Disturbance to the Carbon Cycle

The Carbon Cycle

Carbon is critical to sustain a huge range of Earth’s functions. Not only is it

present in all living beings, it is a major component of a number of minerals (e.g.
graphite and diamond). This means that it is abundant across the world, in: the
atmosphere (air); biosphere (living and dead organism organisms); hydrosphere
(oceans, rivers, and lakes); and lithosphere (soil and rocks). These act as storage areas
of ‘reservoirs’ of carbon, either in the short-term (a few minutes) or long-term (millions of
years). As the Earth is such a dynamic environment, processes such as erosion,
evaporation, photosynthesis, respiration, and decomposition constantly move carbon
between these reservoirs. Carbon enters, is stored, and leaves the different spheres of
the Earth through different methods, and in different quantities:

Atmosphere; carbon is stored in the atmosphere as both methane (CH4) and

carbon dioxide (CO2); greenhouse gases which absorb and retain heat. CO2 is
released into the atmosphere through respiration by living organisms, volcanic
eruptions, weathering, and human activity. It is removed from the atmosphere by
dissolution into water and through photosynthesis by plants. CH4 is released into the
atmosphere through animal emissions, decomposition, and burning of fossil fuels.

Biosphere; all living and deceased organisms contain organic carbon. Organisms
gain carbon by either extracting it from CO2 in the atmosphere through photosynthesis,
or by consuming other organisms and therefore receiving their carbon. Carbon remains
in an organism until it decomposes sufficiently to release carbon to the atmosphere or
lithosphere.

Hydrosphere; the upper layers of oceans hold a vast amount of dissolved organic
carbon, and the lower ocean waters are rich in dissolved inorganic carbon. Dissolved
organic carbon in the surface layers is rapidly exchanged with the atmosphere because
they are constantly in contact with each other. In contrast, the dissolved inorganic
carbon is much deeper in the water column, and remains stored for longer periods of
time – up to thousands of years. It is the thermohaline circulation, which leads to the
large scale mixing of ocean waters, which allows exchange between the upper and
lower ocean layers.

Lithosphere; carbon in the lithosphere is held in soil in the form of both organic
and inorganic carbon (often as calcium carbonate). Carbon can leave the soil through
soil respiration – which releases CO2, or by erosion – which can carry it into rivers or
the ocean, where it then enters the hydrosphere. Within the Earth’s crust a large
amount of carbon is stored in limestone and kerogens (the term given to organic matter
held within sedimentary rocks). These organics are made of decomposed and highly
compressed living matter. Once they become lithified (transformed into rock), some of
the kerogens can become crude oil or natural gas – these are a source of fossil fuels.
These forms of carbon are highly stable and can remain in the lithosphere for millions of
years. If rock is subducted into the Earth’s mantle, it will melt, and the CO2 it contains is
released into the atmosphere via subsequent volcanic eruptions. Alternatively, the
extraction and burning of fossil fuels by human activity can release carbon into the
atmosphere.

Table showing the amount of carbon (in gigatones) stored in different reservoirs.
Table showing the amount of carbon (in gigatones) stored in different reservoirs.

Source: http://www.sciencemag.org/content/290/5490/291

All of these reservoirs are very closely linked. The carbon cycle is the term used
to describe the ways in which carbon moves between them, and the proportion of
carbon stored in each component. See the figure below for an indication of how much
carbon is stored in each reservoir, and for some of the processes by which the carbon
moves. By measuring the storage and transport of carbon, reservoirs can be classified
as either carbon sinks (where more carbon is absorbed than released, so carbon is
accumulated and stored) or carbon sources (where more carbon is emitted than stored).
This is an important distinction that is often used as a measure of human impact on the
natural environment
Diagram of the global carbon cycle. Boxes show the approximate size of carbon stores
(in gigatons), arrows show the most common carbon fluxes in gigatons per year. Red
numbers display the flux increase due to human impact.

Diagram of the global carbon cycle. Boxes show the approximate size of carbon stores
(in gigatons), arrows show the most common carbon fluxes in gigatons per year. Red
numbers display the flux increase due to human impact.

The human impact on the Carbon Cycle

The carbon cycle is a natural process, and has been ongoing throughout Earth’s
history. Left unperturbed (by natural or human processes) it maintains a stable
concentration in the atmosphere, biosphere, hydrosphere, and lithosphere (see the
table above). As the reservoirs are linked (either directly or indirectly), a change in any
of the carbon reservoirs causes changes in the others. Actions by humans have
resulted in the removal of carbon from carbon sinks (such as the oil and coal deposits
mentioned above), directly adding it to the atmosphere. This has been most notable
since the Industrial Revolution in the 18th and 19th Century.

The two main human impacts on the carbon cycle are:

1. Burning of fossil fuels.

Under natural conditions the release of carbon from fossil fuels occurs slowly, as
they are subducted into the mantle, and CO2 is released through volcanic activity.
However, humans are heavily reliant on fossil fuels, and extract it from the lithosphere in
great quantities. Burning coal, oil, natural gas, and other fossil fuels – for industrial
activity and power generation for example, removes the carbon from the fossil fuels and
emits it as CO2 into the atmosphere.
2. Land use and land cover change (e.g. deforestation)

Large amounts of carbon are stored in living plants (c.1,000 gigtones). Therefore,
land use changes, especially the clearance of forests (which are very densely inhabited
by plants, and therefore contain a large amount of carbon), can influence the carbon
cycle in two ways. Firstly, the removal of vegetation eliminates plants which would
otherwise be capturing carbon from the atmosphere through photosynthesis. Secondly,
as dense forests are replaced by crops/pasture land/built environments, there is usually
a net decrease in the carbon store, as smaller plants (and worse still, concrete) store far
less carbon than large trees. Deforestation also allows much more soil to be eroded,
and carbon stored in the soil is rapidly taken into rivers.

Because of the cyclical nature of the carbon cycle, the impacts humans cause
can lead to a number of amplifications and feedbacks. Increasing atmospheric CO2 and
CH4 (along with other greenhouse gases) causes higher global air temperatures which
in turn increases decomposition in soil, thereby releasing more CO2 to the atmosphere.
Increases in global temperature also affect ocean temperatures, modifying oceanic
ecosystems and having the potential to disrupt the oceanic carbon cycle, limiting the
ocean’s ability to absorb and store

http://climatica.org.uk/climate-science-information/carbon-cycle

Humans are one of the biggest reasons why disturbance happens on the
geochemical cycles.

When we remove trees from forests that have been growing for years, it reduces
evapotranspiration, which is the sum of evaporation and plant transpiration from land
and ocean surface to the atmosphere, leading to a possible reduction in precipitation.
This then leads to an increase in water eutrophication, which then cannot be consumed
by humans.