Oxygen Levels could be declining due to Global Warming

 

Over the last 800,000 years it seems that the levels of oxygen in the atmosphere have been decreasing. Researchers at the Rice University have been studying air bubbles in the Antarctic ice and the best guess at what might be causing the very slight decrease in oxygen in the atmosphere is that as global warming causes the glaciers to melt and receive new rocks are exposed to the atmosphere and these oxidise taking up oxygen from the atmosphere. Before you start to panic the oxygen levels have only decreased very slightly. And this has been going on since the late Pleistocene. Generally, the levels of oxygen are not affected in the earths biosphere because that is a very balance system drawing in as much oxygen from the atmosphere as is produced however weathering on a global scale is the most likely geological process capable of us consuming enough of this excess oxygen to account for the decline. The global sea levels fell when glaciers were advancing and they are rising when the glaciers are retreating and this coincides with the oxygen in the atmosphere.




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