Publications

Xu, HT; He, B; Guo, LL; Yan, X; Zeng, YL; Yuan, WP; Zhong, ZQ; Tang, R; Yang, Y; Liu, HM; Chen, YN (2024). Global Forest Plantations Mapping and Biomass Carbon Estimation. JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH-BIOGEOSCIENCES, 129(3), e2023JG007441.

Abstract
Management of forest plantations is a natural based solution to the global-scale mitigation of climate change; however, the role of carbon sequestration remains poorly understood, and this is hampered by a lack of detailed distribution on the global forest plantations. For the first time, we generated a global spatial distribution for forest plantations (GSDFP) during 2015 at a spatial resolution of 250 m using hierarchical extraction based on a machine learning algorithm taking time series of MODIS and ALOS PALSAR imagery as the source data, and finally estimates the biomass carbon stored in forest plantations. The resultant map was validated using reference samples visually interpreted, as well as reference samples collected from previous studies, and inter-compared with statistical forest plantation area and regional forest plantation maps, and the GSDFP was found to accurately represent the spatial distribution of forest plantations around the globe. Globally, forest plantations account for 7.35% (360.22 x 104 km2) of the global forest area and are estimated to contribute 4.60% (12.85 Pg C) of global forest biomass carbon. The forest plantation map and biomass carbon stock estimates will assist forest management and provide a benchmark for the estimation of the forest plantation carbon sink. In recent decades, global reforestation and afforestation practices have aroused wide concern in the effectiveness of climate change mitigation. However, the lack of spatial explicit data on forest plantations is the vital limitation with respect to the corresponding biomass carbon stock estimates. In this study, we generated the global spatial distribution of forest plantations at a spatial resolution of 250 m, and further estimated the biomass carbon stock in forest plantations. We found that forest plantations contributed less biomass carbon stock to forests than their corresponding area. Our results can provide crucial scientific information for decisions on forest management and climate change mitigation. A global distribution of forest plantations was created using machine learning, and the biomass carbon stock in forest plantations was estimated The proportion of plantation area in the forest (360.22 x 104 km2, 7.35%) is higher than that of biomass carbon stocks (12.85 Pg C, 4.60%) The forest plantations map and biomass carbon stock estimates will be beneficial for natural based solutions for climate mitigation

DOI:
10.1029/2023JG007441

ISSN:
2169-8961