[RedDevil]

I learned about the Keeling Curve lately, and I wanted to share it because of a possibility to reduce carbon (for whatever reason, not suggesting it has anything to do with climate change obviously) with help of Mother Nature, none other.

While the Keeling Curve shows a steady increase over the years, it has a strong seasonal fluctuation:


This fluctuation is caused by leaves growing and decaying. During spring and summer trees form leaves and lock carbon from the air into them. During autumn and winter these leaves fall and decay, releasing the carbon again.
As most of the Earths temperate land zones are on the northern hemisphere the carbon variation follows the northern summer and winter pattern, even on the southern hemisphere. Close to forests the variation is biggest, but even on Mauna Loa, far away from the large forests, the pattern is obvious.
The trees absorb so much carbon dioxide that during summer the levels decline globally.

Now, what if we try to harvest the leaves? Store and dry them in giant silos, maybe heat them without oxygen to separate the hydrogen from the carbon, producing combustible gases while retaining some of the carbon.
If we could indeed capture and process a large volume of leaves then we would be able to compensate for all the carbon we put into the atmosphere. We just need to match fossil fuels carbon wise, say (i guess) a tonne of leaves for every barrel of oil.
We could at least try using leaves rather than oil as a source for carbon based products like plastics.

More info on the Keeling curve: https://scripps.ucsd.edu/programs/keelingcurve/