Dr. Patrick Moore sent me this last week, and after reading it, I agree with him in his initial note to me that
This is probably the most important paper I will ever write.
Moore looks at the historical record of CO2 in our atmosphere and concludes that we came dangerously close to losing plant life on Earth about 18,000 years ago, when CO2 levels approached 150 ppm, below which plant life can’t sustain photosynthesis. He notes:
A 140 million year decline in CO2 to levels that came close to threatening the survival of life on Earth can hardly be described as “the balance of nature”.
Now, with 400ppm in the atmosphere, the biosphere is once again booming (see figure 8 below). He also points out how environmental groups and politicians are using the “crisis” of CO2 increase to feather their own nests:
A powerful convergence of interests among key elites supports and drives the climate catastrophe narrative. Environmentalists spread fear and raise donations; politicians appear to be saving the Earth from doom; the media has a field day with sensation and conflict; scientists and science institutions raise billions in public grants, create whole new institutions, and engage in a feeding frenzy of scary scenarios; businesses want to look green and receive huge public subsidies for projects that would otherwise be economic losers, such as large wind farms and solar arrays. Even the Pope of the Catholic Church has weighed in with a religious angle. Lost in all these machinations is the indisputable fact that the most important thing about CO2 is that it is essential for all life on Earth and that before humans began to burn fossil fuels, the atmospheric concentration of CO2 was heading in a very dangerous direction for a very long time. Surely, the most “dangerous” change in climate in the short term would be to one that would not support sufficient food production to feed our own population
A link to the full report follows. I highly recommend it as a sensible and practical take on the issue. – Anthony Watts
Executive Summary
This study looks at the positive environmental effects of carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions, a topic which has been well established in the scientific literature but which is far too often ignored in the current discussions about climate change policy. All life is carbon based and the primary source of this carbon is the CO2 in the global atmosphere. As recently as 18,000 years ago, at the height of the most recent major glaciation, CO2 dipped to its lowest level in recorded history at 180 ppm, low enough to stunt plant growth.
This is only 30 ppm above a level that would result in the death of plants due to CO2 starvation. It is calculated that if the decline in CO2 levels were to continue at the same rate as it has over the past 140 million years, life on Earth would begin to die as soon as two million years from now and would slowly perish almost entirely as carbon continued to be lost to the deep ocean sediments. The combustion of fossil fuels for energy to power human civilization has reversed the downward trend in CO2 and promises to bring it back to levels that are likely to foster a considerable increase in the growth rate and biomass of plants, including food crops and trees. Human emissions of CO2 have restored a balance to the global carbon cycle, thereby ensuring the long-term continuation of life on Earth.
Introduction
This extremely positive aspect of human CO2 emissions must be weighed against the unproven hypothesis that human CO2 emissions will cause a catastrophic warming of the climate in coming years. The one-sided political treatment of CO2 as a pollutant that should be radically reduced must be corrected in light of the indisputable scientific evidence that it is essential to life on Earth.
There is a widespread belief that CO2 emissions from the burning of fossil fuels for energy are a threat to the Earth’s climate and that the majority of species, including the human species, will suffer greatly unless these emissions are drastically curtailed or even eliminated.
1. This paper offers a radically different perspective based on the geological history of CO2. CO2 is one of the most essential nutrients for life on Earth. It has been approaching dangerously low levels during recent periods of major glaciation in the Pleistocene Ice Age, and human emissions of CO2 may stave off the eventual starvation and death of most life on the planet due to a lack of CO2.
2. This is not primarily a discussion of the possible connection between CO2 and global warming or climate change, although some mention must be made of it. There has been a great deal of discussion on the subject, and it is hotly contested in both scientific and political spheres.
There is no question that the climate has warmed during the past 300 years since the peak of the Little Ice Age. There is also no question that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and all else being equal, the emissions would result in some warming if CO2 rose to higher levels in the atmosphere. Yet, there is no definitive scientific proof that CO2 is a major factor in influencing climate in the real world. The Earth’s climate is a chaotic, non-linear, multivariant system with many unpredictable feedbacks, both positive and negative. Primarily, this is a discussion about the role of atmospheric CO2 in the maintenance of life on Earth and the positive role of human civilization in preventing CO2 from trending downward to levels that threaten the very existence of life.
End Points
We should ask those who predict catastrophic climate change, including the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, some pressing questions regarding the outcome if humans had not intervened in the carbon cycle.
- What evidence or argument is there that the global climate would not revert to another glacial period in keeping with the Milankovitch cycles as it has done repeatedly during at least the past 800,000 years?
- What evidence is there that we are not already past the maximum global temperature during this Holocene interglacial period? • How can we be certain that in the absence of human emissions the next cooling period would not be more severe than the recent Little Ice Age?
- Given that the optimum CO2 level for plant growth is above 1,000 ppm and that CO2 has been above that level for most of the history of life, what sense does it make to call for a reduction in the level of CO2 in the absence of evidence of catastrophic climate change?
- Is there any plausible scenario, in the absence of human emissions, that would end the gradual depletion of CO2 in the atmosphere until it reaches the starvation level for plants, hence for life on earth?
These and many other questions about CO2, climate and plant growth require our serious consideration if we are to avoid making some very costly mistakes.
LINK TO FULL REPORT: THE POSITIVE IMPACT OF HUMAN CO2 EMISSIONS ON THE SURVIVAL OF LIFE ON EARTH (PDF)
Moore – Positive Impact of Human CO2 Emissions
![Dr-Moore-Photo-2010-120x180[1]](https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/dr-moore-photo-2010-120x1801.jpg?quality=83)
Dr. Patrick Moore is a Senior Fellow with the Energy, Ecology and Prosperity program at the Frontier Centre for Public Policy. He has been a leader in the international environmental field for over 40 years. Dr. Moore is a Co-Founder of Greenpeace and served for nine years as President of Greenpeace Canada and seven years as a Director of Greenpeace International. Following his time with Greenpeace, Dr. Moore joined the Forest Alliance of BC where he worked for ten years to develop the Principles of Sustainable Forestry, which have now been adopted by much of the industry. In 2013, he published Confessions of a Greenpeace Dropout – The Making of a Sensible Environmentalist, which documents his 15 years with Greenpeace and outlines his vision for a sustainable future.
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..+ 50 Platinum stars !! Awesome reality…..
There is a difference between C3 and C4 plants. http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/biology/phoc.html
Not good enough. They both still require CO2 And especially note his second ‘End Point’ above.
Dr. Patrick Moore is more principled than the whole worldwide network green of activist combined, it’s a pity there aren’t more like him.
Could not agree more! 🙂
“Dr. Moore is a Co-Founder of Greenpeace”.
Really? Are you sure? I can’t find any reference to Dr. Patrick Moore on Greenpeace’s web site.
Being the well funded activists they are, they scrubbed it, lest it hurt the donations, see here:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/01/25/greenpeace-disappears-a-founder-much-like-the-commissar-vanishes-in-soviet-russia/
Doubleplusgood.
brian356 seems surprised:
I can’t find any reference to Dr. Patrick Moore on Greenpeace’s web site.
That’s astonishing… …NOT!
Greenpeace’s current contingent of kleptomaniacs has erased a founding member. It tries to make him a non-person. The Soviets used to do that, too. In fact, there isn’t a lot of difference in attitudes or tactics between Greenpeace and the erstwhile Soviets.
Also, brian356 should know that there is no bright line that identifies the start of Greenpeace. They fiddled with different names until ‘Greenpeace’ was decided upon. Different people came and went, from the (vague) beginning.
At first the organization was very informal. There was no incorporation as a non-profit until later. But there are enough records and hand-written documents to settle the question. They identify Dr. Moore as one of the original founding group. A better question would be: why is Greenpeace propaganda trying to make Moore a non-person?
And why does it matter who started Greenpeace? Apparently it matters a great deal to the current Greenpeace royalty. They’re such a self-serving bunch that they cannot bear to admit that someone as well educated as Dr. Moore was a founding member. And of course, they can’t bear it when Dr. Moore explains that the rise in CO2 has been harmless, and that it is beneficial to the biosphere.
Once someone has the great good fortune to be elevated as a Greenpeace officer or director, they’re set for life. If they aren’t multi-millionaires when they’re annointed, they get to be very well off in short order. They’re not only highly paid, but every expense is covered.
Greenpeace will not disclose any independently audited financials, but for a ‘non-profit’ they appear to be *very* profitable. One director was recently caught flying first class every day to his job, even though a much cheaper “green” train was available. When he was caught using that heavy carbon footprint, what happened to him? Was he fired? Was he disciplined? Fined? Demoted? If brian356 thinks any of that happened, he’s very naive. Greenpeace royalty are as immune from consequences as an EPA bureaucrat causing the Animas river to turn chromium yellow.
The millions of fools who still hand their dues money over to Greenpeace are blinded to reality. They’re part of a vast membership whose money provides an unending river of cash for the organization’s directors to spend however they like.
Greenpeace now is nothing like the casual group of environmentalists that started it. Now it’s a throughly political, self-serving, far-left organization that cares about as much for the environment as the EPA. Greenpeace dues-payers are fools being parted from their money, which provides a rich lifestyle for the few special folks elevated to serve for life as Greenpeace royalty.
Dr. Moore could have been part of that self-serving clique. He had the choice. All he had to do was sell his soul like the rest of them. Instead, he kept his integrity and his ethics. That’s why Greenpeace hates him; Moore’s very existence provides a sharp contrast between their greed and Moore’s honest science, and they hate that comparison.
Thanks db. a thousand thanks!
Well, he was a member of the standing wave committee protesting nuclear testing soon after it started as a Canadian/Alaskan movement and went on to direct that organisation when it became the Greenpeace Foundation…
but Greenpeace as we now see it was formed of an amalgamation of groups founded on the same model in many countries… when that came in to being, he left (after a big row).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrick_Moore_(environmentalist) summarises
so I’d say he founded Greenpeace 1 – but left as Greenpeace 2 came into being, might be a description.
Griff
how many other names have you used here?
dbstealey June 20, 2016 at 8:17 pm
“Greenpeace’s current contingent of kleptomaniacs has erased a founding member. It tries to make him a non-person. The Soviets used to do that, too.”
Some examples. And this was before Photoshop:
http://www.businessinsider.com/people-who-were-erased-from-history-2013-12?IR=T
That is because Greenpeace purposely erased my name from their website(s) in February 2007, where I had been listed a a Founder for over 45 years, since helping start the group in 1971, sailing on the first campaign, and serving as a director on the top committee for 15 years.
All you need do is Google “Who are the Founders of Greenpeace?”
Brians356, that’s because Greenpeace want to disassociate themselves from him because he threatens their fundraising efforts. Check out the earliest photos of Rainbow Warrior and Patrick Moore is in the middle of the photos.
