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Atmospheric Services

Atmospheric Services. Professor John E. Thornes Professor of Applied Meteorology & Climatology School of Geography, Earth & Environmental Sciences University of Birmingham.

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Atmospheric Services

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  1. Atmospheric Services Professor John E. Thornes Professor of Applied Meteorology & Climatology School of Geography, Earth & Environmental Sciences University of Birmingham

  2. The air sphere measures 1999 kilometres across and weighs 5140 trillion tonnes. The water sphere measures 1390 kilometres across and weighs 1.4 million trillion tonnes. Artist Adam Nieman

  3. AIR • You can’t see it; yet the sky is blue. You can’t touch it; yet you can feel its movement. It is very light and easily moved; yet it can support weights of hundreds of tons, destroy buildings and even move the Earth. It has no voice; yet conversation and music are impossible without it. It won’t stop a bullet; yet it protects us from cosmic missile attack. It dries the washing; yet it brings us rain. It doesn’t generate heat; yet it keeps the earth from freezing. It is non-flammable; yet it allows us to make fire. It lacks life; yet it sustains it. These are a few of the multitude of attributes of the wonderful material that is ‘Air’. (Fahy 2009, p ix)

  4. Cultural culture Provisioning Supporting Hindmarch et al 2006

  5. Pennies from Heaven? • We all take the atmosphere for granted • Is the atmosphere the most valuable resource on the planet? • Is the Atmosphere a common? Do we need a Law of the Atmosphere? • ‘With increasing frequency and severity over the past century, human activities have reduced the atmosphere’s capacity to supply the atmospheric servicesupon which humans and the rest of the biosphere intimately depend.’ (Harrison and Matson, 2001, The Atmospheric Commons)

  6. 1. The air that we breathe: Respiration Breathed Air Expired Air Nitrogen 78.62% 74.9% Oxygen 20.85% 15.3% CO2 0.03% 3.6% Water Vapour 0.5% 6.2% 6.75 Billion population produces 2.6 Billion tonnes of CO2 We are all insiders to climate change!

  7. Current Gas Prices (m3) • Compressed Air £2.32 • Oxygen £1.84 • Nitrogen £2.38 • Argon £5.36 • Hydrogen £5.98 • (As of March 2009) • We breathe about 15 m3 of air per day • Atmosphere worth £8 million trillion (£1019)! • That is more than £1 billion each!

  8. 2. Protection from radiation, plasma & meteors * The Ozone Layer – 5 Billion Tonnes of Ozone protect life beneath the atmosphere * Hole in the Ozone Layer led to: * The Montreal Protocol – successful regulation? * Protection from solar wind (radiation plasma) * Meteors – 100 tonnes per year get through

  9. 3. Natural global warming of 33 degrees Celsius • The Climate System:

  10. 4. Cleansing capacity & dispersion of air pollution • Evolution of the Earth’s Atmosphere • Air Quality • Trace gases removed by oxidizing chemical reactions involving ozone and hydroxyl free radicals. • Self-cleansing process • Gas regulation and Nutrient cycling

  11. 5. The hydrological cycle and precipitation • Just 1% of water in hydrosphere available for human use and wellbeing. Running out! • Global fresh water use set to rise 40% by 2020 • Who owns the clouds? • Who owns precipitation? • Commodification of water? • Atmosphere recycles clean fresh water? • Weather Modification? Geoengineering?

  12. 6. Ecosystems and Agriculture • Increased CO2 has increased productivity • Almost 100 million tonnes of nitrogen fertiliser produced each year – nitrogen extracted from the air. • Sustains 2 out of 5 people on planet with food • Agriculture 4% 0f GWP (£2 trillion) • Without the filtering of radiation, natural global warming, precipitation, nitrogen fertilisers, pollination – agriculture impossible

  13. 7. Use of oxygen for combustion of fossil fuels • 1.5 m3 oxygen is needed for the combustion of each litre of petrol • If oxygen had to be bought at current market rates this would add £4 to each litre of petrol/diesel! • 2C8H18 + 25O2 = 16CO2 + 18H2O + 34MJ/litre Petrol • Each day on average we combust about the same amount of oxygen as we breathe

  14. 8. Communications and Transport • Civil Aviation grossed $500 billion in 2007 • 20,000+ planes in service daily producing 750,000 tonnes of CO2 per year. • Airspace also used by birds and insects • 90% of plants on earth wind pollinated • Sound, speech, music etc transmitted by air • Radio wave propogation by ionosphere

  15. 9. Direct & Indirect use for Power • Huge potential for Wind, Wave and Solar Power • To save 1 Billion Tonnes of Carbon by 2050 • Will require about 2 million windmills • And/Or about 20,000 sq km of solar cells • Wave power, hydropower , compressed air

  16. 10. Commodification of atmospheric gases

  17. 11. Atmospheric Recreation & climate tourism • Sport: • Weather Reliant Sports eg sailing, skiing, gliding, ballooning etc • Weather Interference sports eg football, rugby, tennis etc • Weather Advantage Sports eg cricket • Recreation and Leisure • Climate Tourism – sun seeking - skiing

  18. 12. Aesthetic, spiritual and sensual properties of the atmosphere • As I contemplate the blue of the sky, I am not ‘set over against’ it as an acosmic subject .... I am the sky itself as it is drawn together and unified, and as it begins to exist for itself; my consciousness is saturated with this limitless blue. Merleau-Ponty • Cultural Climatology - Environmental Art • John Constable • Monet • James Turrell

  19. Skyspace James TurrellYorkshire Sculpture Park

  20. Value of the Atmosphere 1? • Current CO2 trading price about £12/tonne • Let us value the atmosphere at £10/tonne • 1 GWP = £43 trillion then • 5148 trillion tonnes > 1000 GWP • 1 tonne air occupies about 833 m3 at sea level • At 100km 1 tonne of air about 100 km3

  21. Value of the Atmosphere 2? • A tonne of air doesn’t relate to everyday experience – how about a cubic metre of air? • We breathe about 15 m3 of air every day • What would we be willing to pay?? • Current market price is about £2/m3 (BOC) • At that price we would all be bankrupt! • How about 0.1p or perhaps 1p per m3 ?

  22. Value of the Atmosphere 3? • We breathe about 5,500 m3 per year • At a price of 0.1p per m3 that would amount to just £5.50 per year • At a price of 1p per m3 that would amount to just £ £55.50 per year • That is just 1.5p or 15p per day • This would give the total value of the atmosphere to be between 100 & 1000GWP

  23. Impact of Stratospheric Aerosols on Atmospheric Services

  24. Conclusions • Very early days in identifying and quantifying value of Atmospheric Services • Which Atmospheric Services are vulnerable? • New approach to convince public and policy makers to look after the atmosphere? • Atmosphere should be a global commons? • We need a Law of the Atmosphere? • True cost of Geoengineering the climate ?

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