Comments on: Land Use and Carbon Dioxide

By: Peter Michelmore

Peter Michelmore — Sun, 02 Mar 2014 07:59:42 +0000

Valuable insights! Thanks for the piece of article. I have been borne in Kailua, Hawaii. Since 1983, I am in roofing business. From up there I can see a lot of changes in the environment of Hawaii, especially Oahu. Its a very beautiful place, no question on that but people, mostly tourists will get lessen in a couple of decades if the CO2 rate gets increased. We can start movements now accordingly & sustain it till we get a healthier environment.

Peter M.

By: peggy

peggy — Mon, 05 Nov 2007 22:27:38 +0000

Thanks for writing.

I waited awhile to respond to you because I had to talk to some folks first about this –my knowledge about the ocean is very limited.

It is true that the world’s oceans play an important part in the carbon budget: in fact, I’m working on a blog now related to the recent news that the oceans are becoming less efficient as a carbon sink — at least for now. (This being related to waters near the surface around Antarctica having more carbon dioxide due to the strong winds mixing up carbon-dioxide rich deeper waters).

The chemical reactions within the waters are just one more complicating factor.

I know that the geologists are quite interested in what happens with the ocean — there are a number of studies trying to reconstruct the carbon budget over geologic time, related changes not only to what happens with plants but also with the new rock forming and subduction of old rocks. Some of these studies suggest carbon dioxide contents as high as 5-10 times the amount in the atmosphere today. And then there’s the additional threat of escape of methane from clathrates.

By: qbr

qbr — Thu, 25 Oct 2007 21:45:21 +0000

I was reading your article, which was extremely interesting, and I want to ask you how the â€œimmense amounts of carbon dioxideâ€ are related to carbon dioxide concentration in marine water.

I have considered the Steuber & Veizer study of 2002, but I could not find seasonal information referred to the last ten years.
The formation of calcium cement High/Mg in marine water is represented in a detailed graph similar to yours (fig nÂ°2), so it is possible to calculate the range of the carbon dioxide variations caused from nature, winds and anthropic carbon dioxide.

The CaCO3 precipitation or dissolution in water is linked to the addition or subtraction of CO2 depending on following balance reactions:

If there is a CO2 subtraction (evaporation, photosynthesis), the reaction moves towards left and CaCO3 precipitates. Of course, the biggest CaCO3 precipitation happens during spring-summer.

Moreover, it would be interesting to observe how curves without a standard flow are compared to Atlantic CaCO3 percentile variations.

In summary, it is easy to understand the huge influence of carbon dioxide on the earth\’s evolution, shore formation and coral reef life.

Dr. Diego Delli Carri
QBR Magazine