Permafrost

Video Projections. Sound. Mediterranean Biome, Eden Project


A subsurface layer is below freezing and permeates through the trees in the Australia and South Africa zones at the Mediterranean Biome. Permafrost is soil that has remained below 0C (32F) for more than two years. It occurs in regions where the summer warmth fails to penetrate the ground sufficiently to thaw the soil.

These soils are extremely rich in organic carbon. They contain about 1700 billion tonnes of it – about twice the total amount of carbon currently in the atmosphere. When the soil remains deep-frozen, the carbon is largely inert, but when the permafrost thaws, the decomposition of organic matter through microbial activity increases sharply – with the consequence that large amounts of carbon will eventually get respired into the atmosphere as CO2.

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