13 ms·

Study: Global plant growth surging alongside carbon dioxide (2017)

112 points by morpheos137 5y ago

site-packages1 5y ago
Not a scientist or otherwise expert, but this seems like a silver lining in the climate change that will eventually lead to humans not being able to inhabit the planet and the impact people are having on the planet: plants get more food and grow more. Am I wrong in that thought?
- gmuslera 5y ago
  Plants get more carbon, but not more minerals or elements that are only in the soil. And that may mean more volume, maybe more calories, but less food. That, even if we assume that we get to an stable and livable weather plateau, and not an ever increasing global warming, extreme weather, and livable conditions for every animal and plant. And even in that plateau, if the ecosystem that make that plants to live (I don't know, bees, worms, bacteria and so on) don't make it the plants won't be good for long neither.
  - stupendousyappi 5y ago
    Over the very long term, I see no reason to think that higher CO2 levels are fundamentally worse for life than pre-industrial levels. In general, plants are the foundation of the food chain, and higher CO2 levels are better for them. In addition, life depends on liquid water, and given that surface temperatures are generally closer to the freezing point of water than the boiling point, I could see how higher temperatures might increase the amount of land and ocean surface hospitable to life. The problem is the transition period, during which most things go extinct until evolution can slowly regenerate the lost diversity over 10+ million years.
    - Robotbeat 5y ago
      Good for plants, but not necessarily for humans. Human mental performance seems to reduce at higher CO2 levels, which makes sense as humans (by any definition... behaviorally modern humans ~50,000 years ago, anatomically modern humans 300,000 years ago, the overall genus homo within about 2 million years) have never experienced CO2 levels near the current level, let alone what they may be by the end of the century. Perhaps CO2 levels will be higher than ever experienced by great apes since we first evolved 14 million years ago: https://earth.org/data_visualization/a-brief-history-of-co2/ https://earth.org/data_visualization/a-brief-history-of-co2/
      - morpheos137 5y ago
        Do you got a source for the idea that human mental preformance suffers in the the hundred ppm CO2 range? I don't see how it would since the body has homeostatic mechanisms. CO2 has only increased by several hundred ppm since the industrial revolution. Maybe you are confusing CO2 with CO which has completely different biochemistry (it binds more efficiently with hemoglobin than oxygen and or does not release as easily once bound).
        Robotbeat 5y ago
        No, I'm not confusing CO for CO2. Yes, I do have sources that human mental performance suffers at elevated CO2 levels (800-1000ppm, not uncommon in buildings... but could be the CO2 level outdoors and even if it's not quite that high, it'll be harder and harder to keep building CO2 levels below that as external CO2 levels increase). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41370-018-0055-8 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41370-018-0055-8 https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/10.1289/ehp.1510037 https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/10.1289/ehp.1510037 Current levels aren't really problematic except in stuffy buildings. But if we don't stop changing the chemistry of the atmosphere, it becomes a problem.
        morpheos137 5y ago
        It would be interesting if the study could be duplicated. More importantly it does not seem to distinguish between the acute effect of a sudden increase in CO2 in an experimental setting and the chronic effect of gradually rising ambient rates over the span of years. It stands to reason that the body would adapt to higher CO2 levels over longer time ranges vs. just injecting a sudden pulse of 2500 ppm into a closed chamber.
    - gmuslera 5y ago
      You have as hypothesis that the current process will stop in very short time leaving things like today, more or less. I don't know when it will stop, but before it does, it will have to deal with the excess of greenhouse gases on the atmosphere until reaching an equilibrium point, and the positive feedback mechanisms that are being triggered already (and that they are emitting their own quota of GHG). It not may stop till the yearly global average temperature is several degrees over what is it now, CO2 in the air or not, and that will not bring nice living conditions. And as a difference of the other times in Earth's history that it happened without massive extinctions, it is happening too damn fast at geological/evolution times. If species doesn't adapt fast enough, they get extinct. Yes, at the other side of that process, some millions of years after, they could be a new age for life. But we won't be there.
    - loopz 5y ago
      CO2 levels from hundrer million years ago busted in myth #3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBF6F4Bi6Sg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBF6F4Bi6Sg
