1.5-minute read

800 Gigatons or 1.764 quadrillion pounds. That’s how much greenhouse gas (GHG) lies under the soil in the northernmost regions of our planet. No matter what metric we use, that’s quite a lot—about 174 years’ worth of annual global passenger car emissions. Keeping carbon in cold storage under the permafrost for the last 2.58 million years has worked out really well from a life-sustaining perspective. But accelerating climate change resulting from increasing CO₂ emissions is now thawing frozen soils and releasing even more carbon into the atmosphere, creating a positive feedback loop. More warming is causing more thawing, which is releasing more carbon, which is causing more warming. We hate it when that happens.

According to a recent study in Nature, climate scientists racing to develop strategies to keep global warming below 1.5-2.0°C are working on a hoofed herbivore hack to keep the perma in permafrost and prevent the additional release of GHGs from Arctic soil. Researchers from the Universities of Stockholm and Hamburg and the Russian Academy of Sciences studying the climate impacts of reindeer and bison trampling the tundra believe the movement of large populations of megafauna may have an important role to play in keeping the planet cool.

Like a fluffy down comforter, snow insulates the soil from cold Arctic air, allowing the permafrost to thaw. Herds of roaming, grazing animals compact snow, reducing its insulating effect, which helps to preserve permafrost temperatures and keep GHG’s in the ground. In two study sites in northern Sweden and Russia, introducing substantial numbers of big mammals, including reindeer, bison, horses, and yaks, resulted in a 1.9°C degree reduction on average in soil temperature during winter and spring. Researchers predict that increasing mammal populations could result in 80% of permafrost soils remaining at an average temperature below -4°C by 2100.

At current emission rates, global temperatures are projected to rise by 2-4°C by the end of the century, and the ground temperature will be above freezing in many regions. If increasing the number of hoofed herbivores traversing the frozen North can prevent the permafrost from thawing, help keep massive amounts of carbon in the ground, and prevent further warming, all we can say is walk on, ungulates.

You can learn more about the ongoing efforts to combat climate change by integrating more megafauna into Arctic ecosystems at Pleistocene Park.