From a story in The Melbourne Age:
Professor Trenberth is a bruised survivor of the so-called ”climategate” scandal, which involved the theft and publication of thousands of emails that had been sent between some of the world’s most influential climate researchers.
While he and his colleagues were cleared by a series of investigations, the people who hacked the email system at Britain’s University of East Anglia have never been caught, and the case was closed, unsolved, earlier this year.
Professor Trenberth believes it had a big impact on public debates about climate science. ”It made an immense difference – the level of vitriol and hate we received,” he said. ”Not only do we have waves of attacks when we publish and it ends up on a denialist website, but it has affected politicians.”
The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration recently had its climate change-related research budget slashed by a fifth, affecting Professor Trenberth’s peers, as a result of online campaigns against climate scientists, he said. He believes uncertainties in climate change models scientists rely upon is being falsely inflated as a general uncertainty about the status of climate science.
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
h/t Old Ranga from Oz
I thought weather was not climate :o)
Hmmm, its always been about the specific numbers as I see it. I don’t see many skeptics attacking the fact that CO2 absorbs IR. Maybe Dr Trenberth is finally beginning to open his eyes.
Reblogged this on pindanpost.
Climate scientists only have themselves to blame.
Remember the old saying, do nothing on a works E-Mail / Computer you wouldn’t be happy on the front page of the press.
This is a direct consequence of their own actions towards other people, with bullying and intimidation.
It seems that the poor Professor Trenberth is now a victim, and the evil perpetrators have never been found. What about the billions of people throughout the world who will and are the real victims of this scam. Remember Professor Trenberth that everything in the Climategate release was authored by you and your compatriots.
Good to see you are approaching this with an open mind, Kevin.
Ignore all evidence to the contrary and please make sure you work the numbers to show just how bad us gas guzzling, SUV driving, flat earther deniers are making the weather.
Here’s more from Trenberth.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/too-many-researchers-spoil-climate-studies-20121011-27fpm.html
Trying to back away from all the alarmist tripe?
Climategate may not have received much exposure in the mainstream media but decision makers, politicians and the smarter end of the media understood that it had delivered a small but ultimately fatal blow to ‘the cause’.
For many of these people it was simply to late to recant, their income, investments and reputations were tied up with the Warmist narrative.
For those with no stake in the game however, the blatant corruption, the ‘fudge’ and the doomster mindset of the key players like Hansen and their media cronies was a major turn off.
The true believers are a shrinking band found only in the safety of segregated green sanctuaries or echo chambers as they’re known.
Climategate gave us the big stick we needed to hammer these people…I use it all the time with great gusto but how I long for the revelation of the final encrypted batch of documents – given the shakey nature of edifice one more blow might just bring the whole thing crashing down.
Waa-Waaa-Waaaaa!
And the taxpayers gave thanks….
I’m ready for Climategate 3.0
His team were falsifying their results. It is right and proper that funding should be withdrawn.
Perhaps we should pay them in Monopoly money: phony results should attract phony money.
When South Australia was hit by a spring snow storm yesterday, in jest at Jo Nova’s site I asked if Al Gore was visiting. Since then the snow has moved east into New Souh Wales, could it be Trenberth has the gift of Gore to bring unseasonal cold wherever he goes.
http://iceagenow.info/2012/10/snow-october-australia-100-years/
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/breaking-news/snow-falls-in-nsw-and-act/story-e6frf7kf-1226494110975
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/national/8547140/snow-falls-cause-nsw-traffic-chaos
Dommage, n’est-ce pas?
Repost. The Age article is the same as the Brisbane one, both Fairfax.
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
Of course he knows. He has Faith.
“”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.”
Defund him completely.
Attn. FOIA! This is your cue for Climategate 3.0!
“He (Trenberth) believes uncertainties in climate change models scientists rely upon is being falsely inflated as a general uncertainty about the status of climate science.”
Disagree – The climate change models have demonstrated NO predictive skill whatsoever. The models predicted runaway global warming when in fact there has been NO net global warming for 10-15 years.
The models produce nonsense and global warming alarmists like Trenberth have NO scientific credibility.
I hope he genuinely ‘feels’ the hate and dislike for the ‘climate team’ practises that have been ongoing for the last couple of decades. Maybe he will realise that ‘conned’ layfolk are much more angry than layfolk that have simply been lead by honest mistakes. The CO2 scam in no way can ever be seen as a simple scientific mistake, or collection of mistakes – such as genuine misinterpretation of data,etc.
The CO2/CAGW meme has been carefully constructed and all associated science works designed or slanted to ‘prove’ the construct. There is absolutely NO excuse for this kind of behaviour in science. Science should be pure and truthful and completely self questioning – and one would think that a science supposedly playing with mankinds actual ‘destiny’ would be cleaner and more truthful than any other. Climategate demonstrated, above all else, that there is no such purity, truth or honesty in the climate science circles and NO amout of weaseling by the team will hide that now. They should all do the honourable thing and resign……….at the very least……….
“With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
How is this different to saying “stick with us, we just need to massage the numbers to match our preconceptions”? OK, I know that’s not what he said but, really …
“..the level of vitriol and hate we received”
Gee, I wonder why that happened? Sarcasm is all Kevin deserves from that remark.
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
We “know” the results but data don’t support what we know …. yet.
If those with this sort of “anti-science” attitude and those openly engaged in political eco-activism while supposedly being paid for doing climate research were defunded they could probably cut another fifth and improve the quality of climate science at the same time.
The problem is these idiots are causing climate science funding to be cut but are being allowed to stay in place. This can only be damaging those engaged in real science to improve understanding of climate.
“the specific numbers need work,” Hide the decline ?
Unless we get more funding we won’t be able to make the data fit what we knew to be happening before we looked at the data . It’s a travesty.
“The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration recently had its climate change-related research budget slashed by a fifth”
JK—-Only 80% to go!
Thanks
JK
What happens to his argument when the numbers don’t add up? People like Dr. Trenberth see the majority of us as complete idiots, unable to see through the smoke and mirrors. These models are not accurate representations of the atmosphere – at best they model a tiny fraction of it – and extrapolating anything beyond that is full of “uncertainty.” I know, I use models in my work. They don’t always replicate reality.
Pretty much says it all about the impartiality of the writer.
So, I’m expecting more along the same lines… climate “scientists” realizing that the IPCC is out of their control, so therefore it’s wrong/bad/evil/etc.
Keep talking, Trenberth. And keep publishing these types of articles, “environmental” reporters… what happens is that rational people (there really are many of these!) start wondering what’s going on. It doesn’t take much research online to find out which is the more credible narrative. Here’s a hint: it’s not Trenberth’s…
Then again, what can you say about a man who claims “we know they are there” when discussing the links between weather and climate. I’m assuming that’s not quite what he meant to say.
It’s good start.
“While he and his colleagues were cleared by a series of investigations, the people who hacked the email system at Britain’s University of East Anglia have never been caught, and the case was closed, unsolved, earlier this year.”
Cleared of what? [/sarc so thick shovel is required]
At least it wasn’t a total bust. tallbloke’s computers got a two-week vacation out of it. [/sarc]
That’s such a sad story – where can I go to make a donation to the “Cause”.
Whoops I already pay taxes…no donation necessary.
One can only feel sorrow for the bruising to Professor Kevin Trenberth’s obviously fragile ego.
