Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach Much of the current angst at the UN regarding climate has to do with the idea of “climate reparations”. These are an imaginary debt supposedly owed by the major CO2 emitting nations to the countries of the developing world. As the story goes, we in the industrialized world have been “polluting” the atmosphere with the well-known plant food CO2, and despite the lack of any evidence of any damage caused, we’re supposed to pony up and pay the developing countries megabucks to ease their pain. 
In that regard, I’ve spent the morning laughing at the results I’ve gotten from the Japanese IBUKI satellite CO2 data. It shows the net CO2 flow (emission less sequestration) on a 1°x1° grid for the planet. Their website describes the project thusly:
The Greenhouse gases Observing SATellite “IBUKI” (GOSAT), developed jointly by the Ministry of the Environment Japan, the National Institute for Environmental Studies, and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (hereinafter the Three Parties), is the world’s first satellite designed specifically for monitoring atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) from space.
The satellite has been in operation since its launch on January 23, 2009. The Three Parties will now publicly distribute the data of global CO2 fluxes on a monthly and regional basis for the one-year period between June 2009 and May 2010. These flux values were estimated from ground-based CO2 monitoring data and improved GOSAT-based CO2 concentration data.
It has been confirmed that uncertainties in CO2 flux estimates can be reduced by the addition of GOSAT data to the ground-based observations. This is the first concrete demonstration of the utility of satellite-based concentration data in the estimation of global CO2 fluxes.
It is expected that this progress in the field of global carbon cycle research will lead to more reliable climate change prediction and to the development of effective environmental policies for mitigating global warming in the future.
So why was I laughing? Well, let me unfold the story. First, here is the map showing the net emissions for 2010, the only full calendar year of data in the dataset:
Figure 1. Net emissions by gridcell, IBUKI satellite CO2 data. Click to embiggen.
Now, there are some interesting things about this map.
First, it appears to be pretty accurate. For example, if you look at the lower right part of Australia, you can see the two big cities of Sydney and Melbourne as red dots in the sea of blue.
Next, you can see that while the central Pacific is a net emitter of CO2 (yellow band from above Australia to South America), the intertropical convergence zone immediately north of that is a net absorber. I speculate that this is because of the large amount of rainfall in the area. Atmospheric CO2 dissolves in rain, which is why all rain is very slightly acid. This absorbs more CO2 than in the drier area to the south.
In addition you can see that the tropics emits about twice as much as the temperate zones per square metre … not what I expected.
Next, by and large where there are lots of humans there is a lot of CO2 emitted. Yes, there are also some areas where CO2 is being emitted without much human habitation … but generally, humans = CO2.
So … I figured I’d take the data and divide it up by country, to see how much CO2 each country either emits or absorbs. The answers were pretty surprising … Figure 2 shows the top 20 biggest net emitters of CO2.
Figure 2. Net emissions by country.
That’s where I started laughing … I can just see France demanding climate reparations from India, or the UK demanding reparations from the “Democratic” Republic of the Congo … It gets better. Figure 3 shows the top twenty sequestering nations …
Figure 3. Net sequestration by country.
Funnier and funnier … Sweden and Norway get to demand reparations from Russia, Finland can send a bill to the USA, while Australia can dun China for eco-megabucks.
Now … how can we understand some of these results? I will speculate, as I have no direct data … although it is claimed to be in the IBUKI datasets, I haven’t got there yet.
First, there are two big missing items in the previous standard CO2 accounting, sequestration and biomass burning. In most of the poor countries of the world, they are so ecologically conscious that they mainly use renewable energy for cooking and heating. And despite being all eco-sensitive and all these uncounted millions of open fires burning wood, twigs, and trash add up to a lot of CO2. Plus a bunch of pollution making up the “brown haze” over Asia, but that’s another question …
In addition, both India and China have huge permanent underground wildfires in their coal seams, spewing CO2 (plus really ugly pollution) 24/7. The other wild card is sequestration. In Australia, I speculate that it is due to the huge amount of exposed rock and sand. The mild acids in the rain and the dew dissolves the rocks and sand, sequestering the CO2.
In Canada, Norway, Sweden and Finland, I’ve got to assume that it has something to do with being far north and having lots of forests … but there are still lots of unanswered questions.
Anyhow, that was my fun for the morning … someone should write all of this up for the journals, I suppose, but I always feel like I have to give myself a lobotomy to write standard scientific prose.
Anyone want to go co-authors with me and handle the writing and the submission?
And my congratulations to my Argentinian, Brazilian, and Australian friends for winning the carbon lottery, they can demand climate reparations from every other country on the planet.
My best to everyone,
w.
BONUS GRAPHICS: Someone requested white color at the zero level:
And here are the breakdowns by region …
THE USUAL REQUEST: If you think that someone is wrong about something, please QUOTE THEIR EXACT WORDS. I SHOUT BECAUSE THIS IS IMPORTANT. QUOTE THEIR WORDS so that we can all understand exactly what you are objecting to. If you object to a long comment and all you link to is the comment, that’s not useful. We need to know exactly what you think is incorrect, the exact words that you find to be in error.
CODE: It’s ugly, but it’s here. It’s an 18 Mb zip file including code, functions, data (NCDF files), and product sheet. I think all parts are there, ask if you have questions.
SPREADSHEET DATA: I’ve collated the country-level data into a CSV file here.
DATA: It took a while to find it, because it’s at another website. You have to register first. Afterwards, log in, click on “Product Search and Order”, and select L4A global CO2 flux.
PRODUCT SHEET: The details of the various CO2 products are here, from the same website, not sure if you have to log in first. It’s also in my zipped file above.
This is exactly what I’ve been thinking about today, given that new satellite that just went up. It’ll be interesting to see what it shows.
Anyone care to wager odds on the raw data being available? Or do you think it’ll get corrected with no access to original data? Some of the things I read about the GOSAT indicated it might have a problem with dust fooling the CO2 detection. It’ll be interesting to see if they’ve resolved that. In any event, more data is better!
Thanks, Charles, fixed. Also, the dang WordPress ate all my carriage returns … fixed also.
w.
That is a cracker of an article Willis! Great find.
I am soooo proud to be an Aussie, hence ‘doing’ my bit to save Gaia from the invasion of the Carbon monster.
Thanks for the smile Willis. For both the data analysis and the thought that you need someone else’s help in writing. I find that papers have to be constructed in a slow laborious fashion, sort of like building a house, but then my writing skills are minimal.
My country of Canada is doing so well at sequestration that we can go full bore at the oil sands. Yipee!
Thanks, Willis, excellent article. I’m pleased with New Zealand’s result – the seventh largest CO2 sequestering nation on the earth. Not bad for a little short of 4.5 million people! I’ll let our Ministry for the Environment know and perhaps they’ll take the ETS tax off petrol, diesel, electricity, gas, etc. But don’t hold your breath.
