Signal Land carbon uptake stagnant since around 2000

Summary

Since the industrial revolution, land and ocean carbon sinks have taken up about half of the emissions humans added to the atmosphere, and without them today's climate change would be far stronger. Recent carbon-budget assessments, however, show that land uptake excluding direct land-use change has hardly grown since around 2000. The report interprets this as a land biosphere that still buffers climate change but less dependably than before. Warming-driven productivity losses, drought, fire, disease and ecosystem degradation are named as key factors weakening the sink. The report warns that the persistence of a global net sink should not be taken as proof of a healthy biosphere. It also sees these signs of a weakening sink, together with accelerating warming, as evidence that the window for returning to the safe space is closing fast.