He studied at several German universities, earning a doctorate in organic chemistry in After a few years of moving from job to job, he settled into the Department of Chemical and Fuel Technology at the Polytechnic in Karlsruhe, Germany, where he mastered the new subject of physical chemistry.
His research in physical chemistry eventually led to the Haber-Bosch process. In he was invited to become director of the Institute for Physical Chemistry and Electrochemistry at the new Kaiser Wilhelm Gesellschaft in Berlin, where academic scientists, government, and industry cooperated to promote original research. The Haber-Bosch process is generally credited with keeping Germany supplied with fertilizers and munitions during World War I, after the British naval blockade cut off supplies of nitrates from Chile.
During the war Haber threw his energies and those of his institute into further support for the German side. He developed a new weapon—poison gas, the first example of which was chlorine gas—and supervised its initial deployment on the Western Front at Ypres, Belgium, in His promotion of this frightening weapon precipitated the suicide of his wife, who was herself a chemist, and many others condemned him for his wartime role.
There was great consternation when he was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry for for the synthesis of ammonia from its elements. Once implemented on an industrial scale, ammonia synthesis enabled the widespread fertilization of croplands for decades hence.
As a direct result, the world's population skyrocketed from 1. But Haber's nourishing discovery has a dark side he probably never imagined.
The boom of fertilizer , long injudiciously applied, has come at a high price for the environment. And now, according to a new report to be released later this month by the Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment SCOPE of the International Council for Science, society's aspiration to use biofuels to kick its oil addiction could backfire. By intensifying nitrogen pollution, a business-as-usual approach to biofuels production could exacerbate global warming, food security threats and human respiratory ailments in addition to familiar ecological problems.
Scientists have long known that the reactive nitrogen in fertilizers leaching from agricultural fields as well as those smaller amounts exiting tailpipes and smokestacks wreak havoc as they cascade through the air and rivers. Rogue nutrients often spur harmful algal blooms as they flow into the ocean, and hundreds of estuaries around the world suffer from so-called seasonal dead zones as a result. Fixing the nitrogen problem is at the heart of Jackson's call to make the Green Revolution truly green, a sentiment echoed by scientists around the world.
A primary culprit: so-called first-generation fuels, which are based largely on fermentation of cane and corn sugars. The U. Energy Independence and Security Act of , passed with strong bipartisan support, set a goal of producing 54 billion liters But new research outlined in the SCOPE report indicates that, without a change of practice, meeting that goal could increase the nitrogen flux in the Mississippi by 37 percent.
That pits ethanol production overwhelmingly against another national goal: reducing nitrogen flux in the same river by at least 40 percent to reduce the size of the dead zone in northern Gulf of Mexico.
Corn is a troublesome biofuel source , particularly from a nitrogen standpoint, Howarth says. Typical corn-growing practice is to apply high doses of fertilizer, with substantial losses to the surrounding environment. Corn has very shallow roots compared to most crops and so can use nitrogen only in the top one to two inches 0. Moreover, it only takes up nitrogen and other nutrients for 60 days out of the year. Other crops such as soybean and wheat have deeper roots that are active longer.
But the rising price of corn has encouraged farmers to grow more of this "nitrogen leaky" grain. Land set aside for conservation purposes as well as some active soybean and wheat fields are being converted back to active corn cultivation. Haber was presented with the Nobel Prize in for his research that unlocked the ammonia production process. In , Bosch and Frederick Bergius received the Nobel Prize for their contributions to the invention and development of chemical high pressure methods.
Today, a modern ammonia production facility produces approximately 1, tons of ammonia per day. These advances in ammonia production have significantly increased yields of food and feed grain crops. The world simply cannot do without N fertilizer, and the contributions made by Fritz Haber and Carl Bosch.
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