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Contrasting Regional Carbon Cycle Responses to Seasonal Climate Anomalies Across the East-West Divide of Temperate North America

Journal Article · · Global Biogeochemical Cycles
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1029/2020gb006598· OSTI ID:1764549
 [1];  [1];  [1];  [2];  [3];  [4];  [5];  [3];  [1];  [6]
  1. California Institute of Technology (CalTech), Pasadena, CA (United States). Jet Propulsion Lab. (JPL)
  2. California Institute of Technology (CalTech), Pasadena, CA (United States). Jet Propulsion Lab. (JPL); Univ. of California, Los Angeles, CA (United States)
  3. Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (United States)
  4. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center (GSFC), Greenbelt, MD (United States)
  5. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States)
  6. California Institute of Technology (CalTech), Pasadena, CA (United States)
Across temperate North America, interannual variability (IAV) in gross primary production (GPP) and net ecosystem exchange (NEE) and their relationship with environmental drivers are poorly understood. Here, we examine IAV in GPP and NEE and their relationship to environmental drivers using two state-of-the-science flux products: NEE constrained by surface and space-based atmospheric CO2 measurements over 2010-2015 and satellite up-scaled GPP from FluxSat over 2001-2017. We show that the arid western half of temperate North America provides a larger contribution to IAV in GPP (104% of east) and NEE (127% of east) than the eastern half, in spite of smaller magnitude of annual mean GPP and NEE. This occurs because anomalies in western ecosystems are temporally coherent across the growing season leading to an amplification of GPP and NEE. In contrast, IAV in GPP and NEE in eastern ecosystems is dominated by seasonal compensation effects, associated with opposite responses to temperature anomalies in spring and summer. Terrestrial biosphere models in the MsTMIP ensemble generally capture these differences between eastern and western temperate North America, although there is considerable spread between models.
Research Organization:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA); USDOE Office of Science (SC)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-05CH11231
OSTI ID:
1764549
Journal Information:
Global Biogeochemical Cycles, Journal Name: Global Biogeochemical Cycles Journal Issue: 11 Vol. 34; ISSN 0886-6236
Publisher:
American Geophysical Union (AGU)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English

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