Articles | Volume 20, issue 12
https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-20-2283-2023
https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-20-2283-2023
Research article
 | Highlight paper
 | 
20 Jun 2023
Research article | Highlight paper |  | 20 Jun 2023

Quantifying land carbon cycle feedbacks under negative CO2 emissions

V. Rachel Chimuka, Claude-Michel Nzotungicimpaye, and Kirsten Zickfeld

Related authors

Indicators of Global Climate Change 2023: annual update of key indicators of the state of the climate system and human influence
Piers M. Forster, Chris Smith, Tristram Walsh, William F. Lamb, Robin Lamboll, Bradley Hall, Mathias Hauser, Aurélien Ribes, Debbie Rosen, Nathan P. Gillett, Matthew D. Palmer, Joeri Rogelj, Karina von Schuckmann, Blair Trewin, Myles Allen, Robbie Andrew, Richard A. Betts, Alex Borger, Tim Boyer, Jiddu A. Broersma, Carlo Buontempo, Samantha Burgess, Chiara Cagnazzo, Lijing Cheng, Pierre Friedlingstein, Andrew Gettelman, Johannes Gütschow, Masayoshi Ishii, Stuart Jenkins, Xin Lan, Colin Morice, Jens Mühle, Christopher Kadow, John Kennedy, Rachel E. Killick, Paul B. Krummel, Jan C. Minx, Gunnar Myhre, Vaishali Naik, Glen P. Peters, Anna Pirani, Julia Pongratz, Carl-Friedrich Schleussner, Sonia I. Seneviratne, Sophie Szopa, Peter Thorne, Mahesh V. M. Kovilakam, Elisa Majamäki, Jukka-Pekka Jalkanen, Margreet van Marle, Rachel M. Hoesly, Robert Rohde, Dominik Schumacher, Guido van der Werf, Russell Vose, Kirsten Zickfeld, Xuebin Zhang, Valérie Masson-Delmotte, and Panmao Zhai
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 16, 2625–2658, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-16-2625-2024,https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-16-2625-2024, 2024
Short summary
Indicators of Global Climate Change 2022: annual update of large-scale indicators of the state of the climate system and human influence
Piers M. Forster, Christopher J. Smith, Tristram Walsh, William F. Lamb, Robin Lamboll, Mathias Hauser, Aurélien Ribes, Debbie Rosen, Nathan Gillett, Matthew D. Palmer, Joeri Rogelj, Karina von Schuckmann, Sonia I. Seneviratne, Blair Trewin, Xuebin Zhang, Myles Allen, Robbie Andrew, Arlene Birt, Alex Borger, Tim Boyer, Jiddu A. Broersma, Lijing Cheng, Frank Dentener, Pierre Friedlingstein, José M. Gutiérrez, Johannes Gütschow, Bradley Hall, Masayoshi Ishii, Stuart Jenkins, Xin Lan, June-Yi Lee, Colin Morice, Christopher Kadow, John Kennedy, Rachel Killick, Jan C. Minx, Vaishali Naik, Glen P. Peters, Anna Pirani, Julia Pongratz, Carl-Friedrich Schleussner, Sophie Szopa, Peter Thorne, Robert Rohde, Maisa Rojas Corradi, Dominik Schumacher, Russell Vose, Kirsten Zickfeld, Valérie Masson-Delmotte, and Panmao Zhai
Earth Syst. Sci. Data, 15, 2295–2327, https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-2295-2023,https://doi.org/10.5194/essd-15-2295-2023, 2023
Short summary
Multi-century dynamics of the climate and carbon cycle under both high and net negative emissions scenarios
Charles D. Koven, Vivek K. Arora, Patricia Cadule, Rosie A. Fisher, Chris D. Jones, David M. Lawrence, Jared Lewis, Keith Lindsay, Sabine Mathesius, Malte Meinshausen, Michael Mills, Zebedee Nicholls, Benjamin M. Sanderson, Roland Séférian, Neil C. Swart, William R. Wieder, and Kirsten Zickfeld
Earth Syst. Dynam., 13, 885–909, https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-13-885-2022,https://doi.org/10.5194/esd-13-885-2022, 2022
Short summary
WETMETH 1.0: a new wetland methane model for implementation in Earth system models
Claude-Michel Nzotungicimpaye, Kirsten Zickfeld, Andrew H. MacDougall, Joe R. Melton, Claire C. Treat, Michael Eby, and Lance F. W. Lesack
Geosci. Model Dev., 14, 6215–6240, https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-6215-2021,https://doi.org/10.5194/gmd-14-6215-2021, 2021
Short summary
Is there warming in the pipeline? A multi-model analysis of the Zero Emissions Commitment from CO2
Andrew H. MacDougall, Thomas L. Frölicher, Chris D. Jones, Joeri Rogelj, H. Damon Matthews, Kirsten Zickfeld, Vivek K. Arora, Noah J. Barrett, Victor Brovkin, Friedrich A. Burger, Micheal Eby, Alexey V. Eliseev, Tomohiro Hajima, Philip B. Holden, Aurich Jeltsch-Thömmes, Charles Koven, Nadine Mengis, Laurie Menviel, Martine Michou, Igor I. Mokhov, Akira Oka, Jörg Schwinger, Roland Séférian, Gary Shaffer, Andrei Sokolov, Kaoru Tachiiri, Jerry Tjiputra, Andrew Wiltshire, and Tilo Ziehn
Biogeosciences, 17, 2987–3016, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-17-2987-2020,https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-17-2987-2020, 2020
Short summary

