| 1. |
- Franz, D, et al.
(författare)
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Towards long-term standardised carbon and greenhouse gas observations for monitoring Europe´s terrestrial ecosystems: a review
- 2018
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Ingår i: International Agrophysics. - : Walter de Gruyter GmbH. - 0236-8722 .- 2300-8725. ; 32, s. 439-455
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Research infrastructures play a key role in launching a new generation of integrated long-term, geographically distributed observation programmes designed to monitor climate change, better understand its impacts on global ecosystems, and evaluate possible mitigation and adaptation strategies. The pan-European Integrated Carbon Observation System combines carbon and greenhouse gas (GHG; CO2, CH4, N2O, H2O) observations within the atmosphere, terrestrial ecosystems and oceans. High-precision measurements are obtained using standardised methodologies, are centrally processed and openly available in a traceable and verifiable fashion in combination with detailed metadata. The Integrated Carbon Observation System ecosystem station network aims to sample climate and land-cover variability across Europe. In addition to GHG flux measurements, a large set of complementary data (including management practices, vegetation and soil characteristics) is collected to support the interpretation, spatial upscaling and modelling of observed ecosystem carbon and GHG dynamics. The applied sampling design was developed and formulated in protocols by the scientific community, representing a trade-off between an ideal dataset and practical feasibility. The use of open-access, high-quality and multi-level data products by different user communities is crucial for the Integrated Carbon Observation System in order to achieve its scientific potential and societal value.
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| 2. |
- de Beeck, M. O., et al.
(författare)
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Soil-meteorological measurements at ICOS monitoring stations in terrestrial ecosystems
- 2018
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Ingår i: International Agrophysics. - : Walter de Gruyter GmbH. - 0236-8722 .- 2300-8725. ; 32:4, s. 619-631
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- The Integrated Carbon Observation System is a pan-European research infrastructure providing standardized, long-term observations of greenhouse gas concentrations and earth-atmosphere greenhouse gas interactions. The terrestrial component of Integrated Carbon Observation System comprises a network of monitoring stations in terrestrial ecosystems where the principal activity is the measurement of ecosystem-atmosphere fluxes of greenhouse gases and energy by means of the eddy covariance technique. At each station a large set of ancillary variables needed for the interpretation of observed fluxes and for process studies is additionally monitored. This set includes a subset of variables that describe the thermal and moisture conditions of the soil and which are here conveniently referred to as soil-meteorological variables: soil temperature, volumetric soil water content, water table depth, and soil heat flux density. This paper describes the standard methodology that has been developped for the monitoring of these variables at the ecosystem stations.
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| 3. |
- Merbold, L., et al.
(författare)
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Precipitation as driver of carbon fluxes in 11 African ecosystems
- 2009
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Ingår i: Biogeosciences. - 1726-4189. ; 6:6, s. 1027-1041
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study reports carbon and water fluxes between the land surface and atmosphere in eleven different ecosystems types in Sub-Saharan Africa, as measured using eddy covariance (EC) technology in the first two years of the CarboAfrica network operation. The ecosystems for which data were available ranged in mean annual rainfall from 320 mm (Sudan) to 1150 mm (Republic of Congo) and include a spectrum of vegetation types (or land cover) (open savannas, woodlands, croplands and grasslands). Given the shortness of the record, the EC data were analysed across the network rather than longitudinally at sites, in order to understand the driving factors for ecosystem respiration and carbon assimilation, and to reveal the different water use strategies in these highly seasonal environments. Values for maximum net carbon assimilation rates (photosynthesis) ranged from -12.5 mu mol CO2 m(-2) s(-1) in a dry, open Millet cropland (C-4-plants) up to -48 mu mol CO2 m(-2) s(-1) for a tropical moist grassland. Maximum carbon assimilation rates were highly correlated with mean annual rainfall (r(2)=0.74). Maximum photosynthetic uptake rates (Fp(max)) were positively related to satellite-derived f(APAR). Ecosystem respiration was dependent on temperature at all sites, and was additionally dependent on soil water content at sites receiving less than 1000 mm of rain per year. All included ecosystems dominated by C-3-plants, showed a strong decrease in 30-min assimilation rates with increasing water vapour pressure deficit above 2.0 kPa.
