This document needs better noting/citations
hopefully coming in editing process!
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https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/ContentFeature/CarbonCycle/images/carbon_cycle.jpg
Carbon is the 4th most abundant element in the Universe (behind Hydrogen, helium, oxygen, carbon)
Carbon is the 15th most abundant element in the Earth's crust
Carbon is way cooler than pretty much all the other elements!! -- its capable of 4 bonds, so its able to organize in a lot of different ways and make a lot of different kinds of structures.
Carbon forms a vast number of compounds, more than any other element, with almost ten million compounds described to date -- and yet that number is but a fraction of the number of theoretically possible compounds under standard conditions.
For this reason, carbon has often been referred to as the "king of the elements" (can we find a new, non patriarchy way of saying this?).
Carbon is the foundational element of life on earth. Every living thing -- and many inanimate things -- are based on carbon chains. Plants are carbon based. Microbes are carbon based. we're carbon based.
Carbon anchors all organic substances, it is a polymer, it binds things together, forms chains, helps things get organized -- I guess this is why it is basis for all life!
Carbon plus hydrogen and oxygen make hydrocarbons (and carbohydrates) -- any "Hydro carbon" and any "Carbo Hydrate") -- equals fossil fuels equals crude oil, gasoline, kerosene, coal, natural gas, propane, etc.
Combined with oxygen and hydrogen, carbon forms many groups of important biological compounds: sugars, celluloses, lignans, chitins, alcohols, fats, and aromatic esters. With nitrogen it forms alkaloids, and with the addition of sulfur also it forms antibiotics, amino acids and proteins. With the addition of phosphorus to these other elements, it forms DNA and RNA -- the chemical codes of life.
Makes hardest materials and softest materials, diamond and graphite ...
Carbon is also in the atmosphere as CO2 and other gasses and in limestone layers in the earth and at the bottom of the ocean ...
Whew!
Carbon plus oxygen make carbon dioxide, CO2 is essential for biological life -- plants "breathe" in CO2... This is the real key to the carbon cycle; and also the key to understanding why global warming/climate change are linked to fossil fuel use... more on this...
CO2 is a gas. Our atmosphere is the envelope around our planet where energy from the sun is temporarily stored, giving us the temperatures necessary for life. CO2 along with methane and water vapor are termed greenhouse gases as they are semi opaque gases that allow for the sun's energy to enter the atmosphere but partially block/trap/reflect it after it bounces off the earth's surface in the form of heat. The balance of what is allowed into the atmosphere and the amount that is allowed back out is what determines the atmospheres temperature. In particular the Lower Atmosphere where we live. The higher concentration of greenhouse gases, the more heat confined to the atmosphere. CO2 is a key greenhouse gas.
Under terrestrial conditions, conversion of one element to another is very rare, other than for radioactive materials or the really unstable isotopes, it basically doesn't happen. Therefore, the amount of carbon on Earth is constant (effectively -- the stray meteorite might bring some new stuff in; and we send some up into near space via our space/satellite missions -- but otherwise, yeah, constant). Thus, processes that use carbon must obtain it from somewhere and dispose of it somewhere else all within the boundaries of Spaceship earth.
With our current understanding of the earth's dynamics the carbon cycle is the way that we observe carbon cycling through the planet's interconnected systems.
The total cycle has within it two main systems that operate at different time scales: the Geological and the Biological. The Geological is slow and steady and relies on entire ecosystems... the biological is fast and is more about respiration and consumption.
Carbon was present at the forming of Earth, (bombarding meteorites, random space debris coming together, etc.) H2O and CO2 in the atmosphere form to make a weak acid (carbonic acid) that upon raining down releases the calcium (amongst other things) from exposed rock.
Rivers carry these calcium ions -- the result of chemical (& physical) weathering of rocks -- into the ocean, where they react with carbonate dissolved in the water (carbonic acid: H2CO3, basically CO2 + H2O, a carbonate then has the dissolved carbonate ion, CO2−,3). The product of that reaction, calcium carbonate, is then deposited onto the ocean floor, where it becomes limestone. (NASA earth observatory)
Calcium carbonate from crustacean shells, corals, etc. also gets washed down to the deep ocean and participates in the same process. Many marine animal shells and corals themselves are made from calcium carbonate; so they take carbon dioxide that is dissovled in the water.
