Carbon Budget of Pine Stands in the Povolgie Region of Russia

Within the general theme of regional carbon budget the study addressed the following specific objectives:

• Examine the role of the history of forest use and natural disturbance in defining the current carbon budget of forests in the region. This included detailed analyses of forest land-use changes in Middle Zavolgie during last century and forest product trade (import-export).
• Assessment of existing modelling tools for calculating C budgets at regional scale. A detailed review of models that have been developed by several groups of scientists active in the field (Marland, Karjalainen, Harmon, etc.) to evaluate their ability to simulate C dynamics in the region will be made. Also data needed to parameterise the models were identified . The field data includes extant and newly established research plots, and about 2000 stands polygon retrieved from the forest inventory database
• Finally, an integrated C budget model were compiled and it included the following major components: forest ecosystems, soils, peatlands and forest products. This will involve the use of various regression techniques. Simulation of carbon flows in the wood-based products was based on a submodel that processes harvested timber into products and follows the products until they are removed from use and the carbon in these products is released back into the atmosphere (Karjalainen, 1996). These analyses were included in the model of carbon budget of forest sector in Middle Zavolgie, as well.

The results of this project have been published in EFI Technical Report 2.