CarbonTracker Europe

What's Different

What's the difference to CarbonTracker for North America (I)?
CarbonTracker North America and CarbonTracker Europe are made by two separate, but collaborating, teams of researchers in the United States and Europe. CarbonTracker North America was first released in 2007, while the first release of CarbonTracker Europe was in 2009. CarbonTracker Europe was developed from the CT2007B release of CarbonTracker North America and hence should be compared to this older version. CarbonTracker North America is updated each year in October, while CarbonTracker Europe is not on a fixed release schedule as shown in the image below.

What's the difference to CarbonTracker for North America (II)?
There are also differences in the way the system was set-up for both products. These are listed below:

CT Europe uses a large set of CarboEurope CO2 mole fraction observations not available in CT North America
CT North America uses CSIRO CO2 mole fraction observations which were not assimilated in CT Europe
CT Europe uses a TM5 two-way nested transport grid over Europe instead of over North America
CT Europe uses a different seasonality of European fossil fuel emissions
CT Europe has an increased number of European vegetation types (38 instead of 19 possible types) for which weekly parameters are optimized
CT Europe had 2007 fire estimates available, weher CT North America used climatological 2007 fire fluxes.

How do flux estimates from CarbonTracker Europe compare with other releases?

The tables below summarize the estimated surface fluxes for combined natural sources derived from the current CarbonTracker Europe release (CTE2008) and the latest North American release (CT2008) of CarbonTracker. The uncertainty in the estimates is the one standard deviation from the filter estimate. Units are PgC/yr (1015 gC/year, or billion metric ton C/year, or 3.7 billion metric ton CO2/year).

Table 1: Average natural flux (biosphere + ocean + fire) estimated from CTE2008 [2001-2007], and CT2008 [2001-2007]. The uncertainty is the one standard deviation from the filter estimate. Units are PgC/yr.

2001-2007

Transcom region CTE2008 CT2008

North American Boreal -0.21 ± 0.41 -0.12 ± 0.37

North American Temperate -0.61 ± 0.42 -0.59 ± 0.44

South American Tropical +0.07 ± 0.70 +0.18 ± 0.68

South American Temperate -0.01 ± 0.79 -0.05 ± 0.79

Northern Africa +0.07 ± 0.50 +0.03 ± 0.51

Southern Africa +0.20 ± 0.61 +0.16 ± 0.62

Eurasia Boreal -0.78 ± 1.18 -0.82 ± 1.17

Eurasia Temperate -0.35 ± 0.55 -0.35 ± 0.54

Tropical Asia +0.19 ± 0.21 +0.19 ± 0.21

Australia -0.07 ± 0.32 -0.07 ± 0.31

Europe -0.16 ± 0.47 -0.25 ± 0.74

North Pacific Temperate -0.34 ± 0.38 -0.43 ± 0.38

West Pacific Tropical +0.02 ± 0.02 +0.02 ± 0.02

East Pacific Tropical +0.36 ± 0.23 +0.41 ± 0.23

South Pacific Temperate -0.61 ± 0.47 -0.53 ± 0.46

Northern Ocean -0.30 ± 0.18 -0.28 ± 0.19

North Atlantic Temperate -0.33 ± 0.39 -0.38 ± 0.41

Atlantic Tropical +0.18 ± 0.15 +0.19 ± 0.15

South Atlantic Temperate -0.15 ± 0.25 -0.13 ± 0.25

Southern Ocean -0.17 ± 0.31 -0.18 ± 0.31

Indian Tropical +0.15 ± 0.12 +0.16 ± 0.12

Indian Temperate -0.66 ± 0.24 -0.67 ± 0.23

Non-optimized -0.00 ± 0.00 -0.00 ± 0.00

Table 2: Average natural flux (biosphere + ocean + fire) estimated from CTE2008 [2001-2007], and CT2008 [2001-2007]. The uncertainty is the one standard deviation from the filter estimate. Units are PgC/yr.

2001-2007

Transcom region CTE2008 CT2008

Northern Land -2.11 ± 1.52 -2.12 ± 1.64

Northern Oceans -0.98 ± 0.59 -1.08 ± 0.61

Northern -3.09 ± 1.63 -3.21 ± 1.75

Tropical Land +0.33 ± 0.89 +0.39 ± 0.86

Tropical Ocean +0.72 ± 0.34 +0.78 ± 0.34

Tropical +1.05 ± 0.95 +1.17 ± 0.93

Southern Land +0.11 ± 1.04 +0.05 ± 1.05

Ocean in South -1.58 ± 0.67 -1.51 ± 0.65

Southern -1.47 ± 1.24 -1.46 ± 1.23

Americas -0.76 ± 1.20 -0.58 ± 1.18

Atlantic and Arctic -0.60 ± 0.56 -0.60 ± 0.57

Eurasia and Africa +0.11 ± 0.92 -0.05 ± 1.09

Indian Ocean -0.50 ± 0.26 -0.51 ± 0.26

Asia -1.01 ± 1.38 -1.04 ± 1.36

Pacific Ocean -0.57 ± 0.63 -0.53 ± 0.61

All Land -1.67 ± 2.05 -1.68 ± 2.12

All Ocean -1.84 ± 1.08 -1.82 ± 1.09

Global -3.50 ± 2.32 -3.50 ± 2.38

North America -0.82 ± 0.57 -0.71 ± 0.57

Extratropical Eurasia -1.30 ± 1.40 -1.41 ± 1.53

Temperate Northern Ocean -0.67 ± 0.57 -0.80 ± 0.59

Temperate Southern Ocean -1.41 ± 0.64 -1.33 ± 0.63

Tropical and Southern Land +0.45 ± 1.37 +0.45 ± 1.35

Tropical Pacific +0.38 ± 0.24 +0.43 ± 0.23

Temperate Oceans -2.09 ± 0.80 -2.14 ± 0.81

High Latitude Oceans -0.47 ± 0.34 -0.46 ± 0.34

Extratropical Oceans -2.56 ± 0.94 -2.60 ± 0.95

Tropical and Southern Oceans -0.86 ± 0.86 -0.74 ± 0.84

Northern Boreal Land -0.99 ± 1.25 -0.94 ± 1.23

Northern Temperate Land -1.12 ± 0.83 -1.19 ± 1.03

Tropical land minus northern land +2.44 ± 1.76 +2.52 ± 1.86

High North Ocean and Boreal Land -1.29 ± 1.27 -1.22 ± 1.25

Northern Temperate Land and Ocean -1.79 ± 1.01 -1.99 ± 1.19

Southern Temperate Land and Ocean -1.30 ± 1.22 -1.28 ± 1.22

Tropical and Southern Land and Ocean -0.41 ± 1.62 -0.29 ± 1.59

Tropics and south minus north +2.68 ± 2.27 +2.92 ± 2.35

Tropical and southern land minus northern land +2.56 ± 2.04 +2.57 ± 2.13

	Wageningen University Meteorology and Air Quality Department