A new study reveals information that must be devastating to global warming alarmists: carbon dioxide is actually beneficial to the planet.

The BBC reports that a study published in the Nature Climate Change journal found “significant greening” in 25-50 percent of the Earth’s vegetated land, resulting in a “plant boom,” primarily caused by higher levels of carbon dioxide.

“The greening reported in this study has the ability to fundamentally change the cycling of water and carbon in the climate system,” lead author Dr Zaichun Zhu from Peking University, Beijing, China, told the BBC.

The plants are reducing the effects of climate change by bringing in the carbon dioxide, according to the study, since, after all, plants rely on carbon dioxide for energy. The result: more trees for hippies to hug.

Naturally, the study’s lead author, Prof Ranga Myneni from Boston University, had to salvage the global warming narrative by warning that the benefits of carbon dioxide “would not compensate for global warming, rising sea levels, melting glaciers, ocean acidification, the loss of Arctic sea ice, and the prediction of more severe tropical storms.”

This is all bogus. The sea level has risen slightly over one millimeter annually for the past 50 years, without any evidence of acceleration. According to NASA, Antarctica has actually seen increases in ice that have outweighed the glacier losses. Also, the frequency of severe storms have declined and the science behind ocean acidification is sketchy.

Harrison Schmitt, former astronaut and adjunct engineering professor at the University of Mexico, and William Happer, Princeton University engineering, explain that the current levels of carbon dioxide – 400 parts per million – pale in comparison to when the levels were 3,000 ppm 65 million years ago, and “geological record shows that life flourished on land and in the oceans during those times.” Also, commercial greenhouses maintain carbon dioxide levels of 1,000 ppm to benefit their plants.

Much to the chagrin of the global warming alarmists, more carbon dioxide is a good thing, as common sense would dictate, since it is something plant-life needs to survive.