Amazon Basin Now Net Carbon/Methane Source, Latest Readings Show

Back in 2005, and again in 2010, the vast Amazon rainforest, which has been aptly described as the world’s lungs, briefly lost its ability to take in atmospheric carbon dioxide. Its drought-stressed trees were not growing and respiring enough to, on balance, draw carbon out of the air. Fires roared through the forest, transforming trees into kindling and releasing the carbon stored in their wood back into the air.

These episodes were the first times that the Amazon was documented to have lost its ability to take in atmospheric carbon on a net basis. The rainforest had become what’s called carbon-neutral. In other words, it released as much carbon as it took in. Scientists saw this as kind of a big deal.

This summer, a similar switch-off appears to be happening again in the Amazon. A severe drought is again stressing trees even as it is fanning wildfires to greater intensity than during 2005 and 2010. Early satellite measures seem to indicate that something even worse may be happening — the rainforest and the lands it inhabits are now being hit so hard by a combination of drought and fire that the forest is starting to bleed carbon back. This gigantic and ancient repository of atmospheric carbon appears to have, at least over the past two months, turned into a carbon source.

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(High levels of carbon dioxide, in the range of 410 to 412 parts per million, and methane in the atmosphere over the Amazon rainforest during July and August of 2016 is a preliminary indicator that the great forest may be, for this period, acting as a carbon source. Image source: The Copernicus Observatory.)

EDIT

In this tragic context of heat, drought, ocean acidification and deforestation, it appears that the grace period that the Earth’s carbon sinks have given us to get our act together on global warming is coming to an end. Heating the Earth as significantly as we have is causing these sinks to start to break down — to be able to draw in less carbon, as was the case with the Amazon rainforest in 2005 and 2010. At these points in time, the sink was carbon-neutral. It was no longer providing us with the helpful service of drawing carbon out of the atmosphere and storing it in trees or soil. But, more ominously, in 2016, it appears that the Amazon may also to be starting to contribute carbon back to the atmosphere.

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(High surface methane readings over the Amazon in excess of 2,000 parts per billion is a drought and wildfire signature. It is also a signal that the rainforest during this period was emitting more carbon than it was taking in. Image source: The Copernicus Observatory.)

EDIT

https://robertscribbler.com/2016/08/05/carbon-sinks-in-crisis-it-looks-like-the-worlds-largest-rainforest-is-starting-to-bleed-greenhouse-gasses/