How to feed the world.

[mistermack]

The organisms in the deep-sea food chain circulate the CO2 at great depths, and do not bring that stored CO2 to the surface atmosphere where it could contribute to global warming. Bringing those organic compounds to the surface would release that CO2 into the atmosphere where the greenhouse effect does its work.

I very much doubt that there is much organic matter lying there on the sea bed.
The living animals are very thinly spread, and dead ones get constantly recycled.
The animals and bacteria give off CO2 constantly in respiration, so the organic matter gets broken down to it's chemical constituents, and CO2, which is slowly released to the water, and therefore DOES contribute to warming.
Anyway, that would be very easy to rule in or out, before any trial began.

[FBM]

I'm no expert, but this link suggests that the deep-sea floor is a significant CO2 sink: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12183244

All the bird, fish, whale and dolphin shit goes down, as does the jetsam and flotsam, eventually. Once it goes down, it stays down for a very, very long time, I think. Bringing all that CO2 back up isn't a viable solution, IMO. Better to harvest wave and tidal energy. That comes from non-carbon-related sources off-planet and is practically infinitely renewable with no CO2 impact at all.

[Coito ergo sum]

a little levity to the discussion...

Gotta love Bono's line...."Well, tonight thank God it's them....instead of you!"

Uhh...yeah...thanks God, for letting "them" starve instead of me. Mighty nice of ya....

[mistermack]

I'm no expert, but this link suggests that the deep-sea floor is a significant CO2 sink: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12183244

Snap. I don't claim to be any kind of expert.
That link is about the enormously deep trenches though, not the deep-sea floor. ( about 2% of area). I wouldn't propose going that deep, and it's only 2% anyway.

And they rather contradict themselves. They say the bacterial activity appears higher in the trenches than on the abyssal plains. If that was the case, the carbon would be converted to CO2 faster, as the bacteria emit carbon in the form of dissolved CO2.
They don't specify what form the "carbon sink" takes, which I find odd.
If it's solid carbonates, it's not likely to get sucked up, and if it did, it would sink again quickly.

[mistermack]

I'm no expert, but this link suggests that the deep-sea floor is a significant CO2 sink: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12183244

Just an observation on this study. The global warming cynics have claimed that any science project stands more chance of funding these days, if they claim their study is relevant to CO2. So they are all including a GW element, even if it's really tenuous.
And what do we have here? A trip to the bottom of the Marianas trench, (which is what they really wanted) with a highly doubtful GW element tagged on, so 1) it gets funded and 2) it gets publicity.
Case proved for the sceptics.

[FBM]

I'm no expert, but this link suggests that the deep-sea floor is a significant CO2 sink: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-12183244

Just an observation on this study. The global warming cynics have claimed that any science project stands more chance of funding these days, if they claim their study is relevant to CO2. So they are all including a GW element, even if it's really tenuous.
And what do we have here? A trip to the bottom of the Marianas trench, (which is what they really wanted) with a highly doubtful GW element tagged on, so 1) it gets funded and 2) it gets publicity.
Case proved for the sceptics.

I can definitely see that happening. Everybody's about funding, even the scientists.

[mistermack]

I read a bit of wikipedia, looking for what happens to organic material that sinks to the bottom of the oceans. It appears that bacteria are constantly converting it into dissolved CO2, through respiration.

The microbial loop is of particular importance in increasing the efficiency of marine food web via the utilization dissolved organic matter (DOM) which is typically unavailable to most marine organisms. In this sense, the process aids in recycling of organic matter, and nutrients and mediates the transfer of energy above thermocline. More than 30% of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) incorporated into bacteria is respired and released as CO2. The other main effect of the microbial loop in the water column is that it accelerates mineralization through regenerating production in nutrient-limited environment (e.g, oligotrophic waters). In general, the entire microbial loop is to some extent typically five to ten times the mass of all multicellular marine organisms in marine ecosystem.

Here is the wikipedia link for that article :
(wikipedia Link)

So it would seem that leaving organic material at the bottom of the ocean is just ensuring that it ends up as dissolved CO2, which acidifies the oceans, and increases the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
The only genuine "sinks" of carbon that I can find is the microscopic carbonate shells that some plankton build, which sink and eventually form limestone rock, and coal, oil and gas deposits.

[Pappa]

I read a bit of wikipedia, looking for what happens to organic material that sinks to the bottom of the oceans. It appears that bacteria are constantly converting it into dissolved CO2, through respiration.

The microbial loop is of particular importance in increasing the efficiency of marine food web via the utilization dissolved organic matter (DOM) which is typically unavailable to most marine organisms. In this sense, the process aids in recycling of organic matter, and nutrients and mediates the transfer of energy above thermocline. More than 30% of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) incorporated into bacteria is respired and released as CO2. The other main effect of the microbial loop in the water column is that it accelerates mineralization through regenerating production in nutrient-limited environment (e.g, oligotrophic waters). In general, the entire microbial loop is to some extent typically five to ten times the mass of all multicellular marine organisms in marine ecosystem.

