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Synthetic analysis of GHG dynamics

WP 8 aims to integrate results from WPs 1-7 to better understand and project GHG dynamics as affected by land-use change. We will relate these dynamics to environmental data either directly collected on the plot level, or retrieved from other data sources. We will further develop a framework and platform for integration and synthesis. WP 8 includes the following tasks:

  1. Collection of environmental data: For each plot measured within the framework of Tier 2, its soil type will be determined and climatic variables such as temperature, rainfall and wind speed will be assembled to assess the relationship between environmental conditions and GHG emissions (di Perta et al., 2019). Weather data for the observation years will be collected from the nearest meteorological stations. Long-term climate data will also be extracted from the WorldClim database. For plots’ tree layer, the extent and frequency of biomass loss due to woodcutting, browsing, water stress or fire will be estimated as the percent of canopy volume removed (O’Connor & Page, 2014). For plots located in near-natural vegetation, we will assess physical evidence of grazing in an expert assessment of recent grazing pressure (following Linstädter et al., 2014)
  2. Analysing (in-) direct effects of climate and land-use change: Structural equation modelling (SEM) will be used to analyse direct and indirect effects of climate change and land-use change on GHG dynamics (see Ferner et al. 2018 for an application example created within the framework of WASCAL 1).

Project members involved:

Dr. Amanuel Gebremichael, Dr. Larissa Raatz with Prof. Dr. Anja Linstädter (UP)