Accomplishing the objective of the current climate policies will require establishing carbon budget and flux estimates in each region and county of the globe by comparing and reconciling multiple estimates including the observations and the results of top-down atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) inversions and bottom-up dynamic global vegetation models. With this in view, this study synthesizes the carbon source/sink due to net ecosystem productivity (NEP), land cover land use change (ELUC), fires and fossil burning (EFIRE) for the South Asia (SA), Southeast Asia (SEA) and South and Southeast Asia (SSEA = SA + SEA) and each country in these regions using the multiple top-down and bottom-up modeling results. The terrestrial net biome productivity (NBP = NEP – ELUC – EFIRE) calculated based on bottom-up models in combination with EFIRE based on GFED4s data show net carbon sinks of 217 ± 147, 10 ± 55, and 227 ± 279 TgC yr−1 for SA, SEA, and SSEA. The top-down models estimated NBP net carbon sinks were 20 ± 170, 4 ± 90 and 24 ± 180 TgC yr−1. In comparison, regional emissions from the combustion of fossil fuels were 495, 275, and 770 TgC yr−1, which are many times higher than the NBP sink estimates, suggesting that the contribution of the fossil fuel emissions to the carbon budget of SSEA results in a significant net carbon source during the 2000s. When considering both NBP and fossil fuel emissions for the individual countries within the regions, Bhutan and Laos were net carbon sinks and rest of the countries were net carbon source during the 2000s. The relative contributions of each of the fluxes (NBP, NEP, ELUC, and EFIRE, fossil fuel emissions) to a nation's net carbon flux varied greatly from country to country, suggesting a heterogeneous dominant carbon fluxes on the country-level throughout SSEA.
Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801, USA;Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801, USA;Department of Atmospheric Sciences, University of Illinois, Urbana, IL 61801, USA;Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Institute of Meteorology and Climate Research/Atmospheric Environmental Research, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Germany;Global Carbon Project, CSIRO Oceans and Atmosphere Flagship, GPO Box 3023, Canberra, ACT, 2601, Australia;College of Engineering, Mathematics and Physical Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4QF, UK;Woods Hole Research Center, 149 Woods Hole Road, Falmouth, MA 02540-1644, USA;Institute of Applied Energy, 105-0003 Tokyo, Japan;Earth Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA 94720, USA;Department of Environmental Geochemical Cycle Research, JAMSTEC, Yokohama 2360001, Japan;Institute on Ecosystems and the Department of Ecology, Montana State University, Bozeman, MT 59717, USA;College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter EX4 4RJ, UK;Department of Life Sciences, Imperial College, Ascot SL5 7PY, UK;Laboratoire des sciences du climat et de l’environnement, CEA Saclay, F-91191 Gif-sur-Yvette Cedex, France;Met Office Hadley Centre, Fitzroy Road, Exeter EX1 3PB, UK;Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Science and Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center, University of Maryland, College Park, MD 20742, USA
Recommended Citation:
Matthew Cervarich,Shijie Shu,Atul K Jain,et al. The terrestrial carbon budget of South and Southeast Asia[J]. Environmental Research Letters,2016-01-01,11(10)