Climate change usually refers to long-term shifts in global or regional temperatures and weather patterns.
Meaning and Key Details
In relation to this article I do not claim to be a climate scientist or even a climate expert, I am just an average person that thinks I have a reasonable education and the ability to identify & read information related to climate change and make reasonable deductive assumptions on the basis of that information.
In my personal opinion from studying historical climate records over many centuries, I believe that the climate on earth has been constantly changing through different periods of time.
Given the development of communication technology in the last hundred years and the associated ability for people to promote their ideas and theories across the globe (whether backed by fact or fiction) the world has almost developed what I would term, a case of climate hysteria.
We have gone from Al Gore’s famously highlighted projections, notably in 2007-2009, that the Arctic summer sea ice could be completely gone within 5 to 7 years, or at least in less than 22 years, based on certain models. These predictions, suggesting a largely ice-free Arctic by the mid-2010s, did not materialize as stated.
To the situation where now there are many claims being made of climate emergency and stating that if we don’t reduce the temperature by limiting our emissions of greenhouse gases, the world will heat up to the extent that we will all become extinct.
So given that the focus worldwide seems to be almost entirely on reduction of emissions I thought that I should set out the facts related to the atmosphere and its make-up.
We have been indoctrinated with the lie that CO2 is bad for the environment and that we need to reduce our emissions down to zero if we want to save the planet from burning up.
Well I have to tell you that this is the biggest lie of all and if by some chance we were ever able to get the emissions down to zero that would be the day that life on earth would stop.
As reported on Voice Media February 7th 2024, Greenpeace co-founder, Dr. Patrick Moore, has demolished the lie that CO2 is somehow bad for the environment:
"Carbon dioxide is the currency of life, and the most important building block for all life on earth... The optimum level of CO2 for plant growth is about five times higher [than the concentration of CO2 present in the atmosphere today], yet the alarmists warn it is already too high. They must be challenged every day by every person who knows the truth in this matter.
CO2 is the gas of life, and we should celebrate CO2 rather than denigrate it, as is the fashion today."
Let’s look at the facts around CO2:
What percentage is CO₂ in the atmosphere?
Approximately 0.04 percent
It is a naturally occurring chemical compound that is present in the atmosphere. Carbon dioxide exists in the Earth's atmosphere at a concentration of approximately 0.04 percent (400 parts per million) by volume.
Water vapour can vary from 0 to 4% and is the dominant greenhouse gas in our atmosphere.
Of all of the CO₂ emitted into the atmosphere, what percentage is produced by humans?
Depending on the estimates anywhere from 3.6% to 5% is produced by humans.
That is actually 3.6% to 5% of that 0.04 per cent in the atmosphere.
What produces the most CO₂?
Main sources of carbon dioxide emissions
What are the biggest contributors to global warming?
Fossil fuels – coal, oil and gas – are by far the largest contributor to global climate change, accounting for over 75 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions and nearly 90 per cent of all carbon dioxide emissions.
Agriculture/food production produces carbon dioxide through what is known as a biogenic carbon cycle.
What is a biogenic carbon cycle?
The biogenic carbon cycle centers on the ability of plants to absorb and sequester carbon. Plants have the unique ability to remove carbon dioxide (CO₂) from the atmosphere and deposit that carbon into plant leaves, roots, and stems while oxygen is released back into the atmosphere.
What are the 4 steps of the carbon cycle?
Why is carbon cycling important in agriculture?
Agriculture's Role in the Carbon Cycle
Carbon is critical to soil function and productivity, and a main component of and contributor to healthy soil conditions. Soil management plays a critical role in whether the carbon remains in the soil or is released to the atmosphere.
Soil carbon provides a source of nutrients through mineralisation, helps to aggregate soil particles (structure) to provide resilience to physical degradation, increases microbial activity, increases water storage and availability to plants, and protects soil from erosion.
What's the most important cycle?
One of the most important cycles on earth, the carbon cycle is the process through which the organisms of the biosphere recycle and reuse carbon and produce oxygen in that process.
How does carbon capture work in agriculture?
So, how does carbon sequestration in agriculture work? The answer lies in the soil. As crops photosynthesize to produce their food, they remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and create the oxygen we need to breathe. Through this chemical process, carbon is sequestered in the soil.
