Open AccessPhosphorus flow analysis of different crops in Dongying District, Shandong Province, China, 1995–2016
Author(s) -
Huan He,
Lvqing Zhang,
Hongwei Zang,
Mingxing Sun,
Can Lv,
Shuangshuang Li,
Liyong Bai,
Wenyuan Han,
Jing Dai
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
peerj
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.927
H-Index - 70
ISSN - 2167-8359
DOI - 10.7717/peerj.13274
Subject(s) - environmental science , fertilizer , surface runoff , phosphorus , pollution , hydrology (agriculture) , straw , manure , environmental engineering , agronomy , ecology , geology , chemistry , biology , geotechnical engineering , organic chemistry
Investigating the phosphorus (P) sources, pathways, and final sinks are important to reduce P pollution and improve P management. In this study, substance flow analysis (SFA) was performed for P flow analysis from 1995 to 2016 in different crops of Dongying District, a core region of the alluvial delta at the estuary of the Yellow River. The results showed that P input steadily increased from 1.48 × 10 4 t in 1995 to 2.16 × 10 4 t in 2007, and then decreased from 1.90 × 10 4 t in 2010 to 1.78 × 10 4 t in 2016. Chemical fertilizers made the highest contribution to P input. The cotton with the highest P load was on the top of P load risk ranks. More importantly, this study applied the Partial Least Squares Path Modeling (PLS-PM) model for P flow analysis and established the numerical relationship between the variables (including fertilizers, straws return-to-field, harvested grains, discarded straw, and P erosion and runoff), P use efficiency (PUE) and P load. The analysis revealed that fertilizer and crop production are the key factors affecting the PUE. Therefore, optimizing the use of P-fertilizer whilst maintaining yields can be an effective strategy to improve the local region PUE.