Plateau study on emissions sees region as net gas sink

The Qinghai-Tibet Plateau serves as a net greenhouse gas sink in China, a phenomenon that is expected to persist for several decades amid global warming, Chinese scientists said in a new study.

Greenhouse gas sinks, such as forests and soils, absorb more carbon than they release and are crucial to fighting climate change.

Data on the land surface of the Qinghai-Tibet Plateau in the 2000s and 2010s "showed that the region absorbs greenhouse gases at a rate that effectively offsets its emissions, resulting in a state of near climate neutrality", said Wang Tao, the corresponding author of the study, which was published this month in the journal Science Bulletin. Wang is a researcher at the Institute of Tibetan Plateau Research of the Chinese Academy of Sciences.