Ocean carbon versus land carbon sequestration

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Thomas Goreau

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Aug 9, 2018, 3:59:02 PM8/9/18
to Greg Rau, Carbon Dioxide Removal, edi...@sciam.com, alysha....@geo.uzh.ch, l...@zurich.ibm.com, Soil Age
Unfortunately these errors are all too typical of the sort of nonsense about marine carbon widely propagated in the popular press.

Terrrestrial biomass is around 200 times greater than ocean biomass.

Dissolved organic carbon is very resistant to decomposition, it is composed of residues inedible to bacteria that lasts for thousands of years but forms slowly. 

Most terrestrial biomass is soil carbon with lifetimes of centuries to millennia, and woody tree trunks with lifetime of decades to centuries, but most ocean biomass dies, rots, or is eaten and returned to the atmosphere as CO2 in just days.

All this stuff recently posted about growing marine biomass as a carbon sink is literally pie in the sky, you just can’t grow it fast enough and keep it from recycling to make the difference needed to atmospheric CO2.

Soil carbon enhancement is the only likely way to cost-effectively store carbon and bank it to increase positive future benefits in soil fertility and food production.

On the other hand most CDR proposals are far more costly, and by removing CO2 and blocking the natural recycling of carbon, are just running down the future capacity of the biosphere to safely regulate global atmospheric composition, temperatures, water supplies, and food, our planetary life support systems.

Soil carbon enhancement could draw down the dangerous excess CO2 to safe levels in decades if we used state of the art carbon farming methods, but unfortunately only a few people are now doing so. 

The solutions to runaway global warming lie in the soil and terrestrial vegetation, not the oceans.

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734


On Aug 9, 2018, at 8:55 AM, Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net> wrote:



"From undulating surface to inky black depths, Earth’s oceans are littered with the carcasses of tiny life-forms called phytoplankton that in life form the basis of the marine food chain.

These microscopic ghosts contain a reservoir of carbon estimated at a staggering 662 gigatons—200 times greater than the amount stored in all living plants and animals—that could come back to haunt us if unleashed from its watery grave as planet-warming carbon dioxide.

Some of the carbon-containing molecules in these plankton remnants will remain locked away for millions of years on the seafloor, but some will break down and enter the atmosphere as carbon dioxide. A huge portion will continue to circulate freely in the ocean for generations. But exactly which molecules are destined for which fate—and therefore how much of this vast carbon pool is headed for the atmosphere via ocean warming, acidification, sunlight or digestion by microbes—is an outstanding question. Answering it requires a clearer picture of the structure of the molecules that contain this carbon. An international team of scientists has now taken the first “photographs” of these molecules in an effort to start parsing that out. This first glimpse suggests that while a catastrophic breakdown and release of carbon seems unlikely, there is much left to understand about the behavior of oceanic carbon."

GR - Some inexcusable errors here.  Carcasses of phytoplankton do not constitute 662 Gt C, but rather dissolved organic carbon (DOC) derived from biomass (mostly marine) constitute some 700 Gt C in the ocean (IPCC 2013, Fig. 6.1). Living marine biomass is only 3 Gt. Meantime, living biomass on land is some 500 Gt C. So no way is DOC "200 times greater than the [C] amount stored in all living plants and animals". Nevertheless, we indeed need to make sure that the DOC doesn't "come back to haunt us" such as if climate change accelerates DOC respiration.  For further perspective, the ocean contains 38,000 Gt C in dissolved inorganic form, dwarfing any other reservoir in contact with the atmosphere (850 Gt C). I.e it's pretty clear where nature likes to store C; shall we follow her lead or try to do something different?

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Thomas Goreau

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Aug 9, 2018, 3:59:38 PM8/9/18
to Wil Burns, Soil Age, Carbon Dioxide Removal
Dear Wil,

We have written numerous papers and books, and spoken about this at conferences, for more than 30 years. 

There is a large global network of people of people working on this, but those of us working on naturally sound solutions are not involved with the geo-engineering groups, because we think their efforts are misplaced, although they seem to get all the publicity.

I’d be glad to talk to you but I’m right now in Maui designing coral reef and beach regeneration projects and don’t carry a phone.

Skype can work, but I’m heading soon to give an invited keynote talk on sustainable whole-ecosystem mariculture (and new far more cost effective methods of coastal wetland carbon sequestration) at the Amsterdam Aquaculture conference. 

Should be in Cambridge briefly after the 16th and suggest we talk then.