“It is expected that this progress in the field of global carbon cycle research will lead to more reliable climate change prediction”
Ha ha ha. That’s a good one. Since climate change has nothing to do with CO2 concentrations or emissions, it’s a given that ANY predictions based on this data had better be ZERO HAPPENS or they will be TOTALLY WRONG.
As there is no such thing as a greenhouse gas and no gas at any concentration in the atmosphere can drive the climate, this is just part of the political agenda to decide who gets to pay for being humans not starving to death, per the UN’s Agenda 21.
Global warming “science” requires that the upper tropical troposphere must be warming faster than the surface. Not only is this region of the atmosphere not warmer, it has been cooling over the last few decades. [And the surface has not significantly warmed since 1992.] There is NO HOTSPOT in the upper tropical troposphere.
And, as that region is -17 deg C and the surface is 15 deg C, it is impossible for this atmosphere to warm the surface—completely against the laws of thermodynamics. Sure, pure CO2 in a bottle irradiated with IR radiation can get warmer, but that is a greenhouse effect in a bottle. The bottle prevents convection but our atmosphere has convection in the form of the water cycle, a huge global heat engine that ramps up with any warming and exerts a negative feedback effect. It is responsible for about 85% of the energy transport from the surface and is totally ignored by global warming “science.”
From the article above:
Odd. I cannot justify any reason for Antarctica to be a light green color.
The 14 Mkm^2 continental land areas and 3.5 Mkm^2 shelf ice are permanently ice-covered with very, very little precipitation. Ice will absorb little CO2 from the air compared to forests and tundra, but emit little either compared to deserts or burning fuels.
The seas are a near circular ice-covered band outside of the continental rock area extending 100 – 1600 km out from the land depending on day of the year, but that band will reduce significantly between October and February as the ice melts and exposes cold open ocean. So a yearly plot may be disguising significant CO2 absorption into the exposed and covered seas during part of the year.
In the Arctic, as the sea ice melts, more CO2 can dissolve into the newly-exposed waters that were formerly ice-covered. A benefit of melting Arctic ice? 8<)
Interesting that there is no European Union data – just a bunch of independent states. What a convenient union they have.
Check out the red in Indonesia!
They may have to institute volcano credits.
What then is this “Carbon Pollution”?
A sinister, evil collusion?
CO2, it is clean,
Makes for growth, makes it green,
A transfer of wealth, a solution.
Yes the transfer of wealth is already taking place in increased plant growth from CO2 producers to CO2 consumers.
http://lenbilen.com/2014/02/22/co2-the-life-giving-gas-not-carbon-pollution-a-limerick-and-explanation/
Is there any chance that climate reparations can be sought within a country itself from one party to another? If so, is IBUKI sensitive enough to detect this? Because I have a nagging suspicion, if it is, that Washington and its immediate suburbs would likely owe the rest of us in the US significant climate reparations. Of course they’d use our tax money to pay it.
The time period of this data is taken right during the 2009/10 El Nino. The mainly neutral ocean agrees with what F. Engelbeen was saying that the vegetation cycle is a large part of atmospheric co2 changes. It will be interesting to see the next year after this one as mid 2010 drops quickly to a -2 La Nina.
It would be nice to see the map with white as the neutral color, maybe 0.1 to -0.1, to better display the variation.
RACookPE1978 says:
July 5, 2014 at 6:42 pm
Thank, RA. If you look at the header in Figure 1, it gives the average value for the Antarctic (south of the dotted line at 66.5° south) as 0.001 … about as near to zero as one can get. As you point out, very little emission, very little absorption.
All the best,
w.
Hmm… this fits a theory of mine, although some readers will be tired of my thoughts on this. All atmospheric gases except diatomic oxygen are diamagnetic – repelled by a magnetic field in proportion to the strength of the field. Meanwhile, oxygen (O2) is surprisingly fairly paramagnetic – attracted to a magnetic field.
Originally, my thoughts on this related to the ozone hole, since ozone would, to some degree, be pushed away from the poles and, of course, most are aware of the low ozone over the poles except when it is being created by UV at maximum sun from abundant O2. The effect would be strengthened by the positive attraction of O2 to the polar areas which would tend to assist repelling of the other gases. It was then that I had the thought that this would also mean a coincident CO2, methane, N2, noble gases hole at the poles and a tendency to push the diamagnetic gases toward the low magnetic equator (confounded by weather and bio activity but possibly a measurable effect – most notably the inert noble gases).
Well the data of UBUKU is not conclusive but it doesn’t torpedo my idea. Here is a look at the Ozone hole. Note the thickening of the ozone in the temperate to equatorial zone, I like to say like the roll of a turtleneck sweater.
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/
Now if they would just do the other natural atmospheric gases, it might have something.
At about the start of 2010, Australia had really good rains over most of the country.
Massive greening of the deserts occurred.
The new plant growth would have been sucking up CO2 like nobody’s business. !
goldminor says:
July 5, 2014 at 7:13 pm
First, the ocean is not “mainly neutral”. It is slightly negative, which conceals the fact that it has areas of emission and areas of absorption of CO2.
Next, because it’s so big, despite being only mildly negative, the total sequestration is about -1.5 gigatonnes/year, about five times that of Argentina (see Figure 3) …
Here ya go … the problem is that it kind of occludes the variations on the land.
w.
Any animating gifs of this data? Will be very interesting to see full cycles complete with El Niños and volcanic eruptions.
Chiefio posted about the IBUKU results, back in October 2011. He showed the real kicker, which is the amount of CO2 taken up by various areas as compared with the amount emitted.
It turned out that the US, Europe and Russia absorbed approximately all the CO2 they emitted, mostly because of intense agriculture, and in the US also the re-growth of forests. Most of the net CO2 emissions came from sub-Saharan Africa, South America, and central China.
As Chiefio quoted, “Gesturing to an indelible deep green hue streaked across the United States and Europe [JAXA spokesman Sasano told TV viewers], “in the high latitudes of the Northern hemisphere emissions were less than absorption levels.””
So, as Chiefio noted, it appears that countries of the southern hemisphere and China owe CO2 reparations to Europe, Russia, and North America.
I would love to see this blogged against population size/CO2. Then the whole list would show per-capita.
Bets on, it will be surprising.
This IS funny.
Pat Frank says:
July 5, 2014 at 7:50 pm
Thanks, Pat. I’ll have to take a look at that, Chiefio does good work.
However, it’s not true at all that “the US, Europe and Russia absorbed approximately all the CO2 they emitted”. The US and Russia are shown in Figure 2, they definitely emit more than they absorb. Here’s the breakdown by region:
w.
