2008 Annual Report 1a.Objectives (from AD-416) 1) Improve Wind Erosion Prediction system (WEPS) for cropland and extend it to range, forest, and disturbed lands;. 2)increase understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes;. 3)couple WEPS with appropriate databases to inventory dust emissions including PM-10; and. 4)develop new and evaluate viable practices for reducing dust emissions from wind erosion and incorporate findings into WEPS. 1b.Approach (from AD-416) 1. Modify WEPS to handle more complex sites, consisting of multiple soil types with undulating terrain by: a) partitioning the simulation region into homogeneous sections based upon soil characteristics and b) computing localized wind speed adjustment factors based upon elevation differences within the simulation region. 2. Conduct basic research to determine: a) the threshold friction velocity on dry/wet, bare soils as a function of surface roughness, aggregate size distribution, aggregate density and soil wetness; b) near field deposition rates/patterns of suspended particles; c) surface friction velocity as influenced by vertical and horizontal distribution of biomass; and d) soil aggregate status as influenced by weather, intrinsic soil properties, land use, and animal/vehicular traffic. 3. Redesign the user interface to allow the user to: a) select counties or larger areas of interest for simulation; b) automate both the selection and data input from databases on land use within the selected area and output these results to a database; d) query both the input and output databases to answer questions about the land use, management, and weather that were associated with various levels of erosion and dust emissions; and, e) allow the user to easily edit and update databases. 4. Experimentally determine best management practices (BMPs) to reduce the rate of roughness degradation and maintenance of the crop residue’s ability to reduce wind erosion and evaluate products to reduce dust emissions. 3.Progress Report National Program 203 – Air Quality Particulate Emissions Component The Wind Erosion Prediction System (WEPS) model was delivered to the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) on 26 February, 2008 for training and implementation in over 2600 field offices nation wide. This model will be used by NRCS for conservation planning, environmental estimates, and developing control strategies. WEPS has high potential for reducing fugitive dust emissions resulting from wind erosion in the PM-10 and PM-2.5 categories (10 micrometer and 2.5 micrometer, respectively). This will result in improved soil and air quality. The WEPS model continues to be developed and improved including: a) improved weather, crop growth, and soil processes simulations; b) an improved and easier to use model interface; c) improved access to various WEPS associated databases; d) improved conversion of WEPS management files from the RUSLE2 format; e) improved simulation of organic dominated soils; and f) an expanded and improved WEPS User Manual including comprehensive exercises to provide users with detailed step-by-step examples of WEPS use and operation. Various research projects are also being conducted to elucidate the biological, physical, and chemical mechanisms by which particulates are generated, how they are transported and suspended in the air, and their patterns of movement and deposition. The research goal is to support development of technology to reduce or prevent agricultural particulate emissions. These research projects include but are not limited to: a) development of the Single-event Wind Erosion Evaluation Program (SWEEP) for estimating particulate losses from agricultural fields during a single (i.e., one day) event; b) new methodology was developed to estimate the dust mass fraction in soil loss from eroding fields; c) incorporation of WEPS within various comprehensive regional air quality models (e.g., Washington State University and Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico); d) development of a laser system for high-resolution soils surface and standing residue analysis; e) studies into the wind erodibility of biosolids amended soils; f) research into the nature of the wind erosion process on organic dominated soils; g) studies of erosion reduction on tillage ridges treated by a range of surface amendments; h) research on residue treatments to reduce decomposition rate of wheat residue; and i) development of a high energy moisture content (HEMC) method for determining aggregate stability. 4.Accomplishments 1. Testing of the Wind Erosion Prediction System: On 26 February, 2008, a computer model that is the latest cutting-edge tool for forecasting wind erosion damage and designing conservation practices was delivered to the Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS) for training and implementation in field offices nation wide. During FY 2008, the model was tested by NRCS agronomists and NRCS regional “train the trainer” workshops were conducted at three locations: Ft. Worth, Texas (15-17 January), Greensboro, South Carolina (12-14 February), and Portland, Oregon (18-20 March). The agronomists found the model worked well and identified things that would make it better. Those suggestions have been incorporated into the model. This research relates directly to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of improving the Wind Erosion Prediction System for cropland and extending to range, forest, and distributed lands. 2. Wind Data: NRCS, in cooperation with WERU is reviewing and validating the wind data from all the current NOAA stations with the Climate personnel at the West NRCS Technical Support Center (NTSC). The data is being reviewed and recommendations made as to which windgen station should be used for a given polygon/area (county, group of counties, or other designated area). The recommendation will be based on an examination of the wind data and the state air resource maps, and possibly local wind data. NRCS will review the data and recommendations and create the recommended polygons. After this is completed the states will be given the opportunity to review and accept the recommendations or recommend an alternative. After the states approve their stations/polygons, NRCS will digitize the polygons and provide the digitized map to ARS. ARS will enter the map/location data into the WEPS Cligen and Windgen data into the WEPS database. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of increasing understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes. 3. Crop Growth and Calibration: The run time for crop growth and crop growth calibration is very time consuming and needs to be significantly reduced before WEPS can be used at the field office level. ARS is investigating reprogramming to speed the processing time for calibration and runtime for erosion prediction calculations. Some of the reprogramming will create a script where WEPS will check an erosion calculation and tell the user if a calibration is needed. NRCS will work with state/area agronomists to pre-calibrate crops/yields in rotations and different soils groups for each climate/windgen station polygon. The pre-calibrated files would then be saved and put in the management database for the field offices to use. This should drastically reduce the times when calibration is needed. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of increasing understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes. 4. WEPS Interface: Discussions were held with NRCS on simplifying the WEPS interface and to reduce confusion for users and eliminate extra work to save data for individual clients. Reprogramming is in progress to: a) Eliminate the term “Project” and replace that concept with “Client”. When a user enters the Client Name in the interface that will become part of the file/folder name for the client and all calculations/data used for that client will be stored in the client’s folders by “client” and “field name”. It is anticipated these files can be saved under the user login name and with the Toolkit folder scheme for each client. b) The interface is being programmed to keep the county climate/wind stations, first soil in the soil database, and first management for the crop management zone listed when WEPS is closed. This will eliminate re-entering that data and speed the location of soils and management data. c) The “P” (Project) button will be eliminated next to Soil and Man (Management) and only the “T” (Template) button will remain along with the “MAN” and “SOIL” buttons. The “MAN” and “SOIL” buttons allow the user to get the details of a management or soils database. d) NRCS will develop a draft “Farm/Client Aggregated Report”. This is a report that could be incorporated into WEPS from which it can be printed and saved to summarize the soil loss and management alternatives/decisions for the client. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of increasing understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes. 5. Database Permissions: ARS-WERU has completed a process to lock the databases so individual users cannot edit the data, except for specific elements identified for “temporary edits for a specific calculation”. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of increasing understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes. 6. Skeleton File Processing: The skeleton file processing routine is a script that allows management files that are already developed for RUSLE2 to be exported out of RUSLE2 and configured to work in the WEPS model for wind erosion prediction. Presently there is a problem when single year crops that are planted in the fall of one year and harvested in the following year to properly convert with the correct operations and dates in the management file. The recommended solution: a. Rotation templates can be processed from RUSLE2 to WEPS with no problems and is the recommended method. b. A subfolder is being created in WEPS Management database to house “Monoculture” rotations. This avoids the problem of adding of single year files to other single year or multiple year managements and creating the error in dates and operations. c. A subfolder is being built for the single year crops/managements where users can select and individual single crop file to be added to a rotation. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of increasing understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes. 7. Incorporation of WEPS within a comprehensive regional air quality model (a grant proposal): Understanding the impact of agricultural activities upon air quality requires the ability to address agricultural pollutant sources within a regional modeling system. Washington State University has led an effort to develop and improve a comprehensive, automated air quality forecast system (AIRPACT-3) which employs the WRF-CMAQ modeling suite and treats anthropogenic, biogenic, and agricultural sources to predict ambient gas and PM concentrations. Dust storms produce extremely high levels of PM10 and elevated levels of PM2.5. The Wind Erosion Prediction System (WEPS) was developed by the USDA ARS to estimate soil erosion and PM10 generation for individual fields by treating the soil erosion/dust production process within a comprehensive physical framework that accounts for soil type, soil moisture, other environmental conditions, and land management. The research involves development and testing of the WRF-WEPS-CMAQ system applied to historical dust events and to ongoing daily operations. Field measurements will be conducted to obtain new data for PM mass, size, and spatial distribution during periods of high winds for model evaluation. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of increasing understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes. 8. WEPS Soil submodel science documentation prepared: Tilled cropland soil surface layers undergo many temporal changes in response to weather driving forces that affect the soil erodibility such as aggregate size distribution, mechanical stability, and crust properties. The WEPS Soil submodel simulates these changes by using the range of each soil parameter obtained from measurements specific for each soil texture. Simulated processes that include freezing, thawing, wetting, drying, puddling, and drying while frozen caused by weather are then used to change the affected soil parameters within their measured ranges on a daily basis. The documentation presents the details of these simulations for the current WEPS model and also should prove useful as a guide for future research in this important area of soil science. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of increasing understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes. 9. New methodology developed to estimate the dust mass fraction in soil loss from eroding fields: Project collaborators provided sediment samples collected at several heights in passive BSNE sediment samplers from 9 wind erosion events in 4 different states. The sediment samples were sieved using micromesh sieves. Then, a series of mathematical equations were fitted to vertical profiles of the sieved samples. Finally, the vertical profiles were mathematically integrated to estimate horizontal discharge of both dust and total mobile soil. Using the new methodology, we found that the proportion of dust in the eroding soil mass averaged 42% greater than the dust fraction predicted by a prior procedure reported in the literature. Thus, for a given soil loss in the sampled events, predictions of offsite impacts such as visibility reductions are increased, while onsite soil abrasion from impacts by saltating (hopping) aggregates is decreased. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of increasing understanding of particulate emissions from wind erosion processes. 10. Erosion of tillage ridges can be significantly reduced by a range of surface amendments: The furrow region between tillage ridges is often used to trap aggregates mobilized by wind or water erosion. But erosion often degrades ridge height, so the furrows are no longer protected from wind erosion. To determine effective amendments to stabilize ridges, seventy-five micro-plots were established on 40-cm tall tillage ridges constructed on a sandy soil. Sediment trough collectors were placed in the furrows on both sides of each ridge. The micro-plots were subjected to a number of rainfalls exceeding 5 cm and one severe hailstorm. Treatments with SoilTac alone, or paper sheets treated with SoilTac and Timbor, decreased ridge erosion by more than 50%. Treatments of flyash combined with lime were generally much less effective, because hail penetrated the weak crust. Combinations of low rates of gypsum, composted manure, shredded paper and a mesh material were also tested. Slightly incorporated shredded paper in combination with gypsum and manure was more effective than these other treatments alone and decreased soil erosion loss up to 40%. The combination with shredded paper allowed sustained infiltration while decreasing runoff and sediment loss. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of developing and evaluating viable practices to reduce dust emissions from wind erosion and incorporating findings into WEPS. 11. Residue treatments can reduce decomposition rate of wheat residue: In semi-arid regions, decomposition often reduces residue cover below that needed to protect soil from wind erosion. Residue treatments were applied to wheat residue buried in greenhouse soil and also placed outdoors on a tilled soil surface under a coarse mesh. After nine months outdoors, the average remaining percentage masses with no treatment were 60%, and with treatments of borax 64%, heat 70%, soiltac 76% and commercial chemical 86%. Only the commercial chemical was effective in the greenhouse study of buried residue. While the chemical treatment is effective, it is probably not economic. Hence, additional residue treatments are undergoing testing to try to match the effectiveness of the chemical treatment. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of developing and evaluating viable practices to reduce dust emissions from wind erosion and incorporating findings into WEPS. 12. High energy moisture content (HEMC) aggregate stability method is being modified: a) Collected a number of soils from Kansas and USA to evaluate the contribution of soil type on wind erosion processes. The dry and wet aggregate stability and particle size distribution under wetting - drying condition with various intensities is being tested. b) Aggregate stability of 20 soils treated with biosolids (sludge, manure), gypsum and PAM with different clay mineralogy and soil texture was determined. The results help to understand the role of soil type and amendments interaction on soil structure change and aggregate stability and thus the potential of soil to resist to wind and water erosion. This research relates to the particulate component of NP 203 – Air Quality. The accomplishment addresses the problem objective of developing and evaluating viable practices to reduce dust emissions from wind erosion and incorporating findings into WEPS. 5.Significant Activities that Support Special Target Populations None 6.Technology Transfer Number of Web Sites Managed 2 Number of Non-Peer Reviewed Presentations and Proceedings 15 Number of Newspaper Articles and Other Presentations for Non-Science Audiences 2 Number of Other Technology Transfer 4 Review Publications Skidmore, E.L., Liao, C. 2007. Using Temporally Limited Wind Data in the Wind Erosion Prediction System. Transactions of the ASABE. 51(5):1585-1590. Available: http://asae.frymulti.com/techpapers.asp?confid=min2007 Tang, Z., Lei, T., Yu, J., Shainberg, I., Mamedov, A.I., Ben-Hur, M., Levy, G. 2006. Runoff and erosion in sodic soils treated with dry PAM and phosphogypsum. Soil Science Society of America Journal 70:679.690. Van Donk, S.J., Wagner, L.E., Skidmore, E.L., Tatarko, J. 2005. Comparison of the Weibull Model with measured wind speed distributions for stochastic wind generation. Trans ASAE 48 (2):503-510. Lui, L.Y., E.L. Skidmore, E. Hasi, L. Wagner, and J. Tatarko. 2005. dune sand transport as influenced by wind directions, speed and frequencies in the Ordos Plateau, China. Geomorphology. 67:283-297. Hagen, L.J. 2007. Ratios of erosive wind energies on dry days and all days in the western United States. Transactions of the ASABE. 50(6):1981-1986. Hagen, L.J. 2007. Updating soil surface conditions during wind erosion events using the Wind Erosion Prediction System (WEPS). Transactions of the ASABE. 51(1):129-137. Available: http://asae.frymulti.com/techpapers.asp?confid=min2007