From The Hockey Shtick, word of a new paper that supports Miskolczi’s theory of saturated greenhouse effect. We’ve seen this before, in the form of this graph.
In 2006, Willis Eschenbach posted this graph on Climate Audit showing the logarithmic net downward IR forcing effect of carbon dioxide relative to atmospheric concentration:
The flatter portion of the graph gradually smooths out, as the effect of CO2 forcing becomes saturated with increased concentration. And this graphic of his shows carbon dioxide’s contribution to the whole greenhouse effect:
What’s more, in this new paper there appears to be some evidence for a negative climate feedback, in the form of slightly lowered relative humidity trend, which makes climate sensitivity lower. Relative humidity (RH) is the ratio of the actual amount of water vapor in the air to the amount it could hold when saturated expressed as a percentage OR the ratio of the actual vapor pressure to the saturation vapor pressure expressed as a percentage. The amount of water vapor the air can hold increases with temperature. Relative humidity therefore decreases with increasing temperature if the actual amount of water vapor stays the same. While the study found a slight increase in specific humidity (the mass of water vapor per unit mass of air), relative humidity (near the surface, 2 meter measurement) decreased by 0.5% per decade, resulting in an overall slightly drier atmosphere.
If a positive water vapor feedback response existed in the climate system, you’d expect both the specific and relative humidity to increase with time. It didn’t. This ends up putting the kibosh on the idea of tipping points, and a lack of positive water vapor feedback pretty much takes all the scare out of CO2 induced climate change.
Of note is the issue with station inhomogeneity which apparently had been masking the signal in earlier studies. This study looked at stations individually to determining where such inhomogeneity existed. Here’s an example in figure 3 of their paper:
From THS:
A paper published today in the Journal of Climate finds that relative humidity has been decreasing 0.5% per decade across North America during the 62 year period of observations from 1948-2010.
Computer models of AGW show positive feedback from water vapor by incorrectly assuming that relative humidity remains constant with warming while specific humidity increases. The Miskolczi theory of a ‘saturated greenhouse effect’ instead predicts relative humidity will decrease to offset an increase in specific humidity, as has just been demonstrated by observations in this paper. The consequence of the Miskolczi theory is that additions of ‘greenhouse gases’ such as CO2 to the atmosphere will not lead to an increase in the ‘greenhouse effect’ or increase in global temperature.
Journal of Climate 2012 ; e-View
doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/JCLI-D-11-00003.1
Surface Water Vapor Pressure and Temperature Trends in North America during 1948-2010
V. Isaac and W. A. van Wijngaarden*
Physics Dept., Petrie Bldg., York University, 4700 Keele St., Toronto, ON Canada, M3J 1P3; e-mail: wlaser@yorku.ca
Abstract
Over 1/4 billion hourly values of temperature and relative humidity observed at 309 stations located across North America during 1948-2010 were studied. The water vapor pressure was determined and seasonal averages were computed. Data were first examined for inhomogeneities using a statistical test to determine whether the data was fit better to a straight line or a straight line plus an abrupt step which may arise from changes in instruments and/or procedure. Trends were then found for data not having discontinuities. Statistically significant warming trends affecting the Midwestern U.S., Canadian prairies and the western Arctic are evident in winter and to a lesser extent in spring while statistically significant increases in water vapor pressure occur primarily in summer for some stations in the eastern half of the U.S. The temperature (water vapor pressure) trends averaged over all stations were 0.30 (0.07), 0.24 (0.06), 0.13 (0.11), 0.11 (0.07) C/decade (hPa/decade) in the winter, spring, summer and autumn seasons, respectively. The averages of these seasonal trends are 0.20 C/decade and 0.07 hPa/decade which correspond to a specific humidity increase of 0.04 g/kg per decade and a relative humidity reduction of 0.5%/decade.
The full paper from the Journal of Climate can be viewed at this link.
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Game, set, match.
And in time for IPCC 5.
Oh Dear.
Looking at that chart of relative humidity, there appears to be a step change circa 1970. A precursor to the Great Pacific Climate Shift?
