Temporal variation of soil carbon stock and its controlling factors over the last two decades on the southern Song-nen Plain, Heilongjiang Province

Against the current background of global climate change, the study of variations in the soil carbon pool and its controlling factors may aid in the evaluation of soil’s role in the mitigation or enhancement of greenhouse gas. This paper studies spatial and temporal variation in the soil carbon pool and their controlling factors in the southern Song-nen Plain in Heilongjiang Province, using soil data collected over two distinct periods by the Multi-purpose Regional Geochemical Survey in 2005–2007, and another soil survey conducted in 1982–1990. The study area is a carbon source of 1479 t/km2 and in the past 20 years, from the 1980s until 2005, the practical carbon emission from the soil was 0.12 Gt. Temperature, which has been found to be linearly correlated to soil organic carbon, is the dominant climatologic factor controlling soil organic carbon contents. Our study shows that in the relevant area and time period the potential loss of soil organic carbon caused by rising temperatures was 0.10 Gt, the potential soil carbon emission resulting from land-use change was 0.09 Gt, and the combined potential loss of soil carbon (0.19 Gt) caused by warming and land-use change is comparable to that of fossil fuel combustion (0.21 Gt). Due to the time delay in soil carbon pool variation, there is still 0.07 Gt in the potential emission caused by warming and land-use change that will be gradually released in the future.