The more carbon dioxide we can put into the atmosphere, the better off the planet will be for humans and all other living things. If David Archibald had thrown a thunderflash among delegates at the Greener Skies 2008 conference in Hong Kong it couldn't have made a greater impact than the statement he used to start his presentation.
After a day of hearing from aviation industry leaders how the carbon footprints of the industry were boosting climate change and had to be curbed, the director of the Lavoisier Group was quickly into his stride.
"In a few short years we will have a reversal of the warming of the 20th century," Archibald warned. "There will be significant cooling very soon. Our generation has known a warm, giving sun but the new generation will suffer a sun that is less giving and the earth will be less fruitful.
"Carbon dioxide is not even a little bit bad - it's wholly beneficial."
There would have been fewer jaws dropping if Archibald had stripped off his clothes and run naked from the room, but as his presentation continued, many no doubt wished he had disappeared.
"Plant growth responds to atmospheric carbon dioxide enrichment. In a world of higher atmospheric carbon dioxide, crops will use less water per unit of carbon dioxide uptake. Thus the productivity of semi-arid lands will increase the most," he said.
But Archibald cautioned that he did not bring only good news and said the world should prepare for another Ice Age.
"We will need this in-crease in agricultural productivity to offset the colder weather coming. It also follows that if the developed countries of the world want to be caring and sharing to the countries of the Third World, the best thing that could be done for them is to increase atmospheric carbon dioxide levels. It is the equivalent of giving them free phosphate fertilizer. Who would want to deny the Third World such a wonderful benefit?''
He said the ability to grow food would become the overriding concern over the next decade.
In his conclusion, Archibald said higher atmospheric carbon dioxide levels were "wholly beneficial". "We have to be thankful to the anthropogenic global warming alarmists for one thing: if it weren't for them and their voodoo science, climate science wouldn't have attracted the attention of people from outside the field and we would be sleepwalking into that rather disruptive cooling that is coming next decade."
There was a stunned silence before Martin Craigs, president of Aerospace Forum Asia, called for the microphone. "Don't you have Al Gore's email address?" he asked. "How can you be right and 2,000 scientists wrong?"
To which Archibald replied: "I am happy to share the science. It's all reputable." |
