A carbon budget for Brazil: Influence of future land-use change

✍ Scribed by Paul Schroeder

• Publisher: Springer
• Year: 1996
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 826 KB
• Volume: 33
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0165-0009
• DOI: 10.1007/bf00142584

✦ Synopsis

Because of its large area of high C density forests and high deforestation rate, Brazil may play an important role in the global C cycle. The study reported here developed an estimate of Brazil's biotic CO2-C budget for the period 1990-2010. The analysis used a spreadsheet C accounting model based on three major components: a conceptual model of ecosystem C cycling, a recently completed vegetation classification developed from remote-sensing data, and published estimates of C density for each of the vegetation classes. The dynamics of the model came from estimates of disturbance to ecosystems that release C and estimates of recovery from past disturbance that store C. The model was projected into the future with three alternative estimates of the rate of future land use change. Under all three deforestation scenarios Brazil was a C source in the range of about 3-5 x 109 MgC over the 20-yr study period.