Here is the wikipedia link for that article :
(wikipedia Link)

So it would seem that leaving organic material at the bottom of the ocean is just ensuring that it ends up as dissolved CO2, which acidifies the oceans, and increases the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
The only genuine "sinks" of carbon that I can find is the microscopic carbonate shells that some plankton build, which sink and eventually form limestone rock, and coal, oil and gas deposits.

What about the almost 70% that is not released?

[mistermack]

What about the almost 70% that is not released?

As I read it, 30% of what it takes in gets released as CO2. The 70% would either get excreted, and become available to the next bacterium, or eaten, and get excreted by that grazer. It's not going to disappear.
The point is that these bacteria, en masse, are recycling organic matter back into dissolved CO2 in huge quantities.
So it's not getting "fixed" in any way on the ocean floor.
This is bourne out by the composition of most sedimentary rocks, which are not rich in carbon. It's the limestone deposits from the shells of plankton that actually fix carbon.

[nellikin]

As an environmental engineer (masters, currently doing my PhD) with a strong emphasis on understanding natural systems I would certainly recommend great caution before embarking on a project of that scale, which has the potential to be disastrous and irreversible. I get continually depressed when thinking about the short-sided engineering "solutions" humans have come up with which turn out to create more problems than that which they were purporting to solve.

As a former truck driver, and ice-cream-seller, with a strong emphasis on eating lots of ice-cream myself, I would recommend starting with smaller scale operations, and studying the effects, positive and negative.
And I get continually depressed when I look at the problems we have ignored, and allowed to grow, apparently on the assumption that they will just go away.

Glad to see that 8 years of university study of the environment count for absolutely nothing with you.

BTW - I'm not advocating doing nothing. I strongly believe that we need to do something about the anthropogenically emitted GHGs now. However, since they originated from land-based activities and were stored on and in land, I think it makes no sense to transfer them into the ocean. This is just shifting the problem from land (where it wasn't actually a problem to begin with) to the atmosphere to the oceans. Based upon my understanding of ecosystems and ecology, you cannot shift the balance of and ecosystem, whether it be biologically, chemically or physically, without causing a disturbance in the ecosystem. We don't know how the oceans will react to increased levels of dissolved inorganic carbon (or DOC for that matter) and I would strongly advocate against testing the waters, just in the hope it may help.

I believe the solution to the elevated levels of GHGs in the atmosphere lies in changing our land-use and management practices (as well as immediately changing our lifestyles to reduce current emissions!). If we increased the amount of carbon stored in soils world-wide by 15%, this would be the equivalent of offsetting ALL of the GHGs emitted since the onset of the industrial revolution! And organic carbon is a vital component of soils, boosting physical and chemical soil properties, enhancing soil fertility and reducing erodibility. Soil carbon sequestration is the only win-win solution to the current climate crisis we are seeking that I'm aware of. The issues are how to get more carbon into soils (changing land-use and land-management practices are the key here, but growing population world-wide actually means we are depleting our soil resources, releasing GHGs from soils into the atmosphere) and - once there - how to store it there for the long term (on the order of millennia, whilst looking for other sinks, such as mineral carbon sequestration in geological structures, which through weathering can sequester CO2 for millions of years). I am currently writing my PhD on this topic.

There will be no one-shot solution to this problem but endangering our marine environment through subjecting it to changes with unknown outcomes does appear wise to me.

[mistermack]

Glad to see that 8 years of university study of the environment count for absolutely nothing with you.

Quite the contrary. I want you to marry me, and have my babies.

I believe the solution to the elevated levels of GHGs in the atmosphere lies in changing our land-use and management practices (as well as immediately changing our lifestyles to reduce current emissions!)

You say you're not advocating doing nothing, but let's face facts. If you are advocating something that has no chance of happening, then there is really very little difference. You might just as well advise doing nothing.

If we increased the amount of carbon stored in soils world-wide by 15%, this would be the equivalent of offsetting ALL of the GHGs emitted since the onset of the industrial revolution!

How come it's all right for soil, but crazy for water? There seems to be a double standard there.
Won't the soil bacteria send it back to the atmosphere? (it's not an idea I've come across, so I don't know the mechanics of it).
What would it do to the rivers and lakes, and estuaries and shallow seas?
I'm sure there are good answers, or you wouldn't be PHDing it. But I don't see it being actively promoted by the global warming nuts.

We don't know how the oceans will react to increased levels of dissolved inorganic carbon (or DOC for that matter) and I would strongly advocate against testing the waters, just in the hope it may help

I would absolutely disagree with that. And with the general argument that this is some kind of leap into the unknown.
As I mentioned earlier, the idea is to mimic the natural upwellings of nutrients that happen in many places around the world, where ocean currents meet steeply rising continental shelfs.
We have LOADS of examples to look at, and the result is invariably good. You get a fabulous proliferation of life, all the way up the food chain, and seas where green algae fix dissolved carbon from the ocean, and give off oxygen.
The world would be in big trouble WITHOUT these natural upwellings.

[lsdetroit]

Why dont we just feed as many as current technology can feed? Feeding more just breeds more

yes. let the die off happen already. were already over capacity by about 6 billion.

