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1.
The Kyoto Protocol allows Annex I countries to use afforestation (theconversion of non-forest landto forest) to meet emissions reduction targets. We present a new method forestimating the cost of CO2mitigation through afforestation based on econometric models of land use. Landuse models are developed from dataon observed land allocation decisions and quantify the relationship betweenthe share of land in forest and the netreturns to forestry, among other land use determinants. The econometricapproach measures the actual responsesby landowners to observed changes in net returns, in contrast to earlierstudies in which landowner responses aredictated by the researcher. Models are estimated for Maine, South Carolina,and Wisconsin. The estimated modelsare used to simulate subsidies for afforestation, which imply increases inforest area and net reductions inatmospheric CO2 concentrations. Average cost measures – totalsubsidies divided by total carbon sequestered –are derived for afforestation programs with and without timber harvesting. Theuse of econometric land use modelsin integrated assessments of climate change is explored. We model the effectson land use patterns and the costsof CO2 mitigation of changes in the net returns to agricultureinduced by climate change. 相似文献
2.
The future forests of eastern North America will be shaped by at least three broad drivers: (i) vegetation change and natural disturbance patterns associated with the protracted recovery following colonial era land use, (ii) a changing climate, and (iii) a land-use regime that consists of geographically variable rates and intensities of forest harvesting, clearing for development, and land protection. We evaluated the aggregate and relative importance of these factors for the future forests of New England, USA by simulating a continuation of the recent trends in these drivers for fifty-years, nominally spanning 2010 to 2060. The models explicitly incorporate the modern distribution of tree species and the geographical variation in climate and land-use change. Using a cellular land-cover change model in combination with a physiologically-based forest landscape model, we conducted a factorial simulation experiment to assess changes in aboveground carbon (AGC) and forest composition. In the control scenario that simulates a hypothetical absence of any future land use or future climate change, the simulated landscape experienced large increases in average AGC—an increase of 53% from 2010 to 2060 (from 4.2 to 6.3 kg m−2). By 2060, climate change increased AGC stores by 8% relative to the control while the land-use regime reduced AGC by 16%. Among land uses, timber harvesting had a larger effect on AGC storage and changes in tree composition than did forest conversion to non-forest uses, with the most pronounced impacts observed on private corporate-owned land in northern New England. Our results demonstrate a large difference between the landscape’s potential to store carbon and the landscape’s current trajectory, assuming a continuation of the modern land-use regime. They also reveal aspects of the land-use regime that will have a disproportionate impact on the ability of the landscape to store carbon in the future, such as harvest regimes on corporate-owned lands. This information will help policy-makers and land managers evaluate trade-offs between commodity production and mitigating climate change through forest carbon storage. 相似文献
3.
Forests of the United States and Russia can play a positive role in reducing the extent of global warming caused by greenhouse
gases, especially carbon dioxide. To determine the extent of carbon sequestration, physical, ecological, economic, and social
issues need to be considered, including different forest management objectives across major forest ownership groups. Private
timberlands in the U.S. Pacific Northwest are relatively young, well stocked, and sequestering carbon at relatively high rates.
Forests in northwestern Russia are generally less productive than those in the Northwestern U.S. but cover extensive areas.
A large increase in carbon storage per hectare in live tree biomass is projected on National Forest timberlands in the U.S.
Pacific Northwest for all selected scenarios, with an increase of between 157–175 Mg by 2050 and a near doubling of 1970s
levels. On private timberlands in the Pacific Northwest, average carbon in live tree biomass per hectare has been declining
historically but began to level off near 65 Mg in 2000; projected levels by 2050 are roughly what they were in 1970 at approximately
80 Mg. In the St. Petersburg region, average carbon stores were similar to those on private lands in the Pacific Northwest:
57 Mg per hectare in 2000 and ranging from 40 to 64 Mg by 2050. Although the projected futures reflect a broad range of policy
options, larger differences in projected carbon stores result from the starting conditions determined by ownership, regional
environmental conditions, and past changes in forest management. However, an important change of forest management objective,
such as the end of all timber harvest on National Forests in the Pacific Northwest or complete elimination of mature timber
in the St. Petersburg region, can lead to substantial change in carbon stores over the next 50 years. 相似文献
4.
