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Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Bread dough prepared with flour grown in a future climate with elevated atmospheric CO2 may not rise properly, claims Dr Fitzgerald, a senior Australian research scientist with the Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources.
According to the Sydney Morning Herald;
On the right is a loaf made from grain grown in today’s climate conditions. On the left is a loaf made from grain that sprouted in concentrations of carbon dioxide that are expected by mid-century if greenhouse gas emissions aren’t reduced significantly.
So this is 2050 bread. It was baked at the Australian Grains Free Air CO₂ Enrichment facility (AgFace) in Victoria by a research group studying the effect elevated carbon dioxide will have on crops such as wheat, lentils, canola and field pea.
AgFace leader Glenn Fitzgerald said the effect of high carbon dioxide on grains is complex. On the one hand, it makes plants such as wheat and canola grow faster and produce greater yields but, on the other hand, they contain less protein. Elevated carbon dioxide also alters the ratio of different types of proteins in wheat, which, in the case of bread, effects the elasticity of dough and how well a loaf rises.
“We don’t understand completely why that’s the case,” said Dr Fitzgerald, a senior research scientist with the Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources.
I have hand prepared fresh bread at least twice a week, for the last 5 years. There are so many variables which can influence bread dough. The air temperature is the obvious variable, but bread is also very sensitive to the amount of water, the temperature of the water, the amount of salt and shortening or fat, how long you mix the dough, the type of bowl it is mixed in (metal bowls conduct heat, which tends to cool the dough below optimum temperature), the quality of the yeast, the age of the yeast, what soap you used to wash your hands (bread yeast hates dish washing detergent – even a trace can badly affect yeast growth), the humidity of the air (flour absorbs a lot of water, humidity affects how much water you have to add to achieve the optimum consistency), whether one loaf caught more of a breeze than the other loaf while the bread dough was rising, the list goes on.
To ignore all of this, and conclude that CO2 shrunk the slightly stunted loaf, in my opinion seems utterly absurd, even for climate science.
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Just when you thought the CAGW thing could not get any sillier, damn! It does!!
The loaf on the right looks like it has had botox. Given a choice I would take the one on the left.
Lets just wait and see what happens when the plant breeding catches up with the atmospheric conditions and optimises the genetics shall we. That is the way the biosphere has worked for half a billion years or so as I understand it.
BTW, who knows, in 2050 the whole CAGW scare campaign may well have imploded a few decades earlier.
The loaf on the right looks suspiciously as if it were painted with egg-white to let it expand farther without splitting.
I thought the same thing.
By 2050, they’ll have taken control over the Internet and so all communication of information. You will need a license with a government ID to login. And anti-CAGW speech will be classified as felonious hate speech, along with whatever else catches Hitler’s fancy.
And we sterilized humans who remain will be begging for more worm rations.
Am I correct that this study involved exactly 2 loaves of bread?
Why not? When did replication of results ever have anything to do with “Climate Science”? If it did the models they have been using would have been in file 13 long ago.
Oh! That’s gonna leave a mark.
Tom Crozier
June 21, 2015 at 11:16 am
said:
Am I correct that this study involved exactly 2 loaves of bread?
——–
A miracle! He will starve the masses with only two loaves of bread.
Hmm I still smell fish…
I guess it’s the sermon that comes with it all, that I don’t agree with.
Somewhere along the line, someone presented this for publication, and someone accepted it. And through the length of that process, no one laughed and said “Are you kidding me?”. I find that amazing. Worse yet, in some way or another, I probably paid for this study.
They missed the most important variable. The seed they used to grow the wheat in high CO2 conditions came from a long line of wheat that was not grown in such conditions.
Idiots.
Why would anyone pay for such pointless research? How stupid do you have to be to fund this sort of nonsense?
You have to be government stupid.
That stupid, eh!
All it did was make me feel hungry.
Exactly, and plant breeders are just going to throw up their hands and walk away? I don’t think so. A lot can happen in 35 years. These studies ALWAYS leave out the wild card, human ingenuity!
If we had some bread, we could have some bread with our stone soup, if we had stone soup.
I, for one, welcome our new benevolent One-World Overlords.
Heinlein’s (stolen) version from Starman Jones was: If we had some ham we could have ham and eggs if we had some eggs.
We’ve got spam though…
Just when you think it couldn’t get more absurd…..it does. You can’t make this stuff up. They must think people are gullible enough to believe all the scare mongering for anything but what it really is.
