A Utah lawmaker has proposed legislation that would allow more carbon dioxide to enter the atmosphere "for the needs of the plants."
State Rep. Jerry Anderson, a former science teacher, is pushing for a bill named HB229 that would narrow the definition of atmosphere contaminants, Ars Technica reported via the Salt Lake Tribune.
Under the proposed legislation, gases that occur naturally would not be considered pollution. The state would not be able to establish regulations for "carbon dioxide below atmospheric concentrations of 500 parts per million," according to the Salt Lake Tribune.
"We are short of carbon dioxide for the needs of the plants," Anderson said Tuesday. "Concentrations reached 600 parts per million at the time of the dinosaurs and they did quite well. I think we could double the carbon dioxide and not have any adverse effects."
The proposed carbon dioxide cap of 500 ppm is far above what is already in the earth's atmosphere, and reaching such a figure would heat up the planet and acidify the oceans.
"[Carbon dioxide] isn't toxic to you and me below concentrations of 1,000 or 2,000 ppm, but it's toxic to this planet," Joe Andrade, a retired University of Utah engineering professor, told the Salt Lake Tribune. "Setting an arbitrary upper limit, that is out of the bounds of anything related to planetary stability, is simply bad government."
He noted that the level of CO2 in the atmosphere could soon be doubled due to the use of fossil fuels.
Anderson's proposed legislation was well-received by committee members but put on hold. Because the bill doesn't allow limits on natural gases, some that are toxic to humans such as radon, cyanide and xenon would also be excluded from regulation.
"Xenon is a noble gas and it's an anesthetic. You don't want to exclude it [from regulation] because you might have a pharmaceutical device that uses xenon. A leak in a confined space could be quite hazardous," Andrade told the Salt Lake Tribune.
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