Carbon cycle dynamics during recent interglacials

Trends in the atmospheric concentration of CO2 during three recent interglacials, the Holocene, the Eemian and Marine Isotope Stage (MIS) 11, are investigated using an Earth system Model of Intermediate Complexity, which we extended with modules to dynamically determine two slow carbon cycle processes – peat accumulation and shallow-water CaCO3 sedimentation (coral reef formation). For all three interglacials, model simulations considering peat accumulation and shallow water CaCO3 sedimentation substantially improve the agreement between model results and ice core CO2 reconstructions in comparison to a carbon cycle setup neglecting these processes. This enables us to model the trends in atmospheric CO2, with modelled trends similar to the ice core data, forcing the model only with orbital and sea level changes. During the Holocene, anthropogenic CO2 emissions are required to match the observed rise in atmospheric CO2 after 3 ka BP, but are not relevant before this time. Therefore our model experiments show for the first time how the CO2 evolution during the Holocene and two recent interglacials can be explained consistently using an identical model setup.