With the movement of the earth's crust it is then drawn back into the earth's mantle through subduction, where it becomes magma, through volcanic eruptions is released again as CO2, volcanic gas and lava. As sediment it can also, through tectonic movement, end up becoming strata of rock over time...
This system helps to regulate the amount of atmospheric carbon dioxide which in turn contributes to the regulation of the earth's temperature. (Meaning it adds large quantities of CO2 to atmosphere on occasion; making up for excess carbon that would be being stored by living plants; sans human intervention)
Over the course of the earth's history this cycle has varied in intensity, this variable is thought to be a contributing factor in the oscillation of ice ages and periods of warming or deglaciation.
The biological cycle is based on these two main :
- Carbon enters the atmosphere as CO2 from respiration and combustion (decomposition is also a form of respiration)
- Photosynthetic plants take CO2 from the air and use that C to grow, and then release the O2 back to the atmosphere.
Photosynthesis builds carbohydrates for plants to use for their life processes. Mostly in the form of Glucose. How that works, well, that's another presentation for a different class... or for your own research... but its the coolest kind of useful solar energy... plants keep the C and then exhale just the pure O2 back into the atmostphere.
CO2 is used and temporarily sequestered in the biological cycle by being stored in living and dead plant matter, roots, in the soil, eaten by animals (like us)!
In the oceans CO2 is stored in phytoplankton, clamshells, etc. -- these settle to bottom and form limestone, sediments, fossil fuels this is one place where the biological and the geological carbon cycles interconnect.
Photosynthesis and respiration provide both a daily and annual fluctuation in CO2 levels -- for instance the deciduous forests of North America and Northern Europe/Asia lose leaves in the winter; this means CO2 goes up a little in the northern winter and down a little in northern summer -- southern hemisphere has way less land mass and no large swaths of forest that lose folieage in the southern winter. (chart of winters in Northern Hemisphere?)
- carbon enters the atmospher as CO2 through respiration and combustion.
- carbon is absorbed as CO2 by plants through photosynthesis; used to make glucose (C + H20 = carbohydrates)
- Animals + other organisms eat plants moving some of that carbon into their bodies (moves along the foodchain). We mainly then exhale out the carbon we've taken in from eating as CO2 -- Aerobic respiration.
- Animals, insects, microbes, and plants all eventually die. Decomposition breaks down the dead matter returning more C to the atmosphere as CO2 (microbe respiration also releases CO2). However, somtimes decomposition is blocked and the plant or animal matter gets buried -- this sequesters this carbon, containing it underground or underwater. This might eventually turn into sedimentary rock or into fossil fuels.
- When/If we unearth fossil fuels and burn them, combustion causes that carbon to become CO2 in the atmosphere.
We can look at both the biological and geological as a vast unified carbon regulator, a system the absorbs and releases carbon at different rates over different periods of time.
Normally this is a self regulating system with minor slow fluctuations that historically we can see records of in ice layers, etc. It has contributed to some weather changes in the past (we can now match CO2 measurements in ice cores to historical documentation we have from other places... mini ice age in europe as example?)
Our meddling with unearthing fossil fuels short circuits the natural rgulatory cycles...
And, there is also an Ocean Cycle -- the ocean participates in the geological and the biological cycles; but the oceans themselves dissolve CO2 from the air into their waters. (as this happens they get more and more acidic; carbonic acid from before...). This creates other issues...
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/features/OceanCarbon/page1.php
carbon is contained and moved from one state and place to other states/places -- this is the carbon cycle -- and those containers for storing especially large amounts of carbon are called carbon sinks.
all things store carbon for differing lengths, even our bodies are a type of temporary CO2 containers...
Most of Earth's carbon--about 65,500 billion metric tons--is stored in rocks. The rest is in the ocean, atmosphere, plants, soil, and fossil fuels. (from NASA earth observatory link)
The prairie is a carbon sink; wetlands and marshes are carbon sinks; forests can be; the oceans; corral reefs ... we can also create new ways; burning wood into bio char; make cement that acts like calcium carbonate to absorb more CO2 overtime; etc...
