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Well first, carbon dioxide has been part of the Earth's atmosphere apparently since it was formed kazillions of years ago. It's a natural chemical substance, primarily in gas form. It is not toxic (unless in very intense quantities, which is rare at this time.) An important answer to the question "what is carbon dioxide?" is that it's also a vital substance to life on Earth. We inhale oxygen, which is required for metabolism, and we exhale - you guessed it - carbon dioxide. Now plant life, on the other hand, needs carbon dioxide to function and gives off oxygen. We need plant life as a key source of food and nutrition for our health. Without carbon dioxide, there'd be no plant life! And without plant life (which gives off oxygen) there'd be no human life as we know it. Okay, this all sounds great and beneficial so far. But what's the negative aspect of carbon dioxide? Why is there so much concern about it? As mentioned earlier, carbon dioxide in the Earth's atmosphere is known as a "greenhouse gas." What the heck is a greenhouse gas? A greenhouse gas, such as carbon dioxide, water vapor and a few others, make up the Earth's atmosphere. Greenhouse gases absorb heat radiated by the sun and send the heat back down to the planet, which is a necessary process to maintain temperatures that we can survive in.
So what's the problem? Well, when we ask "what is carbon dioxide?" we can also answer that it is a by-product of many of man's activities, especially resulting from energy production such as the burning of fossil fuels (gas, oil, etc). These activities have been steadily increasing since the advent of the Industrial Revolution over 200 years ago and thus increasing the amount of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Also, the huge forests of this planet have traditionally absorbed carbon dioxide for photosynthesis and then released oxygen back into the air. Through decades of man's activities, these forests have slowly been reduced in size. We now have a situation where the natural balance has gotten out of whack. So that additionally increases the level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere because there is less plant life to absorb it. The problem is that more carbon dioxide acting as a greenhouse gas in the atmosphere means that more heat is trapped and sent back down to a planet that can't absorb and convert it all. That's what global warming is all about. So the question, "What is carbon dioxide?" has a multi-part answer, at least if you want to know what it does! You can see that when all natural activities are occurring, it's vital to both our personal health and to the health of our environment. But it's also a case of "too much of a good thing" I think... too much of it could create even more disastrous results than just the significant weather changes we've already started to experience. I for one, don't enjoy being stuck in my house with the air conditioner running for hours because it's too dang hot to go outside! Not good for my health... The thing we can do is to continue to educate ourselves so we understand what carbon dioxide is and where it comes from - and support good solutions to having too much. Cheers! Return
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