Environmental Effects of Increased Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide

Abstract

A review of the literature concerning the environmental consequences of increased levels of atmospheric carbon dioxide leads to the conclusion that increases during the 20th century have produced no deleterious effects upon global climate or temperature. Increased carbon dioxide has, however, markedly increased plant growth rates as inferred from numerous laboratory and field experiments. There is no clear evidence, nor unique attribution, of the global effects of anthropogenic CO 2 on climate. Meaningful integrated assessments of the environmental impacts of anthropogenic CO 2 are not yet possible because model estimates of global and regional climate changes on interannual, decadal and centennial timescales remain highly uncertain.

From Shakespeare to Defoe: Malaria in England in the Little Ice Age

“…Subsequent warming has been attributed to increased concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide produced by burning fossil fuels, and other greenhouse gases (4). Climate models suggest that this trend could accelerate in the coming century, although the contribution of human-induced greenhouse gases to global temperatures is far from clear (4)(5)(6).…”

Impact of Energy Consumption on CO2 emissions: Case of Pakistan

“…Ang (2007Ang ( , 2008 found a positive relationship between the energy consumption and the pollution. Soon W. et al (1999) discuss about global warming, carbon dioxide emission, temperature and biological effects. They find that increase in demand of green house gasses effect the atmospheric temperature between these variables through general circulation model (GCM) they find the relationship of temperature by analyzing the past, present and predict the future.…”

Modeling climatic effects of anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions: unknowns and uncertainties

“…This difficulty explains why all current GCM studies of the climatic impacts of increased atmospheric CO 2 are couched in terms of relative changes based on control, or unforced, GCM numerical experiments that are known a priori to be incomplete in their forcing and feedback physics. Soon et al (1999), for example, identified documented problems associated with models' underestimation or incorrect prediction of natural climate change on decade-to-century time scales. Some of those problems may be connected to difficulties in modeling both the natural unforced climate variability and suspected climate forcings from volcanic eruptions, stratospheric ozone variations, tropospheric aerosol changes and variations in the radiant and particle energy outputs of the sun.…”

“…Many qualitative outcomes of forcing by anthropogenic GHGs have been postulated, such as changes in standard ocean-atmosphere variables of wind, water vapor, rain, snow, land and sea ice, sea level, and the frequency and intensity of extreme events such as storms and hurricanes (Soon et al 1999), as well as more exotic phenomena, including large cooling of the mesosphere and thermosphere (Akmaev & Fomichev 2000), increased presence or brightness of noctilucent clouds near the polar summer mesopause (Thomas 1996, but see Gadsden 1998), increases in atmospheric angular momentum and length of day (Abarca del Rio 1999, Huang et al 2001), and shrinking of surfaces of constant density at operating satellite altitudes (Keating et al 2000). In these calculations, the benchmark forcing scenario is usually an emission rate of 1% yr -1 chosen to represent roughly the CO 2 equivalent of the burden of all anthropogenic GHGs.…”