Abstract
The oxidative ratio (OR) is the amount of CO2 sequestered in the terrestrial biosphere for each mol of O2 produced. The OR governs the efficiency of a terrestrial biome’s O2 production and it has been used to calculate the balance of terrestrial and oceanic carbon sinks across the globe. However, the value used in carbon cycle calculations comes from only one study of one environment. Here we perform a meta-analysis of studies of soil organic matter and vegetation composition to calculate the first global ecosystem OR value. We use data from 138 samples across 31 studies covering 9 USDA global soil orders, 7 global biomes and 5 continents and combine this information as a weighted average based upon biome land area or organic carbon content of the soil order. Organic matter fractions could not be shown to be reliable proxies for whole soil or vegetation OR. The resulting analysis suggests that although the presently used value of 1.1 is within the range of natural occurrence, it is not the most accurate choice, representing between the 97th and 99th percentile value. Our study yields a global terrestrial OR = 1.04 ± 0.03. This value of OR means that the sink of anthropogenic carbon fluxes to land has been underestimated (and the sink to the ocean overestimated) by up to 14 %. Recalculating with our OR value, the fossil fuel carbon flux to land is 1.48 ± 0.04 Gt C/year and flux to oceans is 2.02 ± 0.03 Gt C/year.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
Achard F, Eva HD, Stibig HJ, Mayaux P, Gallego J, Richards T, Malingreau JP (2002) Determination of deforestation rates of the world’s humid tropical forests. Science 297:999–1002
Akramov Y (1981) Changes in organic matter in reclaimed solonchaks. Pochvovedeniye 3:87–93
Allard B (2006) A comparative study on the chemical composition of humic acids from forest soil, agricultural soil and ignite deposit bound lipid, carbohydrate and amino acid distributions. Geoderma 130:77–96
Bagautdinov FY, Khaziyev FK, Shcherbukhin VD (1984) Polysaccharide fraction of humic substances from a typical chernozem and a gray forest soil. Pochvovedeniye 10:28–32
Baldock JA, Masiello CA, Gelinas Y, Hedges JI (2004) Cycling and composition of organic matter in terrestrial and marine ecosystems. Mar Chem 92:39–64
Battle M, Bender ML, Tans PP, White JWC, Ellis JT, Conway T, Francey RJ (2000) Global carbon sinks and their variability inferred from atmospheric O-2 and delta C-13. Science 287(5462):2467–2470
Celi L, Schnitzer M, Negre M (1997) Analysis of carboxyl groups in soil humic acids by a wet chemical method, fourier-transform infrared spectrophotometry, and solution-state carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance. A comparative study. Soil Sci 162:189–197
Clay GD, Worrall F, Rose R (2010) Carbon budgets of an upland blanket bog managed by prescribed fire—evidence for enhanced carbon storage under managed burning. JGR-Biogeosci 115:G04037
Davis WD, Erickson CT, Johnston CT, Delfino JJ, Porter JE (1999) Quantitative Fourier transform infrared spectroscopic investigation of humic substance functional group composition. Chemosphere 38:2913–2928
Eswaran H, Van den Berg E, Reich P (1993) Organic carbon in soil of the World. Soil Sci Soc Am J 57:192–194
Gaudinski JB, Trumbore SE, Davidson EA, Zheng S (2000) Soil carbon cycling in a temperate forest: radiocarbon based estimates of residence times, sequestration rates and partitioning fluxes. Biogeochemistry 51:33–69
Grishina A, Morgun LV (1985) Elementary composition of humic acids in cultivated sod-podzolic soils. Pochvovedeniye 10:31–39
Hartnett HE, Keil RG, Hedges JI, Devol AH (1998) Influence of oxygen exposure time on organic carbon preservation in continental marine sediments. Nature 391:572–574
Hayes TM, Hayes MHB, Skjemstad JO, Swift RS (2008) Compositional relationships between organic matter in a grassland soil and its drainage waters. Eur J Soil Sci 59:603–613
Hockaday WC, Masiello CA, Randerson JT, Smernik RJ, Baldock JA, Chadwick OA, Harden JW (2009) Measurement of soil carbon oxidation state and oxidative ratio by C-13 nuclear magnetic resonance. J Geophys Res 114:G02014
IPCC (2007) Contribution of Working Group I to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Solomon, S., D. Qin, M. Manning, Z. Chen, M. Marquis, K.B. Averyt, M. Tignor and H.L. Miller (eds.). Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, United Kingdom and New York, NY, USA
Jenkinson DS, Rayner JH (1983) Turnover of soil organic matter in some of Rothamsted classical experiments. Soil Sci 123(5):298–305
