NATURAL "SINK": Scientists hope to precisely measure both how much greenhouse gases get dumped in the atmosphere as well as how much natural "sinks," such as the forest pictured here, absorb.
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The planet soaks up excess carbon dioxide via oceans, plants and soils, among other natural systems, locking away some of the greenhouse gases emitted by burning fossil fuels. In fact, every year these natural "sinks" absorb a larger and larger tonnage of emissions—but thanks to the increasing amount of CO2 and other greenhouse gases dumped in the atmosphere by human activity, the proportion that is reabsorbed is beginning to dwindle, according to new studies.
As efforts get underway to craft a global treaty that begins to reduce man-made greenhouse gas emissions, precise and accurate measurements of the emanations, along with their sources and sinks are increasingly important. Novel technologies as well as new scientific efforts are contributing to that project—although the recent loss of NASA's Orbiting Carbon Observatory caused a setback.
First and foremost, greenhouse gas emissions worldwide continue to grow, according to a new report from the Global Carbon Project (GCP) published online by Nature Geoscience on November 17. (Scientific American is part of the Nature Publishing Group.) From 2000 to 2008, such discharges jumped by 29 percent and, in spite of the onset of the Great Recession, still managed to rise 2 percent in 2008 alone (although they are expected to fall back to 2007 levels this year), according to oceanographer Corinne Le Quere of the University of East Anglia in England. In fact, global emissions from fossil-fuel burning and deforestation are now roughly 37 billion metric tons of CO2 per year—or 41 percent higher than in 1990.
Le Quere and her colleagues' research also hints that the portion of CO2 remaining in the atmosphere may be on the rise, as well—creeping from around 40 percent in 1959 to roughly 45 percent in 2008. That translates to roughly 14 billion metric tons of CO2 a year, or a 1.8-part-per-million increase in atmospheric concentration annually.
Part of the reason for that rise may be explained by a slowing in the amount of CO2 absorbed by the world's oceans, particularly the Southern Ocean surrounding Antarctica, whose frigid waters absorbed 40 percent of the nearly nine billion metric tons of CO2 sequestered by the seas last year. Reconstructing the record back to 1765, oceanographer Samar Khatiwala of Columbia University's Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory and his colleagues estimate that the proportion of fossil-fuel emissions absorbed by the sea has declined 5 percent already in the first years of the 21st century, according to a new paper published November 19 in Nature.
This might indicate that the natural ocean sink—whose carbon dioxide uptake increased in the 1950s—is unable to cope with increasing greenhouse discharges produced by human activity. "The more carbon dioxide you put in, the more acidic the ocean becomes, reducing its ability to hold CO2," Khatiwala said in a prepared statement. Seawater's average pH—a measure of acidity—has dropped to 8.1 from roughly 8.2 in the 19th century.
That is balanced, in some part, by an apparent rise of roughly four billion metric tons of CO2 absorbed by land-based sinks, possibly due to CO2 being used by growing plants. Then again, the researchers' estimate for land uptake of carbon is suspect, given that it is based on what has not been absorbed by the oceans or remains in the atmosphere.
This kind of estimate is endemic to climate research and is perhaps best exemplified by the national emission inventories, which are often based on emissions factors—mathematical formulas for the amount of CO2 produced by burning a particular type of coal, for example. Simply multiplying consumption figures for such coal by these factors is the primary way the U.S. and other nations estimate the greenhouse gas load they contribute to the problem.
"Those emission estimates are not very accurate compared to high-calibration devices," says Michael Woelk, CEO of Picarro, a California-based manufacturer of such a device for measuring CO2 emissions. "No country today is using scientific instruments to monitor and calibrate the effect of policy," not even the European Union, which has an emissions trading scheme for greenhouse gases.
The U.S. uses similar technology to precisely monitor emissions of acid rain–causing sulfur dioxide or smog-forming nitrogen oxides as part of its trading programs for those pollutants. And the World Meteorological Organization has opted to employ Picarro's "cavity ring-down spectroscopy" technology—a computerlike device that measures isotopes to determine both amount and source, whether man-made or natural, of greenhouse gases—to ensure that its global measures are accurate.
The devices depend on the fact that carbon dioxide generated from fossil-fuel consumption has less of the isotope known as carbon 13 than other forms of the gas, thanks to plants preferentially absorbing the lighter version, known as carbon 12. By measuring this ratio, scientists might be able to determine more accurately the proportion of human contribution to climate-warming gases.
