The Haber-Bosch process is a man-made process of nitrogen fixation to produce ammonia gas. The process is important because it facilitates the large-scale manufacture of agricultural fertilizers. Steven K. Ritter (1) says that the main influence of the process on sustainability is that ammonia production makes inexpensive fertilizers available to the world. The availability allows people to grow and cultivate a steady abundance of food both for subsistence use and for commercial purposes.
Despite nitrogen being 78% in the atmosphere, plants cannot use it because the gas is uncreative, and for that reason, nitrogen in the atmosphere cannot be used by plants to make proteins. According to Nature.com (1), nitrogen has to undergo the process of nitrogen fixation to be used by plants. During the process, there is the conversion of nitrogen from the air into ammonia that can be used by plants to make RNA, proteins, and DNA.
People need fertilizers to increase agricultural productivity in their farms. For instance, 40% of people across the world rely on fertilizer inputs to produce food. Also, fertilizer is needed for both biofuel and bioenergy production. At the moment, bioenergy contributes approximately 10% of the global energy requirement (Erisman et al. 2).At the start of the twentieth century; hundreds of thousands of tons of fertilizers were produced and available every year.
Before the invention of the Haber-Bosch process, the main sources of nitrogen were natural resources that comprised of guano and mineral saltpetre that was a combination of potassium nitrate and sodium nitrate (Nature.com, 1). Guano is simply the excrement of bats and seabirds that is used mainly as fertilizer. In modern times, guano is an artificial fertilizer that is manufactured from fish.
The Haber-Bosch process has transformed the world because it has facilitated large-scale manufacture of agricultural fertilizers. The production has gradually increased worldwide agricultural productivity in various parts of the world (Nature Geoscience, 2). Also, the process produced large-scale reactive nitrogen that is the main base of global ammunition supplies.
There are various environmental consequences of the Haber-Bosch process such as the elevation in the quantity of carbon dioxide gas that is used in non-agricultural forms of the ecosystem because of an initial increase in the deposition of atmospheric nitrogen (Nature.com, 3). The increase in carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is dangerous because it causes global warming and climate change.
To mitigate is simply to make something less serious or severe. To mitigate the consequences of the Haber-Bosch process, new methods of ammonia synthesis need to be discovered to reduce the emission of carbon dioxide gas. The emission of carbon dioxide is the main challenge of the process during the production of ammonia because carbon dioxide causes global warming.
Despite the Haber-Bosch process causing large-scale environmental problems as well as used for weapon production, I think the process has done more good than harm. For instance, the process has hugely facilitated mass production of agricultural fertilizers. The mass production has, in turn, resulted in increased food production across the globe with people being able to harvest high-quality agricultural products.
Haber was Jewish, and he invented the process while Bosch provided the necessary engineering skills (Smil, 1). Haber was also a German citizen who keen on developing explosives as well as chemical firearms. Also, he aimed at influencing the course of history through the provision of strategic benefits for his nation regarding military security and food. (Erisman et al. 5).
Works Cited
Nature.com. The Nitrogen Fix.Macmillan Publishers Limited, 2013.
Erisman, et al. How a Century of Ammonia Synthesis Changed the World. Macmillan Publishers Limited, Vol. 1. 2008.
Ritter, Steven, K. The Haber-Bosch Reaction: An Early Chemical Impact on Sustainability.Macmillan Publishers Limited, Vol, 86, Issue 33. 2008.
Smil, Vaclav. Detonator of the Population Explosion.Macmillan Publishers Limited, Vol. 400. 1999.
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