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Collaborative Research: An Interdisciplinary Investigation Of Groundwater-Carbon Coupling In Large Peat Basins And Its Relation To Climate Change, Andrew S. Reeve

University of Maine Office of Research Administration: Grant Reports

The growth of northern peatlands during the Holocene created a globally important source and sink for greenhouse gases. The response of these large carbon reservoirs to Global Warming, however, remains uncertain. Different mathematical models predict that future warming could alter the carbon balance of peatlands by either increasing the rate of carbon sequestration or accelerating the emissions of greenhouse gases. However, these steady-state analytical models make unrealistic assumptions about natural peatlands, which are spatially and temporally variable ecosystems that are still accumulating carbon. This investigation will therefore develop a transient 3D numerical model that couples multiphase groundwater flow to solute …