Land-Use Dependent Variability of Soil Organic Carbon Pool across Urban Green Spaces in Dehradun, Uttarakhand
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.36808/if/2026/v152i7/171363Keywords:
Soil organic carbon (SOC), LULUCF, bulk density, urban green spaces.Abstract
In Indian Himalayan cities, soil organic carbon (SOC) pool measurement across diverse urban land-use categories is still largely undefined, despite being crucial for urban carbon accounting. Using the IPCC (2006) Land Use, Land-Use Change and Forestry (LULUCF) methodology at a standardized 0-30 cm depth across 135 samples from 34 sites, the present study estimated and compared SOC pools across five major urban land-use categories in Dehradun, Uttarakhand: Forests (n = 79), Institutes (n = 37), Parks and Gardens (n = 7), Rail (n = 2) and Roads (n = 10). The Walkley and Black (1934) wet oxidation method was used to measure the content of soil organic carbon and the core sampler method was used to determine bulk density. The Kruskal-Wallis test, Mann-Whitney U pairwise comparisons with Bonferroni correction and Spearman rank correlation were all used in statistical analysis. The overall SOC pool varied from 5.32 to 95.34 t C ha-1, with an average of 48.55t C ha-1. A statistically significant land-use dependent hierarchy was established (H = 62.09, df = 4, p ˂ 0.001): Parks and Gardens (82.67 t C ha-1) ˃ Forest (59.89 t C ha-1) ˃ Road (26.05 t C ha-1) = Institute (25.79 t C ha-1) ˃ Rail (14.65 t C ha-1). All the samples (100%) in the Parks and Gardens category were categorized as High (˃ 65 t C ha-1). In all samples, SOC concentration (%) was found to be the primary driver of SOC pool variation (Spearman ρ = 0.952, p ˂ 0.001), while bulk density and coarse fragment fraction did not significantly affect the overall level. The study provides the first baseline SOC dataset for Dehradun’s urban green spaces and emphasizes the importance of giving institutional greening, roadside vegetation restoration and park maintenance as top priority for SOC-informed urban land management in Himalayan foothill cities.
References
Blake G.R. and Hartge K.H. (1986). Bulk density. In: Klute, A., Ed., Methods of Soil Analysis, Part 1—Physical and Mineralogical Methods, 2nd Edition, Agronomy Monograph 9, American Society of Agronomy—Soil Science Society of America, Madison, 363-382. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2136/sssabookser5.1.2ed.c13
Churkina G., Brown D.G. and Keoleian G. (2010). Carbon stored in human settlements: the conterminous United States. Global Change Biology, 16(1): 135-143. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2486.2009.02002.x
Edmondson J.L., Davies Z.G., McHugh N., Gaston K.J. and Leake J.R. (2012). Organic carbon hidden in urban ecosystems. Scientific Reports, 2: 9 DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/srep00963
Edmondson J.L., Davies Z.G., McCormack S.A., Gaston K.J.and Leak J.R. (2014). Land-cover effects on soil organic carbon stocks in a European city. Science of the Total Environment, 472: 444-453. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2013.11.025
Gautam M.K., Singh S.K., Tripathi S.K. and Sahoo U.K. (2008). Plant diversity and structure of sub-tropical Shorea robusta forests of Doon Valley, India. Indian Forester, 134(3): 383-395.
Guo H., Enzai Du, Terrer C. and Jackson Robert B. (2024a). Global distribution of surface soil organic carbon in urban greenspaces. Nature Communications, Jan 27;15:806. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-44887-y
Guo Y., Han J., Bao H., Wo Y., Shen L., Xu X., Chen Z., Smith P. and Mohamed A. (2024b). A systematic analysis and review of soil organic carbon in urban greenspaces. Science of the Total Environment, 948: 174788. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.scitotenv.2024.174788
Gupta M.K., Panwar V.P. and Kumar M. (2018). Carbon sequestration: organic carbon stock in the soils along with elevation gradient under different land uses in Uttarakhand State. Indian Forester, 144(3): 223-231.
IMD (2012). Climate of Dehradun. India Meteorological Department, Pune.
IPCC (2006). IPCC Guidelines for National Greenhouse Gas Inventories. Volume 4: Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Geneva, Switzerland.
Jobbagy E.G. and Jackson R.B. (2000). The vertical distribution of soil organic carbon and its relation to climate and vegetation. Ecological Applications, 10(2): 423-436. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1890/1051-0761(2000)010[0423:TVDOSO]2.0.CO;2
Lal R. (2004). Soil carbon sequestration impacts on global climate change and food security. Science, 304(5677): 16231627. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1097396
Lorenz K. and Lal R. (2009). Biogeochemical C and N cycles in urban soils. Environment International, 35(1): 1-8. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envint.2008.05.006
Lorenz K. and Lal R. (2015). Managing soil carbon stocks to enhance the resilience of urban ecosystems. Carbon Management, 6(2): 35-50. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/17583004.2015.1071182
Post W.M. and Kwon K.C. (2000). Soil carbon sequestration and land-use change: processes and potential. Global Change Biology, 6(3): 317-327. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1046/j.1365-2486.2000.00308.x
Pouyat R.V., Yesilonis I.D. and Nowak D.J. (2006). Carbon storage by urban soils in the United States. Journal of Environmental Quality, 35(4): 1566-1575. DOI: https://doi.org/10.2134/jeq2005.0215
Pouyat R.V., Yesilonis I.D. and Golubiewski N.E. (2009). A comparison of soil organic carbon stocks between residential turf grass and native soil. Urban Ecosystems, 12(1): 45-62. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11252-008-0059-6
Raciti S.M., Hutyra L.R. and Finzi A.C. (2012). Depleted soil carbon and nitrogen pools beneath impervious surfaces. Environmental Pollution, 164: 248-251. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envpol.2012.01.046
Sarkar D., Das Gupta A. and Panda D.K. (2022). Biomass carbon and soil nutrient status in urban green sites at foothills of Eastern Himalayas: implication for carbon management. Cleaner and Responsible Consumption, 6: 100068.
Singh T.P., Rawat R.S., Rawat V.R.S. and Gupta M.K. (2016). Soil organic carbon stocks under different forest types in India. Indian Forester, 142(3): 211-218.
Vasenev V.I., Stoorvogel J.J. and Vasenev I.I. (2014). How to map soil organic carbon stocks in highly urbanized regions? Geoderma, 227: 103-115. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoderma.2014.03.007
Walkley A. and Black I.A. (1934). An examination of the Degtjareff method for determining soil organic matter, and a proposed modification of the chromic acid titration method. Soil Science, 37(1): 29-38. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1097/00010694-193401000-00003
Wani M., Mahajan D.M. and Shirurkar D. (2025). Soil organic carbon stocks and spatial variability in urban green spaces: insights from the Kalyan-Dombivli Municipal Corporation, Mumbai Metropolitan Region, India. Journal of the Indian Society of Soil Science, 73(4): 391-399. DOI: https://doi.org/10.5958/0974-0228.2025.00039.3
Zhang R., Cheng X., Chen W., Lu F., Liu S., Shi H., Ni Z., Chen Y., Li D., Zhou Y. and Shi Y. (2025). Effects of different urban vegetation cover and green space types on soil greenhouse gas emissions and carbon sequestration. Frontiers in Environmental Science, 13: 1555628. DOI: https://doi.org/10.3389/fenvs.2025.1555628
Downloads
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Unless otherwise stated, copyright or similar rights in all materials presented on the site, including graphical images, are owned by Indian Forester.
