CLARiTy: Transforming Our Understanding of the Global Carbon Cycle

CLARiTy (Combining LAnd-use, modeling and Remote-sensing to Transform carbon budgets) is a five-year project led by University of Exeter, University of Maryland, and Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität Munich. The project is part of the Virtual Institute for the Carbon Cycle (VICC). CLARiTy aims to substantially reduce uncertainties in our understanding of land-based carbon emissions and removals – a critical step towards achieving global climate targets.

Currently, natural land carbon sinks and CO₂ emissions and removals from land-use change account for a large portion of the uncertainty in the global carbon budget. CLARiTy will address this by combining cutting-edge Earth Observation data with advanced modelling techniques and a deeper process understanding. The project will focus on improving how we monitor land-use change, vegetation structure, and biomass dynamics, particularly in key regions like Brazil and China.

CLARiTy will deliver:

• Improved datasets by leveraging high-resolution satellite data and AI to create more accurate maps of land use and ecosystem disturbance
• Enhanced models by integrating new data and insights into existing models to better represent key carbon cycle processes
• A consistent framework by developing a unified approach for estimating carbon fluxes to bridge the gap between models, national inventories, and Earth Observations

As a leading project partner, we play a central role in several key areas of CLARiTy:

• Model Development & Evaluation: Contributing to the development and evaluation of the bookkeeping model BLUE, focusing on integrating high-resolution land-cover data and improved representation of land management practices and disturbance regimes, all of which will be provided by CLARiTy.
• Global Carbon Budget: Providing expertise and data to the annual Global Carbon Budget (GCB) reports, ensuring the integration of CLARiTy’s findings into the latest assessments of the carbon cycle.
• Project Coordination: Supporting overall project coordination and communication, fostering collaboration across the international team.

By reducing uncertainties in land CO₂ fluxes by an order of magnitude, CLARiTy will provide a more reliable foundation for climate policy and contribute to a better-informed Global Stocktake.

Link to CLARiTy project: https://clarityvicc.org