Stable C and N isotope variation during anaerobic digestate composting and in the compost-amended soil-plant system

Abstract

Although the use of composts derived from anaerobic digestates as soil amendments is likely to increase in the future, there is little information concerning the fate of their C and N compounds after their incorporation into soil. This work assesses C and N concentrations and the associated changes in δ¹⁵N and δ¹³C during the composting processes of cattle and pig slurry anaerobic digestates. In addition, the compost effect on C and N fractions and plant uptake were studied during a six-month pot experiment with rosemary plants. The results did not show δ¹³C and δ¹⁵N isotopic discrimination during composting, indicating a previous stabilization of cattle manure and pig slurry during the anaerobic digestion. This fact was also confirmed by the low C losses during the composting processes (1.2-fold and 1.05-fold for the composting piles with cattle and pig slurry anaerobic digestates, respectively). After soil addition, the composts augmented N values (from 0.41 g kg^-1 to around 0.56 g kg^-1 in low dose and 0.68 g kg^-1 in high dose compost amended soils) and δ¹⁵N soil values (increases in the range of 50%-156%), but showed only slight differences in C and δ¹³C values compared to unfertilised control and inorganic fertilized soils. Moreover, the rosemary leaves of the plants grown on the compost amended soils presented higher N and δ¹⁵N abundance than control and inorganic fertilized plants. We conclude that δ¹⁵N abundance of anaerobic digestate composts is useful to discern its N uptake and could thus be a useful tool to detect whether organic or mineral fertiliser types were used for agricultural production.

Keywords: (13)C and (15)N natural abundance; Anaerobic digestate-derived compost; Organic amendments; Rosmarinus officinalis L.