3 ms·

Plants aren't doing that job all that effectively, or the CO2 levels wouldn't be going up. The entire history of industrial civilization has added 140 parts pe

Plants aren't doing that job all that effectively, or the CO2 levels wouldn't be going up. The entire history of industrial civilization has added 140 parts per million of CO2 to the atmosphere. For CO2, that's too much. But Oxygen is 21% of the atmosphere, or 210,000 parts per million. I think we'll be ok for a while.

phkahler 4y ago
>> Plants aren't doing that job all that effectively, or the CO2 levels wouldn't be going up. Sure, but they DO reduce the level over time and they also grow faster with the higher concentration. The CO increase is less than all the CO2 we've produced with industry. It's not ok to say there is 21 percent oxygen and this proposed process won't put a dent in it. One might have thought that about burning hydrocarbons. The question of how long can we "burn rocks" still stands. Is it 10k years or 10M or something else?
MarkusQ 4y ago
Plants do a great job pulling out CO₂ -- that's why CO₂ levels fall in the northern hemisphere's spring and early summer (see https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/ https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/ ). Unfortunately, insects and fungi are just as good at eating plant matter and exhaling the CO₂ back again (aided somewhat by fires) so it goes right back in to the air again.
- entropicgravity 4y ago
  Yes my understanding is that before there were fungi that could deal with the fallen trees they just stacked up on the ground and eventually became coal while the earth turned into snowball earth for a few million years. Sucking up CO2 has been too much of a good thing under some past circumstances.
- zdragnar 4y ago
  Plants also respirate C02 when they use the sugars they generate from photosynthesis. It's why you can grow plants in a completely sealed terrarium. Some do better than others- they generally don't prefer a perfect balance, but they can survive in it.

phkahler 4y ago

>> Plants aren't doing that job all that effectively, or the CO2 levels wouldn't be going up. Sure, but they DO reduce the level over time and they also grow faster with the higher concentration. The CO increase is less than all the CO2 we've produced with industry. It's not ok to say there is 21 percent oxygen and this proposed process won't put a dent in it. One might have thought that about burning hydrocarbons. The question of how long can we "burn rocks" still stands. Is it 10k years or 10M or something else?

MarkusQ 4y ago

Plants do a great job pulling out CO₂ -- that's why CO₂ levels fall in the northern hemisphere's spring and early summer (see https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/ https://gml.noaa.gov/ccgg/trends/ ). Unfortunately, insects and fungi are just as good at eating plant matter and exhaling the CO₂ back again (aided somewhat by fires) so it goes right back in to the air again.

entropicgravity 4y ago
Yes my understanding is that before there were fungi that could deal with the fallen trees they just stacked up on the ground and eventually became coal while the earth turned into snowball earth for a few million years. Sucking up CO2 has been too much of a good thing under some past circumstances.
zdragnar 4y ago
Plants also respirate C02 when they use the sugars they generate from photosynthesis. It's why you can grow plants in a completely sealed terrarium. Some do better than others- they generally don't prefer a perfect balance, but they can survive in it.