Earths Atmospheric Oxygen Content

[StringJunky]

 

But that 1 million molecules of oxygen represents the current concentration in the atmosphere of 21%. Then in order to get to 11% of atmospheric concentration is

 

1,000,000 - ((11%/21%)*1,000,000) = 476190 O₂ molecules needs to be lost per 1 million.

Yes you are right. I was taking the baseline as 100%, which was wrong. That's an even worse prognosis: 25 000 years. It will be significantly less than that I would think if other things were factored in as it depleted.

[pavelcherepan]

Yes you are right. I was taking the baseline as 100%, which was wrong. That's an even worse prognosis: 25 000 years. It will be significantly less than that I would think if other things were factored in as it depleted.

 

There is another way to calculate it and it gives an even scarier number. Here based on observations they give an average number of O₂/N₂ ratio decrease at ~19 per meg per year. The current ratio in the atm is (21/78*1000000) = 269231 per meg. Assuming that nitrogen doesn't come from anywhere in massive amounts and all O₂ lost will be incorporated in CO₂ and other oxides than we're looking at a target level of ~140000 per meg and with 19 per meg/year reduction it gives us 7368 years and now this is a very scary number.

[StringJunky]

 

There is another way to calculate it and it gives an even scarier number. Here based on observations they give an average number of O₂/N₂ ratio decrease at ~19 per meg per year. The current ratio in the atm is (21/78*1000000) = 269231 per meg. Assuming that nitrogen doesn't come from anywhere in massive amounts and all O₂ lost will be incorporated in CO₂ and other oxides than we're looking at a target level of ~140000 per meg and with 19 per meg/year reduction it gives us 7368 years and now this is a very scary number.

We need more sustainable green stuff.

Edited March 24, 2015 by StringJunky

[Acme]

We need more sustainable green stuff.

Lichens anyone?

 

While I don't see anything specific on oxygen output for them in this piece, the co₂ uptake is impressive. I never thought much about them but got a new camera over the holidays for my wildflower hobby and as no flowers were in evidence mid-winter I started shooting lichens. That led to looking for ID's which led to more reading which led to this article which led to the house that Jack built. Well, enough about Jack. >>

 

Cryptogamic Covers Take Up Huge Amounts of Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide

New research from the Max Planck Institute examines the role of cryptogamic covers in the global exchange of oxygen, carbon, and nitrogen. Covering approximately 30% of soil surface that includes the surfaces of plants, the scientists found that algae, mosses, and lichens take up approximately 14 billion tons of carbon dioxide and fix approximately 50 million tons of nitrogen per year. ...

[StringJunky]

Lichens anyone?

 

While I don't see anything specific on oxygen output for them in this piece, the co₂ uptake is impressive. I never thought much about them but got a new camera over the holidays for my wildflower hobby and as no flowers were in evidence mid-winter I started shooting lichens. That led to looking for ID's which led to more reading which led to this article which led to the house that Jack built. Well, enough about Jack. >>

 

Cryptogamic Covers Take Up Huge Amounts of Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide

My pet idea is to get more marine algae photosynthesising by creating solar or wave-powered mechanical upwellers, lifting more nutrients off the ocean floor than occurs naturally. Make everywhere look like the North Sea ...bye bye blue sea.

[Strange]

I would have thought that Oxygen content in Earths Atmosphere would be something science would look at as it is quite an important gas to Man and most life on Earth, like Peter said in His Guardian News Paper article "I found it surprising no one is looking at this".

 

I already posted one link to a project monitoring oxygen levels. I would be very surprised if there were not others. And on the wider issue of possible causes (mainly the rising level of CO2) these are also being actively researched.

[StringJunky]

 

I already posted one link to a project monitoring oxygen levels. I would be very surprised if there were not others. And on the wider issue of possible causes (mainly the rising level of CO2) these are also being actively researched.

