Stable isotopes provide revised global limits of aerobic methane emissions from plants
نویسندگان
چکیده
Recently Keppler et al. (2006) discovered a surprising new source of methane – terrestrial plants under aerobic conditions, with an estimated global production of 62– 236 Tg yr−1 by an unknown mechanism. This is ∼10–40% of the annual total of methane entering the modern atmosphere and ∼30–100% of annual methane entering the preindustrial (0 to 1700 AD) atmosphere. Here we test this reported global production of methane from plants against ice core records of atmospheric methane concentration (CH4) and stable carbon isotope ratios (δCH4) over the last 2000 years. Our top-down approach determines that global plant emissions must be much lower than proposed by Keppler et al. (2006) during the last 2000 years and are likely to lie in the range 0–46 Tg yr−1 and 0–176 Tg yr−1 during the preindustrial and modern eras, respectively.
منابع مشابه
Revised global limits of methane emissions from plants
Stable isotopes provide revised global limits of aerobic methane emissions from plants D. F. Ferretti, J. B. Miller, J. W. C. White, K. R. Lassey, D. C. Lowe, and D. M. Etheridge University of Colorado, Boulder, CO, USA National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research Ltd, Wellington, New Zealand National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration, Boulder, CO, USA Marine and Atmospheric ...
متن کاملEffect of UV radiation and temperature on the emission of methane from plant biomass and structural components
The recently reported finding that plant matter and living plants produce significant amounts of the important greenhouse gas methane under aerobic conditions has led to an intense scientific and public controversy. Whereas some studies question the upscaling method that was used to estimate the global source strength, others have sug5 gested that experimental artifacts could have caused the re...
متن کاملC-labelling approach
• The results of a single publication stating that terrestrial plants emit methane has sparked a discussion in several scientific journals, but an independent test has not yet been performed. • Here it is shown, with the use of the stable isotope 13 C and a laser-based measuring technique, that there is no evidence for substantial aerobic methane emission by terrestrial plants, maximally 0.3% (...
متن کاملTechnical Note: Methionine, a precursor of methane in living plants
When terrestrial plants were identified as producers of the greenhouse gas methane, much discussion and debate ensued not only about their contribution to the global methane budget but also with regard to the validity of the observation itself. Although the phenomenon has now become more accepted for both living and dead plants, the mechanism of methane formation in living plants remains to be ...
متن کاملRevised methane emissions factors and spatially distributed annual carbon fluxes for global livestock
BACKGROUND Livestock play an important role in carbon cycling through consumption of biomass and emissions of methane. Recent research suggests that existing bottom-up inventories of livestock methane emissions in the US, such as those made using 2006 IPCC Tier 1 livestock emissions factors, are too low. This may be due to outdated information used to develop these emissions factors. In this st...
متن کامل