29-1
Climate & Global Change
The Earth’s Carbon Cycle
Carbon Budget
Carbon Change
Rain Forest
Biodiversity
Human Activities
Burning Cycles
Natural Changes
Desertification
Sahel
Deforestation
Science Concepts
Feedbacks
Photosynthesis
The Earth System (Kump, Kastin & Crane)
•
Chap. 8 (pp. 165-167)
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-2
The Carbon Cycle
Carbon Deforestation
Budget
2
Atmosphere 750 + 3/year
5
102
50
50
Land Biota
550
50
Soil and Detritus Rivers
0.8
1500
92
Surface Ocean 1000 + 1/year
36
Biota 3
40
4
Fossil Fuel
90
5
37
Intermediate and Deep Waters
38000 + 2/year
0.2
Sedimentation
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-3
The Carbon Cycle
Ocean
Carbon
Budget
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-4
The Carbon Cycle
Carbon Change
•
The largest human
contribution to climate
change
•
Human activity adds CO2
to the atmosphere
-
Fossil fuels
biomass burning
cement production
•
Carbon dioxide naturally
cycles among the land,
atmosphere and oceans
•
Knowledge of the carbon
cycle is essential to
forecasting human
influences on climate
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
http://www.windows.ucar.edu/tour/link=/earth/
climate/images/carboncycle_jpg_image.html
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-5
The Carbon Cycle
Net Primary Productivity
•
Amount of carbon consumed by plants (both on land and in the ocean) per
square kilometer, called
net primary
productivity,
in 2002
•
Note: Rainforest areas
are regions
of high carbon
consumptions
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/
Study/LBA/escape.html
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-6
The Carbon Cycle
Rainforests
•
Where are they?
Country
Brazil
Indonesia
Zaire
Peru
India
Colombia
Mexico
Bolivia
Papua New Guinea
Burma
Venezuela
Congo
Malaysia
Gabon
Guyana
Cameroon
Suriname
Ecuador
Madagascar
Area of Closed
Forest in 1985 (Hectares)
357,480,000
113,895,000
105,750,000
69,680,000
51,841,000
46,400,000
46,250,000
44,010,000
34,230,000
31,941,000
31,870,000
21,340,000
20,995,000
20,500,000
18,475,000
17,920,000
14,830,000
14,250,000
10,300,000
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-7
The Carbon Cycle
Rainforests (Con’t)
•
Biodiversity Importance
-
Bushmaster snake (lives in the rainforest) venom used as a
pattern to make hypertension medicine.
-
As of 1985, 119 pure chemical substances extracted from
higher plants were used in medicine.
Plant
Foxglove
Opium poppy
Morphine
Tobacco
May apple
White willow
Therapeutic
Category
Cardiotonix
Analgesic
Drug
Digitoxin
Codeine
Sedative
Nicotine
Insecticide
Podophyllotoxin
Cancer
Salicin
Analgesic
(Asperin - known to Hippocrates)
Cocoa, Cacoa
Theobromine
Diuretic
Curare
Tubocurarine
Skeletal muscle relaxant
(Arrow poison)
Pacific yew
Toxal
Ovarian Cancer
(4-6 trees to treat 1 woman)
(~200,000 trees exist)
(20,000 cases per year)
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-8
The Carbon Cycle
South American
Burning Cycles
•
1998 fires
Jan - Dec
•
Note - Aug/Sept/
Oct max for
central and
southern regions
•
Note - Feb/Mar
max for
northern area
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-9
The Carbon Cycle
South American
Burning Cycles (Con’t)
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-10
The Carbon Cycle
African Burning Cycles
•
•
1998 fires Jan - Dec
Dec/Jan max through central Africa, Jun/Jul max farther south
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-11
Desertification
June 2005
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Study/
Desertification/desertification.html?
Rainfall
Sahel
•
•
Sahel stretches across
Africa, roughly 15° north
of Equator
Millimeters per year
2000
Evaporation
1500
1000
Runoff
500
0
Satellite measurements
of vegetation reveal it as
-500
a transition zone between
90°N
sands of the Sahara and
jungles of the Congo in heart of Africa
60°N
30°N
0°
30°S
60°S
90°S
Latitude
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-12
Desertification
Sahel (Con’t)
Soil Condition: Grams of vegetation per 10,000 m2
(N = 450)
N
•
Collapse
Cattle, Camels, & Goats
(N = 600,000)
N/2
Population
(N = 150,000)
1920
1960
2000
2040
Year
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/
Study/Desertification/
desertification2.html
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-13
Desertification
Sahel (Con’t)
•
Albedo
MODIS
-
0.50
Albedo
0.45
0.40
0.35
0.30
0.25
0.20
0.15
0.10
0.05
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (Uncompressed) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
0.00
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/
Study/Desertification/
desertification2.html
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-14
Desertification
Sahel (Con’t)
•
Change
QuickTime™ and a
H.264 decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/
Study/Desertification/
desertification2.html
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-15
Desertification
Sahel (Con’t)
•
2003 data spatially
averaged over area
8.5ºW–8.5ºE and
12.5º–15.5ºN
•
Monthly mean
precipitation in
millimeters per
day (blue)
•
Fraction of Absorbed
Photosynthetically
Active Radiation
(FAPAR) (green)
•
Broadband surface
albedo (red)
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (LZW) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
http://www.agu.org/journals/eo/eo0703/2007EO030002.pdf#anchor
Eos, Vol. 88, No. 3, 16 January 2007
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-16
Desertification
Sahel (Con’t)
•
•
1984 and 2003
latitudinal profile
of total June to
October (JJASO)
precipitation
1984 and 2003
mean August to
October (ASO)
broadband surface
albedo averaged
between
18ºW and 20ºE
QuickTime™ and a
TIFF (LZW) decompressor
are needed to see this picture.
http://www.agu.org/journals/eo/eo0703/2007EO030002.pdf#anchor
Eos, Vol. 88, No. 3, 16 January 2007
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-17
Deforestation
Brazilian Rainforests
1975
1986
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-18
Deforestation
Rondonia, Brazil
1973
1978
1983
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-19
Deforestation
Guatemala
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-20
Deforestation
Guatemala
•
1986 to 1997
1986 - Peten, Guatemala
1997 - Peten, Guatemala
•
Red is forest; Greens are roads and cleared land
•
Area of picture about 40% size of New Jersey
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-21
Deforestation
Facts
•
Equivalent of ten city blocks of rainforest
is destroyed every minute, that an area
the size of Pennsylvania lost every year
•
7% of the Earth's dry land surface is
rainforest, home to more than 50% of
the world's plants and animals
•
A bulldozer must remove 60 rainforest
trees to reach one mahogany tree
•
There are 100
different species of
large trees in a single
acre of rainforest
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-22
Deforestation
Facts
•
Estimate rate of deforestation
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-23
System Dynamics
The Earth System (Kump, Kastin & Crane)
•
•
Chap. 2 (pp. 18-20)
Chap. 14 (pp. 279-280
Climate and Global Change Notes
29-24
System Dynamics
Positive Feedback
•
Desertification - Sahel
•
Ice - Albedo feedback
Negative Feedback
•
CO2 - Cloud - Albedo feedback
•
CO2 - Plankton feedback
Climate and Global Change Notes