Do you think scientists are talking about climate effects that ordinary people can't directly relate to? If, for example, the emphasis was more on oxygen depletion, people might associate directly on a more visceral level about the problem; they could intuitively imagine about difficulty breathing. It might create a greater sense of urgency and cooperation in the general population. Oxygen levels are going down and there's no way anyone can trick their way out of that observation.

[Ant Sinclair]

Below is the last two paragraphs from an article from The Institute of Science in Society and below these two paragraphs a link to the article.

 

 

 

The crucial role of forests and phytoplankton [4] in oxygenating the earth shows how urgent it is to take oxygen accounting seriously in climate policies. Reductionist accounting for CO2 alone is insufficient, and even grossly misleading and dangerous.

 

A case in point is the proposal of the International Biochar Initiative (IBI). ‘Biochar’ is charcoal produced to be buried in the soil that IBI has been promoting worldwide over the past several years [16] as a means of sequestering carbon from the atmosphere to save the climate and enhance soil fertility. It involves planting fast growing tree and various other crops on hundreds of millions of hectares of ‘spare land’ mostly in developing countries, to be harvested and turned into charcoal in a process that could produce crude oil and gases as low grade fuels. There are many excellent arguments against this initiative [17], but the most decisive is that it will certainly further accelerate deforestation and destruction of other natural ecosystems (identified as ‘spare land’). In the process, it could precipitate an oxygen crisis from which we would never recover [18] (Beware the Biochar Initiative, SiS 44).

 

http://www.i-sis.org.uk/O2DroppingFasterThanCO2Rising.php

Stringjunky has a good point in that if the public could see that burning fossil fuels was also affecting the Oxygen that they breathe, that it would be easier to get them on-side in being more prudent in their energy usage.

Below is a link to another web page, on this web page towards the bottom are two pie charts showing showing Chinas' use of fossil fuels in 2012 and projected use by 2040. There is an overall increase in use of fossil fuels to produce an extra 422 Giga Watts of energy, how much Oxygen consumption would this extra 422 GW equate to ?

 

 

http://www.eia.gov/countries/cab.cfm?fips=ch

[pavelcherepan]

There is an overall increase in use of fossil fuels to produce an extra 422 Giga Watts of energy, how much Oxygen consumption would this extra 422 GW equate to ?

 

If we assume this extra power comes from coal thermal plants and based on this:

 

 

In 2000, the carbon intensity of U.S. coal thermal combustion was 2249 lbs/MWh (1,029 kg/MWh).

 

This power increase will equate to 422000*1029 = 434238000 kg of extra CO₂ released. The number will be half as big if energy would come comes from natural gas plants.

[Ant Sinclair]

If we assume this extra power comes from coal thermal plants and based on this:

 

 

 

This power increase will equate to 422000*1029 = 434238000 kg of extra CO₂ released. The number will be half as big if energy would come comes from natural gas plants.

The pie charts indicate Coal pavel. If Iam reading this right pavel would that mean approximately 10 Million tons of Oxygen per day would be consumed for 422 GW?

I believe it would be prudent for science to evaluate all of Earths' numerical tonnage of O2 being produced by phytoplankton, forestry and other sources and its' consumption and their forcasted rates.

Does anybody know the metric tonnage of O2 in Earths" atmosphere at present?

Edited March 24, 2015 by Ant Sinclair

[pavelcherepan]

If Iam reading this right pavel would that mean approximately 10 Million tons of Oxygen per day would be consumed for 422 GW?

 

434238000 kg = 434*10^9 g/44g/mol = 9*10^9 mol CO₂ , hence 324*10^6 kg O₂ required per year, which is 0.9*10^6 kg or 900 tonnes per day.

[Strange]

Stringjunky has a good point in that if the public could see that burning fossil fuels was also affecting the Oxygen that they breathe, that it would be easier to get them on-side in being more prudent in their energy usage.