The Atmosphere is actually a relatively small carbon sink, roughly 1% of the earths carbon pool. But, since its not that much, we can easily change it by disrupting other aspects of the carbon cycle; distrubing these other carbon sinks (like releasing a bunch from below ground via burning fossil fuels or crappy land managment practice)
Disturbing the other stores/systems releases more to the atmosphere and that rapidly has immediate, & lasting affect (effect?) -- and that effect is increasingly drastic!
Fossil fuels are also a kind of carbon sink. Biological system carbon in the form of plant and animal matter might end up not decomposing... if its covered or trapped it doesn't decompose... it then ends up becoming trapped... that carbon doesn't respirate back into the atmosphere; it is stored underground. Overtime, the plant or animal matter becomes fossil fuels! This is another way that biological carbon becomes geological carbon...
https://openstax.org/resources/b7c071eada64a96ced36fdef9fcaa424a9f685a6
Human activities are releasing all these different stores of carbon (forests, plants, soil, fossil fuels) into airbone CO2
The main issue is that we keep adding more to the atmosphere without taking some out -- plants use what we normally respirate; but if we're unearthing carbon from ground from crappy agricultural practices and below ground stores from our fossil fuel addicition it is too much too fast. All our behaviors seem to be releasing carbon from the sinks; and never drawin carbon back down.
https://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/ContentFeature/CarbonCycle/images/carbon_cycle.jpg
Carbon Cycle Video showing fossil fuel carbon showing up everywhere: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dwVsD9CiokY
This is the main way we release extra carbon into the atmosphere. Every drop of oil we take out of the ground is excess carbon we add to the atmosphere when we burn it -- there isn't already a tree or plant or photoplankton waiting to use that carbon; we've bipassed the cycle. This is the main issue of climate change. It's why a main focus of almost all plans is reducing and preferably eliminating fossil fuel usage as quickly as possible.
Permanent agriculture is a great way to store carbon. When a perenial plant is growing, even if the above ground structure dies back in the winter, the roots stay "alive" continuing to sequester carbon in the soil. Lively, microbe rich soil with native and/or permanent species creates a carbon capturing earth environment!
Our contemporary farming practice that tills all the time and plants almost exclusively annuals degrades the soil over time; and actually releases more carbon into the atmostphere instead of sequestering it.
Our industrial farming practice uses a lot of fossil fuels in the form of actual fuel for various tractors and vehicles, but also in the manufacture of fertilizer and herbicide and pesticides. These then not only further extract carbon stored in the ground as fossil fuels; but also often worsen the eco-impact of farming practice reducing diversity in plants and animals, damaging or destroying natural ecosystem processes, and thus further...
We could instead empower farmers to be carbon farmers -- storing carbon AND growing better crops...
Our forests are massive carbon sinks too. A tree breathes in a massive amount of CO2, and since its root structure can often be even larger than the canopy it supports, a tree puts a lot of carbon into the ground, not just into its branches and leaves. As we cut down forests, often to be replaced with industrial agricultural practices; we lost the carbon capturing benefit of the trees AND we get all the problems stated in farming practice each year forward...
So......
- Stop using fossil fuels
- do more organic, non-industrial, small-scale, and permanent agriculture
- steward forests; plant more trees
I'll repeat again: The main issue is that we keep adding more to the atmosphere without taking some out -- we've short circuited the normal cycles by extracting ever more fossil fuels and reducing the natural carbon sink's abiltiies to do their job -- plants use what we normally respirate; but if we're unearthing carbon from ground and below ground stores its too much too fast.
Okay! so that's how carbon travels around? What else do you need to know? want to know?
I tried to stay mainly on the scientific facts side of things; but all of these have a social component as well; and if we think of envronmental justice in the form of better agriculture; better stewarding of marshes and forests and reefs and such; we can also start doing more about how perhaps the same practices that allow us to degrade and oppress the land also are what degrade and oppress people...
This is starting to get ecosocialist; I'll leave it at that for now; stick with the carbon cycles...
The bad part: we've f-ed this up pretty badly
The good part: we do actually seem to understand all this pretty well -- so we don't have to be f-ing it up anymore! let's fix it!
How can our projects do something about this!!!
{okay, I need to actually do some notating and then really plop some references down here!}