GFED4 biomass burning emissions

GFED4 biomass burning emissions are now included in GEOS-Chem v10-01 and higher versions.

Source code and data

GFED4 was implemented into GEOS-Chem v10-01 as a HEMCO extension. The source code files may be found in the GEOS-Chem source code folders:

File	Description
HEMCO/Extensions/hcox_gfed_mod.F90	Module for computing GFED4 biomass emissions
HEMCO/Extensions/hcox_gfed_include_gfed4.H	Emission factors for GFED4 species (inlined for computational efficiency)

The latest GFED4 data files available for use with GEOS-Chem may be found at s3://geos-chem/ in the HEMCO/GFED4/v2023-03 folder.

--Bob Yantosca (talk) 16:09, 28 July 2025 (UTC)

Data visualization

I uploaded GFEDv4s data (1997-2018) to Google Earth Engine and created an online app to visualize GFEDv4s emissions. The GFEDv4s app plots annual and monthly time series of burned area or a given species for custom regions: (1) global, (2) basis region, (3) country, (4) pixel, and (5) custom polygon using lon/lat coordinates. Emissions data are also further subdivided by the six GFEDv4s land use and land cover types: SAVA, DEFO, BORF, TEMF, PEAT, and AGRI.

To compare GFEDv4s with other global fire emissions inventories (GFASv1.2, FINNv1.5, QFEDv2.5r1, and FEERv1.0-G1.2), please use the FIRECAM tool. Currently, FIRECAM supports six species: CO2, CO, CH4, OC, BC, and PM2.5. FIRECAM compares the five inventories at an aggregated 0.5deg x 0.5deg spatial resolution for the 2003-2018 time period. Please see the FIRECAM website for more information.

-- Tianjia (Tina) Liu 14:53, 21 August 2019 (EDT)

Discussion and updates

Update to GFED 4.1

This update was validated with 1-month benchmark simulation v11-01d and 1-year benchmark simulation v11-01d-Run1. This version was approved on 12 Dec 2015.

Prasad Kasibhatla wrote:

Please see attached. This latest version GFED 4.1s is being released July 3, 2015.

The monthly GFED files that go into GEOS-Chem have to be updated (though updates are very minor). In addition, from 2003 onwards there is now daily and diurnal info available in the dataset - this should be added to GEOS-Chem.

--Melissa Sulprizio (talk) 13:25, 13 July 2015 (UTC)

Discussion following 1-month benchmark v10-01h

GFED4 biomass burning emissions were validated in GEOS-Chem v10-01h. The following discussion ensued.

Prasad Kasibhatla wrote:

I have been looking at the CO biomass emission ratio plot in the 10-01h benchmark - there are a couple of regions where things look a bit different than what I expect from the emissions I compute offline at native resolution. Would it be possible for you to send me plots of absolute CO emissions from biomass burning from v10-01h and v10-01f_UCX that went into the ratio plot. And a difference plot?

Melissa Sulprizio wrote:

Please see the attached image for maps of CO biomass emissions from v10-01f_UCX (upper left) and v10-01h (upper right). The absolute difference (lower left) and percent difference (lower right) maps are also included.

Prasad Kasibhatla wrote:

I computed CO emissions offline for GFED3 for July 2011 and GFED4 for July 2013 (corresponding to what was used in the v10-01f_UCX and v10-01h benchmark runs) and reproduced the emissions plot you sent.

Don't worry about the labels on my plot - my panels correspond to your panels. As you can see your patterns match patterns I compute - but absolute values of emissions that you are getting from the model are higher than what I calculate offline. I have not been able to figure out if I am making a mistake in my offline calculation or if there is a problem in the geoschem implementation.

Obviously, we need to figure this out. Perhaps Christoph and I can focus on one or two pixels and resolve what is going on?

For both the GFED3 and GFED4 offline plots, I accumulated dry matter burned in various categories into the generic 1x1 grid, computed emissions in molecules/cm2 on the 1x1 grid using category-specific emission factors, and then regridded to the 4x5 grid using ctm_regridh with the /per_unit_area option.

Christoph Keller wrote:

Thanks, this may explain it. In v10-01e and newer, dry matter burned and vegetation mask are first regridded onto the simulation grid, and emissions are computed on that grid.

I looked into this for version v10-01e, and the changes in GFED-3 emissions (compared to pre-HEMCO versions) are attributable to the regridding order. In v10-01h, we didn’t change anything in GFED-3, and GFED-4 uses the same code as GFED-3 except for the updated dry matter emissions fields.

--Melissa Sulprizio 13:38, 27 March 2015 (EDT)

References

1. GFED website: http://globalfiredata.org
2. Akagi, S. K., R. J. Yokelson, C. Wiedinmyer, M. J. Alvarado, J. S. Reid, T. Karl, J. D. Crounse, and P. O. Wennberg, Emission factors for open and domestic biomass burning for use in atmospheric models, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 11, 4039-4072, 2011. Article
3. Andreae, M. O., P. Merlet, Emission of trace gases and aerosols from biomass burning, Glob. Biogeochem. Cycles, 15, Issue 4, pages 955-966, December 2001. Article
4. Giglio, L., J. T. Randerson, and G. R. van der Werf, Analysis of daily, monthly, and annual burned area using the fourth-generation global fire emissions database (GFED4)", J. Geophys. Res, Biogeosciences., 118, Issue 1, 317-328, March 2013. Article
5. Randerson, J. T., Y. Chen1, G. R. van der Werf, B. M. Rogers, and D. C. Morton, Global burned area and biomass burning emissions from small fires, J. Geophys. Res, Biogeosciences, 117, Issue G4, December 2012. Article
6. van der Werf, G. R, J. T. Randerson, L. Giglio, G. J. Collatz, M. Mu, P. S. Kasibhatla, D. C. Morton, R. S. DeFries, Y. Jin, and T. T. van Leeuwen, Global fire emissions and the contribution of deforestation, savanna, forest, agricultural, and peat fires (1997-2009) Atmos. Chem. Phys., 10, 11707-11735, 2010. Article
7. van der Werf, G. R., J. T. Randerson, L. Giglio, T. T. van Leeuwen, Y. Chen, B. M. Rogers, M. Mu, M. J. E. van Marle, D. C. Morton, G. J. Collatz, R. J. Yokelson, and P. S. Kasibhatla, Global fire emissions estimates during 1997–2016, Earth Sys. Sci. Data, 9, 697-720, 2017. Article

--Bob Y. 10:56, 17 March 2015 (EDT)