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Constraints on estimating the CO2 fertilization effect emerge

Plants offset a large fraction of Earth’s carbon dioxide emissions, but estimating the size of this carbon sink relies on differing terrestrial-biosphere models. Combining multiple models with data has now reduced the uncertainty.
  1. Chris Huntingford

    1. Chris Huntingford is in the Climate System Department, UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Wallingford OX10 8BB, UK.

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  2. Rebecca J. Oliver

    1. Rebecca J. Oliver is in the Climate System Department, UK Centre for Ecology and Hydrology, Wallingford OX10 8BB, UK.

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The goal of mitigating climate change requires a global commitment to reducing greenhouse-gas emissions to avoid substantial temperature increases. However, achieving this objective is complicated by uncertainty over how much carbon dioxide will be absorbed naturally by trees and other plants. Writing in Nature, Keenan et al.1 have constrained estimates of this uncertainty by drawing empirical links between observations of the current climate and multi-model predictions of the land-carbon sink. The relationships between these observations and predictions are known as emergent constraints.

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Nature 600, 224-225 (2021)

doi: https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-03560-w

Updates & Corrections

  • Update 13 September 2022: The authors wish to alert readers to the fact that the report on which this comment was based, ‘A constraint on historic growth in global photosynthesis due to increasing CO2’, has been retracted. Some of the comments in this News & Views relying on the accuracy and reproducibility of these data should therefore be reconsidered.

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Competing Interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

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