C-Turn: Carbon in the system forest - Turn-over, Storage and adaptive forest management stratgies in response to climate change

Climate change and, in particular, the increased occurrence of extreme events pose major challenges for the future management of forests in Germany. Currently, Germany's forests act as a carbon sink. Future forecasts are strongly dependent on climate development and management strategies. The project aims at improving the predictive accuracy of carbon residence time and storage in mixed and deciduous forest ecosystems across Germany. For this purpose, critical key parameters such as carbon residence time and turnover rates will be derived from experimental data sets, especially for deciduous and mixed forests with high precession. The assessment of the carbon balance focuses on different scenarios for climate development and silvicultural management. From these scenarios, possible potentials for carbon storage and adaptation strategies leading to increased carbon residence time and thus storage can be derived for practical use. The goals of the project will be achieved through experimental determination of carbon residence times and turnover rates, through the use of the specified turnover rates in a dynamic vegetation model, and through economic optimizations. Basic research is thus made useful for science-based, practical decisions. This project is implemented by a team of ecophysiologists, vegetation modelers and forest economists at the Technical University of Munich.