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Measurements of CO2 Fluxes at Non-Ideal Eddy Covariance Sites
Published on: June 24, 2019
Imputing forest carbon stock estimates from inventory plots to a nationally continuous coverage.
Barry Tyler Wilson1, Christopher W Woodall, Douglas M Griffith
1USDA Forest Service, Northern Research Station, Forest Inventory and Analysis, St, Paul, MN, 55108, USA. barrywilson@fs.fed.us.
Carbon Balance and Management
|January 12, 2013
Summary
New methods provide detailed forest carbon estimates for better ecosystem management. These maps show regional differences in carbon density, aiding forest monitoring and climate change mitigation efforts.
Area of Science:
- Forestry
- Ecology
- Climate Science
Background:
- National forest carbon estimates are required for international climate reporting (United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change).
- Existing national estimates lack the spatial detail needed for strategic forest management and ecosystem service monitoring.
- There is a growing need for disaggregated forest carbon data to support targeted conservation and climate mitigation strategies.
Purpose of the Study:
- To develop spatially explicit estimates of forest carbon density across the conterminous U.S.
- To adapt existing forest inventory plot imputation methods for generating raster maps of carbon density.
- To assess the feasibility of disaggregating carbon estimates to various spatial scales and pools.
Main Methods:
- Utilized a nearest-neighbor imputation approach applied to the U.S. annual forest inventory data.
- Developed raster maps of forest carbon density for multiple pools (live tree, dead wood, soil organic carbon).
- Compared imputed maps across different regions and validated estimates against forest inventory plot data.
Main Results:
- The imputation approach successfully generated spatially explicit maps of forest carbon density at various scales.
- Significant regional variations in carbon density were observed across different carbon pools.
- Live tree carbon density was highest in high-quality sites (e.g., Pacific Northwest), while detrital carbon was higher in areas with recent mortality (e.g., northern Rockies).
- Validation showed strong agreement for pools directly related to imputation variables (e.g., live biomass) but weaker agreement for detrital pools.
Conclusions:
- Forest inventory imputation provides an efficient and flexible method for monitoring diverse carbon pools at national and regional scales.
- These spatially detailed maps support enhanced forest management, climate change mitigation, and reporting requirements.
- The approach allows for the timely incorporation of empirical data, improving the accuracy and relevance of carbon estimates.
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