biomass and combustion characteristics of secondary mixed deciduous forests in eastern ghats of...

Atmospheric Environment 35 (2001) 3085–3095

Biomass and combustion characteristics of secondary mixeddeciduous forests in Eastern Ghats of India

V. Krishna Prasada,*, Yogesh Kanta, Prabhat K. Guptab, C. Sharmab,A.P. Mitrab, K.V.S. Badarinatha

aNational Remote Sensing Agency, Department of Space, Government of India, Balanagar, Hyderabad 500 037, IndiabNational Physical Laboratory, Dr. K.S. Krishnan Road, New Delhi-110 012, India

Received 19 July 2000; received in revised form 17 January 2001; accepted 27 January 2001

Abstract

Biomass quantities at three different sites in tropical moist mixed secondary deciduous forests before and afterburning have been quantified in the forest patches cleared for shifting cultivation purposes. The main objective of the

experiments was to study the spatial variability in the amount of biomass burnt and the contribution of differentcomponents viz., bole, branch, and mixed leaf litter in the burning process affecting the combustion factors. Speciescomposition at the three sites varied with respect to each other. The total density of species before burning at the three

sites for more than 10 cm diameter were found to be 3192 (site 1), 1194 (site 2) and 1444 (site 3) stems/area, respectively.Analysis of the results from girth-class and density relationships suggests that nearly 80% of the stems occurred in therange from 10–40 cm girth for site one, 64.2% in 10–55 cm girth class for the site two and more than 80% of stems in

10–40 cm girth class for the site three, indicating very poor and secondary nature of the forest. The fire intensity is foundto be high for site one with 60 847 kJ s�1m�1, when compared to 31 086 and 42 789 kJ s�1m�1 for second and third sites,respectively. The values are comparatively higher than the mean value of 2566 kJ s�1m�1 reported for savanna fires.The individual combustion completeness suggested that among the different components of biomass, branch material

with less than 10 cm and upto 5 cm dbh contributed to more than 60% of combustion. Mixed leaf litter contributed toabout more than 50% of individual combustion completeness at all the sites, with third site having the highest (84%).The contribution of dry biomass material having more than 70 cm diameter is found to be very low indicating that most

of the trunks were burnt superficially. The overall combustion completeness suggested that mixed leaf litter and branchmaterial contributed to most of the combustion. Of all the three sites, site three had been found to be having highestcombustion completeness of about 30.04% when compared to 20.18% and 16.1% for first and second sites,

respectively. In the study, comparison of combustion factors for different vegetation types has also been made. # 2001Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Biomass burning; Combustion factors; Tropical secondary mixed deciduous forests

1. Introduction

Biomass burning is widespread, especially in tropicsand serves to clear land for shifting cultivation, to

convert forests to agricultural and pastoral lands, and toremove the vegetation in order to promote agricultural

productivity and the growth of high yield grasses(Crutzen and Andreae, 1990). Biomass burning is animportant source of trace gas emissions, aerosols andhas important effects on atmospheric chemistry and the

radiation budget. More information on the biomassburning is necessary to better understand the sourcesand sinks of the atmospheric trace gases and their

atmospheric constituents. The importance of tracegases in the green house effect and their effects on

*Corresponding author. Tel./Fax: +91-40-3079677.

E-mail address: [email protected] (V.K. Prasad).

1352-2310/01/$ - see front matter # 2001 Elsevier Science Ltd. All rights reserved.

PII: S 1 3 5 2 - 2 3 1 0 ( 0 1 ) 0 0 1 2 5 - X

tropospheric chemistry has been reviewed in detail byearlier workers (Ramanathan et al., 1985; Crutzen, 1988;

Andreae, 1991). Further, results from the researchactivities conducted during the last two decades suggeststhat biomass burning has considerable effects on the

characteristics of the atmosphere and consequently onregional and global climate (Andreae et al., 1988;Crutzen and Andreae, 1990; Lacaux et al., 1996). Theimportance of biomass burning is well recognised in

International Global Atmospheric Chemistry (IGAC)and one of the initial IGAC activities, Biomass BurningExperiment (BIBEX): Impact on the Atmosphere and

Biosphere. The uncertainties with respect to quantifica-tion of trace gas emissions from land use changes aremainly attributed to lack of data on biomass quantities

that is susceptible for burning, exact amount of biomassburnt during different phase of combustion (combustionfactors) and changes in rates of deforestation and data

on secondary re-growth of the forests.Recent studies suggest that forests in India are likely

to come under increased pressure for meeting biomassdemands in the future. Clearing the forests for agri-

cultural use in tropical areas such as in India throughshifting cultivation is one of the most common processespracticed by the native people. In India, tropical

deciduous forests account for more than 40% of thedominating forest type when compared to other forests.These forests are prone to various types of biotic

pressures for meeting fuel wood and fodder demandsby the local people. The major sources of biomassburning in India is from shifting cultivation, accidentalfires, controlled burning, fire wood burning, burning

from agricultural residues, burning due to fire lines, etc.Although, there are no systematic surveys, with respectto the exact amount of biomass burnt from various

sources, considerable rough estimates exist in literature.It is estimated that, 63.5Mha of forests are prone toaccidental burns in India. Total biomass burnt annually

due to accidental fires is estimated to be 20.5Mha. TaskForce (1983) reported an annual area of 9956 km2 withrespect to shifting cultivation. National Land use and

Conservation Board, estimated, nearly 1.0Mha of forestarea to be affected annually due to shifting cultivation.Recent estimate in India by Forest Survey of India,(SFR, 1997), with respect to northeastern states suggest

that, 1875 km2 of forest area has been affected due toshifting cultivation. Biomass burning due to fire lines isestimated to be approximately 0.45–0.5Mha. Further,

recent estimates suggest that shifting cultivation activ-ities in India in general and mixed deciduous forests inparticular are estimated to be increasing at a rapid rate

(SFR, 1997). With respect to amount of biomass burntin India, it is estimated that, 592Tg of dry matter isburnt annually (Ahuja, 1991), compared to globally

estimated burnt dry matter of 8700Tg (Andreae, 1990),accounting for about, 7% of the global value. Of the

592Tg, nearly 250Tg of biomass in the form of fuelwood, dung, charcoal and agricultural residues is

estimated to be utilized by rural and urban people forextraction of useful heat energy, while other 342Tg isattributed from sources such as natural fires (48.1 Tg),

prescribed fires (13.9 Tg), burning of agricultural resi-dues (214Tg), prescribed burning from pastures(24.8 Tg), and slash and burn agriculture (41.3 Tg).Despite implementing one of the largest afforestation

programs in the world, carbon dioxide emissions fromthe forestry sector in India are projected to increaseto 29.3million tones during 2000 and to 77.3 million

tones by 2020 (ALGAS, 1998). However, most of theestimates are based on empirical methods and actualfield based measurements with respect to different green

house gases from various sources in general and biomassburning in particular are absent. Thus field basedmeasurements with respect onsite biomass estimations

and combustion characteristics gain importance, whichprovide valuable information for calculating the emis-sion factors. As a part of Indian Space ResearchOrganization Geosphere-Biosphere Program (ISRO-

GBP) studies, for the first time in India, studies onbiomass burning have been initiated and two fieldcampaigns with respect to quantification of biomass

burned, trace gas emissions, aerosol and UV-B studiesare attempted. The results of the first field campaignhave been discussed elsewhere (Prasad et al., 2000a, b;

Kant et al., 2000). In the present paper, results obtainedfrom the second field campaign with respect to biomassand combustion characteristics from the shifting cultiva-tion areas are discussed.

2. Forests of the study area

Rampa agency forms hilly northern part of EastGodavari District, Andhra Pradesh, India (Fig. 1).

Maredumulli forms one of the small provinces amongthe seven other provinces, which are densely covered byforests and are inhabited by the local tribal people. The

tribal people of the study area practice shifting cultiva-tion known as ‘Podu’. The forests of the study areacorrespond to southern moist mixed deciduous forests as

classified by Champion and Seth (1968). Vegetation inthe study area is of mixed deciduous type and can bedivided into three storeys, viz., the top storey havingtrees of 20–25m height, intermediate with 10–20m

height and under-storey with trees and shrubs less than10m height. The top canopy is occupied by thedeciduous species and intermediate and under-storey

by evergreen to semi-evergreen species. The elevation ofthe study area varies from 400 to 600m. The forestsinhabit several small perennial streams. The soils are

well developed and are mostly loamy soils and richlycovered with humus. pH of the soils varies from 6.5 to

V.K. Prasad et al. / Atmospheric Environment 35 (2001) 3085–30953086

7.0. Grass cover is negligible. The perennial streams are

conspicuous with the presence of Mangifera indica L.and Syzygium cuminii L. The rainfall of the area is about1600mm with about 85 rainy days per annum. The

study area is dominated by hill tribes who practice theshifting cultivation regularly during the biomass burningperiod, which starts from early February and lasts till

the ending of May. Forests are clear-felled and thebiomass is consequently burnt for clearing of land forsowing. Mixed cropping is preferred and harvesting

starts by the month of October. After, harvesting, theplot is abandoned and another patch is selected to startthe cycle again. In the study area, the amount of the areaburnt for shifting cultivation purposes is in the form of

small patches ranging from 0.5 to 3 ha and the forestsdue to repeated short-revisit cycles (3–4 yr) are mostlysecondary in nature. As a part of second field campaign

on biomass burning, three experiments were conductedin the mixed deciduous forests during 5 May (Kotha-valasa-site 1), 8 May (Kuduru-I, site 2) and 10 May

(Kuduru-II, site 3), 2000. The villages are situated5–8 km distance from the place of Maredumulli. The

biomass at the sites were felled approximately 2weeksbefore burning, during the month of April.

3. Materials and methods

3.1. Botanical composition

Onsite botanical composition at three different siteswere noted prior to burning for studying the mixed

nature of vegetation.

3.2. Biomass estimations

3.2.1. Onsite biomass before burning}measurements byallometry and weighingThe onsite biomass that had been clear-felled and left

for burning has been estimated from 10m� 10mquadrat sample plots prior to burning. The biomassestimations with respect to different species for differentgirth classes at different sites have been made to quantify

the biomass. Using the girth measurements of differentspecies, the allometric regression equations relating girthto biomass for the individual species developed for

Indian forest species have been used (Singh and Misra,1979; Singh, 1990; Chaturvedi et al., 1991; Negi et al.,1991). The values have been reported for individual girth

classes starting from 10 cm diameter class and greaterthan 71 cm diameter. Also, within a plot, dead standingtrees, dead trees on the ground and stumps have been

sampled and weighed that have diameter >10 cm.

3.2.2. Onsite unburnt residues}after burningmeasurements by weighingThe onsite un-burnt residues have been measured

from 5m� 5m plots by weighing, and the values areused for computing the combustion factor.

3.2.3. Quantifying under storey and mixed litter biomass

Quadrats of 1m� 1m are laid and all vegetation lessthan 10 cm DBH has been measured within 1m� 1mquadrat. In the study, the results are reported as mixed

litter biomass (leaves+branch material less than 1 cmgirth) and branch biomass (>1 cm upto 10 cm girth).

3.3. Meteorological parameters

Along with the topographical conditions such asaltitude, slope, aspect, terrain conditions, and fuelcharacteristics such as species composition, plant

biomass, fuel moisture content, etc., meteorologicalparameters are particularly important as they governthe type of burning, viz., flaming and smoldering

conditions. Meteorological parameters, with respect towind direction, wind speed, air temperature, relative

Fig. 1. Location map.

V.K. Prasad et al. / Atmospheric Environment 35 (2001) 3085–3095 3087

humidity, and soil temperature have been measuredusing a portable weather station onsite.

3.4. Fire intensity

The intensity of fires has been studied as defined byByram (1959) and is expressed as kilojoules per second

per meter (kJ s�1m�1) of fire front (Trollope, 1981). Thefire intensity has been calculated as the numericalproduct of the available heat energy and the forward

rate of spread of fire front using the equation

I ¼ H�W�R;

where I is the Fire intensity (kJ s�1m�1), H the heatyield (kJ kg�1), W the mass of fuel consumed (kgm�2)and R the rate of spread of fire front. The vertical release

of heat energy during the fires as represented by flameheight had been subjectively estimated during theburning for the fires and is expressed in meters. The

values for different heat yield obtained for different

plant species is available in literature (Vimal and Tyagi,1984). Different heat yields have been used by Trollope

et al. (1996) for head and backfires. In the present study,for computing the fire intensity, heat yields for differentspecies have been averaged. The heat yield for different

deciduous and mixed deciduous species has beenreported in the range of 4290–5222 kcal kg�1. (Vimaland Tyagi, 1984). The release of heat energy during thefires as represented by the flame height has been

estimated visually and through field photographs. Theduration of the experiment from ignition was nearly2–212 h until the smoke emissions from the fuel bed

almost disappeared.

