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Jin, X.;  Jin, H.;  Yang, X.;  Wang, W.;  Huang, S.;  Zhang, S.;  Yang, S.;  Li, X.;  Wang, H.;  He, R.; et al. Shrubification along Pipeline Corridors in Permafrost Regions. Encyclopedia. Available online: https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/25559 (accessed on 05 July 2024).
Jin X,  Jin H,  Yang X,  Wang W,  Huang S,  Zhang S, et al. Shrubification along Pipeline Corridors in Permafrost Regions. Encyclopedia. Available at: https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/25559. Accessed July 05, 2024.
Jin, Xiaoying, Huijun Jin, Xue Yang, Wenhui Wang, Shuai Huang, Shengrong Zhang, Suiqiao Yang, Xiaoying Li, Hongwei Wang, Ruixia He, et al. "Shrubification along Pipeline Corridors in Permafrost Regions" Encyclopedia, https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/25559 (accessed July 05, 2024).
Jin, X.,  Jin, H.,  Yang, X.,  Wang, W.,  Huang, S.,  Zhang, S.,  Yang, S.,  Li, X.,  Wang, H.,  He, R.,  Li, Y.,  Li, X., & Li, X. (2022, July 27). Shrubification along Pipeline Corridors in Permafrost Regions. In Encyclopedia. https://encyclopedia.pub/entry/25559
Jin, Xiaoying, et al. "Shrubification along Pipeline Corridors in Permafrost Regions." Encyclopedia. Web. 27 July, 2022.
Shrubification along Pipeline Corridors in Permafrost Regions
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This entry is adapted from the peer-reviewed paper 10.3390/f13071093

Pipeline corridors have been rapidly increasing in length and density because of the ever growing demand for crude oil and natural gas resources in hydrocarbon-rich permafrost regions. Pipeline engineering activities have significant implications for the permafrost environment in cold regions. Along these pipeline corridors, the shrubification in the right-of-way (ROW) has been extensively observed during vegetation recovery. 

shrubification engineering disturbances climate change permafrost thaw soil drainage

1. Introduction

Pipeline corridors, as one representative type of linear engineering infrastructures and environmental disturbances, are widespread owing to the growing demand for natural resources [1][2]. Pipeline corridors are created for oil and gas exploration and transportation in hydrocarbon-rich boreal and tundra ecosystems in North America [3] and northern Eurasia [4], and in other alpine and high-plateau permafrost regions at mid- to low latitudes, e.g., [5][6][7]. There are more than 2485 km of pipelines in Alaska, 2031 km in China [8], and hundreds of potential routes and tens of thousands of kilometers for pipelines in northern Canada and Russia [9].
Pipeline systems built in permafrost regions are represented by the Alyeska (Trans-Alaska) pipeline system in Alaska, USA, the Norman Wells Oil Pipeline in western Canada, the Eastern Siberia to Pacific Ocean Oil and Gas Pipelines Systems (ESPO) in Russia and its spur line, the China-Russia Crude Oil Pipelines (CRCOP) in northeast China, and the Golmud-Lhasa Products Oil Pipeline (GLPOP) on the interior Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in southwest China [5][10]. Construction of pipeline corridors generally necessitates the partial (elevated construction mode) or complete (burial construction mode) clearance of surface vegetation (except arctic tundra due to low vegetation height) along a belt transect 5–20 m in width (also named the pipeline right-of-way (ROW)) [11][12]. Furthermore, roots of trees and other vegetation and surface organic soil are removed for machine and vehicle movement. For buried pipelines, a trench about 1.5–2.0 m in width or wider and 1.5–3.0 m in depth (depending on the depth of the permafrost table, pipe diameter, and the associated pipe–wall configurations) is excavated [13]. Soil is backfilled after installation of pipelines [14]. These construction processes have substantial ecological impacts, altering the abiotic and biological environments, usually extending far beyond the pipeline corridor widths [15].
Pipeline construction and operation, as well as maintenance (e.g., by adding more readily available gravelly soils above or near pipelines to mitigate water and wind erosion and filling up the thermokarst lakes and depressions with soils) and emergency responses, may generally result in permafrost degradation, as evidenced by a warmer soil/ground, lowering the permafrost table and/or thickening the active layer, ground surface subsidence and thermokarsting, and formation of the supra-permafrost subaerial talik; consequently, they modify or alter the physical, biophysical, chemical and biological properties of foundation soils [1][16].
Pipeline disturbances may have profound implications for boreal forest, wetlands and peatlands, and arctic/alpine tundra ecosystems, where, because of low temperatures, vegetation recovery rate is slow, if ever possible, to return to the pre-disturbance state under severe disturbances [11][17]. Shrub invasion, colonization, establishment, and expansion in the ROW, as characterized by increases in abundance, coverage, and phytomass, also known as shrubification, have been reported in many permafrost regions during vegetation recovery e.g., [14][18][19][20]. Shrubification in the ROW has been linked to permafrost thaw and soil disturbances resulting from pipeline construction and operation [11][12][18]. However, how permafrost thaw influences shrubification in the ROW along pipeline corridors remains evasive [21].
This shrubification, in turn, suppresses the growth and development of herbaceous plants [15] that could effectively mitigate soil erosion and help water and soil conservation in the ROW [22]. In addition, shrubification in the ROW may destabilize the foundation soils of pipeline systems by accelerating permafrost thaw, trapping more snow and anchoring more deep roots, and changing the hydrothermal environment of pipeline foundation soils; these changes may incur other damages that impair the integrity and safety of pipeline systems [23]. However, hydrothermal/abiotic and nutrient/biotic mechanisms of ROW shrubification have been seldom studied and thus remain poorly understood [18][21].

