The influence of advection on the short term CO2 budget in and above a forest canopy

An experimental micrometeorological set-up was established at the CARBOEU-RO-FLUX site in Tharandt, Germany, to measure all relevant variables for the calculation ofthe vertical and horizontal advective fluxes of carbon dioxide. The set-up includes two aux-iliary towers to measure horizontal and vertical CO 2 and H 2 O gradients through the canopy,and to make ultrasonic wind measurements in the trunk space. In combination with the long-term flux tower an approximately even-sided prism with a typical side-length of 50 m wasestablished. It is shown that under stable (nighttime) conditions the mean advective fluxeshave magnitudes on the same order as the daily eddy covariance (EC) flux, which implies thatthey play a significant, but not yet fully understood, role in the carbon budget equation. Thetwo advective fluxes are opposite and seem to cancel each other at night (at least for thesemeasurements). During the day, vertical advection tends to zero, while horizontal advection isstill present implying a flow of CO 2 out of the control volume. From our measurements, amean daily gain of 2.2 gC m-2 d-1for the horizontal advection and a mean daily loss of2.5 gC m-2 d-1 for the vertical advection is calculated for a period of 20 days. However thelarge scatter of the advective fluxes has to be further investigated. It is not clear yet whether thelarge variability is natural or due to measurement errors and conceptual deficiencies of theexperiment. Similar results are found in the few comparable studies.