During the industrial age a tremendous amount of burning has taken place and continues to take place. This burning includes: fires of internal combustion engines, fires of indoor heating systems, fires of electrical generation, fires of waste disposal, and the fires of industrial production processes.
The fuel for these fires is of organic composition. The chemical products of burning organic matter vary depending upon the type of fuel and the conditions under which the combustion occurs. One of the most simple chemistries of fire is the combustion of methane:
CH4 + 2O2 ---> CO2 + 2H2O
One molecule of CO2 is created and released. Two molecules of H2O are also formed. At the same time, two molecules of O2 are removed from the atmospheric oxygen supply.
Burning on the scale of the last several hundred years represents a substantial change in the amounts of these basic chemical compounds that are present in the Earth system. The ever-increasing amount of CO2 in the atmosphere is clearly having a greenhouse-like warming effect. From the equation above it is clear that twice as many molecules of H2O are entering the atmosphere as CO2 when methane burns. In the case of burning more complex organics such as coal, gasoline, diesel fuel and natural gas the exact ratios of CO2 and H2O will differ, but H2O will predominate in numbers of molecules produced.
Greenhouse warming/overheating of the planet is the change brought by elevating CO2 in the atmosphere. What about the much larger increase in H2O? Obviously, this constitutes a change as well, an elegantly simple change: wetter.
With more H2O in the Earth system, oceanic levels would be expected to rise. Global totals of relative humidity will increase depending upon the coincidental changes in global temperature. Earth’s total rainfall will increase. The greenhouse analogy is borne out more fully, for a greenhouse is not only warmer. It is wetter as well.
By burning fossil fuels, we are reestablishing the climatic conditions of the geologic ages when these fuels were formed. Considering the damage that has been done to Earth’s ecosystems it is unlikely that the photosynthetic magnitudes of these past primal times will be repeated.
Recent seasons of excessive rainfall fit perfectly into the wetter Earth theory. The great continental blizzards of the high plains and the epochal Spring floods seem to me to result from the truly huge amount of burning.
A chart presenting annual precipitation data for the continental US as a whole covering the time period 1895-2008 can be found by clicking here.
It is rising.
Annual precipitation for the northeastern US 1895-2008 is also rising. (Click here.)
Weather station data is averaged to calculate the national annual precipitation. Therefore, national annual precipitation is directly proportional to the total quantity of precipitation that fell on the Country. This means that in the U.S. the total quantity of precipitation per year has risen over the past one hundred years.
Determining whether or not annual precipitation for the whole Earth is increasing is my next project. I have found the scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to be very helpful and am hopeful that this question will soon have an answer. It seems logical to conclude that a larger total of H2O in the Earth system would lead to more precipitation. There would be higher concentrations of water vapor in the clouds of the Earth due to the fact that a greater total of H2O was present. This increase in cloud water concentrations would certainly contribute to larger quantities of precipitation falling upon the Earth.
Donald L. Hassig is director of Cancer Action NY (www.canceractionny.org) For further information: Donald L. Hassig; (315) 262-2456; P.O. Box 340, Colton, N.Y. 13625
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