Carbon in Earth


Book Description

"Carbon in Earth is an outgrowth of the Deep Carbon Observatory (DCO), a 10-year international research effort dedicated to achieving transformational understanding of the chemical and biological roles of carbon in Earth (http://dco.ciw.edu). Hundreds of researchers from 6 continents, including all 51 coauthors of this volume, are now engaged in the DCO effort. This volume serves as a benchmark for our present understanding of Earth's carbon - both what we know and what we have yet to learn. Ultimately, the goal is to produce a second, companion volume to mark the progress of this decadal initiative.




Carbon in Earth's Interior


Book Description

Carbon in Earth's fluid envelopes - the atmosphere, biosphere, and hydrosphere, plays a fundamental role in our planet's climate system and a central role in biology, the environment, and the economy of earth system. The source and original quantity of carbon in our planet is uncertain, as are the identities and relative importance of early chemical processes associated with planetary differentiation. Numerous lines of evidence point to the early and continuing exchange of substantial carbon between Earth's surface and its interior, including diamonds, carbon-rich mantle-derived magmas, carbonate rocks in subduction zones and springs carrying deeply sourced carbon-bearing gases. Thus, there is little doubt that a substantial amount of carbon resides in our planet's interior. Yet, while we know it must be present, carbon's forms, transformations and movements at conditions relevant to the interiors of Earth and other planets remain uncertain and untapped. Volume highlights include: - Reviews key, general topics, such as carbonate minerals, the deep carbon cycle, and carbon in magmas or fluids - Describes new results at the frontiers of the field with presenting results on carbon in minerals, melts, and fluids at extreme conditions of planetary interiors - Brings together emerging insights into carbon's forms, transformations and movements through study of the dynamics, structure, stability and reactivity of carbon-based natural materials - Reviews emerging new insights into the properties of allied substances that carry carbon, into the rates of chemical and physical transformations, and into the complex interactions between moving fluids, magmas, and rocks to the interiors of Earth and other planets - Spans the various chemical redox states of carbon, from reduced hydrocarbons to zero-valent diamond and graphite to oxidized CO2 and carbonates - Captures and synthesizes the exciting results of recent, focused efforts in an emerging scientific discipline - Reports advances over the last decade that have led to a major leap forward in our understanding of carbon science - Compiles the range of methods that can be tapped tap from the deep carbon community, which includes experimentalists, first principles theorists, thermodynamic modelers and geodynamicists - Represents a reference point for future deep carbon science research Carbon in Planetary Interiors will be a valuable resource for researchers and students who study the Earth's interior. The topics of this volume are interdisciplinary, and therefore will be useful to professionals from a wide variety of fields in the Earth Sciences, such as mineral physics, petrology, geochemistry, experimentalists, first principles theorists, thermodynamics, material science, chemistry, geophysics and geodynamics.




Deep Carbon


Book Description

A comprehensive guide to carbon inside Earth - its quantities, movements, forms, origins, changes over time and impact on planetary processes. This title is also available as Open Access on Cambridge Core.




Carbon in the Geobiosphere


Book Description

The book covers the fundamentals of the biogeochemical behavior of carbon near the Earth’s surface. It is mainly a reference text for Earth and environmental scientists. It presents an overview of the origins and behavior of the carbon cycle and atmospheric carbon dioxide, and the human effects on them. The book can also be used for a one-semester course at an intermediate to advanced level addressing the behavior of the carbon and related cycles.




The Global Carbon Cycle


Book Description

While a number of gases are implicated in global warming, carbon dioxide is the most important contributor, and in one sense the entire phenomena can be seen as a human-induced perturbation of the carbon cycle. The Global Carbon Cycle offers a scientific assessment of the state of current knowledge of the carbon cycle by the world's leading scientists sponsored by SCOPE and the Global Carbon Project, and other international partners. It gives an introductory over-view of the carbon cycle, with multidisciplinary contributions covering biological, physical, and social science aspects. Included are 29 chapters covering topics including: an assessment of carbon-climate-human interactions; a portfolio of carbon management options; spatial and temporal distribution of sources and sinks of carbon dioxide; socio-economic driving forces of emissions scenarios. Throughout, contributors emphasize that all parts of the carbon cycle are interrelated, and only by developing a framework that considers the full set of feedbacks will we be able to achieve a thorough understanding and develop effective management strategies. The Global Carbon Cycle edited by Christopher B. Field and Michael R. Raupach is part of the Rapid Assessment Publication series produced by the Scientific Committee on Problems of the Environment (SCOPE), in an effort to quickly disseminate the collective knowledge of the world's leading experts on topics of pressing environmental concern.




