Past extreme climate warming triggered by tipping points

Darvasa gas crater in Turkmenistan. Photo: Tormod Sandtorv - Can a rapid warming of Earth trigger tipping points in our climate? For decades scientists have debated if today's warming can strongly amplify itself by triggering a catastrophic release of greenhouse gases. New research, published in Science Advances , now presents evidence that such tipping points did occur in Earth's history. The researchers show that tipping points triggered three periods of extreme warming in the distant past, millions of years ago. Earth has large underground reservoirs with huge quantities of stored carbon, like oil, gas and coal deposits. Besides these fossil fuels there are also other kinds of reservoirs in which carbon is stored. In Russia and Canada large amounts of carbon are preserved in permanently frozen soils, permafrost.