Either witnessing it on our own or seeing it on the news, we all know about the impact that greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide are having on the Earth’s climate, and how harmful it might be to the life on Earth as we know it, in the long-term. However, scientists from the University of Stanford came out with a surprising statement. The theory elaborated suggests that increasing the level of carbon might actually be beneficial to the climate and that it might regulate the climate changes.
Is more carbon the solution?
Although it sounds a bit strange, considering that we know that carbon dioxide is, mainly the one to blame for the changes happening to the climate, the explanation is quite a logic and clear one.
Specialists say that keeping in mind that the element that is the most damaging to our atmosphere is methane, we should convert it into carbon dioxide.
Controversy among scientists
Popular Science shows that the rate at which carbon dioxide managed to warm the atmosphere in the past 20 years is equal to the rate at which industrial or agricultural sourced methane did, divided by 84. Scientists are still debating this issue, as there is yet no official suggestion of how exactly should this transformation be performed. Some of them suggest that such a process will more likely be costly and will require staggering amounts of energy.
Furthermore, several scientists stated that they totally disagree with this hypothesis. However, specialist Rob Jackson suggest that doing so will increase the time available for focusing on the carbon dioxide sources, which is considered to be a more complex and challenging issue.
Pieter Tans, chief of NOAA’s Carbon Cycle Greenhouse Gases Group came out to say to Popular Science that the best way to approach this issue, in his vision, is to put in as much effort as possible to decrease the methane level existing in our atmosphere. Subsequent to that, that we should just let the atmosphere handle its oxidation to CO2 in roughly a decade.
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