Rising CO2 causes more than a climate crisis—it may directly harm our ability to think
Monday, April 20, 2020
As the 21st century progresses, rising atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations will cause urban and indoor levels of the gas to increase, and that may significantly reduce our basic decision-making ability and complex strategic thinking, according to a new CU Boulder-led study. By the end of the century, people could be exposed to indoor CO2 levels up to 1400 parts per million—more than three times today’s outdoor levels and well beyond what humans have ever experienced.
“It’s amazing how high CO2 levels get in enclosed spaces,” said Kris Karnauskas, CIRES Fellow, associate professor at CU Boulder and lead author of the new study published today in the AGU journal GeoHealth. “It affects everybody—from little kids packed into classrooms to scientists, business people and decision makers to regular folks in their houses and apartments.”
Shelly Miller, professor in CU Boulder’s school of engineering and coauthor adds that “building ventilation typically modulates CO2 levels in buildings, but there are situations when there are too many people and not enough fresh air to dilute the CO2.” CO2 can also build up in poorly ventilated spaces over longer periods of time, such as overnight while sleeping in bedrooms, she said.
Put simply, when we breathe air with high CO2 levels, the CO2 levels in our blood rise, reducing the amount of oxygen that reaches our brains. Studies show that this can increase sleepiness and anxiety, and impair cognitive function.
We all know the feeling: Sit too long in a stuffy, crowded lecture hall or conference room and many of us begin to feel drowsy or dull. In general, CO2 concentrations are higher indoors than outdoors, the authors wrote. And outdoor CO2 in urban areas is higher than in pristine locations. The CO2 concentrations in buildings are a result of both the gas that is otherwise in equilibrium with the outdoors, and also the CO2 generated by building occupants as they exhale.
Atmospheric CO2 levels have been rising since the Industrial Revolution, reaching a 414 ppm peak at NOAA’s Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii in 2019. In the ongoing scenario in which people on Earth do not reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicts outdoor CO2 levels could climb to 930 ppm by 2100. And urban areas typically have around 100 ppm CO2 higher than this background.
Karnauskas and his colleagues developed a comprehensive approach that considers predicted future outdoor CO2 concentrations and the impact of localized urban emissions, a model of the relationship between indoor and outdoor CO2 levels and the impact on human cognition. They found that if the outdoor CO2 concentrations do rise to 930 ppm, that would nudge the indoor concentrations to a harmful level of 1400 ppm.
“At this level, some studies have demonstrated compelling evidence for significant cognitive impairment,” said Anna Schapiro, assistant professor of psychology at the University of Pennsylvania and a coauthor on the study. “Though the literature contains some conflicting findings and much more research is needed, it appears that high level cognitive domains like decision-making and planning are especially susceptible to increasing CO2 concentrations.”
In fact, at 1400 ppm, CO2 concentrations may cut our basic decision-making ability by 25 percent, and complex strategic thinking by around 50 percent, the authors found.
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Submarines average 3-4 thousand ppm and can run over 10,000 ppm. If one loses half ones complex strategic thinking at 1,500 ppm, where does that leave the submariners?/
Underwater
LOL!
I am sorry, but that reply was all wet.
It may be a little late to notice but apparently 414 ppmv severely impairs the cognitive processes of a large proportion of the western world already.
Oddly this seems to affect some sectors of the population more than others. There seems to be a strong correlation with WOKE. The biochemical pathway for this effect is illusive , more money is needed to find the cause of this important societal problem.
“It may be a little late to notice but apparently 414 ppmv severely impairs the cognitive processes of a large proportion of the western world already.”
I don’t think it is the ppm level per se that is driving the alamists crazy, it is their delusional fear of CO2 that causes them to be unable to think straight, exaserbated, of course, by the CAGW Charlatans who have been lying about the situation for years.
Skeptics aren’t having any mental problems at 414ppm, at least none that are caused by CO2. 🙂
Actually, I think it is the phytosterols in avocados which open the biochemical pathways for CO2 to impair inter-neuronal activity, but I need more money to continue this important work.
