Silicon Investor (SI) -- The First Internet Community

STOCKTALK

We've detected that you're using an ad content blocking browser plug-in or feature. Ads provide a critical source of revenue to the continued operation of Silicon Investor. We ask that you disable ad blocking while on Silicon Investor in the best interests of our community. If you are not using an ad blocker but are still receiving this message, make sure your browser's tracking protection is set to the 'standard' level.

Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Wharf Rat who wrote (187720)	5/30/2006 8:55:36 PM
From: Hawkmoon	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

One way that we know that human activities are responsible for the increased CO2 is simply by looking at historical records of human activities. That's not correct. You're looking at ONE particular form of data and presuming that there is a correlation between man's burning of wood and fossil fuels, and an increase in CO2 emmissions. But ANOTHER THEORY that could easily replace it is that at about the time that modern man appeared, the end of the last ice age, there was a change in the chemisty of the oceans. Nutrients that had eroded and been blown into the oceans from mineral deposits exposed by glaciation as it drew down ocean levels, were no longer being augmented or increased. And as these levels of nutrients declined, the phytoplankton that depended upon them started to decrease in quantity. The equilibrium that had previously existed between CO2 creation and sequestration was broken and we started running a gradual deficit in CO2 consumption as phytoplankton could not obtain the mineral nutrients they needed to grow. And as phytoplankton levels decreased, CO2 levels commenced a permanent upswing. And upon the commencement of thousands of years of wide-scale fishing by mankind, those nutrients were being depleted from the oceans at an even faster rate, decreasing phytoplankton levels as ocean nutrients contained in fish, are never recycled in the oceanic ecosystem. There you go.. an alternative, AND JUST AS PLAUSIBLE, scenario based upon depleted nutrients in the oceans. And the authors of the article almost come out and admit it as a plausible scenario: Clearly, though, it is our ability to produce CO2 faster than the ocean and biosphere can absorb that it is the fundamental cause of the observed increase since pre-industrial times. And how about some other sources of CO2 emmissions that are not man-made? Volcanoes: This NON-ACTIVE volcano, Mammoth Mt. is release 300 tonnes of C02 every day: volcanoes.usgs.gov pubs.usgs.gov Now I wonder if your authors have taken that into account when they did their tree-ring analysis?? Also, nearly 50% of Kilauea's emissions are C02: volcanoes.usgs.gov Volcanoes release more than 130 million tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere every year. And lets see how many volcanic eruptions we've had since 1850 AD: volcano.si.edu As you can clearly see from the graphs, the number of larger eruptions has remained fairly level, but if you look at the TOTAL number of eruptions, it has increase substantially from less than 20 eruptions in the year 1790, to over 60 eruptions per year now. Now, yes.. they aren't all Krakatoas, or St. Helens, but even if they are small eruptions, the TOTAL release of gases could be far larger than is being acknowledged. Just because the Teapot doesn't boil, doesn't mean that steam isn't being released into the air.. and that's the same principle I'm asserting here. Now Wharf.. don't get me wrong.. I'm not saying that man isn't increasing C02 levels. They surely have, by logic, even if the facts as to how much are still in debate. But the bottom line is that the environment where 90% of all C02 sequestration occurs, the oceans, are showing SIGNIFICANT DECREASES in phytoplankton. Thus, the ability of those oceans to sequestor larger quantities of CO2, man-made, Volcanic.. etc, is decreasing. And we can't afford to not have a plan for revitalizing the lungs of this planet to where it can resume it's previous ability to equalize the levels of CO2 in the atmosphere. Basically, I don't care where the CO2 comes from. I want to know why the natural mechanisms for desposing of the excess PPM of CO2 are failing to do so. And for the solution we have to look at the ocean chemistry.. WE must spend our time focusing there FIRST, and then we'll have considerably MORE time to figure out how to have a healthy economy, a decent standard of living, while creating far less pollution. Hawk