Fertile Ground for Reform: A Research Roadmap for Agricultural Nitrogen Pollution

Good afternoon everyone and welcome to our briefing fertile ground for reform a research roadmap for agricultural nitrogen pollution. Uh I'm Dan Brassette. I'm the president of the Environmental Energy Study Institute and I'd like to start our briefing today by thanking our friends at the Natural Resources Defense Council for working with us and helping us organize today's briefing which is a really really great topic, a very interesting topic. Uh Environmental Energy Study Institute was founded by a bipartisan group of members of Congress. Uh and since 1984, we have worked to provide information about environmental, energy, and climate change topics to policy makers and the public. We do our best to ensure that our resources are always timely, accessible, relevant, and practical. And we put a lot of thought into making sure these resources are always science-based, and ready when congressional staff need the information. What does congressional education look like? 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Everything we do, including the newsletter, including briefings, including articles and fact sheets, is always available online for free at www.eesi.org. We'll put the uh survey link up at the end of the briefing as well, but if you have a few moments today to share your thoughts uh with us about the briefing, if you had any AV problems or any tech issues, please let us know. Um uh like I said, we'll put this back up at the end, but if anyone wants to take the survey or start the survey now, you're welcome to do that. We really appreciate it and we read every response that we get. We have uh a a great guest speaker. We also have a great panel of four people. uh and this is going to be a great conversation. We will give an opportunity uh to ask questions uh from to our online audience as well. If you would like to follow us on social media, you can do that at EESI online. We'll be doing real-time coverage uh of the briefing today on our Instagram story. If you have a question, you can send us an email and the email address to use is ask. That's askesi.org. We'll do our best to incorporate questions into the Q&A with our panelists uh at the end of the uh session today. So today's topic is nitrogen and nitrogen pollution. And nitrogen is a key component in fertilizer and that makes it critical to food security. But only about half of what's actually applied is absorbed by crops and that leads to high levels of nitrous oxide emissions and that threatens drinking water, ecosystems and the public health. Now you've probably heard about carbon dioxide which is the greenhouse gas that gets the most attention. But nitrous oxide has a global warming potential 273 times greater than carbon dioxide and it's the primary driver of stratospheric ozone depletion. So keeping tabs on nitrous oxide is really important for several reasons including for making farms more profitable. Uh but also it needs a robust um uh robust meth um methods for measurement, for monitoring, for reporting and for verification. And those are some of the topics that we're going to hear about a little bit later. So wondering how all of that happens and how it could happen even better is what our panelists are going to talk about. And that brings us to findings from a new research road map that identifies opportunities for measuring and reducing agricultural nitrous oxide emissions. And we're without any further ado, we're going to turn to our experts. But that's actually not true because we have a little bit more ado. Uh and that is because we have a guest speaker joining us and that is Representative Sean Casten who represents the six sixth district of Illinois. Representative Casten is a great expert and clear communicator about clean energy and sustainability issues and we're always extremely appreciative when he uh is willing to join us and participate in one of our briefings or at the expo or even on our podcast. He helped us kick off our podcast season uh earlier this year. So without any additional ado, we're going to hear from Representative Sean Casten from Illinois. Hello, Congressman Sean Casten here and uh hello from uh from a recording to all my friends at NRDC. I just really want to thank you for doing this report. Um you all know this already, but the you know so much of what we have to do to address global warming has to start from the fact that we've already wildly overshot the one and a half degree mark. You don't see that. But it feels cooler than it is right now because we've emitted so much soot into the atmosphere that is temporarily cooling the Earth until it drops out. Which means that if we are going to provide a anything remotely resembling a stable planet, we have to deal with those chemicals that are forcing warming on the other side to offset the cooling that's being forced by soot. It's why I've been so focused on methane emissions and also why why you all ought to be focused and why this report is so important to focus on nitrous oxide. Methane over 10 years is like 80 times as potent to greenhouse gas as CO2. Nitrous oxide over a 100 years is almost 300 times as potent to greenhouse gas. So you only have to take a little bit out of the atmosphere to massively cool it down. And it's, you know, think about the economics from a farmer's perspective. You put nitrogen on your fields, you do it to fertilize, you get increased yields. And now there's a little bit more decomposition because you slightly overfertilized. And now there's a bunch more into it. Well, that's a logical farmer, right? Saying I want to fertilize as much as I can, but you're not exposed to the cost side. So the the results of this report pointing out how people can actually save money through avoided fertilizer costs, maybe by getting some voluntary carbon credits, but then putting the monitoring in so so that people can look and say, "Okay, I know I've put too much on the field. Let me dial it back a little bit next time." Data helps, right? Um so thank you for the report. um you're going to get way wonkier than this, I'm sure, in the in the balance of this, but just appreciate all you guys do and uh keep doing it and keep doing it louder. >> Great. Well, thank you, Representative Casten, for joining us uh via video remarks. Um thanks to to you, but also to your great staff for helping uh ensure your participation in the great event. And trust me, he knows from Wonky. Uh if you if you haven't listened to his episode of our podcast, I definitely recommend it uh because we get into lots of a a great discussion about energy productivity and energy optimization and energy efficiency and he's a really uh really great leader on these issues. So thanks again representative Castton for joining us. That brings us to our panel and it's my pleasure to introduce our first speaker. Rachel Opitz is a program manager at Taylor Geospatial, where she leads program strategy and stakeholder engagement across GEOAI, agricultural resilience, and food security initiatives. Before joining Taylor Geospatial, Rachel spent 20 years as a researcher investigating long-term human environment interactions through remote sensing and geoysical prospection. Rachel, thank you so much for joining our briefing today. I'll turn it over to you. >> Thanks, Daniel. And thanks for inviting us really here today to talk about a major challenge that is facing all of the actors in the agriculture and food supply chain here in the US and globally. And that challenge which you've set out and we just heard about is managing nitrogen and agricultural systems in a way that maintains profitability for people whose livelihoods depend on agriculture and at the same time that can minimize the pollution and the environmental and the health risks that are inherent in how we farm today. Next slide please. So to begin by recapping what Daniel intro said in his introduction, contemporary farming, so the style of farming that gives us high yields and consequently an abundance of food production is dependent on the addition of fertilizers to soils to boost crop growth. This is how it works. But the application of fertilizer is tricky. It's very easy to put too much or too little. And this is really the meat of what we're going to get into today. The reason why this is so challenging for farmers is because it's hard to know exactly how much fertilizer each plant needs based on how much water it's getting, how much sunlight it's getting, what the soil conditions are, what the slope is. There are lots of things in the context of that plant, which make it hard to know exactly how much fertilizer to put on. And so farmers tend to mitigate the risk to their crop yields by airing on the side of caution. So they can accidentally overapply where it's not needed. So that means that when too much fertilizer is added or in a grazing system when too much manure is present the excess can get transformed into ammonium and nitrates which ends up in the groundwater. This can make currently safe drinking water unsafe and it can also lead to water pollution that creates toxic algo blooms none of which we want. And nitrogen that is in the fertilizer that does not leech into groundwater can get released into the atmosphere where it gets converted into ammonia and then into nitrous oxide gases which in turn and nitrous oxide is really our focus today lead to climate change and to ozone layer depletion. So, these are really things that we need to get to grips with and to deal with. And we're focusing today on the especially difficult problem of N2O emissions as a pollutant. Next slide, please. So, as we heard, N2O is a particularly potent greenhouse gas on a 100red-year basis. It's almost 300 times the warming potential of CO2. And not only is it very potent, but its effects, the source of its effects are really concentrated in agriculture. More than 80% of anthropogenic, so human-caused N2O emissions come from agriculture. And there's a projection as farming scales up and intensifies that there will be without intervention growth in N2O emissions. So we understand in this situation that there are not only signals of business impacts. So farmers as we've said who are using a little too much fertilizer uh and end up therefore with higher costs when they're running their agricultural business that tends to correlate with nitrous oxide emissions. But equally important if not more important we also see these big public health impacts. We have the GHG emissions that lead to increases in global temperatures, ozone layer depletion, and public health risks such as higher skin cancer incidents. Next slide, please. Now, I'm going to stop with the doom and gloom because the good news is that researchers in universities, private labs, and government agencies have been actively working to identify practices and develop products that can help reduce nitrous oxide emissions. So at this point you might legitimately be asking why aren't these practices and products more widely used and part of the answer and really the focus of our work is