2. Shrubification along Pipeline Corridors in Permafrost Regions

Vegetation is greatly disturbed by pipeline construction since plants are removed in the ROW along the corridor at the initial stage of pipeline engineering (Figure 1a,b) [12][14]. In this section, researchers discuss the observed shrubification along pipeline corridors in permafrost regions and some seismic lines created for resource exploration [11][12][21]. Pipeline corridors and seismic lines have similar characteristics from removal of the surface vegetation in boreal forests, and shrubification is also extensively observed in seismic lines in boreal forests and arctic tundra ecosystems (Table 1). Moreover, there are fewer studies engaged in documenting vegetational changes in the pipeline ROW in permafrost regions.
Figure 1. Construction and shrubification of the China-Russia Crude Oil Pipelines (CRCOP) I and II at the eastern flank of the northern Da Xing’anling Mountains in the northern part of northeast China. (a) Removal of surface vegetation in winter 2009 prior to the ditching for pipeline laying; (b) soil disturbances increased the presence of gravels on the ground surface immediately above the CRCOP II (photo taken in September 2020); (c) shrubification in the pipe ROW (photo taken in September 2020), and (d) thermokarst ponds in construction-disturbed area alongside the access road to the pipelines (photo taken in September 2020). Notes: The CRCOP I was built in the period from May 2009 to October 2010, and it was put into operation in January 2011; the CRCOP II was built from August 2016 to December 2017 and it was put into operation in January 2018.
Table 1. Shrubification along pipeline corridors/seismic lines based on selected references published since 2000.
  Shrubification
Features		 Trajectory Geographic Location Study Method Environmental Attribute Disturbance Type Selected References
Shrubification
Indices		  
Shrub cover Increase/
abundant		 Alberta, Canada Field survey Soil moisture Seismic line/forest [2][17][19][24]
Cover of evergreen shrub/deciduous shrub Decrease/
Increase		 Northeastern Alaska, USA Field survey Soil moisture Seismic line/tundra [11][25]
Shrub cover Increase Northeastern China Field survey Permafrost table Pipeline disturbance [14]
Shrub presence Increase Northern Alaska Remote Sensing Active layer thickness and soil moisture Pipeline disturbance [18]
Shrub area Increase in bog, while vary in fen Alberta, Canada Bi-temporal airborne lidar Soil moisture Seismic line/boreal wetland [20]
Shrub cover Increase Alaska Field survey Soil properties Pipeline disturbance [26]
Shrub diversity Decrease Northeastern China Field survey Soil nutrient Pipeline disturbance [27]
The impacts of pipeline corridors can reach far into the adjacent ecosystems [15][24]. For example, Abib et al. [3] found that the impacts of seismic lines on the adjacent ecosystems extended laterally to 55 m, and the vegetation height varied greatly within 5 m of the pipeline axis in a proximal boreal forest and wetland environment. Li et al. [14] found that the hydrothermal impacts of buried CRCOPs I and II extended laterally to about 60 m in the undisturbed hemiboreal forest in the northern Da Xing’anling Mountains in northeast China.
