--- title: "Humans Produce 100x More CO2 Than All Volcanoes Combined" description: "According to a decade-long study by a team of scientists, human activity emissions total up to 100 times more than all volcanoes combined." date: "2019-10-01" modified: "2019-10-01" authors: - name: "Victor Tangermann" job_title: "Senior Editor" link: "https://futurism.com/authors/victor" url: "https://futurism.com/study-human-emissions-volcanoes" categories: - "Energy" - "Renewable Energy" - "Science & Energy" tags: - "carbon dioxide" - "co2 emissions" - "global emissions" --- # Humans Produce 100x More CO2 Than All Volcanoes Combined ![According to a decade-long study by a team of scientists, human activity emissions total up to 100 times more than all volcanoes combined.]() *\Image: NASA/Victor Tangermann\* According to a [decade-long study]() by an international team of researchers, human CO2 emissions total 100 times more than the planet-warming effects of all volcanoes combined. The total amount emitted by volcanoes is only about 0.3 gigatons a year — a tiny fraction of the [37 gigatons]() humankind produced in 2018 alone. That means they're not nearly as big of a contributor to global emissions as some prevailing theories hold. "Climate skeptics really jump on volcanoes as a possible contender for top CO2 emissions but it's simply not the case," Marie Edmonds, Professor of Volcanology and Petrology at Queens' College, Cambridge, told [told *Agence France-Presse*](). In the distant past, there have been freak incidents on a similar scale to today's human CO2 output — and they were catastrophic. One such carbon event was the Chicxulub asteroid impact, 66 million years ago, which the scientists estimate to have released anywhere between 425 and 1,400 gigatons of CO2. But the impact of industrial civilization is now taking a comparable toll. "The amount of CO2 pumped into the atmosphere by \[manmade\] activity in the last 10-12 years\[is equivalent\] to the catastrophic change during these events we've seen in Earth's past," Edmonds told *AFP*. "We are on the same level of carbon catastrophe which is a bit sobering," Celina Suarez, Associate Professor of Geology at the University of Arkansas, added. The team of scientists [released a series of papers]() as part of the so-called [Deep Carbon Observatory](), a global research program founded in 2009. Unfortunately, for the Earth to level out carbon dioxide in its atmosphere, it'll be a very long while. "It will rebalance itself, but not on a timescale that is of significance to humans," Suarez said. **READ MORE:** [Humanity's emissions '100-times greater' than volcanoes]() \[*AFP*\] **More on volcanoes:** *[Research: Planting Trillions of Trees Could Cancel Out CO2 Emissions]()* ## Author I've been at Futurism since 2017, where my role has evolved to encompass design, writing, and increasingly editing. I've always been fascinated by space exploration and advanced transportation, which I've leaned into by interviewing luminaries in those fields while closely following the dimensions of policy and regulation that allow next-generation projects to succeed -- or, sometimes, to fail. I'm also keenly interested in the effects of generative AI on society, policies, and democratic institutions, as well as clean energy, physics and biology, and the vagaries of tech leadership. My work for Futurism has been cited by publications including Ars Technica, Gizmodo, PC Magazine, Jalopnik, Fox News, and the New York Post. I spent my childhood living in locations including Manila, the Philippines, and Geneva, Switzerland, attended McGill University, and now live in Toronto, Canada. Before Futurism I worked at AskMen and a small photography studio. In my free time, I'm an avid gardener, foodie, and craft beer lover, as well as a maker of artisanal hot pepper sauces. I have a magnificent dog named Freida. ### Author social links [Bluesky]()