Perhaps as much as a quarter comes from the natural decomposition of nitrogen-bearing rock. This, it turns out, has important unanticipated implications for supposedly "settled" climate science.
“We think that this nitrogen may allow forests and grasslands to sequester more fossil fuel carbon dioxide emissions than previously thought,” said Professor Houlton.That's the funny thing about serious science, it is never "settled," new stuff keeps showing up. Maybe we aren't going to burn up from global warming after all.
As this previously unrecognised source could be fuelling the growth of many more plants, ecosystems around the world may be sucking more emissions from the atmosphere than past climate models have predicted.
Given the currently quiet sun, we might have a little ice age. instead. The only thing we can say for certain is that we don't know enough to make predictions in which anyone should have great confidence.
Hat tip to Lucianne.com for the link. The original research appears in the serious journal Science.