Of course you don’t. Greenpeace was high-jacked by militant ignorant politically correct tree huggers and Dr. Moore was forced out. Similarly the Democratic Party was high-jacked by radical leftists who then gave you Obama, Sanders and Hilary Clinton not to mention ignorant easily manipulated ahole clowns like Gore and Biden and politicized bureaucracies. In case you’ve had your head up your butt for the last few decades it’s time to pull it out and notice that America is no longer a free country so obey big brother or do something about it.
Bravo Dr. Moore (check your six.)
Catastrophic Gaiapogenic Global Carbon Decline (CGGCD) is a serious threat to all life, including man. We owe it to future generations to continue adding more of it. Think of the children.
+10
Well, at least someone is paying attention to the reality of carbon-based life.
I do think he overstates the case a little. Life on earth actually survived the Permian extinction which ended the first great biological carbon draw-down – and more importantly is the nearest analog in terms of planetary temperature and atmospheric carbon levels to the present in geological history. The Mesozoic recovery only reached about 50% the maximum Paleozoic CO2 levels and it would be reasonable to infer that the next great extinction (NGE) would see another roughly 50% recovery. The geological evidence very strongly indicates that planetary carbon outputs are insufficient to maintain parity with biological demands and geological carbon sinks. Happily Dr. Moore actually asserts this publicly.
The Paleozoic lasted roughly 400 MY, the span from the Mesozoic recovery to the present critical level was only about 150 MY. So the period following the NGE could be proportionately shorter – ca. 3/8ths of 150 MY. Freeing carbon “fixed” in coal, oil and methane increases that odds of surviving or delaying a massive extinction event.
Doesn’t Moore realize that actually paying attention to science is a no-no to an activist?
Anyone unfamiliar and/or unsure as to as to the credentials and credibility of Phd. Patrick Moore BEWARE! Surfing the internet for more information on him can also result in finding slanderous accusations and libel against his character……. BUT that is simply because he is a significant threat to Greenpeace and others of that ilk. Even the credibility of Wikipedia has been compromised by such agencies.
Did Wikipedia ever have any credibility?
I have always called it Wackapedia. I do use it for general statistics such as sports people, filmography, geographical areas and cities/countries. When it comes to Global Warming/Climate Change, I find it highly unreliable.
Yes, you can get a good result on non-politcal subjects, such as “Boron”, for example.
dryscottdalegmailcom
Thanks.
May I be seen to try to help?
“Even the credibility of Wikipedia has been compromised by such agencies”
Hmm. Let us try:
“Even the credibility of Wikipedia, which even I can edit, after a glass and a half of shandy, has been compromised by such agencies. And how!!”
Maybe a bit better . . . . . . . . . .
Auto
PS SHandy not BRandy.
Although . . .
Come on, Dr. Moore. You’re arguing AGAINST the global warming Faithful? You’re never going to get rich that way.
I doubt if he cares.
I have managed a comfortable life by telling the truth as I see it. And being able to change my mind when I discover I was wrong. For example, we were very wrong to oppose nuclear energy in the 70s and 80s. I didn’t come to realize that until after I left Greenpeace. In order to atone for my sins I spent 6 years 2006–12 as co-Chair of the Clean and Safe Energy Coalition, a nuclear-industry funded effort to build popular support for new nuclear build in the US. Today, after a 30-year hiatus, there are 4 nuclear plants under construction in the US. But this is nothing compared to China, planning 100 new nukes, India 50, Russia 50, other countries many more than today. The US has allowed its nuclear industry to fall nearly dormant. This will be seen as a great mistake.
is Patrick he related to Michael Moore?
Henry, I doubt it. But can you imagine the family reunion brawls? 🙂
I have a brother named Michael Moore, but he is thankfully not that one.
Dr. Moore has always been honest and that is why he left Greenpeace .
We should celebrate CO2 and the fact we are lucky enough to be around when it is increasing .
The fundamental mistake made by the scary green show is they picked the wrong thing to act as their boogie man . Climate changes and we won’t be stopping the next cooling cycle . Maybe delaying a bit but
no one will notice .
Plants ,trees ,and the vast majority of animals benefit from a warmer climate . Otherwise lets see a scientific study that says cooling is better .
Why would the green industry oppose something that improves nature ? Maybe they are the pollutants .
As I understand it, this idea began in England when Thatcher was trying to break the coal miners union(s). She succeeded but the Law of Unintended Consequences kicked us in the ass big time. Gave us AGW, UN IPCC, etc. Just shows even the Iron Maiden wasn’t perfect!
You mean the Iron Lady?
Was Margaret Thatcher the first climate sceptic?
Yes, Iron Maiden is either a heavy metal band or a torture device……come to think of it they’re rather similar;>))
a pity that the book costs $34. Selling it cheaper would promote a more general spread in the population.
Kindle version of Moore’s book is $7.75
https://www.amazon.com/Confessions-Greenpeace-Dropout-Sensible-Environmentalist-ebook/dp/B004X2I6ZM/ref=sr_1_2?s=books&ie=UTF8&tag=wattsupwithth-20&qid=1466435378&sr=1-2&keywords=Confessions+of+a+Greenpeace+Dropout
patrick,
The internet is an amazing thing. Amazon shows copies of it “new and used” for $13.99, and as William pointed out, Kindle version is $7 and change.
Dr Moore, like most authors, doesn’t get to “decide” how much to sell his book for…the publishers do. And they have to cover their printing and shipping costs, as well as hopefully, provide Dr. Moore with a profit. Probably not going to make the New York Times best seller list, which would mean the general population was very interested in it, and it could be printed and shipped for cheaper. Pity you don’t understand commerce.
The NYT “best sellers” list is a joke. They calculate their list on how many books are shipped from the publisher to a warehouse, not on actual sales after they get to the warehouse.
Now this is a real Canadian scientist! Thank you Dr. Patrick Moore for shinning light on CO2. It is to be celebrated.
Why do Greenies hate life so much? Not enough love from their mommy? Daddy neglect?
It’s a puzzlement.
Nanna didn’t wear a green bandana on their fourth birthday.
Makes nearly as much sense as their power-grab.
Auto
Western guilt.
Greenies don’t hate life…they hate people who enjoy life!! Life itself is irrelevant to them. All they care about is what “other people” are doing with “life” that annoys the crap out of them. 🙂
The risk of hyperbole.
Suspicious I am of the end-of-life argument from the green leftists who want redistribute wealth by claiming that humans are hurting the planet. My instinctive repulsion of claims of “dire consequences” if we don’t do this, and don’t do that, is not limited to extreme rantings from the left. I am also repelled when the credible AGW skeptics indulge also.
Have you every watched a “discover channel” pseudo documentary/entertainment program that ominously portrays the next catastrophe like a super volcano or asteroid strike? The creepy background music and cataclysmic animations? It is simply tiresome and incredulous to deliver an important subject within the framework of “the sky is falling or the sky nearly fell”.
Dr Moore, you have made quite a conversion from the Green Peace monster that you created. I agree that CO2 is beneficial but I am not alarmed the the rhythm of the planet wiped out some life now and again. The petition project creators have long advocated the benefits of increased CO2. They host a Soon et al paper of which you may be familiar:
http://www.petitionproject.org/gw_article/GWReview_OISM150.pdf
The subject is important in that increased [CO2] is a benefit rather than a threat. I just don’t think that the hyperbole of maybe plant life nearly ending, substantively adds to your otherwise sound argument.
Perhaps you have not read the entire paper. I can’t see what would have brought the 140 million-year trend in CO2 reduction to an end, other than human emissions. Can you?
Patrick Moore (@EcoSenseNow)
June 20, 2016 at 10:22 am
Perhaps you have not read the entire paper. I can’t see what would have brought the 140 million-year trend in CO2 reduction to an end, other than human emissions. Can you?
—————————————
Bravo Mr. Moore.
You have shown “scientifically” how actually one can use short term data to conclude over very long term data, with a completely different resolution., in a given aspect of reality.
Sorry but is beyond me to understand how data of a 150 years at most can help one to conclude it’s impact in a given trend of 100 of millions of years……………..the worse ever hockey stick, or “this is really unprecedented ever” claimed position without any real research as what so ever.
What about CH4 Mr. More which its concentration increase is as unprecedented as that CO2 for not saying more?
Is that huge increase of CH4 concentrations at a higher factor than CO2 actually due to the humans?
cheers
Hello Patrick,
I have read this article in WUWT. The response above is to the above article. I am quite satisfied and agree generally that higher [CO2] is beneficial for plants and therefor humanity. I would consider a 30ppb delta a virtual knife-edge to a cataclysm
“This is only 30 ppm above a level that would result in the death of plants due to CO2 starvation. “.
My instinctive response to the rhetoric of end of life, doom and gloom allutions just doesn’t add much to, like i said, a sound argument. As far as the what may have stopped the trend I can only offer speculation and that speculation does not involve human activity. I suspect that since [CO2] lags temperature by 100s of years then it may have something to do with terrestrial & ocean temperature BWO CO2 solubility or natural sequestering in the oceans. I am speculating. and there is always the sun’s thermal impact…
The natural rhythm of the way things change may well have. Human CO2 is not that great an amount as a percentage of the total CO2 produced each year. You refer to a period of 18000 years ago – long, long before man discovered carbon based fuels, other than firewood. Obviously, then, something else reversed the trend, not human usage of carbon fuels. Just the general warming of the oceans would have released additional carbon dioxide. Man’s contribution may well help nudge it up faster, but no, it wasn’t human emissions that brought the down trend to end, nor will it be man’s contribution that has raised it back over 300 alone. The Earth, through whatever process causes volcanoes to erupt, is the heavy lifter, not man.
That does not, in anyway, take away from your argument that burning carbon fuels is beneficial, not destructive. It is always nice to see honest, thoughtful, and genuinely useful argument brought forth to shine light in dark corners.
Tom O:
Human CO2 is not that great an amount as a percentage of the total CO2 produced each year.
Not of any importance as the human contribution is one-way addition, while total natural CO2 produced is more than compensated by natural sinks… Human contribution since ~1850 is about twice the increase in the atmosphere observed in ice cores and direct measurerements (since 1958). The increase is unprecedented in the past 800,000 years and entirely beneficial. See for the past 1,000 years:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/antarctic_cores_001kyr_large.jpg
No natural process (volcanoes, vegetation decay, oceans,…) is responsible for the increase, as that conflicts with one or more observations, while human emissions fit all observations…
Dr Moore, I’m sure most here would agree wholeheartedly that, w/o human input, the CO2 level would have done exactly like all the previous interglacials — hung around 280 ppm and then plunged back to 180 or lower during the next glacial. As volcanoes gradually die down, and IF the current glacial continues long enough, C3 plants might gradually die out and perhaps be replaced by a C4 plant ecosystem. Bamboo-forests anyone?