 

Maybe. But if you look at the more immediate and obvious effects such as air pollution (look at China, for example) then people still don't seem to react very strongly or quickly. (And, of course, at the risk of crossing into the topic of the other thread, coal-fired power stations are a much larger source of radioactivity than any other form.)

[Ant Sinclair]

Pavelcherapan below is a link to the CO2 output of Drax Power Station, in this article on wikipedia it says that this station in 2007 produced 22160000 tonnes of CO2, so would that be approximately 60700 tonnes per day yes?, if this is so is not 32/44ths of this O2?

 

 

 

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drax_power_station

Edited March 24, 2015 by Ant Sinclair

[Greg H.]

 

There is another way to calculate it and it gives an even scarier number. Here based on observations they give an average number of O₂/N₂ ratio decrease at ~19 per meg per year. The current ratio in the atm is (21/78*1000000) = 269231 per meg. Assuming that nitrogen doesn't come from anywhere in massive amounts and all O₂ lost will be incorporated in CO₂ and other oxides than we're looking at a target level of ~140000 per meg and with 19 per meg/year reduction it gives us 7368 years and now this is a very scary number.

This is my opinion - 7,000 years is optimistic. At the rate we breed and consume natural resources, if we're not off this planet in a sustainable fashion in the next 1,000 years, I doubt we'll make it as a species.

[Ant Sinclair]

Pavelcherapan below is a link to the CO2 output of Drax Power Station, in this article on wikipedia it says that this station in 2007 produced 22160000 tonnes of CO2, so would that be approximately 60700 tonnes per day yes?, if this is so is not 32/44ths of this O2?http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Drax_power_station

Drax is a 4GW Station or 1 1/100th approxiamtely of Chinas' projected increase of 422GW of coal generated energy by 2040.

If the 32/44ths assumption is correct then 32/44 x 60700 x 104 = 4,591,000 tonnes of O2 if these chinese stations run at a similar efficiency to Drax. This figure is half of My earlier approximation but drastically different to Your calculation.

[pavelcherepan]

This figure is half of My earlier approximation but drastically different to Your calculation.

 

That is because here I incorrectly read those to be GWh, not GW.

 

 

 

There is an overall increase in use of fossil fuels to produce an extra 422 Giga Watts of energy

 

So increase in power of 422 GW will result in an increase in energy production per year of ~3700 TWh. Which, using the number I used before (1029 kg CO₂/MWh) gets us to 3.8*10^12 kg of CO₂ per year or 10*10^9 kg CO₂ per day. And that equates to 7.5*10^6 tonnes of O₂ consumed per day.

 

Your original estimate was very close, mine was wrong.

[Ant Sinclair]

Thanks for Your reply Pavel, being on Scienceforums.net is all about learning and We are all learning on here daily, even the experts

Edited March 24, 2015 by Ant Sinclair

[Ant Sinclair]

Below is a link to a wikipedia article regarding Oxygen production and consumption. In this article in the Capacities and Flux section are two tables, Table1 is regarding Major Resevoirs involved in the Oxygen cycle and Table2 is regarding Annual gain and loss of Atmospheric Oxygen, should We be worried by increasing Oxygen Consumption and the loss of Oxygen Producers taking into account any resevoirs of Oxygen?

 

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen_cycle

[Essay]

As StringJunky mentioned, maybe focusing on Oxygen would help elucidate the intense significance of some of those reservoirs, capacities, and fluxes; especially that of the Amazon.

 

I highly recommend "Earth from Space" ...a PBS NOVA special, where you can read the transcript:

 

"...as for the Amazon as a whole, a fifth of the world’s oxygen is produced here. But there’s a surprising twist:

we will breathe almost none of it. Satellite data and ground measurements reveal

that almost all the oxygen the Amazon produces during the day remains there and is reabsorbed into the forest at night.

 

PIERS SELLERS: "With the advantage of the satellites, we can now see that the Amazon basically uses all its own oxygen and uses all its own carbon dioxide. It is, as far as we can tell, almost a closed system, in itself, almost."