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| 4. |
- Nemitz, E, et al.
(författare)
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Standardisation of eddy-covariance flux measurements of methane and nitrous oxide
- 2018
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Ingår i: International Agrophysics. - : Walter de Gruyter GmbH. - 0236-8722 .- 2300-8725. ; 32, s. 517-549
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Commercially available fast-response analysers for methane (CH4) and nitrous oxide (N2O) have recently become more sensitive, more robust and easier to operate. This has made their application for long-term flux measurements with the eddycovariance method more feasible. Unlike for carbon dioxide (CO2) and water vapour (H2O), there have so far been no guidelines on how to optimise and standardise the measurements. This paper reviews the state-of-the-art of the various steps of the measurements and discusses aspects such as instrument selection, setup and maintenance, data processing as well as the additional measurements needed to aid interpretation and gap-filling. It presents the methodological protocol for eddy covariance measurements of CH4 and N2O fluxes as agreed for the ecosystem station network of the pan-European Research Infrastructure Integrated Carbon Observation System and provides a first international standard that is suggested to be adopted more widely. Fluxes can be episodic and the processes controlling the fluxes are complex, preventing simple mechanistic gap-filling strategies. Fluxes are often near or below the detection limit, requiring additional care during data processing. The protocol sets out the best practice for these conditions to avoid biasing the results and long-term budgets. It summarises the current approach to gap-filling.
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| 5. |
- Pavelka, M., et al.
(författare)
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Standardisation of chamber technique for CO2, N2O and CH4 fluxes measurements from terrestrial ecosystems
- 2018
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Ingår i: International Agrophysics. - : Walter de Gruyter GmbH. - 0236-8722 .- 2300-8725. ; 32:4, s. 569-587
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Chamber measurements of trace gas fluxes between the land surface and the atmosphere have been conducted for almost a century. Different chamber techniques, including static and dynamic, have been used with varying degrees of success in estimating greenhouse gases (CO2, CH4, N2O) fluxes. However, all of these have certain disadvantages which have either prevented them from providing an adequate estimate of greenhouse gas exchange or restricted them to be used under limited conditions. Generally, chamber methods are relatively low in cost and simple to operate. In combination with the appropriate sample allocations, chamber methods are adaptable for a wide variety of studies from local to global spatial scales, and they are particularly well suited for in situ and laboratory-based studies. Consequently, chamber measurements will play an important role in the portfolio of the Pan-European long-term research infrastructure Integrated Carbon Observation System. The respective working group of the Integrated Carbon Observation System Ecosystem Monitoring Station Assembly has decided to ascertain standards and quality checks for automated and manual chamber systems instead of defining one or several standard systems provided by commercial manufacturers in order to define minimum requirements for chamber measurements. The defined requirements and recommendations related to chamber measurements are described here.
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| 6. |
- Sjöström, Martin, et al.
(författare)
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Evaluation of MODIS gross primary productivity for Africa using eddy covariance data
- 2013
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Ingår i: Remote Sensing of Environment. - : Elsevier BV. - 0034-4257. ; 131, s. 275-286
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- MOD17A2 provides operational gross primary production (GPP) data globally at 1 km spatial resolution and 8-day temporal resolution. MOD17A2 estimates GPP according to the light use efficiency (LUE) concept assuming a fixed maximum rate of carbon assimilation per unit photosynthetically active radiation absorbed by the vegetation (epsilon(max)). Minimum temperature and vapor pressure deficit derived from meteorological data down-regulate epsilon(max) and constrain carbon assimilation. This data is useful for regional to global studies of the terrestrial carbon budget, climate change and natural resources. In this study we evaluated the MOD17A2 product and its driver data by using in situ measurements of meteorology and eddy covariance GPP for 12 African sites. MOD17A2 agreed well with eddy covariance GPP for wet sites. Overall, seasonality was well captured but MOD17A2 GPP was underestimated for the dry sites located in the Sahel region. Replacing the meteorological driver data derived from coarse resolution reanalysis data with tower measurements reduced MOD17A2 GPP uncertainties, however, the underestimations at the dry sites persisted. Inferred epsilon(max) calculated from tower data was higher than the epsilon(max) prescribed in MOD17A2. This, in addition to uncertainties in fraction of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (FAPAR) explains some of the underestimations. The results suggest that improved quality of driver data, but primarily a readjustment of the parameters in the biome parameter look-up table (BPLUT) may be needed to better estimate GPP for African ecosystems in MOD17A2. (C) 2013 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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| 7. |
- Sjöström, Martin, et al.
