Integrating peatlands into the coupled Canadian Land Surface Scheme
(CLASS) v3.6 and the Canadian Terrestrial Ecosystem Model (CTEM) v2.0

Wu, Yuanqiao; Verseghy, Diana L.; Melton, Joe R.

doi:https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-9-2639-2016

Articles | Volume 9, issue 8

https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-9-2639-2016

© Author(s) 2016. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-9-2639-2016

© Author(s) 2016. This work is distributed under
the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.

Articles | Volume 9, issue 8

Model description paper

|

11 Aug 2016

Model description paper |

| 11 Aug 2016

Integrating peatlands into the coupled Canadian Land Surface Scheme (CLASS) v3.6 and the Canadian Terrestrial Ecosystem Model (CTEM) v2.0

Yuanqiao Wu, Diana L. Verseghy, and Joe R. Melton

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Final revised paper (published on 11 Aug 2016)
Preprint (discussion started on 27 Nov 2015)

Interactive discussion

Status: closed

AC: Author comment | RC: Referee comment | SC: Short comment | EC: Editor comment

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RC C3638: 'Referee review', Anonymous Referee #1, 08 Jan 2016
RC C4157: 'Review of Wu et al.', Nigel Roulet, 09 Mar 2016
AC C4387: 'reply to reviewers', YUANQIAO WU, 21 Apr 2016

Peer-review completion

AR: Author's response | RR: Referee report | ED: Editor decision

AR by YUANQIAO WU on behalf of the Authors (09 May 2016)

ED: Referee Nomination & Report Request started (20 May 2016) by Jatin Kala

RR by Nigel Roulet (21 Jun 2016)

Suggestions for revision or reasons for rejection

I think the authors have done an excellent job considering my and the other reviewers comments. The authors should be commended for the effort they put into their response to the reviewers. They provide an very good example of how this should be done.

I do look forward to the simulations with this model for the assessment of the sensitivity of peatland carbon storage to climate change. I am still a bit concerned that the authors did not spin up the peat carbon pools and did not have different C pools beneath the "fens" and "bogs". There is reasonable empirical evidence to suggest not much happens in bogs below 1 m depth but there is no evidence this is the case for fens. The authors did a good job a displaying the partitioning between GEP, AR and HR but the HR is very different in fens than bogs. The literature of permafrost transitions illustrates this. There is a large increase in HR when bogs collapse to fens because of the very different supply of substrates. The authors model, as currently constructed will not capture that transition. This is unfortunate because it is where it appears changes to peatlands might be globally significant.

I also have little faith the coupling their model into the RCM will resolve the question of water supply to the fen. It is not just water supply but also the mineral content of that water, which strongly controls vegetation, and the nutrients in the water, which influences productivity.

However, models are all wrong but some are useful. I think this model is a very uesful first step. It will be inapplicable to permafrost peatlands but probably will give us a good idea for boreal and temperature peatlands in the future.

Nigel Roulet

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ED: Publish as is (24 Jun 2016) by Jatin Kala

AR by YUANQIAO WU on behalf of the Authors (24 Jun 2016)

Short summary

About 20 % of the carbon stored in global soils occurs in peatlands. Warmer and drier conditions will both tend to stimulate the decomposition of peat and increase CO₂ and methane emissions, thus potentially enhancing the warming trend. It is important that this feedback mechanism be captured in climate models. This work integrated peatlands into the Canadian Earth system model (CanESM) for global climate predictions and represent a valuable enhancement to the family of Earth system models.