Interannual Variability in Global Soil Respiration on a 0.5 Degree Grid, 1980-1994 (NDP-081)

Interannual Variability in Global Soil Respiration on a 0.5 Degree Grid
Cell Basis (formerly CDIAC database DB1015) is now available with
enhanced documentation as numeric data package NDP-081 [http://cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ndp081/ndp081.html]. The revised
estimates, based on new climate and land-cover data files, were
contributed by James Raich (Iowa State University), Christopher Potter
(NASA Ames Research Center), and Dwipen Bhagawati (Iowa State
University), and prepared for online distribution by Lisa Olsen. A
climate-driven regression model was used to develop spatially resolved
estimates of soil-CO2 emissions from the terrestrial land surface for
each month from January 1980 to December 1994, to evaluate the effects
of interannual variations in climate on global soil-to-atmosphere CO2
fluxes. The mean annual global soil-CO2 flux over this 15-y period was
estimated to be 80.4 (range 79.3-81.8) Pg C. Monthly variations in
global soil-CO2 emissions followed closely the mean temperature cycle of
the Northern Hemisphere. Globally, soil-CO2 emissions reached their
minima in February and peaked in July and August. Tropical and
subtropical evergreen broad-leaved forests contributed more soil-derived
CO2 to the atmosphere than did any other vegetation type (~30% of the
total) and exhibited a biannual cycle in their emissions.

The authors estimated the seasonal and spatial distribution of global soil-CO2 emissions following the regression based modeling approach of Raich and Potter (1995). This database, therefore, contains global, spatially explicit (0.5-degree grid cells) and temporally explicit model output of soil-CO2 emissions. The calculated emissions include the respiration of both soil organisms and plant roots.

Please note that NDP-081 is an update to DB1015. Specifically, DB1015 used long-term climate data as model input while NDP-081 utilizes new climate and land cover data files. Please refer to Raich et al. 2002 (provided with permission from Blackwell Science Ltd.) for more information.

References:

Raich, J. W., C. S. Potter, and D. Bhagawati. 2002. Interannual variability in global soil respiration, 1980-94. Global Change Biology 8:800-812.

Raich, J.W. and C.S. Potter. 1995. Global patterns of carbon dioxide emissions from soils. Global Biogeochemical Cycles 9(1):23-36.

Raich, J.W. and W.H. Schlesinger. 1992. The global carbon dioxide flux in soil respiration and its relationship to vegetation and climate. Tellus. Ser. B 44:81-99.