A decline in the carbon fertilization effect: One source of uncertainty in climate science is how the carbon fertilization effect (CFE) will contribute to mitigation of anthropogenic climate change. Wang et al. explored the temporal dynamics of CFE on vegetation photosynthesis at the global scale. There has been a decline over recent decades in the contribution of CFE to vegetation photosynthesis, perhaps owing to the limiting effects of plant nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphorus. This declining trend has not been adequately accounted for in carbon cycle models. CFE thus has limitations for long-term mitigation of climate change, and future warming might currently be underestimated. Science , this issue p. 1295

Significance: Agricultural systems are already major forces of ammonia pollution and environmental degradation. How agricultural ammonia emissions affect the spatio-temporal patterns of nitrogen deposition and where to target future mitigation efforts, remains poorly understood. We develop a substantially complete and coherent agricultural ammonia emissions dataset in nearly recent four decades, and evaluate the relative role of reduced nitrogen in total nitrogen deposition in a spatially explicit way. Global reduced nitrogen deposition has grown rapidly, and will occupy a greater dominant position in total nitrogen deposition without future ammonia regulations. Recognition of agricultural ammonia emissions on nitrogen deposition is critical to formulate effective policies to address ammonia related environmental challenges and protect ecosystems from excessive nitrogen inputs.

For the past decade, observations of carbonyl sulfide (OCS or COS) have been investigated as a proxy for carbon uptake by plants. OCS is destroyed by enzymes that interact with CO₂ during photosynthesis, namely carbonic anhydrase (CA) and RuBisCO, where CA is the more important one. The majority of sources of OCS to the atmosphere are geographically separated from this large plant sink, whereas the sources and sinks of CO₂ are co-located in ecosystems. The drawdown of OCS can therefore be related to the uptake of CO₂ without the added complication of co-located emissions comparable in magnitude. Here we review the state of our understanding of the global OCS cycle and its applications to ecosystem carbon cycle science. OCS uptake is correlated well to plant carbon uptake, especially at the regional scale. OCS can be used in conjunction with other independent measures of ecosystem function, like solar-induced fluorescence and carbon and water isotope studies. More work needs to be done to generate global coverage for OCS observations and to link this powerful atmospheric tracer to systems where fundamental questions concerning the carbon and water cycle remain.

Data assimilation systems are used increasingly to constrain the budgets of reactive and long-lived gases measured in the atmosphere. Each trace gas has its own lifetime, dominant sources and sinks, and observational network (from flask sampling and in situ measurements to space-based remote sensing) and therefore comes with its own optimal configuration of the data assimilation. The CarbonTracker Europe data assimilation system for CO₂ estimates global carbon sources and sinks, and updates are released annually and used in carbon cycle studies. CarbonTracker Europe simulations are performed using the new modular implementation of the data assimilation system: the CarbonTracker Data Assimilation Shell (CTDAS). Here, we present and document this redesign of the data assimilation code that forms the heart of CarbonTracker, specifically meant to enable easy extension and modification of the data assimilation system. This paper also presents the setup of the latest version of CarbonTracker Europe (CTE2016), including the use of the gridded state vector, and shows the resulting carbon flux estimates. We present the distribution of the carbon sinks over the hemispheres and between the land biosphere and the oceans. We show that with equal fossil fuel emissions, 2015 has a higher atmospheric CO₂ growth rate compared to 2014, due to reduced net land carbon uptake in later year. The European carbon sink is especially present in the forests, and the average net uptake over 2001–2015 was 0. 17 ± 0. 11 PgC yr⁻¹ with reductions to zero during drought years. Finally, we also demonstrate the versatility of CTDAS by presenting an overview of the wide range of applications for which it has been used so far.

Gross primary productivity (GPP) is the largest flux in the global terrestrial carbon cycle. Drought has significantly impacted global terrestrial GPP in recent decades, and has been projected to occur with increasing frequency and intensity. However, the drought risk of global terrestrial GPP has not been well investigated. In this study, global terrestrial GPP during 1981–2016 was simulated with the process‐based Boreal Ecosystem Productivity Simulator model. Then, the drought risk of GPP was quantified as the product of drought probability and reduction of GPP caused by drought, which was determined using the standardized precipitation evapotranspiration index. During the study period, the drought risk of GPP was high in the southeastern United States, most of South America, southern Europe, central and eastern Africa, eastern and southeastern Asia, and eastern Australia. It was low at some high latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere and in part of tropical South America, where terrestrial GPP increased slightly in drought years. The drought risk of terrestrial GPP was greater during 2000–2016 than during 1981–1999 in 21 out of 24 climatic zones. The global mean drought risk of GPP increased from 13.6 g C m⁻² yr⁻¹ during 1981–1999 to 19.3 g C m⁻² yr⁻¹ during 2000–2016. The increase in drought risk of GPP was mainly caused by the increase in drought vulnerability. Simulation experiments indicated that the drought vulnerability of GPP was mainly induced by climatic variability. This study advances our understanding on the impact of drought on GPP over the globe.