Study Suggests Human Exposure To 20,000 ppm CO2 Has No Effect On Cognition, Health

An observational assessment undermines claims that elevated CO2 levels are harmful to humans. 

Every year there are several papers published attempting to establish CO2 as a pollutant in indoor settings. This has likely served to scare people to regard elevated CO2 levels as dangerous – which is almost certainly the intent.

For example, I have noticed that on my home CO2 monitors the facial symbol denoting healthy vs. unhealthy concentrations vary from a smiley face below 600 ppm to a frowny face when the room CO2 rises to over 1,o00 ppm…and a straight face between 600 and 999 ppm.

Every day children are exposed to air CO2 levels of 2,000 ppm, 3,000 ppm and up in their school classrooms (Corsi et al., 2002). Somehow they manage to survive.

Image Source: Corsi et al., 2002

Dr. Alberto Boretti (2021) points to the ridiculousness of stoking fear about indoor air with 1,000 CO2 and up considering the plethora of evidence available saying these levels are not harmful to humans.

“It has been claimed that the dangerous rise in atmospheric CO2 levels will impede our brain functions, and namely that the continued fossil fuel emissions will impair cognition. In particular, it is said that indoor CO2 levels may reach levels well above 1,000 p.p.m. and this may be harmful to cognition by the end of this century.”

And now in another new study scientists (Maniscalco et al., 2021) report they have observed no adverse physiological or cognitive-related differences when exposing average office workers to CO2 concentrations of 770 versus 20,000 ppm.

“[T]he human body can adapt to high concentrations of pure CO2 (20 000 ppm) without adverse effects on physiological or psychological parameters. Our results  provide additional confirmation that negative health effects at high indoor air CO2 concentrations cannot be attributed to CO2 but are most likely caused by other pollutants.”

“In terms of accuracy and speed in the three cognitive performance tasks, no significant changes were found at exposure to 20 000 ppm CO2 compared to 770 ppm.”

“Our findings our in accordance with earlier research that found null effects of CO2 on cognitive performance with exposures between 5000 and 20 000 ppm CO2 with or without exercise.”

Yet another scare tactic has been contravened using real-world observational evidence.

Image Source: Maniscalco et al., 2021

20 responses to “Study Suggests Human Exposure To 20,000 ppm CO2 Has No Effect On Cognition, Health”

  1. Study Suggests Human Exposure To 20,000 ppm CO2 Has No Effect on Cognition, Health – Climate- Science.press

    […] Study Suggests Human Exposure To 20,000 ppm CO2 Has No Effect On Cognition, Health […]

  2. Dave Ward

    This wouldn’t surprise submariners, who are exposed to 4 figure PPM concentrations – for weeks or months at a time.

  3. Greg

    I worked in a brewery – we wore oxygen monitors when working in the fermenting rooms. The alarm was set at 19% O2, equivalent to 20,000 ppm CO2. Obviously this allowed a generous safety factor.

  4. Tonyb

    Could the author tell me what co2 readings he gets from his meter outdoors?

    I set up a little network of such devices in several countries and never get less than 510ppm and very often up to 800ppm. I have never had a reading of 415ppm

    The way co2 is calculated is very convoluted and scientific And doesn’t seem to bear any resemblance to readings obtained on electronic devices which don’t thoroughly dry the air before taking a reading

    Tonyb

  5. John Brown

    Double edged study.

    Those that think mask wearing has a negative effect due to elevated CO2 levels, will not have this argument against it anymore.

  6. tonyb

    Kenneth

    Thanks. Have you ever read the way in which the official co2 figure is produced?

    It seems to bear no relationship to real world figures as amongst other procedures the air is filtered then thoroughly dried.

    You also get co2 surges, especially in urban areas and the net result is that the official figures seem a very poor representation of actuality.

    I have had readings taken from as far afield as southern England (mine) Australia and France and nowhere did the 415ppm get produced.

  7. drumphish

    If you want to have reduced CO₂ levels in a heated school building that has 300 students and faculty, fill the place up with houseplants up and down the halls and in the rooms.

    You’ll have a terrarium, really, a Josef Priestly experiment.

    There will be a reduction in CO₂ levels.

    About that sea ice volume:

    A seventy-five percent decline in Arctic sea ice translates to water, it would be a nine percent reduction in volume in the final analysis.

    If the ice sheet covering Antarctica loses 75 percent of its ice, it’ll be a problem. If Greenland loses 75 percent of its ice sheet, it’ll be even more of a problem.

    The pack ice covering the Arctic Ocean is up to three meters thick in places.

  8. John Hultquist

    The Mauna Loa CO2 Observatory appears to be the source of Tonyb’s 415ppm CO2 base that he doesn’t find. The elevation is 3,397 m. Other sampling stations are shown on this map:
    https://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu/data/atmospheric_co2/sampling_stations.html

    With respect to any baseline or standard, whether meter, kilogram, or CO2, one needs a consistent way for obtaining the measurement. Most public references to CO2, or any other standard, skip the details of the base.

    The range of measurements obtained with hand-held meters (assuming their accuracy) is a reflection of time and place. A seemingly high or low reading compared to the current baseline of about 420 ppm might suggest there is a reason of local interest – not that there is a problem with the base.

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