Changes in the Source/Sink Relationships of the Alaskan Boreal Forest as a Result of Climatic Warming

A modified version of the LINKAGES ecosystem simulation model is used to access the changes in the role of forests in the interior of Alaska to act as a source or sink of carbon over a fifty-year period. The study area is the Tanana Valley State Forest (TVSF). The TVSF occupies an area of 5523 hecta...

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Bibliographic Details
Main Authors: Yarie, J., Van Cleve, K.
Other Authors: ALASKA UNIV FAIRBANKS
Format: Text
Language:English
Published: 1992
Subjects:
Geography
Forestry
Ecology
*ALASKA
*ATMOSPHERICS
*CARBON
*ECOSYSTEMS
ACCESS
CLIMATE
CONFLUENCE
DISTRIBUTION
ESTIMATES
FORESTS
INVENTORY
LINKAGES
MEAN
MODELS
PRECIPITATION
RIVERS
SIMULATION
STARTING
TEMPERATURE
VALLEYS
VALUE
VEGETATION
ARCTIC REGIONS
SYMPOSIA
Component Reports
*Boreal forests
*Climatic warming
TVSF(Tanana Valley State Forest)
LINKAGES Simulation model
Arctic
Fairbanks
Yukon
Yukon river
Alaska
Online Access:http://www.dtic.mil/docs/citations/ADP007322
http://oai.dtic.mil/oai/oai?&verb=getRecord&metadataPrefix=html&identifier=ADP007322
Description
Summary:A modified version of the LINKAGES ecosystem simulation model is used to access the changes in the role of forests in the interior of Alaska to act as a source or sink of carbon over a fifty-year period. The study area is the Tanana Valley State Forest (TVSF). The TVSF occupies an area of 5523 hectares along the Tanana River from the Canadian Border to the confluence of the Tanana River and the Yukon River. The current inventory for the TVSF is used to develop a starting state for the model for ten vegetation classes. The model is run with the current climate until the current stand age for the various vegetation types is reached. Then a 5 deg C increase in mean annual temperature and a doubling in precipitation distributed evenly over the year is gradually added to the model. The model was then used to develop an average estimate of the atmospheric carbon sequestering for the current vegetation distribution of the productive forest types in the TVSF. This value was estimated as 392 g M-2 yr-1 for a 490,000-hectare area of interior Alaska. This article is from 'Proceedings of the International Conference on the Role of the Polar Regions in Global Change Held in Fairbanks, Alaska on 11-15 June 990. Volume 2', AD-A253 028, p436-439. See also Volume 1, AD-A253 027.

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