Projections of regional changes in forest net primary productivity for different tree species in Europe driven by climate change and carbon dioxide

Christopher Reyer (1) , Petra Lasch-Born (1) , Felicitas Suckow (1) , Martin Gutsch (1) , Aline Murawski (1) , Tobias Pilz (1)

1 PIK - Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research

& Context Projecting changes in forest productivity in Europe is crucial for adapting forest management to chang-ing environmental conditions. & Aims The objective of this paper is to project forest pro-ductivity changes under different climate change scenarios at a large number of sites in Europe with a stand-scale process-based model. & Methods We applied the process-based forest growth mod-el 4C at 132 typical forest sites of important European tree species in ten environmental zones using climate change scenarios from three different climate models and two dif-ferent assumptions about CO 2 effects on productivity. & Results This paper shows that future forest productivity will be affected by climate change and that these effects depend strongly on the climate scenario used and the persistence of CO 2 effects. We find that productivity increases in Northern Europe, increases or decreases in Central Europe, and decreases in Southern Europe. This geographical pattern is mirrored by the responses of the individual tree species. The productivity of Scots pine and Norway spruce, mostly located in central and north-ern Europe, increases while the productivity of Common beech and oak in southern regions decreases. It is im-portant to note that we consider the physiological re-sponse to climate change excluding disturbances or management. & Conclusions Different climate change scenarios and as-sumptions about the persistence of CO 2 effects lead to un-certain projections of future forest productivity. These un-certainties need to be integrated into forest management planning and adaptation of forest management to climate change using adaptive management frameworks.

Domaines: Sciences du Vivant [q-bio]

Christopher Reyer, Petra Lasch-Born, Felicitas Suckow, Martin Gutsch, Aline Murawski, et al.. Projections of regional changes in forest net primary productivity for different tree species in Europe driven by climate change and carbon dioxide. Annals of Forest Science, 2014, 71 (2), pp.211 - 225. ⟨10.1007/s13595-013-0306-8⟩. ⟨hal-01098413⟩