Recovery time and state change of terrestrial carbon cycle after disturbance

Abstract

Ecosystems usually recover from disturbance until a stable state, during which carbon (C) is accumulated to compensate for the C loss associated with disturbance events. However, it is not well understood how likely it is for an ecosystem to recover to an alternative state and how long it takes to recover toward a stable state. Here, we synthesized the results from 77 peer-reviewed case studies that examined ecosystem recovery following disturbances to quantify state change (relative changes between pre-disturbance and fully recovered states) and recovery times for various C cycle variables and disturbance types. We found that most ecosystem C pools and fluxes fully recovered to a stable state that was not significantly different from the pre-disturbance state, except for leaf area index and net primary productivity, which were 10% and 35% higher than the pre-disturbance value, respectively, in forest ecosystem. Recovery times varied largely among variables and disturbance types in the forest, with the longest recovery time required for total biomass (104 ± 33 years) and the shortest time required for C fluxes (23 ± 5 years). The longest and shortest recovery times for different disturbance types are deforestation (101 ± 28 years) and drought (10 ± 1 years), respectively. The recovery time was related to disturbance severity with severer disturbances requiring longer recovery times. However, in the long term, recovery had a strong tendency to drive ecosystem C accumulation towards an equilibrium state. Although we assumed disturbances are static, the recovery-related estimates and relationships revealed in this study are crucial for improving the estimates of disturbance impacts and long-term C balance in terrestrial ecosystems within a disturbance-recovery cycle.

Relocating agriculture could drastically reduce humanity’s ecological footprint

“…Above-and below-ground carbon stocks have been shown to asymptotically reach pre-disturbance values within 50-100 years after land abandonment 51,52,53,54,55,56,57 .…”

“…In grasslands, carbon stocks recover within a few decades following land abandonment 59,53 . Faunal species richness on regenerating degraded land reaches predisturbance levels on timescales of decades to a century 60,61,55,62,52,63 Dotted lines thus show the maximum achievable level of production that causes 50% of the environmental impact.…”

Twenty-Five Years of Aboveground Biomass and Carbon Accumulation Following Extreme Wind Damage in an Old-Growth Forest

“…Accumulation rates documented here appear to be broadly similar to other reported rates following natural disturbance in temperate forests, although rates in tropical systems may be higher (Table 2). Indeed, the 3.4 Mg ha −1 year −1 for biomass and 1.7 Mg ha −1 year −1 found here during years 17-25 is in the upper one-third of the 31 eastern North American studies reviewed in [62]; those studies followed a variety of types of disturbances. Regeneration in the simulated blowdown at Harvard Forest in Massachusetts during years 4-24 averaged 4.7 Mg ha −1 year −1 for biomass (suggesting roughly 2.25 Mg ha −1 year −1 for carbon), very similar to the value reported here (A. Plotkin, personal communication; Table 2).…”

Disequilibrium of terrestrial ecosystem CO<sub>2</sub> budget caused by disturbance-induced emissions and non-CO<sub>2</sub> carbon export flows: a global model assessment

“…6) can be expected to have large ranges of uncertainty, and few data are available to constrain for the fate of laterally transported POC and DOC. Data related to land-use changes (e.g., gross vs. net land-use transition) and procedures to implement them in models are not standardized (e.g., Fuchs et al, 2015). One exception is that multiple satellites have produced long global records of biomass burning.…”