Arctic Soils May Present Additional GHG Complications As Climate Warms

[hatrack]

A little-known valley in northern Sweden holds evidence that warming temperatures may lead to significant changes in nutrient availability for plants and increasing amounts of greenhouse gases, a University of Arkansas researcher and his colleagues say.

"Warming temperatures could have tremendous implications for global nutrient cycling and the so-called greenhouse gases," said John C. Dixon, a geosciences professor in the J. William Fulbright College of Arts and Sciences. Dixon, Robert Darmody, a soil scientist, and Colin Thorn, a geomorphologist, both at the University of Illinois, have recently completed 15 years of work at Kärkevagge, Swedish for "Valley of the Boulders." They studied rock, soil and water samples and conducted experiments in this pristine valley in northern Sweden, based at Abisko, the northernmost year-round operating science research station in the world, run by the Swedish Academy of Sciences.

Kärkevagge holds two advantages for researchers: First, it is a pristine environment, one untouched by human development. Second, the valley's high altitude allows the researchers to study geochemical processes in a cold climate considered to be a potential "hot spot" of precursors to rising global temperatures. "Climate models predict that the impacts of global warming are going to be greater at higher altitudes," Dixon said.

Historically, scientists thought that chemical processes were unimportant in cold climates because, they theorized, the low temperatures would slow down reactions. However, 25 years ago Dixon showed that this was not the case. "Landscape processes are driven more by water than temperature," Dixon said. Dixon, Thorn and Darmody studied weathering, or the processes by which rocks exposed to air and water change over time.

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http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Microscopic_Geochemical_Processes_Point_to_Potential_Problems_If_the_Arctic_Warms_999.html