Perhaps we can take up limestone-cooking to keep CO2 up in the far future. There’s alot of limestone….
inspired by mr db stealey’s temperature graph:
http://imgur.com/m30jGLb
sending your enemies on a snark hunt is a tactic to misdirect their attention and resources and weaken them.
getting them to debate whether or not the snark is a boojum is equally effective.
trolls gotta eat
you
Sir,
I would like to thank you very much for the massive dose of REALITY.
The planet NEEDS more atmospheric CO2, not less.
The guys at 350.org banned me pretty quickly when I started posting “TOWARDS 700ppm” sign-offs on their forum 🙂
I have also commented , in the past, that the zig-zag up and down of atmospheric CO2 noticed over the last xxx,000 years, is an absolute classic model of a species (in this case plant life) very much on the brink of existence due to a low food supply.
Paul,
In a PR climate wherein CO2 has been demonized as “pollution”, I don’t hear worrisome hyperbole in a statement like this;
“It has been approaching dangerously low levels during recent periods of major glaciation in the Pleistocene Ice Age, and human emissions of CO2 may stave off the eventual starvation and death of most life on the planet due to a lack of CO2.”
… I hear much needed counter balancing of worrisome hyperbole. We are inundated with demands to accept our “saving” from a catastrophic “tipping point” sort of supposed ceiling level of CO2, at great cost, when the truth seems to me to be more like we are rising a bit off a virtual floor level of this vital substance. Even if we were just having an “academic” discussion, I feel it would be appropriate to at least mention that potential prominently . .
Is there anything else humans can do, apart from tweaking a chemical compound and changing the climate of a planet that is 4.6 billion years old? Walk on water, maybe??? Turn metal into gold? Dream on Patrick. You’re still a believer!
It makes no difference whatsoever how old the planet is, things are as they are.
a bird is a bird
slavery means slavery
a knife is a knife
death remains death
(- Zbigniew Herbert)
I think you might be overestimating the effects of modern emissions on that trend. The trend is not linear and varies in rate and direction of slope over time. The current “increase” is just as easily attributed to recovery from the Little Ice Age if we argue that the lag in atmospheric CO2 levels to temperature changes visible in ice cores is real. The only necessary affect we may be having as a species burning fossil fuels is a shift in Carbon isotope ratios. Otherwise, thank you for making this point. It is important and the reality of geological history gets lost in the shortsighted arguments about human efffects on climate.
Duster,
The temperature – CO2 relation over the past 800,000 years was quite linear at about 16 ppmv/K. Solubility of CO2 in seawater changes with 4-17 ppmv/K in the literature (and practice from over 3 million on the spot samples).
The MWP-LIA drop in temperature was good for about 8 ppmv less CO2 (Law Dome ice core – 20 year resolution). The increase in temperature since the LIA was ~0.8 K. That gives a maximum of ~13 ppmv from warming oceans (and the biosphere is a net, growing sink…). The rest of the ~110 ppmv above steady state for the current area weighted average ocean surface temperature is from the ~200 ppmv that humans have injected in the atmosphere…
On human time scales 140 million years is a hell of a trend. Surpassing, one might say. Even on geologic or astronomical scale it is very meaningful except that meaningful implies meaning implies humans. Regardless, it’s a long time. If there is no previous period in earth history that shows similar decreases then it is relevant to ask why this happened. Since mankind is at least approaching the capability to modify the state of the earth and its atmosphere, we need to be thinking about how we would do that and what the real problems are.
It appears we may have dodged disaster by NOT ACTING TO REDUCE CO2 levels as many were advocating, via iron fertilization or other means. Now, I am comfortable that the doomsayers of CAGW are way over the top regarding really any negative consequences resulting from CO2 levels even considerably higher than today’s. Additionally, I suppose it may be possible that we have actually averted the impending onset of the next ice age, which would be a good thing. Of course, we really don’t know everything about what causes ice ages to start and I have serious doubts about the ability of CO2 to prevent something of that magnitude.
If we can just work steadily on real pollution problems and habitat destruction and maybe hash out a few reasonable plans for warming things up if need be, we should be fine.
FerdiEgb June 21, 2016 at 1:27 pm
Duster,
The temperature – CO2 relation over the past 800,000 years was quite linear at about 16 ppmv/K. Solubility of CO2 in seawater changes with 4-17 ppmv/K in the literature (and practice from over 3 million on the spot samples).
The MWP-LIA drop in temperature was good for about 8 ppmv less CO2 (Law Dome ice core – 20 year resolution). The increase in temperature since the LIA was ~0.8 K. That gives a maximum of ~13 ppmv from warming oceans (and the biosphere is a net, growing sink…). The rest of the ~110 ppmv above steady state for the current area weighted average ocean surface temperature is from the ~200 ppmv that humans have injected in the atmosphere…
That is reasonable and might well be right (I’ve no doubts about the basic chemistry). The lacuna lies in the facts of empirical reality which are more complex and linked in fashions not at all properly understood. Also, just when did the LIA end in your view? If you consider the “end” when the planet actually began to warm after the peak cooling, then the base temperature is quite different than it would be if you consider 1750, 1850 or 1900 the “end” as other analysts have suggested, then again your base temperature is different for each date. I see, using CET, at least a 1.5 K change since the depth of the LIA, which is where I would call the “end.” I also would like your definition of “steady state” as you used it in your response. I have yet to observe anything I can accept as a steady state in nature. They do occur within simplified laboratory systems, but seem rather more dubious in nature. Thanks for the thoughtful response.
Have you taken a look at how may math, science, and history exams have been dumbed-down lately for the greater glory of “diversity?” Our average high-school graduate now is 30-40% LESS proficient in these areas than the generations before 1965. When people don’t have the slightest idea of either the scientific method OR critical thinking, they’re very, very easy to fool with emotional narratives and commands from authority. Not an accident.
Goldrider,
May I restate your assertion in the words of Roger Bacon AD 1267 in his Opus Majus:
Four obstacles to real wisdom and truth, viz. errors and their sources (the four general causes of human ignorance):
1) the example of weak and unreliable authority;
2) continuance of custom,
3) regard to the opinion of the unlearned, and
4) concealing one’s own ignorance, together with the exhibition of apparent wisdom.
This describes the situation in Canadian Schooling:
“…A high school teacher was arrested today at Toronto Pearson Airport as he attempted to board a flight while in possession of a ruler, a protractor, a compass, a slide-rule and a calculator.
At a press conference, Premier Kathleen Wynne said she believes the man is a member of the notorious extremist Al-Gebra movement. She did not identify the man, who has been charged by the RCMP with carrying weapons of maths instruction.
‘Al-Gebra is a problem for us’, the Premier said. ‘They derive solutions by means and extremes, and sometimes go off on tangents in search of absolute values. They use secret code names like “X” and “Y” and refer to themselves as “unknowns”; but we have determined that they belong to a common denominator of the axis of medieval with coordinates in every country. As the Greek philosopher Isosceles used to say, “There are three sides to every triangle.”’
When asked to comment on the arrest, Prime Minister Trudeau said, “If God had wanted us to have better weapons of maths instruction, He would have given us more fingers and toes.”
Fellow Liberal colleagues told reporters they could not recall a more intelligent or profound statement by any Prime Minister…..”
In the late 1940s I had a brilliant physics teacher who commented once that the trend in U.S. education was toward 90% college graduates. He said when that happens the education inherent in a college degree will equal that of high school graduates in the 1940s. His reasoning was that was the level of education that 90% of the population could assimilate.
Are we there yet?
Today’s primary and secondary education systems are geared to produce “Chevys” and not “Cadillacs”. Or “Fords” and not “Lincolns”, and so on as examples.
But it is now possible to have AP/Advanced Placement courses for all interested students via computer if not available in their local schools. However, cost is a factor for those who can’t afford online courses.
Paul Westhaver-
Hyperbole? How is it hyperbolic to state FACTS such as: 1) that CO2 ppm was close to 180 during the last major glaciation-and 2) at those levels, it stunts plant growth. 3)Below 150ppm, plants cannot photosynthesize, and plants that cannot photosynthesize…die. ???
How is it hyperbolic to state- “It is calculated that if the decline in CO2 levels were to continue at the same rate as it has over the past 140 million years, life on Earth would begin to die as soon as two million years from now and would slowly perish almost entirely as carbon continued to be lost to the deep ocean sediments.”
“IF”….means that certain conditions would have to be met first…such as the rate of CO2 decline would have to return to it’s previous rate…. AND continue to decline that way for the next two million years!! That is the LEAST hyperbolic thing he could have said, and remained truthful! It’s not as if the man said, much less insinuated something like ” If we don’t continue to spew CO2 in ever increasing amounts, CO2 will decline precipitously in the next few”…decades….or centuries…..or even millennia!!! Two million YEARS he stated.
I, ironically, find your statements about his argument, to be hyperbolic. 🙂
Thank you Aphan. I am a CAGW skeptic, not a natural disaster skeptic.
Bill Nye employing a similar “near miss” hype strategy to promote his interests. It seemed unseemly then.
Oh boy! if the asteroid was fifteen minutes off it’s trajectory then it would have been a disaster, *wring hands, wring hands*.
So no argument with the math at all. Just the need to hype on the back of a nonexistent disaster.
Except, as Dr. Moore points out. plant life actually came close to ending 0nly 18.000 years ago. ( A mere blink in the earth’s history) In the whole of earth’s history runaway warming from CO2 never happened.
Massive asteroid/comet strikes have happened in the past, hence they will happen again in the future.
The only question is when.
Super volcanoes have happened in the past, hence they will happen again in the future.
The only question is when.
That CO2 levels got down to 200ppm is fact.
That plants start dying around 150ppm is fact.
That CO2 levels have been dropping for millions of years, and absent human intervention would continue to drop is also fact.
That you don’t like the possible consequences of these facts, doesn’t make them go away.
I could easily have justified higher level of hyperbole. If we had not emitted the CO2 and reversed the trend, and there was another major glaciation spurred by the Milankovitch Cycles, and CO2 went back down to 180 ppm or lower, and there were 9 billion or more humans on the planet, it would be a catastrophe like none in the history of humanity. But we have saved the day so that can’t happen now.
I agree that an asteroid could strike but it is hard to imagine how that could have improved the situation. As for massive volcanism, it is quite possible that the Earth has cooled to such an extent that there will not again be the level of volcanism that was experienced when the massive emissions of the original CO2 occurred. That is very likely the reason that CO2 has been declining for nearly 150 million years.
everything that follows the ‘ would ‘ is subjunctive and is not a fact.