DJBunnies 5y ago
Did anybody else expect this? Plants love CO2, seems like excess will lead to crazy plant growth and a rebalance.
- dreamcompiler 5y ago
  So far it's the first confirmed case of negative feedback from global warming that I've seen, and that makes me hopeful.
  - johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
    Another one is smoke from forest fires; actively cooling the planet.
    - voisin 5y ago
      Have you come across any quantification of this?
      - Salgat 5y ago
        Great question. We know that a large enough volcano eruption can cause a year long winter so I'm curious how much large scale forest fires can compare. Also, assuming regrowth is allowed, the CO2 impact from the burned wood is neutral in the long run.
      - prewett 5y ago
        This is anecdotal quantification, but I lived in northern California for a few years and late June would usually be in the 100s or 110s. By August when California catches on fire, it cools down to 90s (when the smoke was blowing our way). By contrast, when I lived in Texas (no fires), June and July would be in the low 100s, and the first two weeks of August would be 107 - 112.
      - johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
        No. Entirely anecdotal and of my own observance. I traveled from Ontario to British Columbia two years ago when the forest fires out west were really peaking. I noticed smoke in the air as far as Winnipeg, and it only got thicker as I approached Vancouver. Surely all of those white/reflective particles in the upper atmosphere are reflecting the sun's rays. Also, weather predictions that year where WAY off. Predictions were always much higher than the actual high of the day. I assume this is resultant from historical weather data being a poor source for an altered state weather season. The smoke covered almost all of north america at some points and it really got much cooler than seasonal averages.
Cycl0ps 5y ago
From the article, the study assumes that COS is released primarily from plants. Are there any industrial processes that could be releasing this as a byproduct? The claim seems like it could be better tested by measuring COS in a controlled atmosphere.
jmclnx 5y ago
I have been noticing were I live, it has been getting greener and greener for many years 30+. First time I saw conformation on this.
- Inhibit 5y ago
  Certainly the same here for the past 20 years. Although not the same year to year the plants do seem to be growing more vigorously overall. So we now have a sample size of two :).
  - sha256kira 5y ago
    The last time I went to Wisconsin and New York it seemed way greener than ~8 years ago. So make that sample size three (or maybe even four?)!
- code_duck 5y ago
  Where I lived in northern Minnesota has been getting greener, but mainly, I think, because the winter is shorter by 2-3 weeks on both sides versus 80 years ago. Certainly green in Denver this year but it’s because we have received 50% more rain than usual.
- haram_masala 5y ago
  Same here. Weeding and trimming my small yard now fills my weekly compost bin, that never used to happen in the past couple of decades.
martinpw 5y ago
The link in the article to the original Nature paper is broken. Anyone have a valid link?
- _delirium 5y ago
  There's an extra period at the end of the URL. Works if you take it off. Alternately, here's a DOI permalink: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature22030 https://doi.org/10.1038/nature22030
stevespang 5y ago
Aquatic plants and algae are accounting for many times more usage . . . co2 dissolves into fresh and saline waters worldwide
bryan0 5y ago
How do climate change models currently account for increase in plants? Are these plant growth numbers in line with expectations? Is this a large change or a rounding error in those models?
- roter 5y ago
  Any global climate model worth its salt will have a comprehensive carbon cycle submodel, tracking the sources and sinks of carbon in all its forms, between ocean, soil, land, and atmosphere. Some models evolve the amount and type of plants e.g. C1 to project future biome distribution [0] One such model is aptly named TRIFFID [1] [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/35041539 https://www.nature.com/articles/35041539 Edit: non-paywall link to TRIFFID paper [3] [3] http://terra.seos.uvic.ca/model/common/HCTN_24.pdf http://terra.seos.uvic.ca/model/common/HCTN_24.pdf
  - phkahler 5y ago
    One would hope they also have a comprehensive water vapor model including con-trails but last I checked it was still a research area.
    - counters 5y ago
      Water vapor is, indeed, comprehensively included in climate models since the 1970s.
- alecst 5y ago
  I heard John Baez call this "CO2 fertilization". And it's been talked about for a while. Hard to predict the effect, but the consensus seems to range from "could help, sorta" to "not really important". https://www.azimuthproject.org/azimuth/show/Carbon+dioxide+fertilization https://www.azimuthproject.org/azimuth/show/Carbon+dioxide+f... > The details of CO2 fertilization matter a lot. It could make the difference between their original plan being roughly good enough… and being nowhere near good enough! Check the page for more info on young vs old trees, nitrogen limits, etc. There's also this page, which has an even more pessimistic take. https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/11/co_2-fertilization/ https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/11/co_2-...
