2011/03/31 by Axel Kleidon · 1 citation
Earth and Planetary Sciences · Environmental Science · Physics and Astronomy · #Abiotic component #Climate Change and Geoengineering #Context (archaeology) #Disequilibrium #Earth Systems and Cosmic Evolution #Earth system science #Energy (signal processing) #Energy consumption #Origins and Evolution of Life #Sustainability #Thermodynamic system #Uniqueness #nlin.AO #physics.ao-ph #physics.geo-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1098/rsta.2011.0316
contribution to Theme Issue "Influence of Nonlinearity and Randomness in Climate Prediction" of Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society A
arxiv created 2011/08/01 · openalex publication_date 2012/01/30 · arxiv updated 2015/05/27 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
The Earth's chemical composition far from chemical equilibrium is unique in our Solar System, and this uniqueness has been attributed to the presence of widespread life on the planet. Here, I show how this notion can be quantified using non-equilibrium thermodynamics. Generating and maintaining disequilibrium in a thermodynamic variable requires the extraction of power from another thermodynamic gradient, and the second law of thermodynamics imposes fundamental limits on how much power can be extracted. With this approach and associated limits, I show that the ability of abiotic processes to generate geochemical free energy that can be used to transform the surface-atmosphere environment is strongly limited to less than 1 TW. Photosynthetic life generates more than 200 TW by performing photochemistry, thereby substantiating the notion that a geochemical composition far from equilibrium can be a sign for strong biotic activity. Present-day free energy consumption by human activity in the form of industrial activity and human appropriated net primary productivity is of the order of 50 TW and therefore constitutes a considerable term in the free energy budget of the planet. When aiming to predict the future of the planet, we first note that since global changes are closely related to this consumption of free energy, and the demands for free energy by human activity are anticipated to increase substantially in the future, the central question in the context of predicting future global change is then how human free energy demands can increase sustainably without negatively impacting the ability of the Earth system to generate free energy. This question could be evaluated with climate models, and the potential deficiencies in these models to adequately represent the thermodynamics of the Earth system are discussed. Then, I illustrate the implications of this thermodynamic perspective by discussing the forms of renewable energy and planetary engineering that would enhance the overall free energy generation and, thereby 'empower' the future of the planet.