4. Results and discussion

The main objective of the ground based experimentswas to study the spatial variability in the amount of

biomass burnt from different sites and the contribution

Table 1

Site characteristicsa

Site parameters Site 1 Site 2 Site 3

Site characteristics

Site name Kotha Valasa Kuduru (I) Kuduru (II)

Latitude/longitude 178380N 178380N 178380N818450E 818440E 818440E

Date of experiment 5-05-2000 8-05-2000 10-05-2000

Elevation (ft) 1668 1730 1662

Slope class Intermediate Steep Intermediate

Area (m2) 4750 2950 3800

Total density of species 3192 1194 1444

(girth 10 to>70 above)

Biomass characteristics

Fuel Load (tons/ha) 41.6 29.5 31.5

Moisture content (%)

1. Mixed litter 23 26 37.5

(Leaves+branch material less than 5 cm)

2. Branches 32 42 18.7

(530 cm upto 5 cm)

3. Wood material 36.3 50 40

(>30 cm)

Meteorological parameters

Air temperature (8C) 38 41.1 38.3

Relative humidity (%) 43.6 31.5 42.2

Wind direction SW SW SW

Average wind speed (m s�1) 1.95 1.96 1.96

Fire characteristics

Fire intensity (kJ s�1m�1) 60 847 31 086 42 789

Flame length (m) 1–2 0.5–1.0 2–4

Flame height (m) 4.6 2.2 5.3

aFor the total area.


of different components viz., bole, branch, and mixedleaf litter in the burning process affecting the combus-

tion factors. The experimental days well coincided withthe burning period where most of the biomass is burntfor the purposes of land clearing. The detailed site

characteristics for the three sites are given in Table 1.The amount of area burnt at the site one had beenrelatively high accounting to about 4750m2 whencompared to the 1730 (site 2) and 1662m2 (site 3). Sites

1 and 3 had an intermediate slope (10–158) while Site 2was more steep (25–358). The dominant species compo-sition at the three sites along with the habitat and family

to which it belongs is enumerated in Table 2. Though thespecies composition at the three sites varied with respect

to each other, the most dominant species at all the threesites had been found to be Xylia xylocarpa (Roxb) Taubof family Mimosaceae. Along with Terminalia alata

Heyne ex Roth they together form more than 60–70% ofthe total importance value index (IVI) (Prasad et al.,2000c). The total density of species before burning at thethree sites for more than 10 cm diameter were found to

be 3192 (site 1), 1194 (site 2) and 1444 (site 3) stems/arearespectively. Analysis of the results from girth-class anddensity relationships suggests that nearly 80% of the

