Forest-atmosphere Carbon Transfer and Storage, 1996-1999
Schlesinger was the co-principal investigator for the Free Air CO2 Enrichment (FACE) Experiment in the Duke Forest. The object of the study was to investigate the efficacy of carbon sequestration in forest ecosystems (vegetation and soil) in response to elevated atmospheric CO2 concentration, as a means to mitigate the potential for global warming.
During this decade-long experiment, Schlesinger and John Lichter (Bowdoin College) found only small changes in soil carbon content, suggesting that enhanced carbon storage in soils is unlikely to play a major role in slowing the growth of atmospheric CO2 and the magnitude of global climate change. Much larger changes were seen in the growth rate of trees, but even those were unlikely to sequester a significant increment of carbon worldwide as a result of rising CO2 in Earth’s atmosphere.
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