Urease and nitrification inhibitors have repeatedly shown promise for reducing fertilizer-based N2O emissions. However, N2O fluxes are episodic and spatially heterogeneous. As inhibitors have a short window of efficacy following application, the variable spring weather of Eastern Canada brings into question their utility. We used a micrometerological approach with high temporal resolution to capture near continuous, year-round measurements of N2O fluxes from 2017 to 2023. Fields with soil-incorporated urea with and without dual inhibitors were compared. The crops grown were: corn-2017, corn-2018, wheat-2019, soybean-2020 (no fertilizer), corn-2021, wheat-2022 and corn-2023. Weather conditions during May were highly variable from year to year with total rainfall ranging from 14 – 177 mm and average temperature from 11.7 – 15.9°C. Total N2O emissions in the 30 days following fertilizer application ranged from 0.08 to 1.3 kg ha-1 (0.06 to 1.7 % of N applied). Corn crops fertilized with ~150 kg N ha-1 had 6, 33, 69 and 29% reductions in growing season N2O emissions with dual inhibitors in 2017, 2018, 2021 and 2023, respectively. Whole year total emissions had smaller treatment differences of -6%, 16%, 27 and 10% from the corn years, with an average of 12% reduction over the 4 years. Wheat had 78 kg N applied ha-1 and had no observable reductions with inhibitor use. Over all 7 growing seasons, total N2O reduction was 19%, with no apparent increase in yield. Given the extra cost and no improvement in crop yield, inhibitor use may reduce emissions only in high feeding crops.
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