Belowground Biomass Carbon Indicator (BBCI)

The BBCI provides an estimation of the amount of carbon stocks in tree roots. Together with the AGCI and SOCI, it provides a complete overview of the total carbon stored in forest areas (trees and soil). Roots are a long term and stable carbon sink, accounting for about 0.2 - 0.4 of the above ground biomass across biogeographical regions(Reich et al., 2014) of the total tree biomass. Moreover, well stablished and developed root systems provide various ecosystem services related to improved soil quality (higher cation exchange capacity and nutrient turnaround) and soil characteristics (improved aeration, soil porosity) as well as several soil-water-atmosphere interactions. As a derived dataset, the BBCI inherits some of the characteristics from the original data, such as the spatial (100 m) and temporal (year 2017) resolution. In addition, water bodies, urban areas, permanent snow/ice and bare area land cover classes (Land Cover CCI, 2017) are masked.