Energy from Coal is a Win Win. Just scrub out the Mercury and other heavy metals. We still have lots of coal.
MarkW-
“That CO2 levels got down to 200ppm is fact.”
Agreed
“That plants start dying around 150ppm is fact.”
Agreed
“That CO2 levels have been dropping for millions of years, and absent human intervention would continue to drop is also fact.”
FALSE. Conjecture, assumption, educated guess, estimation, prediction. Pick any one of those-but you cannot use the word FACT-because CO2 levels have dropped that low before AND risen again on their own-you cannot eliminate NATURE as a factor-or prove human intervention beyond a shadow of a doubt.
There is correlation, but even perfect correlation does not establish causation.
Patrick Moore – Thanks for your clear thoughts and sterling efforts. I wish I could agree with you that “we have saved the day so that can’t happen now“, but I can’t. Half of all the CO2 that we emit is being absorbed, principally by the oceans it appears, and there is no sign of that absorption slowing down. We have limited fossil fuel resources, and against the combination of ocean absorption and “green” opposition we are unlikely to be able to keep CO2 levels up for more then a century or so. That will leave the next downturn of the Milankovitch cycle free to operate unopposed. Even if we were able to force CO2 concentration further upwards and keep it there, it seems unlikely that it would be powerful enough to have much effect:-
http://members.iinet.net.au/~jonas1@westnet.com.au/ContributionsToTemperature.JPG
[Graph is based on the assumption that the IPCC and the climate models are correct. From https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/07/31/the-mathematics-of-carbon-dioxide-part-3/%5D
That last link shoul be:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/07/31/the-mathematics-of-carbon-dioxide-part-3/
Patrick-
“But we have saved the day so that can’t happen now.”
How can you say that? It’s a direct contradiction of what you’ve said in this article!
According to your own words, CO2 concentrations have been falling “steadily” for the past 140 million years. Yet, during the past 140 million years, Earth has had repeated glaciations and Ice Ages (not the same thing), that started when CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere were much higher than they are today!! (in order for them to have been steadily falling, they must necessarily have been steadily HIGHER in the past)
We may have reversed the CO2 trend, but you cannot, with any degree of certainty, say that we have reversed the warming trend that occurs in every inter-glacial period, or prevented the next glaciation period!! CO2 levels have zero effect upon the eccentricity, axial tilt, or procession of the Earth’s orbit-and it doesn’t matter how much CO2 is in the atmosphere if it’s too cold to grow food and water sources dry up as ice sheets are formed instead!
There are some in the scientific community who disagree that ice measurements provide a reliable record of past CO2 levels in the atmosphere due to CO2 escape at deeper levels in the ice sheets. Hence, CO2 levels in the atmosphere never approached the “dangerously” low point of 180 ppm.
Aphan, since those natural things that caused CO2 to start dropping are still in play and will continue to be in play for millions of years into the future, why wouldn’t one assume that the drop in CO2 would also continue.
Patrick Moore said, “…it is quite possible that the Earth has cooled to such an extent that there will not again be the level of volcanism that was experienced when the massive emissions of the original CO2 occurred.”
Then again, it is quite possible that the interior Earth will never cool to such an extent as to suppress future occurrence of massive volcanic activity. It goes in cycles too, and, I suspect, depends somewhat on continental configurations, and myriad other factors.
You mention the “creepy background music.” Every time that comes on, try to superimpose “Mairzy Doats” or Offenbach’s “Can-Can” or possibly the Chopin F-Major Waltz. That would put the content more into perspective, and all of those pieces are in public domain, so you can mentally listen to them at no charge!
Dr. Moore is, indeed, to be commended–but more important, he should be listened to. During my time here in Mechanicsville (VA), I have noticed the size of leaves gradually growing. I have noted that some daylilies bloom earlier than they used to (by a week, perhaps) in spite of temperatures that have not changed much, if at all. My theory is that the growth and maturation of the daylilies may be slightly hastened by the higher CO2 content, so bloom tends to sneak in slightly earlier. (I grow daylilies–15,000 of them–on this property, and have watched their growth and blooming here since 1993.)
That must be breathtakingly beautiful John! I envy you!
Interesting, John. I notice orange daylillies escaping along roadways quite a bit. Or perhaps they’re just wild ones proliferating….
Paul, it is not hyperbole. Primary production shuts down as CO2 becomes unavailable. The last glacial maximum saw atmospheric CO2 levels descend to very, very close to that limit; some plots estimate levels lower than the limit. In comparison the height of the Mesozoic saw levels about 10 times the present. The key point is that as CO2 draws down, ecological systems become far more susceptible to external insults – things like meteorite impacts. It would not wipe life on earth, but it could lead to a Permian-level extinction event. What the planet would look like afterward is anyone’s guess, though we can probably expect ferns, palms, grass, cockroaches and rats and maybe coelacanths.
As much as I like CO2 for photo-synthesis & have little angst over temperature, it seems the fellow has made an inaccurate declaration that at least 1,000 ppm CO2 is best for plant growth.
If this is based on greenhouse practices on vegetable crops, which I presume is the case, then it has overlooked the actual
method of CO2 enrichment.
Unlike greenhouse increased CO2 in field conditions now the level of C02 is not only higher than last 23 million year range
(140 – 320 ppm CO2) during the day, but also that same amount
higher at night. Point to understand is greenhouse conditions
let operators shut off that high CO2 enrichment & out in the field plants are getting (& will get more) round the clock higher CO2 than have been adapted to.
24 million years ago CO2 was above 400 ppm, like it is now, yet plants have since then fine tuned their pathways to lower levels; in fact when it fell to less than 200 ppm CO2 a greater number of C3 plant species came along. It was ~7 million years ago that the C4 pathway into use; yet 96% of current plant species are still C3
& since these account for ~ 94% of earth’s biomass outside of the greenhouses we have reasons to question how higher C02
impacts the plant.
Have been commenting lately on a nook size tablet & seen some poorly edited instances. I try to develop context when comment &
this little screen makes it annoying to check for errors when am
pressed for time.
gringojay-
You claim to be pressed for time, so does that explain why you failed to mention that the biosphere is greening because of the benefits of increased atmospheric CO2?
Hi Alan Robertson, – I am very content with greening. What am going on about is that photosynthesis fixing of carbon from CO2 is not the only thing a plant does. In brief, dealing with living the plant has to perform diverse things & these largely required adjusting electric charges (reduction & oxidation, or redox for short). Once changes in CO2 levels are considered we need to look at what changes in redox can arise which alter
plant growth dynamics.
For example, plants imperative is reproduction (not providing humans with more greens or greenhouse peppers) & as such seed composition is the end game of their seasonal growth. In general more protein in seeds, rather than the recently higher less, was what plants harmonized their growth for these last 23 million years; since protein content in seeds relates to quality.
In the photo-synthezing leaf an iron molecule (ferre-doxin) is integral to keeping redox happening & yet the enzyme for assimilating nitrogen in the form of NO3- also needs to use ferre-doxin. A conflict arises since the enzyme that uses ferre-doxin (ferre-doxin NADP reductase) to get NADP+ recycled into formation of NADPH
(as part of redox balancing) has a much higher ability to call upon the available ferre-doxin than the NO3- nitrogen assimilation enzyme (nitrate reductase).
When plants evolved under relatively low/lower CO2 they did not fix so much carbon & consequently did not have to do down as much downstream related redox juggling. In other words they did not need as much of their ferre-doxin to form NADPH & NO3- assimilation enzymes had more of what they needed.
C3 plants were adapting to use NO3- nitrogen under high O2 (lower CO2 than now & earlier than ~24 million year when CO2 over 400 ppm). Their O2 use at RuBP gives a 13 carbon molecule + another 2 carbon molecule (unlike how CO2 give different carbon molecules); the 2 carbon molecule gets the cell involved in what is called photo-respiration (the frequency of which elevated CO2 diminishes).
It is Mn++ (manganese) at the Rubisco catalytic site which not only orientates it to engage in oxygen processing (“oxygenation”), but also gives redox electrons to NADP+ in order to generate NADPH; this rise in NADPH makes it possible for the organic acid malate to be synthesized. When Mg++ (magnesium) binds to the same site on Rubisco it orientates toward CO2 processing (“carboxylation”). The ancestral adaptation of plants to live under old higher O2 to lower CO2 ratio than now can be gauged by the fact that Mn++ has more than 5 times greater potential to dock with Rubisco.
C3 plant photo-respiration requires the chloroplast to shuttle out the organic acid malate to where (cytoplasm) it engenders redox reactions that lead to the 1st steps taken to assimilate NO3- nitrogen (to NO2- nitrogen). In other words the C3 plant has a mechanism to improve it’s nitrogen usage that worked very well for a getting good seed protein (reproductivity) & current/experimental higher CO2 works contrary to that end.
The reason C4 plants require different discussion is that their fixation of carbon (from CO2) creates more malate & NADH right in their cytoplasm (unlike C3). Thus, their assimilation (not the same as uptake) of NO3- nitrogen is less of a problem when the rising CO2 around leads to less production of the 2 carbon intermediate (i.e: less photo-respiration, which elevated CO2 is often touted as beneficially reducing).
Higher CO2 effectively means that with less photo-respiration (processing 2 carbon intermediate molecules from Rubisco “oxygenation”) the plant needs to re-allocate resources (malate, redox potential,etc.) to assimilate NO3-. A lot of field plants, like grasses/ “vegetables”/deciduous , were adapted to use NO3- nitrogen for growth; in part because that is what is available in large enough quantity in those micro-environments. These preferentially adapted to NO3- nitrogen feeders initial boost from higher CO2 then go on (~ 4 years later) to show their relative growth rate does not hold up (in earlier thread I cited 10 year desert study showing this loss of CO2 related gains.)
A recent topic was arctic trees are going to be doing just fine; the soil they live in supplies more NH4+ nitrogen (as does wetland soil & pines’ soil). The dynamic I broached above is not the same for plants preferentially adapted to NH4+ nitrogen because it’s assimilation is different & does not need to draw on
the same amount of redox actors.
gringojay-
“If this is based on greenhouse practices on vegetable crops, which I presume is the case, then it has overlooked the actual method of CO2 enrichment. Unlike greenhouse increased CO2 in field conditions now the level of C02 is not only higher than last 23 million year range (140 – 320 ppm CO2) during the day, but also that same amount higher at night. Point to understand is greenhouse conditions
let operators shut off that high CO2 enrichment & out in the field plants are getting (& will get more) round the clock higher CO2 than have been adapted to.”
