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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jan/21/third-of-arctic-carbon-sink-now-a-source-of-emissions-study>
"A third of the Arctic’s tundra, forests and wetlands have become a source of
carbon emissions, a new study has found, as global heating ends thousands of
years of carbon storage in parts of the frozen north.
For millennia, Arctic land ecosystems have acted as a deep-freeze for the
planet’s carbon, holding vast amounts of potential emissions in the permafrost.
But ecosystems in the region are increasingly becoming a contributor to global
heating as they release more CO₂ into the atmosphere with rising temperatures,
a new study published in
Nature Climate Change concluded.
More than 30% of the region was a net source of CO₂, according to the analysis,
rising to 40% when emissions from wildfires were included. By using monitoring
data from 200 study sites between 1990 and 2020, the research demonstrates how
the Arctic’s boreal forests, wetlands and tundra are being transformed by rapid
warming.
“It is the first time that we’re seeing this shift at such a large scale,
cumulatively across all of the tundra. That’s a pretty big deal,” said Sue
Natali, a co-author and lead researcher on the study at the Woodwell Climate
Research Center.
The shift is occurring despite the Arctic becoming greener. “One place where I
work in interior Alaska, when the permafrost thaws, the plants grow more so you
can sometimes can get an uptick in carbon storage,” Natali said. “But the
permafrost continues to melt and the microbes take over. You have this really
big pool of carbon in the ground and you see things like ground collapse. You
can visually see the changes in the landscape,” she said.
The study comes amid growing concern from scientists about the natural
processes that regulate the Earth’s climate, which are themselves being
affected by rising temperatures. Together, the planet’s oceans, forests, soils
and other natural carbon sinks absorb about half of all human emissions, but
there are signs that these sinks are under strain.
The Arctic ecosystem, spanning Siberia, Alaska, the Nordic countries and
Canada, has been accumulating carbon for thousands of years, helping cool the
Earth’s atmosphere. In a warming world, the researchers say that the carbon
cycle in the region is beginning to change and needs better monitoring."
Cheers,
*** Xanni ***
--
mailto:xanni@xanadu.net Andrew Pam
http://xanadu.com.au/ Chief Scientist, Xanadu
https://glasswings.com.au/ Partner, Glass Wings
https://sericyb.com.au/ Manager, Serious Cybernetics