Looks like a lot of emissions in central regions of Africa. Will they be sending a check soon?
How much impact does population density have? Surely millions of people in dense urban areas exhaling CO2 24/7 must have some noticeable effect?
Pat Frank said: “So, as Chiefio noted, it appears that countries of the southern hemisphere and China owe CO2 reparations to Europe, Russia, and North America”
Why not make the reparations process even more granular? Within the U.S. why not let the industrialized northeast and upper midwest buy carbon credits from the carbon absorbing states? Instead the administration has proposed future C02 guidelines which are punitive to states that are not contributing net C02 emissions. What’s up with that?
All that “policy makers” should care about is that the money and power shall filter through them. Let the flow of taxes/reparations/carbon credits/stimulus funds begin!
A small point, but it seems odd to show the scale dark blue, green, light blue, yellow. People generally understand that green lies between blue and yellow – and indeed that green is neutral. When you look at that mass of green, you don’t get the feeling that this is the equivalent of orange on your scale. I’d suggest the graphic would be much clearer if you eliminated green and stuck to blues/purples for absorption.
In Australia, I speculate that it is due to the huge amount of exposed rock and sand. The mild acids in the rain and the dew dissolves the rocks and sand, sequestering the CO2.
————————————————————————————————————–
Not so. its where the there is a high concentration of trees. Eastern Aus isn’t all desert!
Mild acid rain? Nonsense. Are there red dots in Sydney/Melbourne looks more like yellow or orange?
Looking at figure 1, it is strange that Tibet would be such a strong absorber of CO2.
@ Willis…Thanks for the alternate ‘white’ graph. I thought there was more neutral to the oceans. The colors used, blue to green, for negative are not so easy to take in. I did color matching of paints and stains for almost 3 years. The hardest color to match was the greens.
If the so called CO2-experts had realised that they don’t have a case, that be the day….
What they got is figures from stations on land and in sea not placed there for CO2-alarmists needs but for vulcanoexperts to be able to find a pattern in order to be able to warn for next exuption and/or earthquake.
As if that not all, the satellites never ever measure anything but reflexion when it comes to temperatures – not the same as actual temperatur on surface; and CO2-figures from what best could be said to be alike “photos” – changes in colors by using certain filters. Now the later never is the same for a certain area in time, over time and above all never ever after “corrections” As you all know land that seen a heavy rain aren’t looking the same neither on land or from “air” before and after – depending on ground circumstances a heavy rain can cause problem in part of your land (ask any farmer if you don’t believe me) but 200 meters from the problem area the situation can be a complete different situation. Thus the satellites using data which in it’s raw-fact situation is based on what best can be described as colors can seem alike for a large area but on ground the situation can be from water drained to overflooded within short distance on land but a small seen from satellites….
All so called CO2-analyses also have one other big problem: When ever you have readings which best can be described as apples and peaches – they all could fall under same label “fruit” but they never are exactly the same nor taste the same with or without “correction”…..
In addition you can see that the tropics emits about twice as much as the temperate zones per square metre … not what I expected.
Next, by and large where there are lots of humans there is a lot of CO2 emitted. Yes, there are also some areas where CO2 is being emitted without much human habitation … but generally, humans = CO2.
————————————————————————————————————-
Yes in tropics for other reasons.
Not necessarily so re humans. The thing missing in this “analysis” is that there are huge quantities of soil organic matter that are released to the atmosphere not just human emissions.
http://globalecology.stanford.edu/SCOPE/SCOPE_23/SCOPE_23_3.2_chapter4_111-127.pdf
Perhaps you should have researched this a bit more thoroughly.!
Willis
That was quick, Very interesting. of course it is unfortunate that there is only 1 full year of data. As I mentioned in the other article, if you have time to add DLR and OLR as overlays, it would be interesting to see whether there is any correlation with CO2.
Given the sinks, is CO2 well mixed?
Some of the results are surprising. For example, I have lived in both Norway and Sweden and whilst I am not surpirsed that both are net sinks, since they are both well forested with small populations, it surpirses me that Sweden is more of a sink than Norway; Sweden has a larger population and is more industrialised (Norway’s main industries are off-shore such as oil, gas, shipping and fishing). It may be something to do with the high northern latitude.
I share your view about ‘false’ accounting involved in burning biomass. The inescapable fact is that bio mass has a low calorific value and hence per unit of energy required more mass has to be burnt and more CO2 is produced. That is why it is madness to replace coal generators with biomass generators.
The lie rests within the claim that the bio mass absorbs during its own lifetime as much CO2 as it emits when burnt, such that it is CO2 neutral. That may apply to the planting of a new forest (ie., to forest land which before was simply barren land), but it is not applicable when you cut down a forest and replace an existing forest with a new forest. The old forest was already absorbing CO2 and would have continued to do so, if it had not been cut down. Accordingly, cutting down the old forest and replanting it so it grows back does not change the CO2 budget at all. Nature has, of course, already solved so many ‘problems’. If the government is truly concenrned about CO2 emissions and will not sanction new coal or gas powered generators without CCS, the simplest solution is to build a conventionally fueled generator (or keep an existing conventional fueld generator in service) and plant a new forest, ie., plant a forest on what is presently simply scrub land.
I believe that this ‘falsehood’ was based upon the assumption that young trees grow faster and therefore absorb more CO2. That assumption has always surprised me given the volume of a cylinder (such that a small increase in girth of an established tree involves more mass than a large increase in girth of a young sappling) and the canopy area of an established tree is far larger.(with presumably correspondingly more leaves). Recently, I saw a paper (unfortunately I have not got the reference) in which the CO2 absorption of young and old trees was compared and the conclusion of that paper was that old trees absorb just as much if not more CO2 than young trees.
The upshot of this is the point you make with India. It would reduce emissions in India, if they were to electrify and build conventional power generators such that wood burning stoves for cooking and heating were no longer necessary or used. It is ironic that providing poorer countries with conventionally powered generation would in fact be ‘green’ in the sense that there would be less CO2 and modern designed generators are far cleaner pollutionwise to open burning of wood.
I bet Australians would have liked to have seen the data and your analysis before the implication of their much hated carbon tax. The government would have had a hard time selling it to the public if that data had been widespread news in their MSM. It does show how ‘dishonest’ government are since I suspect that the government new that Australia was not a net emitter of CO2, even if they dod not know how big a sink it is. .
“First, it appears to be pretty accurate. For example, if you look at the lower right part of Australia, you can see the two big cities of Sydney and Melbourne as red dots in the sea of blue.”
I don’t think so. Sydney is more than a dot now. Compare Darwin to the East coast of Australia.
http://www.mapsofworld.com/australia/population.html
Etna in Italy emits a lot of volcanic CO2. Are volcanic emissions filtered out of the reported results?
