Theory of the driving model of land use change on the evolution of carbon stock: A case study of Chongqing, China

Abstract Terrestrial ecosystems are significant carbon sinks and are crucial for understanding the regional and global carbon cycles, energy flow, and climate change. As land use change is a significant factor affecting ecosystem carbon stocks, studying it is essential to comprehending the evolution of regional carbon sink functions and achieving sustainable development goals. The drastically diverse land use patterns in each of the study area's functional areas resulted in significant differences in carbon stocks between them. This study explores the evolution traits of carbon stocks based on land use data and their driving mechanisms in Chongqing during the past 30 years by using spatial analysis, the InVEST model, and geographic probes. The results demonstrate the significant change in land use change in the study area, which led to a 5.1078Tg decrease in total carbon stock, a decline of 1.5%. The main pathway for carbon loss pathway in the evolution of carbon stock is the conversion of cropland to construction land, and the primary carbon compensation pathway is the conversion of grassland and cropland to forest land, with a spatial distribution characterized by "higher in the whole area and obvious local differences". The degree of land use contributes most to the evolution of carbon stocks. Moreover, the interaction of pairwise factors played a more important role in affecting the evolution of carbon stocks than did each factor individually. The case study in this paper shows that land use change is a significant driving mechanism for the evolution of carbon stock, and the development of a driving model theory is appropriate for deciphering the trajectory of carbon stock evolution and offering research suggestions for other regions.