In a spatial pattern, with the increasing perpendicular distance from the ROW, plant species diversity and recovery rates increase in the engineering construction- and maintenance-disturbed area of the ROW, and plant community structure and dominant species differ greatly from those in the increasingly undisturbed area going laterally away from the pipelines [3][28]. In boreal forest and arctic tundra ecosystems, vegetation may not recover to its pre-pipeline construction state [11][26]. This is because of the competitive advantages of non-native and invasive species, which are disturbance-tolerant, aggressive, and fast-growing [19]. Furthermore, tree seedlings grow much slower in the ROW compared to those in the adjacent forest, since the abundant 1-m-tall invasive graminoids are shading and smothering small conifer seedlings [12]. In the arctic tundra, compared to those at the undisturbed sites, the patterns of vegetation recovery at the disturbed sites are characterized by increases in coverage of graminoids, forbs, and deciduous shrubs and a decrease in coverage of evergreen shrubs [11].
During the period of vegetation recovery after pipeline construction, herbs and shrubs jointly develop in the disturbed areas, but the shrubs, the Salix spp. in particular, are more competitive in gaining the average coverage and the amount of space in the newly available habitats (Figure 1c) [25]. A survey along the Alyeska pipeline route in Alaska, USA, showed that the pipeline construction area was fully covered by shrubs in 5 years without artificial intervention [26]. In addition, remote sensing results indicated a 51% increase in shrub cover in the areas adjacent to the pipeline from 2010 to 2016, but only a 2.6% increase in the natural/undisturbed areas in the same period [18]. Although shrub cover increases during recovery, shrub diversity may decrease after pipeline disturbance (Table 1). In the ROW of CRCOP I, which was built during 2009–2010 and began operation in 2011, shrub diversity declined in the pipeline construction area, while the shrub phytomass increased in the undisturbed Rhododendrom dauricum-Betula platyphylla forest in 2014 [27]. After disturbance, the evergreen shrub cover decreases, while that of deciduous shrub increases [11]. Finnegan et al. [17] found that large shrubs, such as alder (Alnus spp.), birch (Betula spp.), and willow (Salix spp.), were more likely to present and more abundant in wet soils with poor or medium nutrients, while dwarf (low-statured) shrubs, such as Vaccinium spp. and Rhododendron spp., were associated with dry soils in the ROW along the pipelines with medium or rich nutrients. Generally, shrub growth is light-preferred, and the cover is greater and more abundant in the ROW along the pipelines, on edges of forest stands, and in open and young forests [29].
In the ROW in permafrost regions, the impacts of pipeline disturbances on local vegetation are determined by pipeline corridor/ROW widths and depths of soil disturbances, corridor orientation/directions and complexity, ecosystem types, substrates, and post-construction stage (time) of vegetation recovery [30][31]. Meanwhile, ground ice content plays an important role in permafrost regions, and the melting of ground ice caused by the warming ground and ensued thermokarsting processes dramatically alter the permafrost landscapes, creating new and exposed soils/niches for plant species invasion and colonization. Thus, researchers need to better understand the impacts of rapid permafrost degradation on shrubification along the pipeline corridors under a rapidly changing hydroclimate [32].

