Climate-carbon feedback tradeoff between Arctic and alpine permafrost under warming

Bao, Tao; Xu, Xiyan; Jia, Gensuo; Zhu, Xingru; Riley, William J.; Yang, Yuanhe

doi:10.1126/sciadv.adt8366

Climate-carbon feedback tradeoff between Arctic and alpine permafrost under warming

Journal Article · Wed Sep 17 00:00:00 EDT 2025 · Science Advances

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.adt8366· OSTI ID:2997780

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Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing (China)
Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing (China); University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing (China)
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing (China); Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing (China); China National Botanical Garden, Beijing (China)

Whether greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions from permafrost will trigger positive climate feedbacks under warming remains unknown. Here, we synthesized the response of growing season carbon dioxide (CO₂), methane (CH₄), and nitrous oxide (N₂O) emissions to experimentally manipulated warming of ~2°C for permafrost in alpine and Arctic regions. Warming weakened the GHG sink of alpine permafrost, thereby increasing (13%) its global warming potential, but strengthened the GHG sink of Arctic permafrost and decreased (−10%) its global warming potential. When warming caused drying of alpine permafrost soils, the CO₂ sink weakened but the CH₄ sink increased. In contrast, warming of relatively wet Arctic permafrost increased the CO₂ sink and CH₄ source. Warming led to much stronger increases of the N2O source in alpine than Arctic permafrost. Although keeping additional warming below 2°C in permafrost regions can avoid the positive permafrost-climate feedback, measures are needed to maintain fragile carbon sink of alpine permafrost ecosystems.

View Accepted Manuscript (DOE)

Research Organization:: Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)

Sponsoring Organization:: China Postdoctoral Science Foundation; National Key R&D Program of China; Natural Science Foundation of China; USDOE Office of Science (SC), Biological and Environmental Research (BER). Earth & Environmental Systems Science (EESS)

Grant/Contract Number:: AC02-05CH11231

OSTI ID:: 2997780

Journal Information:: Science Advances, Journal Name: Science Advances Journal Issue: 38 Vol. 11; ISSN 2375-2548

Publisher:: American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)Copyright Statement

Country of Publication:: United States

Language:: English

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