A carbon budget model was developed to examine the effects of forest management practices on carbon storage in U.S. private timberlands. The model explicitly incorporates the demand for wood products and its impact on harvesting and other management decisions. Forest carbon is divided into four components: carbon stored in trees, soils, forest litter, and understory vegetation. Changes in the forest carbon inventory result from tree growth and management activities, in particular harvesting. Harvesting of timber for wood products is determined by demand and supply forces. The model then tracks carbon in timber removals through primary and secondary processing and disposal stages. Harvesting also has effects on carbon in soils, forest litter, and understory vegetation. A base-run scenario projects increases in carbon storage in U.S. private timberlands by 2040; however, this increase is offset by carbon emissions resulting from harvesting. 相似文献
5.
Mountains are critical ecosystems that have a strong influence far beyond their topographic boundaries. More than 50 million people inhabit the Himalayas, and more than one billion people depend on the ecosystem services they provide. Anthropogenic activities have driven concurrent deforestation and regeneration in the Himalayas, and interventions to reduce forest loss and promote forest recovery require a synthetic understanding of the complex and interacting drivers of forest change. We conducted a systematic review of case studies from 1984 to 2020 (n = 137) and combined a system dynamics approach with a causal network analysis to identify, map and articulate the relationships between the drivers, actors and mechanisms of forest change across the entirety of the Himalayan mountain range. In total, the analysis revealed five proximate drivers, 12 underlying drivers, two institutional factors and five ‘other’ factors connected by a total of 221 linkages. Forest change dynamics have been dominated by widespread smallholder agriculture, extensive non-timber forest product extraction, widespread commercial and non-commercial timber extraction, and high rates of agricultural abandonment. Underlying drivers include population growth, poor agricultural productivity, international support for development projects, and successful community forest management systems. Contradictory linkages emerge from a combination of contextual factors, which can have negative impacts on conservation goals. Global processes such as shifts in governance, transnational infrastructure-development programs, economic slowdowns, labor migrations and climate change threaten to destabilize established dynamics and change forest trajectories. The underlying and proximate drivers interact through multiple pathways that can be utilized to achieve conservation goals. Based on this analysis, we highlight five thematic focus areas to curtail forest loss and promote recovery: (1) decreasing the population pressure, (2) sustainable increase of agricultural productivity, (3) strengthening of forest management institutions, (4) leveraging tourism growth and sustainable infrastructure expansion, and (5) fuel transition and establishing firewood plantations on degraded land. The broader adoption of systems thinking, and specifically a system dynamics approach and causal network analysis, will greatly enhance the rigour of policy development, help design site-specific interventions at multiple spatial scales which can respond to local and global changes, and guide deeper inquiry to enhance our understanding of driver-forest dynamics. 相似文献
6.
Community forest management has been identified as a win-win option for reducing deforestation while improving the welfare of rural communities in developing countries. Despite considerable investment in community forestry globally, systematic evaluations of the impact of these policies at appropriate scales are lacking. We assessed the extent to which deforestation has been avoided as a result of the Indonesian government’s community forestry scheme, Hutan Desa (Village Forest). We used annual data on deforestation rates between 2012 and 2016 from two rapidly developing islands: Sumatra and Kalimantan. The total area of Hutan Desa increased from 750 km2 in 2012 to 2500 km2 in 2016. We applied a spatial matching approach to account for biophysical variables affecting deforestation and Hutan Desa selection criteria. Performance was assessed relative to a counterfactual likelihood of deforestation in the absence of Hutan Desa tenure. We found that Hutan Desa management has successfully achieved avoided deforestation overall, but performance has been increasingly variable through time. Hutan Desa performance was influenced by anthropogenic and climatic factors, as well as land use history. Hutan Desa allocated on watershed protection forest or limited production forest typically led to a less avoided deforestation regardless of location. Conversely, Hutan Desa granted on permanent or convertible production forest had variable performance across different years and locations. The amount of rainfall during the dry season in any given year was an important climatic factor influencing performance. Extremely dry conditions during drought years pose additional challenges to Hutan Desa management, particularly on peatland, due to increased vulnerability to fire outbreaks. This study demonstrates how the performance of Hutan Desa in avoiding deforestation is fundamentally affected by biophysical and anthropogenic circumstances over time and space. Our study improves understanding on where and when the policy is most effective with respect to deforestation, and helps identify opportunities to improve policy implementation. This provides an important first step towards evaluating the overall effectiveness of this policy in achieving both social and environmental goals. 相似文献
7.
