Minasny (2026): Accelerating Weathering, Lessons from a Century of Soil Rejuvenation
Budiman Minasny and Xavier Dupla, IN: Frontiers in Climate, https://doi.org/10.3389/fclim.2026.1824420
Enhanced rock weathering (ERW) is now widely discussed as a carbon dioxide removal (CDR) strategy, but many of the issues it faces were already evident in early agronomic experiments on crushed silicate rocks. This article revisits the pioneering work of Octave d’Hotman de Villiers in Mauritius during the 1930s-1950s, where crushed basalt was applied at very high rates (20-450 t ha-1) to highly weathered tropical soils to rejuvenate sugarcane productivity. The authors examine the rationale, experimental design, yield responses, and material constraints of these trials and situate them within the longer history of rock-dust fertilisation and modern ERW.