Cleaning up fertilizer, from factory to field | Nico Pinkowski, CEO of Nitricity

Climate Positive · Oct 8, 2026 · 46m

Mass production of fertilizer was one of the most important advances of the past century, with roughly half the world's food supply depending on it, but it casts a long shadow. Between manufacturing and field application, nitrogen fertilizer accounts for five to seven percent of global greenhouse gas emissions. The inefficiency is just as striking: global nitrogen fertilizer use efficiency sits at about 33%, meaning roughly two-thirds of every tank a farmer buys never reaches the crop. It runs off into waterways, where it drives algae blooms and dead zones, or it volatilizes into the air…