HUH? Commercial greenhouse operators that use “CO2 enrichment” mechanisms, strive to MAINTAIN the level of CO2 in their greenhouses somewhere between 900 and 1500 ppm….at all times. They pump large quantities of CO2 into the greenhouse and then gauges monitor the levels so the enrichment machine/pump/system goes on and off like a thermostat-keeping the CO2 levels in a narrow range. They turn them OFF at night because……plants PRODUCE CO2 at night, so there’s no need to leave the enrichment on at night, the plants MAINTAIN the approximate level the greenhouse is programmed to stay at. Field plants get LESS CO2 round the clock than CO2 enriched greenhouse plants do. Period. Your knowledge of CO2 enrichment in actual greenhouses that use it, seems to be limited. And incorrect.
“24 million years ago CO2 was above 400 ppm, like it is now, yet plants have since then fine tuned their pathways to lower levels; in fact when it fell to less than 200 ppm CO2 a greater number of C3 plant species came along. It was ~7 million years ago that the C4 pathway into use; yet 96% of current plant species are still C3 & since these account for ~ 94% of earth’s biomass outside of the greenhouses we have reasons to question how higher C02 impacts the plant.”
No, we actually don’t need to question how higher CO2 impacts plants. Major scientific studies have been done that PROVE that in conditions where the plant is getting adequate nutrients, sunlight, and water, higher levels of CO2 boosts plant growth AND food production. Period. It certainly has never been proven to HARM plants in any way at greenhouse levels. (think about it….why on earth would greenhouse operators do things to their plants that harm them or cause them to reduce productivity???)
“in fact when it fell to less than 200 ppm CO2 a greater number of C3 plant species came along. ”
Um….I hate to point out the elephant in the room, but when it fell to less than 200 ppm….THE GLOBAL TEMPERATURES were much lower and ice sheets were growing!!! Plants need more than CO2 to grow. They need soil exposed to sunlight, nutrients in that soil, temperatures within a certain range, and water along with their CO2. You do realize that all of those things change during glaciation periods….and not just the CO2 levels…right?
The difference between C3 and C4 plants-
http://www.midway.k-state.edu/livestock/docs/What%20is%20the%20difference%20between%20C3%20plants%20and%20C4%20plants.pdf
I read somewhere recently, that some C4 plants can actually turn off the 4th CO2 process, and in doing so respond even more to raised CO2 than some C3 plants.
Hi Aphan, – I am not trying to say there is something wrong with greenhouse production. More hope to draw attention to the fact that just because it is usually profitable for ornamental & edible plants (tomato/cucumber/peppers/etc,) which are our human priorities, not actually the plants’ reproductive seed viability.
I am not going to parse temperature variables or individual greenhouse practices. Although would like to say the fertilization & water are more perfectly tuned than field grown plants; which themselves contribute to both yield & dealing with sequel to higher CO2.
Furthermore, I don’t mind we humans get more food production but I do want to make sure that the relative reduced protein content of that plant source used for food is understood. It is not enough to assume the reduction in plant protein content is more than compensated for by the greater volume of that plant part. Not everyone gets more of what they would eat; look at countries with rationing – unfortunately if ration is X pounds of flour they aren’t bumped up to X + ration.
Night time CO2 for the plant (not our relatively short time growing vegetable crops) is related to what I wrote above; which I hope you will consider reading. Modern/experimental higher night time CO2 likewise reduces the assimilation of NO3- nitrogen & this then reduces the rate of protein synthesis at night (as compared to what plant adapted to).
Whether elevated CO2 at night decreases “dark” respiration varies with the kind of plant, where a plant is in it’s life cycle and how much nitrogen is available; a lot of taken in NO3- is not assimilated & is usually ~60% of nitrogen in a plant. When C3 plants get just daytime elevated CO2 then ~ 50% of NO3- nitrogen assimilation is done at night.
Higher CO2 also reduces the level (activity) of enzymes (mitochondrial succinate dehydrogenase & mitochondrial cytochrome C oxidase) that would otherwise get more of the carbon in carbohydrates utilized by mitochondria; which also lowers mitochondrial energy output for using NO3- nitrogen. About 25 % if carbon is used to achieve NO3- assimilation (~ 12 ATP/NO3- assimilated); if generalize thatmost C3 plants’ ideal temperature range = 25-30 Celsius then the plant also uses 11 ATP/ CO2 fixed.
With higher CO2 the uptake (absorption) of NO3- nitrogen by many plants goes down a little bit, but the assimilation of NO3- goes down more significantly. In very general terms, higher CO2 provides ~ 30% more CO2 fixed (which early in greenhouse plants jump-starts their growth rate) & then in weeks the same level of CO2 evokes ~ 12% of it fixed; this later phase still works out to ~8% plant growth yet with ~ 14% less nitrogen in it’s shoots than otherwise (elevated CO2 causes a decrease in levels of the enzyme nitrate reductase).
Higher than ancestral adapted CO2 levels also results in more CO2 getting (diffusing) into the stroma part of a chloroplast, which lowers stromal pH & that decrease in pH also fights the NO3- assimilation process. NO2- nitrogen made from NO3- nitrogen in the cell cytosol does come back into the chloroplast well under elevated CO2; it (NO2-) there has to endure redox conditions (“reduced”) to create NH4+ nitrogen; then that NH4+ nitrogen can make amino acids in the stroma of a chloroplast in a way that also requires the “reduced” kind of iron molecule ferre-doxin (explained in earlier reply).
gringojay says, “It is not enough to assume the reduction in plant protein content is more than compensated for by the greater volume of that plant part.”
==============================================
It is not an assumption. Total protein grows, and all the benefits of vegetables increase along with bio-mass. Literally thousands of experiments prove this! We do not eat vegetables primarily for their protein content. In addition this increased production is done with out any increase in water or land! Your concerns regarding nitrogen utilization are likewise unfounded as nitrogen utilization also increases under elevated CO2.
Seriously, the benefits of increased CO2 are real, studied, manifesting, and not overstated, while the projected harms are MIA.
gringojay,
The issue that is different now compared to when CO2 first fell below 280 ppm, 24 million years ago, is that the planet is much dryer today.
There was simply more precipitation 24 million years ago and this continued until about 8 million years ago when the Earth started drying out. The very first C4 savannas appeared, the very first grass herbivores appeared. One of the primates in the completely forested world before that time, decided to start trying to walk on two legs to navigate the new savanna.
It seems like the trend toward the Earth becoming dryer is continuing. Maybe it will even get worse.
The C3 plants need both high CO2 and high rainfall.
Someday, the C4 plants will probably take over and replace the C3 plants. The day when the Sun becomes that little bit warmer and there is then less precipitation everywhere. I imagine Bamboo-like C4 plants will become the dominant vegetation.
Hi Bill Illis, – Yes, C4 plants are going to do better where it is dry (& hot); they do better in where monthly average temperatures are above 22 Celsius. I have some data from elevated CO2 grown peppers that actually parses the effect different water conditions make on pepper yields. Generally, high CO2 improves the yield parameters; interestingly high CO2 & too much water gave worst results.
Higher CO2 does lead to less leaf stomata (pore) openness, this reduces the flow of sap upward in the xylem. As the root keeps trying to load nitrogen into the sap translocation upward gets sluggish destabilizing the linear rate of nitrogen going up into aerial shoots; which is another factor of why % of nitrogen in leaves goes down over time.
When high CO2 has leaf stomata less open & when there is low relative humidity (dry) that dry air induced stress hormone (“ABA”, abscisic acid) increase, which naturally itself (ABA) closes leaf stomata thus augmenting the pre-exisiting high CO2 induce stomata reduction. Point being these 2 factors cumulatively help leaf not lose water but also further reduce inflow of fluid (whether water or sap) up through the stem into the leaf.
Leaves “call” on water with higher CO2 ( with or without dryness issue), in a sense, as feedback given to root water dynamics is less. This is one reason why studies of higher CO2 impact under different soil moisture conditions have led to variable results; with lots of water, like in greenhouses or in the desert having rainy years, the effect of higher CO2 the influence of ABA hormone usually is not taken into account.
When different aspects of those peppers on low water, just right water & excessive water under elevated CO2
are looked at the involvement (or lack of it under just right water) of ABA hormone complicates the issue of
saying what CO2 did. Once ABA is involved a whole slew of other plant hormone cascades become involved.
Gringo
I do not believe the research purporting to show harmful effects of high (growing) CO2 on plants. I am a biologist and kniw how easy it is to prestidigitate molecular and biochemical minutiae to spin any harm/scare story. It has the strong smell of spinning of selected measurement to give an impression of harmful effect of growing CO2 levels. I suspect that transient effects of little long term relevance are being blown up into something that they are not.
The simple fact that the multicellular biosphere has evolved and thrived for hundreds of millions of years with CO2 levels of thousands of ppm CO2. In this context the proposition that CO2 levels growing from the (very low) level of 400 ppm is harmful to plants, makes no sense whatsoever. In this Phanerozoic context, nor does any of the CAGW narrative.
ptolemy2, well said.
Bill, it is worth considering that carbohydrates not only fix carbon, they also fix freshwater. Off I hand I can’t see how that could actually affect the planetary water budget, but … the coincidence is curious.
Hi potolemy, – Plant biology nuances mean they change more over 24 million years than do microorganisms. It seems you are not interested in the relevance of decades worth of reports that relatively higher CO2 for plants generates relatively lower protein for that plant.
Maybe it does not make any difference for you because assume you can eat more or eat something else to make up for the protein content reduction. I’ve been involved in field crops with
poor native people for over 45 years on several continents & protein content is relevant to their
harvest.
As they say around the fire pretty much in every language: “he who smelt it dealt it.” Of course usually not after only eating green leaves, unless the individual is a ruminant.
Total protein does increase,, just the density of protein shows a small decline. This is proved in thousands of experiments and is not an assumption. Therefore your concern for poor is unnecessary with regard to CO2 increase, which also produces far more in drought conditions, and, as explained before, increases nitrogen efficiency as well. The poor are primarily energy poor, and in limiting CO2 increase you would certainly be harming them. Protein is only one of the benefits of vegetables, and not the primary reason for eating them, although as said, total protein increases along with biomass. Your concerns are unfounded.
Hi David A, – Allow me to repeat that I have no issue with CO2 levels & am confident they adapt. Every poor field crop farmer I
have known does not eat more of their harvest when a crop yield
is higher. They sell/barter bounty & are thinking of the protein ratio of their children’s meal; nor how physically demanding their
adult lives might be causing them to break down internal protein.
700 ppm enriched CO2 (many experiments used this to be a doubling of contemporary 350ppm CO2, which is now 400+ppm)
plants of the C3 kind grown from seedling impressively had ~ 44% more biomass after 2 weeks than 350 ppm controls when fertilized with NO3- nitrogen. On the other hand, the high CO2 induced high biomass actually resulted in the green shoot part
( of those reared on NO3- nitrogen) having ~13% lower protein
than those reared on NO3- at 350ppm.
