Carbon

• The natural carbon cycle is the movement and storage of carbon between the land, ocean and the atmosphere.
• There are three forms of carbon in the Carbon Cycle: inorganic, organic, and gaseous.
• The balance between production and absorption of carbon in the natural carbon cycle is generally maintained.
• Stores of carbon in the Carbon Cycle are terrestrial, oceanic or atmospheric.
• A carbon sink is any store which takes in more carbon than it emits, such as an intact tropical rainforest.
• A carbon source is any store that emits more carbon than it stores, such as a damaged tropical rainforest.
• The rock cycle and continental drift recycle the rock over time, but this may take thousands, if not millions of years.
• The second biggest store of carbon in the Carbon Cycle, the oceans, contain a tiny fraction of the carbon of the largest store.
• The oceans are constantly being utilised by marine organisms, lost as an output to the lithosphere, or gains as an input from rivers and erosion.
• Fossil fuel deposits used to be rarely changing over short periods of time, but humans have developed technology to exploit them rapidly, though 4000 billion metric tons of carbon remain as fossil fuels.
• The carbon cycle could be rebalanced through mitigation techniques such as carbon taxation, renewable switching, energy efficient and CCS but these require global management and player integration.
• All have the disadvantage of being visually unappealing and causing minor disturbances to the local environment.
• The extraction of petroleum from sands involves high energies and boiling water, which can leave ponds of concentrated chemicals.
• A large influx of readily available shale gas would drop the price of electricity.
• Fastest growing industry, producing the high-value bitumen for international exportation.
• Tar sand production creates economic growth and a large influx of jobs for rural regions.
• Fracking faces large environmental opposition, especially as fracking can trigger minor tremors.
• The liquid waste is left in tailing ponds, so water can be recycled after it seperates from the clay and salts.
• Renewable energy is likely to be an important component of the future energy mix as it has a low carbon footprint (in most cases), the technology is always improving and becoming more efficient.
• Shale gas produces half the emissions of coal, which would reduce global emissions without completely eradicating fossil fuel use.
• Each renewable resource has advantages and disadvantages , though as time progresses the disadvantages will decrease as the technologies are improved.
• The process of extracting bitumen is water and energy intensive, producing a large volume of waste (12 barrels or hot water produce 1 barrel of bitumen and 3 barrels of tailing pond waste).
• Shale gas is still more expensive to produce than conventional gas.
• Open mining involves removing the top layer of vegetation and soils to access the bitumen-sands, destroying habitats.
• Many engines and appliances are designed to operate on oil, therefore to continue to extract oil would avoid large changes to many important engines: vehicles, planes, etc.
• Deep-water oil faces larger risks during extraction, and (similar to normal oil production) oil spills during transportation.
• The majority of shale gas is found in the US, which would improve the US’s economy and provide an alternative source to Russian oil (if political tensions between UK and Russia continue, our energy security is at risk).
• When permafrost melts, trapped carbon is released into the atmosphere as CO2 and methane which increases greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere.
• A climate tipping point is a critical threshold; when this threshold is reached, small changes in the global climate system can transform a stable system irreversibly.
• In the boreal forest ecosystem, hot and dry summers lead to water stress which can result in a loss of trees.
• To keep warm water heading from the tropics towards Britain, heavy water must sink in the North.
• Peatlands emit carbon in the form of methane which increases greenhouse gases and accelerates enhanced Greenhouse Effects.
• Cold water in the North Atlantic forms part of the thermohaline circulation.
• It is believed by some scientists that the thermohaline circulation is slowing down.
• If there is a drought in the rainforest, trees may die.
• Warming causes peat to dry out and the rate of decomposition increases.
• If it stops then the world will go into another ice age.
• A tipping point could be reached when trees no longer absorb much CO2 which in turn increases the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, leading to further dry summers.
• The melting of Northern ice sheets releases large amounts of fresh water into the ocean which is less dense and has low salinity.
• A tipping point could be reached when moisture can no longer be recycled (due to too few trees to intake moisture) which leads to more trees dying.