nealabq 5y ago
I assume plant life is constrained by different things in different locations: - lack of water - too hot - too cold - not enough light (ground level of the rain forest?) - lack of soil nutrients (rain forest?) - too much salt I'll add CO2 levels to my mental list, a constraint that's independent of location.
- thaumasiotes 5y ago
  > I assume plant life is constrained by different things in different locations: > - lack of water > - too hot > - too cold Hmm. There are lots of examples where plants do not grow in an area that (1) has a lot of water; and (2) is very cold. Are there any examples of a place that is too hot, as opposed to too dry? Even the cold examples might be driven more by a lack of liquid water than by temperature requirements.
  - burnte 5y ago
    Too hot and plants can't properly regulate water loss, shrivel, and die. Too cold, even well above freezing, and they can have problems moving their liquids due to increased viscosity. In both extremes you can have temps too far from optimal that inhibit enzyme reactions, killing the plants.
  - wumpus 5y ago
    The hottest day of the growing season can significantly damage wheat and corn yields, despite typical rainfall. Google [corn yield too hot].
    - thaumasiotes 5y ago
      That's a problem with corn, not with plants. Or more helpfully, it's a problem with a plant experiencing temperatures outside its natural range. There's a huge difference between "the temperature here is too hot for plants to grow" and "the temperature here is too hot for cold-weather plants to grow".
  - klyrs 5y ago
Nbox9 5y ago
We’ve known about this effect for awhile. Tree growth has increased on volume but decreased in density since the industrial revolution[0]. A small bump in plant growth can not be seen as anything but the smallest of a silver lining. [0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378112718310600 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S037811271...
- kibwen 5y ago
  Saving people a click for the abstract: "Forest stand growth dynamics in Central Europe have accelerated since 1870 due to a rise in temperature, extended growing seasons, and other components of climate change. Based on wood samples from the oldest existing experimental plots in Central Europe, we show that the dominant tree species Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) H.Karst.), Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.), European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.), and sessile oak (Quercus petraea (Mattuschka) Liebl.) exhibit a significant decrease in wood density since more than 100 years. While stand and trees grow faster with respect to wood volume, we can show that wood density decreased by 8–12% since 1900. These results object a naïve direct transformation of volume growth trends into an accelerated biomass production. Since 1900, stand biomass increment increased 9–24 percentage points less compared to volume increment (29–100% increase reduces to 20–76%). For a given stem diameter and annual ring width, tree stability against windthrow, wood strength, energy content and C sequestration are even reduced under recent conditions. The generally decreased late wood density, partly going along with an increased early wood fraction, suggests the observed extension of the growing season and fertilization effect of dry deposition as the main causes. Our results indicate that current increased wood volume growth rates must not be straightforwardly converted into sequestrated C and biomass harvest potentials assuming historic values for wood density. This should be taken into account in monitoring, modeling, and utilization of carbon and biomass in forests under global change."
  - dr_dshiv 5y ago
    Hmm, that doesn't shout "plants absorb 30% more CO2 than we thought" as discussed in this thread.
ngcc_hk 5y ago
Do not have science but over 20 years driving around one can see the bare mountain covered with more and more trees … crazily green these days. Question is thus negative feedback loop does not help enough unfortunately.
_delirium 5y ago
(2017)
blondie9x 5y ago
People never ever forget that all of this is not in anyway what so ever has slowed down the exponential increase in greenhouse gases. SF6 CH4 CO2 N2O all growing year over year near record levels. Human consumption and population growth needs to level flatline. Now. https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/ https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/
- premium-lizard 5y ago
  CO2 near its record level? What do you figure the record is?
Uhhrrr 5y ago
A more recent paper on this says carbonyl sulfide peaked forty years ago: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2020JD033074 https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2020JD03...

