“Potentially Huge Implications” – Scientists Discover Ancient Carbon Is Leaking Into the Atmosphere

Scitech Daily ^ | 6/8/25 | University of Bristol

[Eleutheria5]

A new global study reveals that ancient carbon, once thought securely stored in soils and rocks, is leaking into the atmosphere via rivers.

For the first time, researchers have confirmed that carbon trapped in landscapes for thousands of years or longer can return to the atmosphere as carbon dioxide escaping from river surfaces.

The study, led by scientists from the University of Bristol and featured as the cover story in Nature, suggests that plants and upper soil layers may be absorbing about one additional gigaton of CO2 annually to balance this release. This highlights an even more critical role for vegetation and soils in slowing climate change.

Lead author Dr Josh Dean, Associate Professor in Biogeochemistry and UKRI Future Leaders Fellow at the University of Bristol, said: “The results took us by surprise because it turns out that old carbon stores are leaking out much more into the atmosphere than previous estimates suggested. The implications are potentially huge for our understanding of global carbon emissions. Plants and trees take up CO2 from the atmosphere and can then lock this carbon away in soils for thousands of years.”

He continues, “Our findings show some of this old carbon, as well as ancient carbon from rocks, is leaking sideways into rivers and making its way back to the atmosphere. We don’t yet know how humans are affecting this flow of ancient carbon, but we do know plants and trees must be taking up more carbon from the atmosphere today to account for this unrecognized release of old carbon.”

.....

[SunkenCiv]

The rest of the Calliste/Santorini/Thera keywords, sorted:

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• Akrotiri, Santorini: the Minoan Pompeii - part 3 [07/20/2013]
• Akrotiri, Santorini: the Minoan Pompeii - part 2 [07/07/2013]
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[Redcitizen]

We are stardust,
we are golden
We are billion-year-old carbon
We are past our best by date

[Larry Lucido]

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