that there's a research gap. What we don't have right now is a strong enough understanding of which practices work under different circumstances and which products are going to work really on the level of an individual farm field. Right? And that's the level at which farmers can make a change where a business could provide a new product. And the reason why we don't have this understanding is that we currently don't have a good set of technologies and methods to measure and monitor agricultural N2O emissions and consequently we don't have robust data that we can use to model and predict likely N2O emissions under various conditions. And that's really the information that would let companies and agencies provide better advice to farmers or develop new products. So these technologies we need which we're going to refer to as MRV measurement uh reporting and verification or you'll sometimes hear MMRV measurement monitoring reporting and verification and modeling need to be developed really to unlock the potential of the management strategies and products that can help reduce N2O emissions on farms. Next slide please. And these techn these measurement and modeling techniques so MMRV and modeling technologies are also needed for farmers to participate in government and voluntary schemes that provide payments or credits. So again this was mentioned previously. Many farmers, agra food businesses and fertilizer manufacturers want to benefit from participation in carbon credit trading schemes and increasingly these schemes require information on N2O emissions to meet their standards. So MRV is absolutely critical to aggra food supply chain actors in the US really being able to optimally participate and profit from these global carbon credit systems. And we also want to underscore that the MRV and modeling technologies are essential to development of new products like fertilizer inhibitors and bio inputs which can help reduce N2O emissions. But right now it's hard because if you're a startup and you have an amazing new product, it's really hard to test and demonstrate that your product works under a range of conditions and you need MRV to do that. Next slide, please. So what are the MRV and modeling technologies that we need and what do we need to do to develop them? So currently measurement and monitoring for N2O nitrous oxide emissions is done by disperate largely research groups with sensors at lots of different scales. So you have at the really kind of point field scale these uh chambers that are put directly on the ground that are used to measure the N2 emissions from a specific spot in the field. You have what we call towerbased systems. So again you have a sensor but it's on a tower. It gives you information on N2O emissions over a slightly larger area because it's essentially sensitive to the nitrous oxide that passes through the area that is captured by the tower. You then have airborne sensors. Not too many of these, but you do have systems that will allow you to mount a nitrous oxide detector on an aircraft and map the nitrous oxide emissions over a larger area at a specific point in time. You then have what are called tall towers. These are used for regional monitoring. And we do not have yet, but some people are working towards satellitebased systems. And we also have models that take all of this data, combine it with environmental data like soil type or soil moisture or weather and predict what's going to happen. So how much N2O emissions you might get under different circumstances in different places. So the good news again there's a firm foundation of research work providing the basis for N2O MRV and modeling at the scale we need. Next slide please. So with that positivity, there are also some major hurdles to get from our current state of technology to the state of truly robust industry and government ready systems that we need. So nitrous oxide emissions measurement and monitoring is hard because it has a very low atmospheric concentration. So we're at the parts per billion level as opposed to parts per million that we might measure CO2 in. Not only are the emission levels low, but the emissions are episodic. So you might get like 90% of all of your N2O emissions from a field in two or three events over the crop production season. So they're not evenly spread out. It really matters when you take a measurement, which means you have to measure basically all the time to be sure that you're capturing all of the variability. The sensors and instruments that you need to measure very very small levels of N2O all the time are expensive. Um, and they're not only expensive, they're fragile. So, they're not so robust to take into the field. They've really come out of research context. So, we really need some work on the quality of the sensors. And as you can imagine, if you have fiddly, expensive sensors, you end up with a sparse monitoring network. You don't have lots and lots of these sensors available in the field. And this means altogether that we don't have as much data as we need because of the challenges involved inherently among other things in sensor technology. Next slide please. So because the data is sparse and because it's collected and managed by these really dispersed research teams and different organizations, we tend to end up with data that isn't very homogeneous or interoperable, which means the models that use that data are less certain. Everyone's heard garbage in, garbage out. We have a little bit of that problem sometimes in agricultural N2O modeling and that makes it really hard to have consistent reporting for a carbon credit scheme or strong verification of what practices and products work in specific places. Next slide please. So how do we get to where we want to be which is precise measurement, robust modeling as a foundation for transparent reporting that lets us improve nitrogen management, get farmers paid for doing this and reduce greenhouse emissions. and their associated health risks. This is our happy future. Next slide, please. So, together with NRDC and a really amazing community of people, experts in science, industry, and government, we scoped a research roadmap. So, we really looked at the priority research items that need to happen for us to really transform nitrous oxide, MMRB, and modeling. So this was 25 scientists and experts over a year collaborating and a larger community providing feedback through open comment sections. Next slide please. So if you are interested this road map is available online and it's also available on the EC website right now. So please do go grab it and read it. Next slide please. And I'm just going to wrap up quickly by telling you at a high level the key bottlenecks that the road map identified and some of the solution sets that can address them. So bottleneck number one to getting where we want to be as I said is before a little bit is sensor cost and reliability. We need sensor improvements across multiple platforms. They can't have fiddly cables. They can't need a human going out every couple of hours to check their batteries. It has to be easier to get the data off them. They need to be able to be kicked by a cow and still survive if they are going to live on farms. We really need robustness of the sensors and there's a lot of potential to lower costs and have emerging technologies that meet this need with some R&D investment. Key bottleneck number two, uncertainty. We need better representation of soil processes in process models and we also need models to run more efficiently and at scale. So there's a huge amount of potential. People are very excited right now in particular for these new systems that are essentially hybrid AI and processbased models. Uh so process-based models essentially look at what we know about how the nitrogen cycle works in agriculture and the AI model brings scaled use of data about things like management practices or soils or weather puts them together and this is being shown to be a really effective way to work at scale. Next slide please. The third bottleneck that the road map identifies that's really important again which I foreshadowed a little bit is lack of coordinated measurement. So because we have lots of groups using different models, using different sensors, collecting their data in different ways, we don't have very well coordinated or interoperable data sets. And if you remember that I mentioned before that we collect data at lots of different scales. It's really challenging from a technical perspective to integrate a data set that's collected at the scale of a single point in a single agricultural field all the way up to a data set that's collected from an airplane at a different time and all the way up to a data set that's collected from a tall tower that's ultimately looking at aggregate emissions from a whole region. So there's a lot of research that needs to be done to figure out how to do that cross-scale integration and also how to plan measurement campaigns that are coordinated across plots, fields and landscapes. So we really need a convenor of these cross-scale measurement programs and that's kind of a research coordination piece that has to happen. The final bottleneck is lack of agreement on vocabularies and data governance. we promise to get a little bit wonky and this is essentially data management level wonkiness. So, if we're really going to take advantage of the power of AI systems and our ability to coordinate and aggregate data to pull these complex data sets together so that we can model N2O emissions well, we really need some agreement around how data is governed, who can access it, who can use it, what it can be used for, and also what we're going to call different things. So if I am taking a measurement of the N2O emissions and I'm describing my measurement area, I need to describe it in the same way that another scientist is doing it or else our measurements aren't going to be very compatible or we won't understand how to make them compatible. So there's a lot of work to be done in terms of coordination and agreement around the standards and what we call the fair data principles particularly data interoperability to make all of this work. So to conclude my starting speech today, the challenges of agricultural MRV and modeling are significant, but with focused research and development and data coordination efforts, these technologies really can be advanced and we can improve nitrogen management and ultimately reduce N2O emissions. But all of this work sits in the context of a broader need to transform agricultural nitrogen management. So, I'm going to hand it back to Daniel who's going to hand it over to Maria Bowman, who I know is going to talk about this broader context. >> Maria Bowman, I'm director of agricultural nitrogen transformation at Spark Climate Solutions. And a couple words as I get started about Spark and what we do. Um, SparkCC is the science-driven philanthropically funded nonprofit that accelerates progress on unsolved climate challenges. And we focus on blind spots that offer big climate opportunities. So nitrous oxide emissions from agriculture is a great example of that and we work to speed up the development of the fields that are needed to address them. We already talked about how most of the nitrogen that is applied as fertilizer or manure to crops is ultimately lost to the environment on the way through the food chain. And at Spark, we think that bringing a systems approach to innovation to reduce nitrogen losses across crop and livestock systems and the policy and market incentive space holds the potential to not only improve climate and water quality, but also reduce input costs to farmers, which is super important right now given commodity prices, fertilizer price volatility, and enable access to those new markets that other folks have mentioned for valuable ecosystem services. And with that, I'm going to talk a little bit about nutrient management decisions on the farms and some of the challenges and opportunities that go along with those decisions and importantly how this relates to MMRV and modeling in the road map that we're here to talk about today. Next slide. So I want to start by giving a little bit of a background on how farm operations make decisions about nutrient management and more specifically nitrogen management because I think it helps set the stage for the complexity of the process which we've already started getting into as well as the investments that producers are making in planning equipment testing and other dimensions. And by the way fertility and nitrogen management is just one of the sets of decisions that producers are making during a crop year. Nitrogen management decisions involve not only deciding how much nitrogen they're going to apply, which is one of the decisions we focused on the most, but also what types of fertilizer to use, when to apply them, and how to apply them. And each of these elements affects how much nitrogen is available to be used by the plant, and how much is lost to the environment. In general, applying more nitrogen at or after planting and during the growing season helps make sure that it's being used by the plant. So on this slide, I've put some of the tools and resources that farmers use to make decisions about and implement nutrient management. Experience and a historical data is a really important one. Farmers also often use yield maps and soil maps and what they know about their ground to make these decisions. They also use recommendations from trusted advisors like crop advisors, retailers, extension agents, and others and nitrogen rate tools or calculators. So that's like you would go to a website, you'd put in some information about how you make your nutrient management decisions and it would help you decide how much nitrogen to apply. Coming back to those decisions about fertilizer type, timing, and placement, specialized equipment, including precision agricultural technologies and farm machinery is a really important piece of helping a farmer have the data that they need to develop a variable rate prescription and implement it. Um, as well as being able to apply fertilizer close to that plant at the time when it needs it. So, this might sound obvious, but in order to apply fertilizer during the growing season when the corn is actually out there, you have to have high clearance equipment that can go over the plants without damaging them while applying a fertilizer or a drone or something else like that. Last but not least, soil testing can be a really important tool for a farmer to understand how much nitrogen is left on their soil and what's being provided by the soil. So, one example of this would be the late spring nitrate test that can take into account how much nitrogen has been mineralized by the soil to help the farmer decide whether to and how much to fertilize or side dress corn during the growing season. Next slide. All of these tools help, but the fundamental challenge that we've already identified is that the right nitrogen rate depends on the weather. And about 80% of US corn acorage relies on rainfall rather than irrigation. So, let me say this a little bit differently. The farmer doesn't know ahead of time what the right amount of nitrogen is to apply and the right rate varies widely from year to year. So, this graph shows the average economically optimal in rate across trials in the Iowa nitrogen initiative which is an onfarmm network um that's coordinated by Iowa State. You'll see there's a lot of variability across the fields. That's what those ranges are in each of those green bars. And you can also see that the average optimum rate varied a lot from year to year. And this uncertainty is one of the main reasons that we see over application, right? Farmers are applying a little extra because they can't predict the weather or they're not set up to be able to get in there and do two, three or four passes across the field for those inseason applications as the weather plays out. Plus, each of those inseason passes costs money. So coming back to models and measurement and MRV for a minute. This is one area where you'll hear farmers talk about how they'd really like to be able to better use data and information to get closer to that economically optimal in rate. So there's a role for sensors and models and AI here, but these tools have to be easy to use. They have to provide the information just at the right time for the farmer to be able to make the decision. And ultimately they have to reduce risk and provide better outcomes for farmers. And most importantly, they have to trust them, right? And that's a process. Next slide. Having framed up that challenge, I want to talk a little bit about progress and continued opportunities for progress. And one trend that we've been seeing over time is that fertilizer use efficiency has been improving, right? Say over about the last 15 years. In corn, for example, we're using roughly the same amount of fertilizer, but yields are increasing. And this happens for a number of reasons. And I think this also points to, you know, how we can continue to on this progress. Um things that have contributed to this are improved improved crop genetics and pest protection strategies, right? Getting new corn varieties out there. Um changing management practices and moving toward more of that inseason application of nitrogen like I mentioned and the use of new products like enhanced efficiency fertilizers and inhibitors um that keep that nitrogen in the soil a little longer so that it's available to the plant. Still at least a quarter of these nitrogen inputs from fertilizer and manure to crop land are being lost at this crop stage of the food chain. So there's quite a bit of room for improvement using existing tools and also for new innovations and technology that can improve nitrogen use efficiency in crops and that technology that can help us measure when and where those losses are happening so that we can address them. Coming back to the the report. Next slide. So you may already be familiar with precision act technology like variable rate technologies. These are used uh to apply fertilizer and to use those yield and soil maps that a farmer develops to determine rates um and to have those vary across the field. So this is another area with demonstrated potential but also plenty of room for further adoption. So, a recent USDA economic research service report on precision agriculture shows how many farms are using variable rate technologies. And although these numbers are higher than they were 10 years ago, less than half of even those large farms are using variable rate technologies to apply fertilizer. This could be because they don't have equipment to be able to do this. Um, but it what it means is that they're applying the same rate of fertilizer across the field even though they may know that different areas of the field have different yield potential and have different fertilizer needs. So, there's a lot of potential here for continued adoption and use, but it often involves investment on the part of the farmer um to purchase new equipment or learn how to use it or make sure they have support services in place to be able to develop those variable rate fertilizer prescriptions. Next slide. Finally, one of the topics that we're really excited about at Spark is some emerging innovations that hold the potential to reduce nitrogen losses across crop and livestock systems by directly targeting some of those um areas. So, one of them is the development of new crop varieties. So, you know, over time we've invested a lot in crop varieties that improve yield, that have pest protection properties, um that that make corn more resilient in drought, but there's also the potential to actually directly impact nitrogen use efficiency. this. So this was an area that we're really interested in is breeding new varieties to target in UEIE. We're also thinking about this on the livestock side. So a lot of operations in the US, even though we've become more specialized and concentrated in in US livestock production, a lot of operations have both crop and livestock. And so manure is a really valuable resource, but it's also very challenging to manage. And so there are opportunities in the MRV space as well to improve manure recycling. Um, a recent paper showed that manure could substitute for up to 6% of fertilizer demand with existing technology and up to 22% with technological innovations, but those are costly and require research and investment. Finally, there's opportunities at that crop livestock intersection to change livestock diets um toward feed that's has more digestible nitrogen um while still using crops for for other other dietary needs. And these innovations again have an important tie-in with MMRV and the modeling report from our perspective. That's that we're going to need the tools to measure whether these or any other new innovations are working to reduce nitrogen losses um as nitrous oxide or nitrate as they're developed, trial, and implemented. Next slide. To sum up, there's a really big role when it comes to nitrogen management for better data models and tools to support the innovation process and also farmer decision-making about nutrient management. I showed some data and examples in this presentation from the Iowa nitrogen initiative. And one of the closing points I want to make that I think the report makes well is that there's a need to use data from real farms to drive model tool and technology improvement to make sure that these solutions are co-developed with farmers and that they're grounded in that farm reality. And there are a number of other networks and farmers doing this. And in an age where we have these powerful tools available to leverage data and information and AI, developing and expanding these networks is a really important part of getting that data and putting it into action. But this requires structuring those networks and developing those relationships with farmers so that farmers want to participate in them, are learning from them, and that trust has been built for them to be able to share their data. And I can't overemphasize how hard this is. farmers are are really um rightfully so concerned