112 points by morpheos137 5y ago

Not a scientist or otherwise expert, but this seems like a silver lining in the climate change that will eventually lead to humans not being able to inhabit the planet and the impact people are having on the planet: plants get more food and grow more. Am I wrong in that thought?

gmuslera 5y ago
Plants get more carbon, but not more minerals or elements that are only in the soil. And that may mean more volume, maybe more calories, but less food. That, even if we assume that we get to an stable and livable weather plateau, and not an ever increasing global warming, extreme weather, and livable conditions for every animal and plant. And even in that plateau, if the ecosystem that make that plants to live (I don't know, bees, worms, bacteria and so on) don't make it the plants won't be good for long neither.
- stupendousyappi 5y ago
  Over the very long term, I see no reason to think that higher CO2 levels are fundamentally worse for life than pre-industrial levels. In general, plants are the foundation of the food chain, and higher CO2 levels are better for them. In addition, life depends on liquid water, and given that surface temperatures are generally closer to the freezing point of water than the boiling point, I could see how higher temperatures might increase the amount of land and ocean surface hospitable to life. The problem is the transition period, during which most things go extinct until evolution can slowly regenerate the lost diversity over 10+ million years.
  - Robotbeat 5y ago
    Good for plants, but not necessarily for humans. Human mental performance seems to reduce at higher CO2 levels, which makes sense as humans (by any definition... behaviorally modern humans ~50,000 years ago, anatomically modern humans 300,000 years ago, the overall genus homo within about 2 million years) have never experienced CO2 levels near the current level, let alone what they may be by the end of the century. Perhaps CO2 levels will be higher than ever experienced by great apes since we first evolved 14 million years ago: https://earth.org/data_visualization/a-brief-history-of-co2/ https://earth.org/data_visualization/a-brief-history-of-co2/
    - morpheos137 5y ago
      Do you got a source for the idea that human mental preformance suffers in the the hundred ppm CO2 range? I don't see how it would since the body has homeostatic mechanisms. CO2 has only increased by several hundred ppm since the industrial revolution. Maybe you are confusing CO2 with CO which has completely different biochemistry (it binds more efficiently with hemoglobin than oxygen and or does not release as easily once bound).
      - Robotbeat 5y ago
        No, I'm not confusing CO for CO2. Yes, I do have sources that human mental performance suffers at elevated CO2 levels (800-1000ppm, not uncommon in buildings... but could be the CO2 level outdoors and even if it's not quite that high, it'll be harder and harder to keep building CO2 levels below that as external CO2 levels increase). https://www.nature.com/articles/s41370-018-0055-8 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41370-018-0055-8 https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/10.1289/ehp.1510037 https://ehp.niehs.nih.gov/doi/10.1289/ehp.1510037 Current levels aren't really problematic except in stuffy buildings. But if we don't stop changing the chemistry of the atmosphere, it becomes a problem.
        morpheos137 5y ago
        It would be interesting if the study could be duplicated. More importantly it does not seem to distinguish between the acute effect of a sudden increase in CO2 in an experimental setting and the chronic effect of gradually rising ambient rates over the span of years. It stands to reason that the body would adapt to higher CO2 levels over longer time ranges vs. just injecting a sudden pulse of 2500 ppm into a closed chamber.
  - gmuslera 5y ago
    You have as hypothesis that the current process will stop in very short time leaving things like today, more or less. I don't know when it will stop, but before it does, it will have to deal with the excess of greenhouse gases on the atmosphere until reaching an equilibrium point, and the positive feedback mechanisms that are being triggered already (and that they are emitting their own quota of GHG). It not may stop till the yearly global average temperature is several degrees over what is it now, CO2 in the air or not, and that will not bring nice living conditions. And as a difference of the other times in Earth's history that it happened without massive extinctions, it is happening too damn fast at geological/evolution times. If species doesn't adapt fast enough, they get extinct. Yes, at the other side of that process, some millions of years after, they could be a new age for life. But we won't be there.
  - loopz 5y ago
    CO2 levels from hundrer million years ago busted in myth #3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBF6F4Bi6Sg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FBF6F4Bi6Sg

DJBunnies 5y ago

Did anybody else expect this? Plants love CO2, seems like excess will lead to crazy plant growth and a rebalance.

dreamcompiler 5y ago
So far it's the first confirmed case of negative feedback from global warming that I've seen, and that makes me hopeful.
- johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
  Another one is smoke from forest fires; actively cooling the planet.
  - voisin 5y ago
    Have you come across any quantification of this?
    - Salgat 5y ago
      Great question. We know that a large enough volcano eruption can cause a year long winter so I'm curious how much large scale forest fires can compare. Also, assuming regrowth is allowed, the CO2 impact from the burned wood is neutral in the long run.
    - prewett 5y ago
      This is anecdotal quantification, but I lived in northern California for a few years and late June would usually be in the 100s or 110s. By August when California catches on fire, it cools down to 90s (when the smoke was blowing our way). By contrast, when I lived in Texas (no fires), June and July would be in the low 100s, and the first two weeks of August would be 107 - 112.
    - johnnyApplePRNG 5y ago
      No. Entirely anecdotal and of my own observance. I traveled from Ontario to British Columbia two years ago when the forest fires out west were really peaking. I noticed smoke in the air as far as Winnipeg, and it only got thicker as I approached Vancouver. Surely all of those white/reflective particles in the upper atmosphere are reflecting the sun's rays. Also, weather predictions that year where WAY off. Predictions were always much higher than the actual high of the day. I assume this is resultant from historical weather data being a poor source for an altered state weather season. The smoke covered almost all of north america at some points and it really got much cooler than seasonal averages.

Cycl0ps 5y ago

From the article, the study assumes that COS is released primarily from plants. Are there any industrial processes that could be releasing this as a byproduct? The claim seems like it could be better tested by measuring COS in a controlled atmosphere.

jmclnx 5y ago

I have been noticing were I live, it has been getting greener and greener for many years 30+. First time I saw conformation on this.

Inhibit 5y ago
Certainly the same here for the past 20 years. Although not the same year to year the plants do seem to be growing more vigorously overall. So we now have a sample size of two :).
- sha256kira 5y ago
  The last time I went to Wisconsin and New York it seemed way greener than ~8 years ago. So make that sample size three (or maybe even four?)!
code_duck 5y ago
Where I lived in northern Minnesota has been getting greener, but mainly, I think, because the winter is shorter by 2-3 weeks on both sides versus 80 years ago. Certainly green in Denver this year but it’s because we have received 50% more rain than usual.
haram_masala 5y ago
Same here. Weeding and trimming my small yard now fills my weekly compost bin, that never used to happen in the past couple of decades.

martinpw 5y ago

The link in the article to the original Nature paper is broken. Anyone have a valid link?

_delirium 5y ago
There's an extra period at the end of the URL. Works if you take it off. Alternately, here's a DOI permalink: https://doi.org/10.1038/nature22030 https://doi.org/10.1038/nature22030

stevespang 5y ago

Aquatic plants and algae are accounting for many times more usage . . . co2 dissolves into fresh and saline waters worldwide

bryan0 5y ago

How do climate change models currently account for increase in plants? Are these plant growth numbers in line with expectations? Is this a large change or a rounding error in those models?

roter 5y ago
Any global climate model worth its salt will have a comprehensive carbon cycle submodel, tracking the sources and sinks of carbon in all its forms, between ocean, soil, land, and atmosphere. Some models evolve the amount and type of plants e.g. C1 to project future biome distribution [0] One such model is aptly named TRIFFID [1] [0] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/35041539 https://www.nature.com/articles/35041539 Edit: non-paywall link to TRIFFID paper [3] [3] http://terra.seos.uvic.ca/model/common/HCTN_24.pdf http://terra.seos.uvic.ca/model/common/HCTN_24.pdf
- phkahler 5y ago
  One would hope they also have a comprehensive water vapor model including con-trails but last I checked it was still a research area.
  - counters 5y ago
    Water vapor is, indeed, comprehensively included in climate models since the 1970s.
alecst 5y ago
I heard John Baez call this "CO2 fertilization". And it's been talked about for a while. Hard to predict the effect, but the consensus seems to range from "could help, sorta" to "not really important". https://www.azimuthproject.org/azimuth/show/Carbon+dioxide+fertilization https://www.azimuthproject.org/azimuth/show/Carbon+dioxide+f... > The details of CO2 fertilization matter a lot. It could make the difference between their original plan being roughly good enough… and being nowhere near good enough! Check the page for more info on young vs old trees, nitrogen limits, etc. There's also this page, which has an even more pessimistic take. https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/11/co_2-fertilization/ https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/11/co_2-...

nealabq 5y ago

I assume plant life is constrained by different things in different locations: - lack of water - too hot - too cold - not enough light (ground level of the rain forest?) - lack of soil nutrients (rain forest?) - too much salt I'll add CO2 levels to my mental list, a constraint that's independent of location.

thaumasiotes 5y ago
> I assume plant life is constrained by different things in different locations: > - lack of water > - too hot > - too cold Hmm. There are lots of examples where plants do not grow in an area that (1) has a lot of water; and (2) is very cold. Are there any examples of a place that is too hot, as opposed to too dry? Even the cold examples might be driven more by a lack of liquid water than by temperature requirements.
- burnte 5y ago
  Too hot and plants can't properly regulate water loss, shrivel, and die. Too cold, even well above freezing, and they can have problems moving their liquids due to increased viscosity. In both extremes you can have temps too far from optimal that inhibit enzyme reactions, killing the plants.
- wumpus 5y ago
  The hottest day of the growing season can significantly damage wheat and corn yields, despite typical rainfall. Google [corn yield too hot].
  - thaumasiotes 5y ago
    That's a problem with corn, not with plants. Or more helpfully, it's a problem with a plant experiencing temperatures outside its natural range. There's a huge difference between "the temperature here is too hot for plants to grow" and "the temperature here is too hot for cold-weather plants to grow".
- klyrs 5y ago

Nbox9 5y ago

We’ve known about this effect for awhile. Tree growth has increased on volume but decreased in density since the industrial revolution[0]. A small bump in plant growth can not be seen as anything but the smallest of a silver lining. [0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0378112718310600 https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S037811271...

kibwen 5y ago
Saving people a click for the abstract: "Forest stand growth dynamics in Central Europe have accelerated since 1870 due to a rise in temperature, extended growing seasons, and other components of climate change. Based on wood samples from the oldest existing experimental plots in Central Europe, we show that the dominant tree species Norway spruce (Picea abies (L.) H.Karst.), Scots pine (Pinus sylvestris L.), European beech (Fagus sylvatica L.), and sessile oak (Quercus petraea (Mattuschka) Liebl.) exhibit a significant decrease in wood density since more than 100 years. While stand and trees grow faster with respect to wood volume, we can show that wood density decreased by 8–12% since 1900. These results object a naïve direct transformation of volume growth trends into an accelerated biomass production. Since 1900, stand biomass increment increased 9–24 percentage points less compared to volume increment (29–100% increase reduces to 20–76%). For a given stem diameter and annual ring width, tree stability against windthrow, wood strength, energy content and C sequestration are even reduced under recent conditions. The generally decreased late wood density, partly going along with an increased early wood fraction, suggests the observed extension of the growing season and fertilization effect of dry deposition as the main causes. Our results indicate that current increased wood volume growth rates must not be straightforwardly converted into sequestrated C and biomass harvest potentials assuming historic values for wood density. This should be taken into account in monitoring, modeling, and utilization of carbon and biomass in forests under global change."
- dr_dshiv 5y ago
  Hmm, that doesn't shout "plants absorb 30% more CO2 than we thought" as discussed in this thread.

ngcc_hk 5y ago

Do not have science but over 20 years driving around one can see the bare mountain covered with more and more trees … crazily green these days. Question is thus negative feedback loop does not help enough unfortunately.

_delirium 5y ago

(2017)

blondie9x 5y ago

People never ever forget that all of this is not in anyway what so ever has slowed down the exponential increase in greenhouse gases. SF6 CH4 CO2 N2O all growing year over year near record levels. Human consumption and population growth needs to level flatline. Now. https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/ https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/

premium-lizard 5y ago
CO2 near its record level? What do you figure the record is?

Uhhrrr 5y ago

A more recent paper on this says carbonyl sulfide peaked forty years ago: https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2020JD033074 https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2020JD03...