Human impact forms 'striking new pattern' in Earth's global energy flow

http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2016-03/uol-hif032316.php

Public Release: 23-Mar-2016
Human impact forms 'striking new pattern' in Earth's global energy flow
University of Leicester researchers lead Anthropocene study into planet's biological production and consumption
University of Leicester

The impact humans have made on Earth in terms of how we produce and consume resources has formed a 'striking new pattern' in the planet's global energy flow, according to researchers from the University of Leicester.

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Professor Zalasiewicz said: "Very big changes in our planet's pattern of biological production and consumption do not happen very often. The appearance of photosynthesis was one, about two and a half billion years ago. Then, a little over half a billion years ago, animals like trilobites appeared, to add scavengers and predators into a food web of increasing complexity.

"Other major events have happened since, such as five major mass extinctions, but even measured against these events, human-driven changes to production and consumption are distinctly new."

Dr Carys Bennett, co-author on the study from the University of Leicester's Department of Geology, added: "It is without precedent to have a single species appropriating something like one quarter of the net primary biological production of the planet and to become effectively the top predator both on land and at sea."

In addition, by digging phosphorus out of the ground and by fixing nitrogen out of the air to make fertilizers; and by exploiting hundreds of millions of years-worth of stored carbon-based energy in a still-accelerating trend, humans are increasing productivity well above natural levels - and directing much of it towards animals that have been re-engineered to suit our purposes.

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