about sharing their data and they want to know what's going to be done with it and how it's going to be benefit them and their operation. With that foundation in place, if those relationships are built and through the development of these networks, there's the potential to improve models and decision support tools for better nitrogen management to reduce the uncertainty, reduce input costs for farmers, and deliver that value potentially of increased access to markets. Um, so I think there's a lot of opportunity to develop and trial new innovations and reduce nitrogen losses across agricultural systems and part of this is developing these networks. Thank you so much and I look forward to the discussion. >> Thank you, Maria. Sorry for I don't know where I went. I know for one I know for sure it was not human error. Um, Zoom just crashed or whatever. Um, I also think it may have had something to do with what Rachel was talking about. I think a cow kicked something over. Um, and uh, that's probably the reason, but sorry for that. Um, Maria, I did not have an opportunity to introduce you properly. I'm sorry for that. Um, I just want to make sure everyone knows that you are the, uh, you lead the development of agricultural nitrogen or the agricultural nitrogen transformation program at Spark Climate Solutions, uh, which is a great organization that does a lot of great work. Maria, did you say much about your additional background in terms of where you >> I talked about Spark, but I didn't talk about myself very much, which may or may not be relevant. Um, I it may be worth saying that I'm an agricultural economist and a lot of my uh I spent a lot of time at USDA working on tracking adoption of conservation practices that we can understand what's going on out there in the landscape. And I also spent a little bit of time working in onfarmm trials at the National Corn Growers Association. So have had some opportunities to learn from that. Thanks. Great. So, in case you were wondering, yes, Maria knows what she's talking about and everyone should be taking close notes of what she just said. Maria also had great slides. Rachel had great slides. We've got two more presenters. I just wanted to remind everyone that the slides, uh, all the presentation materials and link to the report that we've been talking about. All of that's available on the briefing web page at eesi.org. Uh, also the live cast will we're recording it and there will be a recording of the briefing today. So, if you want to go back, if you want to, you know, relive Rachel's presentation, Maria's presentation, if you want to revisit what our next two panelists are going to talk about, look at the materials, all of that, uh, is available and will be available pretty soon after the briefing ends today. Um, we will also have, uh, written summary notes um, available. That's one reason why it's so important to RSVP for our briefings because that way you get links to everything when everything is complete because it does take a little bit of time sometimes. So, visit us at esi.org or if you want to um uh relive the the briefing today and and go over those great slides. That brings us to our third presenter uh who is rep state representative Rick Hansen. Uh he represents the Minnesota House District 53B uh which is a working-class district split by the Mississippi River. Uh he has served in the Minnesota House since 2005 and he's a lifelong advocate for conservation and the outdoors. He co-chairs the House Agriculture Committee and he serves on the Environment and Capital Investment Committees and the Legislative Audit Commission. Uh Rick, thank you so much for joining us today. Um I will turn it over to you. >> Thank you. And uh I'm zooming in from my farm in Filmore County, uh Minnesota, which the farm is right on the Iowa border. So the southern border of the farm is the is the border. Uh, and I have uh a lot of Amish farmers uh nearby me. So, uh corn and uh a wide diverse agriculture as well. Um I'm a legislator. I've been a legislator for a long time. Uh my masters is in soil management. I'm the only one uh in the 201 legislators uh in Minnesota who's a soil scientist. Uh but I had to check with the university yesterday because my uh my science was getting a little rusty. So, I had to double check a few things. So, you know, as a legislator, I like changing laws, making laws, looking at rules, and in doing that, I look at precedent. And I think it's important. I'm going to ask you all to do a little homework. We've already seen uh the nitrogen cycle, but when this program is over uh later today, I' I'd like you to just search for nitrogen cycle and look at the nitrogen cycle. And this is one of about 50 graphics when I just searched uh on the nitrogen cycle uh that I found. And there are variations. This one has a nitrogen source with a cow. That could be a tractor pulling a white tank of anhydra ammonia. Uh there are various uh graphics for the nitrogen cycle. Um but as legislators, we often change policy. It's very hard for us as legislators to change chemical reactions. It's very hard for us to change the biology. And in this system, I go back to, you know, you may have to go back to your eighth grade, high school chemist or middle school chemistry or back to freshman year in college, first year. Um, but nit the nitrogen cycle is a leaky system. It's just a leaky leaky system. Uh and it is a fascinating system because in that system you also have biology working to fix nitrogen on legumes whether they're soybeans or clover or alalfa putting uh gathering nitrogen from the air and making uh making nitrogen that can be used as a credit when you're uh applying fertilizer because it's being applied to the soil. It also loses nitrogen. And uh let's go back to the tractor and the anhydrris NH4 and goes to nitrate or nitrate nitrite. Nitrate is very leaky goes with water. Um you know when you look on a bag of fertilizer there's an NP and K. And again going back to that original aronomy N is nitrogen P is phosphorus K is potassium. Phosphorus generally moves with soil. nitrog nitrate moves with water and potassium just kind of hangs out and stays fairly immobile. Um there are also micronutrients that are involved but that nitrate we've known about nitrates impacts on water quality groundwater for a very long time and what precipitated that was something called methemoglobanemia uh a health impact or blue baby syndrome um and we've known about that for decades. So work looking at groundwater impacts beyond that initial health impact of met hemoglobinia looking at groundwater contamination started in the late 70s and early 80s. Uh there were plenty of conferences there were changes to laws. Um, I graduated from Iowa State, uh, and there was a change in pesticide and fertilizer law in Minnesota in 1987. And then we had the Groundwater Protection Act of 1989. And I think um, there's a slide of a report that I worked on as a staffer. And I know that um, some of the folks on the call here are staffers at the Senate or the House or in agencies. and I worked as a staffer at the Minnesota uh Department of Agriculture and I worked on this nitrogen fertilizer task force and uh I don't think the slide has the date on it. So, I actually found the report and I'm going to show it to you. And I don't know if you can see the date, but the date was August of 1990. And one of the staffers on that report was me. That's 36 years ago. Uh, a task force on nitrogen fertilizer. I want to go back to the leakiness, you know, because we talked about nitrate. nitrate getting in groundwater, soluble in groundwater moving in groundwater, m he hemoglobinia. Uh nitrate is also a pretty good indicator of other contaminants whether it's cifform bacteria or atrizine other water- soluble pesticides. If you got nitrate, you might have some of that other stuff in there as well. But when we look at N2O or at nitrous oxide which most commonly is known as laughing gas, when you look at these nitro nitrate cycles, nitrogen cycles, often it says N squiggly line going up or NXO. Uh and often that is shown because it's it's unique. How do you put those two nitrogen molecules together in the environment? And what happens in order for those two nitrogen molecules to go together with the oxygen, that nitrous oxide, you often need saturated conditions. You need to have wet conditions. You need anorobic conditions so that you know we've got bacteria that are working on making nitrogen nitrogen uh with legumes. We've got things breaking bacteria breaking things down. And then we have anorobic bacteria, no oxygen, waterlogged situations that are precipitating that N2O. It's hard to make that N2O. Uh you put those two nitrogen molecules together with oxygen. So think about the climate that we're having and the weather that we're having when we're getting water, we're getting these big floods, we're getting heavy rains, we get saturated soils. So, uh, earlier speakers talked about the variability that farmers face. We're getting this greater variability, more water, uh, more situations where we may be precipitating N2 whole. Hard to tell uh, what that volume is, but when we're having these climate impacts, these weather impacts that cause more water in the system after you've applied that fertilizer, you may have more N2O. Um, how do we deal with that? as policy makers, how do we deal with these dynamic systems? And earlier speakers talked a little bit about the amount of fertilizer being applied. So going back, we have rate, timing, application, application methods, the type of fertilizer, those type of things. In these northern climates, we know with the research that if we're putting fertilizer, nitro nitrogen fertilizer on and hydroammonia, again, that pressurized tank, putting that anhydroammonia on, we need that soil temperature, the average soil temperature to be under 50° F. Because when the soil temperature is colder, the microbial activity slows down. When it's hotter, the critters, just think about soil critters, I guess is a better way to describe it. Those soil critters break that down and you're having you're losing that it causes that leakiness whether it's going up as N2O in anhydrris condition or anorobic condition or it's going out as water. So fall fertilizer applications in terms of a method with variability in climate. We may have a cold snap that drives down that soil temperature in Minnesota in early October. We've had snow at Halloween and then we may get a warm snap which raises that soil temperature up and the microbial activity uh heats up. you lose that nitrate, you lose that um nitrous oxide. The variability that's happening with weather and climate is impacting these losses in a leaky system. So what were some precautions we should do? Should we be looking at fall fertilizer application? Should we be doing that period on uh coarse textured soils, sandy soils or carsted topography, groundwater susceptible soils on the water side? My background has been on the water side. And what I worry about a little bit is that we look at the greenhouse gas side and we look at the water side when they're really the same system. that leakiness whether you're we're losing it to gas nitrous oxide or to water the nitrates getting in water those are functions of that same system we have common ground so when we're looking at management in the field and again I'm talking about northern climates here with temperature where we don't have the freeze thaw system that we had in the past we have that increased variability do we need to change some of that management uh in terms of making these applications s getting the fertilizer applied quicker or when it's most needed has always been kind of the the gold standard. If we go back to I was referenced the spring nitrate test that was the holy grail when I was in college. Oh my gosh, we're going to get a spring nitrate test someday. We'll get a spring nitrate test. Well, we have it. So that measurement I'm not sure what the ratios are with nitrate lost to nitrous oxide lost but I think when we're dealing with broad real field situations like amount applied rate timing application what the exact correlation is is not as critical as how we impact the management to reduce both of them. we can work on reducing both of them. Um, and I'm not sure how much time I've got left, but we passed the groundwater act in 1989. That nitrogen fertilizer task force that I wrote uh worked on writing was on that task force. That is 36 years ago. In 2008, Minnesota passed a constitution amendment dedicating money for clean water. We spend now uh from our sales tax revenue almost $200 million a year on clean water efforts. A lot of that goes into monitoring. A lot of it goes to our soil and water districts. Uh some of it went to the Minnesota Agricultural Water Quality Certification Program and I think you're going to provide the link for that. I also have the handy book right here. Uh this report came out. We have a legislative auditor in Minnesota who evaluates not just where the money is spent, but is a program working. So, the a water quality certification was a voluntary program uh working with farmers. We've spent $39 million of clean water funds since 2013 and we don't have a clear result in water quality. We've spent a lot of time on modeling uh but we're not even sure if some of the people who are enrolled implemented the practices and if they did implement the practice did it impact water quality. So I think it's really important when we're going in this future path dealing with both greenhouse gas emissions and nitrates that we have an evaluation component put in for future legislators, future policy makers and future scientists to look at how do we actually impact what we're talking about. We can we can have our task forces and we can have our working groups and we can do our monitoring but in the field we have to look at this leaky system that we've known leaks for a very long time and how do we reduce that leaking because we will not be able to stop those chemical reactions. The chemical reactions are what makes agriculture work, but it has consequences in terms of externalized expenses that the public is being asked to pay for to clean up more and more. So, with that, I'll stop. >> That was a great presentation. Um, and I really appreciate um that you were able to take some time today from your uh your your work a day life uh as a farmer to to join us. Thank you so much. Um you mentioned the you know water and you know we we get a lot of it at at times and there's obviously lots of impacts. We have a briefing next week uh I think it's the July 24th about um severe drought. Uh and so if anyone on our call wants on the briefing today wants to learn uh about severe droughts uh that are impacting all across the our communities all across the US right now um check that out. It's actually one of our rapid readout formats. So it's um only a shorter format. Um so that'll be a really timely resource unfortunately because a lot of communities including here in the DC area are dealing with pretty severe droughts. Um last reminder before I turn to our fourth panelist. If you have any questions you can send us an email uh with your question. The email address to use is ask. That's askesi.org. Uh and we will get to we'll do our best to get to those questions uh once we get to our Q&A. So, that brings up our fourth presenter. Matthew Kaplan is a senior attorney for the Natural Resources Defense Council's uh water and agriculture team. Uh before joining NRDC, Matthew worked in the US House of Representatives for the chair of the House Energy and Water Appropriations Committee. That's where I first met him. Uh he's also an attorney adviser at the Department of Justice and for the DC Court of Appeals. Matthew, thank you so much uh for all of your hard work bringing uh this topic to our audience today. It's always a real treat to work with you and the uh water and a team over at NRDC. So, I'll turn it over to you. >> Got it. Thank you, Dan. And this is the first time I'm on this side of the screen, so it's uh it's exciting to participate in these briefings. Um so first of all let me thank the other panelists for presenting today and offer a special thanks to um Daniel Wrath and Rachel Opitz um in their partnership for writing the uh research roadmap on nitrous oxide emissions in the a sector. Um it was it's been a long road and we've worked really hard and exciting to get this to get this out into the wider world to to compare. Um sort of at the outset, let me set the frame. I think we've heard a little bit about carbon and methane and we're focusing today on on nitrous oxide because it's really not it should not be the forgotten super pollutant. It is huge impacts and I think the goal with the road map here was to put forward a research agenda on how to how to prioritize the monitoring measuring for um for nitrous oxide. I think two conclusions a as we were writing the road map. one is that there was really remarkable alignment around some of the scientific questions and the consensus around uh N2O measurement and I think this is really it's a it's a striking moment um that to identify the gaps for business for farmers for for policy makers to solving many of those gaps and the second is that the roadmap is really a starting point for um for a lot of the work that we're hoping to continue agricultural nitrous oxide emissions are they represent 75% of the nation's nitr nitrous oxide emissions. So unlike in the industrial side where you have a sizable nitrous oxide emissions section, the reason we're focusing on MMRV around nitrous oxide is because it's the A sector that really represents the vast majority of those emissions. And then in in some states like in Representative Hansen's native state in Minnesota, 90 o over 90% of the nitrous oxide emissions come from agriculture. And so that's I think that's really the reason that that we've been sort of laser focused on this question and nitrous oxide as opposed to nitrates. Grateful for representative Hansen walking through the nitrogen cycle. Um, I think you know when we're talking about nitrous oxide, we're talking about sort of the gas from the fertilizer and the emissions as opposed to the nitrates which was is not the gas. It's sort of the water and the sol the soluble version of it. Um, so next slide please. So why nitrous oxide here matters I think is the is sort of the frame one of the framing questions that we have. Um first off carbon markets really do rely on accurate nitrous oxide emissions as there is less uncertainty in carbon markets. It requires more accurate measurement of some of those emission models. And as we maximize some of maximize next, maximizing farmer profit means understanding some of those nitrogen losses. And as we tackle soaring input costs from those nitrogen losses, we need a really better idea of what happens with those nitro nitrous oxide emissions. The third is that global corporations need to track these emissions. These emissions are really important for companies that are trying to explain to both shareholders and consumers what's happening in the marketplace. And lastly um is is relating to the environmental impacts of nitrogen pollution and those nitrog nitrous oxide pollutions that as we said have a huge um impact on global global greenhouse gases but also on nitrous there's a direct relationship between nitrous oxide and the nitrates that are commonly that commonly impact water quality at the local level. So while we're talking about tracking the nitrous oxide emissions as emissions that that data really helps create a clearer understanding of what's happening with the nitrates that are more directly impacting water quality and um and sort of health impacts at at an individual scale. Uh next slide. So when we wrote the the so we have these five categories here that we're identifying when we wrote the road map we were primarily trying to to to really get at these first two pieces. First is developing scientific consensus. I'm not sure if folks here have worked with scientists before, but getting dozens of scientists together to write a single document that where they all agree on something is sort of it is itself a remarkable process and I think that's what we were aiming to do with identifying a nitrous a roadmap for nitrous oxide emissions. Then the second one of the second goals was to identify some of the high-v value science questions to crowdsource with the community where we think that the research and the priorities need to head. So these next three buckets are buckets I think that are work that lies ahead. Um, we're hoping that we can continue to build this national MMRV community, a community that we've started to activate around this work, around with the science community, but we're hoping to take this sort of to continue to engage new new uh actors in this work. We're also hoping that as we move forward, we can identify areas of policy innovation and find ways to build the kind of collaboration for the future both at state in state policy like Representative Hansen was mentioning. Um things like climate action plans pop to mind and at the federal level um thinking about uh identifying policy coordination. And finally, we're hoping that in the long term, we can develop some of these long-term science strategies that can answer some of these questions that will have direct impact for farmers and for resource agencies that are identifying what many of the next steps need to be. Next slide. So, here we're trying to uh identify ways of implementing the the roadmap through policy. And I think um my one of the reasons that I'm presenting forth is I think I'm trying to take what many of the other panelists presented and say like what are some of the policy takeaways for nitrous oxide and the first thing that comes to mind is that we really need to take lessons from the carbon and methane measurement initiatives. important work has happened in those spaces and that in nitrous oxide that there are a number of there are a number of lessons that the community can learn from as we're identifying some of the long-term strategies for nitrous oxide. Next is that we're