Climatic role of terrestrial ecosystem under elevated CO2 : a bottom-up greenhouse gases budget.

Abstract

The net balance of greenhouse gas (GHG) exchanges between terrestrial ecosystems and the atmosphere under elevated atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2 ) remains poorly understood. Here, we synthesise 1655 measurements from 169 published studies to assess GHGs budget of terrestrial ecosystems under elevated CO2 . We show that elevated CO2 significantly stimulates plant C pool (NPP) by 20%, soil CO2 fluxes by 24%, and methane (CH4 ) fluxes by 34% from rice paddies and by 12% from natural wetlands, while it slightly decreases CH4 uptake of upland soils by 3.8%. Elevated CO2 causes insignificant increases in soil nitrous oxide (N2 O) fluxes (4.6%), soil organic C (4.3%) and N (3.6%) pools. The elevated CO2 -induced increase in GHG emissions may decline with CO2 enrichment levels. An elevated CO2 -induced rise in soil CH4 and N2 O emissions (2.76 Pg CO2 -equivalent year-1 ) could negate soil C enrichment (2.42 Pg CO2 year-1 ) or reduce mitigation potential of terrestrial net ecosystem production by as much as 69% (NEP, 3.99 Pg CO2 year-1 ) under elevated CO2 . Our analysis highlights that the capacity of terrestrial ecosystems to act as a sink to slow climate warming under elevated CO2 might have been largely offset by its induced increases in soil GHGs source strength.