A Contemporary Carbon Balance for the Northeast Region of the United States

Lü, Xiaoliang; Kicklighter, David W.; Melillo, Jerry M.; Yang, P.; Rosenzweig, B.; Vörösmarty, Charles J; Gross, Barry; Stewart, Robert

doi:10.1021/es403097z

Cited by 25 publications

(27 citation statements)

References 46 publications

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“…More pristine watersheds in the region are likely in Zone I. For C in our example, since sequestration capacity is already exhausted in the region (i.e., currently far more C is emitted than sequestered [37,38]), there is little possibility of increase due to additional impact (Zone III). If anything, the region's C sequestration capacity may decline with increasing impact, particularly under agricultural extensification scenarios in which native landforms are replaced by land use activities with reduced sequestration capacity; hence, ultimately, the possibility of declining services with increasing impact (Zone IV).…”

Section: Isides and The Kinetics Of Regulating Ecosystem Servicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Scale-Explicit Framework for Conceptualizing the Environmental Impacts of Agricultural Land Use Changes

et al. 2014

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Demand for locally-produced food is growing in areas outside traditionally dominant agricultural regions due to concerns over food safety, quality, and sovereignty; rural livelihoods; and environmental integrity. Strategies for meeting this demand rely upon agricultural land use change, in various forms of either intensification or extensification (converting non-agricultural land, including native landforms, to agricultural use). The nature and extent of the impacts of these changes on non-food-provisioning ecosystem services are determined by a complex suite of scale-dependent interactions among farming practices, site-specific characteristics, and the ecosystem services under consideration. Ecosystem modeling strategies which honor such complexity are often impenetrable by non-experts, resulting in a prevalent conceptual gap between ecosystem sciences and the field of sustainable agriculture. Referencing heavily forested New England as an example, we present a conceptual framework designed to synthesize and convey understanding of the scale-and landscape-dependent nature of the relationship between agriculture and various ecosystem services. By accounting for the total impact of multiple disturbances across a landscape while considering the effects of scale, the framework is intended to stimulate and OPEN ACCESSSustainability 2014, 6 8433 support the collaborative efforts of land managers, scientists, citizen stakeholders, and policy makers as they address the challenges of expanding local agriculture.

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Section: Isides and The Kinetics Of Regulating Ecosystem Servicesmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Scale-Explicit Framework for Conceptualizing the Environmental Impacts of Agricultural Land Use Changes

et al. 2014

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“…The estimate for 2013 is for a terrestrial biosphere sink of 2.5 ± 0.5 PgC year -1 , which offsets 23 % of anthropogenic emissions (GCP 2015). However, to better understand the terrestrial carbon cycle, and to evaluate the possibilities for increased carbon sequestration, there is wide interest in quantifying carbon fluxes at more local and regional scales (Lu et al 2013). Carbon flux can be monitored at the ecosystem scale with the eddy covariance approach (Baldocchi et al 2001), or repeated biometric inventories (Curtis et al 2002).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…However, at the intermediate scales of landscape, ecoregion, and region, evaluating carbon flux is more difficult and uncertain. Spatial heterogeneity in climate, soils, disturbance regime, and forest management, as well as temporal variation in weather all contribute to variation in carbon sources and sinks (Lu et al 2013;Turner et al 2015a).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Regional carbon cycle responses to 25 years of variation in climate and disturbance in the US Pacific Northwest

et al. 2016

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Variation in climate, disturbance regime, and forest management strongly influence terrestrial carbon sources and sinks. Spatially distributed, process-based, carbon cycle simulation models provide a means to integrate information on these various influences to estimate carbon pools and flux over large domains. Here we apply the Biome-BGC model over the four-state Northwest US region for the interval from 1986 to 2010. Landsat data were used to characterize disturbances, and forest inventory data were used to parameterize the model. The overall disturbance rate on forest land across the region was 0.8 % year -1 , with 49 % as harvests, 28 % as fire, and 23 % as pest/pathogen. Net ecosystem production (NEP) for the 2006-2010 interval on forestland was predominantly positive (a carbon sink) throughout the region, with maximum values in the Coast Range, intermediate values in the Cascade Mountains, and relatively low values in the Inland Rocky Mountain ecoregions. Localized negative NEPs were mostly associated with recent disturbances. There was large interannual variation in regional NEP, with notably low values across the region in 2003, which was also the warmest year in the interval. The recent (2006)(2007)(2008)(2009)(2010) net ecosystem carbon balance (NECB) was positive for the region (14.4 TgC year -1 ). Despite a lower area-weighted mean NECB, public forestland contributed a larger proportion to the total NECB because of its larger area. Aggregated forest inventory data and inversion modeling are beginning to provide opportunities for evaluating model-simulated regional carbon stocks and fluxes.

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“…Carbon stocks in urban ecosystem are altered directly and indirectly by human activities Hubacek et al, 2012;Chen et al, 2013a,b;Chen, 2013, 2014a,b). The effects of the attendant increases in urban land uses on the storage of carbon are largely unknown (Lorenz and Lal, 2009;Zhao et al, 2010a,b;Scalenghe et al, 2011;Lu et al, 2013). In the coming decades, the amount of carbon contained in human settlements will grow because urban areas are continuing to expand at an unprecedented rate (Churkina et al, 2010).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Variation in ecosystem services across an urbanization gradient: A study of terrestrial carbon stocks from Changzhou, China

Liu³

et al. 2015

Ecological Modelling

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a b s t r a c tEcosystem services in urban areas are regarded as multiple environmental benefits fostered by urban-rural landscapes. A wide range of ecosystem services have been largely affected by land use and cover change in urban areas, leading to significant variation of ecosystem services, such as terrestrial carbon stocks across a gradient of urbanization. Urban areas are critical for terrestrial carbon dynamics owing to both considerable amount of biomass and soil carbon stored in cities and significant losses in carbon stocks from urban land use and cover change. We used Changzhou, a typical fast-growing city in China, as a case study, and estimated biomass and soil carbon stored in land covers using the InVEST model. We also quantified gradient changes in terrestrial carbon stocks in response to urban land use and cover change along two sample transects as a function of distance from the urban center. We found that carbon densities decreased with increasing intensity of urban development. Gradient transect analyses revealed an overall trend of increasing carbon stocks from the urban center to peri-urban areas as a direct result of land use and cover change driven by policy-oriented urban planning, which led to both infilling of empty areas within the urban center and sprawling of urban land toward peri-urban areas. As recent growth trends continue, the expansion of urban land markedly decreased areas previously dominated by green open spaces, making urban land use and cover change and losses in carbon stocks an increasingly important component of regional carbon dynamics. We proposed measures to mitigate these negative effects of urbanization on carbon stocks both for densely built-up areas and for rapidly urbanizing peri-urban areas.

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A Contemporary Carbon Balance for the Northeast Region of the United States

Cited by 25 publications

References 46 publications

A Scale-Explicit Framework for Conceptualizing the Environmental Impacts of Agricultural Land Use Changes

A Scale-Explicit Framework for Conceptualizing the Environmental Impacts of Agricultural Land Use Changes

Regional carbon cycle responses to 25 years of variation in climate and disturbance in the US Pacific Northwest

Variation in ecosystem services across an urbanization gradient: A study of terrestrial carbon stocks from Changzhou, China

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