Earlier snowmelt may lead to late season declines in plant productivity and carbon sequestration in Arctic tundra ecosystems

Arctic warming is affecting snow cover and soil hydrology, with consequences for carbon sequestration in tundra ecosystems. The scarcity of observations in the Arctic has limited our understanding of the impact of covarying environmental drivers on the carbon balance of tundra ecosystems. In this study, we address some of these uncertainties through a novel record of 119 site-years of summer data from eddy covariance towers representing dominant tundra vegetation types located on continuous permafrost in the Arctic. Here we found that earlier snowmelt was associated with more tundra net CO2 sequestration and higher gross primary productivity (GPP) only in June and July, but with lower net carbon sequestration and lower GPP in August. Although higher evapotranspiration (ET) can result in soil drying with the progression of the summer, we did not find significantly lower soil moisture with earlier snowmelt, nor evidence that water stress affected GPP in the late growing season. Our results suggest that the expected increased CO2 sequestration arising from Arctic warming and the associated increase in growing season length may not materialize if tundra ecosystems are not able to continue sequestering CO2 later in the season. © 2022, The Author(s).

Authors
Zona D.1, 2 , Lafleur P.M.3 , Hufkens K.4, 5 , Bailey B.1 , Gioli B.6 , Burba G.7, 8 , Goodrich J.P.9 , Liljedahl A.K.10, 11 , Euskirchen E.S.12 , Watts J.D.11, 13 , Farina M.11 , Kimball J.S.13 , Heimann M.14, 15 , Göckede M.14 , Pallandt M.14 , Christensen T.R.16, 17 , Mastepanov M.16, 17 , López-Blanco E.16, 18 , Jackowicz-Korczynski M.16, 19 , Dolman A.J.20 , Marchesini L.B. 21, 22 , Commane R.23 , Wofsy S.C.24 , Miller C.E.25 , Lipson D.A.1 , Hashemi J.1 , Arndt K.A.26 , Kutzbach L.27 , Holl D.27 , Boike J.28, 29 , Wille C.30 , Sachs T.30 , Kalhori A.30 , Song X.1 , Xu X. 1 , Humphreys E.R.31 , Koven C.D.32 , Sonnentag O.33 , Meyer G.33 , Gosselin G.H.33 , Marsh P.34 , Oechel W.C.1, 35
Journal
Scientific Reports
Publisher
Nature Publishing Group
Number of issue
1
Language
English
Status
Published
Link
External link
DOI
10.1038/s41598-022-07561-1
Number
3986
Volume
12
Year
2022
Organizations
  • 1 Department Biology, San Diego State University, San Diego, CA 92182, United States
  • 2 School of Biosciences, University of Sheffield, Western Bank, Sheffield, S10 2TN, United Kingdom
  • 3 School of the Environment, Trent University, Peterborough, ON K9L 0G2, Canada
  • 4 UMR 1391 ISPA, INRA, 71 Avenue Edouard Bourlaux, Villenave d’Ornon, 33140, France
  • 5 Department of Applied Ecology and Environmental Biology, Ghent University, 653, Ghent, 9000, Belgium
  • 6 Institute of BioEconomy, IBE, National Research Council (CNR), Via Giovanni Caproni 8, Firenze, 50145, Italy
  • 7 LI-COR Biosciences, 4421 Superior St., Lincoln, NE 68504, United States
  • 8 The Robert B. Daugherty Water for Food Global Institute, School of Natural Resources, University of Nebraska, Lincoln, NE 68583, United States
  • 9 Department of Earth Sciences, University of Waikato, Hillcrest, Hamilton, 3216, New Zealand
  • 10 Water and Environmental Research Center, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, AK 99775-7340, United States
  • 11 Woodwell Climate Research Center, Falmouth, MA 02540, United States
  • 12 Institute of Arctic Biology, University of Alaska Fairbanks, Fairbanks, AK 99775, United States
  • 13 W.A. Franke College of Forestry & Conservation, The University of Montana, Missoula, MT 59812, United States
  • 14 Max Planck Institute for Biogeochemistry, Jena, 07745, Germany
  • 15 Institute for Atmospheric and Earth System Research (INAR)/Physics, Faculty of Science, University of Helsinki, Gustaf Hällströmin katu 2b, 00560, P.O. Box 64, Helsinki, 00014, Finland
  • 16 Department of Ecoscience, Arctic Research Centre, Aarhus University, Frederiksborgvej 399, Roskilde, 4000, Denmark
  • 17 Oulanka Research Station, Oulu University, Kuusamo, Finland
  • 18 Department of Environment and Minerals, Greenland Institute of Natural Resources, Nuuk, 3900, Greenland
  • 19 Department of Physical Geography and Ecosystem Science, Lund University, Lund, 22362, Sweden
  • 20 The Netherlands Institute for Sea Research, Den Burg, PO Box 59, Texel, 1790 AB, Netherlands
  • 21 Department of Sustainable Agro-Ecosystems and Bioresources, Research and Innovation Centre, Fondazione Edmund Mach, Via E. Mach 1, TN, San Michele all’Adige, 38010, Italy
  • 22 Agrarian‐Technological Institute, RUDN University, Moscow, 117198, Russian Federation
  • 23 Department of Earth and Environmental Sciences, Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory, Columbia University, Palisades, NY 10964, United States
  • 24 School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University, 20 Oxford St., Cambridge, MA 02138, United States
  • 25 Jet Propulsion Laboratory, California Institute of Technology, 4800 Oak Grove Drive, Pasadena, CA 91109-8099, United States
  • 26 Earth Systems Research Center, Institute for the Study of Earth, Oceans, and Space, University of New Hampshire, 8 College Road, Durham, NH 03824, United States
  • 27 Institute of Soil Science, Center for Earth System Research and Sustainability (CEN), Universität Hamburg, Hamburg, 20146, Germany
  • 28 Permafrost Research, Alfred Wegener Institute, Helmholtz Centre for Polar and Marine Research, Potsdam, Germany
  • 29 Geography Department, Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Berlin, 10099, Germany
  • 30 GFZ German Research Centre for Geosciences, Potsdam, 14473, Germany
  • 31 Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa, ON K1S 5B6, Canada
  • 32 Climate and Ecosystem Sciences Division, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA 94720, United States
  • 33 Département de Géographie, Université de Montréal, 1375 Avenue Thérèse-Lavoie-Roux, Montréal, QC H2V 0B3, Canada
  • 34 Department of Geography and Environmental Studies, Wilfrid Laurier University, 75 University Ave W., Waterloo, ON N2S 3C5, Canada
  • 35 Department of Geography, College of Life and Environmental Sciences, University of Exeter, Exeter, EX4 4RJ, United Kingdom
Keywords
carbon dioxide; Arctic; carbon sequestration; climate change; ecosystem; plant; season; soil; tundra; Arctic Regions; Carbon Dioxide; Carbon Sequestration; Climate Change; Ecosystem; Plants; Seasons; Soil; Tundra
Date of creation
06.07.2022
Date of change
06.07.2022
Short link
https://repository.rudn.ru/en/records/article/record/83507/
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