The ref to M. Burton (INIGV?) in the livescience article doesnt seem to be available. Not sure if that is significant
http://www.livescience.com/40451-volcanic-co2-levels-are-staggering.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+Livesciencecom+%28LiveScience.com+Science+Headline+Feed%29
You would think New Zealand would be able to congratulate itself on being a net Carbon sequesterer. But no. Apparently our cows belch and fart so much that the inclusion of methane puts us back among the ranks of the sinful. I woud have thought all those drained swamps and wetlands converted to productive farmland would have counted as positive in terms of cutting methane emissions. But apparently no. Of coyurse that doesn’t stop the Greens from also blaming us for destruction of wetlands.
Is the red path in the Northern territory of Australia related to scrub fires?
I’ve been pointing out for a couple of years that Australia absorbs about 20 x what it emits, and that the increase in bioproductivty due to the change in CO2 concentration from 360 PPM to 400 PPM has already completely offset Australias anthropogenic emission. Australia’s Nett emission is already below that of 1995. We’ve done our duty now and all the green schemes can be cancelled.
PS, I want to be the one to send Australia’s reparation bill to India, I think Rajenda Pachurri in particular should pay up…
What is the cause of all the CO2 coming out of the southern portion of central Africa?
Richard T,you should do a write up on this and try and get it in “Stuff” news. They are having a run on global warming now.
The developed countries may not be guilty as stated but their politicians have pleaded guilty, and even working hard to pay reparations for their guilt. Principle 7 of the Rio Declaration as signed by almost 192 countries is ” States shall cooperate in a spirit of global partnership to conserve, protect and restore the health and integrity of the Earth’s ecosystem. In view of the different contributions to global environmental degradation, States have common but differentiated responsibilities. The developed countries acknowledge the responsibility that they bear in the international pursuit of sustainable development in view of the pressures their societies place on the global environment and of the technologies and financial resources they command. ”
Then Principle 27 of the same declaration -“States and people shall cooperate in good faith and in a spirit of partnership in the fulfillment of the principles embodied in this Declaration and in the further development of international law in the field of sustainable development.” You could have the best lawyer and the best detective presenting evidence on the contrary but if the defendant pleads guilty and offered reparations, what could the judge do?
Hello. We Chinese have bought out the country you call Australia. We demand you merge the data sets together to give true Chinese position.
These results should be partitioned into Northern Hemisphere and Southern Hemisphere. Of course the SH would win hands-down, as that is where all the oceans’ water vs. land mass is. Accelerating Antarctic sea ice accumulation anyone?
Question? Is there a Keeling plot of CO2 for Antarctica?
One thing I always wondered about the Keeling Curve is, why it doesn’t seem to show economic slowdowns, like the 2009-2010 worldwide recession? Man-made CO2 output must have slowed but did a 2nd derivative of the Keeling Curve show this?
Willis,is it o.k. To use some of these figures on comments in our “Stuff” news in New Zealand?
MR. Willis, Thank you for taking the time to write this, but since reading your uncalled for tirade on Jo Nova’s blog I reached this point without reading it as you are no longer on my reading list and have gone from interesting to being a mere Mann in one easy move. It takes years to build a rapport, it only takes one ego-fuelled rant to end it. Along the way you have done WUWT no favours, but that is Anthony’s problem
I will move to reading the work of others, so Goodbye.
Thanks Willis, as usual an interesting read…
What is surprising thought are some of the blue areas, especially around Tibet. Pehaps as you suggested for Australia, the rocks are being disolved by acid rain?. However, in Australia the areas shown in blue are areas of thick forest and pastures running along the great dividing range of NSW.
Joel O’Bryan says:
July 5, 2014 at 10:20 pm
They are partitioned into NH and SH. Look at the header in Figure 1.
Billy NZ says:
July 5, 2014 at 10:40 pm (Edit)
Of course. Put in a credit to me and a live link to this post, so folks can come see the full extent of the humor …
w.
Willis you and readers need to look again? or for the first time? at Salby’s lecture in Germany where he shows the SCIAMACHY satellite data. It shows that the highest concentrations of CO2 occurs in the tropical regions of Africa and South-east Asia not in the industrialized areas. The graph comes up about 2/3 of the way thru the lecture. Hence the dominant emissions is not human but natural according to him. Your analysis I fear is somewhat flawed.
Also coming back to Australia as I indicated the east coast of Oz in New South Wales and Victoria (the blue bits) is trees/forest but there is also thick tropical forest in Queensland above the blue strip along the Oz coast. So why is it not showing blue?. Because the dead organic matter is probably much higher in the tropics is giving off more CO2 counteracting the sequestration there in comparison to the higher sequestration evident in the more southern area.
Dr Burns says (July 5, 2014 at 9:24 pm) “I don’t think [it is accurate]. Sydney is more than a dot now. Compare Darwin to the East coast of Australia.“.
It looks pretty reasonable to me. The high-population-density Sydney basin is about 80km across (a mere dot on the map), whereas there are always masses of fires burning in the Kimberley and the NT around Darwin. (Steve from Wingham “scrub fires?” – Yes.)
Perhaps the La Nina of 2010 and associated rainfall across easter Australia caused the blue ?
I applaud the data; this is something that give fundamentally new knowledge.
However, before one can start any meaningful talk of compensations between nations one has to separate out the manmade emissions from the natural ones. This data show the sum of both natural and manmade emissions.
Since CO2, like all gases dissolves more in cold water than in warm it is not surprising that the cold regions have more natural carbon sequestering than warm ones. CO2 dissolves for instance more in cold northern rain than in hot tropical rain.
Even if there was no human emissions at all, the tropics would probably be a net emitter and the Polar Regions a net sequester.
/Jan
Willis, thanks. missed the Fig legend NH v.SH.
Willis Eschenbach says:
July 5, 2014 at 6:27 pm
Thanks, Charles, fixed. Also, the dang WordPress ate all my carriage returns … fixed also.
====
probably because they’re Mac flavoured. Whenever I download any of your files I have to run them through dos2unix to get a readable file. You may want to do the same before pasting your text into WP, There’s a switch ( -m from memory) to convert Mac files.
Interesting graph of central Africa. I can tell you one thing for sure, most people in Ethiopia and Kenya have no idea and simply are stuggling enough to eat more than once per day to care about CO2 emissions. Many people still use dung and charcoal for fuel for heating and cooking.
I think those who feel CO2 is a problem should spend a month or two in ANY African country to get a grasp on how well off we are in the developed world.
Interesting too, as you note, that even though Australia has one of the most expensive “proice ohn cahbohn” the two largest Cities, Sydney and Melbourne, are surrounded by large sinks that dwarf emissions. How inconvenient!
The projection is not very helpful for seeing Europe. Can the data be also presented with the Greenwich meridian in the middle?
