A Carbon Management Estimation System for US Agricultural Lands: Supporting Policy and Management Decisions
Stephen
M
Ogle, Colorado State University, ogle@nrel.colostate.edu
(Presenting)
Keith
Paustian, Colorado State University, keithp@nrel.colostate.edu
Chris
Potter, NASA Ames Research Center, cpotter@mail.arc.nasa.gov
Steven
Klooster, NASA Ames Research Center, sklooster@gaia.arc.nasa.gov
F
Jay
Breidt, Colorado State University, jbreidt@stat.colostate.edu
Richard
Conant, Colorado State University, conant@nrel.colostate.edu
Carbon management estimation systems are needed to support policy initiatives associated with greenhouse gas mitigation, such as C sequestration in agricultural soils. Moreover, farmers and ranchers need information about the potential to sequester C before making decisions that involve an investment of capital. Thus, a model-based assessment system has been developed to quantify land use and management effects on the soil C budget across a range of scales from the entire nation to individual farms. The system integrates model simulations with spatial data on environmental conditions, land use patterns and management information. The Century Ecosystem Model forms the foundation of the system, and environmental conditions are derived from weather records and soil survey data. Anthropogenic activity data on land use and management is derived from national surveys for broader-scale applications, while users enter the activity data for farm-scale assessments. Currently MODIS-derived products are being incorporated into this estimation system to improve the simulation of crop and forage production, which represents the carbon supply for sequestration. NPP in previous versions of the system was based solely on site edaphic characteristics, management information, and weather data. In the current version, an EVI “greenness” measure derived from MODIS is used to estimate NPP according to the framework of the NASA-CASA model. This estimation system has been applied to report changes in agricultural soil C to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change as part of the US greenhouse gas inventory. A web-based version of the system, called COMET-VR, has also been developed that allows farmers and ranchers to evaluate on-farm decisions, and will be made available in the near future to register C credits through the US Federal Government 1605b voluntary reporting process.