Beata Bukosa: NIWA atmospheric scientist on the carbon sink in the South Island

New research indicates New Zealand may be removing more carbon than it produces.

A new study from NIWA has highlighted a potential carbon sink in Fiordland's native forests - and researchers found our environment absorbs at least 170 million tonnes of carbon per year.

NIWA atmospheric scientist Beata Bukosa says it's still unclear where the carbon goes - and more research needs to be carried out.

"It's maybe potentially exported somewhere else, so that's something we still need to figure out."

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Now, I told you yesterday about that carbon zinc that
they've discovered in Fiordland's native bush. This carbon zinc is
sucking in so much more carbon than we originally thought.
In fact, it's so much it may be three times
as much carbon as us humans in New Zealand creating
a year now. The study has been done by Newer
and Biata Bucosa is the atmospheric scientist who led the study. Hibieta, Hello,

(00:20):
how sure are you about these numbers?

Speaker 2 (00:24):
We're quite quite confident in these numbers. We were running
tests for years and years now. Try to challenge our calculations,
models in every possible way we could think of, but
this sinc was always there.

Speaker 1 (00:38):
So does this mean that it really is sucking in?
This carbon zinc is sucking in three times what us
humans in New Zealand are burning.

Speaker 2 (00:48):
So it's just like carbon is mysteriously somewhere disappearing in
this region. But something to be careful about at the
moment is that we don't know where that carbon actually goes,
if it's a long term carbon, or if it's maybe
potentially exported somewhere else. So that's something that we still
need to figure out.

Speaker 1 (01:06):
Well, if it's a long term carbon that's going into
the trees, right.

Speaker 2 (01:09):
That's correct. What's the alternative, Well, there's something also that
we call lateral carbon transport. So if you think about
these regions down in the Southwest coast or Fjordland, these
are regions with a quite complex topography, quite a bit
of rainfall, landslide erosion. So an additional thing that might
be happening is that some of this carbon is being

(01:31):
transported in the rivers and then out to the ocean,
which might then be re emitted back to the atmosphere.
But that may yeah that much. Yes, So we identified
that about half of the difference that we see is
due to these lateral transports. However, there are uncertainties with
these estimates.

Speaker 1 (01:49):
Okay, so even if it's just half of it that's
going down the river, the rest of it is going
into the trees, right, which is more than we are
creating annually as New Zealanders.

Speaker 2 (02:00):
Yeah, so there's a specific amount that it seems is
being kept somewhere potentially in the land. However, we still
haven't identified the exact place or processes that take up
this carbon, so that's still work that needs to be done.

Speaker 1 (02:14):
Does this mean that we have a bit of a
license to relax about what we're doing in this country
and not beat ourselves up so much because actually Fieldland's
taking care of it.

Speaker 2 (02:23):
Well, not really, just because until we know exactly what's
the fate of that carbon, we can't really relax, and
we shouldn't relax because we still need to work to worry.

Speaker 1 (02:33):
I knew you again, I knew you again. I say that,
how long is it going to take to be absolutely sure?

Speaker 2 (02:40):
So we have currently a quite comprehensive proposal where we
would do additional measurements and modeling and basically bring together
everyone and everything to identify exactly identify exactly what is
happening with that carbon and where does it disappear. But
that would take another few years.

Speaker 1 (02:56):
Oh no, really, how many is a few years?

Speaker 2 (03:00):
Well, it really depends on when we could start that research.

Speaker 1 (03:04):
Okay, is it possible that the night of Bush is
just better at capturing carbon than we thought it originally was?

Speaker 2 (03:11):
There is an explanation yes there as well. And one
of the specific things to think about is the fact
that some of these forests and trees might be regenerating. Yeah,
following some disturbance, which means that it can now take
up more carbon than what we thought before. That we
also discuss in the study. There are also some efforts
across New Zealand about pest and browser control which can

(03:33):
further contribute to a healthier, better forest, stronger forest that
can take up carbon. And there's also climate change, the
overall impact of climate change and increase temperatures and other
conditions that would impact how these trees and environment.

Speaker 1 (03:47):
But it relates to us like the native forest is
doing a bit of job, we might want to consider
planting that instead of pine. Right.

Speaker 2 (03:55):
Well, it's very hard to make a conclusion at the
moment about you know, native forests versus pine and exotic forest.
But I think our main message here is that we
should focus quite a bit on maintaining these forests.

Speaker 1 (04:10):
Biata, it's good to talk to you. Thank you so much.
I appreciated as Bata Bucosso, who is the newer atmospheric scientist.
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