A Hidden Loop In the Carbon Cycle Discovered

Googlesaysmysiteisdangerousanditisn't! writes "A recent article in Science says that researchers in China and the US have found massive carbon uptake in the world's deserts. The effects of this are huge. 35% of the Earth's land surface is desert, and the uptake equates to 5.2 billion tons of carbon sequestered each year. This is more than half of the carbon released by humans. In these 'dry oceans,' the grains of sand allow the carbon dioxide to enter and react with alkaline soil to become carbonates. Another scientist suspects that biotic desert crusts, alkaline soils, and increased precipitation may be driving the uptake."

Comments

Re:PDF

[Anonymous Coward]

OSX/Safari/Preview doesn't have problems with PDFs. Maybe you should stop using Windows and Adobe Acrobat Reader.

Re:At what point does ythis break down?

[Profane MuthaFucka]

I think we all get the TRUE meaning of your little posting here. "Vote for Bush, er, McCain"

You say that we should keep on dumping trillions of tons of CO2 into the atmosphere, and if we stop something bad might happen. Excuse me, but that's backwards. It's a little like shitting in the corner every day, and when someone objects you say that you've been shitting in the corner for 10 years. If you stopped shitting in the corner, something bad might happen, so we'd better keep shitting in the corner to avoid rocking the boat.

That view seems awfully convenient and self-serving.