Environmental governance research has discovered much about what drives collective action to address human-environment issues, including factors such as risk perceptions and self-efficacy. Yet the design of many studies limits our ability to draw conclusions about collective action under conditions of environmental change, especially across spatial or temporal scales. In this study, we integrate social and biophysical data—assessing data over time and examining the influence of space—to analyze efforts by community members to manage rapid environmental change in the form of an invasive plant (Mikania micrantha) in community forests in Chitwan, Nepal. Invasive species are an increasingly complex ethical, cultural, and ecological issue that is becoming more pressing with global environmental and social changes. We combine household surveys, ecological surveys, and spatial data in Bayesian hierarchical linear models to explore changes in the drivers of collective action since initial household surveys in 2014. We find that risk perceptions, reliance on forest resources, perceptions of forest safety, and M. micrantha abundance were the most influential factors in our models. Additionally, our findings suggest that the influence of M. micrantha abundance on collective action varies across spatial scales, indicating important interactions between social and biophysical drivers of collective action. Ultimately, our results highlight the importance of considering social and biophysical factors across space and time to inform the design of institutions that will be effective in addressing collection action problems tied to environmental change. 相似文献
8.
Harvesting in boreal forests and the biofuel carbon debt 总被引：2，自引：0，他引：2
Bjart Holtsmark 《Climatic change》2012,112(2):415-428
Owing to the extensive critique of food-crop-based biofuels, attention has turned toward second-generation wood-based biofuels.
A question is therefore whether timber taken from the vast boreal forests on an increasing scale should serve as a source
of wood-based biofuels and whether this will be effective climate policy. In a typical boreal forest, it takes 70–120 years
before a stand of trees is mature. When this time lag and the dynamics of boreal forests more generally are taken into account,
it follows that a high level of harvest means that the carbon stock in the forest stabilizes at a lower level. Therefore,
wood harvesting is not a carbon-neutral activity. Through model simulations, it is estimated that an increased harvest of
a boreal forest will create a biofuel carbon debt that takes 190–340 years to repay. The length of the payback time is sensitive
to the type of fossil fuels that wood energy replaces 相似文献
9.
Insect outbreaks are major disturbances that affect a land area similar to that of forest fires across North America. The recent mountain pine bark beetle (D endroctonus ponderosae) outbreak and its associated blue stain fungi (Grosmannia clavigera) are impacting water partitioning processes of forests in the Rocky Mountain region as the spatially heterogeneous disturbance spreads across the landscape. Water cycling may dramatically change due to increasing spatial heterogeneity from uneven mortality. Water and energy storage within trees and soils may also decrease, due to hydraulic failure and mortality caused by blue stain fungi followed by shifts in the water budget. This forest disturbance was unique in comparison to fire or timber harvesting because water fluxes were altered before significant structural change occurred to the canopy. We investigated the impacts of bark beetles on lodgepole pine (Pinus contorta) stand and ecosystem level hydrologic processes and the resulting vertical and horizontal spatial variability in energy storage. Bark beetle-impacted stands had on average 57 % higher soil moisture, 1.5 °C higher soil temperature, and 0.8 °C higher tree bole temperature over four growing seasons compared to unimpacted stands. Seasonal latent heat flux was highly correlated with soil moisture. Thus, high mortality levels led to an increase in ecosystem level Bowen ratio as sensible heat fluxes increased yearly and latent heat fluxes varied with soil moisture levels. Decline in canopy biomass (leaf, stem, and branch) was not seen, but ground-to-atmosphere longwave radiation flux increased, as the ground surface was a larger component of the longwave radiation. Variability in soil, latent, and sensible heat flux and radiation measurements increased during the disturbance. Accounting for stand level variability in water and energy fluxes will provide a method to quantify potential drivers of ecosystem processes and services as well as lead to greater confidence in measurements for all dynamic disturbances. 相似文献
10.
Thomas Koellner Joachim Sell Manuela Ghwiler Roland W. Scholz 《Global Environmental Change》2008,18(4):746
Global environmental change leads to degradation of tropical forests in many countries. In response to this pressure, programs for payments for ecosystem services (PES) are developing and organizations are emerging which manage forests in order to supply ecosystem services, rather than only harvest timber. Typically such services are carbon sequestration, biodiversity conservation, pollination, and watershed protection. Public or private actors interested to invest in or donate money for the provisioning of such services are faced with the problem of choosing the appropriate organization supplying ecosystem services. The goal of this paper was to develop an assessment framework based on the balanced scorecard concept including drivers, impact, performance and context variables. Results of a survey of international market actors were used to determine assessment criteria and their weights. Putting the focus of this paper on drivers and impacts, we assessed Latin American organizations that “sell” ecosystem services from tropical forests in terms of their general management, marketing, forest management, client and stakeholder satisfaction, and forest ecosystem status. We found that supplying organizations vary widely with respect to their achievements in these areas. However, the variance of assessment results is influenced even more by the variance in weights the international market actors allocate to the assessment criteria. The insights of this study can contribute to the continuous improvement of management processes in supplying organizations and can support investors and donors in their decision-making with respect to organization supplying ecosystem services. 相似文献
11.
