One of the most notable extinction events in Earth’s history has provided us with a new discovery. Recently discovered fossils from the time period known as the “Great Dying” have revealed that the climate tipping point had likely already been crossed before the event began.
The Great Dying, which is scientifically known as the Permian-Triassic Mass Extinction, took place roughly 252 million years ago. This event led to the extinction of most marine species, as well as significant declines in land-based plants and animals. While the event is usually attributed to extreme global warming caused by a period of volcanic activity, scientists have always been perplexed about why the intense greenhouse conditions continued for roughly five million years after the extinction event.
Crossing the tipping point
According to the fossils discovered from the time period, scientists may have found their answer. Based on the findings, which the researchers have published in Nature Communications, the demise and slow recovery of tropical forests from the time period limited what we call carbon sequestration. This is the process where carbon dioxide is removed from the atmosphere and held in plants and the soil. It’s vital to controlling the state of the climate across our planet.
Without this process, carbon dioxide couldn’t be removed as stably from the atmosphere, allowing it to continue building up. This resulted in prolonged periods where high levels of carbon dioxide existed in the atmosphere. As such, the researchers believe the climate tipping point had already been crossed before the volcanic activity that fostered the event actually began.
This is the only high-temperature event in Earth’s history that we know of where the important biosphere found in the tropical forest collapsed. That’s why the researchers began going down this path of study in the first place. And after years of collecting data and looking at fossil records, the researchers finally have the data to back up the hypothesis.
This belief also seems to back up the idea that there are various tipping points, or thresholds, that exist in the Earth’s climate-carbon system. And when these tipping points are reached—similarly to how we have come close to them now—global warming can be amplified greatly. If the tipping point had been reached, then it could have helped spur along the volcanic activity to which researchers often attribute the event’s beginning.
What we do with this data, though, is up to the researchers. It could be vital to understanding the state of our own fight against climate change, as well as the possibility of whether or not we’ll be able to stop ourselves from crossing the tipping point again.
