Carbon dioxide in Earth's atmosphere Atmospheric O levels are decreasing in Earth's atmosphere as it reacts with the carbon in fossil fuels to form . Burning fossil fuels such as coal, petroleum, and natural gas is the leading cause of increased anthropogenic ; deforestation is the second major cause. In 2010, 9.14 gigatonnes of carbon (GtC, equivalent to 33.5 gigatonnes of or about 4.3 ppm in Earth's atmosphere) were released from fossil fuels and cement production worldwide, compared to 6.15 GtC in 1990. In addition, land use change contributed 0.87 GtC in 2010, compared to 1.45 GtC in 1990. In 1997, human-caused Indonesian peat fires
Natural gas in the United States the oil and the gas are treated separately. Gas flows through a gathering system into a pipeline to a gas processing plant. As of 2014, there were 189,000 miles of interstate natural gas pipelines in the United States Natural gas has a variety of chemical constituents that must be removed or diluted with other gas to achieve consistent pipeline quality. Pipeline gas specifications vary from line to line, but generally the gas must contain no appreciable hydrogen sulfide (which is toxic), less than a few percent carbon dioxide (carbon dioxide reacts with water to form carbonic acid, which is corrosive