An estimate of the contribution of outdoor concrete yards used by livestock to the UK inventories of ammonia, nitrous oxide and methane

Many farms have unroofed concrete yards used by livestock. These concrete yards have received little attention as sources of gaseous emissions. From 1997 to 1999 measurements were made of emissions of ammonia (NH3), nitrous oxide (N2O) and methane (CH4) from 11 concrete yards used by livestock. A postal survey was carried out to assess the areas of yards on farms in England and Wales to enable the measurements to be scaled up to estimate national emissions. Using the results of this study NH3-N emissions from farm concrete yards were calculated to be ca. 35×103 t annually. This is 13% of the current estimated total NH3-N emission from UK livestock. Concrete yards were an insignificant source of N2O and CH4 which were both <0.01% of current estimates of agricultural emissions.