Yale Climate Connections published an article this week attacking the scientific consensus, and implicitly calling all greenhouse operators idiots, by claiming that adding carbon dioxide to the air harms plants and reduces crop production.
Not surprisingly, the article, titled “More CO2 in the atmosphere hurts key plants and crops more than it helps,” offers little science to support the assertion.
In reality, the scientific evidence is clear that more carbon dioxide in the air boosts plant growth and improves plant nutrients and water-use efficiency.
These two facts are a primary reason why global crop yields set new records nearly every year as CO2 levels rise and the Earth modestly warms.
While acknowledging carbon dioxide is plant food, which is why it is commonly used in greenhouses, the author of the Yale story writes, “[t]he familiar adage – too much of a good thing is a bad thing – applies to atmospheric carbon dioxide: In higher concentrations, it is a damaging pollutant.”
However, most plants evolved with carbon dioxide levels that were significantly higher than at present, and under no realistic emission scenario will atmospheric carbon dioxide reach levels at which plant growth is harmed.
The Non-governmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) survey of the scientific literature, Climate Change Reconsidered II: Biological Impacts, cites hundreds of peer-reviewed studies demonstrating the beneficial effect of the rise in carbon dioxide levels since the Industrial Revolution has had on plant life.
Citing experiments conducted and summaries completed by the research teams which operate CO2Science.org, the authors of the NIPCC report write:
Results from 3,586 separate experimental conditions conducted on 549 plant species reveal nearly all plants will experience increases in dry weight or biomass in response to atmospheric CO2 enrichment.
Results from an additional 2,094 separate experimental conditions conducted on 472 plant species reveal nearly all plants will experience increases in photosynthesis in response to atmospheric CO2 enrichment.
Several studies indicate plants are not harmed by super-elevated atmospheric CO2 concentrations, an order of magnitude or greater than the globe’s current mean.
Instead, positive growth responses are reported, some of which are particularly large. Most plants will display enhanced rates of photosynthesis and biomass production as the atmosphere’s CO2 concentration rises.
The major thrust of the Yale article is that more atmospheric carbon dioxide will cause such extreme heat and drought that the negative impacts of such heat and drought will overwhelm the beneficial impacts of more CO2.
However, that is a major bait-and-switch from the article’s title, which clearly implies that CO2 itself hurts plants.
More CO2 doesn’t harm plants; only dubious and speculative tangential indirect weather effects caused by more CO2 arguably harm plants. That is a big difference, and quite different than what the title of the article implies.
Even under the Yale article’s dubious claims about more drought, research consistently shows that under higher levels of carbon dioxide, plants use water more efficiently.
This means that plants will still thrive, even if some areas become arider as Yale Climate Connections speculates.
The Yale article comes closest comes to supporting its central claim with any facts when it cites a single study showing minor declines in some nutrients for rice grown under higher CO2 conditions.
That Yale article failed to note, however, that rice yields grow substantially under higher CO2 conditions. More rice production from the same plot of land will logically lead to less nutrient uptake per rice kernel.
This can be mitigated by a corresponding increase in fertilizer usage. Even without more fertilizer usage, the benefits of significantly more rice production outweigh the harms of minor declines in micronutrients per kernel.
Yale Climate Connections deceives its readers when it publishes a misleading title and fails to back up its alarmist claims with scientific evidence.
The scientific consensus regarding atmospheric carbon dioxide stands – more carbon dioxide in the air benefits plants and crop yields.
Read more at Climate Realism
The only people who have confidence in the uber-leftwing Yale Climate Connections are Biden voters that can’t stop listening to PBS “All Things Considered”.
On the subject of ‘too much of a good thing is bad for you,’ does that also apply to a Yale education?
It would appear so.
Yale can only be right if the very, very unlikely theory of anthropogenic global warming proves to be correct. That’s in its worse case scenario, so add a few more verys to that.
Otherwise, the science is settled. Carbon dioxide is not only good for plants, but essential for them and today’s plants are living in what is essentially still CO2 drought conditions.
As someone actually involved in agriculture and horticulture, I’ll go with the proven science, thank you.
Yale was once known as a top tier university. Now it seems to have traded that reputation for becoming a top tier center of dogmatic belief in non-science, abandoning the (formerly) cherished role of universities in fostering critical thinking.
So how much Tax Payers Dollars were shelled out to Yale for this Fake Study in the first place? More reasons to cut back on their bank accounts
Better tell the greenhouse growers that CO2 harms plants. Because they use it as fertilizer by burning natural gas and letting a portion of the exhaust into the building to boost the CO2 because the plants grow faster and are healthier as a result.
Practical experience vs. Yale science.
Common sense wins again.
To say that CO2 is a pollutant is just absolute Garbage. Saying that indicates insanity or if you pretend to know anything you’re am outright liar. The tees you see around you evolved at a time when CO2 was much higher than it is now. 2000 Ppm for deciduous and 4000 Ppm for coniferous. These people cannot be taken seriously.
Charles MacKay would thank Yale Climate Connections for proving his point.