The reinvigoration of the Southern Ocean carbon sink

Several studies have suggested that the carbon sink in the Southern Ocean—the ocean’s strongest region for the uptake of anthropogenic CO2—has weakened in recent decades. We demonstrated, on the basis of multidecadal analyses of surface ocean CO2 observations, that this weakening trend stopped aroun...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Science
Main Authors: Landschuetzer, P., Gruber, N., Haumann, F. A., Rodenbeck, C., Bakker, D. C. E., van Heuven, S., Hoppema, M., Metzl, N., Sweeney, C., Takahashi, T., Tilbrook, B., Wanninkhof, R.
Format: Article in Journal/Newspaper
Language:unknown
Published: 2015
Subjects:
Southern Ocean
Online Access:https://epic.awi.de/id/eprint/38727/
https://epic.awi.de/id/eprint/38727/1/manuscript_with_figures_aab2620.pdf
https://doi.org/10.1126/science.aab2620
https://hdl.handle.net/10013/epic.46019
https://hdl.handle.net/10013/epic.46019.d001
Description
Summary:Several studies have suggested that the carbon sink in the Southern Ocean—the ocean’s strongest region for the uptake of anthropogenic CO2—has weakened in recent decades. We demonstrated, on the basis of multidecadal analyses of surface ocean CO2 observations, that this weakening trend stopped around 2002, and by 2012 the Southern Ocean had regained its expected strength based on the growth of atmospheric CO2. All three Southern Ocean sectors have contributed to this reinvigoration of the carbon sink, yet differences in the processes between sectors exist, related to a tendency toward a zonally more asymmetric atmospheric circulation. The large decadal variations in the Southern Ocean carbon sink suggest a rather dynamic ocean carbon cycle that varies more in time than previously recognized.

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