But a lot of variability in such isotopes remains; for example, the ratio of these isotopes can vary significantly in natural gas alone, potentially throwing such measurements into dispute. And a paper in the November 7 issue of Geophysical Research Letters from earth scientist Wolfgang Knorr of the University of Bristol in England argues that the ocean's uptake of carbon dioxide has not slowed at all in the last 150 years, making it possible that natural systems could compensate for human emissions.
Ultimately, what will matter most is how much the oceans and other natural sinks can buffer the human contribution from fossil-fuel burning. If greenhouse gas emissions continue on their current trajectory, global average temperatures could be 6 degrees Celsius warmer by the end of the century, Le Quere says.
As oceanographer Richard Feely of the National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, a contributor to the GCP, noted: "We're concerned that if the natural sinks can't keep pace with the increased CO2 emissions, then the physical and biological impacts of global warming will accelerate over the next century."
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42 Comments
Add CommentMere facts and science will not convince some people, until it is too late.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOh well a few more suckers who bought into the "CO2 causes Warming" malarkey. If you bother to go back to read the original Arrhenius 1896 paper (see wikipedia) you will find that he did a paper calculation to find out that increasing CO2 results in increasing warming WHEN there is unlimited energy photons available.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIn the real life case of the Earth, there is EXCESS CO2 (& water vapor) above what is needed for the Greenhouse Effect. This means that for an increased GHE where it is required that there be BOTH axtra added energy photons to be absorbed by an extra available GHG, then when one (CO2) is in excess, then the other (the photons) is what actually dictates how much of a GHE there is. THUS the energy coming in dictates the Earth's temperature. (DUH!) Adding extra added CO2 results in adding extra CO2 to the air. It does NOT result in added warming, UNLESS the energy photons are ALSO added. Given the excess CO2 then CO2 emissions control (Cap & Trade etc) will only reduce the extra excess CO2 in the air. IT WILL NOT IMPACT THE TEMPERATURE. (This is explained in the paper Excess CO2 Scenario available at www.scribd.com.)
This paper also explains that gravity and planetary eccentricity results in variable amounts of energy being available to change the temperature (& the GHE which is apparently always about 10% of the Earth's temperature and so also varies.)
However, since it is gravity that changes the temperature and results in the 30 year cooling (1880-1910, 1940-1970, 1998-2028) AND 30 year warming (1910-40, 1970-1998, 2028- 2058...) cycles, and Man has no hope whatsoever, of controlling gravity, then trying to change the climate is a worthless endeavor. The IPCC still can't get the science right.
Now, given that the paper referenced above identified the 60 year Jupiter/Saturn resonance cycle as dictating the Earth temperature, thus resulting in the 30 year cooling from 1998 to 2028, AND it also identifies a 900 year cycle in the Jupiter and Saturn orbits which dictate Earth eccentricity, then we are currently at or close to a longer term temperature peak. ie it will cool till 2028, then warm till 2058, perhaps as high as the 1998 high, but then global cooling should be expected for several hundred years. When you add this to the fact that the polar ice caps are melting (an ice cube in a warm room will continue to melt even if you turn on the air conditioner & the room temperature is cooling!) AND ...since there is no more room left to comment you will have to read the paper
It's amusing how the global warming groupies trot out their 'hocus pocus models' to prove their hysterics....but the information put into the hocus pocus models is based on 'not very accurate estimates of carbon emissions'.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGarbage in....garbage out
JDoddsGW: What a bunch of crap!. CO2 don't absorb photons. CO2 reflects back to earth the infrared radiation that earth emits after is has absorbed the photons and turned their energy into heat. That's how a greenhouse works except that in that case the CO2 is replaced by a sheet of glass.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe earth has been coolen for the last 20 years.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGlobal Warming is nothing but a Liberal Lie.
Santaidm: Go learn some physics.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFirst a photon of energy IS the form that infrared heat takes when it is being transported as radiation.
In order for the co2 to "reflect" the photon of energy back it first has to absorb it. It holds it for nanoseconds (the extra delay in the air result in the extra temperature), and then most of the energy is returned to the air by collisions with the neighboring air molecules. 50% up 50 % down. About 5% of the absorbed photons of energy actually get reemitted. Of all the energy the 50% that goes up actually travels further because the air density is lower. This is how all the energy that comes in from the sun actually goes out and we are then at equilibrium conditions.
