Are nitrification inhibitors effective in reducing N2O from farm-scale emission hotspots?

Livestock congregation areas are nitrous oxide (N2O) hot-spots and could be key areas to focus mitigation action. We tested whether combined cattle urine and fertiliser N2O-N emission factors (EFs) would be higher from a farm gateway area compared to a standard pasture under sub-tropical conditions, and whether the nitrification inhibitor, dimethyl pyrazole phosphate (DMPP), would lower N2O EFs from the gateway area. Treatments (n = 3) included: (i) fertiliser applied to a standard pasture (50 kg urea-N ha(-1)), (ii) fertiliser (50 kg urea-N ha(-1)) + urine (350 kg N ha(-1)) applied to a standard pasture, (iii) fertiliser (50 kg urea-N ha(-1)) + urine (350 kg N ha(-1)) applied to the gateway area, and (iv) fertiliser (50 kg urea-N ha(-1)) + urine (350 kg N ha(-1)) + DMPP (1.5 kg ha(-1)) applied to the gateway area. Emissions were monitored via an automated static chamber-based system and N-15-labelled urine treatments (n = 4) used to assess N2O + N-2 emissions, N2O:N-2 and N-15 recovery from the pasture. No significant differences (p > 0.05) were observed for EFs between the fertiliser + urine treatment for the standard pasture (1.10 +/- 0.17%) or the gateway area (1.46 +/- 0.40%). DMPP did not lower the N2O-N EF from the gateway area (1.50 +/- 0.22%), where wet and warm conditions may have accelerated DMPP degradation. In the N-15-labelled urine treatments, significantly (p < 0.05) greater N2O + N-2 emissions occurred in the gateway compared to the standard pasture, but disaggregating EFs between the contrasting areas was not warranted.