In an editorial calling on Congress to abolish the Environmental Protection Agency, the Washington Times asserts that the EPA's efforts to regulate certain greenhouse gas emissions have an “unscientific basis” because the agency treats fossil fuel emissions differently than human respiration. The editorial goes on to accuse the “left” of inconsistency because Michelle Obama's Let's Move campaign encourages kids to exercise, which increases breathing. It's some pretty special nonsense:

Although we are led to believe that each metric ton of carbon dioxide brings the planet closer to the brink of destruction, companies won't be compelled to report the greenhouse-gas emissions of their own employees, about a dozen of whom would produce a metric ton of carbon dioxide while breathing on the job for a year. “This carbon dioxide is part of a natural closed-loop cycle and does not contribute to the greenhouse-gas concentrations in the atmosphere,” the EPA website explains. “Natural processes of photosynthesis (in plants) and respiration (in plants and animals) maintain a balance of oxygen and carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. Thus, the carbon dioxide from natural process is not included in greenhouse-gas inventories.”

This line of thinking betrays the unscientific basis of the EPA's endeavor. If a CO2 molecule is making the planet warmer, it doesn't matter whether it came from a factory or an animal or a bureaucrat. It interacts with the atmosphere in exactly the same way. The EPA rule reflects a more mystical view of climate change in which individual CO2 molecules can differ. Mother Earth looks favorably upon molecules from “sustainable” sources. Those from SUVs, factories and cigars anger her. Instead of blessing the planet with cold, she will curse it with warmth.

The left isn't even consistent with such beliefs. First lady Michelle Obama's “Let's Move” campaign encourages kids to be less lazy and sedentary and increase their physical activity for better health. Never mind that this could be catastrophic to the planet. As a child's muscles burn calories through exercise, respiration increases and the amount of carbon dioxide exhaled can double. By comparison, encouraging children to take more naps would cut their carbon-dioxide output in half.

To piggyback on the Times' logic, let's say I want to lose some weight and I tell my nutritionist I'm going to cut back on cheeseburgers and donuts. If the Washington Times editorial board were my nutritionist, it would say I shouldn't bother dieting because salad and fresh fruit also contain calories. That's what this argument is like.

The Times completely dismisses the distinction between the CO2 we exhale and the CO2 we release by burning fossil fuels. But it's an important point. As the U.S. Global Change Research Information Office explains:

Human exhalation of carbon dioxide is part of a closed system. There can be no net addition of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere because the amount of carbon dioxide we exhale can't be greater than the carbon we put into our bodies by eating plants, or eating animals that eat plants. The plants got the carbon from the atmosphere via photosynthesis.

This closed system is true for any animal, not just humans. It is also true for a growing population. You simply can't have more animals than there are plants to support those animals.

The reason why burning fossil fuels is a concern is because it is not a closed loop over human time scales. Extracting coal and oil and burning them puts carbon back into the atmosphere that plants removed millions of years ago.

As this chart from NASA's website shows, we've seen a marked increase in the level of CO2 since 1950, and not because that's when humans started breathing: