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Assessing Carbon Balance in European Forests Using a Dynamic Vegetation Model: Recent Trends and Drivers

Zhong, Haoming LU ; Eckes-Shephard, Annemarie LU orcid ; Lindeskog, Mats LU ; Viana-Soto, Alba ; Senf, Cornelius ; Kowalski, Katja ; Piltz, Karl LU orcid ; Miller, Paul LU orcid ; Olin, Stefan LU orcid and Suvanto, Susanne LU , et al. (2025) AGU Fall Meeting 2025
Abstract
European forests have served as a critical carbon sink, absorbing approximately 10% of annual anthropogenic CO₂ emissions in the EU, as a result of both increased forest area and growing stock since 1950. However, this sink has declined by one-third over the past decade, based on the EU National Greenhouse Gas Inventory. This decline has been proposed to be due to multiple interacting factors: climate conditions that now constrain rather than promote tree growth, increased ecosystem respiration, forest aging, more frequent disturbances, and rising harvest rates. Yet, the spatiotemporal dynamics of the carbon sink-source shift and the underlying drivers remain unclear.
In this study, we employ a European-focused version of the dynamic... (More)
European forests have served as a critical carbon sink, absorbing approximately 10% of annual anthropogenic CO₂ emissions in the EU, as a result of both increased forest area and growing stock since 1950. However, this sink has declined by one-third over the past decade, based on the EU National Greenhouse Gas Inventory. This decline has been proposed to be due to multiple interacting factors: climate conditions that now constrain rather than promote tree growth, increased ecosystem respiration, forest aging, more frequent disturbances, and rising harvest rates. Yet, the spatiotemporal dynamics of the carbon sink-source shift and the underlying drivers remain unclear.
In this study, we employ a European-focused version of the dynamic vegetation model (DVM) LPJ-GUESS to simulate forests in 12 EU countries, comprising 71.79% of the EU forest area, over 2011-2023. The model incorporates newly parameterized plant functional types (PFTs) for common European species, satellite-derived forest disturbance inputs, a harvest module based on National Forest Inventories, and forest age aligned with observed age distributions.
Our results show a decreasing carbon sink trend from 2011 to 2023 across European forests, with pronounced interannual variability. The magnitude and direction of sink-source changes vary across countries and regions over time. In identified hotspot areas, different drivers dominate or interact – such as growth reduction, increased soil respiration, intensified harvesting, fire, and other disturbances including bark beetle outbreaks and windthrow.
By comparing living biomass changes from model simulations with country-reported data from Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) inventories, our results indicate the model’s ability to reproduce national-level forest carbon sink trends and its potential to further assist LULUCF reporting by providing a consistent continental-scale framework to explore drivers of sink-source changes and identify priority areas for actions. Our findings suggest that well-constrained DVM simulations can provide powerful insights into both long-term ecosystem trajectories and short-term regional events, contributing to forest management and climate policy development.
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organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to conference
publication status
published
subject
conference name
AGU Fall Meeting 2025
conference location
New Orleans, United States
conference dates
2025-12-15 - 2025-12-19
project
The ForestWard Observatory to Secure Resilience Of European
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
7ad77122-44c4-499d-be9f-df748ea36918
date added to LUP
2026-02-28 16:09:59
date last changed
2026-03-04 03:41:58
@misc{7ad77122-44c4-499d-be9f-df748ea36918,
  abstract     = {{European forests have served as a critical carbon sink, absorbing approximately 10% of annual anthropogenic CO₂ emissions in the EU, as a result of both increased forest area and growing stock since 1950. However, this sink has declined by one-third over the past decade, based on the EU National Greenhouse Gas Inventory. This decline has been proposed to be due to multiple interacting factors: climate conditions that now constrain rather than promote tree growth, increased ecosystem respiration, forest aging, more frequent disturbances, and rising harvest rates. Yet, the spatiotemporal dynamics of the carbon sink-source shift and the underlying drivers remain unclear.<br/>In this study, we employ a European-focused version of the dynamic vegetation model (DVM) LPJ-GUESS to simulate forests  in 12 EU countries, comprising 71.79% of the EU forest area, over 2011-2023. The model incorporates newly parameterized plant functional types (PFTs) for common European species, satellite-derived forest disturbance inputs, a harvest module based on National Forest Inventories, and forest age aligned with observed age distributions.<br/>Our results show a decreasing carbon sink trend from 2011 to 2023 across European forests, with pronounced interannual variability. The magnitude and direction of sink-source changes vary across countries and regions over time. In identified hotspot areas, different drivers dominate or interact – such as growth reduction, increased soil respiration, intensified harvesting, fire, and other disturbances including bark beetle outbreaks and windthrow.<br/>By comparing living biomass changes from model simulations with country-reported data from Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) inventories, our results indicate the model’s ability to reproduce national-level forest carbon sink trends and its potential to further assist LULUCF reporting by providing a consistent continental-scale framework to explore drivers of sink-source changes and identify priority areas for actions. Our findings suggest that well-constrained DVM simulations can provide powerful insights into both long-term ecosystem trajectories and short-term regional events, contributing to forest management and climate policy development.<br/>}},
  author       = {{Zhong, Haoming and Eckes-Shephard, Annemarie and Lindeskog, Mats and Viana-Soto, Alba and Senf, Cornelius and Kowalski, Katja and Piltz, Karl and Miller, Paul and Olin, Stefan and Suvanto, Susanne and Pugh, Thomas}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  title        = {{Assessing Carbon Balance in European Forests Using a Dynamic Vegetation Model: Recent Trends and Drivers}},
  year         = {{2025}},
}