What needs to be understood is that the kind of nitrogen a C3 plant uses does not affect how much more CO2 is assimilated
when C3 plants grow in much higher CO2 than had for millions of years. My intent is in explaining the plant science beyond just a
simplistic conclusion that biomass gain = diluted protein.
Follow me back to that same C3 seedling data; a cohort fertilized with NH4+ nitrogen at 700 ppm CO2 gained ~78% more biomass
than on 350ppm. What is more striking is that their green shoots
only tested for a ~6% reduction of protein (compared to 350 ppm CO2 controls) which is much less than the ~13% protein reduction on NO3- nitrogen (at 700ppm).
Poor open field farmers I know do not have the money to fertilize/insecticide/irrigate like modern farming practice is
able to. The kind of soil nitrogen then becomes the issue I have
described here & since NH4+ nitrogen is not the predominate available (microbes & volatilization don’t leave much for plants) then NO3- nitrogen is what most C3 plants get to use.
Millions of years gave C3 plants the capability (explained previously) to use NO3- nitrogen most had to rely on. Sure, it requires ~ 25% of carbon leaves get from CO2 to assimilate NO3- nitrogen; but at their CO2 level it also perfected their (not our) protein gain. In high NH4+ soils, like wetlands & among pines, the experiments with elevated CO2 show ~ 25% increase in productivity in part because only ~3% of carbon plant took in is used to assimilate NH4+.
Am typing on little tablet & if have not addressed any concerns well enough to any reader please reply. Posting this unedited.
The 150 ppm and the ~2 million years estimates are correct (they can easily be googled from other credible sources), but are misleading taken alone. The main ‘permanent’ carbon sink is calcium carbonate forming ocean phytoplankton, for example coccolithoflorids. That biological sink rate would take the world to 150 ppm in about 2-2.5 million years if it were the only carbon cycle mechanism. It is not. Plate tectonics produces subduction zones where mantel heat calcines the carbonates back into oxides and CO2. That CO2 gets reinjected into the atmosphere via volcanism.
It seems the present steady state absent fossil fuel consumption is around 280 ppm. That is still low enough to have caused ‘recent’ evolution of ‘more CO2 efficient’ C4 photosynthesis plants, which comprise now about 15% of terrestrial plant species. Maize and sugar cane are C4. Wheat, rice, soy, potatoes, pulses, most fruits and vegetables, all trees are C3 and ‘green’ with more CO2.
Higher CO2 also benefits C4 plants (about 5% of plant species). If you read the entire paper you will see that all your points are taken into account. It is the “net” of CO2 up and CO2 down that determines its concentration in the atmosphere, along with the temperature of the oceans. There was no “steady state” of CO2, it was steadily declining for 140 million years and there is no reason to think that trend would have ended had we not come along and burned fossil fuels.
Excellent paper!
Agree with the importance of it and it’s your best yet Patrick Moore.
Craig Idso also has some outstanding information that many are familiar with:
http://www.co2science.org/education/reports/co2benefits/MonetaryBenefitsofRisingCO2onGlobalFoodProduction.pdf
https://buythetruth.wordpress.com/2009/06/13/photosynthesis-and-co2-enrichment/
http://www.co2science.org/
Higher CO2 benefits C4 plants, but to a lesser extent than C3, because these all also retained C3 metabolism.
Dr Moore-
I agree with the statement that CO2 had been “steadily” falling (we’re talking majorly smoothed trend though) for 140 million years before human industry could possibly have affected it’s levels, but 200 million years before that-(340 million years ago), it rose and fell, and if there was anything “steady” about it, it was that it was consistently over 1000ppm.
My question is how does that most recent 140 million years compare to the previous 140 million year segments? What reasoning causes you to tend to think that the most current 140 million year trend of “declining” C02 levels would have continued “IF humans had not come along and burned fossil fuels”? That there is a correlation between the events is obvious. But correlation is not causation. And Earth’s own physical evidence demonstrates that is has had FAR MORE epochs with higher levels of CO2 than today with ZERO humans (or mighty few of them) than it has had WITH humans around to burn fossil fuel.
Aphan, Since the Indian sub-continent is still pushing into the Asian continent, I would presume that the crop in CO2 in the atmosphere would continue, absent intervention by man.
MarkW-
“Aphan, Since the Indian sub-continent is still pushing into the Asian continent, I would presume that the crop in CO2 in the atmosphere would continue, absent intervention by man.”
Crop? Or “drop”?
Tectonic plate movement can cause both increases and decreases in CO2 in the atmosphere, so not sure what your point is…
http://dilu.bol.ucla.edu/
http://www.pnas.org/content/112/30/E3997.long
‘Had we not come along and burned fossil fuels’. how delusional!
Aphan,
India crashing into Asia created the Himalayas.
The Himalayas being made of granite work with water to weather CO2 out of the atmosphere.
As long as the Himalayas continue to grow, CO2 will continue to drop.
MarkW-
“Aphan,
India crashing into Asia created the Himalayas. The Himalayas being made of granite work with water to weather CO2 out of the atmosphere. As long as the Himalayas continue to grow, CO2 will continue to drop.”
Mark, unless you have empirical evidence that the Himalayan Mountains are the sole governing factor for atmospheric CO2 dropping, you cannot logically proclaim with certainty that CO2 will continue to drop. You could say that as the Himalayas continue to grow…AND…every other factor/variable that we currently know of, understand, and measure accurately concerning CO2 in the atmosphere remains constant and doesn’t change in any way, CO2 would likely continue to drop. But even that is based upon the unproven assumption that all of the factors that we KNOW OF are, in reality, all of the factors that actually exist.
The Himalayan Mountains didn’t even begin to form until 40-50 million years ago…and CO2 was dropping long before then. Hence, they cannot be the sole governing factor. Not to mention, subduction zones, where one plate is forced under another plate-such as between the Indian and Asian plates, are regions that have a high rate of volcanism and earthquakes, as well as mountain building. And regions of volcanism and earthquakes are also regions where additional CO2 is released into the atmosphere.
“Weathering” happens to the mountain or rocks on land, not to the atmosphere. (The atmosphere is where “weather” takes place….the affect that the weather has on other things=weathering.) C02 in the air mixes with water and rains down onto rocks in a very weak carbonic “acid” solution. This slightly acidic rain helps to erode or “weather” the surface of the mountains along with wind and other factors. But the process takes hundreds of thousands of years AND is dependent upon the mineral content of the rock. Some rocks break down into a form of carbonate-like limestone-that “locks” the CO2 in, and forms a carbon sink. Some rocks don’t break down into carbonates easily, or at all.
Granite is one of the hardest, least porous rocks on the planet. It’s made of quartz, feldspar, and potassium and contains very little, if any, calcite. It erodes (weathers) extremely slowly and is one of the stones least affected by “acid” in rain water. That is why it’s often used to create building foundations, and other things that are exposed to the elements because it breaks down so much slower than any other type of rock. Because of it’s inability to break down into carbonate rocks-the type that locks away carbon-granite mountains are some of the least able to “scrub” CO2 from the atmosphere.
C4 plants endure low C02 conditions quite well, but they grow poorly in cold conditions. So during the low Co2 ice ages, the better adapted C4 plants were unable to colonise the colder high altitude regions where C3 plants had been decimated by low Co2.
So while C4 plants were able to recolonise high altitude regions in the N of S America, where the climate is warm, they were unable to recolonise the high and cold Gobi desert region. So the entire north of China and all of Mongolia became one vast Co2 deprived desert.
R
“C4 plants endure low C02 conditions quite well, but they grow poorly in cold conditions. So during the low Co2 ice ages, the better adapted C4 plants were unable to colonise the colder high altitude regions where C3 plants had been decimated by low Co2.”
This makes no sense. You cannot prove that low CO2 is what “decimated” the C3 plants in high altitude regions. The temperature drop could have, or the lack of water and water vapor in the air, or the lack of exposed soil. You can pump 1000 ppm of CO2 into the air over Antarctica and still not be able to grow plants on it.
“So while C4 plants were able to recolonise high altitude regions in the N of S America, where the climate is warm, they were unable to recolonise the high and cold Gobi desert region.”
http://www.slidego.com/res/palooza/world/LatinAmericanGeography/1B043FFF.jpg
The higher the altitude, the lower the temperatures, even in South America, and the more dominant C3 plants become. The average height of the Amazon basin is 300 ft above Sea Level. That’s NOT a “high altitude region”, but it is warm because it’s near the equator AND at low altitude. In the high altitude regions of the Andes (in the N of S America) very little plant life exists. It’s too cold, too high, and not enough good soil.
The Gobi Desert is much further North by latitude than South America is. It gets less rain, and is colder by default, being further away from the equator, as well as being of high altitude and it’s climate is harsh-ranging between very hot and dry to very cold and dry very quickly. C4 plants most likely never grew there at any time, so how could they recolonize?
>>The average height of the Amazon basin is 300 ft above Sea
>>Level. That’s NOT a “high altitude region”.
I had the Popaya Plain in Columbia in mind, not the Amazon basin. It is high but reasonably warm there, which is why there was recolonisation by C4 grasses in the region during the low-Co2 LGM.
.
>>This makes no sense. You cannot prove that low CO2
>>is what “decimated” the C3 plants in high altitude regions.
>>The temperature drop could have, or the lack of water and
>>water vapor in the air, or the lack of exposed soil.
During the LGM, Co2 concentrations dropped by 100 ppm, while tropical temperatures dropped by about 3.5 oc. A 3.5 oc temperature drop equates to about a 600m reduction in the mountain treeline. But the 100 ppm fall in Co2 during the LGM represents a 3,000m reduction in the Co2 mountain extinction zone. So ice age Co2 reductions have a far greater effect than temperature reductions.
The latest PMIP3 LGM simulations show little reduction in moisture over northern China at the LGM. While Chinese studies have demonstrated that lakes and lake-beds in the region had significanly higher water levels during the LGM. So it was not a simple lack of moisture that cased the Gobi to become a shifting-sand desert, or the Chinese treeline to shift south by 1000 km.
But you are right that moisture is also important, because C3 plants need much more water in low Co2 conditions, because their stomata open up and increase transpiration. So the Gobi region received a double-blow, both from low Co2 and it generally being a low moisture region. In contrast, C4 plants are tolerant of both low moisture and low Co2 conditions. But they cannot tolerate the cold of the Gobi, so there was no C4 recolonisation in this region.
.
>>C4 plants most likely never grew there (Gobi) at any time,
>>so how could they recolonize?
Grasses can spread widely, within a few millennia. The last ice age took 100 kyr to culminate in depths of the LGM, which is quite long enough for C4 grasses to encroach on the Gobi from the four points of the compass.
