AMBIENT CO2 IN RELATION TO METABOLISM: the coming rise in LT3S and NCDs
To Professor, Dr. Ugo Bardi:
Hi Ugo,
I’ve just read your excellent, incisive paper on atmospheric CO2 levels, which you posted on 6th August, 2025 – I wish that I had gotten onto it sooner: please accept my apologies!
Your point, based on cogent logic, that human metabolism can be adversely affected by increased ambient CO2, is well taken.
The implications got me thinking: I looked it up with AI and in corroboration, the machine replied:
Re. CO2s effect on metabolism
“Elevated ambient CO₂ impairs human metabolism by subtly shifting acid–base balance, increasing systemic inflammation, altering hormone‑regulated processes, and degrading cellular energy efficiency, even at concentrations far below those associated with acute toxicity.
The most consistent findings involve impaired cognitive metabolism, increased oxidative stress, and disruptions in calcium, bone, and kidney physiology.”
The conundrum and the emergency
With this in mind, our scientists should recognise, and consider, our current conundrum and our potential future emergency.
The conundrum, an ongoing reduction in body temperature worldwide, suggests an already-pervasive epidemic of Brown Fat paralysis, due to the stress-related low T3 Syndrome (LT3S)…… Dr. Denis Wilson was right! (see also, another post, re WTS)!
The emergency to be expected is a deepening of our endemic LT3S, as rising ambient CO2 increases the stressful metabolic aberration to which you refer. The situation is complicated by the propensity of deep LT3S to produce, eventually, a wide range of “autoimmune” diseases, a short list of more acute illnesses (including simple heart failure, Takotsubo cardiomyopathy and myxoedema) and psychocognitive effects, including deep depression and rapid-onset dementia.
This information is ominous, in view of the 3% P.A. rise in atmospheric CO2!
CO2s effect on human metabolism
As to its direct effect on our metabolism, the question is “over my head”, excepting that I am familiar with the effects of IL 6 and other cytokines.
However on the basis that ANY stress, as judged by the Hypothalamus, leads to ACTH-induced Cortisol release, with an adverse effect on Thyroid-4 conversion to Thyroid-3, I must conclude that a further increase of atmospheric CO2, from its current level of 428ppm, must soon become important: the current CO2 level is already “important” – it could well be a factor in our worldwide stress epidemic, today.
Regarding that, I must remind you that the Low T3 Syndrome (LT3S) can reach catastrophic severity with few symptoms, can fail diagnosis and can persist subclinically for years, eventually presenting as an autoimmune problem of one sort, or another.
A large-scale study would perhaps, prove the point
It would be interesting to conduct a large-scale investigation of current “raw” FT3, rT3 and FT3/rT3 values – I would expect an almost across-the-board finding of T3/rT3=<20, diagnostic of LT3S (aka “Non-thyroidal illness” (NTIS), “Euthyroid Sick Syndrome” (ESS), and “Subclinical Hypothyroidism”), which I prefer to term “Intracellular Hypothyroidism” (”IH”), since that term best describes the metabolic aberration.
If a significant prevalence of low (<20.0) T3/rT3 ratio were found in the population, it would prove the presence of endemic IH and we would have to accept that the situation is potentially eco-threatening, already: it would become obvious, even to our oblivious politicians, that we MUST reduce our world’s atmospheric CO2 !!
A smaller study, on mice, perhaps?
Come to think of it, a smaller experiment might provide insight and a worthwhile lead: a study of mice, comparing FT3/rT3 ratios between those living in ambient air and those in a high-CO2 environment, would lend credibility to the question of investigating humans.
That’s where scientists, such as yourself, come in: I am a Non- academic “nobody”, with no Institutional connections and I am retired, to boot, so all I can do is suggest!
NOTES FROM AI
Readers familiar with my substack will already have the information below; but the unfamiliar may have difficulty believing and crediting it, so I consulted AI, the modern guru, to lend my words some modern-day credence!
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