Free Carbon Cycle Guided Notes Pairs

THE VIDEO THAT PAIRS WITH THESE NOTES CAN BE FOUND HERE AT MAD GARDEN SCIENCE. Most of Earth’s carbon is stored in the geosphere inside ROCKS. The rest is in the ocean, atmosphere, plants, soil, and fossil fuels. These storage containers, if you will, are called RESERVOIRS. Carbon ows between each reservoir in an exchange called the Carbon Cycle. It’s important to note that any change in the cycle that shifts carbon out of one reservoir puts more carbon in the other reservoirs. THE SLOW CARBON CYCLE Through a bunch of chemical reactions and TECTONIC activity, carbon takes between 100-200 million years to move between the atmosphere, rocks, soil, and ocean in the slow carbon cycle. The movement of carbon from the atmosphere to the lithosphere begins with rain. Carbon in the atmosphere combines with water to form carbonic acid that falls to the surface on the earth in RAIN. This acid dissolves rocks in a process called CHEMICAL weathering. This process releases things like calcium, magnesium, or potassium that are stored in the rocks. The water ow then washes these ions into rivers and then out to the ocean. In the ocean, the calcium forms calcium carbonate. Shellbuilding organisms; such as corals, sand dollars, sea stars, sea urchins and plankton use calcium carbonate to build their outer protective coverings. After these organisms DIE, they sink to the sea oor. Over a long, long time, layers of shells and sediment are cemented together and turn to rock, storing that carbon in LIMESTONE. 80 percent of carbon-containing rock is made this way. The remaining 20 percent contain carbon from living things, or organic carbon; that have been trapped in layers of mud. Heat and pressure press down and compress the mud and carbon over millions of years, forming SEDIMENTARY rock. When dead organic matter builds up faster than it can decay, layers of organic carbon become things like oil, coal, or natural gas instead. The slow cycle returns carbon to the atmosphere through VOLCANOES. When tectonic plates collide, one sometimes sinks beneath the other, and the rock it carries melts under the extreme heat and pressure. The heated rock releases carbon dioxide, which is then vented back to the atmosphere when volcanoes erupt to BEGIN the cycle again. THE FAST CARBON CYCLE The time it takes carbon to travel through the fast carbon cycle is measured mostly in a LIFESPAN because it is largely movement through the biosphere. Carbon molecules are an excellent source of fuel for all living things. Phytoplankton, or microscopic organisms in the ocean; and plants take carbon dioxide from the atmosphere by absorbing it into their cells. Using energy from the Sun, both plants and plankton combine carbon dioxide and water to form sugar and oxygen in a process called PHOTOSYNTHESIS. Carbon can cycle from a plant and back to the atmosphere in one of four ways: 1. Plants break down the sugar to get the ENERGY they need to grow. Some carbon dioxide goes back into the atmosphere. 2. CONSUMERS, all types of animals and humans eat the plants or plankton, and break down the plant sugar to get energy. The carbon is returned through respiration or waste. 3. The Plants and plankton that are not eaten, die and decay. 4. FIRE consumes plants, releasing the carbon directly back to the atmosphere. fl fl fl HUMAN IMPACT If left alone, the fast and slow carbon cycles would maintain a pretty steady concentration of carbon in the atmosphere, hydrosphere, biosphere, and geosphere. But when something changes the amount of carbon in one reservoir, there is a ripple effect throughout the others. The current changes in the carbon cycle are happening because of HUMAN impact; removing carbon from the three main carbon sinks on Earth; Forests, The Oceans, and Soil. When we clear forests, we remove a dense concentration of plants that have stored carbon in leaves, stems, and wood—their BIOMASS. This is extra impactful because, we are at the same time eliminating plants that would otherwise pull carbon from the atmosphere as they grow. Without plant cover, soil is also venting carbon from decaying plant matter into the atmosphere. Without human interference, the carbon in fossil fuels would leak into the atmosphere through volcanic eruptions in the slow carbon cycle. By burning coal, oil, and natural gas, we ACCELERATE the process, releasing carbon that took millions of years to accumulate into the atmosphere every year, moving the carbon from the slow cycle to the fast cycle. The ocean and plants seem to have taken up about 55 percent of the extra carbon while about 45 percent has stayed in the atmosphere. Over time, land and the oceans will continue to absorb most of the extra carbon dioxide, but 20 percent or so may remain in the atmosphere for THOUSANDS of years. Carbon dioxide is a GREENHOUSE gas that absorbs energy—including infrared energy or heat emitted by the Earth—then re-emits it. This energy travels out in all directions, some returning to Earth, where it heats the surface. We need greenhouse gasses! Without them, Earth would be a frozen wasteland, but with too many Earth gets too hot, and that isn't good either! The ocean absorbing carbon dioxide helps out the atmosphere but it creates a more ACIDIC environment for marine life. These warming temperatures are mostly a concern where frozen soil, or PERMAFROST, is now thawing. Permafrost contains vast deposits of carbon from plant matter that has accumulated for thousands of years. The cold temperatures extremely slow down decay. If decay speeds up the carbon dioxide-seeps more quickly into the atmosphere.