Table 2

Species composition at the three sites of the biomass burning

Species composition Family Habitat

Site 1. Kothavalasa

Xylia xylocarpa (Roxb.) Taub. Mimosaceae Semi-evergreen tree

Terminalia alata Heyne ex. Roth. Combretaceae Deciduous tree

Bombax ceiba Linn. Bombacaceae Deciduous tree

Schrebera swietenioides Roxb. Oleaceae Decidous tree

Pterocarpus marsupium Roxb. Fabaceae Deciduous tree

Vitex pubescens Vahl. Verbenaceae Semi-evergreen tree

Terminalia bellirica (Gaertn.) Roxb. Combretaceae Deciduous tree

Caeseria elliptica Willd. Flacourtiaceae Deciduous tree

Grewia tilaefolila Vahl. Tiliaceae Deciduous tree

Careya arborea Roxb. Barringtoniaceae Deciduous tree

Chloroxylon swietenia DC Rutaceae Deciduous tree

Cipadessa baccifera (Roth.) Miq. Meliaceae Bushy shrub

Combretum roxburghii Spr. Combretaceae Liane

Site 2. Kuduru I


Hymenodictyon excelsum (Roxb.) Wall. ex Roxb. Rubiaceae Deciduous tree

Pterocarpus marsupium Roxb. Fabaceae Deciduous tree

Dillenia pentagyna Roxb. Dilleniaceae Deciduous tree

Protium serratum (Coleb.) Engler Bursearaceae Semi-evergreen tree

Lagaestroemia parviflora Roxb. Anacardiaceae Deciduous tree

Haldenia cordifolia (Roxb.) Ridsd. Rubiaceae Deciduous tree

Helicteres isora L. Sterculiaceae Shrub

Grewia hirsuta Vahl. Tiliaceae Under-shrub


Cipadessa baccifera (Roth.) Miq. Burseraceae Bushy shrub

Site 3. Kuduru II


Syzygium cuminii (Linn.) Skeels Myrtaceae Evergreen tree

Bridelia retusa (Linn.) Skeels Myrtaceae Evergreen tree

Lannea coromandelica (Hott.) Merr. Anacardiaceae Deciduous tree

Hymenodictyon excelsum (Roxb.) Wall. Ex. Roxb. Rubiaceae Deciduous tree

Diospyros melanoxylon Roxb. Ebnaceae Decidous tree

Melastoma malabathricum Linn. Melastomaceae Semi-evergreen tree

Protium serratum (Coleb.) Engler. Burseraceae Semi-evergreen tree

Lagaestromia parviflora Roxb. Lythraceae Deciduous tree

Lannea coromandelica (Houtt) Merr. Anacardiaceae Deciduous tree



Table 3

Biomass estimations for different girth-classes and onsite biomass susceptible for burning

Girth classes Density

(stems/area)

Bole

(kgs)

Branch (kgs) Leaf

(kgs)

Root

(kgs)

Above ground

(kgs)

Density weighted

(kgs)

Total aboveground and

below ground (kgs)

Density weighted

total (kgs)

Site 1. Kothavalasa

10–25 1064 0.33 2.5 2.61 2.27 5.44 5788.16 7.71 8203.44

26–40 1520 0.38 2.99 3.02 2.68 6.39 9721.8 90.7 13786.4

41–55 304 0.45 3.6 3.65 3.31 7.7 2340.8 11.01 3347.04

56–70 152 0.46 3.71 3.74 3.4 7.91 1202.3 11.31 1719.12

>71 above 152 0.53 4.3 4.35 4.0 9.18 1395.36 1318 2003.36

Total 3192 } } } } } 20439.4 52.28 29059.36

Mixed litter biomass


} } } } } } 4500 } }

Branch biomass (>1 cm upto 10 cm) } } } } } } 6100 } }

Total } } } } } } 31.0 tons } }

Site 2. Kuduru (I)

10–25 541 0.28 2.11 2.14 1.8 4.53 2450.73 6.33 3424.53

26–40 113 0.4 3.15 3.18 2.84 6.73 760.49 9.57 1081.41

41–55 113 0.44 3.5 3.56 3.2 7.5 847.50 10.7 1209.1

56–70 142 0.47 3.79 3.82 3.48 8.08 1147.36 11.56 1641.52

>71 above 285 0.59 4.81 4.85 4.5 10.25 2921.25 14.75 4203.75

Total 1194 } } } } } 8127.33 11 560.31



} } } } } } 1400

Branch biomass (>1 cm upto 10 cm) } } } } } } 2800

Total } } } } } } 12.3 tons

Site 2 Kuduru (II)

10–25 532 0.33 2.56 2.59 2.24 5.48 2915.36 7.72 4107.04

26–40 684 0.4 3.5 2.84 3.18 6.74 4610.16 9.92 6785.28

41–55 114 0.44 3.54 3.23 3.57 7.21 821.94 10.78 1228.92

56–70 38 0.46 3.71 3.4 3.74 7.57 287.66 11.31 429.78

>71 above 76 0.49 3.91 3.6 3.94 8.0 608 11.94 907.44

Total 1444 9243.12 13 458.46



} } } } } } 1700 } }

Branch biomass (>1 cm upto 10 cm) } } } } } } 1100 } }

Total } } } } } } 12.0 tons } }

V.K.Prasadet

al./Atm

ospheric

Enviro

nment35(2001)3085–3095

3090

stems occurred in the range from 10 to 40 cm girth forfirst site, 64.2% between 10 and 55 cm girth class for the

second site and more than 80% of the stems in the girthclass between 10 and 40 girth for the third site,indicating very poor and secondary nature of the forest.

