It would be interesting to see a graph of the increased irrigation need to increase uptake of synthetic nitrogen (especially nitrates), since my understanding is that the green revolution also entailed a huge (unsustainable) increase in irrigation (200 to 250%) that made it possible to farm more marginal land and thus put a lot more acres into production.
nitrogen does require more water, but also nitrogen plus water enables farming of extremely marginal land. I suspect much of the ogalalla area will be dry farming sooner or later, would be interesting to see how much they can push production as wells dry up and irrigation becomes less tenable.
It would be interesting to see a graph of the increased irrigation need to increase uptake of synthetic nitrogen (especially nitrates), since my understanding is that the green revolution also entailed a huge (unsustainable) increase in irrigation (200 to 250%) that made it possible to farm more marginal land and thus put a lot more acres into production.
nitrogen does require more water, but also nitrogen plus water enables farming of extremely marginal land. I suspect much of the ogalalla area will be dry farming sooner or later, would be interesting to see how much they can push production as wells dry up and irrigation becomes less tenable.