How much co2 will this release and can we afford it?
Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
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Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#12As soon as my 2nd vax dose was 14d behind-me in May 2021, I went to Iceland – which had just recently reopened to vaxed travelers – to see the Fagradalsfjall eruption. It was just a ~50m drive from Reykjavik, plus a ~1h20m hike.
It was spectacular - launching large lava plumes on a roughly 8-minute, reliable cycle, and feeding ever-growing lava fields out around both sides of one hilltop that was ideal for watching the volcano. (The rising lava fields made that perch unreachable just a few weeks later.)
If you've ever wanted to see an eruption up-close, with actual hot flowing lava, get there while it's going/growing. (Of course, this could stop tomorrow or continue for months.)
A good writeup about that time of volcano-tourism: https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/08/23/chasing-the-la...
Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#13How much co2 will this release and can we afford it?
It will release approximately no CO2.
Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#14How much co2 will this release and can we afford it?
“There is no question that very large volcanic eruptions can inject significant amounts of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. The 1980 eruption of Mount St. Helens vented approximately 10 million tons of CO2 into the atmosphere in only 9 hours”
Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#15Twitter running Chirp and Icelandic volcanoes erupting, all is right in the world, here in 2010.
Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#16GeologyHub ( https://www.youtube.com/c/GeologyHub/videos ) does very short (~4 minute) daily videos on volcanic activity, and has covered Iceland several of times recently.
Great channel.
Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#17How much co2 will this release and can we afford it?
There was a famous case of one volcano in Iceland that stranded a bunch of airplanes resulting in net greenhouse savings. That is the amount of greenhouse gas that the volcano emitted was less then what the airplanes would have otherwise emitted if the volcano wouldn’t have stranded them.
That was a fairly small eruption though and didn’t emit a lot of greenhouse gas. There was another eruption last year in the same place as this one, and it was even smaller. This one seems to be larger then last years eruption, but I would be surprised if this one actually emitted more greenhouse gas over the next year then e.g. Iceland’s aluminum industry.
So to answer your question if we can afford it. The answer is yes. We are experiencing about average number of volcanoes globally, and the greenhouse gas emissions of volcanoes has remained steady for the last few millions years, and we are not seeing any increase. In comparison human greenhouse gas emissions are rising dramatically, we should probably focus our efforts there.
EDIT: Here is a short article (in Icelandic) about the greenhouse gas emissions of last year’s eruption: https://kjarninn.is/skodun/eldgos-og-co2/
Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#18How much co2 will this release and can we afford it?
True! We should build a huge biodome above Iceland to contain the CO2.
Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#19Earlier quoted context omitted.
This is the same volcano that erupted last summer and moved slowly enough that you could actually hike it. It was stunning.
As a short and concise report on last year's eruption I would recommend this 60 minutes[0] piece [0]: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LI8Gcpawvo
When 60 minutes is the short and concise version, I'm wondering if Peter Jackson has the full extended version available
Re: Volcanic eruption starts in Iceland (Live webcam)
#20How much co2 will this release and can we afford it?
If I recall the math, the yearly total eruption of actual magma mass is on the same order as the yearly mass of CO2 emitted by humans (some like 80billion tons of magma vs 30billion tons of CO2). The percent, by mass, of dissolved CO2 in that magma is in the single digits.
So to answer to your question: It's a drop in the bucket.