BobC's comment

[Sunsettommy]

From HERE at post # 205.

Well writes:

Quote:Because the oceans suck up huge amounts of the gas each year, the average CO2 molecule does spend about 5 years in the atmosphere. But the oceans also release much of that CO2 back to the air, such that man-made emissions keep the atmosphere’s CO2 levels elevated for millennia.
it’s 5 years for a half-life, but then it gets cycled between the ocean and atmosphere for many years after that.

BobC in reply to the above quote:

Gee, you’ve heard of equilibrium reactions, then? Perhaps you know that, at equilibrium, exactly as much CO2 would go into the oceans each year as would come out?

What apparently escapes you, is what happens when you perturb the equilibrium by, say, adding CO2 to the atmosphere. I’ll make it simple, so you can follow:

1) The atmospheric concentration is increased, so more CO2 now flows from the atmosphere to the ocean, than from the ocean to the atmosphere.

2) This flow unbalance continues until the concentrations are again equal in the ocean and atmosphere, so that the counter flows are also equal.

3) This equalization process proceeds at a rate determined by the CO2 atmospheric half life, which is 5 years. The equalization process is essentially (94%) complete after 4 half lifes = 20 years.

4) Since the oceans’ capacity (for CO2) is 50 times the atmosphere’s, the concentrations (and hence the flows) equalize when about 98% of the CO2 introduced into the atmosphere is contained in the ocean.

So, is it technically true that “man-made emissions keep the atmosphere’s CO2 levels elevated for millennia”? Well, yes: 2% of man-made CO2 remains in the atmosphere indefinitly. At the current rate of production, we might be able to double atmospheric CO2 in about 4,000 years.

Yep, that sounds like a crisis we need to handle in the next few years all right.

The only question remaining is: Are you a Fool or a Knave?

[Sunsettommy]

Post # 206,BobC adds this:

Quote:FYI: If anyone would like to see the above return to equilibrium reaction in action, look at Wikipedia’s graph of the Carbon 14 atmospheric bomb spike.. This shows the removal of C14-tagged CO2 from the atmosphere after the 1963 test ban treaty ended atmospheric testing of nuclear bombs.

The data to 2010 limit the remaining fraction of CO2 to < 3%. The IPCC's estimates of ocean CO2 capacity would give 2%.

[Climate Realist]

(12-30-2010 07:05 PM)Sunsettommy Wrote:  Post # 206,BobC adds this:

Quote:FYI: If anyone would like to see the above return to equilibrium reaction in action, look at Wikipedia’s graph of the Carbon 14 atmospheric bomb spike.. This shows the removal of C14-tagged CO2 from the atmosphere after the 1963 test ban treaty ended atmospheric testing of nuclear bombs.

The data to 2010 limit the remaining fraction of CO2 to < 3%. The IPCC's estimates of ocean CO2 capacity would give 2%.

The problem with this diagram is that in order to establish what the proper baseline of Carbon 14 is we need a number of years measurements before the nuclear tests began. Many of these occurred in the 1950's- so we have insufficient baseline in that diagram from which to judge when the spike has reached its half life for carbon 14 in the atmosphere.

Do we have reliable data of carbon 14 in the atmosphere before 1945???