I wanted to find out the truth behind Trenberth’s one-fifth cut story. I googled NOAA budget cuts. I could not sort out any ACTUAL budget cut numbers, but what I did find was the most amazing amount of what we in the UK call shroud-waving. Which is when an organization faced with a threat comes out with all kinds of scare stories about how tragic the result will be. I suspect NOAA or their PR people, in defence of their budget, have been feeding stories into every US news outlet, every local or regional news medium, all carefully tuned to target any local concern. We are going to lose tsunami warnings, weather forecasts, critical marine programs, coastal erosion protection, you name it. Every dollar of reduction leads to a lost program, it seems. I know this is merely the game of funding, but we should be aware that Trenberth’s position here is just part of that game. And his respect for the numbers betrayed here does not bode well for his scientific work
Time to get a proper job, like some real research with real time data. Throw them models away Kevin they tell porkies.
Why do I keep hearing violins playing in the background?
Trenberth has got himself to blame. His Energy Budget is based on the mistaken belief that a pyrgeometer measures real energy flux when it is actually the vector sum of the Poynting vectors in the detector’s view angle; the subsidiary claim that the Earth emits IR as if it were an isolated black body in a vacuum.
The latter error is, to us professional engineers, a source of derision. How could these people be so stupid? Convection and radiation are coupled, a long established tenet of heat transfer engineering: http://www.thermopedia.com/content/204/
These people have wasted 30 years of research funding. The root paper in climate modelling, Manabe and Wetherald 1967, didn’t make this mistake. What on Earth led them to make assumption which were so wrong? Was it because the perpetual motion machine in the models gave imaginary positive feedback and the fake CO2-AGW scare, getting funding and fame?
What happened to scientific integrity?
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
It’s a rather simple relationship, isn’t it ? Climate is the long-term average of weather. The specific numbers only need work if one is trying to draw conclusions that aren’t readily demonstrable using basic statistics (or if the data being worked with is of such poor quality, it requires significant adjustment).
However, to say climate causes weather is like saying a newspaper report about a murder actually caused it.
From the Sydney Morning Herald version, Trenberth: ”An example would be Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, where there was about 11 inches [28 centimetres] of rain. About one inch of that was due to human influence. Maybe that extra inch was enough to cause the levee to break.”
Sure New Orleans disaster was human made, but it was not climatic.
You don’t design sea defences within an inch of what is needed. There were warnings for years that the levee needed work. Just as years before the Fuckupshima sea wall was overwhelmed, they were warned of the possibility of a tsunami breaching the sea wall.
I suppose Kev would like to pretend that part of the force of that earthquake was due to man made CO2, without which the sea wall would have been able to withstand the tsunami .
He also shows how little he understands about hurricanes and sea level. It is the depression that causes the sea to rise, not amount of rain. Oh wait, but he did say “maybe”, so he’s not being totally misleading, disingenuous and cynical.
rogerknights says:
October 12, 2012 at 2:00 am
Attn. FOIA! This is your cue for Climategate 3.0!
Agreed!
Climategate 3.0?
Waiting for Doha, maybe?
But of course. 🙂 If Trenberth found a decrease in hurricane intensity or frequency would he let the media know about it via an interview? Of course not. We are dealing with a bunch of sneaky and in some case dishonorable and dishonest charlatans.
Here are the numbers Mr. Trenberth in a number of published papers showing no trend or the opposite of the alarmists’ claims.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/05/27/another-paper-shows-that-severe-weatherextreme-weather-has-no-trend-related-to-global-warming/
I don’t see many skeptics attacking the fact that CO2 absorbs IR.
–Bill Hunter
That’s correct, I don’t know anyone who disputes the fact that CO2 absorbs IR in certain narrow bandwidths. The question is, can this dissipative cooling effect be used to do something highly useful like increase the Earth’s average surface temperature? This is like an intelligence test for engineers.
It’s amazing that they are now able to distinguish between rain due to human influences and ordinary rain.
“..the level of vitriol and hate we received”
What goes around, comes around. Stick around Kevin, you have yet to experience all the hate and vitriol that skeptics have endured for almost 25 years.
There are real problems in the world that need funding far more than climate studies. It should be cut by 80% or more. No wonder scientists like Trenberth think reality is a “travesty” … they know they will be out of jobs if people find out.
Bob Malloy says: (October 12, 2012 at 1:45 am) “When South Australia was hit by a spring snow storm yesterday…”
And now it has moved up into our tropics, Bob:
” the level of vitriol and hate we received” ?
So can Pof Trenberth show any evidence of this hate? I mean apart from some odd nutters rants almost all I saw was legitimate questions about what the hell they were up to with our money and systems ?
Anopheles says:
October 12, 2012 at 2:49 am
Someone should investigate the claim based on actually year to year budget numbers for NCAR. They should be publicly available. Let us know if someone finds something interesting…
AGW Models are part of the hypothesis, they are not part of the data or part of scientific experimentation. Trenberth, the AGW hypothesis has been stated via models so I suggest you now get on with completing the rest of the required science that would actually prove or disprove man made CO2’s place in our ever changing climate.
Patrick says:
October 12, 2012 at 1:22 am
Here’s more from Trenberth.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/too-many-researchers-spoil-climate-studies-20121011-27fpm.html
Trying to back away from all the alarmist tripe?
———————————————————————–
I don’t think It’s that at all. I think he is longing for the days when all the funding and attention went to him and a handful of mates.
Even worse, now that there are more people in the field it is harder to collude and browbeat everyone into singing from the hymn sheet as evangelically.
“The US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration recently had its climate change-related research budget slashed by a fifth, affecting Professor Trenberth’s peers, as a result of online campaigns against climate scientists, he said.”
Maybe Trenberth should ask Al Gore and his cronies to make up the short fall. I understand they have made billions off of us tax payers
I see “it has affected politicians”. They were probably appalled at the amateur quality of the lies, being themselves professionals in the art.
Only slashed by a fifth?
Pity. When the eliminate funding for Trenberth et al we will know we are returning to a normal state of science funding instead of using taxpayer’s money for Scientology pursuits of political activists with advanced degrees.
He believes uncertainties in climate change models scientists rely upon is being falsely inflated as a general uncertainty about the status of climate science.
VS
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
Who is inflating the certainty of the models that have missing variables, and whose results miss reality every time?
I don’t see many skeptics attacking the fact that CO2 absorbs IR – Bill Hunter
Climate science has failed to do its work here as well. CO2 in dry air self-absorbs by ~200 ppmV. This is defined as the approach to a steady state emissivity, therefore absorptivity. What’s more, by ~10% RH at ambient, there is no effect of change of concentration of CO2 on emissivity.
So, there can be no CO2-AGW. As for the real reason., it’s quite subtle; the IR emission in that band is switched off, standard heat transfer physics you use once you reject the false trail of ‘black body’ emission from the surface.
Prof Pielke doesn’t see a link between weather & climate.
http://www.denverpost.com/opinion/ci_21752735/climate-spin-is-rampant
“Such scientific findings are so robust that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded earlier this year that over the long-term, damage from extreme events has not been attributed to climate change, whether from natural or human causes.
So if the science is so clear on this subject, why then are companies and campaigners, abetted by a willing media, engaged in spreading misinformation?”
Over to you, Dr T!
Dangit… why’d I have to go and use my good line yesterday?
Suck it up, Kevin. Even if you are right, the proposed remedies would destroy civilization much faster than even the most catastrophic climate change could bring it down.
