Land-use change alters New Zealand’s terrestrial carbon budget: uncertainties associated with estimates of soil carbon change between 1990–2000

  • Tate K
  • Scott N
  • Saggar S
  • et al.
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Abstract

In New Zealand, afforestation and reforestation of grazing land give rise to large (relative to national CO2 emissions) vegetation carbon (C) sinks. These land-use changes may, however, lead to losses of mineral soil C. Full C accounting may, therefore, require including mineral soil C losses if credits are awarded for vegetation C. To monitor soil C stocks and changes, we developed an IPCC-based soil Carbon Monitoring System (CMS) in which New Zealand is stratified by soil type, climate, land-use and an erosivity index (slope ? precipitation). Georeferenced soil C data were used to assign steady-state soil C stocks to various combinations of these factors (cells). We then used a General Linear Model to compare soil C between cells, and derived land-use effects (LUEs) from this analysis that quantify soil C changes that accompany land-use change. These LUEs were used to predict soil C changes resulting from land-use change between 1990?2000. We tested the CMS by comparing predicted soil C stocks, and changes in these stocks, against more detailed soil C data. Overall, soil C estimates obtained from the CMS are consistent with detailed, stratified soil C measurements at specific sites and over larger regions. However, for grazing-land to exotic-forest conversions, estimates of soil C changes are higher and more variable than those based on paired-site studies. Nationally, soil C losses of 0.9 ± 0.4 Tg C yr?1 for all land-use changes over the period 1990?2000 appear likely, with uncertainties arising mainly from estimates of changes in the areas involved, and LUE values for cells with limited soil C data. Changes in soil C in reforested land are likely to be small, but precise area changes, soil C data and detailed paired-site studies are lacking for this key land-use change. By contrast, biomass C accumulation in new exotic plantation forests (afforestation) and native reforestation are 6?9 Tg C yr?1, with C accumulation by afforestation being well quantified. Detailed site studies, process-based modelling and improved area-change estimates are needed to further reduce uncertainties in land-use-change effects on soil C. Our approach could be adapted to countries with country-specific land-use issues different from those in the IPCC default methodology.

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APA

Tate, K. R., Scott, N. A., Saggar, S., Giltrap, D. J., Baisden, W. T., Newsome, P. F., … Wilde, R. H. (2003). Land-use change alters New Zealand’s terrestrial carbon budget: uncertainties associated with estimates of soil carbon change between 1990–2000. Tellus B: Chemical and Physical Meteorology, 55(2), 364. https://doi.org/10.3402/tellusb.v55i2.16762

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