FACE Experiment Receives Two-Year, $1.56 Million Renewal of Research Funds from U.S. Department of Energy

September 12, 2007

DURHAM, N.C. – The Nicholas School of the Environment and Earth Sciences at Duke University has received a two-year grant for $1,559,016 from the Office of Biological and Environmental Research, U.S. Department of Energy, to continue its research on carbon sequestration at the Free Air CO2 Enrichment (FACE) facility in Duke Forest.

Ram Oren, professor of ecology and director of research at the FACE site, said, “The Department of Energy’s far-sighted support enables us to do the kind of painstaking research and long-term monitoring needed on such a complex and critical issue.”

The FACE experiment began in 1994, and has involved studies by dozens of interdisciplinary research teams over the years. Its goal is to quantify the amount of carbon that can be captured from the atmospheric and stored in trees and forest soils under elevated CO2 levels, such as those projected to occur by 2050 as a result of global climate change.

“The long term studies we are conducting at the FACE site help us better understand how changes in temperature, growing season length, nitrogen availability and soil moisture will affect this carbon transfer and storage,” Oren says. “That’s vital information for scientists and policymakers alike.”

For more information about the FACE site, go to http://face.env.duke.edu/main.cfm.