Carbon-nitrogen interactions regulate climate-carbon cycle feedbacks: results from an atmosphere-ocean general circulation model

Inclusion of fundamental ecological interactions between carbon and nitrogen cycles in the land component of an atmosphere-ocean general circulation model (AOGCM) leads to decreased carbon uptake associated with CO2 fertil- ization, and increased carbon uptake associated with warm- ing of the climate system. The balance of these two oppos- ing effects is to reduce the fraction of anthropogenic CO2 predicted to be sequestered in land ecosystems. The primary mechanism responsible for increased land carbon storage un- der radiatively forced climate change is shown to be fertiliza- tion of plant growth by increased mineralization of nitrogen directly associated with increased decomposition of soil or- ganic matter under a warming climate, which in this partic- ular model results in a negative gain for the climate-carbon feedback. Estimates for the land and ocean sink fractions of recent anthropogenic emissions are individually within the range of observational estimates, but the combined land plus ocean sink fractions produce an airborne fraction which is too high compared to observations. This bias is likely due in part to an underestimation of the ocean sink frac- tion. Our results show a significant growth in the airborne fraction of anthropogenic CO2 emissions over the coming

[1]  Peter E. Thornton,et al.  Systematic assessment of terrestrial biogeochemistry in coupled climate–carbon models , 2009 .

[2]  W. Schlesinger.  On the fate of anthropogenic nitrogen , 2009, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[3]  Josep G. Canadell,et al.  Anthropogenic and biophysical contributions to increasing atmospheric CO 2 growth rate and airborne fraction , 2008 .

[4]  Andrei P. Sokolov,et al.  Consequences of Considering Carbon–Nitrogen Interactions on the Feedbacks between Climate and the Terrestrial Carbon Cycle , 2008 .

[5]  C. Field,et al.  A unifying framework for dinitrogen fixation in the terrestrial biosphere , 2008, Nature.

[6]  K. Treseder,et al.  Nitrogen limitation of net primary productivity in terrestrial ecosystems is globally distributed. , 2008, Ecology.

[7]  Peter E. Thornton,et al.  Influence of carbon‐nitrogen cycle coupling on land model response to CO2 fertilization and climate variability , 2007 .

[8]  Helmut Hillebrand,et al.  Global analysis of nitrogen and phosphorus limitation of primary producers in freshwater, marine and terrestrial ecosystems. , 2007, Ecology letters.

[9]  R. Dickinson,et al.  Couplings between changes in the climate system and biogeochemistry , 2007 .

[10]  R. B. Jackson,et al.  Increases in nitrogen uptake rather than nitrogen-use efficiency support higher rates of temperate forest productivity under elevated CO2 , 2007, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

[11]  Peter E. Thornton,et al.  An Improved Canopy Integration Scheme for a Land Surface Model with Prognostic Canopy Structure , 2007 .

[12]  Peter E. Thornton,et al.  The Partitioning of Evapotranspiration into Transpiration, Soil Evaporation, and Canopy Evaporation in a GCM: Impacts on Land–Atmosphere Interaction , 2007 .

[13]  Philippe Ciais,et al.  Weak Northern and Strong Tropical Land Carbon Uptake from Vertical Profiles of Atmospheric CO2 , 2007, Science.

[14]  P. Friedlingstein,et al.  What determines the magnitude of carbon cycle‐climate feedbacks? , 2007 .

[15]  C. Field,et al.  A model of biogeochemical cycles of carbon, nitrogen, and phosphorus including symbiotic nitrogen fixation and phosphatase production , 2007 .

[16]  T. A. Black,et al.  Soil-plant nitrogen cycling modulated carbon exchanges in a western temperate conifer forest in Canada , 2006 .

[17]  Johan Six,et al.  Interactions between plant growth and soil nutrient cycling under elevated CO2: a meta‐analysis , 2006 .

[18]  M. Stieglitz,et al.  A simple model for analyzing climatic effects on terrestrial carbon and nitrogen dynamics: An arctic case study , 2006 .

[19]  S. Malyshev,et al.  The underpinnings of land‐use history: three centuries of global gridded land‐use transitions, wood‐harvest activity, and resulting secondary lands , 2006 .

[20]  Scott C. Doney,et al.  Natural Variability in a Stable, 1000-Yr Global Coupled Climate–Carbon Cycle Simulation , 2006 .

[21]  James J. Hack,et al.  The Low-Resolution CCSM3 , 2006 .

[22]  W. G. Strand,et al.  Climate Change Projections for the Twenty-First Century and Climate Change Commitment in the CCSM3 , 2006 .

[23]  W. Collins,et al.  The Community Climate System Model Version 3 (CCSM3) , 2006 .

[24]  R. Dickinson,et al.  The Community Land Model and Its Climate Statistics as a Component of the Community Climate System Model , 2006 .

[25]  J. Six,et al.  Element interactions limit soil carbon storage. , 2006, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[26]  P. Reich,et al.  Nitrogen limitation constrains sustainability of ecosystem response to CO2 , 2006, Nature.

[27]  R. Norby,et al.  Nitrogen uptake, distribution, turnover, and efficiency of use in a CO2-enriched sweetgum forest. , 2006, Ecology.

[28]  R. B. Jackson,et al.  Potential nitrogen constraints on soil carbon sequestration under low and elevated atmospheric CO2. , 2006, Ecology.

[29]  Yiqi Luo,et al.  Elevated CO2 stimulates net accumulations of carbon and nitrogen in land ecosystems: a meta-analysis. , 2006, Ecology.

[30]  D. E G R A A F F * W, K E E S-J A N Va N G R O E N I,et al.  Interactions between plant growth and soil nutrient cycling under elevated CO 2 : a meta-analysis , 2006 .

[31]  R. Schnur,et al.  Climate-carbon cycle feedback analysis: Results from the C , 2006 .

[32]  Dusanka Zupanski,et al.  An ensemble data assimilation system to estimate CO2 surface fluxes from atmospheric trace gas observations , 2005 .

[33]  P. Thornton,et al.  Ecosystem model spin-up: Estimating steady state conditions in a coupled terrestrial carbon and nitrogen cycle model , 2005 .

[34]  Peter E. Thornton,et al.  Assessing future nitrogen deposition and carbon cycle feedback using a multimodel approach: Analysis of nitrogen deposition , 2005 .

[35]  K. Lindsay,et al.  Evolution of carbon sinks in a changing climate. , 2005, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[36]  K. Gross,et al.  Functional- and abundance-based mechanisms explain diversity loss due to N fertilization. , 2005, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America.

[37]  Keith Lindsay,et al.  Upper ocean ecosystem dynamics and iron cycling in a global three‐dimensional model , 2004 .

[38]  Richard A. Feely,et al.  A global ocean carbon climatology: Results from Global Data Analysis Project (GLODAP) , 2004 .

[39]  Scott C. Doney,et al.  Evaluating global ocean carbon models: The importance of realistic physics , 2004 .

[40]  W. Parton,et al.  Progressive Nitrogen Limitation of Ecosystem Responses to Rising Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide , 2004 .

[41]  Nicolas Gruber,et al.  The Oceanic Sink for Anthropogenic CO2 , 2004, Science.

[42]  Benjamin P Colman,et al.  Decadal-scale fates of 15N tracers added to oak and pine stands under ambient and elevated N inputs at the Harvard Forest (USA) , 2004 .

[43]  Scott C. Doney,et al.  Evaluation of ocean carbon cycle models with data‐based metrics , 2004 .

[44]  Peter E. Thornton,et al.  Technical Description of the Community Land Model (CLM) , 2004 .

[45]  Stephen G. Yeager,et al.  Diurnal to decadal global forcing for ocean and sea-ice models: The data sets and flux climatologies , 2004 .

[46]  Christopher B. Field,et al.  Nitrogen and Climate Change , 2003, Science.

[47]  P. Cox,et al.  How positive is the feedback between climate change and the carbon cycle? , 2003 .

[48]  K. Lindsay,et al.  Global Ocean Carbon Cycle Modeling , 2003 .

[49]  Jerry M. Melillo,et al.  Soil Warming and Carbon-Cycle Feedbacks to the Climate System , 2002, Science.

[50]  W. Oechel,et al.  Environmental controls over carbon dioxide and water vapor exchange of terrestrial vegetation , 2002 .

[51]  Peter E. Thornton,et al.  Modeling and measuring the effects of disturbance history and climate on carbon and water budgets in evergreen needleleaf forests , 2002 .

[52]  J. Aber,et al.  Soil warming and carbon-cycle feedbacks to the climate system. , 2002, Science.

[53]  P. Reich,et al.  Interactive effects of nitrogen deposition, tropospheric ozone, elevated CO2 and land use history on the carbon dynamics of northern hardwood forests , 2002 .

[54]  Scott C. Doney,et al.  Evaluation of ocean model ventilation with CFC-11: comparison of 13 global ocean models , 2002 .

[55]  P. Ciais,et al.  Consistent Land- and Atmosphere-Based U.S. Carbon Sink Estimates , 2001, Science.

[56]  K. K. Goldewijk.  Estimating global land use change over the past 300 years: The HYDE Database , 2001 .

[57]  J. Lamarque,et al.  A global simulation of tropospheric ozone and related tracers: Description and evaluation of MOZART, version 2 , 2001 .

[58]  F. Woodward,et al.  Global response of terrestrial ecosystem structure and function to CO2 and climate change: results from six dynamic global vegetation models , 2001 .

[59]  I. C. Prentice,et al.  Carbon balance of the terrestrial biosphere in the Twentieth Century: Analyses of CO2, climate and land use effects with four process‐based ecosystem models , 2001 .

[60]  Christine L. Goodale,et al.  THE LONG-TERM EFFECTS OF LAND-USE HISTORY ON NITROGEN CYCLING IN NORTHERN HARDWOOD FORESTS , 2001 .

[61]  S. Doney,et al.  An intermediate complexity marine ecosystem model for the global domain , 2001 .

[62]  David W. Kicklighter,et al.  Modelling carbon responses of tundra ecosystems to historical and projected climate: sensitivity of pan‐Arctic carbon storage to temporal and spatial variation in climate , 2000, Global change biology.

[63]  Alexei G. Sankovski,et al.  Special report on emissions scenarios , 2000 .

[64]  W. G. Strand,et al.  Parallel climate model (PCM) control and transient simulations , 2000 .

[65]  N. Ramankutty,et al.  Estimating historical changes in global land cover: Croplands from 1700 to 1992 , 1999 .

[66]  R. Mäkipää,et al.  Effects of climate change and nitrogen deposition on the carbon sequestration of a forest ecosystem in the boreal zone , 1999 .

[67]  B. Emmett,et al.  Nitrogen deposition makes a minor contribution to carbon sequestration in temperate forests , 1999, Nature.

[68]  Gregg Marland,et al.  A 1° × 1° distribution of carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel consumption and cement manufacture, 1950–1990 , 1996 .

[69]  Robert W. Howarth,et al.  Nitrogen limitation on land and in the sea: How can it occur? , 1991 .