Keeling RF, Shertz SR (1992) Seasonal and interannual variations in atmospheric oxygen and implications for the global carbon cycle. Nature 358:723–727
Keeling RF, Piper SC, Heimann M (1996) Global and hemispheric CO2 sinks deduced from changes in atmospheric O-2 concentration. Nature 381:218–221
Kleber M (2010) What is recalcitrant soil organic matter? Environ Chem 7:320–332
Kuz’Menio T, Pavlova MP (1981) Distribution of organic matter and macroelements in floodplain meadow biogeocenosis. Pochvovedeniye 6:16–26
Langenfelds RL, Francey RJ, Steele LP, Battle M, Keeling RF, Budd WF (1999) Partitioning of the global fossil CO2 sink using a 19 year trend in atmospheric O2. Geophys Res Lett 26(13):1897–1900
Loveland TR, Belward AS (1997) The international geosphere biosphere programme data and information system global land cover data set (DISCover). Acta Astronaut 41:681–689
Maie N, Watanabe A, Kimura M (2004) Chemical characteristics and potential source of fulvic acids leached from the plow layer of paddy soil. Geoderma 120:309–3232
Mao JD, Schmidt-Rohr K, Davies G, Ghabbour EA, Xing B (2000) Quantitative characterisation of humic substances by solid-state carbon-13 nuclear magnetic resonance. Soil Sci Am J 64:873–884
Martin M, Celi L, Bonifacio E, Nardi S, Barberis E (2006) Characteristics of soil organic matter in a limnic histosol of the alpine morainic system. Soil Sci 171:527–540
Masiello CA, Gallagher ME, Randerson JT, Deco RM, Chadwick OA (2008) Evaluating two experimental approaches for measuring ecosystem carbon oxidation state and oxidative ratio. J Geophysl Res 113:G3, G03010
Neves-Fernandes A, Giovanela M, Esteves VI, Marta M, Sierra S (2010) Elemental and spectral properties of peat and soil samples and their respective humic substances. J Mol Struct 971:33–38
Olson JS, Watts JA, Allison LT (2001) Major world ecosystem complexes ranked by carbon in live vegetation: a database. Carbon Dioxide Information Analysis Center, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Patti AF, Verheyen TV, Douglas L, Wang X (1992) Nitrohumic acids from Victorian brown coal. Sci Total Environ 113:49–65
Randerson JT, Masiello CA, Still CJ, Rahn T, Poorter H, Field CB (2006) Is carbon within the global terrestrial biosphere becoming more oxidized? Implications for trends in atmospheric O2. Glob Change Biol 12:260–271
Russell JD, Vaughn DJ, Jones D, Fraser AR (1989) An IR spectroscopic study of soil humin and its relationship to other soil humic substances and fungal pigments. Geoderma 29:1–12
Schnitzer M, Preston M (1986) Analysis of humic acids by solution and solid-state carbon 13 NMR. Soil Sci Soc Am J 50:326–331
Seibt U, Brand WA, Heimann M, Lloyd J, Severinghaus JP, Wingate L (2004) Observations of O2/CO2 exchange ratios during ecosystem gas exchange. Global Biogeochemical Cycles 18: GB4024
Severinghaus JP (1995) Studies of the terrestrial O2 and carbon cycles in sand dunes gases and in Biosphere 2. PhD thesis, Columbia University
Shurygina EA, Larina NK, Chubarova MA, Kononova MM (1971) Differential thermal analysis (DTA) and thermogravimetry (TG) of soil humus substances. Geoderma 6:169–177
Skrzypek G, Jezierski P, Szynkiewicz A (2010) Preservation of primary stable isotope signatures of peat forming plants during early decomposition—observation along an altitudinal transect. Chem Geol 273:238–249
Steinbach J, Gerbig C, Rodenbeck C, Karstens U, Minejima C, Mukai H (2011) The CO2 release and oxygen uptake from fossil fuel emission estimate (COFFEE) dataset: effects from varying oxidative ratios. Atmos Chem Phys 11:6855–6870
Stephens BB, Keeling RF, Heimann M, Six KD, Murnane R, Caldeira K (1998) Testing global ocean carbon cycle models using measurements of atmospheric O2 and CO2 concentration. Glob Biogeochem Cycles 12(2):213–230
Tonoco P, Almendros G, Sanz J, Gonzalez-Vazquez R, Gonzalez-Vila JJ (2006) Molecular descriptors of the effect of fire on soils under pine forests in two continental Mediterranean soils. Org Chem 37:1995–2018
Ussiri DAN, Johnson CE (2003) Characterization of organic matter in a northern hardwood forest soil by 13C NMR spectroscopy and chemical methods. Geoderma 111:123–149
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Additional information
Responsible Editor: Cory Cleveland
Rights and permissions
About this article
Cite this article
Worrall, F., Clay, G.D., Masiello, C.A. et al. Estimating the oxidative ratio of the global terrestrial biosphere carbon. Biogeochemistry 115, 23–32 (2013). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10533-013-9877-6
Received:
Accepted:
Published:
Issue Date:
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10533-013-9877-6