Carbon deposits in Arctic could worsen climate change
July 6th, 2009 - 5:32 pm ICT by IANSToronto, July 6 (IANS) Vast amounts of carbon, about twice as much as contained in the atmosphere, is stored in the Arctic, according to a new study. The amount of carbon in frozen soils, sediments and river deltas raises new concerns over the role of the northern regions as future sources of greenhouse gases.
Carbon in permafrost is found largely in northern regions including Canada, Greenland, Mongolia, Russia, Scandinavia and the US.
“We now estimate the deposits contain over 1.5 trillion tonnes of frozen carbon, about twice as much carbon as contained in the atmosphere,” said Charles Tarnocai, of Agriculture and Agri-Food, Canada and lead study author.
Pep Canadell, executive director of the Global Carbon Project at Australian Commonwealth Scientific and Research Organization (CSIRO), Australia, and study co-author says that the existence of these super-sized deposits of frozen carbon means that any thawing of permafrost due to global warming may lead to significant emissions of the greenhouse gases.
“Radioactive carbon dating shows that most of the carbon dioxide currently emitted by thawing soils in Alaska was formed and frozen thousands of years ago. The carbon dating demonstrates how easily carbon decomposes when soils thaw under warmer conditions,” said Ted Schuur, professor at the University of Florida and co-author of the paper.
The authors point out the large uncertainties surrounding the extent to which permafrost carbon thawing could further accelerate climate change.
“Permafrost carbon is a bit of a wild card in the efforts to predict future climate change,” said Canadell, according to a CSIRO release.
The results were published this week in the journal of Global Biogeochemical Cycles of the American Geophysical Union.
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- Climate change strips Arctic of much snow cover - May 05, 2011
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- Climate change 'causing wildfires to burn more fiercely' - Dec 06, 2010
- Two thirds of permafrost likely to melt by 2200 - Feb 17, 2011
- 66pc permafrost to melt by 2200, speed up global warming in coming years - Feb 17, 2011
- Earth's temperature 'depends on CO2 levels in atmosphere' - Oct 15, 2010
- Arctic lands and oceans account for 25 percent of world's net sink of CO2 - Oct 15, 2009
- Thawing of permafrost is likely to boost global warming - Sep 02, 2008
- NASA spacecraft detects significant changes in Mars' atmosphere - Apr 22, 2011
- Greening Arctic unlikely to offset permafrost carbon release - May 28, 2009
- Methane leak from Arctic Shelf may be much larger and faster than anticipated - Mar 05, 2010
- Arctic area, oceans lock up fourth of world's carbon dioxide - Oct 15, 2009
Tags: agri food canada, american geophysical union, australian commonwealth, carbon deposits, climate change, csiro australia, frozen soils, global biogeochemical cycles, global carbon, northern regions, pep canadell, permafrost, radioactive carbon, research organization, river deltas, schuur, sources of greenhouse gases, study author, university of florida, wild card