Amelioration of Shallow and Compact Soils Through Charcoal and Humic Material Amendment

Amelioration of Shallow and Compact Soils Through Charcoal and Humic Material Amendment
Paul Seger, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, TN

Potential Benefits of Charcoal and/or Humic Materials
•Highly resistant to microbial breakdown
•Functional groups provide exchange sites
–Increase nutrient retention
–Assist pH buffering capacity
•Encourages aggregation
–Development of soil structure
–Benefit to available water holding capacity
–Increase resistance to erosion

Charcoal and Soil Fertility
•Summary
–Charcoal provides ion exchange sites in addition to some inherent fertility
–Charcoal additions can generally increase retention of nutrients
•Provide sustainable and slowly available nutrients to plants (mineralization)
•Foliar nutrient concentrations may be lower, but biomass production generally increased
–Fertilizer and/or manure in addition to charcoal provides additional benefits for biomass production and soil health (CEC, pH, and fertility)

Hypotheses
•More favorable plant growth with charcoal
–pH
–CEC and nutrient retention
–Slowly released nutrients
•Humic materials improve soil water characteristics compared with charcoal or soil alone
–Increased aggregation à better infiltration
–Improved porosity à benefit aeration and root growth
•Charcoal and humic material will persist long after the landfill closure period