An open system for CO2 and CH4 flux tracking at ICTS-Doñana

Doñana National Park is located in the southwest of the Iberian Peninsula. This protected area faces significant environmental challenges as frequent and extreme drought events, underground water overuse and its role as an European biodiversity hotspot. The contribution of this National Park as a ecosystem service for carbon and methane reduction is essential in SW Europe. Understanding the dynamics is essential to advance our knowledge of climate change effects on natural land covers. The four main ecosystem types of Doñana: xeric scrubland, characterized by its drought resistance, hydrophytic scrubland, flooded during autumn and winter, xeric fixed sand dunes characterized by Juniper forest and the seasonal marshland, grasslands and aquatic plants dependent on the annual hydroperiod. In-situ data collected by Energy and Carbon Flux Towers (Eddy covariance, EC) installed in the four ecosystems. This allow measure the contribution for each ecosystems to climate change. The aim of the facility is contribute to the understanding of the effect od the global change in national park as Doñana by means of an Open System for CO2 and CH4 Flux tracking. In order to investigate the carbon cycle and its relationship to water and energy cycles in different ecosystems, four flux towers owned by the Unique Scientific and Technical Infrastructure ICTS-Doñana have been deployed in the main ecosystems of Doñana. These flux towers were installed with a wide sensor network (biomet and others). This embedded and automatic powerful processing software generates information gathered by users. This information is published in real time due the radiolinks communication system network in Doñana enabling to push information in real time in ICTS-Doñana website. This instrumentation offers a wide and suitable solution to monitor climate change. Doñana National Park is the most important and valued biodiversity hotspot in Europe. This open software platform software provides a great tool to process huge information volumes and makes easier the complex task of the evaluation of different parameters. The information generated is published for public access and let scientists of different countries to examine how carbon and methane flux changes with climate, seasons, and land management practices.