Role of forest regrowth in global carbon sink dynamics.

ABSTRACT: Although the existence of a large carbon sink in terrestrial ecosystems is well-established, the drivers of this sink remain uncertain. It has been suggested that perturbations to forest demography caused by past land-use change, management, and natural disturbances may be causing a large component of current carbon uptake. Here we use a global compilation of forest age observations, combined with a terrestrial biosphere model with explicit modeling of forest regrowth, to partition the global forest carbon sink between old-growth and regrowth stands over the period 1981-2010. For 2001-2010 we find a carbon sink of 0.85 (0.66-0.96) Pg year^-1 located in intact old-growth forest, primarily in the moist tropics and boreal Siberia, and 1.30 (1.03-1.96) Pg year^-1 located in

SUBMITTER: Pugh TAM 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC6410874 | biostudies-literature | 2019 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature