Abstract Potential drivers disrupting mid‐Proterozoic (∼1.8–0.8 Ga) environmental stasis remain poorly constrained. Here we examined carbonate Li isotopes from the ∼1.44 Ga Tieling Formation, North China, to evaluate the effects of continental chemical weathering on coeval oxygenation. Our results identify two negative excursions in seawater δ 7 Li values, suggesting enhanced continental chemical weathering. Applying a dynamic box model, we demonstrate that 2.5‐fold increase in riverine Li influx coupled with decrease in riverine δ 7 Li by 6‰ can generate the observed data pattern. Intermittently enhanced continental chemical weathering could have delivered elevated nutrients to the ocean, stimulating primary productivity and thus organic carbon burial, favoring the ∼1.44 Ga oxygenation event.
Xu et al. (Sat,) studied this question.