Coastal Blue Carbon (CBC) model units

camilo

Hello,

I wonder why the units for the carbon pool initial values are different in the Coastal Blue Carbon model (Megatonnes of CO₂ e/ha) than the regular Carbon Storage Model (Mg/Ha)

In the model documentation we have:

Carbon pool initial values by LULC class: A collection of values of carbon storage in biomass (Megatonnes of CO₂ e/ha), soil (Megatonnes of CO₂ e/ha), and litter (tonnes of CO₂/ha) for each LULC class

Why tonnes of litter, and Megatonnes of biomass and soil?

Plus, in the example's documentation, the lulc_lookup.csv table, is filled with values of 200, 300, that are very likely to be tonnes, not Megatonnes (I can't imagine a soil with 81000000 MgC/Ha). Futhermore, also in the documentation, the file BlueCarbon_GlobalDB.xls, we have a lot of examples in (T_CO2e_ha)

Is it ok if we use Mg/ha in the tables we fill? does it affect of how the model works?

Thank you very much

jdouglass

Hi @camilo,

I'm very sorry about the delay on this.  I can't speak to why the initial value pools are in Megatonnes as opposed to another unit or order of magnitude.  Each of our models are designed for a particular use case, so it's not especially surprising that Carbon and Coastal Blue Carbon use different units.

As for the units used, the model does not convert the units of your table.  So, if you use Mg/ha as your input units, the model's outputs will also be in Mg/ha.

Hope this helps!

James