2025/09/01 by Jens Daniel Müller, Nicolas Gruber, Aline Schneuwly +6 · 1 voice · 2 citations
Environmental Science · Earth and Planetary Sciences · #Atmospheric and Environmental Gas Dynamics #Marine and coastal ecosystems #Methane Hydrates and Related Phenomena
paper · pdf · doi:10.1038/s41558-025-02380-4
Abstract In 2023, sea surface temperatures (SSTs) reached record highs, partly due to a strong El Niño. Based on historical responses to elevated global mean SSTs, oceanic CO 2 uptake in 2023 should have increased (−0.11 ± 0.04 PgC yr −1 ), driven by reduced outgassing in the tropical Pacific Ocean. However, using observation-based estimates of ocean CO 2 fugacity, we show here that the global non-polar ocean absorbed about 10% less CO 2 than expected (+0.17 ± 0.12 PgC yr −1 ). This weakening was caused by the anomalous outgassing of CO 2 in the subtropical and subpolar regions, especially in the Northern Hemisphere, driven primarily by elevated SSTs reducing the solubility of CO 2 . In most regions, this SST-induced outgassing was mitigated by the depletion of dissolved inorganic carbon in the surface mixed layer. Such negative feedbacks caused an overall muted response of the ocean carbon sink to the record-high SSTs, but this resilience may not persist under long-term warming or more severe SST extremes.