Summary
Today, 3.5 billion people are alive because of a single chemical process. The Haber-Bosch process takes nitrogen from the air and makes ammonia, from which synthetic fertilizers allow farmers to feed our massive population. Ammonia is a source of highly reactive nitrogen, suitable not just for fertilizer, but also as an ingredient in bomb making and thousands of other applications.
We make around 100 million tonnes of ammonia annually - and spread most of it on our fields. But this is a very inefficient way to use what amounts to 1-2% of the planet's energy needs. Only around 20% of fertilizer made ends up in our food.
Professor Andrea Sella explores some of the alternative ways we might make fertilizer. Vegetables such as peas and beans, allow certain cells in their roots to become infected by a specific type of bacteria. In return, these bacteria provide them with their own fertilizer. Could we infect the plants we want to grow for food – such as cereals – in a similar way to cut down the climatic and environmental impact of Haber-Bosch?
Transcript
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| 1:02.0 | Both as concerns me personally and also the Army of |
| 1:06.6 | hunger fighters in which I volunteered. |
| 1:09.8 | Norman Borlogg, the father of the Green Revolution, accepting the Nobel Peace Prize in 1970. |
| 1:16.6 | His hunger-fighting army used a potent chemical weapon, synthetic nitrogen fertilizer. |
| 1:27.0 | Food crops like wheat, rice, corn, and grass for livestock need nitrogen, but they can't simply take it from the air. |
| 1:30.0 | This is what fertilizers are for. |
| 1:32.0 | Today, synthetic fertilizers are for. |
| 1:33.0 | Today, synthetic fertilizers are made by the Haber-Bosch process, now 100 years old, |
| 1:38.0 | that takes atmospheric nitrogen and fixes it into ammonia by the addition of hydrogen. |
| 1:44.0 | Every year we make a hundred million tons globally and huge chemical plants. |
| 1:49.0 | It's the single most significant chemical process of the last hundred years. In Discovery |
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