Quote:
Originally Posted by Johnny1A.2
If a ship comes by a century or two later, would the air still have enough O2 to be breathable?
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Yes. I did the math on this for the thread on timeline
Lucifer-3. Based on Earth:
Total atmospheric oxygen: 1.4x10^15 tons. Total carbon in biomass (living and dead): 2.0x10^12 tons. Even if all of the carbon in biomass were fully oxidized, it would result in a 0.3% drop in atmospheric oxygen. Rusting and other inorganic surface oxidation processes remove about 6x10^8 tons of oxygen per year: significant on a geological time scale (~23,000 years for a 1% drop), but not in the couple of centuries you're asking about.