What adds carbon dioxide to the atmosphere?

Question

Science homework :) thanks.

Answer 1

1. Exhaling by organisms

2. Any kind of Burning(especially fuel)

3. From below the crust of earth(through volcanoes)

Answer 2

breathing of humans

trees and plants (in night)

engines

volcanoes

The level of CO2 in the atmosphere rises and falls naturally in response to

seasonal changes each year.  This has probably occurred for several tens of

millions of years.  What is more serious is an overall, very rapid increase

in the "background" level of CO2 that we can trace back to the beginnings

of the industrial revolution.

The amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is a balance between the

things producing it (the "sources:" breathing, burning, decomposition) and

the things removing it from the air (the "sinks:" plant growth, mineral

formation, dissolving in water).

Why does this concentration change seasonally? Because when spring

arrives, all the plants begin growing again, and this process uses up CO2

-- so during fall & winter carbon dioxide builds up, and during spring and

summer this supply is drawn down.

But if it is spring in the Northern Hemisphere, then it is fall in the

Southern Hemisphere -- doesn't this all just balance out? No, for two

reasons. First, if you look at a map of the whole Earth, you will notice

that there is a lot more land in the Northern Hemisphere than in the

Southern Hemisphere.  This means there are a lot more plants, so the

variation in the Northern Hemisphere is much greater. Second, the air in

the Northern Hemisphere doesn't mix very quickly with the air in the

Southern Hemisphere -- it takes longer than a year to mix thoroughly, so

differences between the hemispheres aren't "lost" with all the stirring.

The following figure shows the concentration of CO2 (the vertical axis) as

a function of time (left to right) and as a function of latitude (in and

out of the page). Notice how much bigger the waves in CO2 concentration are

in the Northern Hemisphere compared to the Southern Hemisphere. Note also

that when it is high in the North, it is low in the South. The final thing

to notice is that the whole pattern is climbing as we go to the right--this

is the "background" level of CO2 that is rising, on top of which the

seasonal ripples go up and down.

What about the oceans? What role do they play? Carbon dioxide

dissolves in water, so if we increase the concentration of CO2 in the air,

it will slowly seep into the oceans. However, the oceans are so huge--and

mix so slowly--that this increase in CO2 in the atmosphere has affected

only the top few hundred meters of the ocean.

Why has it probably been this way for millions of years? The fact

that there is more land in the Northern Hemisphere than the Southern is due

to plate tectonics--the relative movement of the continents on the surface

of the Earth.  Now that's a really slow process--the fastest plates move

about as fast as you fingernails grow, so the pattern of land and water

does not change very fast at all.

So why is an increase in CO2 serious? An increase in carbon dioxide

has both good and bad effects, but we are not sure which are more serious.

It is good in that certain kinds of plants (some of which we use for food)

grow better with more CO2 so we might be able to feed more people. It is

also bad because CO2 is a "green house gas" that traps heat from the sun,

so that the average temperature on the surface would get hotter, making for

more intense weather patterns. Basically, we think more CO2 will mean it

will get hotter where it is already hot, colder where it is already cold,

drier where it is dry, and wetter where it is wet. Bigger deserts, bigger

floods, more strong hurricanes. But we will also have more usable cropland

in Alaska, Canada and Siberia. We might be able to grow more crops, but

they might also get wiped out more often!

Answer 3

the above answers are correct

but also add that acid rain in contact with carbonate rocks (such as limestone) releases are certain amount of CO2 into the atmosphere.  The original formula is CaCO3 for the mineral calcite and the CO2 is release with contact to strong acids.

Answer 4

us! we use oxygen and breathe out carbon dioxide, and then plants use the carbon dioxide and breathe out the oxygen which we then use etc (:

so we do by breathing out.

hope this helps!

Answer 5

Burning of anything.

Answer 6

engines,volcanoes,hot springs,geysers,breathing. any burned substance.