How are humans impacting the carbon cycle?
The impact of humankind on the carbon cycle stems mainly from the release of CO2 to the atmosphere by fossil fuel burning.
What is Carbon Sequestration?
Carbon sequestration is the process of capturing, securing and storing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. There are two main types of carbon sequestration: biological and geological.
Biological Carbon Sequestration
Biological carbon sequestration is the storage of carbon dioxide in vegetation such as grasslands or forests, as well as in soils and oceans.
Soil
Carbon is sequestered in soil by plants through photosynthesis and can be stored as soil organic carbon (SOC).
Forests
About 25 percent of global carbon emissions are captured by plant-rich landscapes such as forests, grasslands and pastures. When leaves and branches fall off plants or when plants die, the carbon stored either releases into the atmosphere or is transferred into the soil. Wildfires and human activities like deforestation can contribute to the diminishment of forests as a carbon sink.
Pastures
While forests are commonly credited as important carbon sinks, they are rapidly becoming more carbon sources due to rising temperatures and impact of drought and wildfires in recent years. Pastures are more reliable than forests in today’s world mainly because they don’t get hit as hard as forests by droughts and wildfires.
Unlike trees, pastures sequester most of their carbon underground. When they burn, the carbon stays fixed in the roots and soil instead of in leaves and woody biomass. Forests have the ability to store more carbon, but in unstable conditions due to climate change, pastures stand more resilient.
We like to eat and we want to breathe clean air and be confident that our planet will be left in acceptable – or even good – shape for our children, for their children and for many generations after them and to do this we need to better understand the role of agriculture in nourishing our world, while also focusing attention on cleaner air and a healthy climate.
When we talk about the GHG emissions of livestock or the carbon footprint of meat, methane is often at the heart of the matter. Ruminant animals such as cows emit methane. As far as global warming potential, methane is a powerful GHG, with about 7 times the warming potential of carbon dioxide over a period of 100 years.
But methane doesn’t hang around for a century; it’s a short-lived GHG. In about a decade’s time, it’s converted to water vapour and carbon dioxide, which is part of the cycle whereby plants take CO₂ out of the atmosphere and convert it into feed via photosynthesis. Animals eat the non-human edible vegetation and up-cycle it to meat and dairy products that provide efficient sources of protein and other essential nutrients to humans. It’s a cyclical process, also referred to as the biogenic carbon cycle, that’s been around as long as life itself.
Given the advances that food producers have made in agricultural processes, today we are producing as much food as we did 50 years ago from far smaller numbers of animals and contributing less methane to the environment as a result.
It is a fact that there is a distinct possibility that life could come close to extinguishing itself, due to a shortage of CO₂, which is essential for life on Earth.
The IPCC in 2007 stated that:
“We should recognise that we are dealing with a coupled nonlinear chaotic system, and therefore that the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible.”
CO₂ is the “Gas of Life” the most important building block for all life on Earth. All life is carbon-based, including our own. Surely the carbon cycle and its central role in the creation of life should be taught to our children rather than the demonization of CO₂, that “carbon” is a “pollutant” that threatens the continuation of life.
We know for a fact that CO₂ is essential for life and that it must be at a certain level in the atmosphere for the survival of plants, which are the primary food for all the other species alive today. Should we not encourage our citizens, students, teachers, politicians, scientists, and other leaders to celebrate CO₂ as the giver of life that it is?
It is a proven fact that plants, including trees and all our food crops, are capable of growing much faster at higher levels of CO₂ than present in the atmosphere today. Even at the today’s concentration of 400 ppm plants are relatively starved for nutrition. The optimum level of CO₂ for plant growth is about 5 times higher, 2000 ppm, yet the alarmists warn it is already too high. They must be challenged every day by every person who knows the truth in this matter. CO₂ is the giver of life and we should celebrate CO₂ rather than denigrate it as is the fashion today.
We may be witnessing the “Greening of the Earth” as higher levels of CO₂, promote increased growth of plants around the world, which has been confirmed by scientists with CSIRO in Australia, in Germany, and in North America.
If CO₂ levels in the atmosphere were to fall to below a minimum of 150 ppm the survival of plants will be threatened and if plants die all the animals, insects, and other invertebrates that depend on the plants for their survival will also die.
