Abstract
Abstract. Fire plays an important role in terrestrial ecosystems. The burning of biomass affects carbon and water fluxes and vegetation distribution. To understand the effect of interactive processes of fire and ecological succession on surface carbon and water fluxes, this study employed the Community Land Model version 4.5 to conduct a series of experiments that included and excluded fire and dynamic vegetation processes. Results of the experiments that excluded the vegetation dynamics showed a global increase in net ecosystem production (NEP) in post-fire regions, whereas the inclusion of vegetation dynamics revealed a fire-induced decrease in NEP in some regions, which was depicted when the dominant vegetation type was changed from trees to grass. Carbon emissions from fires are enhanced by reduction in NEP when vegetation dynamics are considered; however, this effect is somewhat mitigated by the increase in NEP when vegetation dynamics are not considered. Fire-induced changes in vegetation modify the soil moisture profile because grasslands are more dominant in post-fire regions. This results in less moisture within the top soil layer than that in unburned regions, even though transpiration is reduced overall. These findings are different from those of previous fire model evaluations that ignored vegetation dynamics and thus highlight the importance of interactive processes between fires and vegetation dynamics in evaluating recent model developments.
Highlights
Wildfire is a natural process that influences ecosystems and the global carbon and water cycle (Gorham, 1991; Bowman et al, 2009; Harrison et al, 2010)
We evaluate how the simulated burned areas differ between the runs with and without vegetation dynamics, i.e., biogeochemistry model (BGC)-dynamic vegetation model (DV)-F and BGConly-F runs
The BGC with DV (BGC-DV)-F simulation, under the equilibrium condition driven by the 1961–2000 Climate Research Unit (CRU)-National Centers for Environmental Prediction (NCEP) data in this study, estimates a similar burned area (320 Mha yr−1) to that of Li et al (2012)
Summary
Wildfire is a natural process that influences ecosystems and the global carbon and water cycle (Gorham, 1991; Bowman et al, 2009; Harrison et al, 2010). When fire destroys forests and grasslands, the distribution of vegetation is affected (Clement and Touffet, 1990; Rull, 1999). Wildfires are major sources of trace gases and aerosols, which are important elements in the radiative balance of the atmosphere (Scholes et al, 1996; Fiebig et al, 2003). Fires transport approximately 2.1 Pg of carbon from soil and vegetation into the atmosphere in the form of carbon dioxide and other carbon compounds (van der Werf et al, 2010). Soil develops a water-repellent layer during fires due to intense heating (DeBano, 1991) and ash produced by biomass combustion impacts the quality of runoff (Townsend and Douglas, 2000)
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