[FBM]

Someone said a while back that the countries with the highest GNPs tend to have the lowest birth rates. It's the poor countries that are making all the babies. Similarly, higher GNPs tend to correlate with greater enviornmental care, while the poorest populations devastate the enviornment in the never-ending search for food and firewood. I don't have any stats. It's just something someone pointed out a while back.

[nellikin]

I believe the solution to the elevated levels of GHGs in the atmosphere lies in changing our land-use and management practices (as well as immediately changing our lifestyles to reduce current emissions!)

You say you're not advocating doing nothing, but let's face facts. If you are advocating something that has no chance of happening, then there is really very little difference. You might just as well advise doing nothing.

Actually, farmers around the world are currently changing their land-management practices - the rise of low/ no-till farming is documented around the world.

If we increased the amount of carbon stored in soils world-wide by 15%, this would be the equivalent of offsetting ALL of the GHGs emitted since the onset of the industrial revolution!

How come it's all right for soil, but crazy for water? There seems to be a double standard there.
Won't the soil bacteria send it back to the atmosphere? (it's not an idea I've come across, so I don't know the mechanics of it).
What would it do to the rivers and lakes, and estuaries and shallow seas?
I'm sure there are good answers, or you wouldn't be PHDing it. But I don't see it being actively promoted by the global warming nuts.

Maybe you should read the agriculture section of the IPCC reports. They have been advocating soil carbon sequestration as a short-term solution for elevated GHGs for years. When the Liberal Party in Australia announced its climate change policy at the start of the last year, the measure they suggested was soil carbon sequestration - because it's good for soils and good for the atmosphere (as opposed to being bad for the ocean and good for the atmosphere in the case of carbon sequestration in the ocean...) So no double standards, merely an in depth understanding of ecosystems and soil here. And yes, the problem is the long-term storage of organic carbon in soils, but several mechanisms have been identified which offer this and are currently being investigated (amongst other things, by me).

We don't know how the oceans will react to increased levels of dissolved inorganic carbon (or DOC for that matter) and I would strongly advocate against testing the waters, just in the hope it may help

I would absolutely disagree with that. And with the general argument that this is some kind of leap into the unknown.
As I mentioned earlier, the idea is to mimic the natural upwellings of nutrients that happen in many places around the world, where ocean currents meet steeply rising continental shelfs.
We have LOADS of examples to look at, and the result is invariably good. You get a fabulous proliferation of life, all the way up the food chain, and seas where green algae fix dissolved carbon from the ocean, and give off oxygen.
The world would be in big trouble WITHOUT these natural upwellings.[/quote]

I'm not saying that this is necessarily wrong, merely that in depth understanding of the natural ecosystem of the deep ocean (and ocean in general) is important before launching a project like this. The deep ocean ecosystems are barely understood - sampling is a huge issue here, and the associated costs - so that that would be required (and probably take decades to complete) before alunching something like this. This isn't time we really have, so the idea seems to be not really viable to me.

If you are truly interested in soil carcon, why not google it. Or here's a link for you http://www.soilcarbon.com.au/index.html

As I said - getting carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere into soils (where it is stored as soil organic matter) is good for soils and the atmosphere - so highly desirable. It increases soil fertility and productivity, so helps to solve issues regarding adequate food production! If we want to help the humans and our environment, conserving our soils should be one of our top priorities.

[mistermack]

Nellikin, I don't know how to break this to you, but I'm sorry to say that the wedding's off. I'm afraid I rather misunderstood the meaning of dirty girl.

But the good news is that I'm convinced about soil carbon, although with reservations. The article you linked was very persuasive. Perhaps too persuasive. I felt I was being sold something. But the logic looks ok. It does make me wonder though, just how much of today's CO2 is down to the degrading of soil, rather than fossil fuels. If so much more can be stored naturally, it follows that a lot must have been released, to get soils to this state in the first place.

But that doesn't negate the logic of trying to put things right.

There is obviouly a limitation though. Raising the biomass on land can only be a one-off removal of CO2 from the air. And once it's done, it would have to be rigorously maintained, or you would have a huge ticking time-bomb of carbon waiting to be released, if things slid back to the way they are now.

And what would the effect of drought and wild fires be? Would all that carbon be shot back into the atmosphere over a short period?
And how would termites interact with more plant life? Would they massively increase, and start giving off huge quantities of methane?
Having said all that, I'm still convinced it's a worthwhile technique, and it's hard to see why people wouldn't give it a go.


As far as the oceans go, you've got to bear in mind that they are no longer pristine. Man is removing vast quantities of fish every day, so the quantity of organic matter is being artificially reduced all the time as it is. A few trials of what I suggested would probably not even redress that balance, so I don't really see any danger of tipping any balance ecologically.
All that tonnage of fish we catch must be having a drastic effect on the amount of organic matter swimming about, or falling to the ocean floor.
I did originally suggest it as a way of replenishing fish stocks, rather than fixing CO2, but if it did both, it's hard to see any negatives. You could go a long way before you were adding more organic material than we are currently removing by fishing.