Carbon and Greenhouse Gas Budgets of Europe: Trends, Interannual and Spatial Variability, and Their Drivers

Abstract

In the framework of the RECCAP2 initiative, we present the greenhouse gas (GHG) and carbon (C) budget of Europe. For the decade of the 2010s, we present a bottom-up (BU) estimate of GHG net-emissions of 3.9 Pg CO₂-eq. yr⁻¹ (using a global warming potential on a 100 years horizon), which are largely dominated by fossil fuel emissions. In this decade, terrestrial ecosystems acted as a net GHG sink of 0.9 Pg CO₂-eq. yr⁻¹, dominated by a CO₂ sink that was partially counterbalanced by net emissions of CH₄ and N₂O. For CH₄ and N₂O, we find good agreement between BU and top-down (TD) estimates from atmospheric inversions. However, our BU land CO₂ sink is significantly higher than the TD estimates. We further show that decadal averages of GHG net-emissions have declined by 1.2 Pg CO₂-eq. yr⁻¹ since the 1990s, mainly due to a reduction in fossil fuel emissions. In addition, based on both data driven BU and TD estimates, we also find that the land CO₂ sink has weakened over the past two decades. A large part of the European CO₂ and C sinks is located in Northern Europe. At the same time, we find a decreasing trend in sink strength in Scandinavia, which can be attributed to an increase in forest management intensity. These are partly offset by increasing CO₂ sinks in parts of Eastern Europe and Northern Spain, attributed in part to land use change. Extensive regions of high CH₄ and N₂O emissions are mainly attributed to agricultural activities and are found in Belgium, the Netherlands and the southern UK. We further analyzed interannual variability in the GHG budgets. The drought year of 2003 shows the highest net-emissions of CO₂ and of all GHGs combined.