Covid-19 curbed the global Carbon Emissions but current levels are still highest in millions of years

Neither the Covid-19 nor its impacts have been evaded so far.

Neither the anthropogenic activities those called upon this pandemic upon us nor the activities accelerating the doom of this struggling planet, have been stopped so far even after the mirror of Pandemic exposed our vulnerabilities well enough.

It is a characteristic of Human behavior that we tend to forget our lessons once the problem lessens.

In this context, it will not be surprising to know that current levels of carbon dioxide in the Earth’s atmosphere is even higher than it has been in last 3.6 million years.

And in the past 2 decades, the world’s temperature has risen about two-thirds of a degree Fahrenheit. We need to understand how shall we be able to achieve our destined IPCC targets for 1.5 or 2 degree Celsius.

COVID-19 pandemic could do nothing to slow the root cause of global warming: it had been scary for lives, livelihoods yet it couldn’t scare enough to abandon one’s killer ways.

According to NOAA’s Global Monitoring Laboratory, “Human activity is driving climate change. If we want to mitigate the worst impacts, it’s going to take a deliberate focus on reducing fossil fuels emissions to near zero – and even then, we’ll need to look for ways to further remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.”

Although the economic slowdown caused by the coronavirus pandemic might have staggered a country’s potential to emit vehicular, industrial carbon emissions, yet the levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane – the two prominent greenhouse gases – continued their unrelenting rise in 2020.

The pandemic-triggered economic recession was expected to have reduced carbon emissions by about 7% during 2020. But it’s even exhilarating to know that without such economic slowdown, the 2020 increase in emissions would have been the highest on record.

Kate Marvel, a climate scientist at NASA even dares to say: “I’m even more certain CO2 causes global heating, than I am, that smoking causes cancer. The world is already more than 2 [degrees Fahrenheit] warmer than it was before the Industrial Revolution.”

However, there is something other than Carbon obsession that needs to be addressed: a far more reluctant greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide when it comes to global warming, Methane.

While Methane’s atmospheric concentration is much less as compared to carbon dioxide, methane is 28 times more effective at trapping infrared radiation. The atmospheric residence time of methane is approximately 9 years.

There is a recorded annual increase in Methane emissions for 2020 standing at 14.7 parts per billion, which is the largest of all records, since the measurements began in 1983.

According to NOAA research chemist: “Although increased fossil emissions may not be fully responsible for the recent growth in methane levels, reducing fossil methane emissions are an important step toward mitigating climate change“.

Why such CO2 emission is a looming crisis?

Atmospheric CO₂ unlike many other gases, undergo the photochemical destruction. The CO₂ finds its way back into our systems: can dissolve in water and be turned through photosynthesis in plants, into wood and other organic matter.

Cosmic rays tend to produce radioactive carbon-14 in the atmosphere, which thus reacts with oxygen to become ¹⁴CO₂. In this form it can dissolve in the oceans or taken up by plants.

In plants and soils, Carbon source is oxidized back to CO₂ through respiration by living organisms and fires. It holds significance in the processes of our cells or in the intestines during assimilation, producing CO2.

The atmosphere, oceans, and terrestrial biosphere act like an interconnected reservoir that aids Carbon cycle and CO₂ from fossil fuels burning can only increase the total carbon amount in this reservoir, thereby creating a huge imbalance.

This drives us crazy and even sprouts a few disturbing questions in our minds.

Why the slowdown becomes scapegoat when we talk of reduced job opportunities, increased taxes for revival or rehabilitation, increased health problems, increased depression in society, ever-increasing imbibed inequality within our socio-economic fabric. Simply, why?

If CO₂ emissions from the burning of fossil fuels are lower because of the pandemic, why is the atmospheric CO₂ not also going down?

We can choose to avert all these questions but every other time, a report finds its way to the awakened youth of this planet, it will get its voice back.