Papers

Summary

Soils used in agriculture in Brazil are mechanically prepared in different ways. In this work, results of the CO2 emission in a latosol after five forms of preparation are presented: grid harrow followed by leveling grid (Treatment T1); disk plow followed by leveling grid (Treatment T2); rotating hoe (Treatment T3); soil not altered with small amount of crop residue (Treatment T4), and scarifier (Treatment T5). The results showed that variations in soil preparation produce significant differences in the CO2 emission induced after treatments over a period of 15 days. Emissions as a function of time, recorded through soil respiration, could be described by means of exponential decay, the scarified portion being the one that resulted in the highest total CO2 emission, when compared to that of the parcel without mobilization, with an increase of 74 g CO2 m-2, in the total investigated period. Newton La Scala Júnior, Afonso Lopes, José Marques Júnior, and Gener T. Pereira. Emission of CO2 from the soil according to the preparation systems. Agricultural Engineering, v. 21, p. 270-275.