UC Irvine

Where does our CO2 go?The ocean is a major carbon sink, absorbing perhaps a third of anthropogenic CO2 emissions, but there are considerable uncertainties as to the distribution and rate of CO2 capture. Khatiwala et al. present an observationally based reconstruction of anthropogenic carbon uptake in the ocean during the industrial era. They map the regions where it is most concentrated, and track the accumulations over time. The findings indicate that uptake of anthropogenic CO2 in the oceans has increased sharply since the 1950s, with a small decline in the rate of increase in recent decades. The Southern Ocean is the biggest sink, with over 40% of total uptake. The results also suggest that the terrestrial biosphere was a source of CO2 until the 1940s, subsequently becoming a sink.