President Barack Obama challenged America and the world to step up efforts to fight global warming on Monday at the formal unveiling of his administration's controversial, ramped-up plan to cut carbon emissions from U.S. power plants.
Declaring climate change the greatest threat facing the world, Obama said the regulation requiring the power sector to cut its emissions by 32 percent from 2005 levels by 2030 would reduce Americans' energy bills and improve the health of vulnerable populations nationwide.
http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/08/03/us-usa-climatechange-idUSKCN0Q820I20150803Sticking to the facts, it is accurate to state that today, carbon dioxide (CO2) makes up less than 0.04% of the Earth's atmosphere. It is also factual to state that carbon dioxide is a natural organic compound that is absolutely necessary for life on this planet! Here's a pie chart produced by the National Weather Service (as unbiased as I could find):
http://burnanenergyjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/atmospheric.gifOK, all this focus in on an essential atmospheric compound that makes up less than 0.04%.... But, today's modern coal-fueled power plants have state-of-the-art electrostatic scrubbers on them that have reduced emissions to such a healthy point that no American city is plagued with the dirty air we used to see in so many cities, like our big city of Denver, Colorado, back in the 1970's.
Now, what do you imagine the probable effect is going to be on your UTILITY BILLS after Obama has bankrupted the entire U. S. coal industry? In favor of what? Solar? Wind? Biomass? None of those can even begin to make up the loss of coal, and the costs would be stupid-expensive. Natural gas? Sure, we have enough of it, but what do you imagine the cost of natural gas will skyrocket to without coal to offset it?
Obama should have announced a new initiative to develop hydrogen fusion power, which would give us unlimited, non-polluting energy from fusion processes using SEA WATER, and continue burning clean coal in plants with the most advanced scrubbers until we have mastered fusion. Instead, he's throwing this new, expensive burden on top of us, and at a time when it will cost all of us, directly and indirectly, a lot more of our hard-earned money. But, hey, we've recovered from the Recession, and everybody's awash in big money now... right...?!That's a logical fallacy:
Just because something is present at a small concentration doesn't mean that nearly doubling its concentration won't have consequences.
As an example: The stress hormone cortisol is normally present at a concentration of 250 nM, much lower than the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. According to you argument, we should not pay attention to cortisol, because of its low conc.
However, doubling the cortisol concentration has serious consequences, among others a constantly-stressed state and weight gain.
So, if you want to advocate against AGW, please use other arguments, but not that CO2 is present at low concentration and, therefore, of no consequence.
