Oceanic Oscillations and Congo River Basin Climatology

The Congo River Basin (CRB) is the world's largest carbon sink and plays a vital role in moisture recycling. However, anthropogenic climate change, alongside forest and peatland destruction, threaten these critical ecosystem services. Here, we focus on how global sea surface temperature (SST) rise impacts the oceanic oscillations (dipoles and indices) that modulate moisture transportation to the CRB. As SST rise accelerates, increased evaporation and temperature differentials across ocean basins is expected to lead to more extreme events (storms, droughts, floods) and alter the capacity of the CRB to support wetlands, forests, soils, and the communities that rely on them.