Reductions in soil surface albedo as a function of biochar application rate: implications for global radiative forcing
Open accessAbstract
Biochar can be defined as pyrolysed (charred) biomass produced for application to soils with the aim of mitigating global climate change while improving soil functions. Sustainable biochar application to soils has been estimated to reduce global greenhouse gas emissions by 71–130 Pg CO 2 -C e over 100 years, indicating an important potential to mitigate climate change. However, these estimates ignored changes in soil surface reflection by the application of dark-coloured biochar. Through a laboratory experiment we show a strong tendency for soil surface albedo to decrease as a power decay function with increasing biochar application rate, depending on soil moisture content, biochar application method and land use. Surface application of biochar resulted in strong reductions in soil surface albedo even at relatively low application rates. As a first assessment of the implications for climate change mitigation of these biochar–albedo relationships, we applied a first order global energy balance model to compare negative radiative forcings (from avoided CO 2 emissions) with positive radiative forcings (from reduced soil surface albedos). For a global-scale biochar application equivalent to 120 t ha −1 , we obtained reductions in negative radiative forcings of 5 and 11% for croplands and 11 and 23% for grasslands, when incorporating biochar into the topsoil or applying it to the soil surface, respectively. For a lower global biochar application rate (equivalent to 10 t ha −1 ), these reductions amounted to 13 and 44% for croplands and 28 and 94% for grasslands. Thus, our findings revealed the importance of including changes in soil surface albedo in studies assessing the net climate change mitigation potential of biochar, and we discuss the urgent need for field studies and more detailed spatiotemporal modelling.
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Biochar changes the soil surface albedo, which may result in increasing variability in soil moisture.
“Biochar changes the soil surface albedo (Verheijen et al., 2013), which may result in an increasing variability in soil moisture.”
From Biochar improves maize growth by alleviation of nutrient stress in a moderately acidic low-input Nepalese soil (2018) · cites this paper as Verheijen et al., 2013
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- Authors
- Verheijen, F. G. A., Jeffery, S., van der Velde, M., Penížek, V., Beland, M., Bastos, A. C., & Keizer, J. J.
- Affiliations
- Centro de Estudos do Ambiente e do Mar (PT)
- Wageningen University & Research (NL)
- Czech University of Life Sciences Prague (CZ)
- Corresponding author
- Verheijen, Frank G A
- Venue
- Environmental Research Letters
- Publisher
- IOP Publishing
- Published
- 2013-10-16
- Volume
- 8
- Issue
- 4
- Pages
- 044008
- ISSN
- 1748-9326 (ISSN-L)
- OpenAlex
- W1999739813
- Cited by
- 52
- References
- 31
- Citations by year
- 2026: 3 · 2025: 6 · 2024: 4 · 2023: 9 · 2022: 3 · 2021: 3 · 2020: 5 · 2019: 2 · 2018: 3 · 2017: 2 · 2016: 3 · 2015: 3 · 2014: 4 · 2013: 2
- FWCI
- 5.78
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- gold
- doi.org
- Licence
- Locations
- Environmental Research Letters (publishedVersion, cc-by)
- IIASA PURE (International Institute of Applied Systems Analysis) (acceptedVersion)
- DOAJ (DOAJ: Directory of Open Access Journals) (submittedVersion)
- Socio-Environmental Systems Modeling (submittedVersion)
- Portuguese National Funding Agency for Science, Research and Technology (RCAAP Project by FCT) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Data Archiving and Networked Services (DANS) (submittedVersion, other-oa)
- Funders
- Grantová Agentura České Republiky (GA526/09/1762)
- Joint Research Centre
- Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (SFRH/BPD/74108/2010)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Carbon and Nitrogen Dynamics
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Fire effects on ecosystems
- Physical Sciences › Environmental Science › Global and Planetary Change › Land Use and Ecosystem Services
- Keywords
- biochar, radiative forcing, climate change mitigation, biochar application rate, soil moisture, energy balance model, cropland, grassland, greenhouse gas emissions
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