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Global Fire Emissions Database, Version 2 (GFEDv2)
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Revision Date: June 6, 2014

Please note that this version was superseded by Version 2.1 on 2007/06/28.

Follow this link to the latest version:

Randerson, J.T., G.R. van der Werf, L. Giglio, G.J. Collatz, and P.S. Kasibhatla. 2013. Global Fire Emissions Database, Version 2 (GFEDv2.1). Data set. Available on-line [http://daac.ornl.gov/] from Oak Ridge National Laboratory Distributed Active Archive Center, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, USA.  http://dx.doi.org/10.3334/ORNLDAAC/849

Contact ORNL DAAC User Services (uso@daac.ornl.gov) if you need additional assistance.


Summary:

This data set consists of 1 degree x 1 degree gridded monthly burned area, fuel loads, combustion completeness, and fire emissions of carbon (C), carbon dioxide (CO2), carbon monoxide (CO), methane (CH4), non-methane hydrocarbons (NMHC), molecular hydrogen (H2), nitrogen oxides (NOx), nitrous oxide (N2O), particulate matter (PM2.5), total particulate matter (TPM), total carbon (TC), organic carbon (OC), and black carbon (BC) for the time period January 1997 - December 2004. The data set was compiled using satellite data and the Carnegie-Ames-Stanford Approach (CASA) biogeochemical model. Burned area from 2001-2004 was derived from active fire and 500-m burned area data from MODIS (Giglio et al., 2006). ATSR and VIRS satellite data were used to extend the burned area time series back to 1997 (Arino et al., 1999; Giglio et al., 2003; Van der Werf et al., 2004). Fuel loads and net flux from terrestrial ecosystems were estimated as the balance between net primary production, heterotrophic respiration, and biomass burning, using time varying inputs of precipitation, temperature, solar radiation, and satellite-derived fractional absorbed photosynthetically active radiation. Tropical and boreal peatland emissions were also considered, using a global wetland cover map (Matthews and Fung, 1987) to modify surface and belowground fuel availability. The data set also includes monthly estimates of the C4 fraction of carbon emissions that can be used to construct the 13C isotope ratio (Randerson et al., 2005).

The data files are in space delimited ASCII format. For each subject (e.g., burned area, fuel loads, combustion completeness, or individual fire emission species), all monthly files for the 8-year period are combined in one zipped file.

Version 2 Note: This data set is intended for use for large-scale modeling studies. It supersedes and replaces the Global Fire Emissions Database, Version 1 (GFEDv1) which was archived by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory Distributed Active Archive Center in 2005. The Version 2 data set will be updated when new satellite data become available.

Release and Update History of the Global Fire Emissions Database

Updates to this data set will be made periodically.  Please contact ORNL DAAC User Services so that we can add you to our e-mail distribution list for update notices.

Date Release and Update History ORNL DAAC Notes
December 21, 2005 GFED Release 1  
December 21, 2005 ORNL DAAC Global Fire Emissions Database, Version 1 (GFEDv1) Initial release archived
  GFED Release 2  
May 31, 2006 Global Fire Emissions Database, Version 2 (GFEDv2) Superseded and replaced v1

Data Citation:

Cite this data set as follows:

Randerson, J. T., G. R. van der Werf, L. Giglio, G. J. Collatz, and P. S. Kasibhatla. 2006. Global Fire Emissions Database, Version 2 (GFEDv2). Data set. Available on-line [http://daac.ornl.gov/] from Oak Ridge National Laboratory Distributed Active Archive Center, Oak Ridge, Tennessee, U.S.A. doi:10.3334/ORNLDAAC/834.

Additional citation for this data set:

Randerson, J. T., G. R. van der Werf, G .J. Collatz, L. Giglio, C. J. Still, P. Kasibhatla, J. B. Miller, J. W. C. White, R. S. DeFries, and E. S. Kasischke. 2005. Fire emissions from C3 and C4 vegetation and their influence on interannual variability of atmospheric CO2 and d13CO2. Global Biogeochemical Cycles. 19: GB2019, doi:10.1029/2004GB002366.

