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The importance of the terrestrial weathering feedback for multimillennial coral reef habitat recovery
Author(s) -
Meissner Katrin J.,
McNeil Ben I.,
Eby Michael,
Wiebe Edward C.
Publication year - 2012
Publication title -
global biogeochemical cycles
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.512
H-Index - 187
eISSN - 1944-9224
pISSN - 0886-6236
DOI - 10.1029/2011gb004098
Subject(s) - reef , coral reef , coral , resilience of coral reefs , environmental science , oceanography , weathering , ocean acidification , coral bleaching , aragonite , sea surface temperature , climate change , effects of global warming on oceans , carbon cycle , habitat , environmental issues with coral reefs , geology , global warming , ecology , ecosystem , geomorphology , biology , calcite , mineralogy
Modern‐day coral reefs have well defined environmental envelopes for light, sea surface temperature (SST) and seawater aragonite saturation state (Ω arag ). We examine the changes in global coral reef habitat on multimillennial timescales with regard to SST and Ω arag using a climate model including a three‐dimensional ocean general circulation model, a fully coupled carbon cycle, and six different parameterizations for continental weathering (the UVic Earth System Climate Model). The model is forced with emission scenarios ranging from 1,000 Pg C to 5,000 Pg C total emissions. We find that the long‐term climate change response is independent of the rate at which CO 2 is emitted over the next few centuries. On millennial timescales, the weathering feedback introduces a significant uncertainty even for low emission scenarios. Weathering parameterizations based on atmospheric CO 2 only display a different transient response than weathering parameterizations that are dependent on temperature. Although environmental conditions for SST and Ω arag stay globally hostile for coral reefs for millennia for our high emission scenarios, some weathering parameterizations induce a near‐complete recovery of coral reef habitat to current conditions after 10,000 years, while others result in a collapse of coral reef habitat throughout our simulations. We find that the multimillennial response in sea surface temperature (SST) substantially lags the aragonite saturation recovery in all configurations. This implies that if corals can naturally adapt over millennia by selecting thermally tolerant species to match warmer ocean temperatures, prospects for long‐term recovery of coral reefs are better since Ω arag recovers more quickly than SST.