Also, see below the “Continue reading” line for an impressive scientific visualization video of black carbon being transported around the globe.
University of Iowa News Release July 27, 2010
UI researcher finds black carbon implicated in global warming
Increasing the ratio of black carbon to sulphate in the atmosphere increases climate warming, suggests a study conducted by a University of Iowa professor and his colleagues and published in the July 25 issue of the journal Nature Geoscience. No paper was provided with the press release.
Black carbons — arising from such sources as diesel engine exhaust and cooking fires — are widely considered a factor in global warming and are an important component of air pollution around the world, according to Greg Carmichael, Karl Kammermeyer Professor of Chemical and Biochemical Engineering in the UI College of Engineering and co-director of the UI’s Center for Global and Regional Environmental Research. Sulfates occur in the atmosphere largely as a result of various industrial processes.
Carmichael’s colleagues in the study were V. Ramanathan and Y. Feng of Scripps Institution of Oceanography, La Jolla, Calif.; S-C. Yoon and S-W. Kim of Seoul National University, South Korea; and J. J. Schauer of the University of Wisconsin, Madison.
In order to conduct their study, the researchers made ground-level studies of air samples at Cheju Island, South Korea, and then sampled the air at altitudes between 100 and 15,000 feet above the ground using unmanned aircrafts (UAVs).
They found that the amount of solar radiation absorbed increased as the black carbon to sulphate ratio rose. Also, black carbon plumes derived from fossil fuels were 100 percent more efficient at warming than were plumes arising from biomass burning.
“These results had been indicated by theory but not verified by observations before this work,” Carmichael said. “There is currently great interest in developing strategies to reduce black carbon as it offers the opportunity to reduce air pollution and global warming at the same time.”
The authors suggest that climate mitigation policies should aim to reduce the ratio of black carbon to sulphate in emissions, as well as the total amount of black carbon released.
In a paper published in May 2008 in Nature Geoscience, Carmichael and Ramanathan found that black carbon soot from diesel engine exhaust and cooking fires — widely used in Asia — may play a larger role than previously thought in global warming. They said that coal and cow dung-fueled cooking fires in China and India produce about one-third of black carbon; the rest is largely due to diesel exhaust in Europe and other regions relying on diesel transport. The paper also noted that soot and other forms of black carbon could equal up to 60 percent of the current global warming effect of carbon dioxide, the leading greenhouse gas.
Carmichael is chair of the scientific advisory group for the World Meteorological Organization’s GURME (Global atmospheric watch Urban Research Meteorology and Environment) project and chair of the scientific advisory group for the Shanghai Expo pilot project on air quality forecasting. He has worked with Shanghai authorities for three years to help develop an early warning system for air quality problems and heat waves.
The study was funded by National Science Foundation.
=======================================
Tiny air pollution particles commonly called soot, but also known as black carbon, are in the air and on the move throughout our planet. Black carbon enters the air when fossil fuels and biofuels, such as coal, wood, and diesel are burned. Since black carbon readily absorbs heat from sunlight, the particles can affect Earth’s climate, especially on a regional scale. Though global distribution of soot remains difficult to measure, NASA researchers use satellite data and computer models to better understand how these short-lived particles influence Earth’s climate, cryosphere, and clouds. This scientific data visualization uses data from the GEOS5 GOCART climate model to show black carbon’s atmospheric concentration from August to November in 2009.
Credit: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio
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Great! This study shows we do not need to cap carbon emissions. Just make sure all that’s released from burning hydrocarbons is H2O and CO2.
And here I was hoping that my link to the Wired article was the basis for this post…lol
How many soot articles can come out at once?
JimB
REPLY: Jim, I had noted your tip, but it was already in my inbox from the source. Thanks though, your help is appreciated even if not on first. Sometimes the magazine article do a better job or have some interesting footnotes. – Anthony
“The paper also noted that soot and other forms of black carbon could equal up to 60 percent of the current global warming effect of carbon dioxide, the leading greenhouse gas.”
H2O?
Dirty Ice: Soot is three times more effective than carbon dioxide–the most common greenhouse gas–
The caption of that picture tells me all I need to know about the scientific methods used in this study …
Latest from UK Met Office:
Dr Stott said: ‘Despite the variability caused by short-term changes, the analysis conducted for this report illustrates why we are so confident the world is warming.’He added it was possible the warming could be due to something other than greenhouse gases.
He obviously was following my posts on WUWT
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LFC1.htm
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/NFC1.htm
Back in either 1999 or 2002, Hansen was singing the “It’s soot” song himself. When he saw that he was gaining traction again with the “It’s CO2”, he all but abandoned any mention of soot.
“The paper also noted that soot and other forms of black carbon could equal up to 60 percent of the current global warming effect of carbon dioxide, the leading greenhouse gas.” In other words, we shouldn’t be the slightest bit concerned about it. Reducing soot is certainly a good idea, for health reasons as well as others, but it should be reduced for the right reasons. Worrying about any warming effect from it is just silliness. Par for the course for Warmists I guess.
