Is the earth's ability to absorb carbon dioxide weakening? This issue, which is closely related to climate change, has recently caused controversy in the scientific community. The two research groups reached different conclusions respectively. One thinks that the "carbon absorption capacity" of the earth is weakening, and the other thinks that the "carbon absorption capacity" of the earth exceeds people's initial estimate.

A paper published in the new issue of Nature Earth Science this week said that in the past 50 years, the proportion of residual carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has increased from 40% to 45%, which shows that the earth's ability to absorb carbon dioxide is weakening.

Just a few days ago, a paper published in the journal Geophysical Research Letters (GRL) in the United States said that although the amount of carbon dioxide emitted by human beings has doubled since industrialization, the proportion of carbon dioxide left in the atmosphere and absorbed by the earth has remained stable for a long time since 1850, which shows that the earth has absorbed more and more carbon dioxide, and its "carbon absorption" ability has exceeded expectations.

Interestingly, the authors of these two papers include researchers from the University of Bristol in the United Kingdom, who issued a press release explaining the inconsistency between the two research results. According to reports, both research groups used data such as atmospheric composition, energy consumption and land use change. But they adopt different calculation methods and deal with the uncertainty of atmospheric change in different ways.

Dr. House, who participated in the first study mentioned above, said that it is difficult to accurately estimate the emission and absorption of carbon dioxide, especially in the absence of data on land use changes such as deforestation, and the model parameters are greatly affected by annual climate change. He said: "Although the relevant research has made rapid progress, there is still a gap between our views."

Dr. Noel, who participated in the second study, said that this obviously contradictory result showed the real situation at the forefront of science and highlighted the difficulty of accurately quantifying relevant data. But he said: "We are about to make a breakthrough in the research field of detecting the changing trend of residual carbon dioxide in the atmosphere."

Although there is a gap in the research results, researchers agree that the only way to control climate change is for humans to reduce carbon dioxide emissions quickly.