TY - JOUR
T1 - A planetary boundary for green water
AU - Wang-Erlandsson, Lan
AU - Tobian, Arne
AU - van der Ent, Ruud J.
AU - Fetzer, Ingo
AU - te Wierik, Sofie
AU - Porkka, Miina
AU - Staal, Arie
AU - Greve, Peter
AU - Gerten, Dieter
AU - Keys, Patrick W.
AU - More Authors, null
N1 - Green Open Access added to TU Delft Institutional Repository ‘You share, we take care!’ – Taverne project https://www.openaccess.nl/en/you-share-we-take-care Otherwise as indicated in the copyright section: the publisher is the copyright holder of this work and the author uses the Dutch legislation to make this work public.
PY - 2022
Y1 - 2022
N2 - Green water — terrestrial precipitation, evaporation and soil moisture — is fundamental to Earth system dynamics and is now extensively perturbed by human pressures at continental to planetary scales. However, green water lacks explicit consideration in the existing planetary boundaries framework that demarcates a global safe operating space for humanity. In this Perspective, we propose a green water planetary boundary and estimate its current status. The green water planetary boundary can be represented by the percentage of ice-free land area on which root-zone soil moisture deviates from Holocene variability for any month of the year. Provisional estimates of departures from Holocene-like conditions, alongside evidence of widespread deterioration in Earth system functioning, indicate that the green water planetary boundary is already transgressed. Moving forward, research needs to address and account for the role of root-zone soil moisture for Earth system resilience in view of ecohydrological, hydroclimatic and sociohydrological interactions.
AB - Green water — terrestrial precipitation, evaporation and soil moisture — is fundamental to Earth system dynamics and is now extensively perturbed by human pressures at continental to planetary scales. However, green water lacks explicit consideration in the existing planetary boundaries framework that demarcates a global safe operating space for humanity. In this Perspective, we propose a green water planetary boundary and estimate its current status. The green water planetary boundary can be represented by the percentage of ice-free land area on which root-zone soil moisture deviates from Holocene variability for any month of the year. Provisional estimates of departures from Holocene-like conditions, alongside evidence of widespread deterioration in Earth system functioning, indicate that the green water planetary boundary is already transgressed. Moving forward, research needs to address and account for the role of root-zone soil moisture for Earth system resilience in view of ecohydrological, hydroclimatic and sociohydrological interactions.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85129565453&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1038/s43017-022-00287-8
DO - 10.1038/s43017-022-00287-8
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:85129565453
VL - 3
SP - 380
EP - 392
JO - Nature Reviews Earth and Environment
JF - Nature Reviews Earth and Environment
IS - 6
ER -
