Seasonal variation in carbon dioxide exchange over a Mediterranean annual grassland in California

Understanding how environmental variables affect the processes that regulate the carbon flux over grassland is critical for large-scale modeling research, since grasslands comprise almost one-third of the earth's natural vegetation. To address this issue, fluxes of CO{sub 2} (F{sub c}, flux toward the surface is negative) were measured over a Mediterranean, annual grassland in California, USA for 2 years with the eddy covariance method. To interpret the biotic and abiotic factors that modulate F{sub c} over the course of a year we decomposed net ecosystem CO{sub 2} exchange into its constituent components, ecosystem respiration (R{sub eco}) and gross primary production (GPP). Daytime R{sub eco} was extrapolated from the relationship between temperature and nighttime F{sub c} under high turbulent conditions. Then, GPP was estimated by subtracting daytime values of F{sub c} from daytime estimates of R{sub eco}. Results show that most of carbon exchange, both photosynthesis and respiration, was limited to the wet season (typically from October to mid-May). Seasonal variations in GPP followed closely to changes in leaf area index, which in turn was governed by soil moisture, available sunlight and the timing of the last frost. In general, R{sub eco} was an exponential function of soil temperature, but with season-dependent values of Q{sub 10}. The temperature-dependent respiration model failed immediately after rain events, when large pulses of R{sub eco} were observed. Respiration pulses were especially notable during the dry season when the grass was dead and were the consequence of quickly stimulated microbial activity. Integrated values of GPP, R{sub eco}, and net ecosystem exchange (NEE) were 867, 735, and -132g C m{sup -2}, respectively, for the 2000-2001 season, and 729, 758, and 29g C m{sup -2} for the 2001-2002 season. Thus, the grassland was a moderate carbon sink during the first season and a weak carbon source during the second season. In contrast to a well-accepted view that annual production of grass is linearly correlated to precipitation, the large difference in GPP between the two seasons were not caused by the annual precipitation. Instead, a shorter growing season, due to late start of the rainy season, was mainly responsible for the lower GPP in the second season. Furthermore, relatively higher R{sub eco} during the non-growing season occurred after a late spring rain. Thus, for this Mediterranean grassland, the timing of rain events had more impact than the total amount of precipitation on ecosystem GPP and NEE. This is because its growing season is in the cool and wet season when carbon uptake and respiration are usually limited by low temperature and sometimes frost, not by soil moisture

Protecting climate with forests

Policies for climate mitigation on land rarely acknowledge biophysical factors, such as reflectivity, evaporation, and surface roughness. Yet such factors can alter temperatures much more than carbon sequestration does, and often in a conflicting way. We outline a framework for examining biophysical factors in mitigation policies and provide some best-practice recommendations based on that framework. Tropical projects-avoided deforestation, forest restoration, and afforestation-provide the greatest climate value, because carbon storage and biophysics align to cool the Earth. In contrast, the climate benefits of carbon storage are often counteracted in boreal and other snow-covered regions, where darker trees trap more heat than snow does. Managers can increase the climate benefit of some forest projects by using more reflective and deciduous species and through urban forestry projects that reduce energy use. Ignoring biophysical interactions could result in millions of dollars being invested in some mitigation projects that provide little climate benefit or, worse, are counter-productive

On the use of MODIS EVI to assess gross primary productivity of North American ecosystems

[1] Carbon flux models based on light use efficiency (LUE), such as the MOD17 algorithm, have proved difficult to parameterize because of uncertainties in the LUE term, which is usually estimated from meteorological variables available only at large spatial scales. In search of simpler models based entirely on remote‐sensing data, we examined direct relationships between the enhanced vegetation index (EVI) and gross primary productivity (GPP) measured at nine eddy covariance flux tower sites across North America. When data from the winter period of inactive photosynthesis were excluded, the overall relationship between EVI and tower GPP was better than that between MOD17 GPP and tower GPP. However, the EVI/GPP relationships vary between sites. Correlations between EVI and GPP were generally greater for deciduous than for evergreen sites. However, this correlation declined substantially only for sites with the smallest seasonal variation in EVI, suggesting that this relationship can be used for all but the most evergreen sites. Within sites dominated by either evergreen or deciduous species, seasonal variation in EVI was best explained by the severity of summer drought. Our results demonstrate that EVI alone can provide estimates of GPP that are as good as, if not better than, current versions of the MOD17 algorithm for many sites during the active period of photosynthesis. Preliminary data suggest that inclusion of other remote‐sensing products in addition to EVI, such as the MODIS land surface temperature (LST), may result in more robust models of carbon balance based entirely on remote‐sensing data