This reduction in water vapour fits in with that paper which showed a link between vegetative cover and local warming (which they then went on to say “couldn’t” cause global warming … which is nonsense)
Vegetation grows by evaporation. It sucks up ground water that would otherwise flow into rivers and pushes it into the air. Take away the vegetation, leave a field ploughed for a few months, cut downt the trees for lower vegetation, and the amount of vaporation decreases leading to rising temperature.
That is why “Urban heating” starts at population densities as small as a few 10’s of people per square kilometer. It’s not the people, so much as what the do to the vegetation.
The two pillars on which the rotten edifice of Global Warmery totters are (a) Sensitivity and (b) Feedback. The above work hacks away at pillar b.
If the climate’s sensitivity to rising CO2 is dwarfed by other influences (IPCC AR4 says CO2’s the biggie) then that pillar is demolished. If temperature changes have a self-correcting tendency (negative feedback) rather than self-escalating (positive), then the other pillar goes.
In short, the scare story evaporates if CO2 is no big deal and if warm things tend to cool.
The assumption that IR absorbed by GHGs is thermalised locally is wrong. Not only is the energy quantised so it can only be transferred to another GHG molecule, not symmetrical O2 and N2, it is also almost immediately re-emitted in a random direction by another excited molecule which restores Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium and Equipartition of Energy.
The real GHG warming is at second phases, cloud droplets, black carbon etc. The former gives increased convection so accelerates precipitation thus reducing relative humidity, the physical origin of Miskolczi’s observation]
[I’ve solved the cloud physics and the other three major mistakes in climate science are elementary, so should not have been made by professionals! Basically, the game is over and we’#ll have to find employment for all those failures in climate science department.]
definitely a post to bookmark and roll out as evidence that AGW theory does not stand up to scrutiny
Perfect to see Miskolczi confirmed again by measurements. Now let some “climate-neutral” government spend a couple of million on evaluation of this theory and potentially save trillions on this climate change derangement. And be very grateful to Miskolczi rather than firing him from NASA.
I think tipping point is nothing to do with CO2.
The key is the North Atlantic ocean’s circulation on which these 3 forecasts are based:
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/Fc.htm
Changes are first felt in the Europe where climate is controlled by the Gulf stream, while American continent isn’t , except the area under influence of the Florida current.
.
Here is a example of the excuses this paper will be meet with.
Ones, this work does not count, as it does not cover ever square inch of the world .
Two, the people behind it once bought fuel, so their clearly in the pay of big oil
Three, these people are not ‘climate scientists’ and certainly not experts as none of these would ever make these claims.
Four, ‘the Team’ reject this so it must be worthless, and no need to actual read it.
Five, its in conflict with the ‘models’ and they are never wrong so this must be.
Will read the paper later today, but have to admit there’s something I don’t see, and that’s the disappearance of water vapor feedback.
While it’s true that relative humidity is going down by 0.5% per decade, specific humidity is still going up. So, it seems like there will still be water vapor feedback, just not as much as if SPECIFIC humidity were going down.
Unofficial End to Global Warming Scam
For years I’ve been dipping into google search for “Global warming”. OK, they are hugely biased, and vastly exaggerate the pro-warming sites, which is why the best feel for what is actually being created comes from short time slots like the last 24hours or latest news (last hour).
A few years ago I would have been hard pressed to find any substantial sceptic articles.
But, in the last few days (after a time not looking), I started looking again. The first time I saw an overwhelming majority of sceptical articles, I assumed it was a fluke. The next time … I assumed it was an extended fluke. I considered whether there was some common theme which meant that there was a rush of sceptical works … but whilst the European winter features, it is hardly the dominant theme. Sceptic articles not so much are in the majority, … it is more that it is all but impossible to find anything substantial that is pro warming (unless you count something on snails!!!).
This is not a fluke. The tide has turned. Global warming activists might put on a brave face, but in reality they have nothing to say, their enthusiasm is rock bottom … global warming scepticism is not only in the ascendancy, almost all new articles are now sceptical.
