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Accounting for aboveground carbon storage in shrubland and woodland ecosystems in the Great Basin

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dc.contributor.authorFusco, Emily J.
dc.contributor.authorRau, Benjamin M.
dc.contributor.authorFalkowski, Michael
dc.contributor.authorFilippelli, Steven
dc.contributor.authorBradley, Bethany A
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Massachusetts Amherst
dc.contributor.departmentUSGS New England Water Science Center
dc.contributor.departmentColorado State University
dc.contributor.departmentColorado State University
dc.contributor.departmentUniversity of Massachusetts Amherst
dc.date2023-09-24T00:58:32.000
dc.date.accessioned2024-04-26T19:32:50Z
dc.date.available2019-09-06T00:00:00Z
dc.date.issued2019-01-01
dc.description.abstractImproving the accuracy of carbon accounting in terrestrial ecosystems is critical for understanding carbon fluxes associated with land cover change, with significant implications for global carbon cycling and climate change. Semi‐arid ecosystems account for an estimated 45% of global terrestrial ecosystem area and are in many locations experiencing high degrees of degradation. However, aboveground carbon accounting has largely focused on tropical and forested ecosystems, while drylands have been relatively neglected. Here, we used a combination of field estimates, remotely sensed data, and existing land cover maps to create a spatially explicit estimate of aboveground carbon storage within the Great Basin, a semi‐arid region of the western United States encompassing 643,500 km2 of shrubland and woodland vegetation. We classified the region into seven distinct land cover categories: pinyon‐juniper woodland, sagebrush steppe, salt desert shrub, low sagebrush, forest, non‐forest, and other/excluded, each with an associated carbon estimate. Aboveground carbon estimates for pinyon‐juniper woodland were continuous values based on tree canopy cover. Carbon estimates for other land cover categories were based on a mean value for the land cover type. The Great Basin ecosystems contain an estimated 295.4 Tg in aboveground carbon, which is almost double the previous estimates that only accounted for forested ecosystems in the same area. Aboveground carbon was disproportionately stored in pinyon‐juniper woodland (43.7% carbon, 16.9% land area), while the shrubland systems accounted for roughly half of the total land area (49.1%) and one‐third of the total carbon. Our results emphasize the importance of distinguishing and accounting for the distinctive contributions of shrubland and woodland ecosystems when creating carbon storage estimates for dryland regions.
dc.description.sponsorshipUMass SOAR Fund
dc.identifier.doihttps://doi.org/10.1002/ecs2.2821
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/20.500.14394/37666
dc.relation.ispartofEcosphere
dc.relation.urlhttps://scholarworks.umass.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1406&context=nrc_faculty_pubs&unstamped=1
dc.rightsUMass Amherst Open Access Policy
dc.rights.urihttp://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
dc.source.issue8
dc.source.issue10
dc.source.statuspublished
dc.subjectaboveground carbon
dc.subjectcarbon map
dc.subjectGreat Basin
dc.subjectpinyon-juniper
dc.subjectshrubland
dc.subjectEnvironmental Monitoring
dc.subjectEnvironmental Sciences
dc.subjectNatural Resources and Conservation
dc.titleAccounting for aboveground carbon storage in shrubland and woodland ecosystems in the Great Basin
dc.typearticle
dc.typearticle
digcom.contributor.authorisAuthorOfPublication|email:efusco@cns.umass.edu|institution:University of Massachusetts Amherst|Fusco, Emily J.
digcom.contributor.authorRau, Benjamin M.
digcom.contributor.authorFalkowski, Michael
digcom.contributor.authorFilippelli, Steven
digcom.contributor.authorisAuthorOfPublication|email:bbradley@eco.umass.edu|institution:University of Massachusetts Amherst|Bradley, Bethany A
digcom.date.embargo2019-09-06T00:00:00-07:00
digcom.identifiernrc_faculty_pubs/407
digcom.identifier.contextkey15280320
digcom.identifier.submissionpathnrc_faculty_pubs/407
dspace.entity.typePublication
relation.isAuthorOfPublicationb7926289-9cee-4435-9cae-b476a1e9bc6a
relation.isAuthorOfPublication.latestForDiscoveryb7926289-9cee-4435-9cae-b476a1e9bc6a
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