3. Hydrothermal and Biophysical Mechanisms of Pipeline ROW Shrubification

3.1. Permafrost Thaw along the Pipeline Corridor

Despite the different characteristics of the permafrost environment, such as climate, vegetation types (e.g., boreal forest or tussock tundra), ground ice content, topography (upland, slopes, or lowland) and soil types, permafrost thaw has been extensively observed along pipeline corridors [16][33][34][35]. Permafrost thaw induced by pipeline construction and operation is mainly attributed to vegetation and soil disturbances during the pipeline construction [36] and the heating from the operating pipeline buried in the near-surface permafrost and active layer. During the period of pipeline construction, vegetation is removed, which could increase the incoming short radiation, reduce the surface albedo, and control the surface conductance and surface temperature; these processes increase the incoming energy into the ground, resulting in a warmer surface soil, a thicker active layer, melting of ground ice, ground surface subsidence, and formation of supra-permafrost subaerial taliks (Figure 2) [1][6][14][16][34].
Figure 2. Schematic diagram of key permafrost-related factors associated with shrubification along a buried pipeline corridor. The symbol “+” means enhanced environmental variables and facilitated shrubification. Notes: Figure 2 shows that surface vegetation removal would result in more light shed on the ground surface. This warms the surface soil, increases soil moisture and nutrient availability, melts the ground ice, thickens the active layer, and leads to thermokarsting in the ROW. Soil disturbances, water erosion, and frost sorting increase the content of surface gravels, further improve the soil drainage and preferential flow along the supra-permafrost subaerial talik under the ROW. These collectively favor the shrubification. In addition, ground heating from pipeline engineering and snow accumulation/redistribution from increasing shrub presence and height may accelerate permafrost thaw, positively feeding back to the ROW shrubification.
Pipeline disturbance generally results in rapid permafrost degradation by increasing soil temperature in the ROW compared to the adjacent undisturbed areas off the ROW [35][37][38]. Monitoring of ground temperature in a borehole at the kilometer post 304 site showed that soils at shallow depths in the ROW 1.2 to 2.1 m away from the CRCOP pipeline axis were warmed by 1 °C and permafrost (as indicated by the mean annual ground temperature (MAGT) at the depth of zero annual amplitude of ground temperature, 15 m) were warmed by 0.16 °C from 2012 to 2014 in an intermontane boreal wetland [37]; under a warming climate, MAGT increased by 0.3 °C under the ROW, while that off the ROW increased by only 0.1 °C from 2014 to 2018 [34].
Rising soil temperature results in an enlarged active layer thickness (ALT), lowered burial depth of the permafrost table, and the formation of thaw bulbs/cylinders (supra-permafrost subaerial talik) around the buried pipeline in permafrost regions [13][14][39]. In alpine meadows in the Laji Mountains on the northeastern QTP, the greatest burial depth of the alpine permafrost table was 7.0 m observed from August 2016 to July 2017 under the disturbances of two gas pipelines, while the ALT was about 1.5 m under the nearby natural/undisturbed alpine meadows or wetlands/bogs underlain by attached permafrost [40]. Substantial permafrost changes in the ROW were found in the pipeline foundation soils in wetland and forest areas along the CRCOPs [13][16][34][37]. Borehole monitoring data of the CRCOP I in a wetland revealed a thaw depth (permafrost table) of about 6.0 m in the ROW, while only 2.0 m off the ROW in October 2014, and the permafrost table lowered to 8.0 m in depth in October 2017 [35]. At the same time, the thaw bulb was detected by ground penetration radar (GPR) surveys in the same location. According to GPR results, the thaw bulb was 0.5 m above the CRCOP I (initial burial depth was 1.6 m), 2.0 m under the CRCOP I, and 3.5 m laterally from CRCOP I in March 2014 (3 years after operation) in a wetland [37]. For the CRCOP II, the base of the thaw bulb lowered from 4.9 m in depth in 2014 to 9.7 m in 2018 [34], indicating a rapid permafrost thaw resulting from pipeline disturbances. Additionally, the burial depth of the permafrost table was about 10.0 m in the ROW, while that off the ROW was 2.0 m in October 2017 [41]. Recent surveys and monitoring by electrical resistivity tomography (ERT) along the CRCOPs showed that the burial depth of the permafrost table in the ROW was 1.7-6.7 m lower than that in the undisturbed forest areas, and the rate of thaw bulb development was 1.0 m/a in zones of discontinuous permafrost in the northern part of CRCOPs [14][16].
Increases in soil temperature from pipeline disturbances lead to melting of ground ice and ensuing ground surface subsidence and the development of ponding/thermokarst in the ROW [14][42]. Thaw settlement was detected or observed immediately following pipeline operation, and progress in the ground settlement depends on soil types, vegetation cover, ground ice content, landforms, and elapsed time after pipeline operation [36][37][42][43]. For example, thaw settlement in the ROW continued to develop after 17 years of operation of the Norman Wells pipeline, and the amounts of ground surface settlement differed among sites, with fine-grained lacustrine soils (0.4–0.7 m), coarse-grained tills (0.1–0.35 m), and organic soils (0.7 m) [43]. Field observations combined with remote sensing data along a 400 km section of the CRCOPs in 2018 indicated that there were 264 ponds/thermokarst, of which about 47% were larger than 500 m2, and most of these ponds/thermokarst were distributed in areas underlain by ice-rich permafrost [42].
Although rapid and persistent permafrost thaw resulting from pipeline construction, operation, and associated heat accumulation was observed by site surveys, field monitoring, and remote sensing, the rate of permafrost thaw could be effectively reduced by proper pipeline insulation, air-cooled embankment, and some other mitigative measures as evidenced by site and laboratory experiments and numerical model simulations under a warming climate [13][38][40][42][44]. However, most of the abovementioned engineering studies focused on the relationships between the pipelines and pipeline foundation soils. Thus, understanding the responses of current and future permafrost to pipeline disturbances and changes in ecosystem variables, especially vegetation composition and cover, should be taken into account. Because permafrost in these boreal and arctic regions is ecosystem-dominated (driven, modified or protected), it is fragile and sensitive to disturbances, e.g., [45][46].

