Precision Nitrogen Fertilization Technology with Micro Grids

Jon T. Biermacher, Francis Epplin (), B Brorsen, John B. Solie and Bill Raun

No 21046, 2006 Annual meeting, July 23-26, Long Beach, CA from American Agricultural Economics Association (New Name 2008: Agricultural and Applied Economics Association)

Abstract: Sensor-based precision fertilizer technologies are being developed and researched by production scientists. One such technology uses normalized difference vegetation index (NDVI) reflectance measurements of growing winter wheat plants and a nitrogen fertilizer optimization algorithm (NFOA) to determine nitrogen requirement necessary for plants to reach their yield plateau. A number of precision fertilizer application systems that use this technology are considered in this paper. A linear response stochastic plateau wheat yield function conditional on NDVI reflectance measurements is estimated and used within an expected profit-maximization framework to estimate upper bounds on the returns from the precision nitrogen application systems. The on-the-go precision system that assumes perfect information was approximately $7 per acre more profitable than the convention of applying 80 pounds of nitrogen prior to planting in the fall. The whole-field precision system was break-even with conventional methods.

Keywords: Research; and; Development/Tech; Change/Emerging; Technologies (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Pages: 35
Date: 2006
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:ags:aaea06:21046

DOI: 10.22004/ag.econ.21046

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