Abstract

In forest ecosystems, climate change will have consequences for conditions and balances within the system. This will further affect processes already impacted by air pollution that may have altered natural ecosystem behavior. Turnover of elements relate e.g. to acidity, nitrogen, organic matter and metals. These depend on hydrology, which is strongly influenced by changes in precipitation and temperature, being main climatic variables. It is foreseen that more frequently occurring extreme events will need to be monitored and understood in a wide geographical context. Effects of atmospheric deposition and climate conditions are studied in the UN ECE International Cooperative Programme on Integrated Monitoring of Air Pollution Effects on Ecosystems (ICP IM) within the Working Group on Effects (WGE) of the Convention on Long-Range Transboundary Air Pollution (CLRTAP, 2007). The programme focus is on total ecosystem monitoring to reveal cause-effect connections and to give causal explanations for identified changes and effects. Only natural ecosystems are considered. Ecosystems with direct anthropogenic impacts such as agriculture or forest management in the past 100 years are excluded. This facilitates an understanding of large scale pressures without disturbing local activities. Managed forests are included in other programmes such as the ICP on Assessment and Monitoring of Air Pollution Effects on Forests (ICP Forests) including over 30 countries in the ECE region. ICP Forests is carried out on two scales. Level I is large scale monitoring of a large number of small plots and Level II is intensive monitoring of a smaller number of c. 0.25 ha areas located in production, but not totally mature, forests. Linked to this programme is also the LIFE project FutMon. National Forest Inventories (NFIs) also have large scale monitoring, often with a statistical lay-out to cover a spatial distribution. Forest conditions are monitored periodically to identify changes over time. Thus, NFI resemble the ICP Forests Level I but national lay-outs vary between countries. However, these are being harmonized in the European Forest Inventory network (ENFIN). Another relevant monitoring programme where impacts of output from forest ecosystems could be revealed is the ICP on Assessment and Monitoring of Air Pollution Effects on Waters (ICP Waters). This programme studies conditions in rivers and lakes and provides information on forest land pressures on aquatic ecosystems. Climate effects can already be seen in changed hydrology where snowmelt in winter increased water flow and element transport during the dormant period in earlier cold winter regions. Also absence of spring flood events from snowmelt are seen and new patterns created that could mean drastic changes in element turnover with consequences for ecosystem function

Published in

Title: International Conference : research, monitoring and modelling in the study of climate change and air pollution impacts on forest ecosystems : 5-7 October 2010, Rome, Italy : book of abstracts

Conference

Research, monitoring and modelling in the study of climate change and air pollution impacts on the forest ecosystems

SLU Authors

• Lundin, Lars

  • Department of Aquatic Sciences and Assessment, Swedish University of Agricultural Sciences
    

Associated SLU-program

Forest
Cross-programme


UKÄ Subject classification

Environmental Sciences related to Agriculture and Land-use
Forest Science


Permanent link to this page (URI)

https://res.slu.se/id/publ/30770