A new study gives a clear picture of how forests evolved over generations and contribute to the Earth's carbon balance, which is critical to sustaining a stable global climate.
Over 10,000 years, the study reproduced the natural rate and pattern of carbon storage in forests in the Midwestern United States.
The findings have the potential to influence existing discussions about how to manage landscapes to optimize carbon storage while satisfying conservation objectives.
Historical biomass key to buffering climate change
(Photo : JODY AMIET/AFP via Getty Images)
Plants assist the Earth to maintain a carbon balance by absorbing carbon from the atmosphere and storing it in their leaves, branches, trunks, and roots, which is a critical component of a stable climate.
While woody biomass includes one of the greatest reservoirs of terrestrial carbon, fluctuations in the volume of woody biomass across millennia are poorly understood, with most direct measurements of plant biomass lasting just a few decades.
Because trees grow slowly, this lack of data creates a significant knowledge gap.
In the lack of empirical evidence, scientists make assumptions that contribute to uncertainty regarding the long-term carbon sink and future carbon-climate system estimates.
They discovered that forests in the Midwestern United States were spreading and growing larger during the previous 10,000 years, said Ann Raiho of the University of Maryland's Earth System Science Interdisciplinary Center (ESSIC), as per ScienceDaily.
This demonstrates that the ancient basis for understanding forests was incorrect and that it is critical for carbon sequestration to conserve trees that grow larger and live longer.
The researchers created ReFAB (Reconstructing Forest Aboveground Biomass) for the study, a Bayesian model that predicts aboveground woody biomass based on a time sequence of ancient pollen assemblages in sediments.
They utilized ReFAB to statistically recreate changes in woody biomass over the last 10,000 years throughout a 600,000-kilometer region in the Upper Midwest of the United States.
The researchers discovered that, following a brief postglacial drop, woody biomass virtually increased during the previous 8,000 years.
This estimate differs significantly from previous reconstructions of forest biomass in eastern Canada, which might be attributed to variances in forest species between locations.
Previous research employed simpler models that did not account for data errors and reported little or no change in biomass over the previous 6,000 years.
Read more: Solar-Biomass Hybrid System Meets House Heating Needs for Winters, Research Suggests
As a renewable energy resource
In a contemporary society seeking renewable energy, the phrases biomass and bioenergy are commonly used. In reality, they are responsible for 98 percent of renewable energy generation (60 percent - wood derivatives, 32 percent - biofuels, and 7 percent - biomass waste).
Most people reading this have most likely heard the phrases at least once or twice before.
Despite their prevalence, these concepts are nonetheless fraught with confusion and misinterpretation.
Many people believe that biomass and bioenergy are modern forms of energy and that the biomass energy shift is novel. Nothing could be further from the truth.
Biomass existed before humans. There is a lot of evidence to back up the assertions that humanity used biomass as an energy source between 230,000 and 1.5 million years ago. We'll take a look at some historical biomass milestones.
Biomass isn't a new source of energy. In truth, biomass existed long before humans arrived on the planet.
As people filled the globe, they began to use biomass for energy. This suggests that biomass consumption is nearly as old as humans.
The use of fire as an energy source is the first type of biomass.
Biomass is one of the most basic renewable carbon energy sources on the planet, and we utilized it to create heat and prepare meals.
From that moment forward, we were fascinated in what is now known as bioenergy.
Related article: Low Temperature Fuel Cells Can Run on Biomass
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