More climate B+++ocks!
You really could not make this stuff up! in 10,000 years when our descendants read this. They will become deniers, we did not land on the moon, etcetc
Err… and exactly how is this going to be an issue outside a few countries in Europe where they actually know how to make proper bread?
I’ve long thought that the Pilgrims of the Plymouth Colony forgot to take the recipe for bread with them.
These researchers are real http://snag.gy/xq8JN.jpg
There’s also a huge difference between flour made from different types of wheat,and between winter and spring wheat,hard and soft wheat,red and white wheat. Some are high gluten,which has a higher protein content,others are low gluten,less protein content.
High gluten flour is for breads,low gluten is for cakes and pastries.
Wonder why no mention of this in the “study”?
There are also over 30,000 varieties of wheat-
http://www.kingarthurflour.com/flours/learn-more.html
The article begins with outright lies…
“If the promise of higher temperatures, rising sea levels and more frequent natural disasters doesn’t convince you of the urgent need for the world to act on climate change, maybe this picture will.
This is what global warming will do to your loaf of bread.”
Then there’s the “thin tubes” which provide the CO2-looks like 1/2″ galvanized pipe to me-or 12.7mm since it’s Australia-in an open field.
Just more throwing everything possible out there before the Paris climate change talks in the hopes that enough people have no clue about varieties of wheat,high and low gluten flours,different strains of yeast,and al the variables involved in baking believe this horsepucky.
Higher sea levels mean the CO2 loaf will sink and we will lose it. They didn’t think of that I bet.
Good point, haven’t seen the barometric pressure touched on yet!
I think the 1/2″ pipes are a boundary marker. The actual tubes must be at grade, not visible in the photo, though you can see some sort of connection riser near the “researchers.”
Yeah,I noticed that after I looked at the picture a little closer,I think the 1/2″/12.7 mm pipe is what supplies smaller “tubes” that disperse the CO2 at ground level.
The article stated that the seedlings were exposed to higher CO2 levels-still a lot of loss due to wind/air movement and rain
Not a very well controlled experiment,plus we don’t know what strain of wheat they used,whether it was a spring or summer harvest,ambient temp in their test kitchen,oven temp,how the dough was kneaded,how long it was allowed to rise…
Any way you look at the experiment-they’re full of sh*t-CO2 levels will have zero effect on baking bread.
If,and it’s a big if,there was any real effect on wheat’s protein content,the changes would take place very slowly-bakers would adapt their recipes.
This is a long term experiment that has been running for at least five years here in Horsham Australia.
http://www.piccc.org.au/research/project/252
Secondly to alleviate any ignorance, here in Australia we grow what genetically are Spring wheats but are adapted to grow right through our winter.
Seeding depending on the latitude and winter conditions and rainfall [ wheat is grown west of Mildura in a 250mm [ 10″ ] average annual rainfall band ] is from April through to July depending on the local regions climate characteristics.
The harvest period ranges from mid september in NSW and WA through to February in the south of Victoria
A first couple of winter wheat varieties adapted to Australia’s non snow and warm temperatures compared to the NH cereal growing regions, have just been released commercially.
DO NOT assume that what you are familiar with in grain growing applies elsewhere and make any judgments good or bad, until you know what you are talking about as to the operations and conditions of other growing areas.
Even here in Australia in our low rainfall, low yielding crops there are very marked changes in varieties, soils. fertilizer levels temperatures, rainfall and production methods and timing in only a couple of hundred kilometres distance.
CO2 during baking had nothing to do with those bread loaves. they are the same variety, the same aweight of g a couple of hundred grams used for the international I think, completely standardised, reproducible varietal baking test which is used to test the baking and bread qualities of EVERY variety that is a candidate for releasing to the growers.
The two miniature bread loaves illustrated are from the same variety from the same field , grown under the same conditions with just the CO2 concentration levels during it’s growing period being the one major difference in the whole experiment.
And that was the result.
A different variety might well have had a larger or smaller difference in the bread loaf characteristics under the same CO2 enrichment levels and that is what this is all about.
As to whether we will ever see those levels of atmospheric CO2 I frankly don’t believe we will.
And I will add that I have strongly disagreed and said so on many occasions with the direction of some grain research in it’s concentration of more warming and higher temperatures at the critical grain fill period here in Australia.
I have said many times that cold is what we should be worried about but the global warming theme has penetrated deep into every aspect of science to the great detriment of future flexibility in varietal breeding.
