thisisnotgoodtogo | April 11, 2012 at 3:03 am |
The plants grow better and and make protein.
A bogus claim.
1. The key to intensive agriculture is exploiting the dwarf variant of food crops, which forces most growth into the harvestable portions. The dwarf mechanism in plants is suppressed by increased CO2. They discovered this in greenhouses when they couldn’t figure out why pots containing what should have looked like bonsai contained monstrous giants bolting all over the place. Of course, it’s now a well-studied effect entailing several plant hormones either suppressed, enhanced or altered by the CO2 level.
2. Study the effects of CO2 on plants — especially immature plants (every plant has to be young sometime) — and you’ll find it acts more like steroids do in athletes preteen athletes. Plants grown in high CO2 tend to be leggier with frankenbranches, more brittle, and though they have greater vigour in forming woody attenuated piths (cellulose, one of the indigestible proteins) also lose their frankenleaves sooner to premature age.
3. If you have excesses of every other condition and nutrient beneficial to plant you can somewhat offset some of the plant hormone suppressing effects and get some real benefit in some cases. However, you also set up your plants to deplete the soil directly (www.nsf.gov/news/news_summ.jsp?cntn_id=123798&org=NSF&from=news), and your extensive application of fertilizer will require intense soil conditioning which has a long term effect of soil death. Unless a flood or drought beats you too it. And those are getting more common, too.
4. But not to worry. Soil is alive. It’s full of microbes, from archaea (well, you prefer not, generally) to bacteria to fungi, microscopic plants and microscopic or tiny animals. Sometimes the soil microsystem acts like a wounded organism to heal itself and recover. And sometimes that healing flushes nitrogen out of the soil so fast that, like a fever does in a human body, the healing process burns out the soil and it dies.
5. Sometimes — remember that CO2 hormone effect? — some species get overstimulated and run rampant, like weeds. Only they’re archaea (well, you hope not), or bacteria (some of which can be helpful in some concentrations) or fungi (many of which are comutual or saprophytic and generally helpful in moderation) or pathogenic fungi that eat living plant roots like parasites or disease – athlete’s foot for your trees, bushes and crops. Picture a return to the fun and frolic of potato famine.
Sure, as a tool for greenhouse growers CO2 can be, judiciously applied, advantageous. Like any powerful hormone modifying drug.
Without control, in the wild? That’d be like a street drug, except plants and soil can’t just say ‘no’.