The density weighted above ground biomass for threedifferent sites are found to be 20.4, 8.1 and 9.2 tons,respectively, (Table 3). Using the area weighted aboveground biomass values obtained in the study and

including the biomass for mixed litter and branchbiomass (>1 up to 10 cm), extrapolating the values forone hectare plot suggests values of 41.6, 29.5 and 31.5

t/ha biomass for first, second and third sites, respec-tively. The detailed comparison of biomass data withrespect to different forest types from India, in compar-

ison to biomass values of the present study are given inTable 4. Fuel moisture content is one of the importantfactors that influence the burning efficiency and thus the

total emissions. The moisture content of the fuels hadbeen estimated gravimetrically by collecting 20 randomsamples from each site for different fuels, viz., trees(dbh>30 cm), branch material (530 up to�5 cm) and

mixed leaf litter (leaves+small branches less than 5 cm)prior to burning. The fuel moisture content has beencalculated and expressed on dry matter basis (Table 5).

Of all the components, the moisture content for trunks

>30 cm is found to be high accounting to more than60%. Comparison of moisture content for different

components suggests relatively high moisture contentfor site two than site one and three. This is attributed tothe small showers of rain that occurred during the

previous day of the experiment. The fires during theburning were mainly of surface fires. Wind directionduring all the days was from southwest direction. Exceptfor the relative humidity, which had been relatively low

at the second site, all other meteorological parameterswere observed to be relatively constant during the threedays. The entire fuel bed were scattered in such as way

that the bigger logs were interspersed with the dryleaves so as to catch fires. The time of burning during allthe three days was around 13:00 h, so that the moisture

and dew accumulated during the early morning getscompletely vaporized. The mixed litter biomass andbranch biomass (>1 cm upto 10 cm) was relatively high

at the site one followed by two and three, respectively.Though trees with girth greater than 50 cm areinterspersed along with the mixed litter and branches,during the burning, only dried leaves along with mixed

litter and branches less than 10 cm caught fire andspread rapidly.The fire intensity measured as a function of available

heat energy, mass of fuel consumed and rate of spread of

Table 4

Biomass data for different forest types of India (Adapted and modified from Ravindranath et al., 1993)

S.no. Forest type Biomass (t/ha) References

1.a Tropical dry deciduous 93.6 Singh (1990)

2. Tropical semievergreen 468.0 Swamy (1989)

3. Tropical moist deciduous 409.3 Swamy (1989)

Littoral and Swamp 213.8 Singh, V.P. (1989)

2.a Tropical dry deciduous 115.5 Sharma et al. (1990)

4.b Tropical dry deciduous 77.0 Singh and Misra (1979)

5.b Dry deciduous 44.0 Singh et al. (1990)

6. Tropical thorn forests 40.0 Ravindranath et al. (1993)

7. Tropical dry evergreen forests 40.0 Ravindranath et al. (1993)

8. Sub-tropical broadleaved hill forest 108.7 Toky and Ramakrishnan (1982)

9.b Mixed dry deciduous 13.7–613.6 Gupta and Bharadwaj (1993)

10.b Mixed dry deciduous 22.1–31.2 Misra Rajiv et al. (1998)

11. Subtropical pine 210.8 Chaturvedi and Singh (1984)

12. Subtropical dry evergreen 159.7 Ravindranath et al. (1993)

13. Montane wet temperate 237.67 Yadava (1986)

14. Himalayan moist temperate 562.2 Rana (1985)

15. Himalayan moist temperate 169.1 Ravindranath et al. (1993)

16. Subalpine and alpine 127.4 Ravindranath et al. (1993)

17.c Tropical secondary mixed deciduous forests 41.6 (site 1) Present study

29.5 (site 2)

31.5 (site 3)

aDenotes values for maximum biomass.bDenotes values for above ground biomass.cDenotes above ground biomass including litter.


