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Halt rush to condemn carbon dioxide
The Gazette Opinion Staff
Dec. 18, 2009 11:45 pm
I encourage the rejection of the Copenhagen treaty. Its premise is flawed. It places burdens on the United States while allowing other industrial countries, like China and India, to remain unrestricted. Even if enacted, the science is inconclusive whether this would cease climate change.
In our country, there are some in Congress who want to pass laws that limit the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. They claim carbon dioxide is a pollutant. There is no scientific proof that carbon dioxide is a pollutant.
Here's what I also am telling my representatives in Congress:
1. Slow down: The rush to label carbon dioxide as a pollutant or pass cap-and-trade legislation will hurt our economic recovery.
2. Carbon dioxide has benefits: Higher carbon dioxide concentrations help ecosystems support more plant and animal life.
3. Other factors: As for the greenhouse effect that warms the earth, carbon dioxide is not even close to being the most important of the greenhouse gases. Most of the greenhouse effect is because of water vapor, which is about 30 times as abundant in the atmosphere as carbon dioxide and has a much larger greenhouse effect.
4. Carbon dioxide supports life: While it accounts for less than one percent of the atmosphere, carbon dioxide is essential to life on Earth.
Craig Augustine
Cedar Rapids
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