Improving understanding and management of climate change effects on forest carbon cycling: development of national Forest Service observation networks and decision support systems
1) Upgrade the precision and accuracy of basic long-term climate measurements (temperature and precipitation) at FS instrument tower sites to the level of NOAA’s US Climate Research Network. This will provide the detailed information to characterize climate and climate change at these sites and will contribute toward identifying climate change across the US; 2) Install state-of-the-art carbon dioxide/carbon isotope analyzers at a subset of sites to monitor atmospheric CO2 levels. This equipment will lead to dramatically increased stand-level knowledge of carbon cycle processes by partitioning sources of ecosystem respiration and distinguishing the CO2 signal of fossil fuel combustion from vegetation, leading to significant improvements in understanding of the global role of forests in mitigation efforts; and 3) Installation of other site-specific equipment including webcams to monitor canopy foliage development (phenology); one of the anticipated impacts of a changing climate will be on the timing of foliage production and loss.
Project Extension
parts
type
Objectives
value
1) Upgrade the precision and accuracy of basic long-term climate measurements (temperature and precipitation) at FS instrument tower sites to the level of NOAA’s US Climate Research Network. This will provide the detailed information to characterize climate and climate change at these sites and will contribute toward identifying climate change across the US; 2) Install state-of-the-art carbon dioxide/carbon isotope analyzers at a subset of sites to monitor atmospheric CO2 levels. This equipment will lead to dramatically increased stand-level knowledge of carbon cycle processes by partitioning sources of ecosystem respiration and distinguishing the CO2 signal of fossil fuel combustion from vegetation, leading to significant improvements in understanding of the global role of forests in mitigation efforts; and 3) Installation of other site-specific equipment including webcams to monitor canopy foliage development (phenology); one of the anticipated impacts of a changing climate will be on the timing of foliage production and loss.
