Sihong Zhu, Yi Liu, Paul I Palmer, Liang Feng, Dongxu Yang, Shangfeng Chen, Motoki Sasakawa, Robert J Parker, Hartmut Boesch, Junji Cao, Ove Hermansen, Stephen M Platt
The northern permafrost region, which stores double the amount of carbon in the atmosphere, is vulnerable to accelerated warming. Methane emissions from thawing permafrost may eventually result in a climate-carbon feedback. Our analysis of atmospheric methane data shows that Siberian growing-season methane emissions have increased by 12.0 ± 1.9 teragrams of methane (TgCH4) (5% per year) over the period 2010-2023. We reveal contrasting Siberian hydrological trends linked to high-pressure systems and distinct air-sea-land interactions. Warmer, drier conditions over eastern Siberia enhance fire-related emissions (0.7 ± 0.1 TgCH4 year-2), and wetter conditions over western Siberia promote wetland-related emissions (0.4 ± 0.1 TgCH4 year-2). Weakly nonlinear relationships between temperature maxima and emissions suggest that by 2050, higher Siberian emissions could offset about 20% of the global methane reduction required for climate targets, with eastern Siberia dominating the projected increase.