Arctic winter warming causes cold damage in the subtropics of East Asia


Date:
February 8, 2022
Source:
University of Zurich
Summary:
Due to climate change, Arctic winters are getting warmer. An
international study shows that Arctic warming causes temperature
anomalies and cold damage thousands of kilometers away in East
Asia. This in turn leads to reduced vegetation growth, later
blossoming, smaller harvests and reduced CO2 absorption by the
forests in the region.



FULL STORY ==========================================================================
Due to climate change, Arctic winters are getting warmer. An international study by UZH researchers shows that Arctic warming causes temperature
anomalies and cold damage thousands of kilometers away in East Asia. This
in turn leads to reduced vegetation growth, later blossoming, smaller
harvests and reduced CO2 absorption by the forests in the region.


========================================================================== During the past few days, the east coast of the United States experienced
heavy snowfall and low temperatures as far south as Florida. Warmer Arctic winters are now also triggering extreme winter weather of this kind in
East Asia, an international team of researchers from Switzerland, Korea,
China, Japan and the United Kingdom has found. The cooler southern winters reduce vegetation activity in the evergreen subtropics, and continue to negatively affect ecosystems in the spring, for example due to branches
broken under heavy snowfall or frost-damaged leaves. First author
Jin-Soo Kim of the Department of Evolutionary Biology and Environmental
Studies at the University of Zurich says: "The cooler winters also
reduce agricultural productivity of cereals, fruits, root vegetables,
and legumes." Globally connected weather events The scientists combined
earth system modelling, satellite data and local observations for the
study. They also analyzed an index of sea surface temperatures from
the Barents-Kara Sea and found that in years with higher than average
Arctic temperatures, changes in atmospheric circulation resulted in
an anomalous climate throughout East Asia. In particularly cold years,
the unfavorable conditions adversely affected vegetation growth and crop yields, and delayed blossoming. Moreover, the researchers estimated a
decrease in carbon uptake capacity in the region of 65 megatons of carbon during winter and spring (by way of comparison, fossil fuel emissions
in Switzerland are 8.8 megatons of carbon per year). The reduction in
carbon absorption capacity caused by climate change is thus another
issue that must be taken into account when discussing carbon neutrality.

Climate change causes ecological and socioeconomic damage The
warming of the Arctic caused by human greenhouse gas emissions
is causing social and economic harm to humans as far south as the
subtropics. Gabriela Schaepman-Strub, co-author of the study, says:
"This study highlights how complex the effects of climate change
are. While we observe strong warming in the Arctic system, especially
over the Barents-Kara Sea, we have now discovered that this warming
affects ecosystems thousands of kilometers away and over multiple
weeks through climate teleconnections. Arctic warming is not only
threatening the polar bear, but will affect us in many other ways." ========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by University_of_Zurich. Note: Content
may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. Jin-Soo Kim, Jong-Seong Kug, Sujong Jeong, Jin-Ho Yoon, Ning
Zeng, Jinkyu
Hong, Jee-Hoon Jeong, Yuan Zhao, Xiaoqiu Chen, Mathew Williams,
Kazuhito Ichii, Gabriela Schaepman-Strub. Arctic warming-induced
cold damage to East Asian terrestrial ecosystems. Communications
Earth & Environment, 2022; 3 (1) DOI: 10.1038/s43247-022-00343-7 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/02/220208105229.htm
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