If you read through the other story linked by Patrick you can see that he still thinks he’s a hurricane expert, data going the opposite way from his conclusions are completely ignored.
Matt r says:
I’m guessing it’s all relative. When you’re used to being treated like a “science god” and having the ear of senior government around the world, ANY questioning of you must seem like “vitriol and hate”.
”An example would be Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, where there was about 11 inches [28 centimetres] of rain. About one inch of that was due to human influence. Maybe that extra inch was enough to cause the levee to break.”
I’m just an average Joe, but in the circles i move anyone saying something like that would be immediately elevated to favourite for the Darwin award.
So humans are now causing 1/11 of the rain. Your right Kevin, the numbers need some more work.
Trenberth: Climategate caused a loss of funding
I do not think that is fair – i want him to refund previous funding because of academic fraud and being made ineligible for future grants
We need to make it fair for the public that paid for this criminal conspiracy to defraud.
Anyone want a RICO investigation
The ONLY way the earth can get rid of heat is by radiation.
Dear Friends,
Does anyone know if Mr. Trenberth is a US citizen? We should know that since he is pushing so strongly the opinions that affect our lives. Why is he referred to as a Professor? As it appears from the Wikipedia page, he doesn’t teach.
“With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work”
Sounds a lot like data manipulation on the horizon, doesn’t it? We have all the data that would be necessary to show any links. There not there, as far as I or anyone else can seen, even the
warmist folks.
There he goes with the “denialist” label again, but it’s Climategate who revealed who the deniers are, they are the ones who deny the medieval warm period, they are the ones who deny the reality of naturally caused climate change.
Well, if he can’t take the heat (IOW, the perceived vitriol and hate), he should get out of the kitchen. Whiny little pr*ck.
As others have noted, I’m eagerly awaiting FOIA’s release of the password. I have the popcorn ready to go…
What?
Is AlecM is familiar with the field of IR Spectroscopy?
.
For those commenting that CO2 absorbs IR (then immediately re-emits it), keep in mind that the so called “heat-trapping” effect is primarily exhausted once the level attains its pre-industrial level of atmospheric concentration, and due to the logarithmic (think inverse of exponential for the math deprived 🙂 ) temperature increase to CO2 increase, the higher levels of CO2 in the atmosphere due to humans has very little, and an ever diminishing effect on, “heat-trapping” capability.
Why do I have to keep pointing this out?
But, commieBob, what of all that ‘convection’, the transport of ‘sensible’ heat to ‘the poles’?
Doesn’t that ‘heat’ somehow just ‘gravitate’ through the polar vortex using an as-yet undiscovered form of energy?
/sarc
.
“Work” the numbers? Gee. I wonder which way. His dissertation committee should be fired. People like Trenbreth do not know the first thing about research protocol, and less about presenting their case. Funding cut? By their own mouths and keyboards, not by anything or anyone else.
”The science is solid, but with a larger group it’s harder to reach a consensus, and updates every six years are just too slow.”
A consensus on what? Too slow for what? To get governments to enact policy that fits your political views and environmental advocacy? Maybe I just don’t understand the definition of solid science. I seem to remember large uncertainties in the areas of clouds, feed backs, and personally I don’t understand how a little IR from CO2 is heating the oceans.
Perhaps to gain the consensus you are looking for you should use your political clout to stop the publication of papers that are critical with your position on climate change. Oh wait, you have already tried that…
”An example would be Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, where there was about 11 inches [28 centimetres] of rain. About one inch of that was due to human influence. Maybe that extra inch was enough to cause the levee to break.”
Really . . you couldn’t make it up , oh . . wait a minute …………….
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
So they know the results in advance of doing the research?
How remarkable and convenient.
AlecM says, 12 Oct2012, at 3:29am:
Trenberth has got himself to blame. His Energy Budget is based on the mistaken belief that a pyrgeometer measures real energy flux when it is actually the vector sum of the Poynting vectors in the detector’s view angle
and at 5:5am:
CO2 in dry air self-absorbs by ~200 ppmV. This is defined as the approach to a steady state emissivity, therefore absorptivity. What’s more, by ~10% RH at ambient, there is no effect of change of concentration of CO2 on emissivity. So, there can be no CO2-AGW. As for the real reason, it’s quite subtle; the IR emission in that band is switched off, standard heat transfer physics you use once you reject the false trail of ‘black body’ emission from the surface.
AlecM you speak like a true specialist. Trouble is I doubt whether many people reading this blog trail, even people who are engineers or physicists really understand and appreciate what you are saying.
Like you I am also strongly of the opinion that added CO2 has no effect whatsoever on global temperature. But my view is strictly empirical, based on the actual instrumental temperature record since 1850 which, to the evident annoyance of the warmists, is still after all these recent years stubbornly failing to demonstrate an alarming warming trend (only 0.41degC per century)
So here’s my challenge.
Contact me via Anthony and we will work together to come up with a cast-iron theoretical explanation based on the radiative properties of gases that is scientifically accurate but nevertheless accessible to a much wider general audience. It can be done!
I look forward to your response.
Notice of potential strawman erection; No denial or contention of the workings of the physics in situ has been made … however, you do look to be alluding to an assertion that the IR path straight-to-space is ‘blocked’ by saturation, but I _don’t_ take it that you _do not_ assert that additional IR flux will not cause nearby CO2 molecules to vibrate at some proportionately higher amplitude?
.
The link by Patrick at 1:22 am has this little gem not in the original at the end:
Edited, no doubt, to include the obligatory alarmist tripe.
Just previous to the IPCC’s 15th Conference-of-Parties aka “COP 15” in December 2009, that November’s “Climategate” revelations terminally derailed Warmist propaganda blatted out for two decades by the Green Gang of peculating scamsters from Al Gore to Railroad Bill Pachauri down.
Dispassionate, objective, even rational scientific debate has never been AGW cultists’ point at all. At root, extreme-radical Luddite sociopaths such as Paul Ehrlich, John Holdren, Keith Farnish seized on this Doomsday Narrative to promote egregious frauds promulgated by the likes of Briffa, Hansen, Jones, Mann, Trenberth in any number of assiduously corrupt venues.
The object here is never scientific conjecture, positing testable hypotheses, but the explicitly totalitarian One World Order described in detail by death-eating thanatists like Kentti Linkola and Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, anti-Enlightenment reactionaries bent literally on regressing to pre-medieval times. By all means, refute these agents’ smoke-screen findings at length and in detail, but do not ever pretend that addressing them in good-faith debate will make the slightest difference.
Psst… Trenberth, [snip], if your activity demonstrates a serious lack of INTEGRITY, expect people to question your actions and statement.
You and your ilk made your bed… now lie in it.
NOAA received shovel-ready ARRA stimulus funds starting in 2009.
$830 million total for NOAA.
Of this, $170 million “to be used for climate modeling activities, including supercomputing procurement, and research into climate change.”
Perhaps Trenberth’s funding cuts coincide with the termination of the *temporary* ARRA stimulus funds.
In Washington, a three percent increase is a 20 % cut.
Using government math, the rate of increase for FY 2012 was cut by 81% (from 16% to 3%). It’s worse than we thought!
NOAA Budget
2010 actual — $ 4,748.7 million — increase
2011 request – 5,554.5 million 17%
2011 actual — 4,748,7 million 0%
2012 request – 5,497.7 million 16%
2012 actual — 4,906.6 million 3%
2013 request – 5,060.5 million 3%
__Jim says, but I _don’t_ take it that you _do not_ assert that additional IR flux will not cause nearby CO2 molecules to vibrate at some proportionately higher amplitude?
After my earlier challenge to AlecM about the need for simple clear explanatory language, I rest my case…!
This, so much this. I can not understand how someone who calls themselves a scientist can take the output from a computer model and call it data. They are indeed the hypothesis that should be tested — when you plug in forcing numbers for CO2 and H2O vapor and feedbacks, and then run the model, you should be taking those results and comparing them to actual, real-world measurements for validation. What you do NOT do is take the output and use it in an attempt to terrify people into giving you more money, power, or whatever.
I think this behavior, more than anything else, is what makes me think it’s a conspiracy rather than just incorrect science and someone’s favorite theory. Anyone who ever took first-year physics for non-majors would know better than to do what they’re doing.
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.”
“Torture numbers enough, and they’ll tell you anything you want to know.”
We have been warned, ladies and gentlemen.
– – – – –
It still is shocking to see the continued media bias when they state that the CG1 and CG2 emails were stolen by someone outside of the UEA CRU community. The investigating police and UEA CRU did not supply to the public any evidence of theft by outsider; they merely stated that they think so.
The alternate possibility of a ‘whistleblower act’ by an insider(s), which would not be ‘theft’, remains as valid as the outsider theft possibility. Both possibilities remain equally reasonable until the full details of the investigation are provided. I am impatiently waiting for the investigation details.
The media reporting in this case is intellectually dishonest.
John
commieBob says: October 12, 2012 at 6:27 am
The ONLY way the earth can get rid of heat is by radiation.
Isn’t the emphasis on “ONLY” a little strong. It is very likely true that the dominant method of earth heat loss is radiation–but the ONLY method? As I understand it, the mass of a helium gas molecule is small enough that a fraction of helium gas molecules at temperatures around 290 K possess a velocity that is in excess of the earth’s escape velocity (the velocity needed to leave the earth entirely). As a result, atmospheric helium near the upper atmosphere will escape to space. Isn’t this a non-radiative means of heat transfer to space?
Furthermore, in addition to absorbing IR radiation, greenhouse gases radiate. Isn’t it possible that the processes of (a) heat transfer to greenhouse gases via, evaporation (water to the greenhouse gas water vapor), conduction and radiation near the earth’s surface, (b) convection of the heated gases to higher altitudes, and (c) radiation from those gases to space have a net cooling effect on the surface temperature of the earth?
****
AlecM says:
October 12, 2012 at 3:29 am
Trenberth has got himself to blame. His Energy Budget is based on the mistaken belief that a pyrgeometer measures real energy flux when it is actually the vector sum of the Poynting vectors in the detector’s view angle; the subsidiary claim that the Earth emits IR as if it were an isolated black body in a vacuum.
The latter error is, to us professional engineers, a source of derision. How could these people be so stupid? Convection and radiation are coupled, a long established tenet of heat transfer engineering: http://www.thermopedia.com/content/204/
****
Trenberth’s & other team-player responses have been “it’s all taken care of in the physics of the models” or something-such.
Ahhh, yes! You have stumbled upon the dirty little secret of the budget process in the U.S. Actually, I don’t doubt that the process is identical the world over. Let’s say I have an agency with a $100 million budget for climate related studies. Next year I ask for $120 million. The evil Republicans say “No, you get $116 million.” Now I run around whining about my 20% budget cut. But wait, you say! It’s actually a 16% increase! No, in the la-la land inhabited by rent seekers a reduction of your increase is a budget cut. Franz Kafk, call your office.
They could erase the decrease in present funding by adjusting past funding levels downward.
I bet they could even make this year the most funded year ever.
Use by Trenberth of the term “denialist website” says it all really.
“Believer” and “non-believer” do perfectly well, without the nasty connotations…
And what a cry-baby. Grow a pair, Mr. T.
Commiebob: “The ONLY way the earth can get rid of heat is by radiation.”
Very true: the Trenberth perpetual motion machine exaggerates IR absorption in the atmosphere ~5x changing the heat transfer to mostly radiation. In reality, it’s mostly convection until near TOA, That heat energy is lost to space as IR. The other mistake is to assume DOWN emissivity at TOA =1; it’s zero because there can be no direct thermalisation of IR from kinetic factors.
The dip in the CO2 band at TOA is self-absorption of emission from the dry upper atmosphere, not evidence of IR from the surface being absorbed.
_Jim: “Is AlecM is familiar with the field of IR Spectroscopy?”
Yes and I worked for a very long time modelling and measuring IR heat transmission to and from GHGs. The problem with climate science is that it adds to net IR UP [UP PV** – DOWN PV] the DOWN PV, making the claimed black body emission for 16°C. This is a fabrication because most of the UP PV can do no work as it annihilates the DOWN PV [assuming a normal temperature gradient]. This is the most basic axiom of radiation physics, Poynting’s Theorem, and is why when you calculate a radiation equilibrium you subtract the S-B flux of the cooler body from the S-B flux of the hotter body taking account emissivities,absorptivities and geometrical view factor.
**Poynting Vector which for a plane wave averages epsilon0.c.E0^2/2. The UP and DOWN PVs
add together as the vector sum.
David Socrates; I am writing the radiation physics paper now. All I am doing is to transfer standard physics to replace the 6 basic mistakes made by Trenbetth, Hansen et. al. To be fair they inherited mistakes by, e.g. Sagan from van der Hulst, and Houghton. Sagan did not account for an important second optical effect which makes thunderclouds with rain drops convected to the top the highest albedo: the small drop claim was totally spurious to get AR4 approved. Houghton’s mistake was not to look at the boundary conditions properly when you use the two-stream approximation, itself imaginary because only net flux is real, and claimed lower atmosphere was a black body emitter [although later he talked of grey body emission]. In reality each GHG band switches off surface emission by the process of PV annihilation although the subtlety is in the side bands.
The reason why climate science went to the trouble of fabricating the BB UP IR needs explaining because it is not a real energy flux. Did they really not check other fields of study which show this is impossible except for an isolated body in a vacuum?
_Jim: “However, you do look to be alluding to an assertion that the IR path straight-to-space is ‘blocked’ by saturation, but I _don’t_ take it that you _do not_ assert that additional IR flux will not cause nearby CO2 molecules to vibrate at some proportionately higher amplitude?”
A good point. the first answer is that the GHG IR is turned off at source. The reduction of total emissivity caused surface temperature to rise to keep convection + radiation a constant sum at equilibrium. However, the side-bands are also important so it’s not that simple and needs to be worked out – think of the phenomenon of band inversion in optical spectroscopy.
Absolutely correct that CO2 is having a disastrous effect on this planet.
The Global Financial Meltdown can be directly attributed to the direct and indirect funding of this nonsense.
We know that there is a link between the Meltdown and the funding, we just have to work on the specific numbers.
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
How much funding do you need for this? You guys don’t gather data in the field. You operate models. Even Dr Mann says they couldn’t collect recent data from tree rings because of difficulty and cost so Steven McIntyre did his famous collection of bristle cones and back to Starbucks for coffee in Colorado in a few hours! It seems that it cost $50B or so to get where we are today in consensus climate science – being pushed to the wall by unfunded sceptics.
outtheback says:
“Absolutely correct that CO2 is having a disastrous effect on this planet.”
