TY - JOUR
T1 - Decadal variability in land carbon sink efficiency
AU - Zhu, Lei
AU - Ciais, Philippe
AU - Bastos, Ana
AU - Ballantyne, Ashley P.
AU - Chevallier, Frederic
AU - Gasser, Thomas
AU - Kondo, Masayuki
AU - Pongratz, Julia
AU - Rödenbeck, Christian
AU - Li, Wei
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2021, The Author(s).
PY - 2021/12
Y1 - 2021/12
N2 - Background: The climate mitigation target of limiting the temperature increase below 2 °C above the pre-industrial levels requires the efforts from all countries. Tracking the trajectory of the land carbon sink efficiency is thus crucial to evaluate the nationally determined contributions (NDCs). Here, we define the instantaneous land sink efficiency as the ratio of natural land carbon sinks to emissions from fossil fuel and land-use and land-cover change with a value of 1 indicating carbon neutrality to track its temporal dynamics in the past decades. Results: Land sink efficiency has been decreasing during 1957–1990 because of the increased emissions from fossil fuel. After the effect of the Mt. Pinatubo eruption diminished (after 1994), the land sink efficiency firstly increased before 2009 and then began to decrease again after 2009. This reversal around 2009 is mostly attributed to changes in land sinks in tropical regions in response to climate variations. Conclusions: The decreasing trend of land sink efficiency in recent years reveals greater challenges in climate change mitigation, and that climate impacts on land carbon sinks must be accurately quantified to assess the effectiveness of regional scale climate mitigation policies.
AB - Background: The climate mitigation target of limiting the temperature increase below 2 °C above the pre-industrial levels requires the efforts from all countries. Tracking the trajectory of the land carbon sink efficiency is thus crucial to evaluate the nationally determined contributions (NDCs). Here, we define the instantaneous land sink efficiency as the ratio of natural land carbon sinks to emissions from fossil fuel and land-use and land-cover change with a value of 1 indicating carbon neutrality to track its temporal dynamics in the past decades. Results: Land sink efficiency has been decreasing during 1957–1990 because of the increased emissions from fossil fuel. After the effect of the Mt. Pinatubo eruption diminished (after 1994), the land sink efficiency firstly increased before 2009 and then began to decrease again after 2009. This reversal around 2009 is mostly attributed to changes in land sinks in tropical regions in response to climate variations. Conclusions: The decreasing trend of land sink efficiency in recent years reveals greater challenges in climate change mitigation, and that climate impacts on land carbon sinks must be accurately quantified to assess the effectiveness of regional scale climate mitigation policies.
KW - Carbon neutrality
KW - Land carbon sink efficiency
KW - Trend reversal
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85105657528&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1186/s13021-021-00178-3
DO - 10.1186/s13021-021-00178-3
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:85105657528
SN - 1750-0680
VL - 16
JO - Carbon Balance and Management
JF - Carbon Balance and Management
IS - 1
M1 - 15
ER -