About 60% of the European wetlands are located in the European part of Russia. Nevertheless, data on methane emissions from wetlands of that area are absent. Here we present results of methane emission measurements for two climatically different years from a boreal peatland complex in European Russia. Winter fluxes were well within the range of what has been reported for the peatlands of other boreal regions before, but summer fluxes greatly exceeded the average range of 5–80 mg CH4 m−2 d−1 for the circumpolar boreal zone. Half of the measured fluxes ranged between 150 and 450 mg CH4 m−2 d−1. Extrapolation of our data to the whole boreal zone of European Russia shows that theses emissions could amount to up to 2.7 ± 1.1 Tg CH4 a−1, corresponding to 69% of the annual emissions from European wetlands or 33% of the total annual natural European methane emission. In 2008, climatic conditions corresponded to the long term mean, whereas the summer of 2011 was warmer and noticeably drier. Counterintuitively, these conditions led to even higher CH4 emissions, with peaks up to two times higher than the values measured in 2008. As Russian peatlands dominate the areal extend of wetlands in Europe and are characterized by very high methane fluxes to the atmosphere, it is evident, that sound European methane budgeting will only be achieved with more insight into Russian peatlands.
Institute for Environmental Sciences, University of Koblenz-Landau, Fortstr. 7, D-76829 Landau, Germany;Institute for Environmental Sciences, University of Koblenz-Landau, Fortstr. 7, D-76829 Landau, Germany;Thünen Institute of Climate-Smart Agriculture, Bundesallee 50, D-38116 Braunschweig, Germany;Institute of Soil Science, Klima Campus, University of Hamburg, Allende-Platz 2, D-20146 Hamburg, Germany;Department of Forest Ecology and Management, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences, Skogmarksgränd, SE-90183 Umeå, Sweden;Institute of Biology, Komi SC UrD RAS, 28 Kommunisticheskaya st., 167982 Syktyvkar, Komi Republic, Russia;Institute of Biology, Komi SC UrD RAS, 28 Kommunisticheskaya st., 167982 Syktyvkar, Komi Republic, Russia;Institute of Geography, Georg-August University of Göttingen, Goldschmidtstr. 5, D-37077 Göttingen, Germany;Institute of Geography, Georg-August University of Göttingen, Goldschmidtstr. 5, D-37077 Göttingen, Germany;Institute of Botany and Landscape Ecology, Ernst Moritz Arndt University Greifswald, Grimmer Straße 88, D-17487 Greifswald, Germany;Institute of Soil Science, Klima Campus, University of Hamburg, Allende-Platz 2, D-20146 Hamburg, Germany
Recommended Citation:
Julia Schneider,Hermann F Jungkunst,Ulrike Wolf,et al. Russian boreal peatlands dominate the natural European methane budget[J]. Environmental Research Letters,2016-01-01,11(1)