hoping to at a highest at the highest level coordinate some of the nitrous oxide research that we think needs to happen in order to solve some of these long-term questions. And lastly, unpack the roadmap for policymakers and to try to help un translate what was essentially a science document that was the priorities and to translate that into a more policy focused audiences. Next slide. There are essentially four different levers that we are thinking about in this work. Um, and I'm going to focus on the first two. First is uh federal science policy. So the nitrous oxide roadmap has direct relationship to the sort of work that many of the federal agencies that that are working on in terms of developing their research budgets and also the funding mechanisms that that are decided at both an annual and a long-term basis. And at state policy level, at the state policy level, we are focused on thinking through different ways of of de of unpacking the roadmap recommendations for state and state and local governors, state and local entities. The last two I won't hit here, but I think are important just to flag. Both philanthropy and business have a really important role to play in figuring in taking this research priority prioritization and translating them in for the into the long term. Next slide. So many of our federal policy goals here are relating it's kind of in three categories. First is uh research coordination and funding. We're hoping that we can help use some of the recommendations here to prioritize coordination among a number of the federal funding agencies to the different types of technologies that we want to prioritize. Next is create strategic partnerships with different federal agencies um and other associated organizations like the nationalmies and national labs and then also to integrate business and farm farm stakeholder engagement. Next slide. If you look at this map and you see the the wide array of federal agencies that have a a important role in nitrous oxide MMRV. Initially, one would think that USDA would really be at the center point, and certainly they are. They are really critical in um identifying and translating this, but a lot of the long-term strategies that I think we're thinking about are actually really runs run through a number of other agencies. Department of Energy, National Science Foundation, NIST, Office of Science and Technology Policy, sort of centered at, you know, based out of the White House have important opportunities. And in the in the medium term, thinking through how both the annual appropriations process and in the long term, the annual authorizations for many of those different agencies can play in helping prioritize this work. Next slide. And next I think this is a an area that is um under under represented is state policy. State states are really primary actors of innovation in in this space and they have very different kinds of levers and and a more direct feedback loop with resource management with budgets and with and are home to regionally specific resource problems. And so we're hoping that as we move forward that state policy can be an important opportunity for innovation. Next slide. So we're hope we are identifying a a variety of different ideas here for bringing the roadmap to some of these state policy makers and we're hoping that as we move forward to engage state level environmental agencies where conditions are really critical for the kinds of questions around data coordination and research strategies. And many states have a variety of different agencies that have different roles to play in nitrous oxide measurement management and in n in nitrogen pollution more generally. And so as we're moving forward, we're hoping to coordinate a variety of different policy briefs that continue to unpack the recommendations to some of these individual states for for future work. Next slide. So the road map here I think in in this briefing is a starting point. We have begun to build sort of a national network of researchers that are engaged in in nitrogen nitrogen research and we're eager to collaborate in in the future to answer state specific problems on nitro nitrous oxide and sort of use this roadmap as a as a launching pad for some of this future innovation. So, a couple of things to think about. One, we want to share the roadmap, share it out with policy makers, with people that have that folks that have interest in it. Um, we're hoping to then um tailor some of these recommendations to additional additional entities, agencies that have have a role to play in in prioritizing nitrous oxide uh measurement research. And lastly, we're hoping to can use the roadmap as a as a catalyst to start to engage with the private sector to take the to translate the technology and the innovation into practice to help invent a new future for a variety of different marketplaces. So, I I'm grateful for uh for your time and I'll kick it back over to you, Dan. >> Great. Thank you, Matthew. That was a great presentation. Uh as a reminder, all the presentation materials as well as a recording of the briefing today is available on our website, the briefing web page. Uh and you can visit us at at uh esi.org to check that out if you want to go back and revisit any of this. And we also make sure you have links to the reports, the roadmap and things like that. So let's get into a little Q&A in our remaining time. Um this was a great conversation. I've learned a lot uh about the nitrogen cycle. Uh, and it's amazing to me how much work is going on in so many different places. And as Rick was saying, how long some of this work has been going on. Rachel, maybe we could start with you. Um, at the top of the order, um, do you have any, um, thoughts about states, um, universities, agricultural producers that are really leading the way on sort of nitrogen and nitrous oxide related MMRV? And I'm really specifically interested in like who you might hold up as like the role model or who might be working in a way that would be especially replicable for other parts of the country and then we'll hear from the other panelists as well. >> Sure. And this is a challenging question to answer because there are so many people and groups who are doing amazing work. So I'm going to name check just a few so everyone has a sense of the work that's going on. uh because we have representative Rick Hansen with us on the call. I have to start by mentioning the AI leaf lab uh which is based out of the University of Minnesota. This is a national lab funded by the NSF National Science Foundation and NEIFA. And this group led by Shashi Shakar uh have really been the pioneers in knowledgeguided machine learning for modeling of the nitrogen cycle and N2O emissions. And this really is what a lot of people are looking at as the next generation and kind of a big direction for how we do the modeling piece of this work. So I'm aware of a range of other research teams who are trying to follow that model and really make this leap uh to this new form of modeling. So that's very exciting. We have to also look at places like ENL at Colorado State University, Steven Oakwell's group who participated in the road map. uh they're doing an amazing job on developing and implementing models um and they're also working uh in Colorado through the EMDC the environmental modeling data consortium are really trying to take a bite out of this data coordination problem which is not easy so there's lots of work like that going on um we have critical pieces of national infrastructure like the Americian network um and we also have programs like the work that's been supported through Steven Singer's program at RPE um supporting researchers like Mark Zambau who's at Princeton who's been pioneering UAV based N2O sensors. So really trying to work on the sensor side of things. Uh there's just a really wide range of programs that are excellent and that people could take up. >> Thanks Maria. Same question to you. We'll go through the order. Are there any um organizations or or researchers that are doing work that are, you know, that you would hold up as role models or that maybe are demonstrating how this can be replicated and sca and scaled up? >> Yeah, Rachel had a lot of great examples. So, I I'll add on to those. I had the privilege of being at the NASA acres meeting yesterday and learning about a lot of the good work that's going on related to using that Earth observation technology and all the imagery that's being generated. um and in particular how some of that's being applied to nitrogen management. So teams at Purdue and University of Illinois and other folks are working really hard on trying to connect some of that onfarmm research with those decision support tools and the modeling and using all that data um to do that. I'd also like to uh talk about some of the interesting policy related pilots that are going on around like nitrogen warranty programs because I think riskmanagement programs and connecting that to MMRV and measurement and farmer decision-making is also really important. There have been a number of those types of pilots that have happened in cooperation with companies that are interested in supporting their producers and also tying that to some of the market incentives. And then there's work at Purdue um and other places. you know, I think um the Iowa, you know, there's an Iowa farm network that practical farmers of Iowa has also done some of these warranties to try and figure out how you can implement a program that supports a producer in reducing their end rate. And while that might sound like a simple program, you know, I mentioned farmer networks, having that farmer network participating in that program is actually an opportunity also to layer on some of those MMRB pieces and figure out how to improve those decision support tools. So, I really think that um the more we can do all of that in a way that brings something valuable to the farmer and provides some research inputs, I think we'll be better off. Thanks. And Rick, same question to you. You can just talk about how great Minnesota is, but are there any other folks that maybe you're looking at uh either in Minnesota or in other states that you sort of hold up as, you know, example of how to do this the in a most innovative way? Well, I was going to give an idea of ground truthing a little bit that you know most states uh licensed fertilizer dealers, people who sell the fertilizer. Some states uh have a percentage of gross sales in their fee and so you're able to measure sales and you're able to measure sales by product. Um and so many states that have use anhydra ammonia have an anhydra ammonia licensing program because of its safety. And I think one of the things we want to take a look at is and again the privacy per it's not the per sale it's this gross you know when is fertilizer being sold where is it being sold that's different than use but I think those impacts in terms of targeting messaging but also measuring ground truthing um every state's a little different on how they do their licensing but states have some system there and maybe That's a piece