(författare)
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Exploring the potential of MODIS EVI for modeling gross primary production across African ecosystems
- 2011
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Ingår i: Remote Sensing of Environment. - : Elsevier BV. - 0034-4257. ; 115:4, s. 1081-1089
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- One of the most frequently applied methods for integrating controls on primary production through satellite data is the light use efficiency (LUE) approach, which links vegetation gross or net primary productivity (GPP or NPP) to remotely-sensed estimates of absorbed photosynthetically active radiation (APAR). Eddy covariance towers provide continuous measurements of carbon flux, presenting an opportunity for evaluation of satellite estimates of GPP. Here we investigate relationships between eddy covariance estimated GPP, environmental variables and the enhanced vegetation index (EVI) from the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) across African savanna ecosystems. EVI was found to correlate well with estimated GPP on a site-by-site basis. Combining EVI with tower-measured PAR and evaporative fraction (EF, a measure of water sufficiency) improved the direct relationship between GPP and EVI at the majority of the sites. The slope of this relationship was strongly related to site peak leaf area index (LAI). These results are promising for the extension of GPP through the use of remote sensing data to a regional or even continental scale.
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| 8. |
- Yi, Chuixiang, et al.
(författare)
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Climate control of terrestrial carbon exchange across biomes and continents
- 2010
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Ingår i: Environmental Research Letters. - : IOP Publishing. - 1748-9326. ; 5:3
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Understanding the relationships between climate and carbon exchange by terrestrial ecosystems is critical to predict future levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide because of the potential accelerating effects of positive climate-carbon cycle feedbacks. However, directly observed relationships between climate and terrestrial CO2 exchange with the atmosphere across biomes and continents are lacking. Here we present data describing the relationships between net ecosystem exchange of carbon (NEE) and climate factors as measured using the eddy covariance method at 125 unique sites in various ecosystems over six continents with a total of 559 site-years. We find that NEE observed at eddy covariance sites is (1) a strong function of mean annual temperature at mid-and high-latitudes, (2) a strong function of dryness at mid-and low-latitudes, and (3) a function of both temperature and dryness around the mid-latitudinal belt (45 degrees N). The sensitivity of NEE to mean annual temperature breaks down at similar to 16 degrees C (a threshold value of mean annual temperature), above which no further increase of CO2 uptake with temperature was observed and dryness influence overrules temperature influence.
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| 9. |
- Akkermans, T., et al.
(författare)
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Validation and comparison of two soil-vegetation-atmosphere transfer models for tropical Africa
- 2012
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Ingår i: Journal of Geophysical Research. - 2156-2202. ; 117, s. 02013-02013
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- This study aims to compare and validate two soil-vegetation-atmosphere-transfer (SVAT) schemes: TERRA-ML and the Community Land Model (CLM). Both SVAT schemes are run in standalone mode (decoupled from an atmospheric model) and forced with meteorological in-situ measurements obtained at several tropical African sites. Model performance is quantified by comparing simulated sensible and latent heat fluxes with eddy-covariance measurements. Our analysis indicates that the Community Land Model corresponds more closely to the micrometeorological observations, reflecting the advantages of the higher model complexity and physical realism. Deficiencies in TERRA-ML are addressed and its performance is improved: (1) adjusting input data (root depth) to region-specific values (tropical evergreen forest) resolves dry-season underestimation of evapotranspiration; (2) adjusting the leaf area index and albedo (depending on hard-coded model constants) resolves overestimations of both latent and sensible heat fluxes; and (3) an unrealistic flux partitioning caused by overestimated superficial water contents is reduced by adjusting the hydraulic conductivity parameterization. CLM is by default more versatile in its global application on different vegetation types and climates. On the other hand, with its lower degree of complexity, TERRA-ML is much less computationally demanding, which leads to faster calculation times in a coupled climate simulation.
