Let's Burn Down the Earth's Forests!

[fenderzilla]

I was just wondering how much of a greenhouse effect would come from the resulting CO2 if we burned up every last tree in existence. Carbon has a 3/19 weight ratio to Carbon Dioxide, and there are about 638 million tons of carbon in the Earth's forests. If every last atom were converted to Carbon Dioxide, that would, by my calculation result in about 4,028,000,000 tons of Carbon Dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere. So, how much would that increase the earth's temperature by?

I'm not a super villain, I promise. I'm asking for a friend.

[Neil1993]

I'm not a super villain, I promise. I'm asking for a friend.

Well since you're asking for a friend it's ok!

You would also need to consider the fact that, without trees, there will be nothing left to take in CO2 and transform it into Oxygen, which is, by far, the more dangerous factor. 9,900,000,000 metric tons of CO2 were released last year which is still more than your friend is planning to release by burning all the trees.

Edited January 30, 2015 by Neil1993

[Darren9]

Isn't the vast majority of CO2 > O2 transformation by algae/plankton in the ocean surface layer? I'm not at all certain but I thought trees account for less than 1/10th.

[AngelLestat]

I read in some place that venus and earth had similar amount of carbon, so if all that carbon is release into the atmosphere, we would have the same 90 atm of atmosphere that venus has with its 98% of co2.

Plus: all the ocean water will become in vapor which would end in a super green house effect worst than Venus.. With a atmosphere pressure of 200 atm or more.. Not sure if there is a natural process that can avoid this by some way of equilibrium.

Edited January 30, 2015 by AngelLestat

[Ralathon]

Well since you're asking for a friend it's ok!

You would also need to consider the fact that, without trees, there will be nothing left to take in CO2 and transform it into Oxygen, which is, by far, the more dangerous factor. 9,900,000,000 metric tons of CO2 were released last year which is still more than your friend is planning to release by burning all the trees.

Actually algae are the powerhouse in carbon fixation. Trees don't actually fixate all that much of the worldwide CO2 budget.

I reckon that burning all the trees worldwide would actually lower the earth's temperatures. We humans are spewing out vast amounts of CO2, multiple times as much as burning all the trees will ever produce. But when you burn all the forests you'll throw up a lot of ash and soot into the upper atmosphere and thus create a volcanic winter (though caused by forest fires this time).

[Lohan2008]

Would it be possible to burn up ALL the trees ? Even fire needs a certain percentage of oxygen to burn fuel, wouldn't the CO2 gases stop combustion at the end ?? There is 20% Oxygen atmosphere on Earth. Venus has a surface temp of 462 °C with 95% CO2 in it's atmosphere. {Wikipedia}.

Edited January 30, 2015 by Lohan2008

[Brotoro]

I read in some place that venus and earth had similar amount of carbon, so if all that carbon is release into the atmosphere, we would have the same 90 atm of atmosphere that venus has with its 98% of co2.

Plus: all the ocean water will become in vapor which would end in a super green house effect worst than Venus.. With a atmosphere pressure of 200 atm or more.. Not sure if there is a natural process that can avoid this by some way of equilibrium.

The vast majority of Earth's carbon is tied up in carbonate minerals in rocks. Burning up all the trees isn't going to turn Earth into Venus.

[EdFred]

Would it be possible to burn up ALL the trees ? Even fire needs a certain percentage of oxygen to burn fuel, wouldn't the CO2 gases stop combustion at the end ?? There is 20% Oxygen atmosphere on Earth. Venus has a surface temp of 462 °C with 95% CO2 in it's atmosphere. {Wikipedia}.

There's not enough carbon in trees to raise the atmospheric percentage of CO2 that high here on Earth.

[AngelLestat]

The vast majority of Earth's carbon is tied up in carbonate minerals in rocks. Burning up all the trees isn't going to turn Earth into Venus.

I know.. but if the temperature rise just a little, you can end with a chain reaction, and if that happen, all that buried co2 would burn too with the time.

There's not enough carbon in trees to raise the atmospheric percentage of CO2 that high here on Earth.

Someone has right numbers to see of what percentage we are talking about?

[Sirrobert]

Well since you're asking for a friend it's ok!

Wait. That friend doesn't happen to be a supervillain right?

On the question: Aren't rainforests also responsible for maintaining the rain cycle? I read somewhere that it's the existance of the rainforests that causes the massive rains there in the first place.

Burning down all the trees would probably screw with our weather first. No doubt expanding the deserts, making those areas much harder to live in

[Camacha]

You would also need to consider the fact that, without trees, there will be nothing left to take in CO2 and transform it into Oxygen, which is, by far, the more dangerous factor. 9,900,000,000 metric tons of CO2 were released last year which is still more than your friend is planning to release by burning all the trees.

I think algae and other organisms have been shown to take care of a lot of it.

[Elthy]

This is a perfect question for XKCD, you should send it in!

[Sirrobert]

This is a perfect question for XKCD, you should send it in!

Perfect idea. This is just the thing their What If's are for

[AngelLestat]

Yeah trees help to increase the rain due to evapo-transpiration.

They capture dew in the morning at night (condensation), water from rivers, and rain (before reach deep aquifers).

Then they release all that water into the atmosphere again.

So if we burn trees, all that extra co2, plus all the co2 that it would not absorbed for these tress, plus all the animals and plants and bacterya that would also die in this burn, plus all that biggers particles or co that you also release to the atmosphere that would block sun light for some weeks (not sure the effect of that).

A small change in the ocean temperature would kill all coral reef, then all that ecosystem fails which cause a chain reaction in different ecosystems.

