If this is true,with the biomass photosynthesis of CO2 and converting it to oxygen, it would seem to point to a self regulating effect of the biosphere on climate.The new study goes with this item reported on WUWT in June 2008.
Surprise: Earths’ Biosphere is Booming, Satellite Data Suggests CO2 the Cause
The SeaWiFS instrument aboard the Seastar satellite has been collecting ocean data since 1997. By monitoring the color of reflected light via satellite, scientists can determine how successfully plant life is photosynthesizing. A measurement of photosynthesis is essentially a measurement of successful growth, and growth means successful use of ambient carbon. This animation shows an average of 10 years worth of SeaWiFS data. Dark blue represents warmer areas where there tends to be a lack of nutrients, and greens and reds represent cooler nutrient-rich areas which support life. The nutrient-rich areas include coastal regions where cold water rises from the sea floor bringing nutrients along and areas at the mouths of rivers where the rivers have brought nutrients into the ocean from the land.
See an animation of the Earth;s Biosphere: 512×288 (30 fps) MPEG-1 10 MB. More here at NASA SVS
More oxygen – colder climate
From the University of Copenhagen news release. 9 September 2009
Using a completely new method, researchers have shown that high atmospheric and oceanic oxygen content makes the climate colder. In prehistoric times, the earth experienced two periods of large increases and fluctuations in the oxygen level of the atmosphere and oceans. These fluctuations also lead to an explosion of multicellular organisms in the oceans, which are the predecessors for life as we know it today. The results are now being published in Nature.
Everybody talks about CO2 and other greenhouse gases as causes of global warming and the large climate changes we are currently experiencing. But what about the atmospheric and oceanic oxygen content? Which role does oxygen content play in global warming?
This question has become extremely relevant now that Professor Robert Frei from the Department of Geography and Geology at the University of Copenhagen, in collaboration with colleagues from Departamento de Geologı´a, Facultad de Ciencias in Uruguay, Newcastle University and the University of Southern Denmark, has established that there is a historical correlation between oxygen and temperature fluctuations towards global cooling.
The team of researchers reached their conclusions via analyses of iron-rich stones, so called banded iron formations, from different locations around the globe and covering a time span of more than 3,000 million years. Their discovery was made possible by a new analytical method which the research team developed. This method is based on analysis of chrome isotopes – different chemical variants of the element chrome. It turned out that the chrome isotopes in the iron rich stones reflect the oxygen content of the atmosphere. The method is a unique tool, which makes it possible to examine historical changes in the atmospheric oxygen content and thereby possible climate changes.
“But we can simply conclude that high oxygen content in seawater enables a lot of life in the oceans “consuming” the greenhouse gas CO2, and which subsequently leads to a cooling of the earth’s surface. Throughout history our climate has been dependent on balance between CO2 and atmospheric oxygen. The more CO2 and other greenhouse gases, the warmer the climate has been. But we still don’t know much about the process which drives the earth from a period with a warmer climate towards an “ice age” with colder temperatures – other than that oxygen content plays an important role. It would therefore be interesting to consider atmospheric and oceanic oxygen contents much more in research aiming at understanding and tackling the causes of the current climate change,” says Professor Robert Frei.
The results Professor Frei and his international research team have obtained indicate that there have been two periods in the earth’s 4.5 billion year history where a significant change in the atmospheric and oceanic oxygen content has occurred. The first large increase took place in between 2.45 billion years and 2.2 billion years ago. The second “boost” occurred for only 800 to 542 million years ago and lead to an oxidisation of the deep oceans and thereby the possibility for life to exist at those depths.
”To understand the future, we have to understand the past. The two large increases in the oxygen content show, at the very least, that the temperature decreased. We hope that these results can contribute to our understanding of the complexity of climate change. I don’t believe that humans have a lot of influence on the major process of oxygen formation on a large scale or on the inevitable ice ages or variations in temperature that the Earth’s history is full of. But that doesn’t mean that we cannot do anything to slow down the current global warming trend. For example by increased forestry and other initiatives that help to increase atmospheric and oceanic oxygen levels,” explains Professor Robert Frei, who, along with his research team, has worked on the project for three years so far.
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Oh great!!! Now the AGW crowd will blame increased C02 on increased plant life, increased O2 and therefore … Global Cooling!
Pretty amazing to see the effect that the Congo River has all the way across the Atlantic Ocean.
“I don’t believe that humans have a lot of influence on the major process of oxygen formation on a large scale or on the inevitable ice ages or variations in temperature that the Earth’s history is full of.” That was an interesting comment made by Professor Robert Frei?!
Let me guess? The role of atmospheric oxygen has not yet been factored in to the GCM’s?
Al Pipkin (16:56:16) :
Oh great!!! Now the AGW crowd will blame increased C02 on increased plant life, increased O2 and therefore … Global Cooling!
As the subject of Oxygen already has been claimed as the “next scare” I would not worry too much about that.
Especially because your remark contains a contradiction:
We are still in a learning process, trying to understand the complex system that creates our climate.
Hopefully we will get the answers before we are send back into the Medieval Ages thanks to Collective Ignorance and Marxist Loons.
There were at least two other periods of very high oxygen levels.
300 million years ago during the Carboniferous which contained an ice age, low CO2 and very high vegetation output (lots of coal and oil comes from this period). O2 may have been as high as 35% of the atmosphere and forest fires would have been unstoppable without lots of rain.
100 million years ago during the Cretaceous when O2 was as high as 30%, CO2 was relatively low and temperatures were likely the highest in Earth’s history that we know about (4C higher than the PaleoEocene Thermal Maximum). Lots of oil and coal comes from this period as well. Sea levels may have risen 250 metres above today and flooded 20% of the continents.
So I’m not sure this proposition really holds throughout the record.
The press release still seems to focus on “greenhouse gas” as primary regulator of the earth’s climate, though affected by oxygen level.
So, oxygen may have as much of a positive effect on cooling as C02 has on warming; meaning, very little. “Increased forestry” sounds good in theory, not sure it has much practical value. How about better forestry practices, and not cutting or burning down rain forests to grow bio-fuels?
“The more CO2 and other greenhouse gases, the warmer the climate has been. ”
No. The warmer the climate has been the more CO2 and other greenhouse gases there have been in the atmosphere.
I have difficulty with the implication that it’s the gas that is making the temperature change.
We know that plants transpire one heck of a lot of water and self regulate their leaf temperature. This has been clearly measured. I could just as easily dream up a case where it was the trees cooling the place off and the O2 is just a side effect.
Or a scenario where the total convection of water vapor to altitude (from other drivers) disposed of a lot of excess heat, but also came down as extra rain, leading to more plant growth (both on land from the water and at sea from eroded nutrients.)
I don’t get it. Why is everyone so eager to leap off a cliff of conclusion about causality?
I would be much more willing to believe a paper that said, roughly, “We considered all the things that we thought might correlate and this is the list ranked by best supporting evidence. We like #2 best for these theoretical reasons, but #1 has more support in the data.”
For example, we’re all “wrapped around the axle” about CO2 warming the planet, yet what I’ve seen in GIStemp is that it has more to do with asphalt than with air. Yet only here do we hear folks say “maybe it’s the thermometer being over the asphalt.” Well maybe the O2 is just a side effect as well.
FWIW, Anthony, you really need to add an “Islands” thermometer validation project to http://www.surfacestations.org for the simple reason that in GIStemp, it can use a single bad surface station on an island to ‘warm’ the surrounding 20 degrees of latitude and longitude. Ellie pointed me at a couple of highly warming sites in the pacific. These two were Guam and the Marshall Islands. Guam, last I looked, was under the U.S.A. umbrella … so I think it rightly belongs in your audit of “U.S.A. Land Stations”.
Basically, in STEP3 of GIStemp when it pegs the (already molested) land data to grids and boxes, 2 island airports in the middle of the ocean can warm an area roughly the size of the entire continental U.S.A.; and it is pretty clear that the thermometers are often at major International Airports and Military bases. That has just got to have an impact…
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2009/09/08/gistemp-islands-in-the-sun/#comment-854
Just a nitpick, the light-dependent part of photosynthesis, which lead to water photolysis, produces O2 and 2H+. Oxygen is simply a waste product that comes from water.
CO2 and the 2H+ from water photolysis are then used to make sugars in the light-independent part of photosynthesis, giving water as the waste product. So it’s somewhat misleading to say that CO2 is converted to oxygen.
The news release is puzzling because the paper abstract doesn’t say a thing about temperatures. Sounds like editorializing by the author and friends.
What if it’s not about warming or cooling at all?
I mean, CO2 fertilizes plants and creates lot’s of lush plant life. That lush plant life uses lot’s of CO2, and creates lot’s of O2. All that could happen independent of any “forcing” going on by the gases involved.
Now, if it just so happens that warming planet creates more CO2, and also increases water vapor which increases rainfall, then, as the planet does some cooling, we use up this CO2 and make O2, you have the same thing happen, but the linkages are different.
As always, correlation does not prove causation.
I know this isn’t directly towards the idea behind the article, but if burning carbon-based materials is an exothermic reaction (generates heat), then is photo synthesis endothermic (absorbs heat) and if so, where does that heat drawn from?
more natural forests
less pavement
keep it simple stupid
(no need for CO2 mythology)
Carl (19:12:01) :
I know this isn’t directly towards the idea behind the article, but if burning carbon-based materials is an exothermic reaction (generates heat), then is photo synthesis endothermic (absorbs heat) and if so, where does that heat drawn from?
Sunlight, more specifically blue and red/orange wavelengths.
“there is a historical correlation between oxygen and temperature fluctuations towards global cooling.”
Right. Scientists who can’t get into their thick skulls that correlation doesn’t mean causation. Superfantastic.
“This method is based on analysis of chrome isotopes – different chemical variants of the element chrome. It turned out that the chrome isotopes in the iron rich stones reflect the oxygen content of the atmosphere.”
What the hell is “the element chrome” that has “chrome isotopes”? I can’t find that one on my periodic table. It’s very difficult to take seriously a “science” article that can’t get the correct name of an element.
REPLY: It is a UCLA press release, and the element is Chromium which has the symbol Cr and atomic number 24. – Anthony
I too thought use of the term “chrome” rather than chromium detracted from the article and unfortunately it does reflect unfavourably on this blog. It might be a thought to highlight that sort of sloppy reporting and state that the source is not Anthony Watts but whatever it happens to be. I can see it could be quite difficult but if not it provides further ammunition for the crowd at open mind and realclimate who spend hours denigrating WUWT.
There is no way that the biosphere could have created all of that O2. The conversion of CO2 AND H2O into hydrocarbons and O2 is nice and simple chemistry, but look at the amount of atmospheric oxygen involved. The biosphere is almost steady state more or less. Most atmospheric oxygen is the result of solar disassociation of water into O2 that gravity holds and H2 that drifts off into space. Only a water planet can have an oxygen enriched atmosphere. A large and dirty ocean will limit CO2, no photosynthesis needed.
The biosphere is an added modifier, not the main cause. The very early Iron bands are before the existence of the biosphere.
Bill Illis (17:33:29) : There were at least two other periods of very high oxygen levels.
300 million years ago during the Carboniferous which contained an ice age, low CO2 and very high vegetation output (lots of coal and oil comes from this period). O2 may have been as high as 35% of the atmosphere and forest fires would have been unstoppable without lots of rain.
100 million years ago during the Cretaceous when O2 was as high as 30%, CO2 was relatively low and temperatures were likely the highest in Earth’s history that we know about (4C higher than the PaleoEocene Thermal Maximum). Lots of oil and coal comes from this period as well. Sea levels may have risen 250 metres above today and flooded 20% of the continents.
So I’m not sure this proposition really holds throughout the record.
Bill Illis is absolutely correct. The combination of high O2 concentrations and high temps in the Carboniferous and Cretaceous utterly deflate and disprove Frei’s theory. Further, the high O2 during those periods fueled massive fires, possibly continental conflagrations, the evidence of which is abundant fusain (fossil charcoal, ash, and other pyrolysis byproducts) found in coal.
The best reference for a complete and comprehensive examination of fusain is:
A. C. Scott. 2000. The Pre-Quaternary history of fire. Palaeogeography, Palaeoclimatology, Palaeoecology Volume 164, Issues 1-4, December 2000, Pages 281-329.
doi:10.1016/S0031-0182(00)00192-9
Dr. Andrew Scott of Royal Holloway, University of London, is one of the premier paleobotanists in the world. His work and that of his students is unsurpassed. Paleobotany is key to understanding paleo climates.
Perhaps they are confusing cause and effect….lower water temperatures means higher solubility of oxygen….doesn’t mean the temperature drop was caused by the oxygen….
In addition to defining a new element “chrome”, the press release throws in the comment “chrome isotopes – different chemical variants of the element chrome”
Oh dear, I hope the the people who actually did the work have a quiet word with their public relations dept.
I know that it is a press release, but the language interests me, it is designed to pander(Panda?) to the general audiences attraction to newness.
Examples……”using a completely new method”
“everybody talks”
“new analytical method”
“the method is a unique tool”
Certainly not a sober referred paper…..but wait!……
“To understand the future, we need to understand the past”
Now ya talkin’…..!
Note that the study does not state that O2 related to photosynthesis will induce a global cooling. Moreover, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that, in this case, the additional CO2 comes from the burning of fossil fuels which actually CONSUMES oxygen. There’s a high chance that the global balance is very close to zero, if not negative given that CO2 atmopsheric concentrations tend to increase.