Ralph
Ralph,
“I had the Popaya Plain in Columbia in mind, not the Amazon basin. It is high but reasonably warm there, which is why there was recolonisation by C4 grasses in the region during the low-Co2 LGM.”
I cannot find a reference for “Popaya Plain”, but Popayan is 1760 m above sea level and it’s average temperature is 18-20C (64-68F). THAT is what you call “reasonably warm”?
“During the LGM, Co2 concentrations dropped by 100 ppm, while tropical temperatures dropped by about 3.5 oc. A 3.5 oc temperature drop equates to about a 600m reduction in the mountain treeline. But the 100 ppm fall in Co2 during the LGM represents a 3,000m reduction in the Co2 mountain extinction zone.”
You are acting as if the 3.5C temperature drop in the “tropics” and or a fall of 100 ppm in CO2 and it’s resulting “reduction in treeline/extinction zone” can be automatically equated across the globe! But that can only be extrapolated if you control for everything else that affects plant growth-hours of sunlight, water availability, soil, wind, predators, and geological location/original temps.
What if there is no “mountain treeline”? What if the location has no mountains at all?
What if the location, like the Gobi desert, is surrounded by mountains that are 10,000m tall? Then the “CO2 mountain extinction zone” drops 3,000 m (to 7,000 m)…which is still 2000m above the valley floor which is still at 5,000m above sea level!!!
What if the temperature there DID NOT drop by 3.5 C because it’s not located in “the tropics”?
“So the Gobi region received a double-blow, both from low Co2 and it generally being a low moisture region. In contrast, C4 plants are tolerant of both low moisture and low Co2 conditions. But they cannot tolerate the cold of the Gobi, so there was no C4 recolonisation in this region.”
You don’t get it. The Gobi today, after the Ice Sheets have melted away, and the Earth has “warmed” up again, STILL is not growing C4 plants-and unless you can prove it ever did with fossil remains, it’s entirely possible that it NEVER DID-because the Gobi’s temperature extremes might still too harsh to grow C4 plants, or the sandy soil isn’t right nutrient wise, or something else. You cannot say that for sure that CO2 levels in the Gobi prior to, or during, or after the LGM were ever low enough to create a “CO2” desert. You’ve never even defined exactly what levels constitute a “CO2” desert, or how you extrapolate those levels across the globe accounting for all known factors that effect plant growth!
“So ice age Co2 reductions have a far greater effect than temperature reductions.”
NO. Do you understand why I’m saying that you can’t say that? You can say “In some instances, ice age CO2 reductions might have had a far greater effect than temperature reductions”. But you cannot say that as if in all cases they DID until you have proven that you have eliminated every other factor that affects plant growth in every other location and altitude and geological environment on the planet, and the evidence demonstrates that you CAN say that.
>> Popayan is 1760 m above sea level and it’s average
>>temperature is 18-20C (64-68F). THAT is what you call
>>“reasonably warm”?
Warm enough for plants.
Especially as this is a year-round temperature.
.
>>You are acting as if the 3.5C temperature drop in the
>>“tropics” and or a fall of 100 ppm in CO2 and it’s resulting
>>“reduction in treeline/extinction zone” can be automatically
>>equated across the globe!
Because it sort of was. The PMIP3 maps show a very wide band of 3.5 oc temperature reductions, and stable precipitation. And I demonstrated that the small areas of low precipitation and greater cold in the PMIP simulations were abaerations, caused by scientists using treelines as temperature guages and rain gagues. However, if trees are actually responding to CO2 deprevation – C02 guages – these aberrant temperature and precipitation anomolies disappear. So the current LGM models are likely to be wrong.
.
>>What if there is no “mountain treeline”?
>>What if the location has no mountains at all?
What if the Moon was made of cheese.
.
>>You don’t get it. The Gobi today, after the Ice Sheets
>>have melted away, and the Earth has “warmed” up again,
>>STILL is not growing C4 plants
Because the Gobi is STILL too cold for C4 plants, so I do not get your point. But the tropical Popaya plain was warm enough, even during the LGM to grow C4. That is the difference. Understand?
.
>>You can say “In some instances, ice age CO2 reductions
>>might have had a far greater effect than temperature reductions”.
>>But you cannot say that as if in all cases they DID until you have
>>proven that you have eliminated every other factor that affects plant growth
Hey, come on Aphan, step by step. I am proposing a mechanism that apparently no climate scientist has ever considered before. Lets establish the principle first, before we investigate every single variable possible in field investigations. And as an aside, my paper is wholly privately funded. Give me a $20 million grant, as other climate scientists would naturally get, and I can take it further. But science papers demonstrating that CO2 does not greatly effect world temperatures do not get funding.
Ralph
ristvan- There is no such thing as “steady state” in geologic time. From the time the earth formed it has been cooling. The convection in the mantle, the driver of plate tectonics & volcanism, is slowing down. Dr. Moore’s primary premise is that the slowing of volcanism is slowing the replenishment of CO2 into the atmosphere. I don’t necessarily agree with the certainty of Dr. Moore’s biosphere termination date. But two fact are undeniable- 1) the core of the earth is cooling, 2) higher CO2 levels in the past have enabled a more productive biosphere.
The amount of cooling over a few million years time, is not enough to matter.
MarkW, the amount of cooling over roughly the last 5 million years is the difference between ice age and not ice age. That counts the Pliocene as the early ice age. If you go strictly with Pleistocene the span is half that.
Tom, the key problem with CO2 is that biological processes, which fix carbon (limestone forming lifeforms, corals, coal formation from buried plant material, petroleum creation [I think the abiological production of oil is possible but not important], and all the the other ways that living matter “fixes” carbon) out perform geological production. The planet is still very highly active and plate tectonics are far from dying out and any change over the last half-billion years would be fairly limited. Life, in short, is its own worst enemy. The declines are not due to geological changes.
Tom
Weathering of silicates and carbonates in rocks exposed by tectonic turnover is what sucks down CO2 out of the atmosphere over the long term.
Here are a couple of papers on weathering. Is essentially silicate grabbing CO2 and becoming carbonate.
http://www.geos.ed.ac.uk/~suerigby/GEP/Academic%20precis/carboniferous%20plants%20and%20climate.htm
http://web.colby.edu/ch217public/files/2016/02/Berner-Lasaga-and-Garrels-1983.pdf
To use the word “green” to describe the movement that is engaged in the war on CO2 is a monument to the prescience of George Orwell
“Green” = “Money”, not “Green” = “Vegetation”.
Green, it’s the new Red.
That’s what I don’t understand – Hollywood has been telling these sorts of Orwellian cautionary tales for generations, but see absolutely unable to see it playing out right in front of them – or worse, when they’re actually ushering it into reality. In fact, it’s almost like they used them as instruction manuals.
Sunshine +H2O +CO2 +Minerals = O2 +Sugars(food)
Not
Sunshine +H20 +Pollution +Minerals = O2 + Sugars(food)
Wow! Someone understands something.
“Now, with 400ppm in the atmosphere, the biosphere is once again booming”
No, I and my green friends wants 1200ppm to be comfortable.
Dr Moore:
I am sitting at the Pacific Centre looking once again at the wonder of the greenery that surrounds Vancouver. I saw the abundance of (living) nature on the highway to Whistler and appreciate all that the environmentalists from BC have done to clean up the planet. It is a big improvement on what I experienced in my youth in Toronto.
That movements for good are distracted into decayed versions cannot be a big surprise, but it is still disappointing each time it happens.
Your message about the importance of CO2 is well made and appreciated at this juncture. Like the scientist in Australia who challenged the Great Barrier Reef Is Dead nonsense, you are standing up to the invested profiteers earnestly calling for their sub-group to embedded in the chain of command. Thanks for your efforts.
“Every great cause begins as a movement, becomes a business, and eventually degenerates into a racket.”
― Eric Hoffer, The Temper of Our Time
One can use the “Laffer Curve” idea to make sense of this phenomena. If the independent variable is “intensity of social pressure” and the dependent variable is “net social benefit”, then what one sees is a maximum of net social benefit at a particular level of laws/mores/regulation/police/military/legislation.
What happens is that the law of diminishing returns ALWAYS operates and at some point an additional increment of social pressure becomes so costly that things start getting worse rather than better. In that circumstance, greater freedom/liberty/individual-action actually improves society.
This paradigm is correct whether the subject is taxes, or environmental law, or social mores, or military action, or “law and order”. Stronger laws and regulations are beneficial up to a point, beyond which they begin making things worse. No exceptions.
that’s a fine mythology.
obviously there’s no disputing what you are. you’re only dickering on how deep you like it.
and pretending that’s wisdom…lol
Actually the logic follows quite inevitably from the micro-economic principle that people will tend to act in accordance with the incentive structure that they face.
Speaking of “pretending that’s wisdom…lol” I see that you are ignorant of the punctuation rules you ought to have learned in grade school, and that you are afraid to use your real name…lol.
obedience to dogma, dictum or convention is not the hallmark of a functioning mind
obsession over trivia is the hobgoblin of the picayune.
did you ever hear of e e cummings ?
so you went to school on a sports scholarship, was it?
Enviros clean the planet by removing millions of trees for useless
Wind farms and legally killing (thanks to obama and demorats) eagels and thousands of other birds. Switching from coal to wood at Drax, using water for solar ,……
Congrats Dr. Moore on a fine essay. Dr. Salby in on the same page and backs it up with physics and math.
https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2016/06/18/fearless-physics-from-dr-salby/
Whoops. “is on the same page as you”
Ron, Dr. Salby is wrong on a lot of items, including the cause of the increase since ~1850, which is largely human, as Dr. Moore says, but largely temperature related as Dr. Salby says (but he is wrong…).
Ferdinand Engelbeen
I have been trying to find scientific evidence of your assertions that “Salby is wrong on a lot of items” but I can only find the assertion; no real arguments. Your statement that Dr Salby is wrong when he states that Co2 increase is largely temperature is useless. Salby presents a rational argument and only a rational argument should be presented to show he is wrong.
Give me an argument that shows his argument errors. Please.
NO, Salby just has a different stance on these things than you do.
That does not make him wrong.
DCS,
I have listened to Dr. Salby’s lectures in different places and was in London, where he spoke in the Parliament buildings a few years ago. Didn’t answer my questions, as there was little time, but even so, there are several pertinent errors. To name a few:
– Ice core CO2 levels at peaks are too low (not repeated in his last speech in London last year). That is simply impossible: if the peaks were much higher (factor 10-15 in his speeches), any migration would have redistributed the extra CO2 over the glacial period (90% of the time), meaning that the already very low (~180 ppmv) CO2 levels originally were even lower, effectively killing all C3 plants…
In reality the -theoretical- migration deduced from remelt layers in the Siple Dome ice core show a very modest migration of a few decades over 75,000 years in the relative “warm” coastal ice cores. None measurable over 800,000 years in the much colder inland ice cores.
– According to Dr. Salby, one must integrate temperature to obtain the CO2 increase, as the variability in CO2 and temperature are highly related (with a lag), but most variability is caused by the influence of temperature on tropical forests, while global vegetation is a small, but growing net sink for CO2. Thus variability and trend have different causes and one can’t attribute the trend to temperature without further confirmation.
Moreover, he points to the fact that human emissions and vegetation decay have the same 13C/12C “signature”, which is true, but as the oxygen balance shows, the whole biosphere (plants, bacteria, molds, insects, animals,…) is a net source of O2, thus a sink for CO2 and preferentially 12CO2, thus not the cause of the 13C/12C ratio decline which is completely in ratio with human emissions…
The minimum CO2 concentration where plants can survive and continue to make use of CO2 ranges from less than 10 ppm to 145 PPM depending on the kind of plant, according to the PDF obtained from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1469-8137.2010.03441.x/pdf
And just how tasty are those lichens that grow at 10ppm?
Reindeer love em.
But that sucks if you are a vegan.
Please reference exact page and paragraph from your link where it states that-“The minimum CO2 concentration where plants can survive and continue to make use of CO2 ranges from less than 10 ppm to 145 PPM depending on the kind of plant”. Thanks
Per Aphan’s request to show what page and paragraph in j.1469-8137.2010.03441.x-1.pdf downloadable for free from http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1469-8137.2010.03441.x/pdf
The paragraphs are not numbered, as usual for such kind of documents. These are not patents, which in the US have their paragraphs numbered.
On page 6, middle-late in the first and long paragraph after the heading “IV. Early low-[CO2] studies”: “The author found that corn and sugar cane (now known to be
C4 plants) could draw down [CO2] below 10 ppm, whereas the other species (now known to be C3 plants) could only draw down [CO2] between 60 and 145 ppm.”
Thank you Donald-
I wanted to check out the context from which you took your statement.
The article you referenced, at this point, is talking about a study in which plants were grown in a controlled environment and “focused on the compensation point of plants, as well as comparing respiration and photosynthetic rates among species and genotypes.”
You said- “The minimum CO2 concentration where plants can survive and continue to make use of CO2 ranges from less than 10 ppm to 145 PPM depending on the kind of plant, according to the PDF”… isn’t exactly accurate unless you specify that those CO2 levels were accompanied by specific and controlled levels of oxygen and a precise temperature as well. And even then, it’s not talking about the CO2 concentration in the AIR, it’s talking about the CO2 compensation rates of those plants….which means something entirely different.
“The CO2 equilibrium between the rate of photosynthesis and respiration of a leaf in a closed system is the CO2 compensation point or “F”. Factors such as temperature, O2 concentration and water stress, which alter the rate of photosynthesis or photorespiration may change “F”. http://www.plantphysiol.org/content/58/2/143.full.pdf
The CO2 compensation rate then, is NOT the “minimum amount of CO2 in the air in which a plant can survive”, but the difference in the rate of C02 that plant uses for photosynthesis and the rate that plant uses for respiration.
This link sheds more light on what CO2 compensation levels in plants mean-
http://www.pnas.org/content/92/24/11230.full.pdf
“The CO2 compensation point (CO2F) is defined as the CO2 concentration at which net CO2 fixation is zero at a given 02 level and temperature (12,13). It has been assumed that at the CO2F respiratory and photorespiratory processes oxidize carbohydrate to CO2 as fast as CO2 is photosynthetically fixed. This concept may have to be modified to include CO2 fixation by phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase at low ratios of CO2 to O2 (seeDiscussion). The CO2F is “50 ppm CO2 for an isolated C3 plant in a closed chamber at 21% O2 and 20 C. A minimum atmospheric Co2 equilibrium, resulting from the capacity of plants for CO2 uptake and counteracted by abiotic and biotic CO2-generating processes of the global carbon cycle (14), was probably reached millions of years ago. Ice cores from the past 165,000 years (15) show that such an equilibrium has been -235 +/- 45 ppm CO2 until the last century.”
So outside of a controlled environment, the “minimum atmospheric CO2 equilibrium levels for plants” is somewhere between 190 and 280 ppm. MINIMUM.
sorry! Forgot to “unbold” after “controlled environment” in the second paragraph. 🙂 my bad
I applaud Dr. Patrick Moore, he has eloquently presented many of the simple truths about CO2.
However, he included this line:
“There is also no question that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and all else being equal, the emissions would result in some warming if CO2 rose to higher levels in the atmosphere.”
In my own pursuits of the truths concerning CO2, I have yet to find any sort of equation that scientifically describes the greenhouse gas property of CO2. (Or any other gas.) This conflicts with the proclamation that there is no question. There are simple questions that we can pose about the purported greenhouse property of a gas, but there are no mechanisms to formulate an answer. There is no scientific method to quantify the greenhouse gas property, and if we can’t measure it then there is no actual physical property.
Please enlighten me otherwise.
One example of a simple question is an extension of the proclamation itself: “… result in some warming if CO2 rose to higher levels in the atmosphere”.
Take two separate hypotheticals of higher levels of CO2 in the atmosphere. The first is to only double CO2 itself, and then we would have roughly 800 ppm of CO2. The second is to double the entire contents of the atmosphere. In this case, the amount of CO2 is still doubled, however it remains at the same ppm as today.
How do these scenarios differ in terms of the greenhouse gas property of CO2?
It is a well established fact that CO2 absorbs some of the long-wave radiation emitted by the earth and then re-radiates it at certain wave-lengths. Because their are many factors that are dynamic, non-linear, and coupled(resulting in many feedbacks, both positive and negative) it is not possible to predict what the result will be in the real world. Many researchers believe that a doubling of CO2 would result in an increase in temperature of 1ºC or less. The IPCC estimate is up to 4 times higher than that.
The fact that temperature did not rise significantly (other then during El Nino events) over the past two decades, during which about 1/3 of all human CO2 has been emitted, indicates that CO2 has little, or possibly no significant effect in the real world.
Well said, Sir 🙂
Dr Moore-
You state above-
“Because their are many factors that are dynamic, non-linear, and coupled(resulting in many feedbacks, both positive and negative) it is not possible to predict what the result will be in the real world. ”
But you DID previously “predict” what the result would be…in fact, you said there was no question about your prediction!
“There is also no question that CO2 is a greenhouse gas and all else being equal, the emissions would result in some warming if CO2 rose to higher levels in the atmosphere.”
Thomas Homer is calling you out on that. 🙂
reradiates some of it.
i don’t suppose anybody has some numbers on how much is lost by collision with other molecules, does he?
i mean- 0.04% of the atmosphere means each single molecule of it is mixed in with 2500 other molecules of gas.
and we know what ‘temperature’ means, right? it’s the average kinetic energy – how things bounce around- not what color they are.
Thank you for your response Dr. Patrick Moore. (And thank you Aphan for extending the query.)
Dr. Moore states above:
“It is a well established fact that CO2 absorbs some of the long-wave radiation emitted by the earth and then re-radiates it at certain wave-lengths.”
How can it be “well established” when we have no way of measuring it? Or are you saying that we can measure it but we choose not to? Shouldn’t we be measuring this property so we can track changes?
Why don’t we have a Radar gun like tool to emit the long wave radiation and then capture the uptick of the “certain wavelength” that CO2 re-emits? We could then see how altitude changes this behavior, since Denver has less atmosphere over it than Miami does, we should see a difference in this measurement, correct? But we aren’t measuring it, we have no charts tracking this property. We should be able to plainly see how atmospheric tides change this measurement throughout the course of each day regardless of location.
You can’t even begin to formulate an answer to my example question that attempts to define the “Greenhouse gas” property of CO2 as a function of quantity or of density. That’s a fundamental distinction. Yet, there are no axioms, postulates, or laws of this “Greenhouse gas” property to apply. Why is that still the case after 150 years of access to this “well established fact”?
I have other simple questions to pose about this property, but alas there are no rules to apply and we can’t even begin to formulate an answer. Ultimately, the question comes down to the inference that the “Greenhouse gas” property of various atmospheric gases means that the thermal capacity of the atmosphere is not a function of mass. Is that consistent with your theory? How do you reconcile that with the laws of thermodynamics?
The increase in atmospheric CO2 has two benefits: 1) Increased plant growth and higher yields (including cereals and grains) by roughly 50% and 2) Reduction in plant loss of water due to less trans-respiration.
C3 plants (trees, cereal crops, and shrubs) lose roughly 50% of the water they absorb due to trans-respiration (loss of water from the plant’s stomata.) When CO2 rises C3 plants produce less stomata which reduces water loss in the plant. This results in more water at the root of the plant which enables synergistic bacteria on the roots to produce more nitrogen byproducts which increases plant growth.
A higher level of atmospheric CO2 enables plants to make more effective use of water and enables the plant to survive in regions of low water such as deserts. Higher levels of atmospheric CO2 are beneficial net significantly beneficial to the biosphere.
http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/crops/facts/00-077.htm
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2003/05/030509084556.htm
William,
Very nice clips, but I would offer one minor quibble to the following quote: “The plant must decide which it needs more: water or carbon dioxide.”
As you point out, the largest single reason that plants need water in the first place is to replace that water lost as a consequence of their CO2 scavenging operation. I.e., water requirements are so closely linked to the CO2 scavenging operation that these two needs are in a sense, inseparable.
Thus, it doesn’t quite parse for the author to write: “water or carbon dioxide”. Better would be something like: “The plant must decide whether its water supply is sufficient to enable it to acquire an optimum amount of CO2.” In arid regions the answer nearly all of the time is, no.
Hence, cacti that take 100 years to reach a size of a few feet in height. There is CO2 all around them, but they can’t acquire that CO2 without a catastrophic loss of water. Therefore, they sit in full sun for decades without really growing.
As a grower of cacti, I think you underestimate how quickly they can and do grow.
Also, see CAM plant metabolism…they take in CO2 at night while humidity is high.
Separate mechanism than either C3 or C4.
Excellent paper by Moore. A major significance of the paper is the data in the geological record that does not support any notion that CO2 drives the climate system as claimed by failed climate modelers. The correlation of CO2 and temperature is terrible and unsupportive of this claim about CO2.
Failed climate modelers, of course, ignored this as well as the founding principles of atmospheric science that demonstrate CO2 is a GHG of only secondary importance and does not drive the climate system or control the earth’s OLR. The hydrological cycle does and there is nothing humans can do to influence this.
It’s just one of those things skeptics/climate realists are supposed to say. But it is meaningless, and adds nothing to their argument.