Dynamics of Postfire Aboveground Carbon in a Chronosequence of Chinese Boreal Larch Forests

Yang, Yuan; Cai, Wen; Yang, Jian; White, Megan; Lhotka, John M.

doi:10.1029/2018jg004702

Cited by 6 publications

(5 citation statements)

References 119 publications

(169 reference statements)

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“…Boreal forests, one of the largest terrestrial biomes, store 32% of global carbon stocks [1] and play a significant role in global carbon cycles and balance [2][3][4]. Forest carbon is held in six primary pools: standing live trees (SLT), standing dead trees (SDT), coarse woody debris (CWD), shrubs and herbaceous vegetation (S&H), forest floors (litter and duff), and mineral soils [5].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Forest carbon is held in six primary pools: standing live trees (SLT), standing dead trees (SDT), coarse woody debris (CWD), shrubs and herbaceous vegetation (S&H), forest floors (litter and duff), and mineral soils [5]. Wildland fire is a crucial factor that influences boreal forest structures and development [2,6], especially under climate change conditions with increases in fire size, frequency, and severity [7][8][9][10]. Wildfires not only emit carbon during combustion but also induce carbon transfers and redistribution among these carbon pools (e.g., shifting from live biomass to dead) [11][12][13].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, the number of reports on postfire carbon redistribution among forest pools was relatively few compared to forest fire carbon emission research [19][20][21][22], which is not our major focus in this study. However, a few researchers have studied the woody dynamics among forest carbon pools in Canada, America, and northeastern China [2,10,13,23] one or two years post-fire. There is a knowledge gap regarding how much carbon is redistributed between the live pools (e.g., SLT or S&H); dead pools (SDT, CWD, litter, or duff); and soil carbon pools immediately after fires of varying severities.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Carbon Emission and Redistribution among Forest Carbon Pools, and Change in Soil Nutrient Content after Different Severities of Forest Fires in Northeast China

Ping

Chang

Liu

et al. 2022

Forests

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Forest fires are a significant factor that affects the boreal forest carbon distribution which emits carbon into the atmosphere and leads to carbon redistribution among carbon pools. However, knowledge about how much carbon was transferred among pools and the immediate changes in soil nutrient contents in areas that were burned by fires of various severities are still limited. In this study, we surveyed eight wildfire sites that are located in northeast China within three months after the fires occurred. Our results indicate that the total soil nitrogen, phosphorus, and organic carbon contents significantly increased after moderate- and high-severity fires. The carbon emissions were 3.84, 5.14, and 12.86 Mg C/ha for low-, moderate-, and high-severity fires, respectively. The amount of carbon transferred among pools increased with fire severity except for the charcoal pool, storing the highest amounts of carbon in moderate-severity fires. Although the charcoal and ash pools accounted for a small proportion of the total ecosystem, they are important for biogeochemical cycles and are worthy of attention. The carbon redistribution information in our study is important for accurately estimating the forest carbon budget and providing crucial parameters for forest carbon cycling models to incorporate the carbon transfer process.

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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Carbon Emission and Redistribution among Forest Carbon Pools, and Change in Soil Nutrient Content after Different Severities of Forest Fires in Northeast China

Ping

Chang

Liu

et al. 2022

Forests

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“…As global warming and anthropogenic land use change continue to affect environmental conditions at the land surface, including temperature, humidity, drought frequency, and ignition risk, it is projected that the significance of fire in driving biogeochemical cycles will increase in many regions across the world (Abatzoglou et al, 2018;Turco et al, 2018). Consequently, there is a growing appreciation that precise measurements of fire effects on terrestrial C stocks are critical to projecting the future global dynamics of C in the Earth System (Landry & Matthews, 2017;Surawski et al, 2016;Yang et al, 2015). Most exercises for calculating, modeling, and forecasting fire emissions use the "consumed biomass" approach, which assumes that all burnt C is emitted as gases and aerosols (Surawski et al, 2016).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Vegetation fires currently emit an estimated 2.2 × 10 15 Pg of C directly into the atmosphere per year (Van Der Werf et al, 2017). In addition, they redistribute C between ecosystem pools by, for example, transferring C from the aboveground living to the dead vegetation pools (Yang et al, 2018). From an ecological perspective, fire can change ecosystem succession or even result in shifts between ecosystem types, consequently altering ecosystem C storage capacity (Gao et al, 2018; Millar & Stephenson, 2015).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Relevance of Pyrogenic Carbon for Carbon Budgets From Fires: Insights From the FIREX Experiment

Santín

Doerr

Jones

et al. 2020

Global Biogeochemical Cycles

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Vegetation fires play an important role in global and regional carbon cycles. Due to climate warming and land use shifts, fire patterns are changing and fire impacts increasing in many of the world's regions. Reducing uncertainties in carbon budgeting calculations from fires is therefore fundamental to advance our current understanding and forecasting capabilities. Here we study 20 chamber burns from the FIREX FireLab experiment, which burnt a representative set of North American wildland fuels, to assess the following: (i) differences in carbon emission estimations between the commonly used "consumed biomass" approach and the "burnt carbon" approach; (ii) pyrogenic carbon (PyC) production rates; and (iii) thermal and chemical recalcitrance of the PyC produced, as proxies of its biogeochemical stability. We find that the "consumed biomass" approach leads to overestimation of carbon emissions by 2-27% (most values between 2% and 10%). This accounting error arises largely from not considering PyC production and, even if relatively small, can therefore have important implications for medium-and long-term carbon budgeting. A large fraction (34-100%) of this PyC was contained in the charred fine residue, a postfire material frequently overlooked in fire carbon research. However, the most recalcitrant PyC was in the form of woody charcoal, with estimated half-lives for most samples exceeding 1,000 years. Combustion efficiency was relatively high in these laboratory burns compared to actual wildland fire conditions, likely leading to lower PyC production rates. We therefore argue that the PyC production values obtained here, and associated overestimation of carbon emissions, should be taken as low-end estimates for wildland fire conditions. Plain Language Summary Wildfires release substantial amounts of carbon into the atmosphere with direct implications for climate change and air quality. However, not all the carbon from the burnt vegetation is emitted; a fraction of it remains on the ground as charcoal (pyrogenic carbon-PyC). PyC is more resistant to degradation than unburnt vegetation, and the carbon it contains can be stored in soils and sediments for long periods of time instead of going back to the atmosphere. Most current carbon emissions estimations do not take PyC production into account and assume that all carbon burnt is emitted into the atmosphere. Here we quantify carbon emissions and PyC production during the FIREX laboratory burns (Missoula Fire Lab, October 2016), where a range of North American vegetation types (e.g., chaparral shrubs, conifer trees) were burnt to study their emissions. We found that the current way of calculating carbon emissions can lead to an overestimation of carbon emissions of between 2% and 27%. We also found that the PyC produced during burning is mostly held not in big woody pieces of charcoal but instead in small charred particles, which are often not accounted for in wildfire research.

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Wildfire affects boreal forest resilience through post-fire recruitment in Northeastern China

Liu

Liang

et al. 2022

Ecological Indicators

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Dynamics of Postfire Aboveground Carbon in a Chronosequence of Chinese Boreal Larch Forests

Cited by 6 publications

References 119 publications

Carbon Emission and Redistribution among Forest Carbon Pools, and Change in Soil Nutrient Content after Different Severities of Forest Fires in Northeast China

Carbon Emission and Redistribution among Forest Carbon Pools, and Change in Soil Nutrient Content after Different Severities of Forest Fires in Northeast China

The Relevance of Pyrogenic Carbon for Carbon Budgets From Fires: Insights From the FIREX Experiment

Wildfire affects boreal forest resilience through post-fire recruitment in Northeastern China

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