What’s REALLY amazing is that non of these idiots even realize that human beings only contribute 3% of the CO2 in the atmosphere. The rest is all “natural” and we have zero control over it. The plants that comprise our food chain. and other plants like trees etc, take most of it out each year, so we will never put too much into the equation. More CO2 creates more plant growth which consumes more CO2 and makes more food and plant growth. I realize this is too simple for the “educated idiots” to comprehend, but luckily that doesn’t change the reality.
Yep, here we go again
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/17/claim-co2-makes-you-stupid-as-a-submariner-that-question/
“Data collected on nine nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines indicate an average CO2 concentration of 3,500 ppm with a range of 0-10,600 ppm”
Also, at the current/historical 2ppm per year it would take over 250 years to reach the level that they claim it will reach in 80 years.
Yeah, I think that 900ppm figure is based on humans burning all the available fossil fuels on Earth in just a few short years.
That shows you how sloppy this study is, when they can’t even get that figure correct.
It utter claptrap to say that one gets drowsy in lectures die to CO2. If you are warm and cozy from all the warm bodies and the subject matter is a drone of boredom, it is perfectly natural for your mind to want to do something else, and even sleep is more productive at that point. A type of reactive inhibition.
As CO2 partitions 50 to 1 into water, we would have to add 50 times as much CO2 as to simply double the atmospheric CO2. There is simply not enough carbon for us to burn,. We might get a 20% rise, but the oceans would fight us overstep of the way, the higher activities of plants fighting us as well.
True indeed Charles H at 9:53am.
Fortunately for me, sleeping through quantum mechanics lectures steered me towards organic chemistry. As that old saying goes – there but for the grace of God go I.
Sorry, Rich, but the article is not talking about outdoor CO2 levels, but indoor levels. I think it possible that such levels could be achieved in a closed room with poor circulation.
I do have a problem with the statement “We all know the feeling: Sit too long in a stuffy, crowded lecture hall or conference room and many of us begin to feel drowsy or dull.” Warm air alone could account for those reactions. Combine that warmth with a dull speaker or topic, maybe little sleep the night before, and most anyone will nod off.
Ex-KK
Please go back and read more carefully.
Yes, they also hyperventilated about indoor CO2, but the driving force for indoor levels supposedly rising dangerously was the assumption that outdoor CO2 would be 930 ppm in the next 80 years.
CO2 has been rising at 2 ppm/yr, and is around 415 ppm at the moment. In order to reach 930 ppm within 80 years, it must average 6.4 ppm/yr. (3.2x the current rate). K If that average rate is achieved by a linear acceleration that reaches the average 6.4 ppm/ year by the midpoint 2060, that implies 8.4 ppm/yr in 2100. That is 4.2x the current rate, and would seem to be physically impossible. That would require burning far more than four times current consumption of fossil fuel because as atmospheric CO2 gets further and further out of equilibrium with partial pressure of CO2 in the ocean, the driving force increases for the oceans to absorb more CO2.
0 ppm?
. . . and some of those submariners are responsible for missiles that could start WWIII, knocking humanity back at least a couple of thousand years.
Also, let’s not forget our beloved space programs . . . NASA has set the maximum allowable 24-hour average CO2 on board the manned International Space Station at 5,250 ppm (4.0 mmHg). NASA used to have an even higher maximum such limit of 7,000 ppm on the manned ISS.
US astronaut Christina Koch logged 328 consecutive days aboard ISS and US astronaut Scott Kelly spent the current record of 340 consecutive days aboard ISS. Last I heard, they were both doing just fine.
I conclude that both US DoD and NASA each know a helluva lot more about the effects of continuous elevated-CO2 levels on human physiology and brain function than does Kris Karnauskas, CIRES Fellow and associate professor at CU Boulder.
Don’t forget greenhouses, which typically have CO2 levels of 1,200 ppm. Should OSHA step in?
Is that why our school kids are all stupid? Class rooms have anywhere between 800 and 1200 ppm of CO2 depending on the time of the day and how enclosed they are!
We’ll soon know. All the kids are at home sitting in front of their monitors doing schoolwork. Grandson got straight A’s.
Perhaps that’s why they’re called
Bored Room Meetings
A high proportion of mouth breathers.
Here’s the WUWT post from 8 years ago:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/17/claim-co2-makes-you-stupid-as-a-submariner-that-question/
I can confirm your observation. I was an Atmosphere Control Technician (among other duties) on a U.S. SSN.
When we get to 8,000 PPM, I’ll plant more trees.
My thought exactly. I wonder why Charles Rotter does not know this?
Do you really think every article I post is a reflection of my beliefs? Wow.
Please explain why submariners are not endangered by much higher levels during their 3 months submerged. I have seen reports of nuclear submarine atmospheres as high as 8000 ppmv. During WW2, some submarines were forced by hunters to stay sumerged for so long that even matches wouldn’t light and doctors reckoned that the crew should have not survived that level of carbon-dioxide. Not only did they survive, but remained capable of operating their machinery. No computers those days.
Exhaled breath is typically 40000ppm to 50000ppm, more if you are working hard.
Breathing makes you dumb, as we all know.
At that level for exhaled air, could anyone doing mouth to mouth rescue breathing be charged with murder when the victim dies?
In exhaled breath there is 16% oxygen, which is adequate to maintain life even with the high concentration of carbon dioxide.
For some people with COPD they need higher concentrations of circulating carbon dioxide to continue breathing, high levels of external oxygen (above 28%) could kill them.
If someone hyperventilates then they are given a paper bag to rebreathe into to restore carbon dioxide levels in the blood.
The human physiology developed from ancestors that lived in low oxygen environments of around 4%, which some cells still require and would die if exposed to higher concentrations. The blood stream acts as a reservoir.
There’s a book printed by Oxford University press called “Oxygen” which explains some of this.
If you are working hard you are probably dumb already. Smart people sit back and make others do all the hard work 😉
is that why trump is so dumb? he is working too hard. suggesting getting bleach into the body ou uv light into the lungs to kill covid-19 virus. (does he realise that the virus is in all parts of the body so you would need to dissect a patient into a single layer then expose to UV or bleach. Trick is the re-assembly may require time, then waiting for lightening to re- energise the corpse may be too long to be effective.!!!
It really is sad how haters have to drag the object of their hate into every conversation.
Would you care to provide transcripts of everything you have ever said so that I can go thought them and point out all the stupid things you have said over the years?
On the other hand, we have plenty of examples from the things you have written here.
ghalfrunt I think you’d make a great test subject.
Here we go again. Greetings from the orangemanbadosphere
At least the guy’s purportedly less white than the old white guys we’re supposed to hate, purportedly. You know, like the last two “lefties” on the phony-leftie orangemanbad ticket.
When doing a course on confined spaces, or the like, I was told that the test instrument was set to detect CO2 at levels of 120 000 ppm, = 12%, and hazardous to life. I found that by holding my breath as long as possible, and then breathing into the detector, I could set off the alarm. Did that indicate I was dead? Don’t think so as I am still surviving about 25 years later.
We were over 20,000 ppm for several days .
Nobody died…. 😉
IC1(SS)
“In fact, at 1400 ppm, CO2 concentrations may cut our basic decision-making ability by 25 percent, and complex strategic thinking by around 50 percent, the authors found.”
I would say 100% cognitive loss even at 400ppm for those clowns.
Indeed, we have ample evidence that the release of CO2 has already diminished the cognitive abilities of those that are concerned about it – I’m going to say a 40% reduction in decision making ability because that is something measurable. So with your 100% estimate and my 40% estimate, that is an estimated 70% loss of cognition on average among those that are concerned about man made climate change – climate science is fun!
“Rising CO2 causes more than a climate crisis—it may directly harm our ability to think”
It already has, apparently.
I will add this study to my collection of such studies with thanks to wuwt
https://tambonthongchai.com/2018/06/21/climate-change-impacts1/
You deserve some thanks, too, chaamjamal.
Don’t be too quick to dismiss this study’s conclusion; the researchers can point to their own work as proof.
Too late, judging from some of the nonsense the climate alarmists come out with!
+100
There could be something in this. To judge by the decline of intelligence in the Media, politics and the general population, the rising CO2 levels may be already having an effect.
Its 50,000 ppm at the BBC.
Do these professors really live in this world in this world?
Adequate ventilation with extractor fans in summer and heat pumps in winter and there will never be a problem.
There was a saying when I was at school in the 1950s that some of these experts learn more and more about less and less and the then know everything about nothing .
Since then CO2 has appeared as the greatest supposed threat to mankind and any scientific paper written and published about CO2 is well funded even rubbish like this .
I remember eating out at a restaurant in Wellington many years ago with a group and we carried on close to midnight
The manager and staff were to polite to ask us to leave so they opened up all the windows and windy Wellington soon froze us on our way .
These experts are learning more and more about less and less until they know
everything about nothing.
This is going to be a fun thread to read when it fills up some more. So far with only 7 comments, it’s made me smile and I can use a lot more of that. I’ll have to come back a couple more times.
Stay safe and healthy, all.
Bob
These studies also indicated that oxygen depletion in enclosed environments had more effect than increases in CO2. But that doesn’t make good headlines.
Oxygen depletion caused the Dyatlov event in Russia.
After 50 years of research, nobody knows what caused the Dyatlov event. But whatever it was, oxygen depletion could not have been it. 9 hikers in a canvas tent, they weren’t even using their stove.
“CU Boulder” study about CO2? For sure this was a Coors Beer experiment that got off the tracks. Great comments above, RE Submarines.
AHA! Ever drive in Boulder, CO? Half the people on the road are suffering from severe hypoxia. That’s what this study is really about, boroshitu and and hypoxia.
How is this supposed to work? The CO2 outside goes up to 900 ppm, and then leaks inside our homes and work spaces, which are already 1000 to 1200 ppm, and make us stupid? Who could fail to grasp the madness of that notion? Although, TBF, OTOH, there’s strong evidence that some people in Boulder have already been affected.
“Yes, there will be rabbits, Lennie.”
This latest alarmist confection presumes already-high levels of cognitive ability. My experience over forty years of adulthood is that the vast majority of people, including those in the fields of climate-related earth studies in academe, are already embedded and chronically trapped in their own confirmation biased bubbles. Any marginal increases in indoor carbon dioxide can hardly make alarmists any more entrenched in their myopia.
It’s not myopia, it’s proctocraniosis. Very high concentrations of CO2 and deadly H2S present.
The date on this post is wrong…surely it was published on April 1.
More utter piffle from so called researchers. Grab the grant money and make-up more ridiculous nonsense.
CO2’s makes plants grow and judging from this so called research by Kris Karnauskas, CIRES Fellow, associate professor at CU Boulder and lead author of the new study published today in the AGU journal, vegetable matter is in his brain.
Not all scientists agree!!!
A quote from:
https://co2coalition.org/2018/07/03/the-non-effect-of-elevated-atmospheric-co2-on-human-cognitive-performance-and-decision-making/
★★★★
Put simply, open a window. Ignore the PPM numbers game.
Already to much CO2 in the house and thus to low cognition level to achieve such a complexe task.
RStabb: “Put simply, open a window. Ignore the PPM numbers game.”
But I’d advise against that on submarines.
Or screen doors. No screen doors. They’ll have to work out something else.
H.R.
Point taken. It’s never easy.
To be a[n associate] professor these days requires an incredibly dim mind.
Put simply, it’s another load of complete, total and utter tosh.
It’s amazing how high CO2 levels get in enclosed spaces,”
It’s amazing how many enclosed spaces have windows and doors.
To repeat the old cliche:
BS = Bull Sh*t
MS = More Sh*t
PhD = Piled higher and deeper.
That may not be a fair assumption. They may be quite clever. What is required is at least the appearance of orthodox green piety. If your job depends on appearing to be utterly convinced of whacked green dogmas, and no funding goes to heretical research, it’s likely that you will delude yourself into accepting the green dogmas on faith and never think dangerous thoughts.
You have to admit, there is no end to their creativity. CO2, is there nothing it cannot do?
“It’s amazing how many enclosed spaces have windows and doors.”
Some don’t. Stay out of them.
Good advice for living above the grass.
My chum used to drive a ‘bomber’ as they called them and still speaks four languages. Btw I think we should always speak of CO2 in molecules per ten thousand not ppm. So since 1850 CO2 has risen from just under three to just over four molecules per ten thousand AND HAS MELTED THE ARCTIC ICE CAP!
It’s been struggling lately. Beating down on ice at 20 below C or F just ain’t what it used to be.
https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/
Come on carbon, up your game.
Hypoxia, the new atmospheric CO2 scare? Might work on those already affected by acute oligophrenia.
The question is, will the believer crowd notice.
930 ppm is 500 ppm higher than at present. At an annual increase of 2ppm, that is 250 years.
Consider that 1 year ago the global economy was thriving , as were most of the worlds inhabitants , everyone cheerful and optimistic , making plans for careers and holidays, and now there are millions of excess deaths, the economy of most nations has been wrecked and milions in Europe and US have lost jobs , businesses , possibly also their homes. Did any of us see that coming?
How can we be certain of what awaits us in the next 250 years. A rise in internal CO2 is likely to be the least of the world’s worries.
I suppose most of these nonsense papers were made up before the Wuhan apocalypse struck. There may be fewer of them in the future with universities closed or operating online. Difficult see how practical engineering and science lab- based teaching and experimenting can be done with just a server and laptop.
Some universities may never re- open . The well rated University of Manchester (UK) is missing £270 million pounds in the next financial year according to the BBC and other Russell group (ie top rated) universities are also in trouble. There may not be the funds for silly stuff when a country is bleeding out , financially.
150 years ago, we were riding horses. I wonder if anything might change 150 years from now.
These folks are silly.
When I read that, my first thought was finally someone is being bullish on the economy!
Shocked to see that this doesn’t come to us via our EurekAlert! friends. “How can this be?”, I wondered. Is my EurekAlert! detector out of calibration?
It turns out that my EurekAlert! bs meter is still working just fine:
https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2020-04/uoca-cce042020.php
From:
https://inspectapedia.com/indoor_air_quality/Commercial-Airline-Carbon-Dioxide-Levels.php
Anyway, what does it matter?
The Greens top bras does not want to save mankind, only planet Earth – Earth likes the higher CO₂ level – so the CU Boulder-led study is just a substitute for studying something useful, which may demand way more diligence and intelligence (and a few DuckDuckGos).
Since global progressives/left overwhelmingly live in large, densely populated cities, this phenomenon would be a plus.
Finally! A climate change study where the study itself is the proof of the thesis.
★
https://www.nap.edu/read/12529/chapter/10
Table 7-2:
NASA
Time 1000h
Limit 0.5% (New value based on avoiding any risk of mild headache.)
[0.5% = 5000ppm]
https://www.airspacemag.com/daily-planet/why-living-space-can-be-pain-head-180951507/
Law’s paper is the first serious look into the subject, and her team’s recommendation is to go even lower, to 2.5 mm Hg. They found that “for each 1-mm Hg increase in CO2, the odds of a crew member reporting a headache almost doubled.” Their recommended level of 2.5 mm would, according to the paper, “keep the risk of headache to below 1%, a standard threshold used in toxicology and aerospace medicine.” [2.5mm Hg = 333Pa this is equivalent to 5050ppm]
The air in the International Space Station has a concentration of 5000 ppm.
NASA apparently tries to cognitively impair the astronauts.
Acute Exposure to Low-to-Moderate Carbon Dioxide Levels and Submariner Decision Making
https://www.ingentaconnect.com/contentone/asma/amhp/2018/00000089/00000006/art00006?utm_source=TrendMD&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=Aerosp_Med_Hum_Perform_TrendMD_0
“RESULTS: There were no significant differences for any of the nine SMS measures of decision making between the CO2 exposure conditions.”