Methane emission from mires of the West Siberian taiga

Abstract

In the summer-autumn seasons of 2007–2011, the methane emission from typical mire landscapes of Western Siberia was studied using the static chamber method. The lowest methane flux turned out to be characteristic of the ryams (pine-dwarf shrub-sphagnum associations) and the ridges of the ridge-hollow complexes, as well as of the wetland lakes in the northern and middle taiga (the medians are within the range of 0.1–0.5 mg C-CH4/m2 h). Values that are 10 times higher are typical for the oligotrophic hollows, fens, peat mats, and poor fens in different subzones (the medians are 2 to 7 mg C-CH4/m2 h). The maximal values of the methane flux from the wetland lakes of the southern taiga are 17.98 mg C-CH4/m2 h. Based on the data obtained by the authors, along with the previously published ones, the regional methane fluxes from the taiga mires were calculated: 2.22 Mt C-CH4/m2 per year, or about 80% of the total methane flux from the West Siberian mires. The estimates of the CH4 regional flux obtained by other researchers are discussed; the main source of the estimation uncertainty is analyzed.