Yielding a point to climate change deniers because of mainstream lies

“CO2 is a pollutant”

A point I had to yield to the climate change deniers

Usually it is fairly easy to counter any disinformation coming from climate change deniers.

One of the arguments they use is that CO2 is not a pollutant and is important for photosynthesis.

I wrote a fairly “off-the-cuff” rejoinder (to comments by Vinny Eastwood on Facebook) pointing out that no one is saying it is a pollutant because it is a trace gas that is very important in maintaining the thermal balance of the atmosphere -too little and we freeze, too much and we burn, put quite simply.

I decided, in a free moment to check for myself and imagine my HORROR when I discovered that conventional websites are saying just that

“CO2 is an air pollutant”

I chose this item from "Skeptical Science":

The US Clean Air Act was incorporated into the United States Code of Federal Regulations, Title 42, Chapter 85. Its Title III, Section 7602(g) defines an air pollutant:

The term “air pollutant” means any air pollution agent or combination of such agents, including any physical, chemical, biological, radioactive (including source material, special nuclear material, and byproduct material) substance or matter which is emitted into or otherwise enters the ambient air.

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This is preposterous.

CO2 is indeed an important trace gas and we could not live without it. It is is CO2 that is turned into oxygen by plants in photosynthesis.

It is  an incredibly important trace gas for maintaining the energy balance of the planet, belied by its small amount in the atmosphere (we don't breathe, or use in any way that I know of, the nitogen which accounts for 78 percent of the atmosphere) whereas CO2 is an important trace gas.

Wikipedia says:

Carbon dioxide (CO2) is an important trace gas in Earth's atmosphere. It is an integral part of the carbon cycle, a biogeochemical cycle in which carbon is exchanged between the Earth's oceans, soil, rocks and the biosphere. Plants and other photoautotrophs use solar energy to produce carbohydrate from atmospheric carbon dioxide and water by photosynthesis. Almost all other organisms depend on carbohydrate derived from photosynthesis as their primary source of energy and carbon compounds. CO2 absorbs and emits infrared radiation at wavelengths of 4.26 µm (asymmetric stretching vibrational mode) and 14.99 µm (bending vibrational mode) and consequently is a greenhouse gas that plays a significant role in influencing Earth's surface temperature through the greenhouse effect.[1]"

The incredibly spurious claim that "CO2 is a pollutant" plays into the hands of climate change deniers who hardly get anything right.

They did, however, get this one right.

There really is no need to lie to put a point across.