Best wishes,
Tom

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734


On Aug 9, 2018, at 9:28 AM, Wil Burns <w...@feronia.org> wrote:

Dear Thomas. Could we chat on the phone about a workshop idea I have? Wil

From: carbondiox...@googlegroups.com <carbondiox...@googlegroups.com> on behalf of Thomas Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org>
Sent: Thursday, August 9, 2018 12:20:19 PM
To: Greg Rau
Cc: Carbon Dioxide Removal; edi...@sciam.com; alysha....@geo.uzh.ch; l...@zurich.ibm.com; Soil Age
Subject: [CDR] Ocean carbon versus land carbon sequestration
 

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Thomas Goreau

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Aug 9, 2018, 5:54:29 PM8/9/18
to Greg Rau, Alysha Coppola, Carbon Dioxide Removal, Soil Age
It is unfortunate that the press almost always gets the scientific details wrong and does not check their “facts” with the authors, who would immediately find the embarrassing mistakes made by journalists that their colleagues will blame them for later. 

In this case the real point of the paper, not made in the press article, is that global warming would be expected to increase the rate of decomposition of dissolved organic carbon in the ocean, and therefore act as a positive feedback mechanism accelerating CO2 increase and global warming, just like the increasing rate of microbial decomposition of soil organic carbon (another large pool with long lifetimes).

Reversing both these trends is key to stabilizing CO2 at safe levels, much more so than costly geo-engineering with unknown efficiency and side effects, which are mostly temporary band aids to hide the symptoms rather than really sustainably solve the problem!

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734


On Aug 9, 2018, at 10:57 AM, Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net> wrote:

Alysha in not a member of CDR so I'm forwarding her response to the CDR list.
Greg


From: Alysha Coppola <alysha....@geo.uzh.ch>
To: Thomas Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org>
Cc: Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net>; Carbon Dioxide Removal <carbondiox...@googlegroups.com>; "edi...@sciam.com" <edi...@sciam.com>; "l...@zurich.ibm.com" <l...@zurich.ibm.com>; Soil Age <soil...@googlegroups.com>; Chris Sciacca <c...@zurich.ibm.com>
Sent: Thursday, August 9, 2018 12:32 PM
Subject: Re: Ocean carbon versus land carbon sequestration

Hi All,

I agree there are some errors, but we did not see a proof before it when out.  Our paper wasn’t about decomposition of DOC with warmer temperatures, but about visualizing these compounds to give clues about it’s persistence in the ocean.  

Yes, I agree it should be specified that we’re talking about the dissolved organic carbon pool.  These “carcasses (i.e. dead) of phytoplankton” should be explicitly stated as dissolved organic carbon, which forms the majority of phytoplankton/living biomass forms the DOC pool.  But we’re talking about the same thing here.   This is to have a catchy title for the general audience.

The 662 Gt is from Hansel et al., 2009 paper. And the 200 times is from this paper as well-holding greater than 200x the carbon inventory of marine biomass. This is an error. 

I agree- and as I was quoted in the article- this carbon is ancient, and from our paper it shows that the structure might explain it’s recalcitrance in the deep ocean.  With increasing temperatures, we may reimeralize some of this DOC- but not this old carbon in the deep. The temperature change hasn’t reached past 1000m, and this most recent study only found a 7 Gt decrease from temperatures of 1oC warming in labile and semi-labile pools.The labile and semi-labile pools are a small percentage of the total DOC, which is mostly refractory according to Hansell’s definition. 

And I agree- there’s that 4 per mil initiative to store carbon in soils. 

Thomas Goreau

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Aug 9, 2018, 5:55:39 PM8/9/18
to Greg Rau, Alysha Coppola, Carbon Dioxide Removal, Soil Age
To avoid more confusion, there are in fact two different papers being referred to. Each reveals different important aspects of marine organic carbon storage.

The first focuses on the potential positive feedback from dissolved ocean organic carbon with temperature enhanced decomposition in surface waters.

The second paper is on the physical structure of deep dissolved organic carbon, which finds that the material in the deep sea is largely black carbon, very old and highly resistant to decomposition, and so might be less affected by global warming in surface water. Black carbon is very similar in composition to biochar and is largely derived in significant part from erosion by water and wind of biochar residues in soils from ancient forest fires.

Titles and abstracts of both papers are below.


ORIGINAL RESEARCH ARTICLE

Front. Mar. Sci., 12 January 2018 | https://doi.org/10.3389/fmars.2017.00436

Large Stimulation of Recalcitrant Dissolved Organic Carbon Degradation by Increasing Ocean Temperatures


Abstract:
More than 96% of organic carbon in the ocean is in the dissolved form, most of it with lifetimes of decades to millennia. Yet, we know very little about the temperature sensitivity of dissolved organic carbon (DOC) degradation in a warming ocean. Combining independent estimates from laboratory experiments, oceanographic cruises and a global ocean DOC cycling model, we assess the relationship between DOC decay constants and seawater temperatures. Our results show that the apparent activation energy of DOC decay (Ea) increases by three-fold from the labile (lifetime of days) and semi-labile (lifetime of months) to the semi-refractory (lifetime of decades) DOC pools, with only minor differences between the world's largest ocean basins. This translates into increasing temperature coefficients (Q10) from 1.7–1.8 to 4–8, showing that the generalized assumption of a constant Q10 of ~2 for biological rates is not universally applicable for the microbial degradation of DOC in the ocean. Therefore, rising ocean temperatures will preferentially impact the microbial degradation of the more recalcitrant and larger of the three studied pools. Assuming a uniform 1°C warming scenario throughout the ocean, our model predicts a global decrease of the DOC reservoir by 7 ± 1 Pg C. This represents a 15% reduction of the semi-labile + semi-refractory DOC pools.




Cycling of black carbon in the ocean

Geophysical Research LettersVolume 43, Issue 9First published: 11 April 2016Black carbon (BC) is a by‐product of combustion from wildfires and fossil fuels and is a slow‐cycling component of the carbon cycle. Whether BC accumulates and ages on millennial time scales in the world oceans has remained unknown. Here we quantified dissolved BC (DBC) in marine dissolved organic carbon isolated by solid phase extraction at several sites in the world ocean. We find that DBC in the Atlantic, Pacific, and Arctic oceans ranges from 1.4 to 2.6 μM in the surface and is 1.2 ± 0.1 μM in the deep Atlantic. The average 14C age of surface DBC is 4800 ± 620 14C years and much older in a deep water sample (23,000 ± 3000 14C years). The range of DBC structures and 14C ages indicates that DBC is not homogeneous in the ocean. We show that there are at least two distinct pools of marine DBC, a younger pool that cycles on centennial time scales and an ancient pool that cycles on >105 year time scales.

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734

Thomas Goreau

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Aug 9, 2018, 8:17:52 PM8/9/18
to Margaret Torn, Greg Rau, Alysha Coppola, Carbon Dioxide Removal, Soil Age
A large part of the highly resistant fine black carbon in the deep sea is derived from water or wind erosion of biochar in soil produced (very inefficiently) by forest fires that ends up in the deep sea.

The rest is from polymerization of marine organic matter, but this much less rich in lignin and aromatic organic carbon that is the precursor to biochar.

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734


On Aug 9, 2018, at 2:02 PM, Margaret Torn <mst...@lbl.gov> wrote:

I will chime in with two more cents, about soil C and DOC, just to clarify something:

Thomas G wrote that "Dissolved organic carbon is very resistant to decomposition, it is composed of residues inedible to bacteria that lasts for thousands of years but forms slowly."  Was this for soil DOC or ocean? For soil, this kind of generalization is not meaningful. DOC can be a large range of compounds. If you have to generalize, it is more generally  the case DOC is the pool of soil that turns over most quickly, on order of hours - weeks. Once soil OC is sorbed to minerals or protected in aggregates, it may persist for centuries to millennia as he wrote.

The question about marine biomass is not whether most of it turns over quickly. The way you would get a sink is if some fraction sinks to deeper water where it tends to persist--and if that fraction is large enough to create a large sink. I'm not saying it will sink and I'm not advocating that approach.  I just wanted to point out that the fact that most near-surface ocean OC turns over quickly is not sufficient grounds for saying it won't work.

Thanks


On Thu, Aug 9, 2018 at 1:57 PM, Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net> wrote:
Alysha in not a member of CDR so I'm forwarding her response to the CDR list.
Greg


From: Alysha Coppola <alysha....@geo.uzh.ch>
To: Thomas Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org>

Sent: Thursday, August 9, 2018 12:32 PM
Subject: Re: Ocean carbon versus land carbon sequestration
Hi All,

I agree there are some errors, but we did not see a proof before it when out.  Our paper wasn’t about decomposition of DOC with warmer temperatures, but about visualizing these compounds to give clues about it’s persistence in the ocean.  

Yes, I agree it should be specified that we’re talking about the dissolved organic carbon pool.  These “carcasses (i.e. dead) of phytoplankton” should be explicitly stated as dissolved organic carbon, which forms the majority of phytoplankton/living biomass forms the DOC pool.  But we’re talking about the same thing here.   This is to have a catchy title for the general audience.

The 662 Gt is from Hansel et al., 2009 paper. And the 200 times is from this paper as well-holding greater than 200x the carbon inventory of marine biomass. This is an error. 

I agree- and as I was quoted in the article- this carbon is ancient, and from our paper it shows that the structure might explain it’s recalcitrance in the deep ocean.  With increasing temperatures, we may reimeralize some of this DOC- but not this old carbon in the deep. The temperature change hasn’t reached past 1000m, and this most recent study only found a 7 Gt decrease from temperatures of 1oC warming in labile and semi-labile pools.The labile and semi-labile pools are a small percentage of the total DOC, which is mostly refractory according to Hansell’s definition. 

And I agree- there’s that 4 per mil initiative to store carbon in soils. 



On Aug 9, 2018, at 9:20 PM, Thomas Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org> wrote:

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Denise Ward

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Aug 9, 2018, 11:18:28 PM8/9/18
to Soil Age, Wil Burns, Carbon Dioxide Removal
You know this is kinda funny - you're traveling across the world using fossil fuels????  This IS a BIG  problem. I hope you don't also drive an SUV? Where is our morality if we believe we are poisoning our planet and we continue to do these things? Especially now when we have skype and remote meeting technolgies. What kind of mentors are we if even environmentalists use fossil fuel like a Republican?

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Denise Ward

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Aug 9, 2018, 11:18:28 PM8/9/18
to Soil Age, Greg Rau, Carbon Dioxide Removal, edi...@sciam.com, alysha....@geo.uzh.ch, l...@zurich.ibm.com
Can't you make this known somehow? Get onto interviews or drop leaflets from planes? After all they drop aluminum...

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Thomas Goreau

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Aug 10, 2018, 1:25:24 AM8/10/18
to Soil Age, Wil Burns, Carbon Dioxide Removal
I have not had a car for at least 10 years. My projects restoring coral reefs and beaches around the world are too far to swim to.

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734

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Thomas Goreau

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Aug 10, 2018, 1:25:29 AM8/10/18
to Soil Age, Wil Burns
We train people hands-on in new methods to restore their own environment, this intensive one to one training cannot be done by video.

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734

On Aug 9, 2018, at 5:12 PM, Denise Ward <denis...@gmail.com> wrote:

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Thomas Goreau

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Aug 11, 2018, 12:07:30 AM8/11/18
to Robert Tulip, Greg Rau, Carbon Dioxide Removal, edi...@sciam.com, alysha....@geo.uzh.ch, l...@zurich.ibm.com, Soil Age
Dear Robert,

Almost all ocean productivity is limited by lack of nitrogen and phosphorus. 

There is excess iron in all coastal zones, and in ocean areas downwind from them. 

The areas of the ocean that are iron limited are only a very small proportion of the ocean, in very remote ocean gyres far from dust transport, and around Antarctica. 

These areas are the biological deserts of the ocean, so fertilization of them starts starts at the smallest baseline possible (but seems large proportionately even though not in absolute terms). 

The CO2 effect you describe is likely more due to increased solubility of CO2 in very cold  bottom water formation around Antarctica than increased storage of carbon in marine sediments. 

But this will be upwelled again in about 1500 years, less if deep water formation was greater than now.

The absence of anoxia during the Ice Ages was due to the greatly increased oxygen solubility in the cold sinking water around Antarctica.

But our current scenario is the opposite: high temperatures driving oxygen out of hot water, and increasing microbial decomposition of sedimentary organic carbon,leading to vastly increasing ocean dead zones. 

Global ocean dead zones are the real negative CO2 feedback global ocean carbon sink, by turning the oceans into a dead zone stinking of hydrogen sulfide, devoid of fish and anything but microbes, in which carbon piles up un-rotted in black shales on the ocean floor. 

This happened in every geological period of high CO2 and high temperature, and is why those periods ended. 

Killing the oceans does not seem a desirable solution, coral reef ecosystems vanished for several million years each time (although the coral species persisted in marginal habitats).

If we are to stop the global warming caused mass extinction of coral reef ecosystems, which we are ALREADY most of the way through, we need CO2 removal mechanisms that will work in decades, not in the millennia constrained by ocean mixing times.

In brief, ocean sinks seem to me to be unlikely to be as efficient or as fast as is needed NOW. 

On the other hand, carbon farming using rock powders, biochar, and compost could remove the excess easily in decades if most farmers regenerated their soil fertility, instead of running it down, as almost all now do, and as proposed BECCS would only increase.

Best wishes,
Tom

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734


On Aug 10, 2018, at 3:26 AM, Robert Tulip <rtuli...@yahoo.com.au> wrote:

Dear Thomas, 
 
Your claim that "the solutions to runaway global warming lie in the soil and terrestrial vegetation, not the oceans" appears to conflict with a dominant natural cooling mechanism of our planet. 
 
As I mentioned in reply to comments from Greg Rau, a paper published in Science available at Dust in the wind drove iron fertilization during ice age, found that “iron fertilization of Southern Ocean plankton can explain roughly half of the CO2 decline during peak ice ages”.  This scale of impact, removing about 50 parts per million of CO2, could potentially be replicated in time frames relevant to anthropogenic climate change, especially since this increase in primary productivity due to dust also involves increased deposition of carbon to the ocean floor, as explained by Hendy.
 
The massive increase in ocean primary productivity in the ice ages, when CO2 level fell by 100 ppm, did not produce anoxia, or the other hypothetical adverse effects that people have posited, as indicated in benthic sediments.  The amount of unused nutrient in the High Nutrient Low Chlorophyll regions of the world ocean, more than sixty million square kilometres in size, is enough to significantly increase the ocean primary biomass, with likely flow-on benefits for biodiversity and cooling. 
 
Clearly there is much more need for research, especially computer modelling and field tests. The rationale is that working out the best ways to mimic the natural cooling feedback amplifiers of the ice age, for example using iron salt aerosol, could well remove more carbon than the decarbonisation plans of the Paris Accord, at a fraction of the cost and risk.  

Robert Tulip


From: Thomas Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org>
To: Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net>
Cc: Carbon Dioxide Removal <carbondiox...@googlegroups.com>; "edi...@sciam.com" <edi...@sciam.com>; "alysha....@geo.uzh.ch" <alysha....@geo.uzh.ch>; "l...@zurich.ibm.com" <l...@zurich.ibm.com>; Soil Age <soil...@googlegroups.com>
Sent: Friday, 10 August 2018, 5:20

Subject: [CDR] Ocean carbon versus land carbon sequestration

Thomas Goreau

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Aug 11, 2018, 12:08:10 AM8/11/18
to Brian Cady, Robert Tulip, Greg Rau, Carbon Dioxide Removal, edi...@sciam.com, alysha....@geo.uzh.ch, l...@zurich.ibm.com, Soil Age
That’s about right, but it is almost all the one fifth of the ocean with the lowest productivity. 

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734


On Aug 10, 2018, at 8:56 AM, Brian Cady <brianc...@gmail.com> wrote:

I thought iron limited oceanic areas totalled about 20% of the world's oceans, or 14% of the world's area
"HNLC regions cover 20% of the world’s oceans and are characterized by varying physical, chemical, and biological patterns."

Brian

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Thomas Goreau

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Aug 14, 2018, 6:10:15 PM8/14/18
to Charles Greene, Robert Tulip, Greg Rau, Carbon Dioxide Removal, edi...@sciam.com, alysha....@geo.uzh.ch, l...@zurich.ibm.com, Soil Age
A major factor in the Ice Age drawdown, which is claimed to be due to iron fertilization of phytoplankton seems instead/also to be the increased formation of very cold deep water around Antarctica with very high dissolved CO2 content due to the cold temperatures.

Thomas J. F. Goreau, PhD
President, Global Coral Reef Alliance
President, Biorock Technology Inc.
Coordinator, Soil Carbon Alliance
Coordinator, United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development Small Island Developing States Partnership in New Sustainable Technologies
37 Pleasant Street, Cambridge, MA 02139
gor...@globalcoral.org
www.globalcoral.org
Skype: tomgoreau
Tel: (1) 617-864-4226

Books:

Geotherapy: Innovative Methods of Soil Fertility Restoration, Carbon Sequestration, and Reversing CO2 Increase
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466595392

Innovative Methods of Marine Ecosystem Restoration
http://www.crcpress.com/product/isbn/9781466557734


On Aug 14, 2018, at 7:24 AM, Charles Greene <ch...@cornell.edu> wrote:

Note the following quote from the “Dust in the Wind” website that was cited:

"Although Martin had proposed that purposeful iron addition to the Southern Ocean could reduce the rise in atmospheric CO2, Sigman noted that the amount of CO2 removed though iron fertilization is likely to be minor compared to the amount of CO2 that humans are now pushing into the atmosphere.”

“The dramatic fertilization that we observed during ice ages should have caused a decline in atmospheric CO2 over hundreds of years, which was important for climate changes over ice age cycles,” Sigman said. “But for humans to duplicate it today would require unprecedented engineering of the global environment, and it would still only compensate for less than 20 years of fossil fuel burning.”


On Aug 10, 2018, at 6:26 AM, 'Robert Tulip' via Carbon Dioxide Removal <CarbonDiox...@googlegroups.com> wrote:

Dear Thomas, 
 
Your claim that "the solutions to runaway global warming lie in the soil and terrestrial vegetation, not the oceans" appears to conflict with a dominant natural cooling mechanism of our planet. 
 
As I mentioned in reply to comments from Greg Rau, a paper published in Science available at Dust in the wind drove iron fertilization during ice age, found that “iron fertilization of Southern Ocean plankton can explain roughly half of the CO2 decline during peak ice ages”.  This scale of impact, removing about 50 parts per million of CO2, could potentially be replicated in time frames relevant to anthropogenic climate change, especially since this increase in primary productivity due to dust also involves increased deposition of carbon to the ocean floor, as explained by Hendy.
 
The massive increase in ocean primary productivity in the ice ages, when CO2 level fell by 100 ppm, did not produce anoxia, or the other hypothetical adverse effects that people have posited, as indicated in benthic sediments.  The amount of unused nutrient in the High Nutrient Low Chlorophyll regions of the world ocean, more than sixty million square kilometres in size, is enough to significantly increase the ocean primary biomass, with likely flow-on benefits for biodiversity and cooling. 
 
Clearly there is much more need for research, especially computer modelling and field tests. The rationale is that working out the best ways to mimic the natural cooling feedback amplifiers of the ice age, for example using iron salt aerosol, could well remove more carbon than the decarbonisation plans of the Paris Accord, at a fraction of the cost and risk.  

Robert Tulip


From: Thomas Goreau <gor...@globalcoral.org>
To: Greg Rau <gh...@sbcglobal.net>

Sent: Friday, 10 August 2018, 5:20
Subject: [CDR] Ocean carbon versus land carbon sequestration

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Seth Itzkan

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Aug 15, 2018, 9:35:00 AM8/15/18
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Excellent point. Thank you Tom. 

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Sally Dodge

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Aug 15, 2018, 4:01:06 PM8/15/18
to soil...@googlegroups.com, Charles Greene, Robert Tulip, Greg Rau, Carbon Dioxide Removal, edi...@sciam.com, alysha....@geo.uzh.ch, l...@zurich.ibm.com
Have you seen this? It is an amazing lecture and important! The first 34 minutes are the bad news; the rest is how we will personally deal with the realities of climate change. The questions at the end and his answers are also illuminating. Thanks to Tom Newmark at Carbon Underground for bringing it to our attention. 


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John Steven Bianucci

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Aug 15, 2018, 5:38:01 PM8/15/18
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Thank you, Sally. 

Sincerely,

John Steven Bianucci
Director of Impact
Iroquois Valley Farmland REIT, PBC
847.401.6050
"In every deliberation we must consider the impact on the
seventh generation"  - Iroquois Great Law of Peace 

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Sally Dodge

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Aug 15, 2018, 5:47:49 PM8/15/18
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Glad you saw this, JSB — it is an amazing speech! I have been trying to figure out how to speak to my grandchildren about what to do as the world is ending. This lays it out …. generosity, be in the moment, love the place you live and take care of it, love your loved ones, be of service. 

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Deane Belfield

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Aug 15, 2018, 7:00:45 PM8/15/18
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Sally
Have you tried to listen to the video? The sound quality is very bad. Is there a better recording? 

Regards 
Deane, (Regenerative Australian Farmers)
Australia
0414 617542

Sally Dodge

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Aug 16, 2018, 7:03:23 AM8/16/18
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Mine worked fine. We watched it last night on Apple TV, but the slides of photos and charts didn’t come up, as they did on my computer. 
Maybe try a different device. 

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