fire front suggested higher heat yields for site one with

60 847 kJ s�1m�1, when compared to 31 086 and42 789 kJ s�1m�1 for second and third sites, respectively.The fire intensity values obtained in the present study

are comparatively higher than the mean value of2566 kJ s�1m�1 reported for savanna fires (Trollopeet al., 1996). Contrary to the fire intensity, the fire

characteristics, viz., flame length and flame height werefound to be relatively high for site three than one andtwo. The flame height at all the three sites remained

below 6m, where only in certain cases the fires reachedto a height of 7–8m when the foliage of the dried leavesof the interspersed trees caught fires from the spreadingbranches.

In the present study, we followed the nomenclaturegiven by Carrvalho et al. (1998), for describing thecombustion completeness. For computing the combus-

tion completeness, the post-burn surveys were con-ducted in the small burn plots to estimate the unburntfuel material selecting the similar plots in each case.

Detailed data with respect to dry biomass (Mdry),individual combustion completeness (ZðindÞ%) mass ofdry biomass burned (MdryðburnÞ) and overall combustion

completeness (ZðgÞ%) averaged for 20 sites for 5m� 5mplots for the three sites are given in Table 6. Analysis ofthe results with respect to (ZðindÞ%) suggest that amongthe different components of biomass, branch material

with less than 10 cm dbh and upto 5 cm contributed tomore than 60% of (ZðindÞ%). Among the different sites,the third site has the highest (ZðindÞ%) (89%). Mixed leaf

litter contributed to about more than 50% of (ZðindÞ%) at

all the sites, with third site having highest (ZðindÞ%)(84%). (ZðindÞ%) decreased with increasing girth for allthe sites. The contribution of dry biomass material

having more than 70 cm diameter is found to be very lowindicating that most of the trunks were burnt super-ficially. Analysis of the results with respect to overall

combustion completeness (ZðgÞ%) suggest that mixed leaflitter and branch material contributed to most of thecombustion. Of all the three sites, site three had the

highest combustion completeness of about 30.04% whencompared to 20.18% and 16.1% for first and secondsites, respectively. The highest combustion completenessobserved in the third site is mainly attributed to the high

amount of biomass burned in mixed leaf litter class andalso in the girth classes ranging from 10 to 40 dbh. Theoverall combustion for all the three sites thus is found to

be below 30%.Biomass densities, fractions of biomass above ground,

fractions of biomass which burns and combustion

factors for different vegetation types as reviewed byCooke and Wilson (1996) along with vegetation typesincluding tropical deciduous and tropical mixed decid-

uous forests of India are shown in Table 7. After cuttingand felling, fires may consume relatively a small fraction(�10–20%) of the biomass (Hao et al., 1990). Carrvalhoet al. (1998) reported combustion completeness of about

20.47% from a detailed biomass burning study con-ducted in Amazonian rain forest in Brazil. Fearnsideet al. (1992a) estimated that about 27.6% of the above

Table 5

Moisture content and total dry weight at the three sites

Description Mfresh (%) Mfresh

(tons)

Moisture

content (%)

Mdry

(tons)

Site 1. Kothavalasa

Trunks (DBH>30 cm 68.28 32.0 36.3 20.4

Branch material530 cm upto�5 cm 19.23 6.30 32 6.1

Mixed leaf litter (Leaves+small branches less than 5 cm diameter 12.47 5.84 23 4.5

Total 100 44.14 } }

Site 2. Kuduru-I

Trunks (DBH>30 cm 70.7 16.2 50 8.1

Branch material DBH530 cm upto �5 cm 21.09 4.83 42 2.8

Mixed leaf litter (Leaves+small branches less than 5 cm diameter 8.25 1.89 26 1.4

Total 100 22.9 } }

Site 3. Kuduru-II

Trunks (DBH>30 cm 65.6 15.3 40 9.2

Branch material DBH530 cm upto�5 cm 8.96 2.09 18.7 1.1

Mixed leaf litter (Leaves+small branches less than 5 cm diameter 25.3 5.92 37.5 1.1

