Besoeker

Without the resolution that is nothing more than unfounded conjecture.
As an aside, please remind me of anything anything I posted that was ambiguous. Please be specific and direct.

Clippo

By most people’s criteria I feel your link isn’t independent Matt and it didn’t actually answer my question. So, I have been forced to google ‘Carbon dioxide emissions from volcanoes'.
(I have left out animal & plant emissions because they aren’t ‘fossil’ emissions – they are the normal equilibrium of emission /absorption and even typical of pre-industrialisation. I’ve left out your ‘oceans’ emissions because they absorb, not emit CO2). See http://www.bbc.co.uk/climate/evidenc..._dioxide.shtml for support for these omissions.

The first reference on my googled list was :-
http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/Hazards/Wh...as/volgas.html
an extract is :-
(My bolding).

Now, I have no idea whether this site is independent – all I can say it doesn’t have extreme rhetoric of other websites on either side of the debate. It seems to be a US government website (the geological service ?). It also gives a direct reference to CO2 emissions from volcanoes :-

Gerlach, T.M., 1992, Present-day CO2 emissions from volcanoes: Eos, Transactions, American Geophysical Union, Vol. 72, No. 23, June 4, 1991, pp. 249, and 254-255.
I have looked closely at the next 20+ google hits but most either refer to this US site as I’m assuming, or don’t deal with my question. One turned out to be an engineering discussion forum – but like this one there were wild unsubstantiated claims on either side.

I tried to look at the Gerlach original paper but it’s off the bottom of the AGU list. However, he/she is still active (get it!) in volcanic gas measurements and in the abstract of a paper in 2002, they found CO2 emissions 2-3 times higher than previously at Mt kileau – (but nowhere near 150 times).

So, I’m still really am trying to be scientifically dispassionate about this question but my undeniable conclusion, (unless you can show me otherwise) is:-

Human activities release far, far more CO2 into the atmosphere that so-called natural sources.

Besoeker

Clippo
If you are referring to just volcanic action, then yes.
If it is all natural sources, then no.
Here is an old link that gives some numerical data:
http://www.radix.net/~bobg/faqs/scq.CO2rise.html

I thought I had posted this earlier.
That Disaronno shot.....need I say more.
:wink:

Clippo

Besoeker,
Being absolutely pedantic you are obviously correct. In my previous post I left out other ‘natural’ CO2 emissions because of the general assumption, quoted in the BBC link and further supported in your link, sect. 2.1, quote
To be honest, I was trying to keep it simplistic to equate to the general mentality of most posters here, (yourself excluded), and since some had previously raised the volcanic issue, I thought I would try to find independent evidence in clear & simple terms to debunk that one. My link was indeed the first one that I found and amply suited my purpose.

I am aware of the various aspects of the carbon cycle, including the removal of CO2 by silicate weathering although I didn’t mention this in the earlier post. (Your link actually says this is quite low but may have been higher in the past since it has been postulated as a major cause of one of the previous ice-ages due to the rapid rise of the Tibetan plateau – I think about 20 million years ago but would need to check).

I hadn’t seen your link before but it is indeed interesting. As I do with all new information to me, I try to assess its’ objectivity, whether it agrees with my preconceptions or not.. Obviously this is an composed article from various sources including books and since I have not read the primary sources, I cannot comment on the veracity of the detailed figures. That being said, I see there are several references to IPCC material which immediately disposes me to form a favourable view.

Following up one of the references in my earlier link, (Marland, G), I found this site :- http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/ which gives many independent references and from which maybe some of the figures from your reference may be culled.

Whilst I am utterly convinced that the recent upsurge in CO2 emissions is mostly due to mankind’s fossil carbon burning, I consider there are many other factors involved in the perturbation of the historical, (mostly steady or only very slowly changing), carbon cycle equilibrium. The oft-quoted example is deforestation, both temperate & tropical but a very recent study on re-forestation, see http://environment.newscientist.com/...l-warming.html indicates tropical being the more critical. Then there is the predicted effect of heat/drought on the destruction of vegetation i.e. fire & desertification reducing a big carbon ‘sink’ (talk to an Australian if you disbelieve this!). And of course the oceans themselves. It is chemical fact that CO2 ‘acidifies’ at least the ocean surfaces and thus will likely interfere with the metabolism of calcifying organisms, the phytoplankton(possibly the biggest potential carbon sink of the planet). Hard data is difficult to come by but read:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_acidification
That’s just ‘acidification’, - nobody knows what the hell the effect of other man-made pollutants is having.

In my view, the paleo-climate ‘graphs’ produced by doubters have only one practical use and I don’t want to go to the ‘bottom’ of that issue.

Finally, I’m usually quite good at inferences but this time I didn’t understand the ‘disaronno’ quote – could you elaborate?

Besoeker

And you are loquacious....... :wink:
Anyway, had I not commented on it, you can be sure that others would have made the most of it.

An Italian liqueur.
8)