The Greenhouse Effect is actually MISNAMED. The process is nothing like a greenhouse. In a greenhouse the glass is opaque to the energy photons & stops almost all of them from going out. Hence you get an energy buildup that significantly slows down the ability for the energy to get out. Eventually it does, which is why a greenhouse is COLD at 4AM.. Go read www.realclimate.org, written by many of the authors of the papers that claim that CO2 causes warming. Even they say that the functioning of a greenhouse has nothing whatsoever to do with the greenhouse effect.
Is it just me or are these people's comments really depressing? Everyone thinks they know the answer...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYes, they are depressing. Welcome to the modern age where even the dumbest schmuck on the corner can parrot his views without fear of any moderation or review. Truly the internet is a wondrous place.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThe less energy we steal from the sun, the longer it will live.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd the more heat we can keep on earth without having to steal it from the sun, the brighter our future.
It strikes me that when you can see that there is trouble ahead on the tracks, it is more important to slow the train down as much as possible than it is to know precisely how fast it is going. It just takes 2 questions to get the big picture:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIs the amount of sequestered carbon (fossil fuels) being released increasing decade after decade? Yes
Is the buffering capacity of the biosphere infinite or limited? Limited
I mean the rates of carbon absorption versus emission are interesting from a fine-tuning perspective, but it's clear that carbon in the biosphere is rising, from the temperature records, ocean acidity, and world events that we are endangering ourselves, and from the looks of things surrounding Copenhagen, we aren't yet ready to play any tune to do anything about it.
I looked at the Knorr article briefly. From the abstract:
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"This study re-examines the available atmospheric CO2 and emissions data including their uncertainties. It is shown that with those uncertainties, the trend in the airborne fraction since 1850 has been 0.7 ± 1.4% per decade, i.e. close to and not significantly different from zero. "
Huh? The airborne fraction of CO2 has gone from about 287 to about 386 ppm, an ~1/3 increase. How is the overall trend not significantly different from zero? Sounds like he has reduced the statistical significance by looking at smaller, individual time periods.
"Is it just me or are these people's comments really depressing? Everyone thinks they know the answer..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAs a geologist i don't claim to know the answer. This is in part why I am dismayed by the cultish enthusiasm of global warming groupies. Too much of the so-called 'science' is anything but science. Drink the Kool-aid or suffer the apocalyptic consequences as a non-believer...floods, droughts, hurricanes, famine, disease...still waiting for the plague of locusts. 10 to 1, however, if Africa gets a locust plague next year it will be 'further evidence of blah...blah...'
"Drink the Kool-aid or suffer the apocalyptic consequences as a non-believer...floods, droughts, hurricanes, famine, disease..."
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis message brought to you by: Exxon-Mobil
Maybe he just couldn't count how many years there are between 1850 and 2009?
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisJDoddsGW: I'm not sure who's being misquoted where, or how exactly it impacts upon your argument, but the existence of the photon wasn't suspected until 1900 -- when Max Planck did his experiments on black body radiation. The term 'photon' wasn't itself used until 1926.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAmerican Patriot: I hope this is satire. If not, may I ask why you are on Scientific American? I can appreciate other views, but your rambling nonsense is ridiculous. Congratulations for using 'nazis', 'moon landing', 'taxes' and 'christian ideals' all in one post. That takes effort. Not to mention the complete disregard for spelling.
Not totally relevant to the goal of measuring CO2 emissions, but related to the crisis atmosphere under which this activity is being pressed is the fact that we should be talking to the public about geoengnieering - the ability to stop global warming in short order by such actions as emulating the coolling effect of large volcanic eruptions and give the world the ceutury or more that it will need to change its energy base.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisSupport for these studies is now coming from the American Meteorological Society and the British Royal Society - and will be most assuredly contained in the National Academy of Sciences report on it Congressionally mandated program - America's Climate Choices to be published in early 2010.