The main thing that looks odd in all this the Arctic which is major sink is not showing up at all.
Does this satellite have polar coverage or are they doing some kind of extrapolation and krigging frigging to fill it in? No satellites have full polar coverage yet it looks like there are no blank regions at all.
Looks like they’re making things up. Is this documented?
Even if there was no human emissions at all, the tropics would probably be a net emitter and the Polar Regions a net sequester.
/Jan
Which is a major worry with this dataset I think they method ( note that is method , not methodology ) needs close scrutiny. Trouble is the Japanese are even more inscrutable than Europeans with their data.
Willis Eschenbach:
Thankyou for this article which provides another reason why climate reparations are illogical. I agree – indeed, applaud – much of what you say, but write to provide a nit-pick.
You assert
I caution against confirmation bias: the easiest person to fool is always oneself.
If those Australian “red dots” are because of concentrated human habitation then why is Sub-Saharan Africa a red region? You suggest it is probably because the human population of Sub-Saharan Africa is burning wood and dung for fuel: you write
I can argue that your suggestion is extremely improbable for a variety of reasons, but there is no data that would show which – if either – of us is right.
Simply, your essay implies the major imbalance between CO2 emission and CO2 sequestration is the existence of the human emission. However, that is not true. The natural emission varies with the time of year (this is the Mauna Loa variation) and the variation demonstrates that the natural imbalance is more than an order of magnitude more than the anthropogenic (i.e. from human activity) CO2 emission.
Importantly, you say you analysed
One can only analyse the data one has, but a single year is not typical and 2010 certainly had its net emission from nature because of the ENSO phase in that year.
During the past week a new satellite has been launched to provide additional data on atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Hopefully it will add to our knowledge so we can obtain data which demonstrates if the major cause(s) of the recent (and continuing) rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration are natural or anthropogenic. At present analysis is hindered by confirmation biases of those who champion a natural or an anthropogenic cause.
I write to congratulate you for your estimates of national net emission totals for year 2010, to caution about your calculated values as they apply to all years, and to caution about confirmation bias with respect to attribution of sources and sinks of CO2.
Richard
RACook says: “. I cannot justify any reason for Antarctica to be a light green color.
The 14 Mkm^2 continental land areas and 3.5 Mkm^2 shelf ice are permanently ice-covered with very, very little precipitation. Ice will absorb little CO2 from the air compared to forests and tundra, but emit little either compared to deserts or burning fuels.”
Yes, more evidence that they are totally fabricating the polar regions. (and how much else ?!)
BTW there is no such unit as Mkm^2 , you cannot compound prefixes like that, it’s not in the standards and it’s ambiguous. An engineer should know better: 10^6 km^2 or million km^2 please. megakilometres^2 , no go.
” humans = CO2″
Not so fast.
It’s a bit cryptic, especially in the google translation, but it appears the data product is not pure satellite data. There could be a bias introduced by the placement of ground based senors, probably near urban centers, and the way they are blended in. If the test for “the uncertainty… is reduced” is, “how well do results agree with what we expect?” then the whole thing may be a circular exercise.
Chiefio did a similar piece in 2011, my question is: why haven’t the media picked it up and plastered it all over since then?
http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2011/10/31/japanese-satellites-say-3rd-world-owes-co2-reparations-to-the-west/
Joel O’Bryan says:
July 5, 2014 at 10:29 pm
Question? Is there a Keeling plot of CO2 for Antarctica?
Yes, you can find it at:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/dv/iadv/
The data for many ground, ships and flight measurements can be plotted there.
The South Pole data are available as flaks samples and continuous measurements. The trend is similar to the Mauna Loa data, but with a lag and with less seasonal variability, which is a lot smaller in the SH than in the NH. The lag shows that the main source of extra CO2 is in the NH and the seasonal variation is dominated by the extra-tropical forests in the NH, as can be deduced from the opposite δ13C variation over the seasons.
A Great Post, Willis, thanks a lot.
I wonder if any political figure anywhere will see this output from the Ibuku satellite and notice the implications of it…..No that’s very unlikely, I guess.
CO2 measured at Alert, Canada (82N) shows a very large annual swing that looks a lot like the variation in ice coverage, with a sharp trough in mid September.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=970
Surprisingly this is very close in form and magnitude to data from the Black Forest area of Germany.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=985
This cold water region with huge abduction of cold saline water continually sinking should be a major CO2 sink. I think this data is highly questionable.
Why has it taken them 5 years to get around to releasing just one year of data? Do the other years contradict what they’ve released.
Don’t forget that until it’s been reproduced independently it is not validated.
I’m very suspicious of this data and what they’ve done with it.
So Australia is emitting even less CO2 than Antarctica? Not a lot of industry there (i.e. none).
Willis, you should definitely write this up in a more formal manner- it might just render the current expressions of ‘Western’, CO2 producers guilt, rather mute.. This is assumption rattling stuff.
Dear Willis,
Thanks a lot for this analysis… That gives a nice overview of the main fluxes but…
Some caution about the data: As far as I remember, the direct measurements are accurate to +/- 5 ppmv and they measure CO2 concentrations, not fluxes. From the concentrations they calculate fluxes, but without ground flux measurements – as measured by the “carbon tracker” program (see http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2141884/ ) the flux calculation is rather questionable.
One of the main problems is the combination of wind, upwelling and temperature in the tropics. The main upwelling of CO2-rich deep ocean waters in in the tropical Pacific near the Chilean coast. With the trade winds, that blows mostly over the Pacific Ocean. With an El Niño, that blows over land, including an extra release from land due to higher temperature and drought. So one year is not another year…
About one third of human CO2 emissions – as quantity – is absorbed near the poles, but that doesn’t show up in the satellite fluxes. Compare the ocean plot from the satellite with the ocean plot of ships measurements over the oceans compiled by Feely e.a.:
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/feel2331/mean.shtml
Thus until more accurate data are available, I wouldn’t wait for our CO2 compensation paycheck…
Ferdi says: “The lag shows that the main source of extra CO2 is in the NH and the seasonal variation is dominated by the extra-tropical forests in the NH…”
Thle lag could be due to the inverted seasons, you seem to be jumping to conclusions there. Equally the reduced amplitude could be because of the larger area of water acting as a sink and reducing the variation.
Yesterday you said the variation at Schauinsland was greater than at Alert. That is incorrect. They are virtually identical.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=985
Willis Eschenbach says:
July 5, 2014 at 6:27 pm
Thanks, Charles, fixed. Also, the dang WordPress ate all my carriage returns … fixed also.
w.
That’s done it, W. You’ve given Trenberth another excuse for the heat. WordPress ate it.
