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more local and regional in their extent.


3. Would the smoke and particles lead to global warming or produce a
"nuclear winter?"

The oil fires would be too small to cause any significant global warming or
widespread cooling, such as could be produced in the "nuclear winter"
scenario. In general, particles in the air can lead to a cooling of the
atmosphere near the surface.

The nuclear winter scenario is based on the injection of particles into the
atmosphere from hundreds of wide-spread nuclear explosions and the
firestorms they would cause. This scenario requires the stratospheric
injection (and consequent long residence time) of particles, and even a
massive oil fire would not produce enough energy to achieve this effect.
Second, the fire would be limited to areas downwind of the Persian Gulf
region, whereas the nuclear winter scenario requires a global blanket of
particles formed by many such plumes originating across several
continents.


4. Would the release of carbon dioxide affect global warming?

Any release of carbon dioxide would have some influence on the warming
of the atmosphere, but the amount released by a massive oil fires would be
negligible in comparison to what is normally released. as a result of burning
of coal and other fuels, forest fires, agricultural fires, etc. Even if an oil
field which produced a significant fraction, say 10%, of the world's    -
consumption of petroleum were set afire, it wpuld contribute no more thai~
a few percent to the rate at which carbon dioxide is normally produced,
and unlikely to significantly increase or accelerate global warming.


5.  Would crop productivity be influenced?

Ash and smoke particles will deposit on crops within a few miles of the
fires causing a temporary and minor reduction in photosynthesis. Blocking
and scattering of sunlight would also have a minor and temporary effect
within the first few miles.


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