Mastodawn

Learning about rock weathering over hundreds of thousands to millions of years in the carbon flux (cycle).

Pretty amazing
https://overcast.fm/+BTumWKJNdk

The Misunderstood History of CO2: The Science Behind Earth’s Most Controversial Molecule with Peter Brannen — The Great Simplification with Nate Hagens

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is often seen as the problematic byproduct of modern lifestyles that threatens our planet’s stability – at least within conversations among environmentalists. But this perspective overlooks the fundamental role of CO2 in everything on Earth, from the food we eat to the houses we live in to our bodies themselves. Despite this reality, the carbon cycle as we know it has been interrupted in ways never before seen in Earth’s history. How could understanding the deep history of CO2, as well as humanity’s relationship with this controversial and vital molecule, help us prepare for the planetary changes ahead? In this episode, Nate is joined by science journalist Peter Brannen, who reframes CO2 from an industrial pollutant to a miraculous substance whose critical role within the carbon cycle makes Earth habitable. Peter traces our planet’s history through the lens of CO2, including mass extinctions, Snowball Earth events, and the surprisingly stable Holocene period that has cradled human…

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Jonathan Schofield Feb 14

…“CO2 reacts with rainwater making it slightly more acidic. That rainwater washes over rocks, and chemically and physically weathers them, delivering bicarbonate to the oceans, and that can partition into carbonate, which sea creatures use to build their shells.

Eventually they snow down to the bottom of the ocean and become this calcar ooze that on the long term can become things like limestone, which when that sea floor subducts under the crust, can come out of volcanoes as CO2 again…

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Jonathan Schofield Feb 14

…“And that's the long cycle of CO2, where volcanic gas becomes air, becomes chemicals in the ocean, that become creatures that become rock, that then becomes CO2 out of volcanoes again.”

—Peter Brannen

https://overcast.fm/+BTumWKJNdk

The Misunderstood History of CO2: The Science Behind Earth’s Most Controversial Molecule with Peter Brannen — The Great Simplification with Nate Hagens

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is often seen as the problematic byproduct of modern lifestyles that threatens our planet’s stability – at least within conversations among environmentalists. But this perspective overlooks the fundamental role of CO2 in everything on Earth, from the food we eat to the houses we live in to our bodies themselves. Despite this reality, the carbon cycle as we know it has been interrupted in ways never before seen in Earth’s history. How could understanding the deep history of CO2, as well as humanity’s relationship with this controversial and vital molecule, help us prepare for the planetary changes ahead? In this episode, Nate is joined by science journalist Peter Brannen, who reframes CO2 from an industrial pollutant to a miraculous substance whose critical role within the carbon cycle makes Earth habitable. Peter traces our planet’s history through the lens of CO2, including mass extinctions, Snowball Earth events, and the surprisingly stable Holocene period that has cradled human…

Show thread

Jonathan Schofield Feb 14

…If you need a dose of wonder this weekend, do have a listen to Peter Brannen chatting with Nate Hagens: https://overcast.fm/+BTumWKJNdk

#climateDiary

Peter has a lovely manner and dishes out astonishing science-based narratives in readily understandable terms.

You’ll come away with his sense of gratitude that to be alive in this moment on the back of the gifts of deep time is an extraordinary thing. A good thing to hold to 😌

I may add further notes later