Is the woolly mammoth the solution to our climate problem?

A new company plans to bring the woolly mammoth to life and use it to combat some of the most worrying impacts of climate change already occurring in the Arctic.

On Wrangel Island, climate change is not a far-from-my-bed show. The island is located in the Arctic Ocean and is therefore in the heart of the Arctic, where global warming is much faster than elsewhere. This is mainly reflected in the melting of sea ice and the thawing of permafrost: the ground that until recently was almost permanently frozen. In addition to powerful greenhouse gases, the thawing permafrost on Wrangel Island also releases many other things: bones and tusks of woolly mammoths, for example. “Wrangel Island is believed to have been home to the last woolly mammoths about 4,000 years ago – when the pyramids rose in Egypt,” says Carl Königel, ecosystem expert at the Dutch branch of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).

Comeback

These last of their kind also died and with that the woolly mammoth was history. But the new company Colossal is determined to change that. Using genetic engineering, the company aims to bring the woolly mammoth back to life and reintroduce it into its original habitat. Not so much as a place of interest, but as a solution to the climate problem.

How?

In the heyday of the woolly mammoth, the Arctic looked very different than it does today. Where today the area has fairly open pine forests, in the time of the mammoths mainly grasslands were found here. “At the moment it is mainly tundra and taiga, but before that it was steppe,” says Königel. “And now we see that the area is changing again under the influence of climate change and those changes are happening very fast in the Arctic.” The previously mentioned thawing permafrost is a clearly visible, but also very worrying consequence of this. “Permafrost contains methane, which is a strong greenhouse gas. When permafrost thaws, methane is released. In some places it literally bubbles up and that is worrying.”

At Colossal they feel the same way. And that’s why they want to get the woolly mammoth back. The enormous beast must ensure that the Arctic landscape transforms again into a grass-dominated mammoth steppe. Because the grass is lighter in color than the dark pine forests, it absorbs less sunlight and therefore heat, so that snow does not melt as quickly and reflects sunlight (and therefore heat) for a longer period of time. And that, according to Colossal, would lead to local cooling and thus preservation of permafrost. In addition, the mammoths themselves can also help to protect the permafrost. The Colossal website states that it is expected that the mammoths will have to push away the snow during the winter when grazing the grasslands, allowing cold air to reach and cool the underlying permafrost. In addition, with their enormous weight, the mammoths would compact the soil well, which would also contribute to the preservation of permafrost.

Wolves

The mammoth as nature restorer and protector. How plausible is that? We should certainly not underestimate the impact that a single animal species has on an ecosystem and landscape, believes Königel. As an example, he cites the wolf that was reintroduced to Yellowstone, America, in 1995 after years of absence. “The wolves went hunting for deer. Those deer are grazing tree seedlings again. The wolves caused deer to avoid certain places, so that the forest recovered and more birds and beavers came. Erosion diminished as the tree roots held the bottom and beaver dams created pools suitable for fish, otters and amphibians. And so the dynamics in the ecosystem changed quite a bit.” One species can therefore strongly influence the functioning of an ecosystem. That said, however, Königel has his doubts about Colossal’s radical plan. There are quite a few loose ends. Because while we can properly study how a modern species such as the wolf influences an ecosystem, it is difficult to say with certainty for an extinct species. “We don’t even know what the ecosystem it used to be a part of was like.” Never mind that we can accurately predict how the introduction of this species in an area that is both ecologically and climatically very different from the glory days of the woolly mammoth.

The company Colossal sees the bright light and expects the woolly mammoth to transform the tundra and taiga into grasslands and protect the permafrost from thawing. But according to Königel, these are just assumptions. “You can’t research it, because the mammoth is nowhere to be found.” And even if the woolly mammoths affect their ecosystem and habitat exactly as Colossal expects, we shouldn’t underestimate how many mammoths it takes to realize the intended effects. “If you want mammoths to tamp the soil to keep the permafrost frozen, you’ll soon need hundreds of thousands of animals.” And that raises new questions – difficult or even impossible to answer. “Can you produce that many? And does the landscape have enough food to offer? How does this relate to the people who live there?” Königel is clearly not very enthusiastic about Colossal’s plan. “I think it’s a pretty reckless idea from an ecological point of view.”

Guidelines

This is not to say that bringing back extinct species is by definition undesirable. But it is something that you have to think very critically about beforehand, says Königel. In 2016, the IUCN therefore guidelines published aimed at so-called de-extinction. “Without making a value judgment about it, IUCN has put on paper a number of things that you run into when you bring extinct animals back to life.” This way you run the risk of introducing (old) diseases into an ecosystem with these animals or influencing that ecosystem in an unexpected and undesirable way. “Hybridization (where the formerly extinct animal crosses with closely related contemporary species, ed.) is also a factor to take into account, although that will not be the case with woolly mammoths; the Indian elephant is safe behind the Himalayas.” And so there are many more things to consider before reviving a woolly mammoth – or other extinct species. “It is of course an exciting idea, but you have to be careful.”

And finally, it is of course always the question whether all the risks that one takes with the introduction of a previously extinct species outweigh the (alleged) benefits. In the case of the woolly mammoth, that is questionable. “Climate change is a serious problem,” emphasizes Königel. “But we know what we can do about it.” The list of measures to be taken is of course topped by reducing emissions. “But it is also important, for example, to preserve and restore forests.” As far as Königel is concerned, bringing back the woolly mammoth certainly does not belong on the list of climate measures. “It is a very expensive and reckless experiment and we should not focus on it as a solution to the climate problem.”