Whole Orchard Recycling Provides Alternative to Burning Trees

What happens to orchards when they’ve reached the end of their lifespan and are no longer producing crops? Conventionally, orchards are burned. However, concerns about biomass burning and air quality have led to an alternative practice known as whole orchard recycling.

Hear Amisha Poret-Peterson, a research microbiologist with the USDA’s Agricultural Research Service in Davis, California, on the Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory’s Bonding Over Science podcast as she talks about the benefits of whole orchard recycling and how it could decrease effects on air quality from burning trees.

The Environmental Molecular Sciences Laboratory (EMSL) is a Department of Energy (DOE) user facility that provides scientists from around the world with the opportunity to access world-class instrumentation and expertise through open calls for proposals. EMSL is sponsored by DOE’s Biological and Environmental Research program.

Poret-Peterson received research funding from EMSL to use nuclear magnetic resonance to learn about the role and efficiency of microbial nitrogen in soils in whole orchard recycling. Read more about her project in a feature article on the EMSL web site.