Carbon Pools and Emissions from Deforestation in Extra-Tropical Forests of Northern Argentina Between 1900 and 2005
By Néstor Ignacio Gasparri, H. R. Grau, E. Manghi. Ecosystems, 2008
129 citations recorded by the source corpus.
We estimated carbon pools and emissions from deforestation in northern Argentine forests between 1900 and 2005, based on forest inventories, deforestation estimates from satellite images and historical data on forests and agriculture. Carbon fluxes were calculated using a book-keeping model. We ran 1000 simulations for a 105-year period with different combinations of values of carbon stocks (Mg C ha−1), soil carbon in the top 0.2 m, and annual deforestation series. The 1000 combinations of parameters were performed as a sensitivity analysis that for each run, randomly selected the values of each variable within a predefined range of values and probability distributions. Using the simulation outputs, we calculated the accumulated C emissions due to deforestation from 1900 to 2005 and the annual emission as the average of the 1000 simulations, and uncertainties of our estimates as the standard deviation. We found that northern Argentine forests contain an estimated 4.54 Pg C (2.312 Pg C in biomass and 2.233 Pg C in soil). Between 1900 and 2005 approximately 30% of the forests were deforested, yielding carbon emissions of 0.945 (SD = 0.270) Pg C. Estimated average annual carbon emissions between 1996 and 2005, mostly from deforestation of the Chaco dry forests, were 20,875 (SD = 6,156) Gg C y−1 (1 Gg = 10−6 Pg). These values represent the largest source of carbon from land-cover change in the extra-tropical southern hemisphere, between 0.9 and 2.7% of the global carbon emissions from deforestation, and approximately 10% of carbon emissions from the Brazilian Amazon. Deforestation, which has accelerated during the last decades as a result of modern agriculture expansion, represents a major national source of greenhouse gases and the second emission source, after fossil fuel consumption by fixed sources. We conclude that Argentine forests are an important carbon pool and emission source that need more attention for accurate global estimates, and seasonally dry forest deforestation is a key component of the Argentine carbon cycle.
Subfields: Global and Planetary Change, Nature and Landscape Conservation
View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/53d6d41a9c267f5689045c4fe2e16a8aa31b8f33
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In Global and Planetary Change
In Nature and Landscape Conservation
Citations in the corpus
- Guest Editorial, part of a Special Feature on The influence of human demography and agriculture on natural systems in the Neotropics Globalization and Land-Use Transitions in Latin America (2008, background): “…but most other biomes have also been and continue to be severely affected by conversion to agriculture and pastures (e.g., Ellenberg 1979, Sader and Joyce 1988, Viña and Cavelier 1999, Galindo-Leal and De Gusmao Camara 2003, Klink and Machado 2005, Viglizzo et al. 2006, Gasparri et al. 2008).”
- Modifying Argentina: GM soy and socio-environmental change (2014, background): “Many authors agree, however, that the rate of deforestation has accelerated with the introduction of GM soy (Gasparri et al., 2008; Grau et al., 2005; Paolasso et al., 2012; Pengue, 2005).”