Synthetic fertilizer

Synthetic fertilizer is a manufactured product that supplies plants with nutrients in forms produced through industrial processes. It includes nitrogen, phosphate, and potash fertilizers, often sold as single-nutrient or blended products.

Haber–Bosch process: An industrial process that produces ammonia by reacting nitrogen with hydrogen under high pressure and temperature. It supplies the ammonia used to make most synthetic nitrogen fertilizer.
Fritz Haber: German chemist who developed a laboratory method for synthesizing ammonia from nitrogen and hydrogen. His ammonia synthesis made industrial nitrogen fertilizer possible.
NPK fertilizer: A fertilizer labeled by its proportions of nitrogen, phosphorus pentoxide equivalent, and potassium oxide equivalent. It combines the three macronutrients most commonly supplied in commercial fertilizer blends.
Eutrophication: Excess nutrient enrichment of water that can promote algal blooms and oxygen depletion. Fertilizer runoff and leaching can carry nutrients into lakes, rivers, and coastal waters.
Organic fertilizer: Fertilizer derived from plant, animal, or other biological materials, usually containing nutrients in organic or mineral forms. It contrasts with nutrients manufactured through industrial chemical processes.
Ammonia: A nitrogen- and hydrogen-containing compound used as a feedstock for many fertilizers. It is both a direct fertilizer and a starting material for other nitrogen products.
Carl Bosch: German chemist and engineer who developed the high-pressure technology for industrial ammonia production. He scaled Haber’s chemistry into a process that factories could operate.
Fertigation: The application of dissolved fertilizer through an irrigation system. It delivers synthetic nutrients with irrigation water, often in precise doses.
Nitrous oxide: A potent greenhouse gas produced by natural and human-driven processes, including soil nitrogen transformations. Some applied fertilizer nitrogen is converted by soil microbes into this greenhouse gas.
Compost: Decomposed organic matter produced through controlled biological breakdown of plant and other biodegradable materials. It supplies nutrients and organic matter through a biological process rather than mineral manufacture.

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