It is investigated how abrupt changes in the
North Atlantic (NA) thermohaline circulation (THC)
affect the terrestrial carbon cycle. The Lund-Potsdam-Jena Dynamic Global
Vegetation Model is forced with climate perturbations from freshwater
experiments with the ECBILT-CLIO ocean-atmosphere model. A reorganization of
the marine carbon cycle is not addressed. Modeled NA THC
collapsed and recovered after about a millennium in response to prescribed
freshwater forcing. The initial cooling of several Kelvin over Eurasia causes a reduction of extant boreal and temperate
forests and a decrease in carbon storage in high northern latitudes, whereas
improved growing conditions and slower soil decomposition rates lead to enhanced
storage in mid-latitudes. The magnitude and evolution of global terrestrial
carbon storage in response to abrupt THC
changes depends sensitively on the initial climate conditions. These were
varied using results from time slice simulations with the Hadley climate model
for different periods over the past 21,000 years. Terrestrial storage varies
between -67 and +50 PgC for the range of experiments with different initial
conditions. Simulated peak-to-peak differences in atmospheric CO2
and d13C are 6 and 18 ppmv for
glacial and early Holocene conditions. Simulated changes in d13C are between 0.18 and 0.30 permil. The small CO2 changes
modelled for glacial conditions are compatible with available evidence from
marine studies and the ice core CO2 record. The latter shows CO2
variations of up to 20 ppmv broadly in parallel with the Antarctic warm events
A1 to A4.
Author: F. Joos, P. Köhler, S. Gerber, and R. Knutti (joos at climate dot unibe dot ch)
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