Effects of grazing on CO2 balance in a semiarid steppe: field observations and modeling

Abstract

Purpose Carbon (C) dynamics in grassland ecosystem contributes to regional and global fluxes in carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations. Grazing is one of the main structuring factors in grassland, but the impact of grazing on the C budget is still under debate. In this study, in situ net ecosystem CO2 exchange (NEE) observations by the eddy covariance technique were integrated with a modified process-oriented biogeochemistry model (denitrification–decomposition) to investigate the impacts of grazing on the long-term C budget of semiarid grasslands.