The vast reservoir of carbon that is stored in soils probably is more sensitive to destabilization from climate change than has previously been assumed, according to a new study by researchers at WHOI and other institutions.
The vast reservoir of carbon that is stored in soils probably is more sensitive to destabilization from climate change than has previously been assumed, according to a new study by researchers at WHOI and other institutions.
The study found that the biospheric carbon turnover within river basins is vulnerable to future temperature and precipitation perturbations from a changing climate.
Although many earlier, and fairly localized, studies have hinted at soil organic carbon sensitivity to climate change, the new research sampled 36 rivers from around the globe and provides evidence of sensitivity at a global scale.
“The study results indicate that at the large ecosystem scale of river basins, soil carbon is sensitive to climate variability,” said WHOI researcher Timothy Eglinton, co-lead author of the paper in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. “This means that changing climate, and particularly increasing temperature and an invigorated hydrological cycle, may have a positive feedback in terms of returning carbon to the atmosphere from previously stabilized pools of carbon in soils.”
Read more at: Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute
A new study from scientists at WHOI and other institutions shows that climate change can destabilize the global soil carbon reservoir. (Narayani River in the Himalayas, a Tributary to the Ganges River). (Photo Credit: ©Valier Galy/Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution)
