Projects "Forests and Climate Modeling"
Team Forest Ecosystem
Links to ongoing project:
Links to finished project:
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NitroEurope
Information: M.J. (Mart-Jan) Schelhaas Start: 2008 Finish: 2011
Nitro Europe focusses on the impact of nitrogen on the greenhouse gas budgets of the European landuse sector.
Major objectives include
- Quantification of effects of past and present global changes (climate, atmospheric composition, land-use/land-management) on C-N cycling and net green house gas exchange,
- Scale up these fluxes for terrestrial ecosystems from plot and landscape level to regional and European levels, considering spatial variability and allowing assessment of past, present and future changes, and
- Assess uncertainties in the European model results and use these for verification of European N2O and CH4 inventories and refinement of IPCC approaches.
Results and products:
- Articles on extensive laboratory study research on the role of oxygen exchange in relation to nitrous oxide production has been published in Rapid Communications in Mass Spectrometry.
- A review was made of the effect on N deposition on carbon sequestration. The results of the various studies are in close agreement and show that above-ground accumulation of carbon in forests is generally within the range 15-30 kg C/kg N. The uncertainty in carbon sequestration per kg nitrogen addition in soils is larger than for above ground biomass and varies on average between 5-35 kg C/kg N. All together these data indicate a total carbon sequestration range of 30-70 kg C per kg N deposition. Results are published in Nature and a special issue of Forest Ecology and management will come out on this topic.
- The present knowledge on the geographic variation in nitrogen budgets for terrestrial (agricultural and non-agricultural) ecosystems over Europe has been summarized for a European Nitrogen assessment. Model results for the Dutch landscape Noordelijke Friese Wouden show that measures which focus on NH3 emission reductions to reach the emission target, such as low protein feeding, are significant but insufficient to reach the target for critical load exceedance in the NFW area. Additionally, “spatial abatement” strategies, such as buffer zones in the landscape are needed in the area to reach these goals. Results are published in Conference proceedings and the Dutch Journal Milieu.
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European Forest Sector Outlook Studies (EFSOS)
Information: M.J. (Mart-Jan) Schelhaas Start: 2009 Finish: 2011
The European Forest Sector Outlook Study (EFSOS) is carried out for the Timber Committee of the UN-ECE.
Objectives
- The objectives of EFSOS are to analyse the development of the forest and forest industry sector, considering challenges and uncertainties of varying policies, market developments and the influence of exogenous factors.
- The aim is to assist policy and investment decision-making.
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BACCARA: Biodiversity and Climate Change - a Risk Analysis
Information: M.J. (Mart-Jan) Schelhaas Start: 2009 Finish: 2012
Objectives:
- BACCARA has as its main goal to build scientific foundations for developing tools allowing forest managers and policy makers to evaluate risk of European forest biodiversity and productivity loss under climate change.
- The scope of BACCARA encompasses forest composition at multiple trophic levels, i.e. assemblages of forest symbionts (mycorrhiza), producers (keystone tree species), consumers (herbivores and pathogens) and their predators.
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MOTIVE: Models for Adaptive Forest Management
Information: M.J. (Mart-Jan) Schelhaas Start: 2009 Finish: 2013
Objectives and research
- The project MOdels for AdapTIVE forest Management (MOTIVE) seeks to develop and evaluate strategies that can adapt forest management practices to balance multiple objectives under changing environmental conditions.
- The evaluation of different adaptive management systems will take place within a scenario analysis and a regional landscape framework.
- A wide range of possible scenarios will be taken into account from optimistic predictions (“no major change for forest ecosystems”) including possible opportunities offered by climate change (e.g. increased tree growth in northern areas) to worst case scenarios (“extreme deterioration of the growth conditions for trees”) on different time scales (short - , mid-, long term). The main forest types in Europe for the most important bioclimatic regions will be covered.
Results and products:
- In 2009 the case study area in the Southeast Veluwe has been exactly identified.
- Data files and maps from earlier studies have been retrieved.
- The forest simulation model LandClim is currently being set-up for the case study area so it can be used to simulate adaptive management strategies.
- Furthermore, local and national stakeholders have been sent a questionnaire about their views on forest management and use in the future, in relation to climate change.
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CARBONES: Re-analysis of CARBON fluxes and pools over Europe and the Globe
Information: M.P. (Markus) Didion Start: 2010 Finish: 2013
Objectives
- CARBONES aims to deliver consistent, high space and time resolution information of the history of the carbon cycle, with associated uncertainties and attribution to controlling processes.
- CARBONES will reanalyze the 30 year recent history of the carbon cycle both terrestrial and marine.
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GHG Europe: Greenhouse gas management in European land use systems
Information: M.P. (Markus) Didion Start: 2010 Finish: 2013
The GHG Europe project aims:
- to improve our understanding and capacity for predicting the European terrestrial carbon and greenhouse gas (GHG) budget
- by applying a systematic, comprehensive and integrative approach.
- GHG-Europe quantifies the annual to decadal variability of the carbon and GHG budgets of
terrestrial ecosystems in EU27 plus Switzerland and in six data-rich European regions via data-model integration, diagnostic and predictive modelling.
- Models are calibrated by multi-site observations.
Research
- Research includes CO2, CH4 and N2O in forests, croplands, grasslands, shrublands, peatlands and soils. Via an integrated approach:
- GHG Europe scales up consistently from local to regional and continental scale via scale dependent error propagation and systematic quantification of uncertainties, model validation at different scales and top-down verification by atmospheric inversion models.
- At regional and European scale lateral C transport by land use, trade and rivers are included. Variability in C and GHG budgets is attributed to natural (climate) and anthropogenic drivers (N deposition, land use, past and present management) by synthesis of past and emerging experiments, targeted observations in hot spots and hot moments and model sensitivity analyses.
- For this purpose, observations are extended to under-sampled regions and ecosystems with likely high importance for the European C budget: forests and land use change in Eastern Europe and Mediterranen shrublands.
- The future vulnerability of carbon pools and risks of positive feedbacks in the climate-carbon system are assessed by scenario analyses with biophysical models and by integrating feedbacks with socioeconomic changes and EU climate and land use policies.
- GHG-Europe uses a bidirectional interaction with stakeholders to provide regular and timely scientific advice targeted to the emerging needs of the UNFCCC process and for implementing post-2012 climate commitments in Europe.
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CAMELS: Carbon Assimilation and Modelling of the European Land Surfaces
Information: M.J. (Mart-Jan) Schelhaas Start: 2002 Finish: 2005
Objectives:
- CAMELS tried to integrate different methods and data sources on the estimation of the terrestrial carbon balance
- to reduce the uncertainty in such estimates and
- provide support to EU countries in meeting their obligations under the Kyoto Protocol.
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ADAM: Adaptation and Mitigation Strategies
Information: M.J. (Mart-Jan) Schelhaas Start: 2006 Finish: 2009
Objectives:
- The ADAM project assessed mitigation and adaptation strategies for Europe in order to arrive at a safe landing (i.e. maximum increase of World temperature of 2 degrees).
- Special attention was paid to the role of extreme weather events both as exposing vulnerability and as a signal for future change.
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