Process-oriented analysis of dominant sources of uncertainty in the land carbon sink

Michael O’Sullivan; Pierre Friedlingstein; Stephen Sitch; Peter Anthoni; Almut Arneth; Vivek K. Arora; Vladislav Bastrikov; Christine Delire; Daniel S. Goll; Atul Jain; Etsushi Kato; Daniel Kennedy; Jürgen Knauer; Sebastian Lienert; Danica Lombardozzi; Patrick C. McGuire; Joe R. Melton; Julia E.M.S. Nabel; Julia Pongratz; Benjamin Poulter; Roland Séférian; Hanqin Tian; Nicolas Vuichard; Anthony P. Walker; Wenping Yuan; Xu Yue; Sönke Zaehle

doi:10.1038/s41467-022-32416-8

Process-oriented analysis of dominant sources of uncertainty in the land carbon sink

Michael O’Sullivan, Pierre Friedlingstein, Stephen Sitch, Peter Anthoni, Almut Arneth, Vivek K. Arora, Vladislav Bastrikov, Christine Delire, Daniel S. Goll, Atul Jain, Etsushi Kato, Daniel Kennedy, Jürgen Knauer, Sebastian Lienert, Danica Lombardozzi, Patrick C. McGuire, Joe R. Melton, Julia E.M.S. Nabel, Julia Pongratz, Benjamin PoulterRoland Séférian, Hanqin Tian, Nicolas Vuichard, Anthony P. Walker, Wenping Yuan, Xu Yue, Sönke Zaehle

Ecosystem Processes

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35 Scopus citations

Abstract

The observed global net land carbon sink is captured by current land models. All models agree that atmospheric CO₂ and nitrogen deposition driven gains in carbon stocks are partially offset by climate and land-use and land-cover change (LULCC) losses. However, there is a lack of consensus in the partitioning of the sink between vegetation and soil, where models do not even agree on the direction of change in carbon stocks over the past 60 years. This uncertainty is driven by plant productivity, allocation, and turnover response to atmospheric CO₂ (and to a smaller extent to LULCC), and the response of soil to LULCC (and to a lesser extent climate). Overall, differences in turnover explain ~70% of model spread in both vegetation and soil carbon changes. Further analysis of internal plant and soil (individual pools) cycling is needed to reduce uncertainty in the controlling processes behind the global land carbon sink.

Original language	English
Article number	4781
Journal	Nature Communications
Volume	13
Issue number	1
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32416-8
State	Published - Dec 2022

Funding

M.O.S., P.F. and S.S. have received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement No. 821003 (project 4 C). AR was supported by grant number T32HS026121 from the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. The content is solely the responsibility of the authors and does not necessarily represent the official views of the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Other authors have no pertinent conflicts of interest to report.

Funders	Funder number
Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality
Horizon 2020 Framework Programme	821003

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O’Sullivan, M., Friedlingstein, P., Sitch, S., Anthoni, P., Arneth, A., Arora, V. K., Bastrikov, V., Delire, C., Goll, D. S., Jain, A., Kato, E., Kennedy, D., Knauer, J., Lienert, S., Lombardozzi, D., McGuire, P. C., Melton, J. R., Nabel, J. E. M. S., Pongratz, J., ... Zaehle, S. (2022). Process-oriented analysis of dominant sources of uncertainty in the land carbon sink. Nature Communications, 13(1), Article 4781. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32416-8

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title = "Process-oriented analysis of dominant sources of uncertainty in the land carbon sink",

abstract = "The observed global net land carbon sink is captured by current land models. All models agree that atmospheric CO2 and nitrogen deposition driven gains in carbon stocks are partially offset by climate and land-use and land-cover change (LULCC) losses. However, there is a lack of consensus in the partitioning of the sink between vegetation and soil, where models do not even agree on the direction of change in carbon stocks over the past 60 years. This uncertainty is driven by plant productivity, allocation, and turnover response to atmospheric CO2 (and to a smaller extent to LULCC), and the response of soil to LULCC (and to a lesser extent climate). Overall, differences in turnover explain ~70% of model spread in both vegetation and soil carbon changes. Further analysis of internal plant and soil (individual pools) cycling is needed to reduce uncertainty in the controlling processes behind the global land carbon sink.",

