Adding tree rings to North America's National Forest Inventories: an essential tool to guide drawdown of atmospheric CO2
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Published version
Date
2022-03
Authors
Evans, M.E.K.
DeRose, R.J.
Klesse, S.
Girardin, M.P.
Heilman, K.A.
Alexander, M.R.
Arsenault, A.
Babst, F.
Bouchard, M.
Cahoon, S.M.P.
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Published version
OA Version
Citation
M.E.K. Evans, R.J. DeRose, S. Klesse, M.P. Girardin, K.A. Heilman, M.R. Alexander, A. Arsenault, F. Babst, M. Bouchard, S.M.P. Cahoon, E.M. Campbell, M. Dietze, L. Duchesne, D.C. Frank, C.L. Giebink, A. Gómez-Guerrero, G.G. García, E.H. Hogg, J. Metsaranta, C. Ols, S.A. Rayback, A. Reid, M. Ricker, P.G. Schaberg, J.D. Shaw, P.F. Sullivan, S.A.V. GaytÁn. 2022. "Adding Tree Rings to North America's National Forest Inventories: An Essential Tool to Guide Drawdown of Atmospheric CO2.." Bioscience, Volume 72, Issue 3, pp. 233 - 246. https://doi.org/10.1093/biosci/biab119
Abstract
Tree-ring time series provide long-term, annually resolved information on the growth of trees. When sampled in a systematic context, tree-ring data can be scaled to estimate the forest carbon capture and storage of landscapes, biomes, and-ultimately-the globe. A systematic effort to sample tree rings in national forest inventories would yield unprecedented temporal and spatial resolution of forest carbon dynamics and help resolve key scientific uncertainties, which we highlight in terms of evidence for forest greening (enhanced growth) versus browning (reduced growth, increased mortality). We describe jump-starting a tree-ring collection across the continent of North America, given the commitments of Canada, the United States, and Mexico to visit forest inventory plots, along with existing legacy collections. Failing to do so would be a missed opportunity to help chart an evidence-based path toward meeting national commitments to reduce net greenhouse gas emissions, urgently needed for climate stabilization and repair.
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© The Author(s) 2021. Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the American Institute of Biological Sciences. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial License (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits non-commercial re-use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. For commercial re-use, please contact journals.permissions@oup.com.