Forests And Oceans As Carbon Sinks

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major sources of carbon dioxide presently and historically. They are industrial activity, land use change and cement plants. The carbon dioxide from industrial activity mainly comes from fossil fuel burning and is by far the most abundant of sources. The carbon dioxide from land use change comes mostly from deforestation which occurs mostly in Brazil, Indonesia and Columbia. The last major source of carbon dioxide in the earth's atmosphere is the emission from cement plants. Carbonaceous material used for making cement releases significant amounts of carbon dioxide. This source is fairly large since cement is used for roads, bridges, buildings and powering and manufacturing plants.

SINKS:

1) A carbon dioxide sink is a storage reservoir that increases in size, and the carbon dioxide sink size or strength is the rate that the storage reservoir grows.

OCEANS AS CARBON DIOXIDE SINKS:

1) Oceans can regulate carbon in three different ways: by physical processes, ...

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to the lack of solar energy, resulting in very little biological activity below a certain level. In addition to sunlight, nutrients such as nitrogen and phosphates are needed for biological production. The euphotic zone, where sunlight is sufficient for photosynthesis, tends to lack these nutrients and the deeper zones, where sunlight is not sufficient, tends to have nutrient-rich water. If a mechanism were available to bring the deep water containing nutrients to the euphotic zone, phytoplankton and algae would flourish, as would the marine life that live on these tiny organisms, thus allowing more consumption of carbon dioxide.

2) The Antarctic Ocean has a limiting factor for ...

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