Soil Redistribution in Agricultural Landscapes - Source or Sink of CO2 ?

Project Staff:

Dr. Peter Fiener (Coordination, Modelling & Field Measurements)

Prof. Dr. Karl Schneider (Modelling) 

Dipl. Geogr. Verena Dlugoß (Field Measurements & Modelling) 

Project summary:

The major aim of the project is to answer the global change relevant question if soil redistribution in extensively used agricultural watersheds is a sink or source of CO2. Therefore, soil carbon balance in a small agricultural watershed (4.2 ha) near Bonn (Germany) will be modelled spatially distributed for a period of about 50 years with the SPEROS-C model. 

To validate and improve the model an extensive field and laboratory campaign is carried out. Soil carbon and other soil properties, e.g. texture, bulk density, is determined in at least 3 soil depths in a 12.5 x 12.5 m raster. Moreover, soil moisture, soil temperature and soil respiration as well as carbon input due to roots and plant residues are measured bi-weekly during the summer half year at locations representing different slope positions. 

To analyse and validate the soil redistribution modelling it is planed to derive the soil redistribution integrated over the last 50 years from 14C-measurments derived from Accelerator Mass Spectrometry (proposed project)

Funding: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG)