Pronounced and unavoidable impacts of low-end global warming on northern high-latitude land ecosystems
Abstract
Arctic ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to climate change because of Arctic amplification. Here, we assessed the climatic impacts of low-end, 1.5 °C, and 2.0 °C global temperature increases above pre-industrial levels, on the warming of terrestrial ecosystems in northern high latitudes (NHL, above 60 °N including pan-Arctic tundra and boreal forests) under the framework of the Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project phase 2b protocol. We analyzed the simulated changes of net primary productivity, vegetation biomass, and soil carbon stocks of eight ecosystem models that were forced by the projections of four global climate models and two atmospheric greenhouse gas pathways (RCP2.6 and RCP6.0). Our results showed that considerable impacts on ecosystem carbon budgets, particularly primary productivity and vegetation biomass, are very likely to occur in the NHL areas. The models agreed on increases in primary productivity and biomass accumulation, despite considerable inter-model and inter-scenario differences in the magnitudes of the responses. The inter-model variability highlighted the inadequacies of the present models, which fail to consider important components such as permafrost and wildfire. The simulated impacts were attributable primarily to the rapid temperature increases in the NHL and the greater sensitivity of northern vegetation to warming, which contrasted with the lessmore »
- Authors:
-
[1];
[3];
[4];
[6];
[2];
- National Inst. for Environmental Studies, Tsukuba (Japan); Japan Agency for Marine-Earth Science and Technology, Yokohama (Japan)
- Potsdam Inst. for Climate Impact Research (Germany)
- Laboratoire des Sciences du Climate et de l'Environment (IPSL-LSCE), Paris (France)
- Pacific Northwest National Lab. (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
- Univ. of Liege (Belgium)
- Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Center (BiK-F), Frankfurt (Germany)
- Senckenberg Biodiversity and Climate Research Center (BiK-F), Frankfurt (Germany); Goethe Univ., Frankfurt (Germany)
- Auburn Univ., AL (United States)
- ETH Zurich (Switzerland); Vrije Univ. Brussel, Brussels (Belgium)
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), Richland, WA (United States)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE; German Federal Ministry of Education and Research (BMBF); National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA); National Science Foundation (NSF)
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1634210
- Report Number(s):
- PNNL-SA-151785
Journal ID: ISSN 1748-9326
- Grant/Contract Number:
- AC05-76RL01830; 01LS1711A; 80HQTR19T0055; 1903722
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Environmental Research Letters
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 15; Journal Issue: 4; Journal ID: ISSN 1748-9326
- Publisher:
- IOP Publishing
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 54 ENVIRONMENTAL SCIENCES; Biome sector; ISIMIP2b; northern high latitudes; Paris agreement; climatic impacts
Citation Formats
Ito, Akihiko, Reyer, Christopher P. O., Gädeke, Anne, Ciais, Philippe, Chang, Jinfeng, Chen, Min, François, Louis, Forrest, Matthew, Hickler, Thomas, Ostberg, Sebastian, Shi, Hao, Thiery, Wim, and Tian, Hanqin. Pronounced and unavoidable impacts of low-end global warming on northern high-latitude land ecosystems. United States: N. p., 2020.
Web. doi:10.1088/1748-9326/ab702b.
Ito, Akihiko, Reyer, Christopher P. O., Gädeke, Anne, Ciais, Philippe, Chang, Jinfeng, Chen, Min, François, Louis, Forrest, Matthew, Hickler, Thomas, Ostberg, Sebastian, Shi, Hao, Thiery, Wim, & Tian, Hanqin. Pronounced and unavoidable impacts of low-end global warming on northern high-latitude land ecosystems. United States. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab702b
Ito, Akihiko, Reyer, Christopher P. O., Gädeke, Anne, Ciais, Philippe, Chang, Jinfeng, Chen, Min, François, Louis, Forrest, Matthew, Hickler, Thomas, Ostberg, Sebastian, Shi, Hao, Thiery, Wim, and Tian, Hanqin. Fri .
"Pronounced and unavoidable impacts of low-end global warming on northern high-latitude land ecosystems". United States. https://doi.org/10.1088/1748-9326/ab702b. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1634210.
@article{osti_1634210,
title = {Pronounced and unavoidable impacts of low-end global warming on northern high-latitude land ecosystems},
author = {Ito, Akihiko and Reyer, Christopher P. O. and Gädeke, Anne and Ciais, Philippe and Chang, Jinfeng and Chen, Min and François, Louis and Forrest, Matthew and Hickler, Thomas and Ostberg, Sebastian and Shi, Hao and Thiery, Wim and Tian, Hanqin},
abstractNote = {Arctic ecosystems are particularly vulnerable to climate change because of Arctic amplification. Here, we assessed the climatic impacts of low-end, 1.5 °C, and 2.0 °C global temperature increases above pre-industrial levels, on the warming of terrestrial ecosystems in northern high latitudes (NHL, above 60 °N including pan-Arctic tundra and boreal forests) under the framework of the Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project phase 2b protocol. We analyzed the simulated changes of net primary productivity, vegetation biomass, and soil carbon stocks of eight ecosystem models that were forced by the projections of four global climate models and two atmospheric greenhouse gas pathways (RCP2.6 and RCP6.0). Our results showed that considerable impacts on ecosystem carbon budgets, particularly primary productivity and vegetation biomass, are very likely to occur in the NHL areas. The models agreed on increases in primary productivity and biomass accumulation, despite considerable inter-model and inter-scenario differences in the magnitudes of the responses. The inter-model variability highlighted the inadequacies of the present models, which fail to consider important components such as permafrost and wildfire. The simulated impacts were attributable primarily to the rapid temperature increases in the NHL and the greater sensitivity of northern vegetation to warming, which contrasted with the less pronounced responses of soil carbon stocks. The simulated increases of vegetation biomass by 30–60 Pg C in this century have implications for climate policy such as the Paris Agreement. Comparison between the results at two warming levels showed the effectiveness of emission reductions in ameliorating the impacts and revealed unavoidable impacts for which adaptation options are urgently needed in the NHL ecosystems.},
doi = {10.1088/1748-9326/ab702b},
journal = {Environmental Research Letters},
number = 4,
volume = 15,
place = {United States},
year = {2020},
month = {3}
}
Free Publicly Available Full Text
Publisher's Version of Record
Other availability
Search WorldCat to find libraries that may hold this journal
Cited by: 19 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science
Web of Science
Figures / Tables:
Table 1: Amplification factors (definitions in equation 1 and 2) of northern high-latitude lands above 60°N for indicated temperature changes and simulated ecosystem carbon budgets at 1, 1.5, 2, and 2.5°C global mean temperature warming levels predicted by the IPSL-CM5A-LR global climate model. Medians and standard deviations (SD) among themore »
All figures and tables
(5 total)
Save to My Library
You must Sign In or Create an Account in order to save documents to your library.
Works referenced in this record:
Status and trends in Arctic vegetation: Evidence from experimental warming and long-term monitoring
journal, March 2019
- Bjorkman, Anne D.; García Criado, Mariana; Myers-Smith, Isla H.
- Ambio, Vol. 49, Issue 3
Responses of European forest ecosystems to 21st century climate: assessing changes in interannual variability and fire intensity
journal, January 2011
- Dury, M.; Hambuckers, A.; Warnant, P.
- iForest - Biogeosciences and Forestry, Vol. 4, Issue 2
Climate change and the permafrost carbon feedback
journal, April 2015
- Schuur, E. A. G.; McGuire, A. D.; Schädel, C.
- Nature, Vol. 520, Issue 7546
A multi-model analysis of risk of ecosystem shifts under climate change
journal, October 2013
- Warszawski, Lila; Friend, Andrew; Ostberg, Sebastian
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 8, Issue 4
Assessing the impacts of 1.5 °C global warming – simulation protocol of the Inter-Sectoral Impact Model Intercomparison Project (ISIMIP2b)
journal, January 2017
- Frieler, Katja; Lange, Stefan; Piontek, Franziska
- Geoscientific Model Development, Vol. 10, Issue 12
Dependence of the evolution of carbon dynamics in the northern permafrost region on the trajectory of climate change
journal, March 2018
- McGuire, A. David; Lawrence, David M.; Koven, Charles
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 115, Issue 15
Water-Use Efficiency of the Terrestrial Biosphere: A Model Analysis Focusing on Interactions between the Global Carbon and Water Cycles
journal, April 2012
- Ito, Akihiko; Inatomi, Motoko
- Journal of Hydrometeorology, Vol. 13, Issue 2
Increased plant growth in the northern high latitudes from 1981 to 1991
journal, April 1997
- Myneni, R. B.; Keeling, C. D.; Tucker, C. J.
- Nature, Vol. 386, Issue 6626
Carbon residence time dominates uncertainty in terrestrial vegetation responses to future climate and atmospheric CO 2
journal, December 2013
- Friend, Andrew D.; Lucht, Wolfgang; Rademacher, Tim T.
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 111, Issue 9
Net exchanges of CO 2 , CH 4 , and N 2 O between China's terrestrial ecosystems and the atmosphere and their contributions to global climate warming
journal, January 2011
- Tian, Hanqin; Xu, Xiaofeng; Lu, Chaoqun
- Journal of Geophysical Research, Vol. 116, Issue G2
Global patterns and controls of soil organic carbon dynamics as simulated by multiple terrestrial biosphere models: Current status and future directions: MODELING GLOBAL SOIL CARBON DYNAMICS
journal, June 2015
- Tian, Hanqin; Lu, Chaoqun; Yang, Jia
- Global Biogeochemical Cycles, Vol. 29, Issue 6
CO 2 loss by permafrost thawing implies additional emissions reductions to limit warming to 1.5 or 2 °C
journal, February 2018
- Burke, Eleanor J.; Chadburn, Sarah E.; Huntingford, Chris
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 13, Issue 2
Quantifying global soil carbon losses in response to warming
journal, November 2016
- Crowther, T. W.; Todd-Brown, K. E. O.; Rowe, C. W.
- Nature, Vol. 540, Issue 7631
The polar regions in a 2°C warmer world
journal, December 2019
- Post, Eric; Alley, Richard B.; Christensen, Torben R.
- Science Advances, Vol. 5, Issue 12
Forest disturbances under climate change
journal, May 2017
- Seidl, Rupert; Thom, Dominik; Kautz, Markus
- Nature Climate Change, Vol. 7, Issue 6
Biomass offsets little or none of permafrost carbon release from soils, streams, and wildfire: an expert assessment
journal, March 2016
- Abbott, Benjamin W.; Jones, Jeremy B.; Schuur, Edward A. G.
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 11, Issue 3
Satellite-observed photosynthetic trends across boreal North America associated with climate and fire disturbance
journal, September 2005
- Goetz, S. J.; Bunn, A. G.; Fiske, G. J.
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 102, Issue 38
Enhanced Seasonal Exchange of CO2 by Northern Ecosystems Since 1960
journal, August 2013
- Graven, H. D.; Keeling, R. F.; Piper, S. C.
- Science, Vol. 341, Issue 6150
The representative concentration pathways: an overview
journal, August 2011
- van Vuuren, Detlef P.; Edmonds, Jae; Kainuma, Mikiko
- Climatic Change, Vol. 109, Issue 1-2
Increased plant growth in the northern high latitudes from 1981 to 1991
journal, April 1997
- Myneni, R. B.; Keeling, C. D.; Tucker, C. J.
- Nature, Vol. 386, Issue 6626
Increased wintertime CO 2 loss as a result of sustained tundra warming : Tundra Wintertime CO
journal, February 2016
- Webb, Elizabeth E.; Schuur, Edward A. G.; Natali, Susan M.
- Journal of Geophysical Research: Biogeosciences, Vol. 121, Issue 2
Global patterns in the vulnerability of ecosystems to vegetation shifts due to climate change: Global vulnerability to climate change
journal, June 2010
- Gonzalez, Patrick; Neilson, Ronald P.; Lenihan, James M.
- Global Ecology and Biogeography, Vol. 19, Issue 6
Decomposing uncertainties in the future terrestrial carbon budget associated with emission scenarios, climate projections, and ecosystem simulations using the ISI-MIP results
journal, January 2015
- Nishina, K.; Ito, A.; Falloon, P.
- Earth System Dynamics, Vol. 6, Issue 2
ORCHIDEE-MICT (v8.4.1), a land surface model for the high latitudes: model description and validation
journal, January 2018
- Guimberteau, Matthieu; Zhu, Dan; Maignan, Fabienne
- Geoscientific Model Development, Vol. 11, Issue 1
Ecosystem warming extends vegetation activity but heightens vulnerability to cold temperatures
journal, August 2018
- Richardson, Andrew D.; Hufkens, Koen; Milliman, Thomas
- Nature, Vol. 560, Issue 7718, p. 368-371
Estimated stocks of circumpolar permafrost carbon with quantified uncertainty ranges and identified data gaps
journal, January 2014
- Hugelius, G.; Strauss, J.; Zubrzycki, S.
- Biogeosciences, Vol. 11, Issue 23
Evapotranspiration simulations in ISIMIP2a—Evaluation of spatio-temporal characteristics with a comprehensive ensemble of independent datasets
journal, June 2018
- Wartenburger, Richard; Seneviratne, Sonia I.; Hirschi, Martin
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 13, Issue 7
Regional contribution to variability and trends of global gross primary productivity
journal, September 2017
- Chen, Min; Rafique, Rashid; Asrar, Ghassem R.
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 12, Issue 10
Increased atmospheric vapor pressure deficit reduces global vegetation growth
journal, August 2019
- Yuan, Wenping; Zheng, Yi; Piao, Shilong
- Science Advances, Vol. 5, Issue 8
Global Carbon Budget 2019
journal, January 2019
- Friedlingstein, Pierre; Jones, Matthew W.; O'Sullivan, Michael
- Earth System Science Data, Vol. 11, Issue 4
Ecosystem services in the Arctic: a thematic review
journal, April 2019
- Malinauskaite, Laura; Cook, David; Davíðsdóttir, Brynhildur
- Ecosystem Services, Vol. 36
Implications of incorporating N cycling and N limitations on primary production in an individual-based dynamic vegetation model
journal, January 2014
- Smith, B.; Wårlind, D.; Arneth, A.
- Biogeosciences, Vol. 11, Issue 7
Research frontiers for improving our understanding of drought-induced tree and forest mortality
journal, February 2018
- Hartmann, Henrik; Moura, Catarina F.; Anderegg, William R. L.
- New Phytologist, Vol. 218, Issue 1
Evaluation of the terrestrial carbon cycle, future plant geography and climate-carbon cycle feedbacks using five Dynamic Global Vegetation Models (DGVMs)
journal, September 2008
- Sitch, S.; Huntingford, C.; Gedney, N.
- Global Change Biology, Vol. 14, Issue 9
Research frontiers for improving our understanding of drought-induced tree and forest mortality
journal, February 2018
- Hartmann, Henrik; Moura, Catarina F.; Anderegg, William R. L.
- New Phytologist, Vol. 218, Issue 1
Large loss of CO2 in winter observed across the northern permafrost region
journal, October 2019
- Natali, Susan M.; Watts, Jennifer D.; Rogers, Brendan M.
- Nature Climate Change, Vol. 9, Issue 11
On the causes of trends in the seasonal amplitude of atmospheric CO 2
journal, September 2017
- Piao, Shilong; Liu, Zhuo; Wang, Yilong
- Global Change Biology, Vol. 24, Issue 2
Carbon–Concentration and Carbon–Climate Feedbacks in CMIP5 Earth System Models
journal, August 2013
- Arora, Vivek K.; Boer, George J.; Friedlingstein, Pierre
- Journal of Climate, Vol. 26, Issue 15
Photosynthetic productivity and its efficiencies in ISIMIP2a biome models: benchmarking for impact assessment studies
journal, July 2017
- Ito, Akihiko; Nishina, Kazuya; Reyer, Christopher P. O.
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 12, Issue 8
Tamm Review: Observed and projected climate change impacts on Russia’s forests and its carbon balance
journal, February 2016
- Schaphoff, Sibyll; Reyer, Christopher P. O.; Schepaschenko, Dmitry
- Forest Ecology and Management, Vol. 361
Five decades of northern land carbon uptake revealed by the interhemispheric CO2 gradient
journal, April 2019
- Ciais, P.; Tan, J.; Wang, X.
- Nature, Vol. 568, Issue 7751
Sensitivity of the carbon cycle in the Arctic to climate change
journal, November 2009
- McGuire, A. David; Anderson, Leif G.; Christensen, Torben R.
- Ecological Monographs, Vol. 79, Issue 4
A climate-change risk analysis for world ecosystems
journal, August 2006
- Scholze, M.; Knorr, W.; Arnell, N. W.
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 103, Issue 35
Enhanced seasonal CO2 exchange caused by amplified plant productivity in northern ecosystems
journal, January 2016
- Forkel, M.; Carvalhais, N.; Rodenbeck, C.
- Science, Vol. 351, Issue 6274
Forecasting Regional to Global Plant Migration in Response to Climate Change
journal, January 2005
- Neilson, Ronald P.; Pitelka, Louis F.; Solomon, Allen M.
- BioScience, Vol. 55, Issue 9
Benchmarking carbon fluxes of the ISIMIP2a biome models
journal, March 2017
- Chang, Jinfeng; Ciais, Philippe; Wang, Xuhui
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 12, Issue 4
Reduced probability of ice-free summers for 1.5 °C compared to 2 °C warming
journal, April 2018
- Jahn, Alexandra
- Nature Climate Change, Vol. 8, Issue 5
Terrestrial mechanisms of interannual CO 2 variability : INTERANNUAL CO
journal, March 2005
- Zeng, N.; Mariotti, A.; Wetzel, P.
- Global Biogeochemical Cycles, Vol. 19, Issue 1
The representative concentration pathways: an overview
journal, August 2011
- van Vuuren, Detlef P.; Edmonds, Jae; Kainuma, Mikiko
- Climatic Change, Vol. 109, Issue 1-2
The marker quantification of the Shared Socioeconomic Pathway 2: A middle-of-the-road scenario for the 21st century
journal, January 2017
- Fricko, Oliver; Havlik, Petr; Rogelj, Joeri
- Global Environmental Change, Vol. 42
Greening of the Earth and its drivers
journal, April 2016
- Zhu, Zaichun; Piao, Shilong; Myneni, Ranga B.
- Nature Climate Change, Vol. 6, Issue 8
Impacts of future climate change on the carbon budget of northern high-latitude terrestrial ecosystems: An analysis using ISI-MIP data
journal, September 2016
- Ito, Akihiko; Nishina, Kazuya; Noda, Hibiki M.
- Polar Science, Vol. 10, Issue 3
Characteristics, drivers and feedbacks of global greening
journal, December 2019
- Piao, Shilong; Wang, Xuhui; Park, Taejin
- Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, Vol. 1, Issue 1
Projecting the future distribution of European potential natural vegetation zones with a generalized, tree species-based dynamic vegetation model: Future changes in European vegetation zones
journal, December 2011
- Hickler, Thomas; Vohland, Katrin; Feehan, Jane
- Global Ecology and Biogeography, Vol. 21, Issue 1
Tipping elements in the Earth's climate system
journal, February 2008
- Lenton, T. M.; Held, H.; Kriegler, E.
- Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, Vol. 105, Issue 6
Climate extremes and the carbon cycle
journal, August 2013
- Reichstein, Markus; Bahn, Michael; Ciais, Philippe
- Nature, Vol. 500, Issue 7462
Circumpolar permafrost maps and geohazard indices for near-future infrastructure risk assessments
journal, March 2019
- Karjalainen, Olli; Aalto, Juha; Luoto, Miska
- Scientific Data, Vol. 6, Issue 1
Parameterization improvements and functional and structural advances in Version 4 of the Community Land Model
journal, January 2011
- Lawrence, David M.; Oleson, Keith W.; Flanner, Mark G.
- Journal of Advances in Modeling Earth Systems, Vol. 3, Issue 3
Modelling the role of agriculture for the 20th century global terrestrial carbon balance
journal, March 2007
- Bondeau, Alberte; Smith, Pascalle C.; Zaehle, SÖNke
- Global Change Biology, Vol. 13, Issue 3
Long-Term Release of Carbon Dioxide from Arctic Tundra Ecosystems in Alaska
journal, November 2016
- Euskirchen, E. S.; Bret-Harte, M. S.; Shaver, G. R.
- Ecosystems, Vol. 20, Issue 5
Enhanced Seasonal Exchange of CO2 by Northern Ecosystems Since 1960
journal, August 2013
- Graven, H. D.; Keeling, R. F.; Piper, S. C.
- Science, Vol. 341, Issue 6150
Bias correction of surface downwelling longwave and shortwave radiation for the EWEMBI dataset
journal, January 2018
- Lange, Stefan
- Earth System Dynamics, Vol. 9, Issue 2
Evaluating changes of biomass in global vegetation models: the role of turnover fluctuations and ENSO events
journal, June 2018
- Cantú, Anselmo García; Frieler, Katja; Reyer, Christopher P. O.
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 13, Issue 7
Crop productivity changes in 1.5 °C and 2 °C worlds under climate sensitivity uncertainty
journal, May 2018
- Schleussner, Carl-Friedrich; Deryng, Delphine; Müller, Christoph
- Environmental Research Letters, Vol. 13, Issue 6
Figures / Tables found in this record:
Figures/Tables have been extracted from DOE-funded journal article accepted manuscripts.