Science: Health: Emergency Rescue
Treeline chancers   (+2, -1)  [vote for, against]
Line all the worlds roads with motionless cleaning crews.

By one calculation, there are 33,503,102 km of roads in the world.

Let us suppose that just 1/4 of this total is a climate and condition for planting trees on both sides of the road.

With 2 trees on each side of the road with every km, the calculation would be:

8,375,775 km x 2 x (25 pounds CO2 per young tree per year) = 418,788,775 pounds of C02 removed per year.

"To meet the Paris climate agreement - to global temperature rise below 2C - about 20 billion tonnes of CO2 would need to be removed from the atmosphere every year by 2100" -- BBC
-- 4and20, Oct 25 2019

All roads https://www.reddit....all_roads_on_earth/
Estimating their combined length [4and20, Oct 25 2019]

Moss bench https://www.forbes....n-a-grove-of-trees/
Takes more pollution than a grove of trees. [4and20, Oct 27 2019]

Idea gathering moss? https://sciencenord...arbon-sinks/1427326
Moss absorbed oxygen, not CO2 before being buried [4and20, Oct 27 2019]

(Hey [4and20], long time no see.) Since I live in the US under the greatest presidential ruler of all time, we got no climate change, and we don't need no stinking trees. Remember???
-- blissmiss, Oct 25 2019


// 20 billion tonnes of CO2 //

So, shut down three medium volcanoes, or one large one ?

Huynaputina, actually a rather small volcano, is good for about 5 x 10^6 tonnes per month - 60 million tonnes a year; and the same amount of SO2.

Over the next 80 years that's 4.8 billion tonnes ...

Remind us again how many large, active volcanoes there are on your planet ...

Oh, and what were those figures for the mid-ocean ridge solution vents again ? The ones your species has only just noticed, the ones that spew so much CO2 that they acidify the water over vast areas ?

While you're looking that up, why exactly was your planet in an ice age only 10kyears ago ? C'mon, it was almost within recorded history ... some Australian petroglyphs go back at least 27,000 years.
-- 8th of 7, Oct 25 2019


Apparently (or allegedly, depending on your level of trust) volcanoes globally release about 250 million tons of CO2 per year.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 25 2019


So in 80 years, that's your 20 billion tonnes, right there .... without taking any other sources into account.

If, that is, the figures are correct (which is debatable) and if there isn't another Toba, or Tambora, or Myvatn, or a Yellowstone, or the Campi Flegrei doesn't go pop ...
-- 8th of 7, Oct 25 2019


//or the Campi Flegrei doesn't go pop// Isn't that an Italian boy-band?
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 25 2019


A band, yes .... but boys ? Hard to be sure.

Definitely "non-binary".
-- 8th of 7, Oct 25 2019


I'm not getting the math. For a start, I'm not sure if billion is the US or European usage. But the BBC figure of 20 billion tonnes is per year. Seems like you could cut down all the world's volcanoes or boy bands and still get excessive hot air by huge factors anyway.
-- 4and20, Oct 26 2019


//not sure if billion is the US or European usage// "Billion" nowadays is always the short billion, i.e. 1,000,000,000 or 1000 million.

The older long system, where a billion was 1,000,000,000,000 (i.e., twice as many zeros as a million, or a million to the power of two, hence "bi-") and a trillion was 1,000,000,000,000,000,000 (i.e. three times as many zeros as a million, or a million to the power of three, hence "tri-") made more sense to me, but it's long gone.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 26 2019


Given the new knowledge to mesaure a billion...

The EPA states: "A typical passenger vehicle emits about 4.6 metric tons of carbon dioxide per year."

To meet the BBC CO2 limits, 4.3 billion cars a year, or really, every car on the road, would have to stop driving.

This very much appears to be a case of consumers taking the blame for what industrial polluters are doing instead.
-- 4and20, Oct 26 2019


Interesting ... so, what are the figures for all non-anthropogenic sources ?

Please don't omit the emissions from surface faults, solution into aquifers, naturally occurring coal seam fires, releases as a consequence of ice melt and decomposition of sedimentary rocks, biogenic emissions from natural yeasts ...

Take your time - innacurate or merely estimated (or indirect) dsta are worse than no data at all ...
-- 8th of 7, Oct 26 2019


As a person who's never had a problem with alcohol, I know there are limits to what I can control. I invite all people named 8th to explore volcanic fissures in detail.

The iea.org reports that "global energy-related CO2 emissions in 2018 to reach a historic high of 33.1 Gt CO2"

That's 33.1 gigatonnes or 33.1 thousand million tonnes, which accounts for the largest proportion of C02 emissions, problem eliminated if most people lived in volcanoes, or like Iceland does and Japan should, got their energy from volcanoes.
-- 4and20, Oct 26 2019


// largest proportion of C02 emissions, //

So, what actual percentage ?

What are the contributions from all sources, broken down as percentages ?

What are the total emissions from all sources ?

No estimates or proportions; accurate data. Show your working. Write on both sides of the paper. Use ink, via some form of writing instrument if possible - crayon is not acceptable, unless you can provide documentary proof that you are not permitted access to sharp objects. Close cover before striking. Not to be taken internally. Terms and conditions apply. Do not adjust your set. Do not exceed the stated dose. You will be Assimilated; resistance is futile.
-- 8th of 7, Oct 26 2019


Fair point. Badly phrased on my part. Another source states that natural sources of CO2 really dwarf anthropogenic sources and always have.

Assigning an overall percentage may be pointless unless a disproportionate amount from natural sources is being exacerbated in a cycle from manmade ones.
-- 4and20, Oct 26 2019


Facts, facts, facts ...
-- 8th of 7, Oct 26 2019


As a definite skeptic when it comes to anthropogenic climate change, I'm nevertheless satisfied that human activity is responsible for the large (relative) change in atmospheric CO2. There's not much else that's changed in the last 100 years or so on which to pin it.

Now, whether the CO2 increase from 0.03% to its current 0.04% has any significant effect on climate is a much trickier problem. The basic physics says "no way", unless you invoke some very strange ideas.

But, have humans raised our atmosphere's CO2 content? Yes, almost certainly.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 26 2019


[MB], just for my own education, could you provide a link/reference for the //strange ideas// please?

Ta.
-- Frankx, Oct 26 2019


I don't think there's a site called "strange ideas". My point was that if you just calculate the effect of an extra 0.01% of CO2 on the absorption of infra-red, it's not significant.
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 26 2019


//if you just calculate the effect of an extra 0.01% of CO2 on the absorption of infra-red//

...
-- FlyingToaster, Oct 26 2019


What, you want me to go and wake up my pet physicist at this time of night?
-- MaxwellBuchanan, Oct 26 2019


SOLUTION: If roadways or 100 million households were planted with the linked trees -- or just moss-covered trees --, we'd suck that CO2 all the way back to 8th's lunar system.

I also had the idea of planting moss on top of cars.
-- 4and20, Oct 27 2019


No, in the morning will be fine.
-- pocmloc, Oct 27 2019


In a bizarre twist, it's possible that moss and/or some plants start to absorb oxygen instead of C02 if the temperature rises. [link]
-- 4and20, Oct 27 2019



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