Here is the daily data from MLO with a fitted model
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=721
compare to the Arctic and Black Forest
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=985
Willis,
As an additional note: indeed CO2 is absorbed by rain, but the quantities are minimal. Because fresh water is becoming acidic, the solubility of CO2 in rainwater is reduced to 1.3 mg/l (/kg) at 0.0004 bar atmospheric CO2 pressure. That means that 1 mm rainfall is good for less than 1 ppmv change in 1 m3 of air near ground (the first meter above 1 m2 of ocean or soil) if all CO2 is set free…
Of course, much depends of the quantities of rain and air circulation involved, but as the latter circulates between dry and wet areas, the differences may be minimized faster than rain can make a difference…
Thanks Willis, interesting post.
Unfortunately for the alarmists it has now been established that it is impossible to differentiate between volcanogenic and FF produced CO2 because they are isotopically identical.
By the time net benefits for higher agricultural yields are calculated in, China and India actually owe us money.
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/feel2331/images/fig06.jpg
Thanks Ferdi, that looks more credible. Also not the strongest upwelling source ( though probably not the biggest in overall volume ) is the tropical Indian Ocean.
This was also demonstrated by one of the Scipps “cuise” missions.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=715
That´s great. In Uruguay we have the best beef in the world, and we just love our “asados” (grilled beef made with wood embers). Now I am living in Spain, and I really miss them. But it is great that we can have enjoy them without remorse (not that we ever had any bad feeling, I assure you)
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=715
This map also clearly shows the importance of temperature on the net flux. Assuming 1995 was not a freak year, this supports Gosta Pettersson’s work showing that temperature effect on out-gassing is at least a important as human emissions.
“we’re supposed to pony up and pay the developing countries megabucks to ease their pain”
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0939571234/ecoimpegreepo-20?creative=327641&camp=14573&link_code=as1
Greg Goodman says:
July 6, 2014 at 1:19 am
I had the impression that Schauinsland had a higher seasonal amplitude, based on its CO2 plot, but that was because it had more outliers. Nevertheless, there is a lag between the SH and the NH and between altitude and ground level :
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/co2_trends_1995_2004.jpg
Equally the reduced amplitude could be because of the larger area of water acting as a sink and reducing the variation.
The main sink of CO2 is in the NE Atlantic. But the amplitude anyway is from vegetation, even in the SH, as can be seen in the opposite variation of CO2 and δ13C. If it was from the oceans, both CO2 and δ13C would go in the same direction.
Increased temperature will give more CO2 from the oceans and more absorption by vegetation, but as can be seen in both hemispheres: vegetation is dominant…
So; no need for Santa, his reindeer or any elves overtime this Christmas given this year’s gift giving windfall has come so early
Perhaps a tiny grudging comment from John Winston to encourage Tony A to finally ‘fess up, man up and come out; and better still that young Malcolm ought to consider physics instead of witchcraft as a path to the Big Gig
And of course, one and all offer a kind thought to Ray Evans shade and his untiring efforts to save the world’s great unwashed & clueless from themselves
Jo Nova has a good post on the same thing.
http://joannenova.com.au/2011/11/co2-emitted-by-the-poor-nations-and-absorbed-by-the-rich-oh-the-irony-and-this-truth-must-not-be-spoken/
Occasional sparse measurements of atmospheric CO2 does not constitute a detailed global map of fluxes. Otherwise there would be no need or justification for the OCO satellite launced a few days ago. The detailed data is absent and we already know that carbon cycle models are not up to the ask of estimating data where there is none.
A pretty graphic based on guesses remains just that.
johnmarshall says:
July 6, 2014 at 1:34 am
Unfortunately for the alarmists it has now been established that it is impossible to differentiate between volcanogenic and FF produced CO2 because they are isotopically identical.
Sorry, but that is not true. Volcanogenic CO2 is either from the mantle or subduction, the latter is mainly from seafloor carbonates which are around zero per mil δ13C. Deep magma CO2 is slightly lower in δ13C of around -5 per mil (with isolated exceptions to -25 per mil). Human and vegetation releases are average at – 24 per mil, which makes it possible (together with the absence of 14C) to know the origin of CO2 even near volcanic vents. See:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0377027399000761
http://www3.geosc.psu.edu/courses/Geosc518/15_Random_Mixing_Model/Chapter_15/Mantle%20Carbon.pdf
A map centered at the Atlantic would be nice.
Ferdi says: “The main sink of CO2 is in the NE Atlantic. But the amplitude anyway is from vegetation, even in the SH, as can be seen in the opposite variation of CO2 and δ13C. ”
The map you linked shows your “NE Atlantic” goes well above Norway. There is a large white area in most of the Arctic indicating no data. That is also a major part of the sink.
Have you thought that a large part of your “vegetation” attribution may be water-borne in the form of plankton?
According to Wikipedia, Australia has over 15 acres of native forest per person so it should be a net sink
cynical scientist says: “Apparently our cows belch and fart so much that the inclusion of methane puts us back among the ranks of the sinful. ”
I never recall seeing a single cow all the time I was in NZ. A land of sheep I always thought.
Ferdi: there is a lag between the SH and the NH and between altitude and ground level :
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/co2_trends_1995_2004.jpg
If you mean a time lag , I think you are seeing what you want to see. The inter-annual ups and downs seem fairly synchronous between all those regions. with possibly a greater magnitude in the north. There is a north-south gradient. How that can be interpreted in the context of the previous observation is not obvious.
Clearly this would be more informative if using monthly averages or even daily data.
Someone else was posting about this latitude gradient recently but I can’t recall his blog where he discussed it.
This is some thing that needs looking into, thanks for bringing it up.
As always, if you are interested in “trends” plot rate of change not some steadily increasing time series which is the integral of the trend and filters out most of the useful information, allowing you to read into it what you will.
Willis: The satellite is IBUKI, not IBUKU.
Ibuki means originally “fetal movement”, and is in general used for “a movement for a bright future.”
However, since Ibuku is a verb form of Ibuki (noun), your nomenclature is not utterly out of order.
The Japanese have had a CO2 satellite for 5 years? What does NASA hope to accomplish with another? Maybe since the Japanese have detected no meaningful change in sea level for several decades they must be wrong abut CO2 as well.
umm so that satellites been up for quite a LONG time
why>
do we have only ONE full year of data..an that ones so many years out of date?
just wondering:-)
I am not much of an R programer, but it would be interesting to see the CO2 data normalized on both a regional and national, “per capita” basis.
Greg Goodman says:
July 6, 2014 at 2:32 am
There is a large white area in most of the Arctic indicating no data.
The area covered by ice isolates the waters for more CO2 uptake. But there were ships surveys until the edge of the ice above Russia…
Have you thought that a large part of your “vegetation” attribution may be water-borne in the form of plankton?
