Study: Earth's "thermostat" can slow climate change

Researchers have discovered a natural mechanism that removes carbon dioxide much faster than previously thought. The process will not stop current global warming, however. The Earth could respond to the huge emissions of carbon dioxide (CO₂) produced by human activity with a natural "self-correction" mechanism, which would allow the next ice age to be triggered in time. The discovery was published in the journal Science and reported by Live Science.

• An unexpected geological mechanism

According to researchers, the planet has a geological "thermostat" that buries massive amounts of carbon dioxide beneath the ocean floor, in a process much faster than previously thought. This mechanism could eliminate traces of human activity in about 100,000 years, compared to the intervals of up to a million years estimated for previously known processes. "This extra thermostat could help the next ice age arrive on time, rather than being delayed by climate change,” explained Andy Ridgwell, a professor of geology at the University of California, Riverside, and a co-author of the study, as quoted by Live Science.

• How Earth's "thermostat” works

The new mechanism complements the so-called silicate feedback-a natural process that has been known for decades. It occurs when rain captures carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and transports it to silicate rocks. The gas reacts with minerals in the rock, forming compounds that end up in the oceans and turn into limestone or chalk, locking up the carbon for millions of years. When carbon dioxide concentrations rise, the planet warms, and the precipitation cycle intensifies, speeding up chemical reactions and gradually reducing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. The process reverses when the climate cools.

• A slow-moving balance

"If it gets too cold, the natural thermostat slows down and carbon dioxide levels rise again, due to volcanic emissions. The system always tends towards equilibrium, but it does so very slowly,” explained Ridgwell. Until now, researchers thought that this cycle takes hundreds of thousands of years to take effect. However, the discovery of the new mechanism shows that the planet reacts more quickly, which could explain the succession of glacial and interglacial cycles, which occur approximately every 100,000 years.

• Good news for the planet, but not for humanity

Experts warn that this geological process does not provide short-term protection against global warming. "This thermostat will not save people today. It does not mean that we will be safe from the effects of global warming in the next 100 or 1,000 years,” emphasized Dominik Hulse, a mathematician and geochemist at the University of Bremen, co-author of the research.

Although the new discovery does not change the current climate situation, it offers an optimistic perspective on the Earth's natural ability to regulate its climate in the long term. However, geological mechanisms operate on a time scale far too large to counteract the effects of accelerated industrialization over the past two centuries.