How long will it be at the present level of CO₂ depletion until most or all of life on Earth is threatened with extinction by lack of CO₂ in the atmosphere?
Climate change activists say that food production is destroying the planet but in fact the food producers rely on the land to make a living and the vast majority use best practical options to ensure that they maintain or improve the land they use for their food production operations.
It is now a well-established practice for them to put back native species of plants and trees where possible and to increase biodiversity by making ponds and lakes where wetland plants, insects, and waterfowl can become established.
Yes there will always be a small number of food producers who believe they can ignore the rules and the food production industry in general supports these bad apples being removed from the industry for the benefit of all citizens and the environment.
The food producers believe that land should be used for food production in a sustainable manner and that we get the food security that is required to ensure our populations survival.
An example from Research on sheep and beef farm;
The farmers decided to use regenerative farming methods following the advice of a leading scientist in regenerative farming whose methods build carbon into the soil, lower inputs, improve stock health, and are better for the environment.
The farmer’s motto is ‘optimising not maximising production’ and despite some pretty tough challenges and hard work, they are really happy with the decision they took and the outcomes.
Professor Dave Frame who advises the government and farming industries, and has been an IPCC participant, admits that New Zealand’s total emissions from all sheep, beef, dairy and deer ruminant methane over the last 100 years have caused some nonsensical fraction like one, one-thousandth of a degree centigrade change; In other words, an immeasurable, utterly insignificant amount per year.
It seems to tally with what a Dr William van Wijngaarden told Irish farmers recently stating that all the world’s ruminant methane over the next century would only cause 0.17th of a thousandth of a degree C change. Remember New Zealand only has 1% of the world’s ruminants. For this we are proposing slashing our sheep and beef industry by 20% - even more if the carbon price goes higher as demanded by green groups. Few people know our ruminant emissions in New Zealand are falling and have done since 2005.
You might be thinking that everyone has to play their part – the sacrifice needs to fall on every sector in the battle against global warming. If that is the case, we should compare ‘apples with apples.’ Farm ruminant methane and car emissions are both greenhouse gases – but they differ significantly. Farm emissions can only occur by farms using lots of CO2 – greenhouse gas - to create them.
Compared to the use of fossil fuels, farms have a ‘negative' position in relation to CO2 emissions. Here is what the research showed.
According to a paper published called Phase 3 Multivariate analysis of Greenhouse Gas emissions from sheep and beef farms – April 2020 it takes up to 7 tonnes of CO2 to grow a hectare of grass on the farm. It’s called photosynthesis (if you can’t remember your college science.) Plants use CO2, sunlight, water and mineral salts.
The farm turns those 7 tonnes of CO2 per hectare into enough feed for 10 ewes. Those 10 ewes each emit about 20 – 22 grams of methane a day which means they produce in total 80 kgs of methane per year. It is accepted that methane is a more potent greenhouse gas than CO2 – generally regarded as 7 times stronger. If we multiply our ewe’s 80 kgs of methane by 7 we get 560 kgs of CO2 equivalent.
The farm is therefore, using approximately 12 times more CO2 than it emits. A car owner cannot say that, or a coal fired boiler, or a private jet going to a climate conference. Farmers are not quite the villains they are made out to be.
New Zealand has the lowest carbon footprint of any food producer in the world. We feed 40 million people around the world with our food exports. Article 2 (b) of the Paris Agreement that we signed said clearly; that no government should take steps that “threaten food production”.
Our Prime Minister, Christopher Luxon recently reaffirmed his commitment to the 2050 net zero target for emissions which his government (and the previous Labour government) signed up to under the Paris Accord.
In line with these commitments, there has been an increasing amount of interest in understanding how agriculture affects climate change and about how to recognise and encourage carbon sequestration on farmland.
Emissions from agriculture are usually measured as CO2 equivalents and reducing emissions is done by way of fixing carbon in the vegetation and soils of the farming operations (known as ‘Carbon Sequestration’).
National data on net carbon sequestration by trees within farms equates to 29% of the total on-farm GHG emissions.
To recognise and encourage carbon sequestration on farmland, an accurate and comprehensive estimate of net emissions and removals from vegetation and soils on farmland is required.