Carbon Sequestration and Its Role in the Global Carbon Cycle


Book Description

Published by the American Geophysical Union as part of the Geophysical Monograph Series, Volume 183. For carbon sequestration the issues of monitoring, risk assessment, and verification of carbon content and storage efficacy are perhaps the most uncertain. Yet these issues are also the most critical challenges facing the broader context of carbon sequestration as a means for addressing climate change. In response to these challenges, Carbon Sequestration and Its Role in the Global Carbon Cycle presents current perspectives and research that combine five major areas: The global carbon cycle and verification and assessment of global carbon sources and sinks Potential capacity and temporal/spatial scales of terrestrial, oceanic, and geologic carbon storage Assessing risks and benefits associated with terrestrial, oceanic, and geologic carbon storage Predicting, monitoring, and verifying effectiveness of different forms of carbon storage Suggested new CO2 sequestration research and management paradigms for the future. The volume is based on a Chapman Conference and will appeal to the rapidly growing group of scientists and engineers examining methods for deliberate carbon sequestration through storage in plants, soils, the oceans, and geological repositories.




The Global Carbon Cycle


Book Description

A must-have introduction to this fundamental driver of the climate system The Global Carbon Cycle is a short introduction to this essential geochemical driver of the Earth's climate system, written by one of the world's leading climate-science experts. In this one-of-a-kind primer, David Archer engages readers in clear and simple terms about the many ways the global carbon cycle is woven into our climate system. He begins with a concise overview of the subject, and then looks at the carbon cycle on three different time scales, describing how the cycle interacts with climate in very distinct ways in each. On million-year time scales, feedbacks in the carbon cycle stabilize Earth's climate and oxygen concentrations. Archer explains how on hundred-thousand-year glacial/interglacial time scales, the carbon cycle in the ocean amplifies climate change, and how, on the human time scale of decades, the carbon cycle has been dampening climate change by absorbing fossil-fuel carbon dioxide into the oceans and land biosphere. A central question of the book is whether the carbon cycle could once again act to amplify climate change in centuries to come, for example through melting permafrost peatlands and methane hydrates. The Global Carbon Cycle features a glossary of terms, suggestions for further reading, and explanations of equations, as well as a forward-looking discussion of open questions about the global carbon cycle.




Marine Carbon Biogeochemistry


Book Description

This open access book discusses biogeochemical processes relevant to carbon and aims to provide readers, graduate students and researchers, with insight into the functioning of marine ecosystems. A carbon centric approach has been adopted, but other elements are included where relevant or needed. The book focuses on concepts and quantitative understanding of primary production, organic matter mineralization and sediment biogeochemistry. The impact of biogeochemical processes on inorganic carbon dynamics and organic matter transformation are also discussed.




The Many Lives of Carbon


Book Description

In its pure form, carbon appears as the soft graphite of a pencil or as the sparkling diamond in a woman’s engagement ring. Underneath the surface, carbon is also the basic building block of the cells in our bodies and of all known life on earth. And at a molecular level, carbon bonds with oxygen to create carbon dioxide—a gas as vital to our life on this planet as it is detrimental at high levels in our atmosphere. As we face the climate change crisis, it’s now more important than ever to understand carbon and its life cycle. The Many Lives of Carbon is the story of this all-important chemical element, labeled C on our periodic tables. It’s the story of balance—between photosynthesis and cell respiration, between building and burning, between life and death. Dag Olav Hessen is our guide as we discover carbon in minerals, rocks, wood, and rain forests. He explains how carbon is studied by scientists, as well as its role in the greenhouse effect, and, not least, the impact of manmade emissions. Hessen isn’t afraid to ask the difficult questions as he confronts us with the literally burning issue of climate change. How will ecosystems respond to global change, and how will this feed back into our climate systems? How bad could climate change be, and will our ecosystems recover? What are our moral obligations in the face of excess carbon production? Neither alarmist nor moralistic, Hessen takes readers on a journey from atom to planet in informative, compelling prose.




Climate Intervention


Book Description

The signals are everywhere that our planet is experiencing significant climate change. It is clear that we need to reduce the emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases from our atmosphere if we want to avoid greatly increased risk of damage from climate change. Aggressively pursuing a program of emissions abatement or mitigation will show results over a timescale of many decades. How do we actively remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere to make a bigger difference more quickly? As one of a two-book report, this volume of Climate Intervention discusses CDR, the carbon dioxide removal of greenhouse gas emissions from the atmosphere and sequestration of it in perpetuity. Climate Intervention: Carbon Dioxide Removal and Reliable Sequestration introduces possible CDR approaches and then discusses them in depth. Land management practices, such as low-till agriculture, reforestation and afforestation, ocean iron fertilization, and land-and-ocean-based accelerated weathering, could amplify the rates of processes that are already occurring as part of the natural carbon cycle. Other CDR approaches, such as bioenergy with carbon capture and sequestration, direct air capture and sequestration, and traditional carbon capture and sequestration, seek to capture CO2 from the atmosphere and dispose of it by pumping it underground at high pressure. This book looks at the pros and cons of these options and estimates possible rates of removal and total amounts that might be removed via these methods. With whatever portfolio of technologies the transition is achieved, eliminating the carbon dioxide emissions from the global energy and transportation systems will pose an enormous technical, economic, and social challenge that will likely take decades of concerted effort to achieve. Climate Intervention: Carbon Dioxide Removal and Reliable Sequestration will help to better understand the potential cost and performance of CDR strategies to inform debate and decision making as we work to stabilize and reduce atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide.