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Forecasting Atmospheric Radiocarbon Decline to Pre-Bomb Values

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  25 April 2018

Carlos A Sierra Open the ORCID record for Carlos A Sierra [Opens in a new window]
Carlos A Sierra*
Affiliation:
Max-Planck-Institute for Biogeochemistry, Hans-Knöll-Str. 10, 07745 Jena, Germany
*
*Corresponding author. Email: csierra@bgc-jena.mpg.de.
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Abstract

In this manuscript, I present an estimation of the rate of decline in atmospheric radiocarbon and the amplitude of its seasonal cycle for the past four decades for the northern and southern hemispheres, and forecast the time required to reach pre-1950 levels (i.e. Δ14C<0‰). Using a set of 30 different exponential smoothing state-space models, the time series were decomposed into their error, trend, and seasonal components, choosing the model that best represented the observed data. According to the best model, the rate of change in Δ14C has decreased considerably since the 1970s and reached values below −5‰ per year since 2005. Overall, the time-series showed larger rates of radiocarbon decline in the northern than in the southern hemisphere, and relatively stable seasonal cycles for both hemispheres. A forecast of the exponential smoothing models predicts that radiocarbon values will reach pre-1950 levels by 2021 in the northern hemisphere with 20% probability, and by around 2035 in the southern hemisphere. However, at regional levels radiocarbon concentrations have already reached pre-1950 levels in several industrialized regions and cities around the world as a consequence of fossil-fuel emissions.

Keywords

bomb curvecitiesfossil fuelsstatistical forecasttime series decomposition
Type
Atmosphere
Information
Radiocarbon , Volume 60 , Issue 4: 2nd Radiocarbon in the Environment Conference Debrecen, Hungary, July 3–7, 2017 Part 1 of 2 , August 2018 , pp. 1055 - 1066
Copyright
© 2018 by the Arizona Board of Regents on behalf of the University of Arizona 

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