The role of terrestrial plants in limiting atmospheric CO2 decline over the past 24 million years

Mark Pagani (), Ken Caldeira, Robert Berner and David J. Beerling
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Mark Pagani: Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06520, USA
Ken Caldeira: Carnegie Institution of Washington, Stanford, California 94305, USA
Robert Berner: Yale University, New Haven, Connecticut 06520, USA
David J. Beerling: University of Sheffield

Nature, 2009, vol. 460, issue 7251, 85-88

Abstract: A limit on CO2 drawdown Despite the occurrence of high rates of global silicate rock weathering likely to increase the drawdown of atmospheric CO2 — and hence temperatures — CO2 concentrations are thought to have stayed above about 180 parts per million throughout the past 24 million years (compared to about 385 p.p.m. today, and a 'pre-industrial' 280 p.p.m.). Based on terrestrial and geochemical carbon-cycle modelling simulations, Pagani et al. suggest that it may have been the actions of land plants that strongly attenuated long-term CO2 variability and helped prevent the onset of icehouse conditions. As CO2 falls to critically low levels due to increased chemical weathering, they find that vegetation activity is substantially reduced, compromising the capacity to further enhance silicate chemical weathering.

Date: 2009
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DOI: 10.1038/nature08133

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