Effects of national ecological restoration projects on carbon sequestration in China from 2001 to 2010
Fei Lu, Huifeng Hu, Wenjuan Sun, Jiaojun Zhu, Guobin Liu, Wangming Zhou, Quanfa Zhang, Peili Shi, Xiuping Liu, Xing Wu, Lu Zhang, Xiaohua Wei, Limin Dai, Kerong Zhang, Yirong Sun, Sha Xue, Wanjun Zhang, Dingpeng Xiong, Lei Deng, Bojie Liu, Li Zhou, Chao Zhang, Xiao Zheng, Jiansheng Cao, Yao Huang, Nianpeng He, Guoyi Zhou, Yongfei Bai, Zongqiang Xie, Zhiyao Tang, Bingfang Wu, Jingyun Fang, Guohua Liu, Guirui Yu
Abstract
Significance China has launched six key ecological restoration projects since the late 1970s, but the contribution of these projects to terrestrial C sequestration remains unknown. In this study we examined the ecosystem C sink in the project area (∼16% of the country’s land area) and evaluated the project-induced C sequestration. The total annual C sink in the project area between 2001 and 2010 was estimated to be 132 Tg C per y, over half of which (74 Tg C per y, 56%) was caused by the implementation of the six projects. This finding indicates that the implementation of the ecological restoration projects in China has significantly increased ecosystem C sequestration across the country.