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| 10. |
- Harper, Anna B., et al.
(författare)
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Improvement of modeling plant responses to low soil moisture in JULESvn4.9 and evaluation against flux tower measurements
- 2021
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Ingår i: Geoscientific Model Development. - : Copernicus GmbH. - 1991-959X .- 1991-9603. ; 14:6, s. 3269-3294
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Drought is predicted to increase in the future due to climate change, bringing with it myriad impacts on ecosystems. Plants respond to drier soils by reducing stomatal conductance in order to conserve water and avoid hydraulic damage. Despite the importance of plant drought responses for the global carbon cycle and local and regional climate feedbacks, land surface models are unable to capture observed plant responses to soil moisture stress. We assessed the impact of soil moisture stress on simulated gross primary productivity (GPP) and latent energy flux (LE) in the Joint UK Land Environment Simulator (JULES) vn4.9 on seasonal and annual timescales and evaluated 10 different representations of soil moisture stress in the model. For the default configuration, GPP was more realistic in temperate biome sites than in the tropics or high-latitude (cold-region) sites, while LE was best simulated in temperate and high-latitude (cold) sites. Errors that were not due to soil moisture stress, possibly linked to phenology, contributed to model biases for GPP in tropical savanna and deciduous forest sites. We found that three alternative approaches to calculating soil moisture stress produced more realistic results than the default parameterization for most biomes and climates. All of these involved increasing the number of soil layers from 4 to 14 and the soil depth from 3.0 to 10.8 m. In addition, we found improvements when soil matric potential replaced volumetric water content in the stress equation (the "soil14_psi" experiments), when the critical threshold value for inducing soil moisture stress was reduced ("soil14_p0"), and when plants were able to access soil moisture in deeper soil layers ("soil14_dr&z.ast;2"). For LE, the biases were highest in the default configuration in temperate mixed forests, with overestimation occurring during most of the year. At these sites, reducing soil moisture stress (with the new parameterizations mentioned above) increased LE and increased model biases but improved the simulated seasonal cycle and brought the monthly variance closer to the measured variance of LE. Further evaluation of the reason for the high bias in LE at many of the sites would enable improvements in both carbon and energy fluxes with new parameterizations for soil moisture stress. Increasing the soil depth and plant access to deep soil moisture improved many aspects of the simulations, and we recommend these settings in future work using JULES or as a general way to improve land surface carbon and water fluxes in other models. In addition, using soil matric potential presents the opportunity to include plant functional type-specific parameters to further improve modeled fluxes.
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| 11. |
- Merbold, Lutz, et al.
(författare)
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Opportunities for an African greenhouse gas observation system
- 2021
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Ingår i: Regional Environmental Change. - : Springer Science and Business Media LLC. - 1436-3798 .- 1436-378X. ; 21:4
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Tidskriftsartikel (refereegranskat)abstract
- Global population projections foresee the biggest increase to occur in Africa with most of the available uncultivated land to ensure food security remaining on the continent. Simultaneously, greenhouse gas emissions are expected to rise due to ongoing land use change, industrialisation, and transport amongst other reasons with Africa becoming a major emitter of greenhouse gases globally. However, distinct knowledge on greenhouse gas emissions sources and sinks as well as their variability remains largely unknown caused by its vast size and diversity and an according lack of observations across the continent. Thus, an environmental research infrastructure—as being setup in other regions—is more needed than ever. Here, we present the results of a design study that developed a blueprint for establishing such an environmental research infrastructure in Africa. The blueprint comprises an inventory of already existing observations, the spatial disaggregation of locations that will enable to reduce the uncertainty in climate forcing’s in Africa and globally as well as an overall estimated cost for such an endeavour of about 550 M€ over the next 30 years. We further highlight the importance of the development of an e-infrastructure, the necessity for capacity development and the inclusion of all stakeholders to ensure African ownership.
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