A report prepared by Auckland University of Technology, estimated woody vegetation on sheep and beef farms may be offsetting 63 to 118 per cent of the gross agricultural emissions from this sector (Case and Ryan, 2020).
In contrast, the findings of a report prepared by the Ministry for the Environment indicated net carbon dioxide removals are 63 per cent lower than the midpoint estimate of the Auckland University of Technology report by Case and Ryan (2020), equivalent to 33 per cent of the on-farm agricultural emissions.
This MfE report claimed to provide a robust and up-to-date estimate of net carbon dioxide removals occurring on sheep and beef farmland.
But, whilst both of these reports are related to sheep and beef farmland only, neither of them takes into account the carbon sequestration from grass pasture.
Across the whole of the agricultural sector including all types of pastoral farming there is no account taken of the ability for grass pasture to sequester carbon.
The carbon sequestration from pastoral farming is currently ignored and surely this must mean that the basis for analysis of the GHG emissions from farming is based on flawed science and therefore gives an incorrect measure of the actual emissions from farming.
When people look at farming they think of greenhouse gas emissions yet farming systems are actually sequestering carbon and the carbon sequestration from grass pasture is totally ignored when discussing emissions from farming.
It is only fair that if the discussions are to be held around the detrimental effects of farming on the environment, then the beneficial effects should also be part of the discussion to reflect the reality of the situation and bring some much needed balance to the discussions.
The world needs agriculture in all its different forms to ensure the population can be fed so any discussion should be based on science and include all of the relevant information that gives a realistic starting point when discussing rules around agriculture.
New Zealand is reliant on agricultural exports for the vast majority of our overseas income yet we are still making it harder for the agricultural sector to produce these export commodities through using the agricultural production sectors to meet our agreed reduction targets for GHG emissions under the Paris Accord, even though this agreement specifically excludes food production from reductions.
Unlike the current situation where the beneficial effects of carbon sequestration from grass pastures in agriculture, have been totally removed from the discussion and there is no balance.
The failure to include the beneficial effects, (from carbon sequestration through to security of food supply) highlights the inequity in the current discussions where agriculture is being unfairly portrayed as a destroyer of the natural environment, when in actual fact it is no worse or better than other parts of society as we see it today.
Farming is currently being asked to lower its carbon footprint to comply with New Zealand’s Paris agreement requirements when in fact if the true picture is used which includes the total carbon sequestration from all forms of on farm vegetation (including grass pastures), then the farming industry will be seen to be nowhere near as bad as it has been portrayed in discussions up to now.
Even taking into account just the National data on net carbon sequestration by trees within farms which equates to 29% of the total on-farm GHG emissions, the farming industry in New Zealand has definitely been poorly served by government, in the whole discussion around GHG’s and farming’s part in New Zealand’s emission levels.
Given that the carbon sequestration from grass pasture is measured at 12 times above the current level of emissions from the same operation yet this is not currently being taken into account, the agricultural industry can rightly feel aggrieved by the proposed reductions in their levels of emissions.
If we also were to take into account the differences between short lived GHG’s (Methane) & long lived GHG’s (Carbon Dioxide) and recognise that farming mainly produces methane, we can see even more clearly how poorly the farming industry has been treated by government through their total ignorance of the offsetting from on farm vegetation sequestering carbon.
The previous Labour Government’s own modelling suggested that the result of their reduction proposals for emissions would have seen sheep and beef farming reduced by 20% and dairying by 5%. This is equivalent to the entire wine industry and half of the seafood industry in New Zealand being wiped out.
It seems that there is a belief that farming is the main cause of our GHG emissions and also that it will be the cure-all for those emissions, when in fact it is just one of the causes and will be only one of the sectors required to take actions to reduce our emissions.
The current proposed scale of the requirements on farming in relation to GHG emissions will only have the effect of endangering our country’s economy, our farmer’s economic survival and security of our food supply.
The reality is that farming is being dealt a rotten hand by the people who are supposed to represent it and the previous Labour Government did nothing to help the industry given their continued use of incorrect facts as a basis for making emissions policies, including their declaration of a climate emergency.
We need to remember that carbon dioxide is the gas of life, indeed the backbone of life on Earth rather than the devil that it is being portrayed as by many environmental commentators.
