Carbon anthropogenic

Assuming the current emissions and sinks remain about the same, estimate the global atmospheric CO2 mixing ratio in the year 2050. Now repeat this calculation, but this time assume that the terrestrial biosphere no longer continues to sequester some of this anthropogenic carbon. 

The use of coal for electricity generation is responsible for about 32% of anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions in the U S. 11 As shown by France, it is possible to displace virtually all the coal used in electricity generation. Thus, France in 1997 obtained about 78% of its electricity from nuclear power and only about 5% from coal. Further reductions in carbon dioxide emissions could be made by the electrification of other sectors of the energy economy, including buildings, and eventually perhaps much of transportation. 

Murr, L.E., Garza, K.M., Soto, K.F., Carrasco, A., Powell, T.G., Ramirez, D.A., Guerrero, P.A., Lopez, D.A., and Venzorlll, J. (2005) Cytotoxicity assessment of some carbon nanotubes and related carbon nanoparticle aggregates and the implications for anthropogenic carbon nanotube aggregates in the environment. International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, 2 (1), 31-42. 

The future response of the ocean to increasing injection of anthropogenic carbon into the atmosphere can be predicted by considering how the physical and biological pumps are most likely to respond. Initially, the physical fectors will lead to a decrease in the ocean s uptake rate. This is a result of four fectors. First, as discussed in Chapter 25.3.1,... 

The most important single source of anthropogenic carbon monoxide in the United States is motor vehicles. Cars and trucks account... 

Sarmiento, J. L. Gruber, N. 2002. Sinks for anthropogenic carbon. Physics Today, August, 30-36. 

J. L. Sarmiento and N. Gruber, Sinks for Anthropogenic Carbon, Physics Today, August 2002, p. 30. 

Priority 1 — Quantifying the Anthropogenic Carbon Input Priority 2a — Understanding the Biological Pump Priority 2b — Tracing Water Masses Priority 3 — Other Analytes of Interest... 

Anthropogenic carbon emissions have grown constantly ever since industrial development, reaching 5.2 GtC in 1980 and 6.3 GtC in 2002. 

In the present-day CO2 cycle, the interactions between land and ocean via rivers appear to have been affected substantially by the activities of humankind. Herein lies an important link between the carbon cycle and those of the nutrients N and P. This link is shown in Figure 10.33B, which also demonstrates, when compared to the long-term carbon cycle of Figure 10.33A, the effects of anthropogenic carbon on land-ocean-atmosphere CO2 coupling. 

Figure 1.11, prepared by the U.S. Energy Information Administration, describes the global carbon cycle. It provides data that was collected in 2001. Since that date, the yearly anthropogenic carbon emissions (measured in carbon equivalent terms) increased from 6.3 to about 9 billion metric tons (over 1 ton per capita in the world). In November 2007, the National Academy of Science reported actual emissions for 2006 as 8.4 billion tons. Carbon equivalent means that the emission of 3.7 tons of COz is counted as the emission of 1 ton of carbon, so the 8.4 billion tons per year of carbon that enters the atmosphere owing to fossil fuel combustion corresponds to 33 billion tons per year of C02 because of the molecular weight ratio of COz to carbon (44/12). 

Mt C/yr anthropogenic carbon emissions from the energy sector. 

Sarmiento J. L. and Sundquist E. T. (1992) Revised budget for the oceanic uptake of anthropogenic carbon-dioxide. Nature 356, 589-593. 

A perusal of the literature suggests that carbon sequestration by iron fertilization is not a panacea for the anthropogenic carbon emissions that increased atmospheric CO2 from 280 p,atm at the start of the industrial revolution to 369 p,atm by December 2000 (Keeling and Whorf, 2001). Ocean models suggest that enhanced ocean uptake of carbon with iron fertilization of the Antarctic Ocean will at best draw down atmospheric CO2 by 70 xatm if carried out continuously for a century (Peng and Broecker, 1991a,b) and damp the annual anthropogenic CO2 input to the atmosphere by less than 30% of current annual emission levels (Joos et al, 1991). 

Orr J. C., Maier-Reimer E., and Mikolajewicz U. (2001) Estimates of anthropogenic carbon uptake from four three-dimensional global ocean models. Global Biogeochem. Cycles 15, 43-60. 

Although the oceans determine the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere in the long term, in the short term, lags introduced by other processes besides chemistry allow a temporary disequilibrium. Two processes that delay the transfer of anthropogenic carbon into the ocean are (i) the transfer of CO2 across the air-sea... 

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