where the federal government can aggregate that data so we can have some measurement. And the piece that comes in a second here is uh tax policy. So there may be fertilizer purchases that occur in November and December uh to get a lower cost but also to have the expense occur in the calendar year where there may be uh more income and then what's the impact on that and in a in a schedule Federal tax I think it's schedule F on the egg uh income tax where are how much fertilizer sale is occurring there is there a way where we can use uh what is being you what is being done for um income tax or 1031 exchanges or section 179 depreciation where we can tie in management practices such as handling the or monitoring on uh the nitrous oxide or some of these other uh water contaminants. So th that's not a a blue ribbon for what people are doing, but I think it's an area where we could maybe get some more information and particular with AI uh getting it aggregated. >> No, that's super interesting. Thanks for that. And Matthew, I know you want to jump in on this one, too. >> Yeah. So, f first of all, California has has really been leading in a lot of different ways here. the California Air Resources Board has developed a ton of expertise and I I think is a is a model um especially as we're looking in an environment where states should be coordinating directly with each other um and representing a national agenda. I think many of these state, you know, agencies like ARB really have a a key role to play in in doing that type of coordination. Um, the other program that pops to mind is a practical farmers of Iowa have done some really important work. Um, there's been some some bleed over into Minnesota um on those on that on the trials on nitrogen. Um and then um lastly the roadmap authors that we have here it's sort of like a rolodex of all of the people who are really engaged in the nitrogen research um nitrogen MMRV and they're in they're all across the country. They have expertise in a lot of different places and I think they're eager we're eager to to utilize that expertise and to sort of unpack it in a variety of different ways. I wonder if there are impractical farmers of Iowa um sort of as a a counterpoint. Just do things in funny ways. Um thanks for that, Matthew. That that's um great information. Um so Maria, maybe we could start with you on this one and then open it up to the crowd um for um for comments. Unfortunately, a lot of us have learned a lot about the straight of Hermuz over the last several months. Um and one of the things I think we've learned is that uh a lot of um sort of uh energy flows through the straight of Hormuz, but also a lot of nitrogen uh and and other feed stocks for fertilizers uh are are sourced in the Middle East and have to pass through the straight of Hormuz. um how could what we've talked about today, so MMRV and strategies to reduce fertilizer application, how could we apply those to help pro protect or or um or shield agricultural producers from the kinds of global supply chain disruptions that we're unfortunately many of them are unfortunately experiencing right now. Yeah, that's such a great question. And you know, I'll note that it's both fertilizer prices that are causing this crunch, but also low commodity prices, right? So, it's price volatility on both sides and exposure that creates kind of that whole picture that farmers are facing right now. And you know, I keep asking this question every opportunity I get at every meeting when there's a farmer there. You know, what tools do you wish you had that were available to you right now? And I think farmers are, like I said in my presentation, are really hungry for having better decision support tools because they want right now to reduce their fertilizer applications because it's expensive, but they're scared because it's one of the things that they can control that is going to be able to provide income to them, right? So, how do you help them balance that really really tricky um puzzle that they are in? and they have to have confidence in those tools and know what to use um when those prices are changing whether it's now or whether 2022 when the last fertilizer price spike happened. Um so you know in the in the short term I think the answer is partially around having better decision support tools and having things available to them that they can use to make decisions in real time when they need them. I also think from a longer term perspective innovations that improve NUE and reduce those needs for fertilizer inputs directly. So like I mentioned, you know, new varieties or other things that reduce fertilizer demand and needs at the outset or better improving their ability to use fertilizer substitutes like manure in a way that can fit into that precision egg um picture I think is really really important. So I think there are are a lot of of answers. It doesn't fully it doesn't fully fix this problem, right? Because I know it's something that farmers are feeling really deeply right now, but maybe there are some some things that can help. Rick, do you have any thoughts on this topic based on your perspective as someone who represents farmers and works with farmers but also is a farmer? >> I would uh I got another homework assignment for you uh to look up Habber Bosch process. Haberbos process. And that's generally how nitrogen fertilizer and hydro ammonia is made. Um, and a lot of our fertilizer comes from petrochemicals in the Gulf of Mexico. Uh, in Minnesota, we have uh Canadian crude coming over or Canadian natural gas. Uh, there's a plant in North Dakota. So, tariff has uh tariffs have an impact a bit uh on on that flow and and that cost. Uh I think in terms of the fertilizer companies, we're we're down to four very large companies uh controlling much of the market. So uh I'll give a little different answer. I think we need to break them up and we need competition in the market again and we have some very large entities that um you know 40 50 years ago we broke up AT&T. Um I think the fertilizer uh concentration and monopoly uh would be important to provide competition back into the system from a variety of sources making the fertilizer. >> Thanks. And Matthew and Rachel, do you have any thoughts about sort of how we might use MMRV and different strategies to insulate farmers a little bit from these global um supply disruptions? >> Go ahead. Um, so I think that coming back to what we highlighted from the road map, the ability of farmers to participate in other income streams, um, especially in constrained moments when you are having these global supply chains and that means being able to participate in these carbon crediting schemes or other schemes where they're being paid for their environmental management is important and MMRV is essential to them being able to do that. And I also think to Maria's point about getting new products onto the market. Um, and knowing whether they're effective or not, again, MMRV is what's going to underpin that. So, I really see it as playing that critical role in giving them the tools they need and giving them alternative sources of income. It's not going to solve it, but every little bit helps. >> Yeah. The other thing in addition to that and agreed on agreed on Rachel's point um that the marketplace the farmers creating systems where we have a better idea of what's happening between when you put your fertilizer in the ground and where it goes, how it moves. That's really important for farmers and important for farmers for the bottom line for their bottom line. And so having the long in the long term having better better relationship data between the farm scale and the larger scale of what's happening with nitrous oxide and fertilizer is important for farmers to make to make best use of their of their limited resources. >> Thanks Matthew. Maybe we could stick with you for this one and then open it up to the group. In your slides you talked about federal policy levers. You talked about the role of key agencies. Um, and I'm curious since Congress right now is of the things they're thinking about. They're thinking about farm program reauthorizations in the farm bill. And I'm curious for staff who might be sort of learning about this topic today who might want to, you know, learn a little bit more about specific reauthorizations or specific programs. Are there any opportunities uh in the context of the farm bill that Congress might want to start paying attention to more to prioritize the issues we've talked about today? >> Right. It's a great question and I think on the carbon side, there's been a lot of work and a lot of legislative proposals to create better carbon um create better carbon MMRV. there's been less on the nitrogen side and um that's in part because the marketplace is sort of in a little bit of a different mo moment and I think the the the goal here is part of what we were thinking is before these markets develop let's have a science roadmap for helping guide the evolution and so the farm bill is I think an interesting place to do that there you we always used to say you know USDA is like a little bit of everything and they have agencies that cover all sorts of different angles, you know, whether it be NIFA or ARS or NRCS or the Office of the Chief Economist. Um there are a lot of different pieces of this puzzle and there's also like USDA is also a bit of an umbrella to dealing with and filtering out to some of the other federal agencies that might have more role in let's say sensor development or the quantum program at NSF. And so having having direction to coordinate with with USDA and many of these other federal agencies that who are already spending resources essentially in this space having that resources be coordinated in terms of like a long-term end goal of like where we want to land 10 years from now on some of these MMRV technologies. I think that's that was sort of the thinking behind why we wanted to put this in one place is to help those agencies figure out where they want to prioritize some of their scarce resources. And I think Congress, you know, has would would want to ask some of those same questions. >> Great. Um Rachel, Maria, Rick, any thoughts for you uh from you about sort of specific programs or specific reauthorizations that you're thinking about in the context of Farmville? you unmuted. Please go ahead. >> I think, you know, if I was uh king for a day, I would maybe throw out uh an RFP for onfarmm creativity, experimentation, and evaluation to try to get farmers, you know, and say, you know, here's something that we're looking at with >> nitrous oxide. Maybe there's area where we've got a lot of saturated soils. Uh it's not whole farm management, but you know there there is creativity and to try to maybe get some experimentation um through the farm bill, a small um you know catalyst program to just see and realize that some of it will work and some of it won't. But there may be some uh there may be some unique reactions there that are helpful. And then you also have advocates onfarmm advocates that can say hey I tried something uh and it worked