References:

Andreae, M. O. and P. Merlet. 2001. Emission of trace gases and aerosols from biomass burning. Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 15: 955-966, 2000GB001382.

Arino, O., J.-M. Rosaz, and P. Goloub. 1999. The ATSR World Fire Atlas. A synergy with 'Polder' aerosol products. Earth Observation Quarterly, 1-6.

Giglio, L., J. D. Kendall, and R. Mack. 2003. A multi-year active fire dataset for the tropics derived from the TRMM VIRS. International Journal of Remote Sensing, 24: 4505-4525.

Giglio, L., G. R. van der Werf, J. T. Randerson, G. J. Collatz, and P. Kasibhatla. 2006. Global estimation of burned area using MODIS active fire observations. Atmos. Chem. Phys., 6: 957-974.

Matthews, E. and I. Fung. 1987. Methane emission from natural wetlands: Global area, distribution and environmental characteristics of sources. Global Biogeochemical Cycles, 1; 61-86.

Randerson, J. T., G. R. van der Werf, G .J. Collatz, L. Giglio, C. J. Still, P. Kasibhatla, J. B. Miller, J. W. C. White, R. S. DeFries, and E. S. Kasischke. 2005. Fire emissions from C3 and C4 vegetation and their influence on interannual variability of atmospheric CO2 and d13CO2. Global Biogeochemical Cycles. 19: GB2019, doi:10.1029/2004GB002366.

Van der Werf, G. R., J. T. Randerson, G. J. Collatz, L. Giglio, P. S. Kasibhatla, A. Avelino, S. C. Olsen, and E.S. Kasischke. 2004. Continental-scale partitioning of fire emissions during the 1997-2001 El Nino / La Nina period. Science, 303: 73-76.

Van der Werf, G. R., J. T. Randerson, L. Giglio, G. J. Collatz, and P. S. Kasibhatla. Interannual variability in global biomass burning emission from 1997 to 2004. Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics Discussion (submitted).

Data Format:

Each data file contains 360 columns and 180 rows (and has a 1 degree latitude by 1 degree longitude spatial resolution, with a monthly temporal resolution). The upper left corner of each file is at 180.0W, 90.0N, and the lower right corner is at 180.0E, 90.0S. For each subject (e.g., burned area, fuel loads, combustion completeness, or individual fire emission species), all monthly files for the 8-year period are combined in one zipped file. Uncompressed they are in space delimited ASCII format. The data files are named as follows:

SUBJECT_YEARMONTH.txt

where:

SUBJECT is:

BF -- Burned fraction. Burned area equals the product of BF and gridcell area.
FL -- Fuel loads (g C / m2). This is not identical to total biomass.
CC -- Combustion completeness. This is the fraction of the fuel load actually combusted (unitless, 0-1).
C4 -- Fraction of emissions stemming from the combustion of C4 plants (unitless, 0-1).
VEG -- Vegetation map used to convert C to trace gas emissions. 1 = savanna / herbaceous vegetation, 2 = tropical forest, 3 = extratropical forest.
C -- Carbon emissions (g C / m2 / month). Dry matter (DM) equals C / 0.45.
CO2 -- CO2 emissions (g CO2 / m2 / month).
CO -- CO emissions (g CO / m2 / month)

Etc, also for CH4, NMHC, H2, NOx, N2O, PM2p5 (PM2.5), TPM, TC, OC, BC.

Units used for trace gas and aerosol species follow the conventions used in Andreae and Merlet (2001).

MONTH is: 01 for January, 02 for February, etc.

for example: CO2_199701.txt is the CO2 emissions file for January 1997; CH4_199702.txt is the CH4 emissions file for February 1997; etc.

Additional information about the methodology, data format, and parameters measured is found in the companion file: global_fire_emissions_v2_readme.pdf.

Document Information:

Document Review Date:

2006/4/26

Document Curator:

webmaster@www.daac.ornl.gov

Document URL:

http://daac.ornl.gov