OK, hardly scientific, but in terms of my own personal expertise having monitored this quite intensely for many years, the present evidence shows that the scam is over.
So, why are the politicians still acting the way they are? You might ask.
There is a saying … kick a dinosaur between the legs and it will be a long time until the nerve inpulse reaches its brain at it reacts. For politicians that time-scale is around 5-10years. In other words, most of them don’t talk to ordinary people, don’t care about what ordinary people think – until its time to ask us to vote for them. So, for most of the time, they draw their inspiration and beliefs from the other deluded individuals in the same bubble devorced from everyone else.
One election … when no one likes global warming … that’s a fluke. Two elections when people don’t like parties who pursue the idiotic policy of destroying our carbon based economies … that’s a worrying lack of understanding of the electorate …. three elections … and they were always against global warming taxes!
Sorry, totally blew the second paragraph of previous comment.
While it’s true that relative humidity is going down by 0.5% per decade, specific humidity is still going up. So, it seems like there will still be water vapor feedback, not the disapperance we’d see if SPECIFIC humidity were going down.
@Jay Currie
“…And in time for IPCC 5. Oh Dear….”
I think you will find, if the paper gets into IPCC 5, that it is presented as
“…and it has also been shown that increased CO2 levels cause dessication of the atmosphere, which has the potential to kill every living thing on earth….”
Just one last comment … you might ask why I don’t have tabulated figures in a scientific way… the reason is that Google are known to be (have been?) strongly pro-warming and any kind of statistics were likely to be affected by the spin they wanted to put on the figures rather than anything meaningful. That is why e.g. when you search for “global warming”, it will appear that the web is overwhelmingly behind google’s own view on the subject.
Indeed, any attempt to show the decline in support for global warming in the google stats, was likely to result in a change in those stats. Stats can be manipulated, but what is far more difficult to manipulate is the enthusiasm of the source articles for a subject.
And in my judgement, the enthusiasm of pro-warmists is now rock bottom. A few may be going through the actions because that is their job, or their reputations have been hung in this noose. But those with a choice, have found something better.
I am sorry, but I am not that sure about some of the points mentioned here.
I can see a negative feedback in Paltridge (2009) reanalisys study (*), but I don’t think it is that clear in this study.
A very small reduction in relative humidity is compatible with an increase in net water vapour content in the atmosphere (specific humidity), and it is this second which will affect the radiative properties.
The seasonal values are a bit confussing too. Saturation water vapor content increases exponentially with temperature, so it is normal that a smaller positive trend in summer temperature brings about a bigger trend in water vapour pressure when compared to winter.
What is interesting, and the authors repeat it several times in the paper, is that there is not statistically significant increase in water vapour trends. That means that there is no conclusive evidence of positive water vapour feedback, and that one of the fundamental tenets of the AGW hypothesis is still invisible to the human eye.
(*)Trends in middle- and upper-level tropospheric humidity from NCEP reanalysis data
Garth Paltridge, Albert Arking and Michael Pook
Theoretical and Applied Climatology, 2009, Volume 98, Numbers 3-4, Pages 351-359
Interestingly, today’s Frankfurter Algemeine carries a lengthy article claiming that solar radiation variations are “irrelevant and constant, that CO2 and water vapour are the only things that matter and IPCC 2007 got everything right …
I’d love to send them an email saying “B*ll*cks” but sadly my written German wouldn’t say it effectively, and they don’t have an email address for responses to this …
Not more model output!
If the theory of GHG’s worked as advertised then when feeling cold one could get into a freezer to get warm. We all know that this is impossible but people still believe that a colder atmospheric CO2 molecule will radiate heat to a warmer surface. The 2nd law of thermodynamics states that this cannot happen! Another so called greenhouse gas, water vapour, actually causes cooling. Evapouration needs heat which is extracted from the surface cooling it. If it convects then forms cloud then the released heat will exchange with the surrounding atmosphere and be radiated to cooler areas and eventually to space. This cloud formation cools the surface.
It all comes down to whether the use of the SB formula for BB radiation is the correct one to use for a planet. Earth is not a black body with a uniform surface it is the exact opposite. It also assumes that the majority of the heat is lost through radiation it is not. Cloud formation demonstrates that heat is being lost by convection. Within the atmospheric envelope heat distribution is through convection it is only at the atmosphere/space interface that radiation becomes the overriding heat loss method. Heat is also wind distributed around the surface and from day to night sides. Heat is also generated through atmospheric compression and the difference between saturated and dry adiabatic lapse rates, a la Foehne effect, which produces extra heat probably confused with a GHG warming. The Foehne effect is real GHG warming is not.
Nice article, shame that is is bogus and obsolete, because there is no greenhouse effect. It is simply impossible according to the laws of thermodynamics.
As RW Woods has shown and recently repeated.
http://www.biocab.org/Wood_Experiment_Repeated.html
For more info read Hans SChreuders excellent website
http://www.ilovemycarbondioxide.com/
and read the Sky Dragon Slayers book.
The greenhouse effect from back radiation, the biggest urban myth of our time.
> Computer models of AGW show positive feedback from water vapor by incorrectly assuming that relative humidity remains constant with warming while specific humidity increases
No. The GCMs make no assumption of fixed relative humidity. That is an emergent property, approximately.
Oh, and how do we know that there is not some other cause of the drop in water vapur measurements. Increased urbanisation for example over the USA or air travel (high stmosphere effects), or changes in solar activity.
Or is it a measurement artifact much like UHI for temperatures…..
John Marshal- great post, spot on! 🙂
Not a model in sight. Simply observations. How refreshing.
Mydogsgotnonose says:
February 8, 2012 at 1:09 am
“The real GHG warming is at second phases, cloud droplets, black carbon etc. The former gives increased convection so accelerates precipitation thus reducing relative humidity, the physical origin of Miskolczi’s observation]”
____________________________________________________
Indeed yes, Mydog … Just what the ‘Slayers’ and I have been saying. Increased convection goes with reduced relative humidity, and vice versa. So, as we know, the moist adiabatic lapse rate is only about two-thirds of the dry adiabatic lapse rate, primarily because of the release of latent heat in the formation of rain drops which then carry the energy back downwards, warming air and sometimes the ocean and land as well
Apart from turbulent weather, this is the only way thermal energy can go downwards in the troposphere, because it cannot do so by convection or radiation – just by those rain drops that “keep falling on my head … ”
Elementary my Dear Watson.
Does anyone else spot a connection here between this post and the snows of Kilimanjaro?
I was a meteorological technician (professional weather observer) at the start of my career. I wonder if the paper’s authors accounted for the following facts…
Many years ago temperatures at Canadian airport stations were measured manually. The dry bulb temperature and wet bulb temperatures were measured with *MERCURY* thermometers. The dry bulb and wet bulb were then used to calculate RH and dewpoint (vapour pressure). The temperatures at Schefferville, QC often do fall below -30 C and colder during the winter. I don’t have a copy of MANOBS (the observing manual) but I vaguely remember that weather observers were supposed to take the mercury thermometers indoors once the temperature fell below -30, to protect them from freezing (mercury freezes at -38.8 C). Under those circumstances, we were to read the hourly “dry bulb temperature” from the minimum thermometer, which uses a column of alcohol. The wet bulb (and therefore the RH and dew point and vapour pressure) was missing during hours when the mercury thermometers were out of service. Therefore there would be a number of hours during the winter when RH and vapour pressure would be missing. This would be 100% biased to hours with dry bulb temperatures below -30 C.
Fast-forward to current times, and temperature+RH+dewpoint are measured by sensors at autostations. The temperature range for valid data depends on which sensor from which manufacturer is used. So in more recent data, the winter data holes would be fewer, and the temperature threshold for missing data would probably be lower.
So we’re looking at at least 2 temp/RD/vapour_pressure data sets with different characteristics during the winter. I’d hate to be the guy analyzing the data.