Changes in global terrestrial live biomass over the 21st century

View/ Open
Issue date
2021-07Author
Xu, Liang
Saatchi, Sassan S.
Yang, Yan
Yifan, Yu
Pongratz, Julia
Bloom, A. Anthony
Bowman, Kevin
Worden, John
Liu, Junjie
Yin, Yi
Domke, Grant
McRoberts, Ronald E.
Woodall, Christopher
Nabuurs, Gert-Jan
Keller, Michael
Harris, Nancy
Maxwell, Sean
Schimel, David
Suggested citation
Xu, Liang;
Saatchi, Sassan S.;
Yang, Yan;
Yifan, Yu;
Pongratz, Julia;
Bloom, A. Anthony;
...
Schimel, David.
(2021)
.
Changes in global terrestrial live biomass over the 21st century.
Science Advances, 2021, vol. 7, núm. 27.
https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abe9829.
Metadata
Show full item recordAbstract
Live woody vegetation is the largest reservoir of biomass carbon, with its restoration considered one of the most
effective natural climate solutions. However, terrestrial carbon fluxes remain the largest uncertainty in the global
carbon cycle. Here, we develop spatially explicit estimates of carbon stock changes of live woody biomass from
2000 to 2019 using measurements from ground, air, and space. We show that live biomass has removed 4.9 to
5.5 PgC year
−1
from the atmosphere, offsetting 4.6 ± 0.1 PgC year
−1
of gross emissions from disturbances and
adding substantially (0.23 to 0.88 PgC year
−1
) to the global carbon stocks. Gross emissions and removals in the
tropics were four times larger than temperate and boreal ecosystems combined. Although live biomass is responsible
for more than 80% of gross terrestrial fluxes, soil, dead organic matter, and lateral transport may play important
roles in terrestrial carbon sink
Is part of
Science Advances, 2021, vol. 7, núm. 27European research projects
The following license files are associated with this item: