Human CO2 Emissions Greatly Outstrip Natural Sources
Human activity churns out up to 100 times more planet-warming carbon each year as all the volcanoes on Earth, says a decade-long study released on Tuesday.
The Deep Carbon Observatory (DCO), a 500-strong international team of scientists, released a series of papers outlining how carbon is stored, emitted and reabsorbed by natural and manmade processes.
They found that manmade carbon dioxide emissions drastically outstrip the contribution of volcanoes - which belch out gas and are often fingered as a major climate change contributor - to current warming rates.
The findings, published in the journal Elements, showed just two-tenths of 1% of Earth's total carbon - around 43 500 gigatonnes - is above the surface in oceans, the land, and in our atmosphere.
The rest - a staggering 1.85 billion gigatonnes - is stored in our planet's crust, mantle and core, providing scientists with clues as to how Earth formed billions of years ago. One gigatonne is equivalent to around 3 million Boeing 747s.
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