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Carbon losses from all soils across England and Wales 1978–2003
Abstract
More than twice as much carbon is held in soils as in vegetation or the atmosphere, and changes in soil carbon content can have a large effect on the global carbon budget. The possibility that climate change is being reinforced by increased carbon dioxide emissions from soils owing to rising temperature is the subject of a continuing debate. But evidence for the suggested feedback mechanism has to date come solely from small-scale laboratory and field experiments and modelling studies. Here we use data from the National Soil Inventory of England and Wales obtained between 1978 and 2003 to show that carbon was lost from soils across England and Wales over the survey period at a mean rate of 0.6% yr(-1) (relative to the existing soil carbon content). We find that the relative rate of carbon loss increased with soil carbon content and was more than 2% yr(-1) in soils with carbon contents greater than 100 g kg(-1). The relationship between rate of carbon loss and carbon content is irrespective of land use, suggesting a link to climate change. Our findings indicate that losses of soil carbon in England and Wales--and by inference in other temperate regions-are likely to have been offsetting absorption of carbon by terrestrial sinks.
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“UK wide surveys recording trends in soil carbon over time (at the 0–15 cm depth) have also reported significant reductions (~6%) in soil carbon under managed fertile grasslands between 1998 and 2007 (Bellamy, Loveland, Bradley, Lark, & Kirk, 2005; Emmett et al., 2010).”
From Measured and modelled effect of land‐use change from temperate grassland to Miscanthus on soil carbon stocks after 12 years (2019) · cites this paper as Bellamy et al., 2005
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“In addition, there are indications (Bellamy et al., 2005;Monson et al., 2006;Luo, 2007;Arnone et al., 2008;Bond-Lamberty and Thomson, 2010;Smith and Fang, 2010;Yvon-Durocher et al., 2010;Zhao and Running, 2010) of a positive feedback in which increases in global temperature lower the ability of present soils and other parts of the biosphere to absorb CO 2”
From Breeding crop plants with deep roots: their role in sustainable carbon, nutrient and water sequestration (2011) · cites this paper as Bellamy et al., 2005
In the citing paper
“The first thing to note is the huge variation in the organic (carbon) content of soils -at least 15-fold in the UK alone (Bellamy et al., 2005;Bradley et al., 2005;Ostle et al., 2009).”
From Breeding crop plants with deep roots: their role in sustainable carbon, nutrient and water sequestration (2011) · cites this paper as Bellamy et al., 2005
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Citations
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Flagged first, then by citations
Research works printed but not linked: 1
- Hulme, M. et al. Climate Change Scenarios for the United Kingdom: The UKCIP02 Scientific Report (Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research, Norwich, UK, 2002)
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“6 Gt C yr in the 1990s (Watson et al. 2000; Bellamy et al. 2005).”
InfluentialBeesley, L., Moreno-Jiménez, E., Gomez-Eyles, J. L., Harris, E., Robinson, B., & Sizmur, T. (2011) · Environmental Pollution · doi:10.1016/j.envpol.2011.07.023 · Cited by 1,610
“Given that contaminated land often contains young, poorly developed soils with little or no vegetation cover (Bellamy et al., 2005; Mench et al., 2010) the revegetation of contaminated soils is key to its stabilisation (Arienzo et al., 2004; Ruttens et al., 2006) and the presence of a vegetative…”
Background
Metadata
- Authors
- Bellamy, P. H., Loveland, P. J., Bradley, R. I., Lark, R. M., & Kirk, G. J. D.
- Affiliations
- Cranfield University (GB)
- Rothamsted Research (GB)
- Corresponding author
- Kirk, Guy J. D.
- Venue
- Nature
- Published
- 2005-09
- Volume
- 437
- Issue
- 7056
- Pages
- 245-248
- ISSN
- 0028-0836 (ISSN-L)
- 1476-4687
- OpenAlex
- W2013840199
- Cited by
- 1,131
- References
- 31
- Citations by year
- 2026: 18 · 2025: 26 · 2024: 35 · 2023: 33 · 2022: 42 · 2021: 46 · 2020: 44 · 2019: 42 · 2018: 50 · 2017: 50 · 2016: 61 · 2015: 52 · 2014: 71 · 2013: 54 · 2012: 64
- FWCI
- 110.59
- Type
- journal article
- Language
- en
- Open access
- closed
- Licence
- www.springer.com/tdm (tdm)
- Locations
- Nature (publishedVersion)
- PubMed (publishedVersion)
- Rothamsted Repository (Rothamsted Repository) (submittedVersion)
- RePEc: Research Papers in Economics (submittedVersion)
- CERES (Cranfield University) (submittedVersion)
- Topics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Carbon and Nitrogen Dynamics
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil erosion and sediment transport
- Life Sciences › Agricultural and Biological Sciences › Soil Science › Soil Geostatistics and Mapping
- Keywords
- soil carbon loss, soil carbon feedback, climate change, global carbon budget, soil carbon content, terrestrial carbon sink, England and Wales
- MeSH terms
- Carbon, Carbon Dioxide, England, Poaceae, Soil, Soil Microbiology, Temperature, Wales, Water, Linear Models, Greenhouse Effect, Ecosystem, History, 20th Century, History, 21st Century
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