you are wrong CO2 absorbs photons and vibrates, causing bipolarization, enabling it to take up H ions to give HCO2 anions in the atmosphere.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisYou are wrong CO2 absorbs energy, light energy and vibrates harmonically creating positive and negative charges, and grabs a Hydrogen in the atmosphere from water vapour to give HCO2- ion which is the start of many acidicCO2 processes.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisOne thing that can influence the decrease of CO2 absorption by oceans is sea water temperature itself. Increased temperature reduce the water capacity to accept solutes, be these gases, solid or liquids, as they have to compete with water's own vapor pressure, that raises as temperature does. May be the subject can be simulated in a computer. There's no room for three in a two seat car.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisI believe that far to much human ego and desire to profit from the so-called global warming. Bringing all of the known and suspected scientific factors together tells us that we do not have the technological ability nor extensive history to say with any scientific and evidence based certainty that humans can in anyway significantly change the global temperature up or down. Global Warming is a hoax perpretrated by those who can profit from it, as I see it. This is very likely true of the "hole in the ozone layer". Profitable for some and costly for others and today, ozone is always with us as a pollutant. The hole in th ozone layer continues to respond to so many factors beyond our human control or even total understanding that eliminating Freon gas had no effect. No one wants to talk about this truth and since we have already made to move to a much more hazardous gas for refrigerant, I doubt that we will change until everyone magically discovers that we need to go back to Freon because the newer refrigerant can be to reactive and dangerous under certain conditions. We switched to Freon from ammonia for that very reason and yet few remember that. This world is full of "Lemmings" that will, as I see it, blindly follow the leader right over the cliff without question. Think about it.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisIs it perhaps the word Scientific at the top of the page that attracts a certain . . . element here? I always enjoy the magazine but I don't see the most of the responders above to this article spending much time within its pages. I guess the best way to attack a reasonable argument is with ignorance.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThis is a serious question! I don't know if AGW is real or not. But we *do* know that Glaciers have been retreating since the last ice age ~10,000 years ago. So...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisFor those of you who do *know*
How much money do you expect this CO2 problem will cost? Keep it simple: In Trillion$ please.
God of the Bible gave us dominion over this earth and gave us the plants and animules to use for our porposes to live.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thishe didn't make junk so we knows that we have enough plants and animules for the end of time.
the time of the great tribulation is upon us and all of this clap trap science is just freedom stealing treason against our christian country.
"I don't see the most of the responders above to this article spending much time within its pages"
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisScience is inspired by Lucifer as rebellion against God.
God Fearing folk don'ts read the satanic bible either.
itsall anti-god junk science.
Nothing can change these skeptics opinion about climate change. The evidence is there, in journal articles on Nature, Science and the AGU.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisGHG play a major part in climatic forces. E.g Mercury is the closest planet to the sun so you'd expect it to be hotter. However this is not the case, Venus's thick cloudy atmosphere consists of ~94% CO2 and as a result makes it the hottest planet in our solar system.
Moreover , there is nothing in the major journals to suggest that AGW isn't happening...
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnd to all you skeptics out there. I have homework for you. I want you to list as many peer reviewed journal articles for and against climate change. I have read 3 journals against AGW compared to ~30 for AGW...
Now list !
You represent just about every problem that exists in this nation's culture. Bravo.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this"Venus's thick cloudy atmosphere consists of ~94% CO2 and as a result makes it the hottest planet in our solar system." -
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThat's just Junk Science, and we yall knows it.
no one has ever been to Venus.
It's all NASA Fraud.
We are in the majority and we are going to take our nation back from the stinking Communist Liberals.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRead the commentsto the following article and see what you are up against.
http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D9C2OPP80&show_article=1
It's ironic that someone who is 'all about god' can tell us we are communist compared to what they have done in the past.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAnyway American Patriot. What are you doing on a science site? Seriously? Don't you have anything better to do.
Get a degree in science and then come back to talk to us.
While also I'm waiting for the list of peer reviewed journals please.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisAccurate measurement conditions are well defined by bog-standard sampling theory which has been totally accepted by all modern science.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisThere is only one sure thing that will reduce or remove our human impact on the environment. Limitation of growth as a species. Nobody wants to talk about it though. We blame our technologies only. Well if it is true that a cow emits more damaging gases in its lifetime than a car then it might make sense that we need t make fewer mouths to feed via cow. I think China may as sad and evil as it translates be the only country taking the right approach. Population limitation is the one sure thing that will limit human impact on environment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLimiting the amount of human population growth will by nature of lack of need to produce more items to support the growing population reduce the impact of humans. Less people less chemicals less resource abuse. In short keep it in your pants and don't allow people to produce more than their own replacement. If they can't then the option should be removed...