New Zealand has a problem where these commentators operate in a ‘bubble’ far removed from the views of ordinary people?
But in fact our situation is more akin to the views expressed by British historian Sir Niall Ferguson, a Senior Fellow at the Hoover Institute, who claims the climate change phenomenon is “A bogus ideology” that hardly anyone really believes in, but everyone has to parrot unless they are prepared to be labelled as climate deniers.
Is fear of being labelled “climate deniers” - to be pilloried by the press and scoffed at by opponents - the real reason New Zealand Politicians are too scared to challenge this ideology?
The reality is that the current Coalition and the previous Labour Government have did nothing to help the environment given their continued use of incorrect facts as a basis for making emissions policies, including Labour’s declaration of a climate emergency.
Depending on the estimates anywhere from 3.6% to 5% of the CO2 in earth’s atmosphere is produced by humans.
That is actually 3.6% to 5% of that 0.04 per cent in the atmosphere.
Even if we used the top figure of 5% that still means that there is 95% of CO2 in the atmosphere that is naturally produced from issues such as oceans degassing.
I fail to understand how this 95% of CO2 can be disregarded and the claims made that the 5% produced by humans is going to cause the planet to burn up.
How does nature identify the 5% produced by humans and then only take that into account? Obviously it doesn’t but the climate change warriors would have us believe that that’s the way it happens.
I have yet to see anyone produce a scientifically proven answer to this claim that anthropogenic CO2 and Methane are going to cause catastrophic global warming.
In fact one of New Zealand’s respected business leaders, Mr Harry Mowbray, who majored in physics and chemistry and along with his engineering skills, has spent his whole life in industry and business getting his head around these sorts of problems.
When people become adamant about doom and gloom regarding greenhouse gases he has asked them "What specific aspect of science convinced you that anthropogenic CO2 and Methane are going to cause catastrophic global warming?" No one, including the IPCC, has ever answered that satisfactorily for him.
He has been actively seeking the answer to that question for over 30 years.
The truth is that when he found he could not explain the science to people, he then came up with his $100,000.00 challenge, which people could claim if they gave him scientifically proven empirical data linking anthropogenic CO2 to any significant temperature change.
That was his way to challenge people to ask the deep and meaningful question of the science world. He was called a climate change denier so he put up another $100,000.00 for people to tell him when the temperature of the world was stable and once they find it tell him if that is what we are aiming for.
The truth is the temperature has never been stable.
I urge you, particularly if you believe in catastrophic anthropogenic CO2 and Methane warming to contact Harry and have a serious discussion, produce the scientific empirical evidence and make a claim on his $100,000 challenge.
But I must warn you that I have yet to see any evidence from any person, scientist or other, which has proved the link between anthropogenic CO2 & Methane and significant global temperature change and you will need to provide unchallengeable proof of your claim.
I personally believe that human induced global warming has nothing to do with the environment; it’s got everything to do with a mechanism for unelected people to gain power, influence, occupational advancement and monetary reward.
An Australian Senator, Malcolm Roberts asked the CSIRO if they could give him a few scientific papers that proved human emissions of carbon dioxide drive global warming and the CSIRO presented him with “one” scientific paper which wasn’t on the subject, so he asked them again “can you please show me that human emissions of carbon dioxide drive global warming?”
They couldn’t.
This is a question that has been asked of scientists around the world for 25 years or more; been asked of journalists; been asked of politicians and no one has been able to prove from the scientific literature that human emissions of carbon dioxide drive global warming.
The same reason why no-one has been able to come forward and claim the money from Harry’s challenge is that they can’t prove a scientific relationship between anthropogenic emissions of CO2 and global warming.
But even if we took the view that human emissions of CO2 (5% of the total) did drive global warming, then we would have to show that the other 95% doesn’t drive global warming. That’s never been shown.
So we have built a whole empire around global warming based on something that cannot be shown.
Our farming methods are unique in that we use more greenhouse gas than we emit and as the Greenpeace co-founder, Dr. Patrick Moore stated, I believe that we need to remember that carbon dioxide is the gas of life, indeed the backbone of life on Earth rather than the devil that it is being portrayed as by many environmental commentators.
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By Andy Loader, Poke the Bear