author = "Michael O{\textquoteright}Sullivan and Pierre Friedlingstein and Stephen Sitch and Peter Anthoni and Almut Arneth and Arora, {Vivek K.} and Vladislav Bastrikov and Christine Delire and Goll, {Daniel S.} and Atul Jain and Etsushi Kato and Daniel Kennedy and J{\"u}rgen Knauer and Sebastian Lienert and Danica Lombardozzi and McGuire, {Patrick C.} and Melton, {Joe R.} and Nabel, {Julia E.M.S.} and Julia Pongratz and Benjamin Poulter and Roland S{\'e}f{\'e}rian and Hanqin Tian and Nicolas Vuichard and Walker, {Anthony P.} and Wenping Yuan and Xu Yue and S{\"o}nke Zaehle",

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O’Sullivan, M, Friedlingstein, P, Sitch, S, Anthoni, P, Arneth, A, Arora, VK, Bastrikov, V, Delire, C, Goll, DS, Jain, A, Kato, E, Kennedy, D, Knauer, J, Lienert, S, Lombardozzi, D, McGuire, PC, Melton, JR, Nabel, JEMS, Pongratz, J, Poulter, B, Séférian, R, Tian, H, Vuichard, N, Walker, AP, Yuan, W, Yue, X & Zaehle, S 2022, 'Process-oriented analysis of dominant sources of uncertainty in the land carbon sink', Nature Communications, vol. 13, no. 1, 4781. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-022-32416-8

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AU - O’Sullivan, Michael

AU - Friedlingstein, Pierre

AU - Sitch, Stephen

AU - Anthoni, Peter

AU - Arneth, Almut

AU - Arora, Vivek K.

AU - Bastrikov, Vladislav

AU - Delire, Christine

AU - Goll, Daniel S.

AU - Jain, Atul

AU - Kato, Etsushi

AU - Kennedy, Daniel

AU - Knauer, Jürgen

AU - Lienert, Sebastian

AU - Lombardozzi, Danica

AU - McGuire, Patrick C.

AU - Melton, Joe R.

AU - Nabel, Julia E.M.S.

AU - Pongratz, Julia

AU - Poulter, Benjamin

AU - Séférian, Roland

AU - Tian, Hanqin

AU - Vuichard, Nicolas

AU - Walker, Anthony P.

AU - Yuan, Wenping

AU - Yue, Xu

AU - Zaehle, Sönke

PY - 2022/12

Y1 - 2022/12

N2 - The observed global net land carbon sink is captured by current land models. All models agree that atmospheric CO2 and nitrogen deposition driven gains in carbon stocks are partially offset by climate and land-use and land-cover change (LULCC) losses. However, there is a lack of consensus in the partitioning of the sink between vegetation and soil, where models do not even agree on the direction of change in carbon stocks over the past 60 years. This uncertainty is driven by plant productivity, allocation, and turnover response to atmospheric CO2 (and to a smaller extent to LULCC), and the response of soil to LULCC (and to a lesser extent climate). Overall, differences in turnover explain ~70% of model spread in both vegetation and soil carbon changes. Further analysis of internal plant and soil (individual pools) cycling is needed to reduce uncertainty in the controlling processes behind the global land carbon sink.

AB - The observed global net land carbon sink is captured by current land models. All models agree that atmospheric CO2 and nitrogen deposition driven gains in carbon stocks are partially offset by climate and land-use and land-cover change (LULCC) losses. However, there is a lack of consensus in the partitioning of the sink between vegetation and soil, where models do not even agree on the direction of change in carbon stocks over the past 60 years. This uncertainty is driven by plant productivity, allocation, and turnover response to atmospheric CO2 (and to a smaller extent to LULCC), and the response of soil to LULCC (and to a lesser extent climate). Overall, differences in turnover explain ~70% of model spread in both vegetation and soil carbon changes. Further analysis of internal plant and soil (individual pools) cycling is needed to reduce uncertainty in the controlling processes behind the global land carbon sink.

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VL - 13

JO - Nature Communications

JF - Nature Communications

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Process-oriented analysis of dominant sources of uncertainty in the land carbon sink

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