We inhale O2 and exhale CO2, so does that mean we just add carbon and exhale the same oxygen we just inhaled? Why cant we just exhale carbon?
In: Biology
There’s no such thing as gaseous carbon at room temperature and atmospheric pressure. If you want to expel carbon as a gas, you’ll need to find a form of carbon that will be a gas in these conditions, and is also exothermic (generates energy) to produce. Carbon dioxide is simply the best option to do that.
You also seem to be under the impression that we are “wasting” the oxygen we take in by expeling it back out as CO2. The CO2 isn’t being created purely to cart carbon away, it’s just the unusable “ash” left over from using that oxygen to make energy. It has oxygen *in it*, sure, but you can’t use that oxygen anymore. It’s spent.
Latest Answers