1) As the reports author has already asserted, the findings suggest that the oceans only slow the rate at which CO2 is increasing in the atmosphere. Tackling the emissions is still an essential for our planets health.

2) CO2 dissolves in water to form Carbolic acid. Acidification of the oceans is one of the by-products of CO2 emissions, harmful to our oceans, especially shell and reef forming creatures

Look at this research carefully. This interpretation is facile.

Not so. 2006 CO2 to atmosphere is as follows: Using Chemical Equations for burning of Natural Gas + and Engineering Orsat Analysis for the combustion of same in a chamber, the amount of fuel converted to CO2 and that goes to the atmosphere is 3.05E9 metric tons of CO2(2006). That is 1.43 ppmv to the atmosphere. I verified this using Schack 1973 estimate of CO2 increases to the atmosphere. The values, calculated differently, agree within fractions of a percent.

This is even worse for the AGW proponents, because at that “offset” rate (If we suddenly stopped Carbon production now), it would take over 100 years to save 1 ºCelsius. So, what’s the point in trying to reduce emissions? No point at all.

We are told that the solubility of CO2 in sea water is a function of temperature; and in particular it is more soluble in colder warers.

We also know that the ocean water temperature tends to fall as you go deeper.

That seems to imply that CO2 is less soluble in the warmer surface waters than the deeper colder waters, and my elementary chemistry says that therefoire CO2 ought to diffuse out of the warmer surface waters into the colder deeper waters setting up a pumping action that continually sends CO2 into the depths.
The Henry’s Law equilibrium bwtween ocean and atmosphere; to the extent that it ever reaches equilibrium, would be between the warm surface waters and the atmosphere.
Those warmer surface waters ought to be constantly depleted by the diffusion to colder deeper waters, so the surface waters are constantly taking up more CO2 out of the atmosphere. Of course as temperatures fluctuate, that equilibrium would shift either to outgas CO2 or take up more.

Bottom line is that I believe that the oceans do not look like a sponge that is saturated with CO2. The warm surface waters can take up CO2 out of the atmosphere just as fast as the diffusion due to the water temperature gradient, can transport it to colder deeper waters.

Now if SSTs then increase, so the surface loses CO2 to the atmosphere, and also to the cooler deeper waters; that would seem to me to result in a surface depleted in CO2.

Chemical and biologivcal processes that take up CO2 and end up forming calcium carbonate, or other carbonates, in skeletons or other ocean body parts, would seem to remove carbon from the water, more or less permanently.

And as we now know from Jane Lubchenko’s remarkable experiment; Corals and sea shells, cannot grow in ordinary tap water containing Chlorine and perhaps Fluoride, that has been dyed yellow with an ordinary laboratory yellow dye, and chilled with dry ice; but they presumably can grow in ordinary tap water, with Chlorine and Fluoride, that is dyed blue with a common lab blue dye at room temperature.

Somlpy amazing what one can learn from these scientific geniuses that President Obama has brought into his administration.

I’m waiting for some grad student to apply for a government grant to see if corals can be made to grow in ordinary sea water; preferrably obtained from the immediate vicinity of a coral reef; once it has been dyed blue with a common laboratory blue dye; and also to see if that sea water turns yellow when it is chilled with pounds of dry ice as demonstrated in Lubchenko’s experiment.

What on earth does that mean? If it means that the ratio of atmospheric CO2 to Oceanic CO2 hasn’t changed; why not say that, sow e know what you are talking about. I find that the ability of scientists to write decent English, and say what they mean, is abyssmal. When somebody says “balanced” I see a teeter-totter (see-saw to some).

Is this Bristoian revelation some new pronouncement of Henry’s Law ? Isn’t that ratio supposed to stay constant; well assuming other physical parameters stay the same ?

The short time ratio of 4 ppmv/K is the reaction found on the detrended curve for the past 60 years and is surprisingly linear. See:
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/CO2vsTMacRae.pdf (but I don’t endorse his conclusions!)

The trend itself is independent of temperature and the result of human emissions, besides a small increase due to the warming in the past century. That makes that the oceans are a net sink for CO2, but that seems not to change the amplitude of the temperature influence (neither over the seasons nor from year by year temperature variations).
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Thank you for the citation Ferdinand, and Happy New Year to you and your family.

I personally enjoyed your comments here, and found your explanations to be very well-stated. I further enjoyed the earlier exchanges between you and Richard Courtney on this subject. Richard spoke against your “mass balance argument” far better than I did. You both did such a good job that I’m not sure who I agreed with from day to day, so I’ll just hold to my original conclusions for now…

The fact remains that the only signal I’ve been able to detect in the data is that CO2 lags temperature by ~9 months in the short-term ~ENSO cycle. CO2 also lags temperature by ~800 years in the much longer cycle(s) measured in ice cores.

We also know that 12-month dCO2/dt at Mauna Loa has “gone negative” several times since CO2 measurements began there in 1958: one month of 12 in each of 1959, 1963, 1964 and 1971, and three months in 1965 and 1974.

Still, there is that nagging upward overall trend, which could reflect the manmade component – or not.

