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Atmospheric Inversion of the Global Surface Carbon Flux with Consideration of the Spatial Distributions of US Crop Production and Consumption

Posted on:2013-09-27Degree:M.ScType:Thesis
University:University of Toronto (Canada)Candidate:Fung, Jonathan WinstonFull Text:PDF
GTID:2453390008471375Subject:Atmospheric Sciences
Abstract/Summary:
Carbon dioxide is taken up by crops during production and released back to the atmosphere at different geographical locations through respiration of consumed crop commodities. In this study, spatially distributed county-level US cropland net primary productivity, harvested biomass, changes in soil carbon, and human and livestock consumption data were integrated into the prior terrestrial biosphere flux generated by the Boreal Ecosystem Productivity Simulator (BEPS). A global time-dependent Bayesian synthesis inversion with a nested focus on North America was carried out based on CO2 observations at 210 stations. Overall, the inverted annual North American CO2 sink weakened by 6.5% over the period from 2002 to 2007 compared to simulations disregarding US crop statistical data. The US Midwest is found to be the major sink of 0.36+/-0.13 PgC yr-1 whereas the large sink in the US Southeast forests weakened to 0.16+/-0.12 PgC yr-1 partly due to local CO2 sources from crop consumption.
Keywords/Search Tags:Crop, CO2
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