A must-have introduction to this fundamental driver of the climate
system
The Global Carbon Cycle is a short introduction to this essential
geochemical driver of the Earth's climate system, written by one of the
world's leading climate-science experts. In this one-of-a-kind primer,
David Archer engages readers in clear and simple terms about the many
ways the global carbon cycle is woven into our climate system. He begins
with a concise overview of the subject, and then looks at the carbon
cycle on three different time scales, describing how the cycle interacts
with climate in very distinct ways in each. On million-year time scales,
feedbacks in the carbon cycle stabilize Earth's climate and oxygen
concentrations. Archer explains how on hundred-thousand-year
glacial/interglacial time scales, the carbon cycle in the ocean
amplifies climate change, and how, on the human time scale of decades,
the carbon cycle has been dampening climate change by absorbing
fossil-fuel carbon dioxide into the oceans and land biosphere. A central
question of the book is whether the carbon cycle could once again act to
amplify climate change in centuries to come, for example through melting
permafrost peatlands and methane hydrates.
The Global Carbon Cycle features a glossary of terms, suggestions for
further reading, and explanations of equations, as well as a
forward-looking discussion of open questions about the global carbon
cycle.
