Fact Check: Excess carbon dioxide is harmful to the environment and causes climate change
Carbon dioxide is Earth’s most important greenhouse gas, as it is a heat trapping gas. Atmospheric carbon dioxide
Carbon Dioxide
Carbon dioxide is Earth’s most important greenhouse gas, as it is a heat trapping gas. Atmospheric carbon dioxide comes from two primary sources – natural and human activities. Natural sources of carbon dioxide include most animals, which exhale carbon dioxide as a waste product. Human activities that lead to carbon dioxide emissions come primarily from energy production, including burning coal, oil, or natural gas.
An image of a carbon dioxide generator or a natural gas burner, used in the commercial greenhouses, is being widely shared on social media with a claim that it aids in increasing carbon dioxide in the region to give better crop yield. The caption on the image is “This is a picture of a CO2 generator used by commercial growers to INCREASE the CO2 in the building so as to speed up and increase their crop yields. Plants adore CO2 as well as warmth! We rely on plants for oxygen, natures a wonderful thing. Please don't share, it makes too much sense”.
The post implicates that when plants grow well in the environment filled with carbon dioxide, how can it be bad for the environment and cause climate change?
Fact Check:
The claim is False. Even though carbon dioxide enhances photosynthesis, but it is harmful for the whole planet as well as plants.
According to a report published in Client earth.org, when fossil fuels are burned, they release large amounts of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas, into the air. Greenhouse gases trap heat in our atmosphere, causing global warming. Already the average global temperature has increased by 1C. Warming above 1.5°C risks further sea level rise, extreme weather, biodiversity loss and extinction of species, resulting in food scarcity, worsening health and poverty for millions of people worldwide.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has found that emissions from fossil fuels are the dominant cause of global warming. In 2018, 89% of global CO2 emissions came from fossil fuels and industry. Coal is a fossil fuel, and is the dirtiest of them all, responsible for over 0.3C of the 1C increase in global average temperatures. This makes it the single largest source of global temperature rise. Oil releases a huge amount of carbon when burned - approximately a third of the world’s total carbon emissions. There have also been a number of oil spills in recent years that have a devastating impact on our ocean’s ecosystem.
The IPCC, in its sixth assessment report, stated that global surface temperature will continue to increase until at least mid-century, under all emissions scenarios considered. Global warming of 1.5°C and 2°C will be exceeded during the 21st century unless deep reductions in carbon dioxide (CO2) and other greenhouse gas emissions occur in the coming decades.
According to a report published by NASA, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere warms the planet, causing climate change. Human activities have raised the atmosphere’s carbon dioxide content by 50% in less than 200 years. The report also shared the animated map of the historical changes in the global carbon dioxide over times.
Hence, the claim that carbon dioxide is not harmful to the environment and does not lead to climate change is False. Though carbon dioxide is useful in crop growth and is used in greenhouses, it is harmful for the environment.