Total 100 22.9 } }


ground biomass was burned at an experimental site in

the Amazonian primary forests. In contrast to the forestfires, in case of Savanna fires, the burnt material mainlyconsists of grasses along with sparse trees. The fraction

of grass burned in tropical Savanna fires has beenestimated to be 84% in Nigeria (Hopkins, 1965), 67 and98% in Ivory Coast (Delmas, 1982; Lamotte, 1985).Different workers used different values of combustion

factors in estimating the trace gas emissions frombiomass burning globally. Seiler and Crutzen (1980)used the value of 25% in estimating the global scale

emissions of green house gases from biomass burning. Inestimating the global scale emissions of green house gasemissions from biomass burning, the parameter of b for

secondary (fallow) forests (fraction of above ground thatis burnt) is assumed to be larger than that of primary(non-fallow) forests due to smaller sizes of vegetation. In

a detailed study on the regional releases of CO2 andother trace gases to the atmosphere from fires in the

tropics, based on FAO statistics, Hao et al. (1990)

adopted a value of b equal to 0.3 (30%) for primaryforests and 0.4 (40%) for secondary forests, realizing theuncertainty of the values to be around 30%. Again with

respect to the uncertainty, Hao et al. (1990) inferredthat, uncertainty is not critical as most of the biomassburning takes place in Savanna regions. In this regard, itmay be noted that though the forests of the study were

mainly of secondary nature, the combustion factor inthe initial burns didnot exceeded more than 30%.Analysis of the results for overall burning for each of

the sites suggest that partitioning of the biomass fuels indifferent vegetation classes (girth components) is a majorcontributing factor affecting the combustion process.

Further, it is concluded that more studies in the tropicalregions with respect to biomass and combustioncharacteristics will help in improving the regional

estimates of biomass burned and resulting trace gasemissions.

Table 6

Averaged data for 5� 5m (20 plots) for individual and overall combustion completeness for the three sites of the experimenta

Girth classes (DBH) MðdrybiomassÞ (kg) ZðindÞ (%) MdryðburnÞ (kg) ZðgÞ (%)

Site 1. Kothavalasa

10–25 36.3 26.2 9.51 6.83

26–40 60.6 16.3 9.87 7.09

41–55 14.6 4.2 0.613 0.44

56–70 7.58 4.3 0.32 0.22

70 above 8.88 2.7 0.23 0.16

Branch material DBH510 cm up to �5 cm 4.7 73 3.43 2.46

Mixed leaf litter (Leaves+small branches less than 5 cm diameter 6.5 64 4.16 2.98

Total 139.16 20.18

Site 2. Kuduru–I

10–25 20.95 14.1 3.05 4.62

26–40 12.8 11.3 1.44 2.18

41–55 7.1 8.1 0.57 0.86

56–70 7.7 4.2 0.32 0.48

70 above 9.92 2.6 0.25 0.37

Branch material DBH510 cm up to �5 cm diameter 2.5 62 2.31 3.50


Total 65.97 } } 16.1

Site 3. Kuduru-II

10–25 20.56 26.2 5.38 6.26

26–40 31.95 17.3 5.52 6.42

41–55 7.2 16.0 1.15 1.33

56–70 7.5 11.2 4.325 5.03

70 above 8.0 3.1 0.24 0.28

Branch material DBH510 cm up to �5 cm 4.7 89 4.18 4.86


Total 85.91 } } 30.04

aMdry the dry biomass ; ZðindÞ (%) the individual combustion completeness; MdryðburnÞ the mass of dry biomass burned; ZðgÞ (%) the

overall combustion completeness.


Acknowledgements

We are grateful to Dr. D.P. Rao, Director, NRSA,Prof. S.K. Bhan, Dy. Director, NRSA, Prof. A.K.Raychaudhary, Director, NPL, Prof. B.H. Subbaraya,Program Director, ISRO-GBP, Shri. P. Rajaratnam,

Dy. Program Director, ISRO-GBP, Dr. A.K. Sarkar,Head, Chemistry Section, NPL, Dr. K. Lal, Head,Material Characterization Division, NPL for their

encouragement. The help provided by Dr. P. SivaramaKrishna, Director, SAKTI, NGO, during the fieldexperiment is gratefully acknowledged. We sincerely

thank anonymous reviewer for his critical comments andsuggestions on the manuscript.

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