Estimation of carbon sequestration in Astragalus rangelands of Markazi province (Case study: Malmir rangeland in Shazand region)

Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have substantially increased in recent decades. Land management practices, however, offer opportunities to mitigate the rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration through sequestration of this additional carbon via storage in plant biomass and soil organic matter in a process termed terrestrial C sequestration. Rangelands ecosystems have a large potential to sequester C because they occupy about half of the world's land area. In Iran, the Astragalus rangelands with about 17 million hectare area have 10% of the country land area and have the important role in carbon sequestration. In order to investigation the role and potential of Astragalus rangelands in carbon sequestration, a study was carried out at a key area of Astragalus verus-Bromus tomentellus vegetation type in Malmir rangeland site, Shazand township of Markazi province and the content of aboveground and underground biomass carbon, litter carbon and soil organic carbon was determined. The results showed that the total carbon sequestration per hectare was 32.95 ton and 87.43 % of total carbon sequestration was soil organic carbon. The results of biomass carbon distribution showed that the carbon content in aerial biomass was higher than underground biomass. Correlation and stepwise regression analysis revealed that the content of carbon sequestration was positively related to Astragalus height and volume, aerial and underground biomass, total biomass, litter amount and soil organic carbon (SOC) content. It was concluded that the Astragalus rangelands have a large potential to sequester carbon and the soil is most important sink for organic carbon storage in this rangelands.