Ahh, nice to hear about some good old fashion pollution. Soot and sulphates. Dickensian London. Dirty old town. When I look at the dusty sooty plant on the median of my local arterial, sitting there at exhaust pipe level, I imagine how pleased they would be if those pipes were pumping pure CO2.
Excuse me, but my admittedly aged memory seems to recall an experiment by my 6th grade science teacher that demonstrated this, back in 1956. Are we all now expected to genuflect before “new” science?
There’s a giveaway in the press release.
“NASA researchers use satellite data and computer models to better understand how these short-lived particles influence Earth’s climate, cr[…]”
Short-lived. Hmm, what does short-lived mean? Googling a little i find this:
“The dark side of aerosols : Article : Nature – [ Diese Seite übersetzen ]von MO Andreae – 2001 – Zitiert durch: 71 – Ähnliche Artikel
But is it reasonable to compare the present-day effects of black carbon, which has a lifetime of about a week, to that of the long-lived greenhouse gases, …
”
A week.
Hmmmm, anyone recall the heavy soot production at the beginning of the industrial revolution? Where in the data does it indicate that huge amounts of soot produced in the the latter half of the 1700s and in the 1800s caused global warming?
No need to answer. The above questions are, of course, rhetorical. The answer is that the global effects on climate of soot and other so-called anthropogenic greenhouse gasses are not very well understood. Neither is the complex mix of natural global thermodynamic elements, despite claims to the contrary from junk-scientists trying to maintain their funding stream.
I expect NASA will soon be manipulating data to show the influence of soot. Hide the decline!
Isn’t this the same school that is studying why pig crap stinks? How did they source the evil black carbon to diesel and cow dung? Since when is CO2 “the leading GHG”?
Black is the new white. Climate fashion changes so quickly nowadays, just can’t keep up.
‘Black carbon could equal up to 60 percent of the current global warming’ . The other 40 percent being caused by white carbon no doubt. There is a good deal running on green carbon at the moment but there are no percentages left for that one.
Warming, WHAT WARMING!
When are they going to ‘Man Up’ and start talking about the cooling. Is there anyone left not taking a paycheck from ‘Big Carbon’ .
[yawn]
Now what do we have here. A press release that talks long and in detail about the possible harmful effects of black carbon, about how big a “climate forcing” it may be in relation to CO2 (omitting the onlySIGNIFICANT GHG, H2O) AND omitting to tell us that black carbon has a lifetime of about a week.
I’m not willing to blame the quality of such press releases on incompetence anymore.
So given that there is only a certain amount of warming happening, then if some of that is attributable to soot then a smaller proportion is attributable to CO2, so CO2 is not as potent as previously thought. That is a good news story that the MSM should be cheering about, especially as there is currently no positive feedback mechanism yet proposed for carbon particles.
Anthony,
Aren’t they really two different articles by different researchers published in different journals? The Wired article is going to press in “Journal of Geophysical Research-Atmospheres”…and besides, it has MUCH better quotes 😉 and the researcher is “Stanford University climate scientist Mark Jacobson”.
Seems a bit odd to me…sort of through-the-looking-glassish?
JimB
Also, black carbon plumes derived from fossil fuels were 100 percent more efficient at warming than were plumes arising from biomass burning.
Is this due to particulate size or what?
Your iceberg has moraine on/in it, not carbon.
REPLY: Just going on what was provided by NOAA and SciAm – Anthony
The solution to trap black soot:
A water bath that the exhaust is passed through.
It doesn’t get any simpler than that, if capturing carbon soot is what you are needing to do.
One could look at it another way too. The more a particle absorbs heat, the more heat it transports when a passing storm sucks it up above the clouds. The stored energy is radiated out, day and night, some up towards space, and some down to Earth. But since it got lifted above the clouds, more of that downward radiation gets reflected back towards space.
So it seems reasonable to consider these particles as contributors to both warming and cooling, depending on the circumstances.
Well, since we cannot thrust them on anything else, why thrust them on this?
The government in Norway has been pushing diesel engines on the public for years now.
Why?
The out of focus image appears to be a piece of ice from a calving glacier. The “soot” implied in the image is actually shale flour from eroding hillsides.
“Tiny” particles from dung-fueled cooking fires (you can’t make this stuff up) in China and India are unlikely to make their way to the arctic. If soot is an issue, it’s likely coming from northern countries since the particles would be attracted to water vapor and produce clouds. Soot is necessary to make clouds – where’s the heat?
Is the video just a computer simulation based on the UAV samples in South Korea?
Oh, I forgot;
“The paper also noted that soot and other forms of black carbon could equal up to 60 percent of the current global warming effect of carbon dioxide, the leading greenhouse gas.”
And since there has been no global warming lately, the effect would then be ….zero?
Did they borrow the Met. Office’s volcanic ash program to ‘prove’ the distribution around the globe by weather?
So all this deindustrialization in the west and moving things with carbon credits to China/India where there are no scrubbers on the chimney is causing any warming if it is actually happening not CO2.
Time for China to be taxed to clean up their act! Not the west!