3.2. Soil Moisture, Topography, and Soil Drainage

The movement of heavy/crawler machines and vehicles during pipeline construction and operation increases soil compaction and bulk density, and therefore, it decreases soil water holding and retention capacities [1]. The melting of ground ice resulting from pipeline construction and operation increases ALT and soil moisture contents in the ROW, which increases the depth of root spreading for deeper-rooted shrubs, favoring shrub expansion in the flat, open areas and lowlands [47]. Boulanger-Lapointe et al. [48] found greater shrub colonization at the sites with a higher soil moisture content compared with those sites with limited water availability in the High Arctic of Greenland and Canada. Remote sensing and field investigations showed the close association of higher soil moisture and thicker organic soils with tall shrub expansion adjacent to the Dempster Highway, Northwest Territories, Canada [49].
The melting of ground ice may also result in thaw subsidence of the ground surface and (differential) thaw settlement of foundation soils and underlying permafrost; snow and ice melt-water, and precipitation bring more water to fill these depressions, forming positive feedbacks to ground thaw settlement and ground surface subsidence [32][50]. These shallow thaw depressions could further develop into thermokarst lakes and ponds and thaw slumps and wetland environment, which may enhance the hydraulic connectivity via deepened, elongated, and/or new surface and subsurface flow paths [51][52]. These processes result in changes in microtopography and landscapes, creating drier areas adjacent to thermokarst depressions and lakes/ponds and improved soil drainage, thereby favoring the shrub establishment and growth [53][54]. Field surveys found that tall shrubs (e.g., Betula nana and Salix glauca) were more dominant on thaw pond banks, where the soil drainage was improved and there was lower soil moisture content in comparison with those in the tundra and thaw pond channels on the Seward Peninsula, Alaska [55]. However, excess soil moisture may limit shrub growth [56], and sedges dominate in wetlands in the ROW [16][34].
In addition, pipeline foundations (backfilled into pipe trenches) and periodical maintenance on flat or concave ground could also intercept or alter shallow groundwater paths, generate preferential flows in taliks, change the timing and routing of surface and groundwater runoffs, and create riparian habitats, which benefit the aquatic vegetation and shrub growth [53][57]. On slopes, disturbances from pipeline construction and the ensuing heating delay ground freezing in the ROW and may create preferential flow paths in the supra-permafrost subaerial talik under the ROW, because the ground has already re-frozen outside the ROW while inside the ROW, the ground maintains a perennially thawed cylinder (linear supra-permafrost subaerial talik) [58]. This, therefore, accelerates surface water or groundwater flows, resulting in enhanced water erosion on slopes and accumulating water and high nutrients at the slope toes and eventually on the valley bottoms, favoring the shrubification on the valley bottoms [42].
Numerous studies have demonstrated that shrub expansion is substantially influenced by topography [47][59][60][61][62]. Wetlands or peatlands are generally topographically lower than upland forest and are less resilient than uplands after disturbances since vegetation, especially tree seedlings, fails to recover in very wet areas [3][12]. In addition, thawed pipeline trenches/cylinders can form a hydraulic connection among peat plateaus, bogs, and fens, resulting in forest fragmentation and tree losses [1].
Changes in microtopography resulting from pipeline construction and operation, together with the rutting from large machines and vehicle movement, are related to vegetation and organic damage or removal and, subsequently, a warmer soil and rapid permafrost thaw [14][32]. Williams and Quinton [63] found that removal of surface vegetation for pipelines increased incoming solar radiation by 11% on a boreal peatland in Northwest Territories, Canada. This modifies the microtopography along the pipeline corridor by warming the soil and melting the ground ice, leading to the ground surface subsidence and settlement of foundation soils and near-surface permafrost, as well as thermokarst, in the landscapes; these processes could further modify or change nutrient availability, soil moisture contents, soil hydrology, rooting depths, and surface soil cryoturbation, influencing shrub colonization and coverage [64].
Soil moisture and drainage and local topography have been highlighted as key factors related to shrub establishment in the ROW in boreal forest and arctic tundra. Permafrost thaw resulting from pipeline construction and heat dissipation from oil flows increases soil moisture content and results in ground surface subsidence and thermokarst, creating waterlogged lowlands and relatively drier uplands with improved soil drainage in the ROW. These can contribute to shrubification in the ROW.

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Subjects: Environmental Sciences
Contributors MDPI registered users' name will be linked to their SciProfiles pages. To register with us, please refer to https://encyclopedia.pub/register :
Xiaoying Jin
,
Huijun Jin
,
Xue Yang
,
Wenhui Wang
,
Shuai Huang
,
Shengrong Zhang
,
Suiqiao Yang
,
Xiaoying Li
,
Hongwei Wang
,
Ruixia He
,
Yan Li
,
Xinze Li
,
Xinyu Li
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Update Date: 27 Jul 2022
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