But I will lay odds that a couple of our plant breeders have a few varieties tucked away that can be used as cold tolerance crosses if such a cold period appears.
oh yes Horsham ag mob.. the ones that grew GM wheat in OPEN paddocks with free access to birds roos n fox n rabbits running through to spread seed?
as for cold tolerant seed, good luck with that for the avg farmer accessing it for a fair price if at all
locked up os isnt it?svaalbard with gates and the monmen able to grab n patent
and our ag import(justifibly so ) quarantine laws make imports near impossible if youre NOT a big agri mob.
saved seed of old varieties is slim to zip due to the mega industrials only wanting to BUY the new bred hybrid grains.
mates organic farm using OLD breeds on mid to poor soil no chem inputs grows 13/14% hard grain
silos dont want it, but organic mills sure do.
the input to farm are beyond rude using hitech “advice”n products
take those costs out and its far easier to make money
chemical to poison the soil?
or two passes with a disc spaced apart…same fuel cost but thousands less on toxic crud.
same 2 crops or use a variety and a fallow year?
let stock roam in the fallow year to eat weeds and fertilize.
that doesnt suit bigagri or industrial food manufacturers
doesnt do humans or the land any good either, to pander to them.
less “science” and more hands on experience from the old timers who KNOW the land would be good
“Secondly to alleviate any ignorance, here in Australia we grow what genetically are Spring wheats but are adapted to grow right through our winter.”
What you are growing is winter wheat-it grows through the winter,and is harvested in spring,when it completes its growth.
Note that I stated there are over 30,000 varieties of wheat.
Less protein in wheat-the claim made in the experiment, makes low gluten flour aka cake flour when the wheat is milled.
“CO2 during baking had nothing to do with those bread loaves.”
CO2 during baking has everything to do with how a loaf of bread turns out-dough rises because the yeast releases CO2 as it “eats” the sugars in the flour-along with added sugars.
The experiment is total bullsh*t-using only a single strain of wheat proves exactly nothing.
Similar soils,ambient temps,amounts of rainfall,fertilizers used,growing and harvesting methods found in Australia can be found in North America.
Do NOT assume that I have no idea about farming practices and growing conditions only in the small area in which I live.
Err yes OK. But did they bake the bread in a high CO2 room so that it fully replicate the BS new level?
As someone who has made too much beer, not yet enough wine, and maybe just enough bread – I can tell you that besides reproducing at a rate that would make rabbits blush – yeast eats sugar, farts CO2, and pees alcohol. No more, no less. It most definitely does not give a damn how the sugar came to be on it’s teeny plate.
So the bread didn’t rise as much because it didn’t have as much air in it?
Just play some of the CAGW promoters speeches to it. Not only will all the hot air make rise but it will also help bake it (at least half way) thus saving energy!
FTA: “”We don’t understand completely why that’s the case,” said Dr Fitzgerald, a senior research scientist with the Department of Economic Development, Jobs, Transport and Resources.”
WUWT Quiz: How many errors of science can you spot in that one sentence?
Is Fitzzy even a ‘scientist’?
what a great study. they say more CO2 equals less protein in wheat, therefore less gluten, therefore less elasticity, therefore, “bread won’t rise as much, because the gluten provides the elasticity”.
Absolute freekin geniuses, they are.
Perhaps they should have contacted someone in the food biz. You want your wheat flour with more gluten? Just ask…
Professional bakers use flours with a variety of protein levels, depending on what their final product is to be. For instance, cakes need flour with a protein level very low, say 7%. Bread does well with 10-12%. Bagels/pizza dough like 14%. And if that isn’t enough protein, add concentrated wheat gluten at 75% protein. For a single loaf like they baked in the study, a tablespoon would have saved the day. So now maybe humans won’t go extinct from lack of protein in bread.
Yikes, can we get a grant to prove this?
Ah but why do you think the article didn’t say gluten?
Because 99.99% of the hypochondriac leftist dots who claim to be gluten intolerant don’t know what the hell it is.
To illustrate TOM T’s last comment:
Pedestrian Question – What is Gluten?
Study after study seems to show the negative consequences of increasing CO2. Despite the 25% increase in yields that they site, this study focuses on what clearly is identified as a negative consequence.
I’m not an expert on baking bread. Maybe wheat that grows under higher CO2 levels will not rise as much. It’s complex as they state.
