Summary of the Final Report of Research Results1) Title of the proposed researchInteraction Between Atmospheric Greenhouse Gases & Terrestrial Biospheric Processes Over
Indian Subcontinent
2) Principal Investigator (PI) and Co-Investigators (Co-Is)
PI:

Dr. R.P. Singh

Co-I:3) PI’s affiliation
Land Hydrology Division
Geosciences, Hydrology, Cryosphere Sciences and Applications Group (EPSA)Space Applications Centre, ISRO
Ahmedabad-380015

4) Summary of the Final Report of Research Results(1 or 2 pages or at least 400 words in single spacing, including Figures and Tables if any)Increasing human population and industrialization are a major cause of concern related to climatechange. Inter annual increase in concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) in atmosphere is an importantindicator of human induced climate change. Interaction of vegetation with atmosphere in terms ofphotosynthetic uptake of atmospheric CO2 plays important role in defining seasonal distribution of
CO2 over different regions. GOSAT data provided valuable scientific observations on variability ofgreenhouse gases (CO2, CH4) and biospheric carbon fluxes over Indian subcontinent. Study was
focused on (1) analysis of seasonal and inter annual variability of atmospheric CO2 and CH4
concentration (2) correlation between changes in carbon dioxide and Methane concentration withrespect to changes in biophysical parameters (NDVI as indicator of Vegetation growthcharacteristics) and (3) spatio-temporal variability of terrestrial biospheric fluxes over the different
agro-climatic zones of India and its dependence on various regional climatic factors like insolation,
precipitation and mean monthly temperature. SCIAMACHY derived CO2 and CH4 data as well as
NDVI data from EOS-MODIS and SPOT VEGETATION satellites were used in analysis along withGOSAT data products. Temporal data analysis of average atmospheric CO2 concentration
over India showed characteristic seasonal cycle with high in summer (April and May)and low during monsoon season (Sept and Oct.). NDVI showed an inverse behavior with
CO2 concentration showing highest value in monsoon period (Sept. and Oct.) and lowest
in summer (April & May). Empirical model was fitted to relate the inverse relationship.

CO2 (in ppm) = 377.88 NDVI -0.006
Negative Correlation (r = -0.49) was observed between NDVI and CO2 values. Overall
4.2 ppm difference in CO2 was observed during the seasonal cycle

Figure 1. Inverse relationship between average monthly CO2 and NDVI season cycle over India
observed from GOSAT and MODIS data.

It was observed that consistently higher CO2 was detected by GOSAT over tropical dry
deciduous forest (Ranthambhor site) in comparison to moist deciduous forest (Kanharegion). Overall an increasing trend was observed in atmospheric CO2 in both
SCIAMACHY as well as GOSAT observations. The CH4 concentration was foundrelatively uniform over India during March period. A characteristic increase in CH4
concentration over India was observed during September data in comparison to June
data. The high CH4 concentration during September is associated with the rice crop
sown in Kharif season.

The major sources for CH4 in the Indian region are ricepaddies, wetlands and ruminants. High concentrations of CH4 were observed overeastern coastal regions which have predominantly rice crop. The concentration is
generally lower in the western regions.

Figure 2. The SCIAMACHY (SCIA) and GOSAT data of CO2 over India compared withground NOAA flask data at Mauna Loa (MLO) and Assekrem (ASK).
Study on understanding the spatio-temporal variability of terrestrial biospheric fluxes
over the agro-climatic zones of India was carried out and its dependence on various
regional climatic factors like precipitation, temperature and incident solar radiation
was analysed. The optimised mean biospheric flux varied between -0.47 (October) to0.37 (April) gC m-2 day-1, where negative sign indicates a net uptake of carbon from theatmosphere and positive sign denotes release of CO2 to the atmosphere by theterrestrial biosphere. This is in accordance with the high vegetation cover during themonsoon season leading to more uptake of carbon whereas the hot and dry conditions
during summer months result in release of carbon to the atmosphere. Maximum
variability in fluxes was obtained for north-eastern region (-2.18 to +1.38 gC m-2 day-1)
of India followed by the Western Ghats (-1.55 to 1.24 gC m-2 day-1). The dry region ofRajasthan showed extremely low variability with values ranging from -0.1 to +0.1 gC
m-2 day-1.

JanFebMar

AprMayJunJulAug

SepOctNovDecFigure 3. Optimised mean monthly terrestrial biospheric flux for the study region.
Monthly mean calculated by taking pixel wise average of images corresponding to samemonth of different years.
Precipitation showed negative correlation (r<0) with biospheric flux in the arid andsemi-arid regions of Rajasthan, Gujarat and parts of Maharashtra and Karnataka,
upper and trans-Gangetic plains. Precipitation in these regions results in conducive
environment for vegetation growth and leads to carbon sequestration (-ve flux). Similar
to insolation, temperature showed positive correlation with biospheric carbon flux inmost parts of the country except for regions of North Himalayas, Arunachal Pradesh,and parts of Gangetic plains. High temperatures in arid and semi-arid regions are notfavorable for vegetation growth and thus, result in net release of carbon to theatmosphere from the terrestrial biosphere (+ve flux).

5) List of publications relating to the proposed research(In addition, if there are any publication plans, please also describe them as well.)
1. Prasad P., Rastogi S., and Singh R.P., (2014), Study of satellite retrieved CO2 andCH4 concentration over India. Advances in Space Research, 54, 1933-1940.
2. Pradhan, R., Goroshi, S. K., and Singh, R. P., (2014), Spatial and seasonal
characterization of terrestrial biospheric carbon flux over India using GOSAT
data, Int. Arch. Photogramm. Remote Sens. Spatial Inf. Sci., XL-8, 617-621, doi:
10.5194/isprsarchives-XL-8-617-2014, 2014.
3. Goroshi S. K., Singh R.P, Panigrahy S., And Parihar J.S. (2011), Seasonalvariability of Methane and Vegetation over India: An analysis using
ENVISAT-SCIAMACHY and SPOT-VEGETATION NDVI data. J. Ind. Soc.
Remote Sensing DOI 10.1007/s12524-011-097-z.
4. Navalgund R.R. and Singh R.P. (2011), Climate Change Studies using Space
based Observation. J. Ind. Soc. Remote Sensing, DOI 10.1007/s12524-011-092-4.
5. Panigrahy S., Manjunath K.R., Singh R.P., Chhabra A., andParihar J.S.

(2010), Spatio-temporal pattern of green house gases over India and up-scalingof methane emission from agriculture using space technology. NNRMS Bulletin,
NNRMS (B)-35, December 2010.
6. Singh R.P., Goroshi, S.K, Panigrahy, S., and Parihar, J.S. (2010), Variability ofAtmospheric Greenhouse Gases Concentration over India. Kyoto International
Conference Centre, Japan, January 28 – 29, 2010.