The true is, I am not sure what would happen, but earth had previous mass extintion before due similar cases, for example huge volcanic activity who burn a big carbon reservoir in siberia (if I dont bad remember)

[Brotoro]

I know.. but if the temperature rise just a little, you can end with a chain reaction, and if that happen, all that buried co2 would burn too with the time.

No. You aren't going to burn limestone or dolomite by raising the temperature a little. It takes temperatures higher than the surface temperature of Venus to burn limestone.

[AngelLestat]

you can get temperatures higher than venus here on earth, because you have a full ocean that can become into vapor which will increase the greenhouse effect by a lot plus +200 atm on pressure.

So yes, the temperatures may be high enoght to melt almost anything.

Edited January 30, 2015 by AngelLestat

[Starwhip]

Who said that the oceans would become vapor? I'm fairly certain that wouldn't happen because the trees went up in flames...

Or I'm ignorant, an idiot, or both.

[NFUN]

you can get temperatures higher than venus here on earth, because you have a full ocean that can become into vapor which will increase the greenhouse effect by a lot plus +200 atm on pressure.

So yes, the temperatures may be high enoght to melt almost anything.

But not by burning the trees. As mentioned earlier in the thread, burning the forests won't have too much of a direct effect on carbon dioxide. The climate is very complex, and it would take much, much more than a temperature change of a few degrees to evaporate the oceans. I'm sure that releasing all of the methane in Siberia, one of the biggest positive feedbacks loops of climate change, won't be nearly enough. It would take incredibly dramatic changes to evaporate the oceans, possibly near-extinction of all life on Earth over millions of years (life helps to seed clouds, create O2, etc). There are inhibiting factors as well as positive feedback loops.

What would be fun is if all of the methane clathrate on Earth melted and realized the methane inside of it. All 440 trillion tons of it (assuming there is 3e15 m^3 of it, as the wiki says).

[magnemoe]

Yeah trees help to increase the rain due to evapo-transpiration.

They capture dew in the morning at night (condensation), water from rivers, and rain (before reach deep aquifers).

Then they release all that water into the atmosphere again.

So if we burn trees, all that extra co2, plus all the co2 that it would not absorbed for these tress, plus all the animals and plants and bacterya that would also die in this burn, plus all that biggers particles or co that you also release to the atmosphere that would block sun light for some weeks (not sure the effect of that).

A small change in the ocean temperature would kill all coral reef, then all that ecosystem fails which cause a chain reaction in different ecosystems.

The true is, I am not sure what would happen, but earth had previous mass extintion before due similar cases, for example huge volcanic activity who burn a big carbon reservoir in siberia (if I dont bad remember)

The corral reef temperature dependency has some logical fails, first its corrals in some of the hottest areas in the world, also corral reefs are so old they predated the end of the ice age.

More likely some corrals are very temperature dependent, other are not, the big killer for corral reefs are migrate microorganisms and eggs who come in with ballast water from ships.

In short if earth would go to hell if global temperature increased 3 degree it would have gone to hell hundreds of millions of years ago, flooding human cities only matter for humans and rats, somebody has to think about the rats.

Burning all the forests would however has major ecological effects in missing species, not sure how much cooling it would generate as clouds would be pretty low.

[NFUN]

In any case, no temperature achievable on Earth (realistically) will be able to melt dolomite, with its melting point at 3000 degrees Celsius.

"The rock that won't cop out when there's heat all about. It's Dolomite baby!"

Edited January 30, 2015 by NFUN

[Stargate525]

What would be fun is if all of the methane clathrate on Earth melted and realized the methane inside of it. All 440 trillion tons of it (assuming there is 3e15 m^3 of it, as the wiki says).

It'll suck for a few years, but Methane breaks down really quickly in atmosphere.

[NFUN]

The corral reef temperature dependency has some logical fails, first its corrals in some of the hottest areas in the world, also corral reefs are so old they predated the end of the ice age.

More likely some corrals are very temperature dependent, other are not, the big killer for corral reefs are migrate microorganisms and eggs who come in with ballast water from ships.

In short if earth would go to hell if global temperature increased 3 degree it would have gone to hell hundreds of millions of years ago, flooding human cities only matter for humans and rats, somebody has to think about the rats.

Burning all the forests would however has major ecological effects in missing species, not sure how much cooling it would generate as clouds would be pretty low.

Just because coral often lives in warmer areas doesn't mean that it can resistant changes in temperatures. In any case, coral is sensitive to acidity, which elevated levels of CO2 in the air and oceans will increase.

Edited January 31, 2015 by NFUN
Now 2% more accurate!

[magnemoe]

Who said that the oceans would become vapor? I'm fairly certain that wouldn't happen because the trees went up in flames...

Or I'm ignorant, an idiot, or both.

Did not happen the last time it was raining burning rocks, or we pretty much got an global ice age, trees dying from lack of sunlight and the breaks down release the same co2, it only take some years.

[NFUN]

It'll suck for a few years, but Methane breaks down really quickly in atmosphere.

What if both burning forests and melting clathrates occurred at the same time? The raging infernos could ignite all of that new methane, creating metric craploads of more resilient CO2!

Sssshhhh. I can dream.

[magnemoe]

Just because coral lives in warmer areas doesn't mean that it can resistant changes in temperatures. In any case, coral is sensitive to acidity, which elevated levels of CO2 in the air and oceans will increase.

I say that corrals live in an variety of sea temperatures, most corrals has minimum temperature requirements, some does not they have found corrals in the north sea, outside of that requirement you find it lots of places but not some other, west cost on Africa don't have them, however the canary islands has remains of them, saw them while diving.

Northern part of east Africa and Arabia has lots and the belt continues far into the pacific, one fun part is that they not only survived the end of the ice age but also the rising sea water, fun idea if sea level would drop we would get a lot of new land because if the corral reefs.