy and increasing the feasibility of using GO a
slow-release fertilizer or in any other utilization (Kusrini
et al., 2019; Kusrini et al., 2020). Muharam
et al. (2015) studied the release of potassium chloride from chitosan
microspheres as a slow-release fertilizer.
In the current study, rice husk waste from agricultural production was made into biochar and utilized as an economically and environmentally friendly alternative coating agent for urea. The fertilizer in this experiment was modified with the addition of a mixture of rice husk biochar and clay. Biochar itself has been found to have a beneficial effect on soil and crop yields as its porous structure made up of carbon can, when added to the soil, increase the soil’s ability to store nutrients and increase water retention, decreasing heavy metal content and regulating soil pH (Zornoza et al., 2016; Chen et al., 2018). Nitrogen release is also assessed using a mathematical model. The models are divided into two forms, granule mixture and coated fertilizer, as Figure 1 shows.
The experiment with granule fertilizer showed that the addition of rice
husk biochar can slow the release of nitrogen from the fertilizer. The results
showed that the addition of more biochar into the granule slowed the release of
nitrogen. The optimum amount, however, is 40% biochar, 40% urea, and 20% clay,
as shown. The addition of more biochar did not affect the release rate, other
than the initial release. The experiment with coated fertilizer showed that
decreasing biochar content in the coating slowed the nitrogen release. The
slowest release of nitrogen was obtained with 80% clay and 20% biochar content.
This phenomenon is due to biochar’s hydrophobicity, which makes the coating
more brittle at high biochar content, such that it will leak nitrogen. High
clay content also acts as a binder to prevent the release of nitrogen into the
soil. The De value obtained from the 80% clay and 20% biochar sample was 2.85×10-8
cm/s2. Because of the differences in nitrogen absorption for every
type of plant, the coating method chosen can be suitable for the absorption
system. This result shows that biochar is a prospective slow-release agent in
minimizing the inefficiency of fertilizer usage. The use of biochar provides a
circular economy for farmers dealing with rice husk waste from paddies’
production.
We gratefully
acknowledge the Department of Chemical Engineering, Energy Conservation and
Environmental Protection Laboratory for the provided facilities to complete
this study.
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