Related subject area

Earth System Science/Response to Global Change: Climate Change
Long-term impacts of global temperature stabilization and overshoot on exploited marine species
Anne L. Morée, Fabrice Lacroix, William W. L. Cheung, and Thomas L. Frölicher
Biogeosciences, 22, 1115–1133, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-1115-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-1115-2025, 2025
Short summary
Modelling ozone-induced changes in wheat amino acids and protein quality using a process-based crop model
Jo Cook, Durgesh Singh Yadav, Felicity Hayes, Nathan Booth, Sam Bland, Pritha Pande, Samarthia Thankappan, and Lisa Emberson
Biogeosciences, 22, 1035–1056, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-1035-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-1035-2025, 2025
Short summary
Toward more robust net primary production projections in the North Atlantic Ocean
Stéphane Doléac, Marina Lévy, Roy El Hourany, and Laurent Bopp
Biogeosciences, 22, 841–862, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-841-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-841-2025, 2025
Short summary
Assessment framework to predict sensitivity of marine calcifiers to ocean alkalinity enhancement – identification of biological thresholds and importance of precautionary principle
Nina Bednaršek, Hanna van de Mortel, Greg Pelletier, Marisol García-Reyes, Richard A. Feely, and Andrew G. Dickson
Biogeosciences, 22, 473–498, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-473-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-473-2025, 2025
Short summary
Review and syntheses: Ocean alkalinity enhancement and carbon dioxide removal through marine enhanced rock weathering using olivine
Luna J. J. Geerts, Astrid Hylén, and Filip J. R. Meysman
Biogeosciences, 22, 355–384, https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-355-2025,https://doi.org/10.5194/bg-22-355-2025, 2025
Short summary

Cited articles

Arora, V. K., Boer, G. J., Friedlingstein, P., Eby, M., Jones, C. D., Christian, J. R., Bonan, G., Bopp, L., Brovkin, V., Cadule, P., Hajima, T., Ilyina, T., Lindsay, K., Tjiputra, J. F., and Wu, T.: Carbon–Concentration and Carbon–Climate Feedbacks in CMIP5 Earth System Models, J. Climate, 26, 5289–5314, https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-12-00494.1, 2013. 
Boer, G. J. and Arora, V.: Geographic Aspects of Temperature and Concentration Feedbacks in the Carbon Budget, J. Climate, 23, 775–784, https://doi.org/10.1175/2009JCLI3161.1, 2010. 
Boer, G. J. and Arora, V.: Feedbacks in emission-driven and concentration-driven global carbon budgets, J. Climate, 32, 3326–3341, https://doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-12- 00365.1, 2013. 
Boucher, O., Halloran, P. R., Burke, E. J., Doutriaux-Boucher, M., Jones, C. D., Lowe, J. Ringer, M. A., Robertson, E., and Wu, P.: Reversibility in an earth system model in response to CO2 concentration changes, Environ. Res. Lett., 7, 024013, https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/7/2/024013, 2012. 
Download
Co-editor-in-chief
This study is the first to quantify land carbon cycle feedbacks under decreasing atmospheric CO2 concentration following negative CO2 emissions and compare them to feedbacks under positive emissions. The novel approach presented here reduces the carbon cycle inertia in the phase where atmospheric CO2 concentration decreases in order to improve the quantification of carbon cycle feedbacks under negative emissions. This approach reduced the effectivity of negative emissions in reducing atmospheric CO2, due to larger concentration-carbon and climate-carbon feedbacks.
Short summary
We propose a new method to quantify carbon cycle feedbacks under negative CO2 emissions. Our method isolates the lagged carbon cycle response to preceding positive emissions from the response to negative emissions. Our findings suggest that feedback parameters calculated with the novel approach are larger than those calculated with the conventional approach whereby carbon cycle inertia is not corrected for, with implications for the effectiveness of carbon dioxide removal in reducing CO2 levels.
Share
Altmetrics
Final-revised paper
Preprint