Do erupting volcanoes add to global warming?

Question

Do erupting volcanoes add to global warming?

Answer 1

Volcanoes are intensively studied and research has been conducted on the amount of CO2 emitted from Volcanoes compared with that by humans. It’s thought that humans emit 150 times as much as all the volcanoes emit. (0.7%). Currently volcanoes emit only 130 million tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere every year compared to 24 billion tons released due to human activity.

http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/Hazards/What/V... (Scroll down.)

http://volcano.und.nodak.edu/vwdocs/Gase...

Man-made (anthropogenic) CO2 emissions overwhelm volcanic CO2 emissions by at least 150 times.

http://volcano.und.edu/vwdocs/Gases/man....

http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/Hazards/What/V...

Most of the emissions at St Helens (erupted 1980) were Tephra (ash from from igneous rocks) that forms the distinctive volcanic ash column. Ninety percent of all gas emitted by volcanoes is water vapour as steam.

http://vulcan.wr.usgs.gov/Glossary/Emiss...

Most ash doesn’t stay in the atmosphere long. For example during the first 9 hours of the St Helens eruption about 540 million tons of ash fell over an area of more than 22,000 square miles.

Some volcanoes mainly generate sulphur dioxide(SO2,) this makes the distinctive rotten eggs smell you get around active vents should you visit a dormant volcano. Worldwide, sulphur dioxide emissions from volcanoes add up to about 15 million tons a year, compared to the 200 million tons produced by power plants and other human activities. This causes haze that cuts visibility and causes rain to become acidic.

The eruption of 1991 eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1991 spewed about 22 million tons of sulphur dioxide into the atmosphere, this combined with water to form droplets of sulphuric acid, blocking some of the sunlight from reaching the Earth and thereby COOLING temperatures in some regions by as much as 0.5 °C.

e.g. http://www.cmar.csiro.au/e-print/open/gr...

Of course, the earth has been much more volcanically active in its past and volcanic CO2 has played a major role at times in climate change. But this was volcanic activity on a massive scale that drove the continents apart at a much faster rate than today and formed massive features such as the granite islands and mountains of Scotland and Ireland or the granite mountain ranges of the Sierra Nevada or Cascades in the USA or the massive Deccan Traps that form much of central India and so on.

http://volcano.und.edu/vwdocs/volc_image...

As for the claim that recent volcanoes have emitted more CO2 than humans; if this were true, then that CO2 record would be full of spikes, one for each eruption. The fact is, it is a very smooth trend over the past 50 years. Even St Helens and Pinatubo for example don't cause spikes.

http://environment.newscientist.com/data...

Answer 2

They do emit greenhouse gases, but they've always been doing that.  

Global warming is addition of gasses over and above the natural level which includes the average of all volcano emissions, so technically no, but varying levels of activity in a given year can be seen in the climate's trends.

Answer 3

not necessarily but they do emit C02

Answer 4

yes, they emit gases. but how often do volcanoes erupt? in comparison its probably nothing to the years of constant pollutants humans emit.

Answer 5

yes they do but we caused most global warming

Answer 6

the 1980 eruption of Mt. Saint Helens released 1/10 the amount of CO2 that humans emit per year - fairly large for a single event. Volcanoes have a cooling effect upon eruption - most gases released by volcanoes block incoming light

Answer 7

yep

Answer 8

yes the carbon dioxide, carbon monoxide, and sluphur dioxide emited adds to the greenhouse effect. the lava heating up the air doesnt do anything though.

Answer 9

yer they do, they release co2 and sulphur and more there are hundreds all around the world sum constantly active which will constantly pump out the green house gassses but with out them life couldnt exist cos they helpd make the atomosphere but yer do contribute to global warming.

Answer 10

Yes the gasses they emit do however in the short term they cause some cooling as the dust clouds will obscure the sun and cause less heat to reach the surface. global warming is caused by the sun and has been happening since the last ice age. the reason why it is such an issue at present is that various governments have found an ideal way of increasing taxation without the usual fallout as "this is a green tax" is tha mantra. In my view the scientists and politicians in the global warming camp are merely using this to prop up their jobs, in the case of the scientists and the taxation regime, in the case of politicians like Brown.