There I said what nobody wants to say. The fact is we can't continue to populate the way we have. There has to be a restriction placed on it. One that foes far enough to not only slow but reduce population. I know it is inhumane to place those restrictions, but ask yourself this. if we do not reduce these things that are ruining the world around us don't we stand the chance of causing future human race genocide? So in a matter of course we may have to make the sacrifice of a few over all to save the lives of the future many.
There is only one sure thing that will reduce or remove our human impact on the environment. Limitation of growth as a species. Nobody wants to talk about it though. We blame our technologies only. Well if it is true that a cow emits more damaging gases in its lifetime than a car then it might make sense that we need t make fewer mouths to feed via cow. I think China may as sad and evil as it translates be the only country taking the right approach. Population limitation is the one sure thing that will limit human impact on environment.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisLimiting the amount of human population growth will by nature of lack of need to produce more items to support the growing population reduce the impact of humans. Less people less chemicals less resource abuse. In short keep it in your pants and don't allow people to produce more than their own replacement. If they can't then the option should be removed...
There I said what nobody wants to say. The fact is we can't continue to populate the way we have. There has to be a restriction placed on it. One that foes far enough to not only slow but reduce population. I know it is inhumane to place those restrictions, but ask yourself this. if we do not reduce these things that are ruining the world around us don't we stand the chance of causing future human race genocide? So in a matter of course we may have to make the sacrifice of a few over all to save the lives of the future many.
I am a traditional Blacksmith from East Anglia in the UK and spent over ten years studying the same climate records as the IPCC used. For many years now I have been trying to publicise my findings and had even been given an opportunity to study within the UEA but after sharing my work with others I was ushered out of the back door. Please look at my findings http://geologymaster.com/mydvd.htm Im sure you will find them interesting.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRegards
Roy
I am a traditional Blacksmith from East Anglia in the UK and spent over ten years studying the same climate records as the IPCC used. For many years now I have been trying to publicise my findings and had even been given an opportunity to study within the UEA but after sharing my work with others I was ushered out of the back door. Please look at my findings http://geologymaster.com/mydvd.htm Im sure you will find them interesting.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRegards
Roy
I am a traditional Blacksmith from East Anglia in the UK and spent over ten years studying the same climate records as the IPCC used. For many years now I have been trying to publicise my findings and had even been given an opportunity to study within the UEA but after sharing my work with others I was ushered out of the back door. Please look at my findings http://geologymaster.com/mydvd.htm Im sure you will find them interesting.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRegards
Roy
I am a traditional Blacksmith from East Anglia in the UK and spent over ten years studying the same climate records as the IPCC used. For many years now I have been trying to publicise my findings and had even been given an opportunity to study within the UEA but after sharing my work with others I was ushered out of the back door. Please look at my findings http://geologymaster.com/mydvd.htm I’m sure you will find them interesting.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRegards
Roy
I am a traditional Blacksmith from East Anglia in the UK and spent over ten years studying the same climate records as the IPCC used. For many years now I have been trying to publicise my findings and had even been given an opportunity to study within the UEA but after sharing my work with others I was ushered out of the back door. Please look at my findings http://geologymaster.com/mydvd.htm I’m sure you will find them interesting.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRegards
Roy
As much as I would like to see a decrease in the worlds populations it has to be from natural causes.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisEven so, the vegetarians out there slam the omnivores because of their cow eating habits and claim it is bad for the environment. The same types of people, time and time again and the only word I have to say to them to make them shut up is India. India is overpopulated with cows and they don't even eat them.
American Patriot : Judging by your remarks, no doubt the American Indians were 'stinking Communist Liberals'? Or did the God of 'your' Bible give you dominion over anyone who does not believe 'your' irrational ideas.
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to thisRead the IPCC reports and you will see why virtually no educated scientist will agree with you...And what makes you think that your ideas represent the majority of Americans, who are equally as patriotic as you are but more sensible?
As Piers Corbyn (astrophysicist and genuine climate expert) states in this video http://www.climatejournal.org/video00003.htm there is no relationship between carbon dioxide and world temperature or climate extremes. This whole man-made global warming theory should be torn up and thrown away, but it will be supported by non-experts such as Al Gore, Rajendra Pachauri and the WWF because there is so much money in it!
Reply | Report Abuse | Link to this