Did you notice that after a storm the plants become greener and more luxuriant? More than they are after a normal rainy day. The credit is all of lightning.
Lightning has the ability to “fix” nitrogen in the air and make it available to plants, and a scientific test conducted in Auburn, Australia, sought to replicate the process by creating “lightning in a bottle.”
How was it possible?
The test was born thanks to the developments of a technology called “al unit non-thermal plasma“, which acts just like controlled lightning (or an arc welder).
The aim of the researcher Greg Butler in this Australian federal government funded project? Find out if you can effectively replicate the natural nitrate creation process that occurs during thunderstorms.
To do this he created a system in which air was forced into a container of water using a compressor.
“Imagine putting an arc welder in a glass of water,” says Butler, “and then spraying it all into the air: it's the same behavior as lightning, but controlled.”
The non-thermal plasma unit breaks down the molecular forms of nitrogen and oxygen in the air and reforms them as dissolved nitric oxide in water.
“From there, we collect that nitrogen into a liquid and spray it through the fertigation system,” Butler said.
Fertigation is the process of delivering dissolved fertilizer to crops via an irrigation system.
“Lightning in a Bottle” creates liquid fertilizer for farmers
Michael Paxton, the manager of the Australian vineyard that hosted the test, already had a fertigation system, and he exploited it for the first time by obtaining nitrogen from the air.
“Lightning in a bottle” promises to give him and farmers a machine that costs less than the urea they buy to supply nitrogen to plants.
Not only that: the production process of fertilizers Conventional nitrogen mixing (mixing nitrogen from the air with hydrogen to create ammonia) is energy intensive. Powering this new device with solar panels, producing zero kilometer fertilizer, could also reduce the energy impact.
And that would be great, especially in Europe where over 70% of fertilizer production has been reduced or stopped due to the energy (and geopolitical) crisis.
For once, a bolt from the blue doesn't bring bad news.
