Volcanoes and Carbon Dioxide

I met someone at a company function a while ago and got into a discussion about green-energy and how cool it was that we were working for a company involved in helping customers better manage their energy usage. We eventually started discussing CO₂ and climate change and I soon realized this person was skeptical about man’s ability to affect climate change. He then stated quite matter-of-factly that a single volcanic eruption emits more CO₂ than man has ever.

I didn't know if he was right or not as I didn't know how much CO₂ is emitted by volcanoes. I decided to look into it and make it a subject of this post.

Natural sources of CO₂ emissions come from many sources, e.g., animal exhalations, burning and decaying of organic matter and from volcanoes. So surely fantastic eruptions from volcanoes like Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Pinatubo have emitted more CO₂ than we ever could right?

Volcanoes are found all over the planet surface as well as underneath the oceans. There are about 50 – 60 active volcanoes on the surface and over 100 active volcanoes underneath the oceans. According to the US Geological Survey, the estimates of CO₂ emissions from all volcanoes on the surface and underneath oceans range from 150 million to about 270 million tonnes (metric tons; 1 tonne = 1.1 tons) a year. This seems like a huge amount but now we have to compare it against what is emitted as a result of human activity.

Some examples of man-made sources of CO₂ come from the burning of fossil-fuels like oil, coal and natural gas for power generation and transportation; from industrial processes like cement production and gas-flaring. Other sources include deforestation from slash/burn farming and from transformation to growing palm trees for palm-oil and the like. The global estimates of man-made CO₂ emissions, based on a study published by Nature Geoscience, is around 35,300 million tonnes. This is roughly 130 times higher than that emitted by all active volcanoes!

What if we wanted to compare volcanic CO₂ emissions to that from transportation and industry only? Estimates from Oak Ridge National Laboratory indicate that CO₂ emissions from light-duty vehicles used throughout the world contribute about 3,040 million tonnes, or more than 11 times that from volcanoes. From the same study, the emissions from industries contribute approximately 6,100 million tonnes, which is more than 22 times that from volcanoes.

And as countries like China, India, Brazil and others continue to industrialize, the amount of man-made CO₂ emitted will only increase, which will adversely affect climate change on Earth unless we make some changes!

In my next post, I’ll compare the percentage of man-made CO₂ against all other contributors in the atmosphere that cause the Earth to warm. Spoiler alert!! Man’s contribution is small but it is still a big deal.

Update

Hi everyone, it’s been a while since I’ve posted on my blog site so I thought I’d take this time to update you as to what’s happened since my last post in February of 2010. You see, I was living in Plano, TX, a suburb of Dallas at the time when I was posting. In the second quarter of 2009, I was released by my employer in a work-force reduction initiative and during my search for my next opportunity I had some free time and decided to use this time to create a blog and post on topics that interest me.

I worked for a manufacturer of power systems aimed primarily at the telecom industry; when the telecom carriers were spending to upgrade and expand their networks, we were making revenue; however, when things were tight – as was the case immediately after the Internet-bubble bust and during the current economic crisis – the carriers cut back on spending and our revenues were heavily impacted. It was also one of the major reasons for the workforce reductions my employer had to undertake to remain viable. All telecom equipment manufacturers were in a similar position; as a result, I wanted to move into a different and growing industry.

During this time, I noticed a lot of activity and investment in alternative-energy, energy-efficiency and energy-management. I was interested in alternative energy especially PV/solar energy and decided to focus my energies to enter this industry for my next-opportunity. As part of this endeavor, I read and research important topics, current issues, opportunities and challenges germane to this industry.

I’ve also wanted to write but never had the time to seriously pursue it; I also couldn’t decide what I wanted to write about. I had heard about blogs and read many of them and thought I could do this! So I decided to combine my two interests and start a blog site to write about the various topics I researched. During the latter part of 2009, I researched and wrote six posts on topics ranging from CFL light bulbs to an experiment I ran in lowering my carbon footprint.

I was also interviewing for my next opportunity during this time and in early 2010, I interviewed with a startup company in Roanoke, VA involved in energy-management and sub-metering; they were looking for a hardware product manager. I liked what I saw and decided to take the offer. So in March, the company relocated me to Virginia.

I was excited to work for a startup and came in with preconceived notions of what to expect. I expected a company with a flat-organization with an entrepreneurial sprit and an intense focus on customers with preservation of cash being a major concern; however, to my chagrin, what I saw was just the opposite! We had many executives who were at times working at cross-purposes with one-another to the detriment of the company; individuals were flying to our many remote sites on a whim with no clear purpose, etc. But my biggest concern was that our actual revenues were much lower than the unrealistic end-of-year targets. I had a feeling it couldn’t last long … and it didn’t.

The company had difficulty raising cash from operations and had to look to external investors; in garnering this investment, they had to show their investors they were making strives to shore up their revenue shortfall so a major restructuring ensued whereby entire businesses were shuttered and personnel including me, were released! I had been there only seven months! My first experience working for a startup company was not good.

I really liked the industry and the products the company made – in a future post, I’ll write about what sub-metering is and how it helps companies – and I was disappointed that it didn’t last longer. I also liked the people I worked with in the Virginia office; furthermore, Roanoke is a beautiful and scenic city albeit being small and not having many of the large-city amenities that I was used to.

In looking for my next opportunity, I shied away from startups and tried to focus on large corporations but I interviewed with all types of companies. In whittling through the opportunities that was availed to me, one company really impressed me in the way they pursued me, but it was a startup company! The people at this company assuaged my concerns regarding working for a startup company; they also explained that they had just secured a major investment from a foreign company so cash-flow wouldn’t be a concern. After much deliberation, I decided to take a chance and accepted the position.

So in November of this year, the company relocated me to Indianapolis, Indiana, my second move of this year! I’ve been with the company for about a month now and this company feels more like what a startup company should be like. Also, Indianapolis looks like it could be a lot of fun and I’m looking forward to exploring.

This company is involved in mega-Watt battery power systems in frequency-regulation and grid-stabilization applications with the electric utilities as well as with solar and wind applications and in another future post, I’ll elaborate more on what these are and how my company and our products help.

So that’s what I’ve been doing since my last post. 2010 was a pretty exhausting year for me and I’m really looking forward to a better 2011! I’m still interested in all things related to energy and will be posting shortly again once I get more settled; I move into my apartment in January so it shouldn’t be much longer! I’ll also post on non-energy related topics, i.e., on topics that generally interest me and I hope you’ll find it entertaining and informative.

Finally, I want to wish everyone a happy and prosperous New Year!

Happy New Year everyone!!