Siberian carbon sink reduced by forest disturbances

Lei Fan*, Jean Pierre Wigneron, Philippe Ciais, Jérome Chave, Martin Brandt, Stephen Sitch, Chao Yue, Ana Bastos, Xin Li, Yuanwei Qin, Wenping Yuan, Dmitry Schepaschenko, Liudmila Mukhortova, Xiaojun Li, Xiangzhuo Liu, Mengjia Wang, Frédéric Frappart, Xiangming Xiao, Jingming Chen, Mingguo MaJianguang Wen, Xiuzhi Chen, Hui Yang, Dave van Wees, Rasmus Fensholt

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to JournalArticleAcademicpeer-review

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Abstract

Siberian forests are generally thought to have acted as an important carbon sink over recent decades, but exposure to severe droughts and fire disturbances may have impacted their carbon dynamics. Limited available forest inventories mean the carbon balance remains uncertain. Here we analyse annual live and dead above-ground carbon changes derived from low-frequency passive microwave observations from 2010 to 2019. We find that during this period, the carbon balance of Siberian forests was close to neutral, with the forests acting as a small carbon sink of +0.02+0.01+0.03 PgC yr−1. Carbon storage in dead wood increased, but this was largely offset by a decrease in live biomass. Substantial losses of live above-ground carbon are attributed to fire and drought, such as the widespread fires in northern Siberia in 2012 and extreme drought in eastern Siberia in 2015. These live above-ground carbon losses contrast with ‘greening’ trends seen in leaf area index over the same period, a decoupling explained by faster post-disturbance recovery of leaf area than live above-ground carbon. Our study highlights the vulnerability of large forest carbon stores in Siberia to climate-induced disturbances, challenging the persistence of the carbon sink in this region of the globe.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)56-62
Number of pages11
JournalNature Geoscience
Volume16
Issue number1
Early online date12 Dec 2022
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - Jan 2023

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
This study is supported in part by research grants from the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant no. 41830648, 42171339), the Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities (SWU020016) and Innovation Research 2035 Pilot Plan of Southwest University (SWUPilotPlan031). J.-P.W acknowledges funding support from the CNES (Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales, France) TOSCA programme. P.C. acknowledges the support from the European Space Agency (ESA) Climate Change Initiative (CCI) Biomass project (contract no. 4000123662/18/I-NB). P.C. and S.S. have received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement no. 821003 (project 4 C). P.C., A.B., S.S. and J.-P.W acknowledge support from the ESA CCI RECCAP2-A project (ESRIN/4000123002/18/I-NB). Y.Q. and X.X. are supported by research grants from US NSF (OIA-1946093, 1911955) and NASA (GeoCarb contract #80LARC17C0001). Tree species information preparation and pre-processing were financially supported by the Russian Science Foundation (project no. 21-46-07002). The data on dead-wood stock and decomposition rate were collected and processed with support by the State Assignment of V.N. Sukachev Institute of Forest SB RAS no. 0287-2021-0008 (state registration number 121031500339-0). M.B. was funded by the European Research Council (ERC) under the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme (grant agreement no. 947757 TOFDRY) and DFF Sapere Aude (grant no. 9064–00049B). C.Y. acknowledges support from the National Science Foundation of China (U20A2090). D.v.W. acknowledges support from Dutch Research Council (NWO) Vici scheme research programme (no. 016.160.324) We also acknowledge that S. Saatchi provided the Saatchi biomass map.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022, The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Limited.

Funding

FundersFunder number
Climate Change Initiative4000123662/18/I-NB
National Science Foundation1911955, OIA-1946093
National Science Foundation
National Aeronautics and Space Administration80LARC17C0001
National Aeronautics and Space Administration
Horizon 2020 Framework ProgrammeESRIN/4000123002/18/I-NB, 821003
Horizon 2020 Framework Programme
European Research Council947757
European Research Council
European Space Agency
National Natural Science Foundation of China41830648, 42171339, U20A2090
National Natural Science Foundation of China
Centre National d’Etudes Spatiales
Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek016.160.324
Nederlandse Organisatie voor Wetenschappelijk Onderzoek
Southwest UniversitySWUPilotPlan031
Southwest University
Russian Science Foundation21-46-07002
Russian Science Foundation
Danmarks Frie Forskningsfond9064–00049B
Danmarks Frie Forskningsfond
Fundamental Research Funds for the Central UniversitiesSWU020016
Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities

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