Abstract. Model-calculated forecasts of soil organic carbon (SOC) are
important for approximating global terrestrial carbon pools and assessing
their change. However, the lack of detailed observations limits the
reliability and applicability of these SOC projections. Here, we studied whether
state data assimilation (SDA) can be used to continuously update the modeled
state with available total carbon measurements in order to improve future
SOC estimations. We chose six fallow test sites with measurement time
series spanning 30 to 80 years for this initial test. In all cases, SDA
improved future projections but to varying degrees. Furthermore, already
including the first few measurements impacted the state enough to reduce the
error in decades-long projections by at least 1 t C ha−1. Our
results show the benefits of implementing SDA methods for forecasting SOC
as well as highlight implementation aspects that need consideration and
further research.
Abstract. Model-calculated forecasts of soil organic carbon (SOC) are important for approximating global terrestrial carbon pools and assessing their change. However, the lack of detailed observations limits the reliability and applicability of these SOC projections. Here, we studied if state data assimilation (SDA) can be used to continuously update the modeled state with available total carbon measurements in order to improve future SOC estimations. We chose six fallow test sites with measurements time series spanning 30 to 80 years for this initial test. In all cases, SDA improved future projections but to varying degrees. Furthermore, already including the first few measurements impacted the state enough to reduce the error in decades long projections in by at least 1 t C ha−1. Our results show the benefits of implementing SDA methods for forecasting SOC, but also highlight implementation aspects that need consideration and further research.
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