How Efficient Is OIF At Removing Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide?
There are two measures commonly used to describe the effectiveness of OIF. The first measure, atmospheric uptake efficiency, is the ratio of atmospheric CO2 absorbed by the ocean to the amount of carbon exported by the biological pump to depths at which it will not re-equilibrate with the atmosphere for long periods of time. We believe this is an important measure of the efficiency of OIF as a carbon sequestration technique, because the goal of a carbon sequestration technique is to remove CO2 from the atmosphere. Jin et al. [2008] found atmospheric uptake efficiencies of 0.75 – 0.93, which were much higher than earlier and simpler models (e.g., [Gnanadesikan, Sarmiento, and Slater, 2003]). The second measure commonly referred to is the iron utilization efficiency, which is the ratio of carbon exported to iron supplied. We do not believe that this is an appropriate method of determining the amount of carbon sequestered. Iron introduced to the surface water is not directly related to ca