In response to substantial deforestation over many decades, large scale reforestation programs are being implemented across many tropical developing countries. Examples include the United Nations Billion Trees Campaign, the National Greening Program in the Philippines, and the 5 million ha reforestation program in Vietnam. However, while substantial investments are being made in reforestation, little information exists on the drivers influencing reforestation success and how these interact to determine environmental and socio-economic outcomes. In this study we surveyed 43 reforestation projects on Leyte Island, The Philippines to identify the drivers that most influence reforestation success as measured by key indicators drawn from the literature, including interactions between drivers and between drivers and indicators. We investigated 98 potential success drivers, including technical and biophysical factors; socio-economic factors; institutional, policy and management factors; and reforestation project characteristics. We also measured 12 success indicators, including forest establishment, forest growth, environmental and socio-economic success indicators. Stepwise multiple regressions were used to identify significant relationships among drivers and indicators and this analysis was used to develop a system of driver and indicator relationships. Based on this we found that revegetation method, funding source, education and awareness campaigns, the dependence of local people on forests, reforestation incentives, project objectives, forest protection mechanisms and the condition of road infrastructure were highly connected drivers that influenced multiple success indicators either directly or indirectly. We conclude that policies targeting revegetation methods, socioeconomic incentives, forest protection mechanisms, sustainable livelihoods, diversification of funding and partnerships, technical support, and infrastructure development are likely to have a broad systemic and beneficial effect on the success of reforestation programs in tropical developing countries. 相似文献
12.
By FEDERICO MAGNANI RODERICK C. DEWAR † MARCO BORGHETTI 《Tellus. Series B, Chemical and physical meteorology》2009,61(2):385-393
Leakage (spillover) refers to the unintended negative (positive) consequences of forest carbon (C) management in one area on C storage elsewhere. For example, the local C storage benefit of less intensive harvesting in one area may be offset, partly or completely, by intensified harvesting elsewhere in order to meet global timber demand. We present the results of a theoretical study aimed at identifying the key factors determining leakage and spillover, as a prerequisite for more realistic numerical studies. We use a simple model of C storage in managed forest ecosystems and their wood products to derive approximate analytical expressions for the leakage induced by decreasing the harvesting frequency of existing forest, and the spillover induced by establishing new plantations, assuming a fixed total wood production from local and remote (non-local) forests combined. We find that leakage and spillover depend crucially on the growth rates, wood product lifetimes and woody litter decomposition rates of local and remote forests. In particular, our results reveal critical thresholds for leakage and spillover, beyond which effects of forest management on remote C storage exceed local effects. Order of magnitude estimates of leakage indicate its potential importance at global scales. 相似文献
13.
G. S. Haripriya 《Climatic change》2003,56(3):291-319
The paper quantifies the role of Indian forests as source or sink of carbon. The model used in the study takes into account the growing stock, additional tree organs, dead biomass, litter layer and soil organic matter, harvesting and harvesting losses, effects of pests, fire etc., allocation of timber to wood products, life span of products including recycling and allocation to landfills. The net carbon balance calculated as the net source or sink of the forest sector was assessed for the year 1993–94. The study isimportant in view of the obligation placed by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) on the signatory nations to provide a periodic update of carbon budget in the atmosphere. For the available data and the underlying assumptions, the results of the carbon budget model indicated that the Indian forest sector acted as a source of 12.8 TgC (including accumulation of carbon in the dead biomass) for the year 1994. The results obtained reinforced the notion that an integrated approach is required in order to evaluate the forest sector's influence on the global atmospheric carbon levels. The model used in this study has the advantage that all the factors determining the carbon budget can be integrated and altered to determine their influence. The study also throws light on the issues that stand in the way of preparing through carbon budget for developing countries like India. 相似文献
14.
Investigating the Balance between Timber Harvest and Productivity of Global Coniferous Forests under Global Change 总被引：2，自引：0，他引：2
A widely used assumption in forestry is that thedemand for timber will exceed the maximum levelavailable from forests on a sustainable basis. In thisstudy, measurements of extracted timber and modeledforest productivity were used to investigate therelationship between harvested timber and naturalforest productivity for current conditions, and underglobal change scenario. The analysis was confined toconiferous forests and countries that have coniferousforests within their territories. Annual roundwoodproduction from the database of Food and AgricultureOrganization was used as an approximation of annualtimber harvest for each country. Annual stem primaryproductivity of coniferous forests was estimated usingthe BIOME-BGC model. Based on the current rates,annual timber extraction was extrapolated for eachcountry for the next 80 years. Then, on a countrybasis, the timber harvest was related to the modeledforest stem productivity, assuming that the area ofconiferous forest would stay unchanged for the next 80years.The results of this study suggest that globalconiferous forests currently produce more wood thanpeople consume, but that this gap will narrow in thefuture. The results also suggest that wood extractionmay reach forest regrowth by the middle of the nextcentury, even though most coniferous forests arelocated in high latitudes and may have an acceleratedstem growth associated with the joint effect ofclimate change and elevated carbon dioxideconcentration in the atmosphere. 相似文献
15.
The tree species composition of a forested landscape may respond to climate change through two primary successional mechanisms: (1) colonization of suitable habitats and (2) competitive dynamics of established species. In this study, we assessed the relative importance of competition and colonization in forest landscape response (as measured by the forest type composition change) to global climatic change. Specifically, we simulated shifts in forest composition within the Boundary Waters Canoe Area of northern Minnesota during the period 2000–2400?AD. We coupled a forest ecosystem process model, PnET-II, and a spatially dynamic forest landscape model, LANDIS-II, to simulate landscape change. The relative ability of 13 tree species to colonize suitable habitat was represented by the probability of establishment or recruitment. The relative competitive ability was represented by the aboveground net primary production. Both competitive and colonization abilities changed over time in response to climatic change. Our results showed that, given only moderate-frequent windthrow (rotation period = 500?years) and fire disturbances (rotation period = 300?years), competition is relatively more important for the short-term (<100?years) compositional response to climatic change. For longer-term forest landscape response (>100?years), colonization became relatively more important. However, if more frequent fire disturbances were simulated, then colonization is the dominant process from the beginning of the simulations. Our results suggest that the disturbance regime will affect the relative strengths of successional drivers, the understanding of which is critical for future prediction of forest landscape response to global climatic change. 相似文献
16.
South America’s tropical dry forests and savannas are under increasing pressure from agricultural expansion. Cattle ranching and soybean production both drive these forest losses, but their relative importance remains unclear. Also unclear is how soybean expansion elsewhere affects deforestation via pushing cattle ranching to deforestation frontiers. To assess these questions, we focused on the Chaco, a 110 million ha ecoregion extending into Argentina, Bolivia, and Paraguay, with about 8 million ha of deforestation in 2000–2012. We used panel regressions at the district level to quantify the role of soybean expansion in driving these forest losses using a wide range of environmental and socio-economic control variables. Our models suggest that soybean production was a direct driver of deforestation in the Argentine Chaco only (0.08 ha new soybean area per ha forest lost), whereas cattle ranching was significantly associated with deforestation in all three countries (0.02 additional cattle per hectare forest loss). However, our models also suggested Argentine soybean cultivation may indirectly be linked to deforestation in the Bolivian and Paraguayan Chaco. We furthermore found substantial time-delayed effects in the relationship of soybean expansion in Argentina and Paraguay (i.e., soybean expansion in one year resulted in deforestation several years later) and deforestation in the Chaco, further suggesting that possible displacement effects within and between Chaco countries may at least partly drive forest loss. Altogether, our study showed that deforestation in the Chaco appears to be mainly driven by the globally surging demand for soybean, although regionally other proximate drivers are sometimes important. Steering agricultural production in the Chaco and other tropical dry forests onto sustainable pathways will thus require policies that consider these scale effects and that account for the regional variation in deforestation drivers within and across countries. 相似文献
17.
