Abstract
Abstract. Global forests are the main component of the land carbon sink, which acts as a partial buffer to CO2 emissions into the atmosphere. Dynamic vegetation models offer an approach to projecting the development of forest carbon sink capacity in a future climate. Forest management capabilities are important to include in dynamic vegetation models to account for the effects of age and species structure and wood harvest on carbon stocks and carbon storage potential. This article describes the implementation of a forest management module containing even-age and clear-cut and uneven-age and continuous-cover management alternatives in the dynamic vegetation model LPJ-GUESS. Different age and species structure initialisation strategies and harvest alternatives are introduced. The model is applied at stand and European scales. Different management alternatives are applied in simulations of European beech (Fagus sylvaticus) and Norway spruce (Picea abies) even-aged monoculture stands in central Europe and evaluated against above-ground standing stem volume and harvested volume data from long-term experimental plots. At the European scale, an automated thinning and clear-cut strategy is applied. Modelled carbon stocks and fluxes are evaluated against reported data at the continent and country levels. Including wood harvest in regrowth forests increases the simulated total European carbon sink by 32 % in 1991–2015 and improves the fit to the reported European carbon sink, growing stock, and net annual increment (NAI). Growing stock (156 m3 ha−1) and NAI (5.4 m3 ha1 yr1) densities in 2010 are close to reported values, while the carbon sink density in 2000–2007 (0.085 kg C m−2 yr1) equates to 63 % of reported values, most likely reflecting uncertainties in carbon fluxes from soil given the unaccounted for forest land-use history in the simulations. The fit of modelled and reported values for individual European countries varies, but NAI is generally closer to reported values when including wood harvest in simulations.
Highlights
Forests globally provide ecosystem services including provision of timber, fuel, and water; regulation of local climate and hydrology; carbon sequestration; support of biodiversity; and recreation (Bonan, 2008; Mori et al, 2017)
We describe the implementation of expanded forest management capabilities including even-age and clear-cut as well as uneven-age and continuous-cover management in LPJ-GUESS v4.0
When the age distribution and species composition from spin-up is retained in each patch, both the warming climate in the 20th century and the prevention of fires and other disturbances result in an increase in tree biomass and a tree species shift from a Q.robur– P.sylvestris-dominated forest landscape to a forest increasingly dominated by the shade-tolerant species P.abies and F.sylvatica in an example forest simulated at a southern Swedish site (Fig. 2a)
Summary
Forests globally provide ecosystem services including provision of timber, fuel, and water; regulation of local climate and hydrology; carbon sequestration; support of biodiversity; and recreation (Bonan, 2008; Mori et al, 2017). Productivity may increase due to the fertilising effect of increased nitrogen deposition and higher atmospheric CO2 levels (Zaehle and Dalmonech, 2011; Luyssaert et al, 2008) and shifts in Published by Copernicus Publications on behalf of the European Geosciences Union. The size of the forest carbon sink has been estimated by using bookkeeping methods (Pan et al, 2011; Houghton et al, 2012) and global vegetation models (Luyssaert et al, 2008; Shevliakova et al, 2009; Pugh et al, 2019), but this sink is associated with relatively large uncertainties, resulting in differing estimates using different approaches and models.
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