I am keeping the perspective, the carbon was around in one form or another for that entire time.
But now your talking sequestering, not plants decomposing, a big difference, and it's as the opposite end of the spectrum. It is going to happen sooner or later, be it from plants rotting, forest fires, naturally occurring coal seam fires, or simply exposed coal seams weathering away. Any natural or man made process that locks up as much carbon as it uses can be called carbon neutral, but few actualy achieve it. The current world climate is no exception. No where ( to my knowledge ), in the world today is it happening like it was when the major coal deposits were formed. I personally would like to know what the carbon source was, in the time frame preceding the formation of majority of the large coal seams. The carbon had to come from somewhere, it was not just locked up in one form, and all of a sudden it was another form. I have heard that it was in the atmosphere to begin with before the age of plants changed it to a solid form. I do not doubt that with CO2 and with global warming, some plant species will die off, others will survive, and new plant life that is able to handle ( and be able to take advantage of )the increased CO2 levels, will arise. On a geologic scale, the plant / swamp / carbon age ( what ever you want to call it ), that laid down the large beds of coal, was not all that long ago, less than a few hrs ago on a 4 billion yr clock, and what man has done is barely noticeable, on that scale. Am I saying that we should continue on as we have? No. What I am saying is that we barely have a firm grasp on the hear and now, to say with any total assurance that A+B=D, and if D happens then F will result 150 years after the onset of D, and H will occur 500 years after F. Too many variables. As simple humans we can only look back a few thousand years or so, and say what has happened with any great degree of certainty. Beyond that we only have educated guesses to work with, and the farther we look back, the greater amount of error that is possible, of guessing wrong. As for looking to the future, we still can't predict the weather a month from now with anything more than a guess, and again the farther we try and look, and say doing this action will cause that effect - the greater the chances of being wrong ( anybody that says other wise ought to be playing the lottery and winning regularly ). Man sequesters tons of carbon every year, in forms that will last for a long time. If man was to sequester all the carbon that he has released in the last 2000+ yrs, the world would be turned on it's ear and we will have even more problems. We may as well stop using computers and go back to the horse and buggy - and more would die from things like exposure and hunger, than from hurricanes, spawned by the increase in global temperature. Man has exceed the biological holding capacity of the world, based on carbon neutral practices, unless the global weather climate changes in a way that will allow a fast rate of turn around. If we want to continue to fight world hunger, give hurricane warnings, and other good things that the use of fossil fuels have brought to life, the best we can hope for is a slowed rate increase in atmospheric CO2 and other greenhouse gasses. Greg H. ----- Original Message ----- From: "bob allen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> Sent: Tuesday, February 22, 2005 19:09 Subject: Re: [Biofuel] Kyoto- nothing but a buch of crap/junk science > Greg, the carbon released from the combustion of fossil > fuels accumulated for 10s or even 100s of millions of years. > We are releasing it over a matter of a couple of > centuries. The variations you speak of in carbon > sequestration/release rates occur over a matter of decades. > there is a big, big difference. Like 6 or 7 orders of > magnitude. Let's keep our carbon budgets in perspective > here. > > > Greg Harbican wrote: > > Bob & Ken > > > > You are both correct for the most part, but, I would like to point out a few > > things that you may want to consider, that make me disagree with parts of > > your statements.. > > > > Decomposing plant material is not totaly carbon neutral nor steady state. > > After all where did coal come from, but, the remains of plants that did not > > decompose. This process can not be carbon neutral. > > > > Decomposing plants can be carbon positive or carbon negative, depending on > > many factors, some of which depend on soil moisture and ambient air > > temperature. > > > > It is also known that simply disturbing the soil in one way or another can > > increase or decrease the rate of decay - and change the amount that will > > decay over all. Increasing the amount of available moisture in arid soils > > ( like through the use of irrigation ), increases the over all amount and > > rate of decay. Draining a swamp can do the same thing, as can simply > > plowing a field, because it makes more organic matter exposed to air. > > > > Making aerobic soils anoxic, slows the rate of decay and retards the over > > all amount of decay by a large amount. > > > > An experiment done in Alaska, studying the effects of forest fires, showed > > that in areas of permafrost, a fire has 2 effects in generating CO2. The > > first comes directly from the fire it's self, and the second, comes from the > > destruction of the top layer of peat. Once the top layer of peat is > > burned away, it can no longer insulate the permafrost lower down, once the > > permafrost melts, the peat in those layers is subject to decay, and it > > release's more CO2 while decaying, for months even years after the fire has > > occurred. > > > > Greg H. > > > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > > From: "bob allen" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Sent: Tuesday, February 22, 2005 11:18 > > Subject: Re: [Biofuel] Kyoto- nothing but a buch of crap/junk science > > > > > > > >>Thompson, Mark L. (PNB R&D) wrote: > >> > >>>Sorry Mike > >>> > >>>Actually most CO2 emissions come from Decomposing Plant material. > >> > >>That is immaterial. Those emissions are essentially steady state. > >>Anthropogenic emissions are above and beyond natural emissions. > > > > > > > > ----- Original Message ----- > > From: "Ken Provost" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > To: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > > Sent: Tuesday, February 22, 2005 11:31 > > Subject: Re: [Biofuel] Kyoto- nothing but a buch of crap/junk science > > > > > > > >> > >>Decomposing plant material is carbon-neutral, of course, and > >>therefore completely irrelevant to greenhouse warming. > >> > > > > > > > > _______________________________________________ > > Biofuel mailing list > > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > > http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/biofuel > > > > Biofuel at Journey to Forever: > > http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html > > > > Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): > > http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/ > > > > > > > > > -- > Bob Allen, Professor of Chemistry , http://ozarker.org/bob > ========================================================= > president, Arkansas AAUP http://arkansasaaup.org > _______________________________________________ > Biofuel mailing list > [EMAIL PROTECTED] > http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/biofuel > > Biofuel at Journey to Forever: > http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html > > Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): > http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/ > _______________________________________________ Biofuel mailing list [EMAIL PROTECTED] http://wwia.org/mailman/listinfo.cgi/biofuel Biofuel at Journey to Forever: http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel.html Biofuel archives at Infoarchive.net (searchable): http://infoarchive.net/sgroup/biofuel/
