Earthworms: Do They Help or Hurt in Terms of Climate Change?
Every once in a while I come across something in the scientific literature that really surprises me. Because there isn’t much oxygen in a worm gut, it creates the ideal conditions for these particular microbes (”de-nitrifiers”) to turn nitrate (NO3) into nitrogen gas and also generate some nitrous oxide in the process.
Nitrous Oxide
Ok, some background. Nitrous oxide (N2O) is a very potent greenhouse gas with 310 times the global warming potential of carbon dioxide. Its really an Achilles heel for agricultural sustainability because around 80% of the human-generated emissions of this gas come from farms. If even a small amount of the farmer’s nitrogen fertilizer gets converted to N2O it becomes a major part of the total carbon footprint of that field
