NON-SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT Consequences of the Changes of Global Carbon Cycle

The concepts of sustainability include the necessity to preserve the Earth for future generations in an unchanged state. However, has irreversibly exploited a considerable part of the usable fossil fuels. Due to their combustion, as well as to changes in vegetation cover and land use the global carbon cycle receives additionally more than 6 billion tons of carbon annually. About half of this carbon remains in the atmosphere in the form of CO2 which has increased its concentration from about 280 ppm in pre-industrial times to the present 380 ppm. This anthropogenic CO2 concentration increase induces changes in the radiation balance of the Earth and its global climate.