Increased Carbon Sink in Temperate and Boreal Forests 总被引：6，自引：0，他引：6
Jari Liski Alexander V. Korotkov Christopher F. L. Prins Timo Karjalainen David G. Victor Pekka E. Kauppi 《Climatic change》2003,61(1-2):89-99
An intense search is under way to identify the `missing sink' in the world carbon budget of perhaps 2 Pg year–1 (petagrams, or billiontonnes) of carbon, but its location and mechanism have proved elusive. Here we use a new forest inventory data set to estimate the carbon sink and the carbon pool of woody biomass in 55 countries that account for nearly all temperate or boreal forests and approximately half the world's total forest area. In each country there was a net accumulation of biomass; together, the carbon sink of woody biomass was 0.88 Pg year–1 during the 1990swith estimated uncertainty from 0.71 to 1.1 Pg year–1. Thisestimate, already about half of the missing sink, would probably be even larger if carbon accumulation in soil and detritus were also accounted for, but we are unable to quantify that additional sink. The sink is twice that estimated for the woody biomass of these forests a decade ago due to higher estimates for tree growth throughout the region and decreased timber harvests in Russia. In contrast, the new data indicate a carbon pool that is smaller than earlier estimates because of improved data for Russia and Australia. 相似文献
18.
T. Nuutinen J. Matala H. Hirvelä K. Härkönen H. Peltola H. Väisänen S. Kellomäki 《Climatic change》2006,79(3-4):315-333
The purpose of this study was to optimize forest management for a forest region (the total area of forest and scrub land 1.54
mill. ha) under changing climate by using the large-scale forestry scenario model MELA and sample plot data from the geo-referenced
National Forest Inventory (NFI). The MELA model is based on integrated simulation and optimisation; in the simulation it utilises
empirical tree-level models into which the impacts of climate change were introduced by transfer variables derived by using
the physiological model FinnFor. Six scenarios with differences in climate and forest management were defined. In simulations,
the accelerating tree growth caused by climate change resulted in an increase in maximum sustainable removal of trees at regional
level. Changes in regionally optimized forest management were also detected during the analysis period of 30 years; the proportion
of thinnings increased because the stands fulfilled the thinning requirements earlier than in the current climate. This study
was the first attempt to solve endogenously maximum sustainable timber production and corresponding forest management at the
regional level under different climate scenarios. When implemented in the MELA system, which is widely used in Finnish forestry,
the transfer variables offer means of disseminating the results from physiological studies to planning of adjustment and mitigation
measures under changing climate. 相似文献
19.
This paper examines the potential role of forest set-asides in global carbon sequestration policy. While set asides that protect
forests from timber harvests and land-use conversion may alleviate concerns with permanence, and they may provide large ancillary
environmental benefits, they may also lead to large leakage. This paper uses a global land use and forestry model to examine
the efficiency of three crediting schemes for set-asides. The results show that if set-asides are integrated into a global
forestry carbon sequestration program that includes a wide range of other management options, then 300 million hectares of
land would be set-aside, and up to 128 Pg C could be sequestered in global forests by 2105. Under alternative policies that
focus exclusively on set-asides, more forestland can be set-asides, up to 3.2 billion hectare, but these policies invite large
leakage in the near-term, and in the long-run, they less net carbon is removed from the atmosphere. Specifically, leakage
is estimated to be 47–52%, depending on the policy, and by the end of the century, up to 17% less carbon will be sequestered
in all forests. 相似文献
20.
Determining Effects of Area Burned and Fire Severity on Carbon Cycling and Emissions in Siberia 总被引：14，自引：0，他引：14
Susan G. Conard Anatoly I. Sukhinin Brian J. Stocks Donald R. Cahoon Eduard P. Davidenko Galina A. Ivanova 《Climatic change》2002,55(1-2):197-211
The Russian boreal forest contains about 25% of the global terrestrial biomass, and even a higher percentage of the carbon stored in litter and soils. Fire burns large areas annually, much of it in low-severity surface fires – but data on fire area and impacts or extent of varying fire severity are poor. Changes in land use, cover, and disturbance patterns such as those predicted by global climate change models, have the potential to greatly alter current fire regimes in boreal forests and to significantly impact global carbon budgets. The extent and global importance of fires in the boreal zone have often been greatly underestimated. For the 1998 fire season we estimate from remote sensing data that about 13.3 million ha burned in Siberia. This is about 5 times higher than estimates from the Russian Aerial Forest Protection Service (Avialesookhrana) for the same period. We estimate that fires in the Russian boreal forest in 1998 constituted some 14–20% of average annual global carbon emissions from forest fires. Average annual emissions from boreal zone forests may be equivalent to 23–39% of regional fossil fuel emissions in Canada and Russia, respectively. But the lack of accurate data and models introduces large potential errors into these estimates. Improved monitoring and understanding of the landscape extent and severity of fires and effects of fire on carbon storage, air chemistry, vegetation dynamics and structure, and forest health and productivity are essential to provide inputs into global and regional models of carbon cycling and atmospheric chemistry. 相似文献