From: Amara D. Angelica (amara@kurzweilai.net)
Date: Sun Jul 13 2003 - 02:46:48 MDT
Hal, Spike, and Jeff: thanks. Here are the calculations confirming your
number. If anyone sees an error in these numbers, please let me know.
Average atomic weight of carbon (adjusting for isotope ratios): 12.011
Moles of carbon in biomass: 829 x 10^15 grams/12.011 = 69 x 10^15 mols
69 x 10^15 x 6.02 x 10^23 atoms (Avogadro's number) = 4.15 x 10^40
carbon atoms.
However, the report also states: " FAO-UNESCO values indicate that the
amount of soil organic carbon in the world is about 3000 x 10^15 g," so
I'm confused.
> -----Original Message-----
> From: owner-extropians@extropy.org
> [mailto:owner-extropians@extropy.org] On Behalf Of Hal Finney
> Sent: Friday, July 11, 2003 11:17 AM
> To: extropians@extropy.org
> Subject: RE: Number of carbon atoms in the Earth's biomass
>
>
> Amara Angelica writes:
> > Does anyone have data on the total number of carbon atoms
> currently in
> > the Earth's biomass and the rate of depletion?
>
> I googled a good web page,
> http://www.icsu-scope.org/downloadpubs/scope13/chapter06.html.
>
> Some possibly surprising facts:
>
> 99% of the biomass is in plants, not animals or
> microorganisms. 99% of the plant biomass is in land plants,
> not ocean plants.
>
> The total biomass is 829 x 10^15 grams of Carbon. If my
> calculations are correct this is about 4 x 10^40 Carbon
> atoms. Of this the largest portion is in tropical rain
> forests, about 40%.
>
> Although the web page above has enormous detail about
> forestry operations, it is a little hard to pull out a
> summary number. Section 6.3.1 gives a 1977 estimate that the
> rate of deforestation is about 1.1 x 10^15 g/year, with
> reforestation at about 0.3 x 10^15 g/year, for a net loss of
> 0.8 x 10^15 g/year.
>
> It's not clear if this is the same "grams of Carbon" used
> elsewhere in the report (versions "grams of wood") but
> assuming it is, that corresponds to a loss of about 0.1% per
> year, or 4 x 10^37 Carbon atoms per year, which would also be
> about 10^30 Carbon atoms lost to biomass per second.
>
> All these numbers are very rough estimates.
>
> Hal Finney
>
>
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