 

"The soil of the rainforest is continually washed into the Amazon river system, taking with it nutrients and organic material. An average of 2,000,000 tons of this sediment is released every 24 hours. The sediment flows eastward, traveling 4,000 miles into the Amazon delta. Here, microscopic plankton near the surface thrive on the nutrients, and their population explodes."

 

"...the Aqua satellite shows us how a giant plankton bloom grows to cover 25,000 square miles.

This vast area translates into a huge boom in oxygen production, made available to the entire planet."

 

GENE FELDMAN: "Plankton in the ocean are responsible for over half of the oxygen that we breathe, and it’s what most creatures on this planet rely on to survive."

 

Yikes (what "ocean acidification" effects may occur to those long-evolved, plankton bloom cycles?)!!!

 

~

Edited March 25, 2015 by Essay

[imatfaal]

1. Not saying they are wrong - but those figures are from 1980. There has been a lot of change in climate modelling since then.

 

2. Yes - we should be concerned about any changes we are making to the environment. We have learnt that we do have the unfortunate capacity to affect the atmosphere in a potentially deleterious mannner over a short timescale. Once ones knows that fact it is impoosible to be sanguine about any large scale changes - the old argument that the earth is so massive as a system that we cannot seriously change/damage it is simply not true.

 

3. Any arguments based on less than supportable science will do a massive disservice to the necessary discourse on anthropogenic co2 based climate change.

 

4. There is also the point that climate change due to anthropogenic co2 emmission could make all of this completely academic - and conversely that solutions to CO2 problem will amost certainly fix any O2 problem

[Ant Sinclair]

As StringJunky mentioned, maybe focusing on Oxygen would help elucidate the intense significance of some of those reservoirs, capacities, and fluxes; especially that of the Amazon.

 

I highly recommend "Earth from Space" ...a PBS NOVA special, where you can read the transcript:

 

"...as for the Amazon as a whole, a fifth of the worlds oxygen is produced here. But theres a surprising twist:

we will breathe almost none of it. Satellite data and ground measurements reveal

that almost all the oxygen the Amazon produces during the day remains there and is reabsorbed into the forest at night.

 

PIERS SELLERS: "With the advantage of the satellites, we can now see that the Amazon basically uses all its own oxygen and uses all its own carbon dioxide. It is, as far as we can tell, almost a closed system, in itself, almost."

 

"The soil of the rainforest is continually washed into the Amazon river system, taking with it nutrients and organic material. An average of 2,000,000 tons of this sediment is released every 24 hours. The sediment flows eastward, traveling 4,000 miles into the Amazon delta. Here, microscopic plankton near the surface thrive on the nutrients, and their population explodes."

 

"...the Aqua satellite shows us how a giant plankton bloom grows to cover 25,000 square miles.

This vast area translates into a huge boom in oxygen production, made available to the entire planet."

 

GENE FELDMAN: "Plankton in the ocean are responsible for over half of the oxygen that we breathe, and its what most creatures on this planet rely on to survive."

 

Yikes (what "ocean acidification" effects may occur to those long-evolved, plankton bloom cycles?)!!!

 

Would You agree Essay that We need to take a close look at phytoplankton, its' abundance, its' general health and any processes that are destroying it?

 

~

[Essay]

Would You agree Essay that We need to take a close look at phytoplankton, its' abundance, its' general health and any processes that are destroying it?

 

Yes, I agree and I assume somebody is doing that, as fast and as thoroughly as possible, given funding. However, I'd worry more about other global changes; since those seem more likely to develop into catastrophic disruptions for civilization long before any problems with oxygen levels become noticeable.

 

~

[Ant Sinclair]

Yes, I agree and I assume somebody is doing that, as fast and as thoroughly as possible, given funding. However, I'd worry more about other global changes; since those seem more likely to develop into catastrophic disruptions for civilization long before any problems with oxygen levels become noticeable.

 

~

Thanks for Your reply Essay, would You know how these Oxygen resevoirs "come into play" as regards overall Oxygen levels that a lot of life on earth need to carry on living. And could You please expand a little more on these "other global changes" that could create "catastrophic disruptions" for civilisation?

[Essay]

Thanks for Your reply Essay, would You know how these Oxygen resevoirs "come into play" as regards overall Oxygen levels that a lot of life on earth need to carry on living. And could You please expand a little more on these "other global changes" that could create "catastrophic disruptions" for civilisation?

 

As a civilization, we are changing the chemistry of the atmosphere, oceans, and lands more extensively and more quickly than they have ever been simultaneously changed in over 20 million years.

 

Mostly this is due to the carbon dioxide excess, which by the end of the century will be at levels not seen for 30 million years, according to the National Research Council of the National Academies.

 

Changes in Albedo, or the reflectivity of the planet, caused by land-use & land-cover changes, as well as polar and glacial melting, are additional major changes attributed to civilization's reliance on extensive, energy-intensive agriculture, and other "extractives" industries.

 

And there is also the unprecedented (in life's evolutionary history, i think) problem with the Nitrogen Cycle!!!

At least that helps lay the foundation for some future civilization, since the "Dead Zones" that this problem creates are just the basis for future oil-shale & gas deposits.

 

But the acidification effect of CO2 on the oceans, as well as on the lands and to the hydrological cycle, may be more significant than CO2's pronounced effect on polar ice loss and other global "greenhouse" effects. Aside from a slight increase in erosion due to acidity (and in addition to the drought/flood-associated increase in erosion)....

 

Food chains are intricate webs of co-evolved species, which may be more vulnerable to disruptions in acidity on a global scale than we can imagine from our experiences with other problems locally and regionally. Though they are also more resilient than we can imagine, we are pushing many different "earth systems" more forcefully, and collectively, further than they've been pushed since we came down out of the trees and began walking upright. And by now, we've used up most of the easy-to-get resources, so it'd be too difficult for any modern civilization to start over again.

 

Even the delicate balances, which led to the evolution of the seasons and the good soils and the Temperate Zone and even to honeybees and earthworms, are not appreciated by most. And especially not appreciated by most is how very recently those essential fundamentals of modern civilization evolved, especially in comparison with the scale of the "tens of millions of years of" changes we now, within just a few decades or generations, are forcing into the global system. We need the honeybees and earthworms before we can expect to find any lands of milk and honey!

 

Life evolved to fit the conditions, and if we change the conditions so that they are as they were 20 to 30 million years ago, what do you think will happen to the life (and our agricultural crops and foods/fibers) adapted to today's conditions. Istm, it is likely today's life will be out-competed by other life, which still exists within niches around the globe, that is better adapted to those ancient conditions ...just waiting for some opportunity.

 

~

p.s. ...and there is the whole new antibiotic (genetics/immunology) resistance problem (and any new genetic engineering "reactions" or unintended consequences?) that could lead to various global threats to civilization; but sorry I don't know much about the oxygen reservoirs, other than it seems 20% depends upon the delicate balance of eroding nutrients supplied by the Amazon, of which much phosphorus and iron seasonally comes from the soils of the Sahara, across the Atlantic ...according to that "Earth from Space" summary.

Seasonal effects seem to be significant....

 

Follow the nutrients!

Edited March 26, 2015 by Essay

[Ant Sinclair]

In this link from wikipedia (http://en.m.wikipedi...ki/Oxygen_cycle) it states three Oxygen Resevoirs ie the Atmosphere, Biosphere and Lithosphere, if Oxygen is depleting from the Atmosphere by whatever rate, can Oxygen "leach" into the Atmosphere from the Biosphere and Lithosphere or is only the Atmospheres' Oxygen Resevoir applicable when calculating the net Oxygen available for life?

Edited March 26, 2015 by Ant Sinclair