I would like to respond to Richard Slater’s letter last week asserting that atmospheric CO2 concentration has reached a saturation point beyond which a higher concentration will produce no additional warming. That is an often-used but misleading argument. Carbon dioxide and other global warming gases not only cause our atmosphere to absorb heat, they also increase its equilibrium temperature by reducing its ability to radiate heat to outer space. Skeptical Science has clear basic, intermediate, and advanced explanations of this effect.
Anyone who has read The Uninhabitable Earth by David Wallace-Wells — or the prediction by James Hansen and his colleagues that a 7° Centigrade warming is already “in the pipeline” — will understand that, as Bill McKibben says, “we have to stop burning stuff.” (See James Hansen and Makiko Sato, “Global Warming in the Pipeline,” 13 December 2022.)
If we all love our children, fellow humans, and life on Earth then we are called upon to do everything in our power to slow and reverse climate change. A moratorium on gas hookups to new construction and major renovations is a modest step in that direction.
Bob Persons
Auburndale
