The Global Carbon Cycle

The Global Carbon Cycle by David Archer, is one of the excellent series of Princeton Primers in Climate. These are short, economically priced (in the paperback or Kindle editions), slightly technical discussions of aspects of climate.The carbon cycle is the movement of Earth's stock of carbon among its several reservoirs - the solid earth, the oceans, fossil fuels, the soils, the biosphere, and the atmosphere. The atmosphere is the smallest of these but it is also the one crucial for anthropogenic climate change and climate change more generally. The movements are complex, imperfectly understood, and, again, crucial for our understanding of the effect of carbon on the climate.Archer's book explains much of what is known, something about how it is known, and discusses those things that aren't known, all in concise fashion. I liked the book and learned a lot, but I still have a number of complaints. The Kindle version is cheap ($19.25) and easy to carry on my phone, but the not very numerous equations are rendered as tiny images which are difficult (or were difficult for me) to magnify. In some cases, the author gives different numbers for the same quantities, like the amount of carbon in natural gas reservoirs, for example. To be sure, estimates vary, but I would prefer that he give a range rather than quote different estimates in different places. I would also prefer a more structured organization scheme, with more chapters and fewer topics in each.Despite it's generally careful approach to the unknown aspects of the problem, the author occasionally lets his alarm at human caused climate change emphasize, or perhaps overemphasize, the worst case scenarios.In my many arguments with climate skeptics, I have found that the carbon cycle is one of the things about which they are most deeply confused. Its complexity makes it a convenient dumping ground for all kinds of magical thinking, but they could learn a lot by reading this book. That, however, is something that they are unlikely to do.

Cons:(1) There is no schematic of the global carbon cycle, indicating the magnitudes of the carbon reservoirs and fluxes, such as in the Wikipedia.(2) There is no plot of the time history of a CO2 Slug (the net anthropogenic release) over geologic time scale. A plot of the amount in the various carbon reservoirs, and the fluxes acting on the reservoirs, would have been helpful for this prominent topic. A visit to the author's interactive models at his website remedies this deficiency somewhat.(3) Though the geochemistry claims are all given formal citations, some of the climate statements are not, as on the bottom of page 138: "The argument is that dangerous stuff is already happening, in droughts and extreme weather events, and further warming is clearly dangerous."Pros:(1) Truly a primer. Right at that beginning, the ubiquitous issue of Gton of C and Gton of CO2 is addressed. Likewise a rule of thumb for converting Gton of C to ppm is given, and the "per mil" unit is explained. What a relief to have these elementary issues treated with authority and without condescension. How many hours have been wasted in seminars because audience members were too embarrassed to ask for clarification?(2) The use of isotope ratios to deduce the past history of Earth is a scientific triumph that is certainly worth sharing with a wide audience. A real treat for the reader.(3) The dictum "Everything should be as simple as possible,but no simpler." is successfully followed. "Carbonate system pH Chemistry" is difficult to understand, as I suppose it should be. (I still don't get it).(4) Many wonderful factoids about the Earth, life, civilization and fossil fuels are shared with the reader.(5) The book has a high star per dollar ratio.

An interesting analytical look at how Caron works in the earth the relationship on methane to carbon to oh in atmosphere is explained

Interesting book. It was required for a Climate Change class I took in college, and I thought that it was thorough and fairly easy to follow, considering that I am not an environmental science major.

I bought this to read using the iPhone Kindle app and it is literally unreadable. I expect a certain level of formatting goofs -- graphics can only be so perfectly translated -- but the text is butchered; words, sentences, and (I am forced to guess) entire paragraphs are dropped. Can't tell where the first chapter begins. I've never seen anything like it, even in figure- and table-laden books.I am a big fan of David Archer, but man alive. Prof Archer, I'm assuming you didn't do this for the money -- pls assert some kind of veto power over the work. Nobody's learning about global warming this way.