The future of evapotranspiration : global requirements for ecosystem functioning, carbon and climate feedbacks, agricultural management, and water resources

The fate of the terrestrial biosphere is highly uncertain given recent and projected changes in climate. This is especially acute for impacts associated with changes in drought frequency and intensity on the distribution and timing of water availability. The development of effective adaptation strategies for these emerging threats to food and water security are compromised by limitations in our understanding of how natural and managed ecosystems are responding to changing hydrological and climatological regimes. This information gap is exacerbated by insufficient monitoring capabilities from local to global scales. Here, we describe how evapotranspiration (ET) represents the key variable in linking ecosystem functioning, carbon and climate feedbacks, agricultural management, and water resources, and highlight both the outstanding science and applications questions and the actions, especially from a space-based perspective, necessary to advance them

Looking deeper into the soil : biophysical controls and seasonal lags of soil CO2 production and efflux

Author Posting. © Ecological Society of America, 2010. This article is posted here by permission of Ecological Society of America for personal use, not for redistribution. The definitive version was published in Ecological Applications 20 (2010): 1569–1582, doi:10.1890/09-0693.1.We seek to understand how biophysical factors such as soil temperature (Ts), soil moisture (θ), and gross primary production (GPP) influence CO2 fluxes across terrestrial ecosystems. Recent advancements in automated measurements and remote-sensing approaches have provided time series in which lags and relationships among variables can be explored. The purpose of this study is to present new applications of continuous measurements of soil CO2 efflux (F0) and soil CO2 concentrations measurements. Here we explore how variation in Ts, θ, and GPP (derived from NASA's moderate-resolution imaging spectroradiometer [MODIS]) influence F0 and soil CO2 production (Ps). We focused on seasonal variation and used continuous measurements at a daily timescale across four vegetation types at 13 study sites to quantify: (1) differences in seasonal lags between soil CO2 fluxes and Ts, θ, and GPP and (2) interactions and relationships between CO2 fluxes with Ts, θ, and GPP. Mean annual Ts did not explain annual F0 and Ps among vegetation types, but GPP explained 73% and 30% of the variation, respectively. We found evidence that lags between soil CO2 fluxes and Ts or GPP provide insights into the role of plant phenology and information relevant about possible timing of controls of autotrophic and heterotrophic processes. The influences of biophysical factors that regulate daily F0 and Ps are different among vegetation types, but GPP is a dominant variable for explaining soil CO2 fluxes. The emergence of long-term automated soil CO2 flux measurement networks provides a unique opportunity for extended investigations into F0 and Ps processes in the near future.Data collection was possible thanks to NASA, the NSF Center for Embedded Networked Sensing (CCR-0120778), DOE (DE-FG02-03ER63638), CONACyT, UCMEXUS, NSF (EF-0410408), NSF-LTER, KAKENHI (12878089 and 13480150), the Academy of Finland (213093), the Austrian Science Fund (FWF, P18756-B16), the Kearney Foundation, the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences (CFCAS), and the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC). R. Vargas was supported by grant DEB-0639235 during the preparation of this manuscript

Integration of MODIS land and atmosphere products with a coupled-process model to estimate gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration from 1 km to global scales

