eprintid: 13829 rev_number: 21 eprint_status: archive userid: 2 dir: disk0/00/01/38/29 datestamp: 2016-09-22 08:26:55 lastmod: 2022-01-26 10:56:22 status_changed: 2016-09-22 08:26:55 type: article metadata_visibility: show creators_name: Jones, C.D. creators_name: Ciais, P. creators_name: Davis, S.J. creators_name: Friedlingstein, P. creators_name: Gasser, T. creators_name: Peters, G.P. creators_name: Rogelj, J. creators_name: van Vuuren, D.P. creators_name: Canadell, J.G. creators_name: Cowie, A. creators_name: Jackson, R.B. creators_name: Jonas, M. creators_name: Kriegler, E. creators_name: Littleton, E. creators_name: Lowe, J.A. creators_name: Milne, J. creators_name: Shrestha, G. creators_name: Smith, P. creators_name: Torvanger, A. creators_name: Wiltshire, A. creators_id: 8630 creators_id: 1351 creators_orcid: 0000-0003-2056-9061 creators_orcid: 0000-0003-1269-4145 title: Simulating the Earth system response to negative emissions ispublished: pub divisions: prog_asa divisions: prog_ene keywords: climate, carbon cycle, earth system, negative emissions, carbon dioxide removal, mitigation scenarios abstract: Natural carbon sinks currently absorb approximately half of the anthropogenic CO2 emitted by fossil fuel burning, cement production and land-use change. However, this airborne fraction may change in the future depending on the emissions scenario. An important issue in developing carbon budgets to achieve climate stabilisation targets is the behaviour of natural carbon sinks, particularly under low emissions mitigation scenarios as required to meet the goals of the Paris Agreement. A key requirement for low carbon pathways is to quantify the effectiveness of negative emissions technologies which will be strongly affected by carbon cycle feedbacks. Here we find that Earth system models suggest significant weakening, even potential reversal, of the ocean and land sinks under future low emission scenarios. For the RCP2.6 concentration pathway, models project land and ocean sinks to weaken to 0.8 ± 0.9 and 1.1 ± 0.3 GtC yr−1 respectively for the second half of the 21st century and to −0.4 ± 0.4 and 0.1 ± 0.2 GtC yr−1 respectively for the second half of the 23rd century. Weakening of natural carbon sinks will hinder the effectiveness of negative emissions technologies and therefore increase their required deployment to achieve a given climate stabilisation target. We introduce a new metric, the perturbation airborne fraction, to measure and assess the effectiveness of negative emissions. date: 2016 id_number: 10.1088/1748-9326/11/9/095012 creators_browse_id: 254 creators_browse_id: 138 full_text_status: public publication: Environmental Research Letters volume: 11 number: 9 pagerange: e095012 refereed: TRUE issn: 1748-9326 projects: Coordinated Research in Earth Systems and Climate: Experiments (CRESCENDO, H2020 641816) projects: Effects of phosphorus limitations on Life, Earth system and Society (IMBALANCE-P, FP7 610028) coversheets_dirty: FALSE fp7_project: yes fp7_project_id: info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/H2020/641816/EU/Coordinated Research in Earth Systems and Climate: Experiments, kNowledge, Dissemination and Outreach/CRESCENDO; info:eu-repo/grantAgreement/EC/FP7/610028/EU//IMBALANCE-P fp7_type: info:eu-repo/semantics/article access_rights: info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess citation: Jones, C.D., Ciais, P., Davis, S.J., Friedlingstein, P., Gasser, T., Peters, G.P., Rogelj, J. ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2056-9061 , van Vuuren, D.P., et al. (2016). Simulating the Earth system response to negative emissions. Environmental Research Letters 11 (9) e095012. 10.1088/1748-9326/11/9/095012 . document_url: https://pure.iiasa.ac.at/id/eprint/13829/7/erl095012_suppdata.pdf document_url: https://pure.iiasa.ac.at/id/eprint/13829/1/erl_11_9_095012.pdf