This research requires an interdisciplinary approach, bringing together investigators from a multitude of disciplines spanning the atmospheric, oceanic, terrestrial, and human dimensions of the carbon cycle. .
We are entering an era in which reducing uncertainties about the carbon cycle will be central to answering questions of future climate change and its consequences for humans. Such questions include: What will be the future atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide and methane resulting from environmental changes, human actions, and past and future emissions? To what extent can forest and agriculture management be used to effectively offset emissions of carbon from fossil fuel combustion, regionally, nationally, and globally? How will the natural processes that store carbon in the oceans and on land change in the future? What are the prospects for feedbacks within the climate system, especially those that might prompt large increases in carbon emissions from the land and oceans? Will food security increase or decrease as the composition of the atmosphere continues to change? How do the prospects for carbon storage through increasing the growth of trees and plants compare to and interact with the prospects for storing carbon in the deep oceans and in geological formations? .
To answer these and related questions, the USGCRP has initiated an integrated carbon cycle science program, focusing on targeted research areas that are ripe for scientific progress, and that are the most relevant to pressing societal concerns.
