The Direct Radiative Forcing Impact of Agriculture-Emitted Black Carbon Associated With India's Green Revolution

Biomass burning contributes considerably to black carbon (BC) emissions in South Asia, but such emissions have not been linked with the Green Revolution (GR) which has enabled substantial crop production growth in South Asian countries, India in particular. Here, we use an Earth system model to quantify climate change through the direct radiative forcing (DRF) by agriculture-emitted BC associated with the GR in India. We show that the BC DRF in India has increased significantly since the GR, especially during the post-GR period. The estimated BC DRF in India rose from +0.197 W/m(2) in 1961 to +0.805 W/m(2) in 2011; this represents a fourfold increase in DRF since the onset of the GR. The contribution of BC DRF by India's intensive agriculture to the global BC forcing also increased from 2.6% to 4.4% during the GR. Our results reveal that increasing BC emissions associated with the GR raises the importance of emission mitigation from agriculture source.

Automated summary

The study shows that the direct radiative forcing (DRF) of agriculture-emitted BC associated with the Green Revolution in India has significantly increased since the onset of the revolution, especially in the post-revolution period. This highlights the importance of emission mitigation from agricultural sources in reducing the impact of BC emissions on climate change.