CO2 Now

Why is it important to talk about carbon and carbon dioxide?  

According to the Earth Justice document: Climate Crossroads: A Research-based framing guide, from and for global warming advocates, it is helpful to emphasize the problem of "too much carbon" and, at the same time, frame solutions in terms of managing and reducing carbon. Here is an excerpt:

"The idea that “we are putting too much carbon into the atmosphere” is a simple and intuitive idea that is well suited to becoming conventional wisdom about global warming. This idea focuses thinking in a number of productive ways that build support for the right solutions:

• Begins the conversation with a non-controversial yet compelling fact. The rise in carbon emissions is undisputed, and is clearly problematic. Even global warming deniers are largely compelled to accept the more basic fact of “too much carbon.”
• Sharply focuses the conversation on relevant policy choices: How are we dealing with our carbon problem?
• Clarifies the (currently unclear) role of carbon-based energy in leading to “too much carbon” and, as a consequence, global warming.
• Encourages “big picture” considerations: Where does it come from? How much is being produced? What does it do (e.g., acidifies the ocean, blankets the earth)? How can we keep it out of the atmosphere?
• Can be captured by simple language which has the potential to infuse the existing discourse in a viral way." 

EarthJustice.org  |  Social Capital Project 

Combined, GHGs other than CO2 cause climate forcing comparable to that of CO2, but growth of non-CO2 GHGs
is falling below IPCC scenarios. Thus total GHG climate forcing change is now determined mainly by CO2.
Coincidentally, CO2 forcing is similar to the net human-made forcing, because non-CO2 GHGs
tend to offset negative aerosol forcing. 

~ Hansen et al (2008)