Hidden carbon layer may have sparked ancient bout of global warming

By -
https://www.science.org/content/article/hidden-carbon-layer-may-have-sparked-ancient-bout-global-warming

By Paul Voosen, Science Magazine. 

Excerpt: There is no perfect parallel in Earth’s past for present-day climate change—human-driven warming is simply happening too fast and furiously. The closest analog came 56 million years ago, when over the course of 3000 to 5000 years, greenhouse gases soared in the atmosphere, causing at least 5°C of warming and pushing tropical species to the poles. The cause of the Paleocene-Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) has long been debated, with researchers invoking exotic mechanisms such as catastrophic releases of methane from the sea floor or even asteroid strikes. But over the past few years, evidence has mounted for a more prosaic culprit: carbon-spewing volcanoes that emerged underneath Greenland as it tore away from Europe. Now, researchers have found signs of an effect that would have supercharged the warming effect of the volcanoes, making them a stronger suspect. The underside of Greenland is thought to be encrusted with carbon-rich rocks, like barnacles on the keel of a ship. During the rifting, they might have liberated a gusher of carbon dioxide (CO2), says Thomas Gernon, a geologist at the University of Southampton and leader of the new study. “It’s a perfect storm of conditions.” Mudrocks on the sea floor also contain carbon that originated in living things, and magma from submarine eruptions could have heated the rocks and liberated the carbon. But in 2017, researchers analyzed plankton fossils from an ocean core and found the carbon released during the PETM was heavier than previously thought. For some, that indicated the carbon wasn’t from living sources. “Given the current state of knowledge, it seems likely to be volcanism,” says Marcus Gutjahr, a geochemist at GEOMAR Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel, who led the 2017 study. ...CO2 and other gases can bubble out of tectonic plates as they dive into the mantle, percolating up into the underside of thick crusts like Greenland’s, and forming carbonate formations that can be stable for millions or even billions of years.…

Popular posts from this blog

Lost history of Antarctica revealed in octopus DNA

By -
https://www.science.org/content/article/lost-history-antarctica-revealed-octopus-dna By ERIK STOKSTAD .  Excerpt: Some 100,000 years ago, scientists believe Antarctica’s massive western ice sheet collapsed, temporarily opening waterways between a trio of seas surrounding the continent. New evidence for that scenario comes from a surprising source: octopus DNA. ...About 129,000 to 116,000 years ago, a warm spell called the last interglacial gave our planet a brief break in between several million years of ice ages. The average temperature of the planet was about 0.5°C warmer than it is today—and climate projections predict it will be again within decades. The global sea level was also 5 meters to 10 meters higher than current levels. Many scientists believe  the collapse of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet and consequent melting could have been a primary reason . ...The findings are consistent with growing geological evidence supporting the ice sheet collapse....
Read more

An architect has found a way to build flood-proof homes

By -
https://www.washingtonpost.com/climate-solutions/interactive/2023/flood-resistant-home-bamboo/ By Nick Aspinwall, The Washington Post.  Excerpt: Yasmeen Lari spent a …career designing …structures out of concrete, glass and steel before stumbling into her ideal material. It was at a camp for refugees…. Residents there were struggling to secure bricks and wood to build communal kitchens — until she spotted a nearby bamboo grove. “Let’s use it,” recalls Lari…. The material worked so well that over the last decade, Heritage Foundation of Pakistan …has built some 85,000 structures for displaced Pakistanis, including victims of last year’s devastating monsoon rains. That disaster, the worst flooding in Pakistani history, left a third of the country underwater and  destroyed more than 2.1 million homes . The thousands of bamboo structures Lari’s group had erected “all survived,” she said. …Many species of bamboo have been used as a building material in Asia for thousands of years and they are
Read more

Climate Change Drives New Cases of Malaria, Complicating Efforts to Fight the Disease

By -
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/30/health/malaria-climate-change.html By  Stephanie Nolen , The New York Times.  Excerpt: There were an estimated 249 million cases of malaria around the globe last year,  the World Health Organization said on Thursday , an increase of five million over 2021. Malaria remains a top killer of children. Those new cases were concentrated in just five countries: Pakistan, Nigeria, Uganda, Ethiopia and Papua-New Guinea. Climate change was a direct contributor in three of them, said Dr. Daniel Ngamije, who directs the W.H.O. malaria program. In July 2022, massive flooding left more than a third of Pakistan underwater and displaced 33 million people. An explosion of mosquitoes soon followed. The country reported 3.1 million confirmed cases of malaria that year, compared with 275,000 the year before, with a fivefold increase in the rate of transmission....
Read more