Portal de Periódicos da CAPES

Plant uptake of phosphorus and nitrogen recycled from synthetic source-separated urine

2015; Springer Science+Business Media; Volume: 44; Issue: S2 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1007/s13280-014-0616-6

1654-7209

Christophe Bonvin, Bastian Etter, Kai M. Udert, Emmanuel Frossard, Simone Nanzer, Federica Tamburini, Astrid Oberson,

Constructed Wetlands for Wastewater Treatment

Urine contains about 50 % of the phosphorus (P) and about 90 % of the nitrogen (N) excreted by humans and is therefore an interesting substrate for nutrient recovery. Source-separated urine can be used to precipitate struvite or, through a newly developed technology, nitrified urine fertilizer (NUF). In this study, we prepared 33P radioisotope- and stable 15N isotope-labeled synthetic NUF (SNUF) and struvite using synthetic urine and determined P and N uptake by greenhouse-grown ryegrass (Lolium multiflorum var. Gemini) fertilized with these products. The P and N in the urine-based fertilizers were as readily plant-available in a slightly acidic soil as the P and N in reference mineral fertilizers. The ryegrass crop recovered 26 % of P applied with both urine-based fertilizers and 72 and 75 % of N applied as struvite and SNUF, respectively. Thus, NUF and urine-derived struvite are valuable N and P recycling fertilizers.