When Volcanoes erupt and emit C02 into the atmosphere, what effect
does this have on climate?
Also is there anyone who could help some high school students with a
AiS (Adventures in Supercomputing) project about volcanoes?
Chris Stutts
Hi Chris,
I had to pass on your question to Dr. Don Thomas, our resident gas
geochemistry expert here at the University. Here is his reply:
The short answer is as follows:
As a long-term average, volcanism produces about 5X10^11 kg of CO2 per year;
that production, along with oceanic and terrestrial biomass cycling
maintained a carbon dioxide reservoir in the atmosphere of about 2.2X10^15
kg. Current fossil fuel and land use practices now introduce about a (net)
17.6X10^12 kg of CO2 into the atmosphere and has resulted in a progressively
increasing atmospheric reservoir of 2.69X10^15 kg of CO2. Hence, volcanism
produces about 3% of the total CO2 with the other 97% coming from
anthropogenic sources. For more detail, see Morse and Mackenzie, 1990,
Geochemistry of Sedimentary Carbonates.
I hope this helps to answer your question. As for the supercomputing part
I don't know, but I'll pass the request on to the computer guy who is
working at VolcanoWorld.
Sincerely,
Scott Rowland
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