You sound like a lunatic. Prove me wrong. Provide hard data showing a direct connection between rising CO2 and harm or damage to the planet.
****
commieBob says:
October 12, 2012 at 6:27 am
The ONLY way the earth can get rid of heat is by radiation.
****
True. But the avg radiating altitude/temp is constantly moderated by convection. Convection pushes relatively warm, IR-radiating vapor/liquid/frozen water upward to high altitudes & increases heat-loss (also often reflects some incoming solar). Assuming warmer temps cause convection to increase, that’s negative feedback. The actual CO2 effect will be less than the simple theoretical doubling effect of ~1.2C.
D Böehm says:
October 12, 2012 at 10:14 am
I think (hope?) that outtheback was being sarcastic!
Kev-in-UK,
If so, then my apologies. That is why Anthony requests a “/sarc” tag, if the comment was intended to be sarcasm.
Kev-in-Uk says:
October 12, 2012 at 10:29 am
D Böehm says:
October 12, 2012 at 10:14 am
I think (hope?) that outtheback was being sarcastic!
————————————
I’m sure he was. Made me smile out loud anyway.
Just have to work on the specific numbers – it is priceless, really.
I wonder if Kev Trenberth worries about the third tranche of yet to be revealed/released Climategate emails???
– – – – –
I think when we see any of the public’s and the scientific community’s increasing rejection of both Trenberth’s work and his behavior, it is caused essentially by Trenberth himself. His work and behavior inspires little confidence in me of his ability to conduct publicly funded climate research in a truly open and fully transparent way. His activities have the appearance ( see CG1 & CG2 ) of being fundamentally biased by cloaked activist alarmism . . . while he was being funded by the US public.
I see the more open and transparent part of the climate science community, using a more objectively balanced and open scientific process, is self correcting for the deficiencies of the seemingly cloaked and biased nature of Trenberth’s work. It appears that the scientific community and public have largely moved on past Trenberth’s previous attempts (with the ‘teams’ aid ) to block the vital open process of scientific skepticism. I suggest that scientists do understand that open scientific skepticism is an essential aspect of all balanced and objective scientific processes. Given Trenberth did not understand that, then it more reason to mitigate against his continued influence in climate science.
γνῶθι σεαυτόν
John
Now, that is a truly profound observation. They actually “know” there are links between climate and weather!! Remarkable.
D Böehm says:
October 12, 2012 at 10:34 am
I think the progression to funding for this junk, to the Global financial meltdown made the /sarc unnecessary.
DaveE.
The Gray Monk says:
October 12, 2012 at 2:25 am
What happens to his argument when the numbers don’t add up? People like Dr. Trenberth see the majority of us as complete idiots, unable to see through the smoke and mirrors.
It takes a remarkable degree of self confidence to practice any form of science or engineering. KT probably doesn’t consider what he broadcasts as “smoke and mirrors.” He merely wants to separate the “true and beautiful” [his theory] from the noisy messiness of reality. That is pretty clear in his climategate complaint about missing heat and the data therefore being wrong. Theory clearly right, thus conflicting data must clearly be wrong. He argues like a philosopher rather than a scientist. So do most of the putative scientists on “the team.”
These models are not accurate representations of the atmosphere – at best they model a tiny fraction of it – and extrapolating anything beyond that is full of “uncertainty.” I know, I use models in my work. They don’t always replicate reality.
I would argue that models, which are always simplifications, never “replicate” reality, though a good one will approximate reality.
To avoid doubt, sarcastic yes in the sense of CO2 influence on climate but I did not say that.
By calling it nonsense in the second sentence I assumed that that would have been clear, but that shows once more what assume stands for.
While one would have to run the specific numbers through the most sophisticated computer model available to date, I am very confident ( I believe that means more than 95% in IPCC speak) that it will show that had we not spent all those billions in direct and indirect funding (with indirect I mean funds spent on alternative energy schemes etc) on this codswallop research and related issues the world would have been in a much better financial situation.
Hence the comment that CO2 is having a direct influence on the planet, I never said that it had any influence on the climate.
While I have never taken the time to add it all up the total cost so far of this debacle will be in the trillions, but like the supposed degree of warming we can debate endlessly what can and can not qualify as money spent on AGW related issues.
Imagine how much world wide poverty we could have reduced had we spent all that money on humanitarian issues, oh wait then we would still have been in the same Financial Meltdown. That is the trouble with money, we can only spend it once. Let’s spend it wisely.
Oops,
I formatted the links to the NOAA budgets wrong. They should be:
FY2011 http://www.corporateservices.noaa.gov/nbo/fy11_bluebook/FY_2011_NOAA_Blue_Book.pdf
FY2012 http://www.corporateservices.noaa.gov/nbo/fy12_bluebook/NOAAblueBook_2k12.pdf
FY2013 http://www.corporateservices.noaa.gov/nbo/fy13_bluebook/noaaBlueBook_2013_Web_Full.pdf
outtheback,
My apologies for misunderstanding. You were being funny, but there are lots of people who truly believe your sarcasm: “Absolutely correct that CO2 is having a disastrous effect on this planet.”
It cannot be pointed out too often that CO2 has no measurable effect on the planet. Therefore, AGW stops at the Conjecture stage of the Scientific Method. It is not even a testable Hypothesis, much less a Theory.
Why is he a survivor of the CRU emails? He should have been fired and charged with impersonating a scientist for grant money purposes. What bothers me here, other than the media failure and fake enquiries, is the money.It appears the USA put up the majority of the funding for what has turned out to be an attack on the US economy, way of life and individual freedom .
At what point, if this is true, does this become treason on the part of those who set this in motion?Here in Canada we are rid of the politicians who bought Canada into this scam but no criminal investigations have been announced to date, rather the federal govt is quietly cutting funding and suggesting layoffs are imminent within the civil service as they back away from the Kyoto BS and any further such nonsense. I suppose thats the politically appropriate solution but I want retribution, this fraud was and is an attack on our wallets and freedom and a betrayal of the public trust.
The comment that there must be an aerosol that causes these creatures to stop their nibbling at the roots of society and come out into the sunlight was priceless. The arrogance of the CAWG academics is amazing, if we challenge their assertions we are stupid little people who should defer to the majesty of our betters?These elected and appointed royalty must be removed from positions of trust and authority as in their promotion of the CAWG scam, and after the CRU emails, their attempts to defend the indefensible have shown they have zero in the way of ethics and credibility.
Climategate showed that the standards of climate science were way, way, below the public perception and that there were conflicts of interest. When the collapse of Enron showed that the accountancy profession had standards below the public perception and conflicts of interest there was no whitewashing. There was a instead a very heavy-handed raft of new regulations. Yet the conflicts and lack of standards in climate science are much below those of the accountancy profession a decade ago, and the consequences for humanity of this lack poses far greater consequences for our economic well-being.
“He believes uncertainties in climate change models *scientists rely upon* is being falsely inflated as a general uncertainty about the status of climate science.” [emphasis added]
A contradiction in terms. The models are unreliable, the scientists rely upon them, but we’re supposed to rely upon the scientists (at least Trenberth’s scientists). In fact, the models are more reliable than the scientists.
http://www.thesydneyinstitute.com.au/podcast/climate-change-what-we-know-and-what-we-dont-2/
It’s just that bloody earth that won’t cooperate.
That remaining 80% of funding needs to be cut straight away. It is snowing in Australia from Queensland to South Australia and the Warmistas are tucked up in bed with their Dunce’s Caps on trying to keep warm and hoping that no one notices their utter failure.
