Skip to main content

Thank you for visiting nature.com. You are using a browser version with limited support for CSS. To obtain the best experience, we recommend you use a more up to date browser (or turn off compatibility mode in Internet Explorer). In the meantime, to ensure continued support, we are displaying the site without styles and JavaScript.

  • Perspective
  • Published:

Ensuring consistency between biogeochemical planetary boundaries

Nature Sustainability (2026)Cite this article

Subjects

Abstract

The planetary boundaries framework sets precautionary limits to keep humanity within a safe operating space, aiming to maintain a stable, Holocene-like Earth system. Current methods for estimating these limits, however, create an imbalance by overstating biogeochemical risks relative to climate change. Here we propose a revised, flow-based, method for estimating the climate change boundary, aligned with the other biogeochemical flow boundaries. We find that under a consistent approach, climate change is in greater violation than nitrogen and phosphorus. This is consistent with the widely accepted view that greenhouse gas emissions constitute one of the most pressing biogeochemical issues in environmental protection.

This is a preview of subscription content, access via your institution

Access options

Buy this article

  • Purchase on SpringerLink
  • Instant access to the full article PDF.

USD 39.95

Prices may be subject to local taxes which are calculated during checkout

Fig. 1: Planetary boundaries.
Fig. 2: The stock versus flow concept.
Fig. 3: Sensitivity of the proposed flow-based planetary boundary for climate change to the assumed remaining carbon budget, the timeframe over which it is spent and carbon removal rates.

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. IPCC: Summary for Policymakers. In Climate Change 2021: The Physical Science Basis (eds Masson-Delmotte, V. et al.) (Cambridge Univ. Press, 2021); https://www.ipcc.ch/report/ar6/wg1/downloads/report/IPCC_AR6_WGI_SPM.pdf

  2. Betts, R. A. et al. Approaching 1.5 °C: how will we know we’ve reached this crucial warming mark? Nature 624, 33–35 (2023).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  3. Carpenter, S. R. & Bennett, E. M. Reconsideration of the planetary boundary for phosphorus. Environ. Res. Lett. 6, 014009 (2011).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  4. Schulte-Uebbing, L. F., Beusen, A. H., Bouwman, A. F. & De Vries, W. From planetary to regional boundaries for agricultural nitrogen pollution. Nature 610, 507–512 (2022).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  5. Zhang, X. et al. Nitrogen management during decarbonization. Nat. Rev. Earth Environ. 5, 717–731 (2024).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  6. Rockström, J. et al. Safe and just earth system boundaries. Nature 619, 102–111 (2023).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  7. de Vries, W. Impacts of nitrogen emissions on ecosystems and human health: a mini review. Curr. Opin. Environ. Sci. Health 21, 100249 (2021).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  8. de Vries, W. et al. Trends and geographic variation in adverse impacts of nitrogen use in Europe on human health, climate, and ecosystems: a review. Earth Sci. Rev. 253, 104789 (2024).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  9. Kyle, P. et al. Assessing multi-dimensional impacts of achieving sustainability goals by projecting the sustainable agriculture matrix into the future. Earths Future 11, e2022EF003323 (2023).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  10. Gong, C. et al. Global net climate effects of anthropogenic reactive nitrogen. Nature 632, 557–563 (2024).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  11. Li, Y. et al. The role of conservation agriculture practices in mitigating N2O emissions: a meta-analysis. Agron. Sustain. Dev. 43, 63 (2023).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  12. Rockström, J. et al. A safe operating space for humanity. Nature 461, 472–475 (2009).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  13. Lenton, T. M. et al. Tipping elements in the Earth’s climate system. Proc. Natl Acad. Sci. USA 105, 1786–1793 (2008).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  14. McKay, D. A. et al. Exceeding 1.5°C global warming could trigger multiple climate tipping points. Science 377, eabn7950 (2022).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  15. Steffen, W. et al. Planetary boundaries: guiding human development on a changing planet. Science 347, 1259855 (2015).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  16. Richardson, K. et al. Earth beyond six of nine planetary boundaries. Sci. Adv. 9, eadh2458 (2023).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  17. Gupta, J. et al. A just world on a safe planet: a Lancet Planetary Health–Earth Commission report on Earth-system boundaries, translations, and transformations. Lancet Planet. Health 8, e813–e873 (2024).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  18. Biermann, F. & Kim, R. E. The boundaries of the planetary boundary framework: a critical appraisal of approaches to define a “safe operating space” for humanity. Annu. Rev. Environ. Resour. 45, 497–521 (2020).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  19. Mahecha, M. D., Kraemer, G. & Crameri, F. Cautionary remarks on the planetary boundary visualisation. Earth Syst. Dyn. 15, 1153–1159 (2024).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  20. Nordhaus, T., Shellenberger, M. & Blomqvist, L. The planetary boundaries hypothesis: a review of the evidence. Breakthrough Institute https://thebreakthrough.org/articles/planetary-boundaries (2012).

  21. de Vries, W., Kros, J., Kroeze, C. & Seitzinger, S. P. Assessing planetary and regional nitrogen boundaries related to food security and adverse environmental impacts. Curr. Opin. Environ. Sustain. 5, 392–402 (2013).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  22. de Vries, W., Schulte-Uebbing, L., Kros, H., Voogd, J. C. & Louwagie, G. Spatially explicit boundaries for agricultural nitrogen inputs in the European Union to meet air and water quality targets. Sci. Total Environ. 786, 147283 (2021).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  23. Chang, J. et al. Reconciling regional nitrogen boundaries with global food security. Nat. Food 2, 700–711 (2021).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  24. National Lakes Assessment 2022: The Fourth Collaborative Survey of Lakes in the United States (US Environmental Protection Agency, 2024); https://nationallakesassessment.epa.gov/webreport/

  25. Wang, M. et al. A triple increase in global river basins with water scarcity due to future pollution. Nat. Commun. 15, 880 (2024).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  26. Ding, X. et al. Seasonal variations of nutrient concentrations and their ratios in the central Bohai Sea. Sci. Total Environ. 799, 149416 (2021).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  27. Tian, H. et al. Global nitrous oxide budget (1980–2020). Earth Syst. Sci. Data 16, 2543–2604 (2024).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  28. Watson, A. J., Lenton, T. M. & Mills, B. J. Ocean deoxygenation, the global phosphorus cycle and the possibility of human-caused large-scale ocean anoxia. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A 375, 20160318 (2017).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  29. Lindsey, R. Climate change: atmospheric carbon dioxide. NOAA Climate Portal https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/climate-change-atmospheric-carbon-dioxide (2024).

  30. Friedlingstein, P. et al. Global Carbon Budget 2024. Earth Syst. Sci. Data 2024, 1–133 (2024).

    Google Scholar 

  31. Global Methane Tracker 2024 (International Energy Agency, 2024); https://www.iea.org/reports/global-methane-tracker-2024

  32. Hausfather, Z. Analysis: What the new IPCC report says about how to limit warming to 1.5°C or 2°C. Carbon Brief https://www.carbonbrief.org/analysis-what-the-new-ipcc-report-says-about-how-to-limit-warming-to-1-5c-or-2c/ (2022).

  33. Wolfram, P., Kyle, P., Fuhrman, J., O’Rourke, P. & McJeon, H. The hydrogen economy can reduce costs of climate change mitigation by up to 22%. One Earth 7, 885–895 (2024).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  34. Fuhrman, J. et al. Diverse carbon dioxide removal approaches could reduce impacts on the energy–water–land system. Nat. Clim. Change 13, 341–350 (2023).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  35. Shi, H. et al. Saturation of global terrestrial carbon sink under a high warming scenario. Glob. Biogeochem. Cycles 35, e2020GB006800 (2021).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  36. van Vuuren, D. P. et al. Exploring pathways for world development within planetary boundaries. Nature 641, 910–916 (2025).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  37. Balcombe, P., Speirs, J. F., Brandon, N. P. & Hawkes, A. D. Methane emissions: choosing the right climate metric and time horizon. Environ. Sci. Process. Impacts 20, 1323–1339 (2018).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

  38. Rogelj, J. & Lamboll, R. D. Substantial reductions in non-CO2 greenhouse gas emissions reductions implied by IPCC estimates of the remaining carbon budget. Commun. Earth Environ. 5, 35 (2024).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  39. Rogelj, J., Meinshausen, M., Schaeffer, M., Knutti, R. & Riahi, K. Impact of short-lived non-CO2 mitigation on carbon budgets for stabilizing global warming. Environ. Res. Lett. 10, 075001 (2015).

    Article  Google Scholar 

  40. Historical GHG emissions. ClimateWatch https://www.climatewatchdata.org/ghg-emissions (2025).

  41. Tian, P. et al. Keeping the global consumption within the planetary boundaries. Nature 635, 625–630 (2024).

    Article  CAS  Google Scholar 

Download references

Acknowledgements

H.M. was supported by the National Research Foundation of Korea (MSIT grant RS-2025-02312954). All analyses presented in this paper were conducted by the human authors without assistance from generative AI tools. In preparing the paper, the authors used GPTs to improve the clarity of the writing. The authors subsequently reviewed and edited the content for accuracy and take full responsibility for the final version of the publication.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Joint Global Change Research Institute, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, College Park, MD, USA

    Paul Wolfram, Hassan Niazi & Page Kyle

  2. KAIST Graduate School of Green Growth and Sustainability, Daejeon, Republic of Korea

    Haewon McJeon

Authors
  1. Paul Wolfram
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Hassan Niazi
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Page Kyle
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Haewon McJeon
    View author publications

    Search author on:PubMed Google Scholar

Contributions

P.W., H.N., P.K. and H.M. conceptualized the study. H.N. contributed to data curation, analysis and visualization. P.W. led the analysis, data collection, visualization and wrote the paper with input from all co-authors.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Paul Wolfram or Haewon McJeon.

Ethics declarations

Competing interests

The authors declare no competing interests.

Additional information

Publisher’s note Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Rights and permissions

Springer Nature or its licensor (e.g. a society or other partner) holds exclusive rights to this article under a publishing agreement with the author(s) or other rightsholder(s); author self-archiving of the accepted manuscript version of this article is solely governed by the terms of such publishing agreement and applicable law.

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Check for updates. Verify currency and authenticity via CrossMark

Cite this article

Wolfram, P., Niazi, H., Kyle, P. et al. Ensuring consistency between biogeochemical planetary boundaries. Nat Sustain (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-026-01770-6

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Version of record:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41893-026-01770-6

Search

Advanced search

Quick links

Nature Briefing

Sign up for the Nature Briefing newsletter — what matters in science, free to your inbox daily.

Get the most important science stories of the day, free in your inbox. Sign up for Nature Briefing