However, I have been forecasting global crop yields/production for a living for over 2 decades. Without question, the increasing CO2 is contributing to higher crop yields/food production across the planet. Regardless of the rising capability of wheat, 25% more wheat is 25% more wheat. It doesn’t become less wheat because of the way it rises. Increasing the CO2 produces much more food for people to eat……….with almost every crop.
Note: The picture shown with the article shows 2 loaves of bread. The one identified as being grown in the higher CO2 environment looks around 25% smaller. Interesting visual impact when the reality is that they found that in the higher CO2 environment, there was 25% MORE wheat.
If you went to the grocery store and were told that for $2, you could have today’s bigger loaf as pictured in their article or tomorrow’s smaller loaf, which one would you pick? You would think that you are getting more for your money on the bigger loaf…………..but apparently, just the opposite would be true.
What if the choice was not as visually depicted but instead was stated based on the actual data from the wheat yields. Today’s amount of wheat for $2, or that same amount of wheat +25% more product for the same price based on the more favorable CO2 growing conditions?
Maybe the smaller loaf is more dense. Or maybe there would be more loaves to offset the smaller loaves.
Regardless, 25% more wheat is 25% more wheat and the reason was because the CO2 went up:
Sunshine +H2O +CO2 +Minerals = O2 +Sugars(food)
“…Maybe the smaller loaf is more dense…”
I know something that’s more dense.
“which, in the case of bread, effects the elasticity of dough and how well a loaf rises.”
If these DramaQueens can’t even write correct English, should we pay attention?
Their claim is that CO2 AFFECTS elasticity etc. Maybe it has an EFFECT, maybe not.
Maybe Glenn Fitzgerald should study the difference between a noun and a verb.
This may help:-
Liar = noun.
Lie = verb.
AH HA! Just as I suspected, if the chemistry of the ingredients change – so would the recipe:
“Substitute spelt or wheat flour, cup for cup, for all-purpose or bread flour in any bread recipe. However, for spelt make two adjustments: reduce the amount of water by 25% and reduce the mixing or kneading time by one half.
Whereas a Kamut bread requires more kneading and, as its gluten is less elastic, the addition of coarse ingredients (such as nuts, dried fruit or seeds) tends to tear and, therefore, compromise its leavening power.”
http://www.rebeccawood.com/food-as-medicine/spelt-and-kamut/
Apparently scientists want less wheat to make Pretty Bread that feeds less people; instead of more wheat that MAY make a lot of ugly bread.
Shaking My Head.
Pretty Bread – is that like Fairy Bread? 100’s and 1,000’s.
well the FOOD scientists DO
theyre adding pea flour and all sorts of plasticisers n crap that is NOT wheat to commercial mixes to save money and increase costs.
I grind whole grains add gluten yeast salt sugar n some oil and get a perfect loaf.
What evidence do you have that food scientist add crap to bread. Please report the evidence to the FDA. because crap in bread doesn’t sound good.
How long before the environmentalists call for a ban on yeast. . . . and break and wine, since, after all, they’re production results that noxious carbon dioxide being realized into the atmosphere, where it will stay for hundreds of years and cause the oceans to boil away. . .
This is your bread.
This is your bread on CO2.
Any questions?
Sure is a far cry from the 10-10 “no pressure at all … it’s your own choice” ads ain’t it?
Those ads look like something that someone would make to show how deranged environmentalists are, but psychotic environmentalists saved us all the trouble and outted themselves. Such is the nature of mental illness, I guess.
Lol
At what point does this stuff become a parody of itself?
apparently never
Ask Nathan Poe.
Sufficiently advanced climate science is indistinguishable from its parody.
Wow, man, this is a tragedy. I was literally pulling a slice of bread out of the bag when I opened this page.
So, if I understand them correctly, they’re saying, post climate change, I will have to have rice instead? Damn you, climate-change deniers!
This explains why I can’t get a decent Kosher corned beef sandwich in northern California
They withheld the news that the same experiment showed no change in pumpernickel.
You need to go to Montreal
Well known since the end of the 16th century : “Though this be madness,yet there is method in’t !”
It’s brainwashing and indoctrination even in completely absurd contexts!What counts for Jane and Joe Smith, is the number of CAGW messages!
hey! … that’s ma kin yer talkin’ about
But what they sez is you can pick yer friends, you can pick yer nose .. can’t pick yer relations.
Can’t eat yer friends neither.
There really is nothing (bad) that CO2 cannot do… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9vdl3TRxv0c