I’m confused. Is or isn’t weather climate? These climologists can’t even keep that straight.
What sort of inane comment is this?
“With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
I can tell him what the link is: when you average the weather over 30 years it is climate. It’s a definition; it does not need any further research.
CodeTech says:
October 12, 2012 at 2:27 am
he and his colleagues were cleared by a series of investigations
==========
conducted by folks that stood to gain as a result of the findings. The fix was in from the start. No outside witnesses needed or welcome, thank you.
Let me assist you. 😉
1) Weather is climate when there is a heatwave in the USA.
2) Weather is just the weather when it snows with freezing temperatures in Australia.
3) Weather is climate when Australia has one of its usual droughts.
4) Weather is and is not the climate / weather when Australia recently got Biblical floods.
and so on……………………………..
These scammers must know the jig is up. There massive funding fraud has to come to a slow and miserable end sooner or later.
I’m sorry, but would someone please explain to me how this is NOT an admission of a conflict of interest? We promote CAGW because our paychecks are linked to it.
David A. Evans says:
October 12, 2012 at 11:17 am
to a degree – yes, absolutely – but as an international forum, some folk may not always grasp the sarcastic over(or under)tones! (IMHO – It is worth remembering that ones mans humour can be anothers distress! – different strokes and all that…)
Do I detect the smell of burning martyr?
kinda off topic – but related to my previous comment re Trenberths (non) scientific attitude. I was wondering whether it would be a worthwile exercise to have poll of the actual scientists that frequent WUWT to ask if they (like myself) feel that science has all but been abandoned and denigrated within the climate science field.
I’m being serious here, and kinda curious to know if others (only the scientifically trained folk, not the layfolk) feel the outrage at the politically biased BS produced in the name of ‘science’ to promote AGW themes (or vice versa, the anti-AGW themes, which seems much less common!).
I write reports for a living and if in doubt, I always express those doubts, as a scientist and engineer. I know that some assumptions I make MAY be wrong or uncertain, but I always draw them to the fore, and any limitations of the work/study are important to admit and explain…. I really want to ask these people (as in the team) why they cannot do this themselves. Sure, everyone has their own preferences and biases – but when it comes to the scientific facts these should NEVER be twisted. For myself, as a classically trained scientist, I genuinely feel denigrated and disgusted by the actions of the ‘bad science’ exposed and outrageously promoted by the warmista – perhaps it’s because I am simply ‘old school’ – but the belief of the search for the answer and the truth within all aspects of science should be paramount in any scientifically trained persons mindset IMHO – or am I just too old fashioned ? has science moved on past the classical stance, and I am unaware of this?
I would seriously like to know how others view this aspect of the whole issue……..sometimes, I feel almost alone in upholding my scientific ‘principles’ – even though I am fully aware of other skeptics views of the ‘climate science’ as presented.
Look at it another way, if you see something published in your field that is obviously wrong or biased (I’m talking only science here) to my mind, you have a DUTY to point it out. In the true scientific world, this would already have been done by the author (self doubt and self questioning, etc), but assuming it ‘got through’; it should then be picked up by your peers (hence the term peer review!) – but if you and your peers are blinded by some agenda – how could the real truthful science ever be presented? This is the crux of what we are up against in the climate science arena. To me, it is an outrage and I would like to know how other trained scientists feel about this when they see and review the hysterical type headline papers. I’d like to ask them; when they see these types of papers, do they also feel disgusted and denigrated as scientists like I do? Do they feel outraged? or disenchanted with their own personal (as in, tarred with the same brush, if you will) scientific status?
In the old days, a peer reviewed publication was an illustration of the ‘acceptance’ of the findings as relatively ‘correct’ – but this is clearly not true today. How do current scientists view this situation? Do the young scientific pups of today ‘know’ that the publications are not necessarily validated correctly? In the old days, you would cite a paper or previous work by others ‘knowing’ it was relatively honest and truthful – can the same be said of the current climate science publications?
I have no problems with mistakes getting through the ‘system’ – sometimes, this is inevitable – but complete scientific BS (like most of the CO2=AGW rubbish) should never see the light of day!
Sorry for the long post/rant….but I do think a poll would be a good indication of understanding by others……
“…Professor Trenberth believes it had a big impact on public debates about climate science…”
WHAT public debates about climate science?
And, about that second statement “…An example would be Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans, where there was about 11 inches [28 centimetres] of rain. About one inch of that was due to human influence. Maybe that extra inch was enough to cause the levee to break..”
Yet sections of the Midwest are still classified as being in a drought. If human influence causes about an inch of rain, maybe that extra inch will be enough to cause the drought to break.
“we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work”
Trenberth needs to take a vacation from his PR job, and try doing science science. If the numbers don’t add up,they don’t add up, and adjusting the data like he usually does is getting tiresome. Oh, yeah, he knows they are there, but how does he know? He is blinded by his own confirmation bias. On top of that, we are paying his salary. The best and brightest do not work for government.
Dr., I like your posts generally, but otb’s comment is both simultaneously hyperbolic (extreme exaggeration) and serious. Note that the effect adduced is FINANCIAL, nothing whatsoever to do with atmospheric physics, and yet is a clever backhanded reference to the possibility that the climatology fraud and the engineered collapse were both machinations of the anti-industrialists like Strong, Holdren, and Ehrlich.
Do Germans do humour?
Brian H says:
“Do Germans do humour?”
Yes, if they read the comment closely, instead of scanning it and reacting too quickly. Lesson learned. ☹
kencoffman (@kencoffman) on October 12, 2012 at 4:19 am
I don’t see many skeptics attacking the fact that CO2 absorbs IR.
–Bill Hunter
That’s correct, I don’t know anyone who disputes the fact that CO2 absorbs IR in certain narrow bandwidths.
————
I do. That person claimed that a statement of principle by a Nobel laureate made the absorption of IR impossible. That person is of course an idiot. And can’t read to good. Seems like the fact that the statement of principle only referred to mono atomic gases escaped the idiots attention.
———-
The question is, can this dissipative cooling effect be used to do something highly useful like increase the Earth’s average surface temperature? This is like an intelligence test for engineers.
————
I would agree with the application of that intelligence test. Seems like some engineers would fail that test.
michael hart said on October 12, 2012 at 5:47 pm:
Do I detect the smell of burning martyr?
I love the smell of climate martyr in the morning.
Smells like… victory.
Gee, Dr. T, ya think the fact that there’s been no observable global warming for over a decade now, while at the same time the US has run $1T yearly decits 4 years in row. . . .maybe. . . .just maybe. . . meant Congress quite reasonably decided there are more important fish to fry just now?
”With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
This is pinko ‘science’ speak. Just as Lenin said, “Language is to be used to shape reality, not report it;” pinko ‘science’ says, “Numbers are to be used to shape reality, not report it.” And thus we have computer models telling us what ‘reality’ shoud be.
