Proposal of Forest Restoration Plan for Forest Fire Damage for Preservation of Permafrost in Alpine Region of Mongolia

Mongolia has a continental climate with a topography that decreases in altitude from north to south and west to east, forming a forest area - grassland area - desert area from north to south. Due to Mongolia's unique climatic and topographical characteristics, Mongolia's ecosystem has spatial features in which water necessary for living things supplies from northwest to southeast. The alpine forests in northern Mongolia, which occupy less than 10% of the total land area, serve as an essential water source for the southern grasslands and deserts. In particular, permafrost, sporadically distributed in alpine forests, exists mainly in forested areas and is an important water source in the southern deserts. However, as the intensity and frequency of fires increase due to the decrease in precipitation and increase in temperature due to climate change, forest damage is increasing, and the consequent loss of permafrost is accelerating drought and desertification in the southern region. Therefore, the ultimate goal of this study is to preserve the permafrost layer by restoring areas damaged by forest fires in Mongolia. The study period includes the entire territory of Mongolia spatially and temporally from 2014 to 2021. We qualitatively studied the effects of fire-induced damage in forests on permafrost loss and drought. Through qualitative research, we performed a theoretical logic analysis of each phenomenon's interrelationship. Based on this logic, we derived forest areas damaged by fire using satellite image-based spatial data and analyzed it in Google Earth Engine. Hansen Global Forest Change v1.9 dataset, MCD64A1.061 MODIS Burned Area Monthly Global 500m dataset, WWF HydroATLAS Basins Level 12 dataset, and Sentinel-2 image collection dataset were used as spatial data used in the study. In addition, we used forest field survey data conducted during the period from May to September 2014. All the derived damaged areas were forest areas with permafrost, and we classified damaged areas into three types according to restoration priority. In the last step, we proposed a restoration plan for each kind of damage caused by fire through a literature review. 

 

Acknowledgement :

This work was supported by Korea Environment Industry &Technology Institute (KEITI) through "Climate Change R&D Project for New Climate Regime.", funded by Korea Ministry of Environment (MOE) (2022003570003)