We propose the Breathing Earth System Simulator (BESS), an upscaling approach to quantify global gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration using MODIS with a spatial resolution of 1-5 km and a temporal resolution of 8 days. This effort is novel because it is the first system that harmonizes and utilizes MODIS Atmosphere and Land products on the same projection and spatial resolution over the global land. This enabled us to use the MODIS Atmosphere products to calculate atmospheric radiative transfer for visual and near infrared radiation wave bands. Then we coupled atmospheric and canopy radiative transfer processes, with models that computed leaf photosynthesis, stomatal conductance and transpiration on the sunlit and shaded portions of the vegetation and soil. At the annual time step, the mass and energy fluxes derived from BESS showed strong linear relations with measurements of solar irradiance (r(2) = 0.95, relative bias: 8%), gross primary productivity (r(2) = 0.86, relative bias: 5%) and evapotranspiration (r(2) = 0.86, relative bias: 15%) in data from 33 flux towers that cover seven plant functional types across arctic to tropical climatic zones. A sensitivity analysis revealed that the gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration computed in BESS were most sensitive to leaf area index and solar irradiance, respectively. We quantified the mean global terrestrial estimates of gross primary productivity and evapotranpiration between 2001 and 2003 as 118 +/- 26 PgC yr(-1) and 500 +/- 104 mm yr(-1) (equivalent to 63,000 +/- 13,100 km(3) yr(-1)), respectively. BESS-derived gross primary productivity and evapotranspiration estimates were consistent with the estimates from independent machine-learning, data-driven products, but the process-oriented structure has the advantage of diagnosing sensitivity of mechanisms. The process-based BESS is able to offer gridded biophysical variables everywhere from local to the total global land scales with an 8-day interval over multiple years.Keywords: Energy fluxes, Water vapor exchange, Foliage clumping index, Carbon dioxide, Stomal conductance, Net ecosystem exchange, Sitchensis bong carr, Radiative transfer, Oak hickory forest, Leaf area inde

FLUXNET: A New Tool to Study the Temporal and Spatial Variability of Ecosystem-Scale Carbon Dioxide, Water Vapor, and Energy Flux Densities

FLUXNET is a global network of micrometeorological flux measurement sites that measure the exchanges of carbon dioxide, water vapor, and energy between the biosphere and atmosphere. At present over 140 sites are operating on a long–term and continuous basis. Vegetation under study includes temperate conifer and broadleaved (deciduous and evergreen) forests, tropical and boreal forests, crops, grasslands, chaparral, wetlands, and tundra. Sites exist on five continents and their latitudinal distribution ranges from 70°N to 30°S. FLUXNET has several primary functions. First, it provides infrastructure for compiling, archiving, and distributing carbon, water, and energy flux measurement, and meteorological, plant, and soil data to the science community. (Data and site information are available online at the FLUXNET http://www–eosdis.ornl.gov/FLUXNET/.) Second, the project supports calibration and flux intercomparison activities. This activity ensures that data from the regional networks are intercomparable. And third, FLUXNET supports the synthesis, discussion, and communication of ideas and data by supporting project scientists, workshops, and visiting scientists. The overarching goal is to provide information for validating computations of net primary productivity, evaporation, and energy absorption that are being generated by sensors mounted on the NASA Terra satellite. Data being compiled by FLUXNET are being used to quantify and compare magnitudes and dynamics of annual ecosystem carbon and water balances, to quantify the response of stand–scale carbon dioxide and water vapor flux densities to controlling biotic and abiotic factors, and to validate a hierarchy of soil–plant–atmosphere trace gas exchange models. Findings so far include 1) net CO2 exchange of temperate broadleaved forests increases by about 5.7 g C m–2 day–1 for each additional day that the growing season is extended; 2) the sensitivity of net ecosystem CO2 exchange to sunlight doubles if the sky is cloudy rather than clear; 3) the spectrum of CO2 flux density exhibits peaks at timescales of days, weeks, and years, and a spectral gap exists at the month timescale; 4) the optimal temperature of net CO2 exchange varies with mean summer temperature; and 5) stand age affects carbon dioxide and water vapor flux densities

Reduction in carbon uptake during turn of the century drought in western North America

Fossil fuel emissions aside, temperate North America is a net sink of carbon dioxide at present¹⁻³. Year-to-year variations in this carbon sink are linked to variations in hydroclimate that affect net ecosystem productivity³,⁴. The severity and incidence of climatic extremes, including drought, have increased as a result of climate warming⁵⁻⁸. Here, we examine the effect of the turn of the century drought in western North America on carbon uptake in the region, using reanalysis data, remote sensing observations and data from global monitoring networks. We show that the area-integrated strength of the western North American carbon sink declined by 30–298 Tg C  yr⁻¹ during the 2000–2004 drought. We further document a pronounced drying of the terrestrial biosphere during this period, together with a reduction in river discharge and a loss of cropland productivity. We compare our findings with previous palaeoclimate reconstructions⁷ and show that the last drought of this magnitude occurred more than 800 years ago. Based on projected changes in precipitation and drought severity, we estimate that the present mid-latitude carbon sink of 177–623 Tg C yr⁻¹ in western North America could disappear by the end of the century.KEYWORDS: Hydrology, hydrogeology and limnology, Biogeochemistry, Climate scienc