As a graduate (albeit about 10 years earlier) of the same high school (Linwood) and university (Canterbury) that Kevin Trenberth attended, I would like to say that I think that he is an embarrassment to his school, his university, his city of origin, his country (New Zealand), and most of all, to science. He has become a poster boy for all that is wrong with science in general and climate science in particular. I can understand how a graduate of an obscure university in a small country got seduced by the apparent glamor of the early AGW movement. The delusion and corruption have now become so pervasive and normalized that those involved in it remain blissfully unaware of the level to which they have sunk. The mainstream news media, wallowing in its scientific ignorance and leftist prejudice, bear a heavy responsibility for this situation. The truth is that Trenberth is a third-rate scientist from a small country, who has made it to the top of his “profession” in the U.S.. Unfortunately for him, and the rest of the world, this “profession” has turned out to be a stinking dung-heap that history will eventually view with all of the contempt it so richly deserves. It’s a travesty that the country that produced Ernest Rutherford and William Pickering, among others, has had its reputation sullied by this pathetic man.
Jackbill
@LazyTeenager. I Think the point is more can the influence of the radiative properties of CO2 in Scattering IR radiation slow down the emission of energy from the planet any more than it slows down the emission of energy to the planet from the sun?
@ commiBob – Sorry, you fail. Consider evaporation of water, the heat is converted first into the energy of vaporisation, then results in the raising of some Billions on Tonnes of H2O some 2-3 km into the atmosphere where it gains potential energy ostensibly from the heat input. The Water then condenses losing the heat of vaporisation and falls to earth as rain. Now what hits the earth is a few billion tonnes of water driven into the planet surface expended as energy into the gravitational system (Every action after all has an equal and opposite reaction) – So I am sorry, you are wrong some 1-6W per m2 of heat input that was used to raise the CO2 to 2-3KM elevation is expended as kinetic / gravitational energy and not radiated to space.
When I think about the past two decades of peoples’ careers ruined for these frauds, it makes me glad to know that eventually each of these despicable [snip] will have to get up in the morning to [snip] the last time. Couldn’t happen to a nicer bunch of [snip] when it does
[Over-the-top name-calling snipped – mod]
It’s possible that many climate scientists simply don’t have adequate multidisciplinary background to work productively on the following:
1. Solar Cycle Length/Frequency, Northern Hemisphere Sea Surface Temperature (SST), Pacific Ocean Sea Surface Temperature (SST), & 0.18 Degrees Celsius (°C) / Century:
http://i46.tinypic.com/303ipeo.png
2. Solar Cycle Frequency/Length, Antarctic Ice Specific Mass, & Terrestrial Geomagnetic Field Jerks:
http://i49.tinypic.com/wwdwy8.png
Progress on understanding multidecadal solar-terrestrial-climate waves needs to move rapidly & immediately (set a 1 year deadline and push hard), so some of the funding for climate research needs to be redirected to parties who are more likely to be up to the task, such as those at NASA JPL.
Despite what many of you think of him, I still like Kevin Trenberth. Some of his research gave me key insights into natural climate variations.
NCAR 2013 NSF Budget request (in millions): NCAR
2012 98.6
2013 92.3
-6.4%
Flash this relentlessly on the monitors of all climate & solar scientists:
=
Multidecadal Solar-Terrestrial-Climate Waves …
Solar Cycle Length/Frequency, Terrestrial Geomagnetic Field Jerks, Antarctic Ice Specific Mass, Northern Hemisphere Sea Surface Temperature (SST), Pacific Ocean Sea Surface Temperature (SST), & 0.18 Degrees Celsius (°C) / Century:
http://i48.tinypic.com/2v14sc5.gif
=
Their blurred vision must be snapped like a pretzel.
Vitriol and hate?
Obviously he meant to say reasonable criticism and much needed correction
Lazyteenager: ‘The question is, can this dissipative cooling effect be used to do something highly useful like increase the Earth’s average surface temperature? This is like an intelligence test for engineers.
————
I would agree with the application of that intelligence test. Seems like some engineers would fail that test.’
No-one can prove the emissivity of the Earth’s surface is 1 because if it were, you could never get radiative equilibrium. The proof is to imagine two closely spaced parallel plates with insulated backs in a vacuum. If inner-face emissivities did not fall to zero, there could never be zero net radiative heat transport, the definition of radiative equilibrium, and the plates would vapourise..
In the case of the Earth-atmosphere couple, the problem is a bit different in that the second plate has an absorptivity <1, otherwise there would be no 'atmospheric window', its back isn't insulated and there is parallel convective heat transport. However, surface emissivity in GHG band wavelengths must be <1 otherwise you could not get radiative equilibrium in those bands!
[More 'back radiation' would cause more UP IR from the Earth's surface, hence more back radiation and thermal runaway.]
The only way for this to happen is for GHG band thermal emission from the atmosphere to the surface in GHG bands to reduce surface emissivity in those wavelengths. Kirchhoff knew this because his Law of Radiation applies to all wavelength intervals. Read his works.
It's difficult for people indoctrinated by the 'GHG blanket' concept because it depends on emissivity being constant. Once you attack that premise they break into a hissy fit and shout 'denier', or in your case claim without any quantitative argument that I am wrong. Prove it……
LazyTeenager: “The question is, can this dissipative cooling effect be used to do something highly useful like increase the Earth’s average surface temperature? This is like an intelligence test for engineers.”
I answered this but the post seems to have disappeared. You appear to subscribe to the Aarhenius ‘GHG blanket’ idea. However this assumes the emissivity of the Earth’s surface is a constant level of unity. This is impossible because its real level is ~0.7, a near grey body, and at radiative thermal equilibrium between two bodies, de facto emissivity must fall substantially.
You prove this by a thought experiment, two infinite, parallel plates in a vacuum with insulated backs and initially unit emissivity/absorptivity inner faces. If the latter applies at all times and temperature is above absolute zero, radiation from first plate increases the temperature of the second and the 4th power emission in the reverse direction etc. means they’d vaporise.
The standard explanation of this is either the difficult to understand mathematical physics of Claes Johnson or my past attempts to introduce 4 rate equations [2 more with convection!] and statistical thermodynamics, equally impossible for most to understand.
I am now using Poynting vectors. For a plane wave the average is epsilon0.c. E0^2/2 [usual nomenclature, the electric field E0 is a strong function of the temperature of the emitting body] and in the direction of the wave. At the hotter body surface [the Earth], the net radiative energy flux in any wavelength interval is the vector sum of all the PVs at that point in space.
So, GHG thermal emission from the lower atmosphere results in lower net energy flux from the surface in that wavelength interval. This can be interpreted as a much lower de facto emissivity and the total de facto emissivity reduction from all the GHG bands leads to the rise in temperature of the surface, the real GHE. This is obvious to anybody with proper physics, just that the past nomenclature hid it from most.
The physics is complex. The 23 W/m^2 net IR absorbed in the atmosphere [2009 energy budget] is water vapour side bands; these can vary as other GHGs and temperature vary. There is also an increase in IR emission in the ‘atmospheric window’. As for convection, I’m not yet certain..
Please don’t try to justify the Aarhenius’ concept. It’s plain stupid and Bohr and Angstrom told him so at the time. However, it appeals to those like Trenberth with little physics’ understanding and for whom ‘back radiation’ is real energy, not imaginary except for an isolated emitter in a vacuum.
Comment for Paul Vaughan – October 13, 2012 at 2:37 am
Thanks for the interesting graphs. Can you link to a paper or website? What is the scale on your first graph? What are the units on both graphs?
I much prefer the work of Chris Landsea to that of Trenberth et al ( see post from 2011 below).
I urge everyone to read Landsea’s 2005 letter of resignation from IPCC4 (link below), which was caused by the actions of Trenberth. The Landsea letter was written years before the release of the Climategate emails in 2009 – it serves as an early warning of the unscientific, unethical actions of leaders within the IPCC.