it didn't work. It's a little different than what I'm saying with a water quality certification realizing that it's experimentation but I think it might be something to try. >> That's very good. Yeah. >> Um >> yeah can I piggyback on that a little bit? I think you know we have some good models for that that have been directed at other practices right I mean cover there's an intersection between cover crops and water quality and nitrogen management obviously but I think some of those programs that have been really successful at NRCS and at USDA and trying to stimulate some of that innovation but haven't really been directed maybe at nitrogen management quite as much that there's an opportunity there um you know we collaborate really closely with the agricultural research service and I think within re at USDA just maintaining um the scientific knowledge base and the funding to be able to do that innovation in-house at USDA and like Matthew said coordinating that across USDA so that those data are being managed and leveraged to deliver insights back to farmers and to businesses and making sure that stakeholders and and USDA are working together to to do that work. >> Thanks. Thanks Rachel, unless you have anything you'd like to chime in with. Well, I Okay, so that's we have a really interesting question from the audience. I'm not exactly sure who sure who I should direct it to, so I'm just going to say it and then anyone who has something to chime in, please feel free. Uh, and the question is, are there conservation practices recommended for one reason uh that might deliver some benefit to a farm that might inadvertently or uh or otherwise sort of knowingly um increase uh N2O emissions? Um, it's kind of an interesting question. The is any thoughts about that? Is there are there's things that we're doing that might inadvertently lead to more N2O or or the opposite? Are there things that we might do to reduce uh the that particular pollutant, but that might lead to other forms of pollution or >> Go ahead, Rick. I saw you unmute first and then we'll go to Matthew. Well, I think the, you know, going back to the saturated soil and the N2O, you know, if you had drainage, uh, that takes the water off, but then the drainage may facilitate a nitrate problem, you know, so you might have tile drainage that's moving a high concentration of nitrates into surface water or or groundwater in a car area. So, um, it's kind of a different than what the question was about, but there there there's the trade-off there, you know, of of, okay, will could facilitate drainage, but then you might increase nitrates. Um, [clears throat] >> yeah, that's exactly what I was going to say. I was going to mention drainage. And so, making sure that you're pairing some of the nitrate management tools and best practices for nitrate management coming out of the ends of tile drains. if you're doing that I think is maybe a set of innovations that you can but that's you know it's costly too right so making sure that we're providing the incentives and the support for producers that want to do that to be able to hit both of those at once >> great and I think this is you know answering this question about getting better data about the impact and the relationship between practices and consequences is a lot of where where our heads are at. Um there's a lot of variability that these that farmers need to deal with and having better research on the the sort of outputs of what's happening from that fertilizer is exactly the kind of sweet spot of what we're thinking about in wanting to u direct the sort of research and long-term innovation strategy at the agencies. So, it's it is a good question and I think I'm thinking thinking it through into the future. >> Yeah. Great. All right. Well, we are just about at time. Um I think maybe it might be fun to just do like a quick lightning round. Rachel, maybe we could start with you and then go through the presentation order. Uh Rachel, any final thoughts? Anything that hasn't been mentioned yet that you think would be really important for our audience to know about the road map or uh the sort of the broader issue of of nitrogen pollution in general? and then we can hear from uh Maria, Rick, and and Matthew. >> I think what I want the audience to come away with is that the technologies that we're talking about that need to be developed are very possible. This isn't something that is 40 or 50 years in the future. This is something that we could have a strategic roadmap and over the next 5 to 10 years could make real progress. And in terms of science sensor development, that's very good. So we can act now and we can put the coordination and the seeds in place to have the technologies we need as Matthew said as these markets start to develop um so that those things can be ready when we need them. >> Great. I feel like there's a sewing and reaping metaphor in there somewhere. Maria, uh over to you, final thoughts. >> Yeah, you know, I mentioned those innovations that we're thinking about across crop and livestock systems to reduce nitrogen losses. And you know, we think we think that that systems approach is super important because of the leaky system and nitrogen being lost at so many different places all the way from the field to the fork to address all of those pieces. So linked innovations across cropping systems, how we feed animals and then what we do with the manure to improve efficiency across the whole system as being essential. Um and we're going to we're going to have some papers coming out from a lot of our collaborators um and with Spark uh emphasizing some of the potential results of this on both nitrous oxide um nitrate in in PNAS hopefully later this year. So keep an eye out for that if you want to learn more about some of that innovative approach. But you know I also want to emphasize that for all of those solutions substantial investment and coordination is needed to get to a place where these innovations exist. whether it's MMRV, new crop varieties. Um so making sure that there are policy and market incentives in place for that um to make sure that we're moving toward um those climate and water quality outcomes and reduce input costs for farmers that we're all looking for. >> Thanks Rick. Parting thoughts from you. >> Just want to say it's very important to support science and by supporting science means you're supporting people. That means people in the agencies and independent research at our colleges and universities. Um, you know, sometimes science gets under attack. Uh, and, uh, it's really important for us to invest in that at the federal and state level and to support those people who devote their lives to providing answers to us. Uh, whether policymakers listen to them or not, that's upon us. But funding that research at our colleges and universities is just a big thank you that needs to be said and that we support uh that independent research and we support the work at the agencies for people who are doing good things. >> Thank you. Uh our online audience can't see it, but there are little little hearts floating up from the bottom of the screen uh to double click as they say on on Rick's point. Matthew, you get the last word today. >> Well, I'm glad uh Representative Hansen you said that. I just feel like states are a a hidden gem in a lot of this work. Um there are a ton of research agencies that are directed at the state level. coordination by the state state departments of agriculture and natural resources and the innovation agenda around the Stensor technologies that we want to develop that historically is driven it in in state bystate policy and sort of job creation around like thinking where we want to go 10 years from now and sort of backing out those technologies. So um excited to see where this all goes. So thank you. >> Great. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you so much. Uh we're going to wrap up or start our process of wrapping up. I'd like to start by saying um huge thanks to Rachel and Maria and Rick and Matthew for being awesome panelists today. Um thanks for joining us. Uh thanks to Representative Casten and his great team for helping him be part of our event today as well. Um we wouldn't be doing this briefing if it weren't for NRDC. Matthew and and everyone at NRDC. Thanks so much for your partnership and just being, you know, pretty easy and cool people to work with. Um this was a a really important topic to um elevate uh especially with everything happening on on the hill right now and AC and around the globe. Uh and so thank you so much for um for your support for today. Um I have really great colleagues at ESI who do all the work uh to pull these briefings off. So thanks to Dan O and to Omry who's somehow on vacation today. um Allison, Hannah, Nicole, Laura, and Miguel for everything they contributed um to all of this. We are also known for our fantastic interns, and we have two really awesome summer interns, uh Megan and Yasm mean. So, thanks um for everything um that they're doing and will do to get the summary notes and everything else uh done uh on time. And then of course uh way in the background is Troy, our videographer who makes who produces our briefings and does such a great job and and makes them and makes them look good and makes them sound good, too. So, thanks for everything. Thanks to our audience. We had a great online audience. Sorry we couldn't get to everyone's questions, but uh we did our best. Um thanks for dialing in today. We will be back um on I want to say July 24th for our rapid readout about severe drought impacts. Um so it's something that's unfortunately hitting lots and lots of communities um all across the country. Um we also just highlighted in our um most recent issue of climate change solutions all of the res or some of the best resources the most timely resources we have on extreme heat as well. Uh including a really great article about how professional sports are dealing with extreme heat which is something that's on a lot of our minds with um the World Cup coming to a close um this weekend. So check out all of our resources on at esi.org. Sign up for climate change solutions, our bi-weekly newsletter. Pretty much if youth can think of a climate topic or an environmental topic or an energy topic, we probably have a resource about it. Uh and so you should really do yourself a favor and visit us and or at least when you're searching online, search for something ESI uh so that you get to our resources. Um they're really really good. I promised earlier that we'd put the survey link back up. Here it is. You can use the QR code. you can click on the survey link if you have a moment to share with us uh how today's briefing went. Um we read every response and we really appreciate all of that. Um and without um anything more, thanks to everyone. Stay cool if you're in parts of the country that are, you know, in triple digit heat today. Uh it is hot out there. So stay hydrated and stay cool. And we'll see you for our upcoming rapid readout briefing about severe drought impacts. Thanks everyone. Great to see you.