Carbon cycle processes

Feedbacks may be affected directly by atmospheric CO2, as in the case of possible CO2 fertilization of terrestrial production, or indirectly through the effects of atmospheric CO2 on climate. Furthermore, feedbacks between the carbon cycle and other anthropogenically altered biogeochemical cycles (e.g., nitrogen, phosphorus, and sulfur) may affect atmospheric CO2. If the creation or alteration of feedbacks have strong effects on the magnitudes of carbon cycle fluxes, then projections, made without consideration of these feedbacks and their potential for changing carbon cycle processes, will produce incorrect estimates of future concentrations of atmospheric CO2. 

Figure 1. Changes in global climate due to increased atmospheric CO2 will alter carbon cycle processes in land, continent margins, and oceans, which will in turn effect the atmospheric C02concentration. Processes that may have effects large enough to Eilter future projections of atmospheric CO2 are listed under their geographic region.

The research detailed in previous sections outlines productive steps toward increased certainty in global quantification of the effects that climate has on carbon cycle processes. Presented here is a short summary of future research directions. 

Ehleringer JR (1991) 13C/12C fractionation and its utility in terrestrial plant studies. In Coleman DC, Fry B (eds) Carbon isotopic techniques. Academic, New York, pp 187-200 Ehleringer JR, Buchmann RN, Flanagan LB (2000) Carbon isotope ratios in belowground carbon cycle processes. Ecol Appl 10 412-422... 

Fig. 2.1.1. Interaction between the organic and inorganic (carbonate) carbon cycles. Processes promoting precipitation, bold arrows processes promoting dissolution, fine arrows incorporation of bicarbonate by plants, dashed arrow.

Figure 6.1 Notional carbon speciation in sediments. Profiles of carbon reservoirs observed in sediments, combined to give a qualitative picture of carbon cycling processes.

The primary application of is to date objects or to determine various environmental process rates. The method is based on the assumption of a constant atmospheric formation rate. Once produced, atmospheric reacts to form i COi, which participates in the global carbon cycle processes of photosynthesis and respiration as well as the physical processes of dissolution, particulate deposition, evaporation, precipitation, transport, etc. Atmospheric radiocarbon is transferred to the ocean primarily by air-sea gas exchange of Once in the ocean, is subject... 

Carbon cycle Process by which carbon from atmospheric carbon dioxide enters hving and non-hving things and is recycled through them. 

Renewable carbon resources is a misnomer the earth s carbon is in a perpetual state of flux. Carbon is not consumed such that it is no longer available in any form. Reversible and irreversible chemical reactions occur in such a manner that the carbon cycle makes all forms of carbon, including fossil resources, renewable. It is simply a matter of time that makes one carbon from more renewable than another. If it is presumed that replacement does in fact occur, natural processes eventually will replenish depleted petroleum or natural gas deposits in several million years. Eixed carbon-containing materials that renew themselves often enough to make them continuously available in large quantities are needed to maintain and supplement energy suppHes biomass is a principal source of such carbon. 

The efficiency of the weathering of rocks in using carbonic acid produced in the carbon cycle is affected by various hydrologic, environmental, and cultural controls. The fact that the principal anion in fresh surface water worldwide almost always is bicarbonate attests to the overriding importance of this process. Exceptions are systems in which evaporite minerals are available for dissolution by groundwater or where human activities are major sources of sulfate or chloride inflow. 

Active Carbon. The process of adsorbiag impurities from carbon dioxide on active carbon or charcoal has been described ia connection with the Backus process of purifyiag carbon dioxide from fermentation processes. Space velocity and reactivation cycle vary with each appHcation. The use of active carbon need not be limited to the fermentation iadustries but, where hydrogen sulfide is the only impurity to be removed, the latter two processes are usually employed (see Carbon, activated carbon). 

Like all matter, carbon can neither be created nor destroyed it can just be moved from one place to another. The carbon cycle depicts the various places where carbon can be found. Carbon occurs in the atmosphere, in the ocean, in plants and animals, and in fossil fuels. Carbon can be moved from the atmosphere into either producers (through the process of photosynthesis) or the ocean (through the process of diffusion). Some producers will become fossil fuels, and some will be eaten by either consumers or decomposers. The carbon is returned to the atmosphere when consumers respire, when fossil fuels are burned, and when plants are burned in a fire. The amount of carbon in the atmosphere can be changed by increasing or decreasing rates of photosynthesis, use of fossil fuels, and number of fires. 

The most popular form of internal treatment for many years dates from the nineteenth century and is based on a combination of soda ash and caustic. This traditional program, the so-called carbonate-cycle or carbonate treatment, utilizes the addition of sodium carbonate to the BW to deliberately form carbonate sludges that can be removed by BD, rather than permit sulfate scales to develop. If sulfate scales do form in the boiler, the removal process is difficult and very time-consuming, and obviously, boiler operating efficiency will continue to decrease as the sulfate scale increases in thickness. 

Alternatives to fossil fuels, such as hydrogen, are explored in Box 6.2 and Section 14.3. Coal, which is mostly carbon, can be converted into fuels with a lower proportion of carbon. Its conversion into methane, CH4, for instance, would reduce C02 emissions per unit of energy. We can also work with nature by accelerating the uptake of carbon by the natural processes of the carbon cycle. For example, one proposed solution is to pump C02 exhaust deep into the ocean, where it would dissolve to form carbonic acid and bicarbonate ions. Carbon dioxide can also be removed from power plant exhaust gases by passing the exhaust through an aqueous slurry of calcium silicate to produce harmless solid products ... 

The Table of Contents for this collection will facilitate this discussion. Notice that the papers are grouped into the categories of Atmospheric, Aquatic and Terrestrial Components, Global Carbon Cycle and Climate Change, and Global Environmental Science Education. The reader may want to consider the various chemical species studied in each paper. Next, the reader may wish to group the papers by whether they address the source or the receptor, the transport or transformation processes for the chemical species. Finally, the reader needs to establish the time scales and the spatial resolution used. 

The global carbon cycle is the continuous movement of carbon between the living and nonliving portions of the biosphere, driven in part by biological processes and resulting in a constant supply of carbon to life (Figure 1). The... 

Budgets and cycles can be considered on very different spatial scales. In this book we concentrate on global, hemispheric and regional scales. The choice of a suitable scale (i.e. the size of the reservoirs), is determined by the goals of the analysis as well as by the homogeneity of the spatial distribution. For example, in carbon cycle models it is reasonable to consider the atmosphere as one reservoir (the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is fairly uniform). On the other hand, oceanic carbon content and carbon exchange processes exhibit large spatial variations and it is reasonable to separate the... 

Box models and box-diffusion models have few degrees of freedom and they must describe physical, chemical, and biological processes very crudely. They are based on empirical relations rather than on first principles. Nevertheless, the simple models have been useful for obtaining some general features of the carbon cycle and retain some important roles in carbon cycle research (Craig and Holmen, 1995 Craig et al, 1997 Siegenthaler and joos, 1992). 

There has been a tremendous development of various types of prognostic models of the carbon cycle during the past decades with increased refinement of both oceanic processes (see Siegenthaler and Sarmiento, 1993 Sarmiento et ah, 1992, 1998), terrestrial processes (Bonan,... 

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