I am not as willing as some others to dismiss Ernst Beck’s data and thoughts. Time will tell…

In any case, this dCO2/dt argument, while scientifically interesting, is not that critical to the big question of alleged catastrophic manmade global warming. There is increasing evidence that the sensitivity of climate to increased atmospheric CO2 is so low as to be practically inconsequential. The IPCC model numbers are about an order of magnitude too high, and there is no evidence of any “climate tipping point”.

The ClimateGate emails have certainly put a different spin on this core science argument – everything we have written on these core issues has been technically vindicated – we just thought the other side of the argument was wrong – we were reluctant to suggest that they were utterly dishonest, a reluctance they did not share in their discussion of our motives.

I understand we are in for some serious cold temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere in the next few weeks. Bundle up and stay warm.

Best regards, Allan

If this is true then the science is based on BS ( bad science ) the methoid used to determine “anthropogenic” carbon from “natural” carbon is flawed. An unchanged ratio over extended period is not logical. Would not be the first time the wrong conclusive result was caused by a mistake in the original input premise.

Done it myself a few times :-(

It is my understanding that the oceans both absorb and give off CO2, so there is a constant exchange of CO2 between the oceans and the atmosphere. Even if the oceans were completely saturated with CO2, they would still exchange CO2 with the atmosphere.

If the oceans are a sink, they are absorbing more than they release. If the oceans are saturated, they absorb the same amount that they release. This means saturated oceans would either absorb less CO2, or release more CO2, or both (as compared with sink oceans).

It appears in this post there is an assumption that saturated oceans would absorb less CO2 than sink oceans. However, do we know this assumption is correct? Why wouldn’t saturated oceans absorb the same amount as sink oceans, while releasing more CO2 than sink oceans?

RC seems to be annoyed… (sorry if this is ad hom from me, but RC write “sigh” after they find that their accusation against Sciency Daily’s headline was answered with that Science Daily just used AGU’s conclusion).

The October 30 2008 article’s introduction:

Boston (MA) – Scientists at MIT have recorded a nearly simultaneous world-wide increase in methane levels. This is the first increase in ten years, and what baffles science is that this data contradicts theories stating man is the primary source of increase for this greenhouse gas. It takes about one full year for gases generated in the highly industrial northern hemisphere to cycle through and reach the southern hemisphere. However, since all worldwide levels rose simultaneously throughout the same year, it is now believed this may be part of a natural cycle in mother nature – and not the direct result of man’s contributions.

Matthew Rigby and Ronald Prinn lead authors in the paper published in Geophysical Review Letters.

I’m no pro, but decreased airborne fraction should be logical since emission increase is larger than CO2 increase rate in the atmosphere. By google I (first hit…) find Dr. Jarl Ahlbeck, who mention: “In reality, the increase rate of atmospheric carbon dioxide has, despite the substantial increase of carbon dioxide emissions, remained on a very stable level during the recent 30 years. In fact, the airborne fraction, or the portion of the yearly emissions that stays in the atmosphere, has decreased from 52% in the year 1970 to 39% today. The IPCC model using IS92a implies however a nearly constant future airborne fraction”.

IPCC’s view is that the increase so far is only because of human emissions, but in that case a 0.3 correlation between temperature anomaly and increase in CO2 rate is hard to explain; Dr. Roy Spencer:

http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/01/25/double-whammy-friday-roy-spencer-on-how-oceans-are-driving-co2

IPCC also believed that the increase rate of methane would soar, but it stopped to increase. Recently MIT showed that humans are not causing current changes in methane concentration:

http://tgdaily.com/html_tmp/content-view-39973-113.html

Watts, and others, are right when they say that our understanding of this isn’t so sure as IPCC suggests.

The alarmists claim that “The confusion in the denialosphere is based on a misunderstanding between ‘airborne fraction of CO2 emissions’ (not changing very much) and ‘CO2 fraction in the air’ (changing very rapidly)”

I just stumbled upon http://www.skepticalscience.com/Is-the-airborne-fraction-of-anthropogenic-CO2-emissions-increasing.html

They say that Anthony misunderstood the science. What is our position on this? How do we debunk the http://www.skepticalscience.com/Is-the-airborne-fraction-of-anthropogenic-CO2-emissions-increasing.html article?

AGW is based on the recent increases in CO2 are solely due to mankind and not natural increases.

“Carbon dioxide is released to the atmosphere by a variety of sources, and over 95% percent of these emissions would occur even if human beings were not present on Earth”

http://www.gcrio.org/ipcc/qa/05.htm

Currently anthropogenic activities only accounts for about 5% of the total annual Carbon (CO2) emissions into the atmosphere. If the ratio of man caused CO2 and natural CO2 present in the atmosphere hasn’t changed in 160 years, then 95% of the increase should be caused by natural releases.

And note, the sequestering of CO2 from the atmosphere is independent of the source of the CO2. Nature doesn’t treat a “naturally” emitted molecule any different than one from a jet afterburner. If 55% of 5% is being removed, than 55% of 95% is also.

I don’t see how recent increase in CO2 levels can be solely driven by man unless its ratio increases.

We live in interesting times.