Another clear early warning came from Richard Lindzen in a WSJ article on June 11, 2001:
(excerpt)
The full IPCC report is an admirable description of research activities in climate science, but it is not specifically directed at policy. The Summary for Policymakers is, but it is also a very different document. It represents a consensus of government representatives (many of whom are also their nations’ Kyoto representatives), rather than of scientists. The resulting document has a strong tendency to disguise uncertainty, and conjures up some scary scenarios for which there is no evidence.
Science, in the public arena, is commonly used as a source of authority with which to bludgeon political opponents and propagandize uninformed citizens. This is what has been done with both the reports of the IPCC and the NAS. It is a reprehensible practice that corrodes our ability to make rational decisions…
(end of excerpt)
Regards, Allan
________
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/12/02/hurricanes-and-global-warming-opinion-by-chris-landsea/#comment-817571
I’m not commenting on this paper – I haven’t read it.
I’m commenting on Chris Landsea.
I did some independent work on the subject of hurricane frequency and severity a few years ago.
In the course of my work, which included considerable background reading, I concluded that papers by Chris Landsea were logical, well-researched and worthwhile.
Landsea also showed great courage by resigning from IPCC4. Here is his letter of resignation:
http://www.climatechangefacts.info/ClimateChangeDocuments/LandseaResignationLetterFromIPCC.htm
I no longer read anything by Trenberth et al.
We can account for the lack of funding and it’s a travesty that we can.
Jackbill says:
October 12, 2012 at 10:57 pm
well said. I was lucky to go to a grammar school that produced two nobel prize science winners – Cockcroft and Wilkinson (my mates uncle actually) – there was never any hint of psuedo science a few decades ago, it was all about attacking the problem from all sides and seeing who cracked it first and then ultimately PROVED it was right – not some half ar$ed attempt to prove a posited conjecture using a clique group of ‘insiders’ all tweaking each others output to produce the same blinking result!
My belief is that climategate merely highlighted the arrogance and inadequacy of climate scientists as communicators as well as climate science as a study. Had they admitted there was data both good and bad and reported honestly that if you start from a belief in AGW the case for was 100% and if you start from disbelief the case is against is also 100% they might never have got as much in the way of grants in the first place but they would not suffer from the backlash we are already seeing and I hope will see far more intensely soon.
They were never entitled to any credibility the day they claimed the science was settled and from that day should have had a zero budget.
It’s not the result of any “online campaign” (yet another conspiracy theory), but rather the result of budget austerity. Whatever they try to use as an excuse to attack those who they think are responsible for their own problems.
It is really informative to read all of your comments in this thread. I was wondering if, in a different era, someone caught preaching the level of dishonesty we see from the warmists wouldn’t have been tarred and feathered and ridden out if town on a rail. They certainly deserve it.
So Trenberth wants to go from being a climatologicphrenolproctologist to a weatherman?
I’d get better information sticking my head out the window every morning than where his is.
Oh, and /sarc.
What nonsense from Kevin. Every NOAA program other than their precious NPOESS sp? has been cut to fund that beast. NOAA is also in a pinch for funding anything new because that is supposed to take a line in the congressional budget and the Democrat controlled senate has not passed a new budget in 3 years, forcing defaults to Continuing Resolutions of the 2008 or 09 Pelosi/Reid dream budget when Dems controlled both branches of congress+ the WH.
Judith Curry’s “Quote of the week”:
Allan MacRae (October 13, 2012 at 6:09 am)
“Thanks for the interesting graphs. Can you link to a paper or website? What is the scale on your first graph? What are the units on both graphs? […] work of Chris Landsea […]”
Units are normalized to facilitate visualization.
(If you need links to raw data, please feel welcome to ask.)
Thanks Allan. I hadn’t seen this [ http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/Landsea/gw_hurricanes/index.html ].
Note the match with Tamino’s recent analysis of North American East Coast Sea Level Rate:
Landsea tropical storms: http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2011/12/ts_trend.jpg
Tamino NY(Battery): http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/battery_30yrate2.jpg
Tamino “hotspots”: http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2012/09/hotnotratedepart.jpg
Above I’ve shown these:
http://i48.tinypic.com/2v14sc5.gif (slow animation of the following 2 graphs)
= http://i46.tinypic.com/303ipeo.png
+ http://i49.tinypic.com/wwdwy8.png
Compare with:
Indian Monsoon Rainfall, Japanese Sea Level, Atlantic Hurricanes, Atlantic Cyclone Energy, Solar Cycle Length/Frequency:
http://i40.tinypic.com/16a368w.png (Gaussian smoothing on rainfall, sea level, & hurricanes)
Consider solar cycle deceleration a universal index of integrated zonality vs. meridionality of terrestrial flow. I speculate that comparable structures exist for all star-planet pairs throughout the universe.
I have grossly insufficient time & resources to pursue this formally, but I continue to informally volunteer what I can when I can (at the disappointing snail’s pace that my severely constraining current employment circumstances afford). I request that you and others (including Drs. Trenberth & Landsea) support my efforts to secure local lifelong secure funding + secure pension to accelerate this exploratory work by orders of magnitude well before life clocks me out. Thanks if you & others can do something to help make this happen. I’m reaching out to all parties who appreciate & respect nature’s beauty.
Best Regards.
Perhaps sadly, Trenbreth’s race is almost run. There is only time for raising his voice to higher registers on the-end-is-nigh failed themes. He could never find his way back now. When he famously said in a climategate email to Mann
“The fact is that we can’t account for the lack of warming at the moment and it is a travesty that we can’t.”
I thought there might be some redemption for this man. Phil Jones, who admitted the climate hadn’t warmed in 15 years (2010), also had an obvious exit that he, like Trenberth passed up on. It makes James Lovelock, inventor of the Theory of Gaia – the earth as an organism, who backed out of the alarmist stance after climategate, a remarkable man at the age of 90 when he switched horses.
Kevin, my boy, its been a further three years of this no warming travesty. Your next opportunity to bow out is looming large – retirement age.
It just goes to show that coming up with complete crap doesn’t have to cost a fortune. You can quite easily do it on a small fortune.
After predicting a 4 C increase in Australia this summer, it snowed here last week. So if that is a warning for you in Northern Hemisphere I wouldn’t be pushing away your Ugg boots for a while?
It even snowed in Adelaide (SA) where snow hadn’t fallen for 100 years, much to the delight of youngsters who had never seen it before. We got it on the NSW Northern Tablelands, and of course our native birds are sitting on their eggs right now, awaiting their babies, so I went out and bought an extra large bag of wild bird seed to feed them and had visitors I had never seen before. It was delightful, the Rosellas were playful, one was hanging off one leg, upside down, looking down on the table where I had left the seed, imitating a sock next door to it.! I wish I had a photo of it! It amazes me the money spent on these so called scientists and the UN CCF for no avail. I hope they trip over running to the bank before the money runs out!
The rats have not even begun to jump off the IPCC cruise ship captained by a piltdown man, and swim away yet. Some merely complain about losing a few perks in first class and are eyeing the lifeboats. They are still in public denial that they have been holed.
“With the links between weather and climate for instance – we know they are there, but the specific numbers need work,” Professor Trenberth said.
I can answer this one; climate is the average of 30 years of weather.
AlecM says:
October 12, 2012 at 10:00 am
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I hope that you will offer a guest post here on WUWT when you finish your paper.
Thanks in advance.