Yes, but as plankton is far more abundant in the SH and especially around Antarctica, one would expect a larger seasonal variation in the SH, which is not the case.
Greg Goodman says:
July 6, 2014 at 2:55 am
Clearly this would be more informative if using monthly averages or even daily data.
It is also clear in monthly data:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/month_2002_2004_4s.jpg
South Pole CO2 data also go down in Austral spring and up in fall and δ13C goes opposite, thus caused by vegetation, despite the larger ocean area and less forests. The lag between Mauna Loa and Barrow is clear, the lag between SH and NH too, but as Samoa is in the influence of the ITCZ, it receives irregular extra CO2 from the NH peak during several months.
Greg Goodman,
These days by far the biggest export industry in New Zealand is Dairy. Cow numbers have increased dramatically over the last 10 to 15 years at the expense of sheep. Dairy is also more intensive than sheep or beef farming. Deer (Venison) is also tending to replace and/or complement sheep farming in some areas.
In addition the sheep are being bred for multiple births at lambing so these days the ewes are individually more efficient at producing lambs. Thus we don’t need as many ewes.
An accurate description would be that pastoral farming is a very strong and growing industry in NZ. We export tasty processed/recycled CO2 to all corners of the globe.
Written by an NZ Dairy farmers son.
Willis. Northern Canada is full of fresh water lakes. Does fresh water sequester CO2?
nickreality65 says:
July 6, 2014 at 4:46 am
The Japanese have had a CO2 satellite for 5 years? What does NASA hope to accomplish with another?
Much better resolution: less than 1 ppmv over a much smaller area… Should be capable to see individual strong emitters like power plants and industrial areas but also strong sinks like agriculture and forests…
Ferdinand Engelbeen
July 6, 2014 at 1:15 am,
I agree that the preliminary data Willis is working with may be doubtful. The net ocean uptake (Willis shows -0.006 gC/M^2/day) compared to the global average flux (+0.026 gC/M^2/day) seems clearly inconsistent with earlier estimates of net ocean sequestration. Of course, higher biomass sequestration might make up the difference, but then we would expect to see much less O2 depletion than has been actually measured.
This is excellent news.
I guess if we combine this data with some regional data (say from the study noted here- http://phys.org/news/2014-07-people-growth-nasa.html ) we could come up with a way to have say the Bay Area governments pay the more rural counties in the state for managing lands to improve carbon sequestration (and the albedo)-
..”The researchers found that the magnitude of changes in plant growth over the 29-year study period was different depending on the size of nearby population. Near areas defined as dense settlements – with about 500 people per square kilometer – the vegetation index increased by 4.3 percent. That’s less than near villages, where the vegetation index increased by almost 6 percent.”
A payment of say $200.00/ton for the biomass, and maybe something like $500.00 for not putting asphalt pavement on driveways. As we have some data for 29 years I guess we could even have the payments be retroactive. Seems like a fair scheme to me- heck if we can pay Sierra Pacific for not cutting trees in the forest, why not pay folks for actually producing something (greenness) that the powers that be say they value.
Instead of handing us a bill for “climate reparations”, a simple “thanks for all you have done for us, and particularly for helping to green the planet” will suffice.
nickreality65 says:
July 6, 2014 at 4:46 am
The Japanese have had a CO2 satellite for 5 years? What does NASA hope to accomplish with another?.
Control over the data?
Thank you to Willis for another outstanding contribution!
You really make us think!
When I scanned the top twenty Carbon Dioxide producers, and saw no mention of South Africa, I thought you had somehow missed us out – I felt hurt and disappointed. After all, is this country not the evil, fossil-fuel guzzling, climate-changing monster of Africa? Did our President not go to Copenhagen in 2009, and graciously offer to reduce our Carbon Dioxide emissions by 34%, a voluntary gesture not required by any international agreements? And is our Treasury not planning to introduce a Carbon Tax next year? Our concerned government already has a vehicle tax in place to punish those who would drive a car with more than a predetermined amount of the ghastly pollutant coming out of its exhaust pipe.
We use coal to generate most of the electricity in South Africa, with our peak load hitting above 34 000 Megawatts on a cold winter evening. And our Sasol coal to liquid operation is described by green activists as the biggest single point source of Carbon Dioxide in the world. Somehow, being only number 35 on the list of global villains does not seem right….
Given South Africa’s industrial activity, and our use of fossil fuels, it seems almost unbelievable that countries around us with hardly any major energy infrastructure can be net producers of more Carbon Dioxide than South Africa. Among them are Angola, Mozambique and Zambia. I think Willis is correct about all the biomass being burnt for cooking and heating in Africa. And I think most environmentalists have been suckered into believing that it is OK to burn biomass, because it can be replaced. The big problem in Africa is that it is mostly not replaced! The removal of firewood in most southern African countries far exceeds what is put back, and that has the same net effect as burning fossil fuel.
Remember too that Angola and Mozambique are recovering from decades of civil war. Vast areas of bush that took over farmlands during the wars are being cleared to plant crops – in some cases these are marginal areas where farming is not a proposition, and after a few years the land is abandoned. This has happened on a large scale in Zimbabwe where land invasions have turned many well-vegetated game ranches into barren wasteland.
In some places (like the Western Cape and KwaZulu-Natal provinces) South Africa resembles Europe more than any other part of Africa, and there are large areas of perennial agricultural crops as well as large commercial plantations of Northern Hemisphere pine trees and Eucalyptus from Australia. Tree planting has been done on a vast scale in South Africa and the greater city area of Johannesburg is reputedly the largest man-made forest in the world.
There is no doubt that South Africa has established a very large Carbon Dioxide sequestering capacity in all of these environmental developments, a factor that is never mentioned in all the alarmist nonsense that we hear from our green activists and the MSM, who have done a fine job of persuading politicians that we are a thoroughly bad lot, and must take extraordinary steps to change our ways. We now have wind and solar farms springing up all over the place, and lots of eager consultants very keen to get into the carbon-taxing industry.
This fine contribution by Willis should make people around here stop and think. My students will certainly all get it as required reading; a number of them work for government and industry. I hope the Japanese will continue to put out their data so that we can have a number of years of observations for Willis to analyse!
Brilliant post Willis, Thanks. It shows the lemming type of mental behaviour when science and politics merge confirming the deadly green party line overseen by accountants all named Winston Smith (1984).
In my post of richard verney says: July 5, 2014 at 9:16 pm
I was commenting upon the ‘false’ accounting behind the claims that burning wood/biomass is carbon neutral. I observed:
“The lie rests within the claim that the bio mass absorbs during its own lifetime as much CO2 as it emits when burnt, such that it is CO2 neutral. That may apply to the planting of a new forest (ie., to forest land which before was simply barren land), but it is not applicable when you cut down a forest and replace an existing forest with a new forest. The old forest was already absorbing CO2 and would have continued to do so, if it had not been cut down. Accordingly, cutting down the old forest and replanting it so it grows back does not change the CO2 budget at all. Nature has, of course, already solved so many ‘problems’. If the government is truly concenrned about CO2 emissions and will not sanction new coal or gas powered generators without CCS, the simplest solution is to build a conventionally fueled generator (or keep an existing conventional fueld generator in service) and plant a new forest, ie., plant a forest on what is presently simply scrub land.
I believe that this ‘falsehood’ was based upon the assumption that young trees grow faster and therefore absorb more CO2. That assumption has always surprised me given the volume of a cylinder (such that a small increase in girth of an established tree involves more mass than a large increase in girth of a young sappling) and the canopy area of an established tree is far larger.(with presumably correspondingly more leaves). Recently, I saw a paper (unfortunately I have not got the reference) in which the CO2 absorption of young and old trees was compared and the conclusion of that paper was that old trees absorb just as much if not more CO2 than young trees.”
Having made that comment, I now see that WUWT is carrying a post on a recent paper dealing with this issue, see http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/07/06/big-trees-a-new-look-at-growth-factors/#more-112594
I am not certain that that was the paper that I had seen and that I was referring to, but that paper does support my view that the claim regarding biomass being carbon neutral is based upon ‘false’ accounting in that if the existing forest is not cut down it woukld in any event be absorbing C)2. accordingly cutting down a CO2 sink and replacing it with the exact same sink does not result in additional CO2 absorption that would be necessary to absorb the additional CO2 that burning biomass emits when compared to burning of coal or gas (the lower calorific value of biomass results in more quantity of biomass having to be burnt to produce any given unit of energy with result increase in CO2 emissions as a by product)>
This paper underlies the ‘scam’ that the green movement is forcing upon government to switch from coal to biomass..
I am not sure how to interpret this, because the interpretation the media has conditioned me to make refers to a wealth transfer from the industrialized nations (who are often times regarded as having ill-gotten gains) to the poorer countries.
However, if you look at Willis’ graph of Net CO2 emissions you will see that those of North America and Europe are offset by the ocean and Australia, and that it is Africa and Asia that are the biggest sources of CO2 and the industrialized countries that gain, or so it would seem.
Can you clarify what you meant?
Note, I think that the notion of reparations is supposed to be a wealth transfer allowing certain elites to skim off the top, so I have little sympathy for it. I am simply trying to understand what you meant.
Well, it is possible with this data to still support the notion of reparations from industrialized countries to the poorer countries of Africa and Asia, however, to do that would require taking a more positive view of CO2. After all, the poorer countries are helping the agricultural industries of the industrialized countries with their efforts at producing CO2.
Willis,
For fairness in comparing against the US, China and Russia, I would like to see your fig 2 redone, treating the EU as a single entity.
Very interesting:
I would think that normalizing based on population would provide first order information on natural vs anthropogenic carbon dioxide sources and sinks.
And am I correct in assuming that the theoretical greenhouse effect is an upper atmosphere well mixed process and there is no way to correlate local carbon dioxide sources and sinks to local temperature?
Thanks again, Willis.
Also, thanks to Ferdinand Englebeen and Greg Goodman for their comments.
Richard Sharp: It is all about the efficiency of managing one’s national resources. This is directly related to the quality of education and the mental freedom the citizins of such nations have. CO2 has very little to do with it, in relation to “damage” to our dear atmosphere, I have said this before: In 1972 without a shred of scientific evidence at one of the UNEP opening meetings in Nairobi I heard several bankers and accountants discussing best ways to tax the polluting CO2 gas. Anyway we live in revealing times, therefore things will be sorted out pretty soon.
As as already been said twice, we cant see clearly (or at all, here and there) what’s going on in Europe.
MattS
Ed Hoskins did a post here on this subject yesterday which included the EU as one entity
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/07/04/message-to-the-president-data-shows-co2-reduction-is-futile/
tonyb
@John Ledger
Hi. Long time. You are right about the number of sinks RSA has created including vast forests in eastern Mpumalanga and KZN. Swaziland has three large forestry areas all 100% planted. The wattle around manage has far outgrown the expanding population’s ability to chop it for fuel. Geoffrey Winkler told me he travelled 80,000 miles on horseback in the Transkei planting tree where there used to be nothing but bald green hills.
Peter Forbes’ grandfather used to see elephant herds 25 miles wide moving up the coastal plain where the N4 crosses to Maputo and in their absence the trees proliferated.
Angola has a small population and massive biomass production but a lot is tropical and it is clear that the net CO2 from tropical areas that are not soaking wet is high. Wet seems to be more neutral.
South Africa has so many trees now it is hard to remember that the traditional name for the highveld is ‘the tree-less place’. Dr Billy Mollison advocated planting bands of trees north-south from Nelspruit to Joburg to increase the rainfall in summer. There is about 70-80,000 sq km of wattle there now. That’s new. Gum trees were only introduced in numbers in 1912.
Lastly the farmers of South Africa grow huge amounts of crops which are exported carrying carbon with them. There seem to be lots of expanding sinks.
From the article:
“…the world’s first satellite designed specifically for monitoring atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) and methane (CH4) from space.”
I knew about atmospheric carbon dioxide but I didn’t know that methane came from space!
🙂
I would sure like to see two (2) different graphics of that “Net CO2 Flux 2010” Figure 1 map, …. one (1) for the 7 months when the Northern Hemisphere is experiencing Fall and Winter (Oct 2009 thru April 2010) …. and the 2nd one for the 5 months when the NH is experiencing Spring and Summer (May 2010 thru Sept 2010).
The “start” point of the two (2) above stated time periods pretty much correlates with the “switch” points of the bi-yearly 6 ppm avg. cycling of the atmospheric CO2 ppm as denoted by the Keeling Curve Graph.
Thus, I would like to know if said 6 ppm of CO2 is visible on the newly created maps of “Net CO2 Flux” by comparing for any obvious differences between the two.
One of the things that I am curious in knowing is if that “yellow band from above Australia to South America in the central Pacific” …. shifts farther north and south of the equator in the new graphics.
I fear that these data, and the data soon to be obtained from the NASA OCO-2, do not tell us what we need to know. If they are merely measuring localized CO2 concentration, what does that tell us?
A narrowly focused source area will show up having heavy concentration. But, so might a narrowly focused sink area, as it draws more CO2 to it from surrounding areas. A patch of area which shows up “red” in the plot might well be entirely self-contained, with equal source and sink activity.
And, keep in mind that the net imbalance over a year is quite small, so there is a very small SNR over a single year for the signal we are looking for. And, the SNR for a very broad sink or source area is tiny, too.
I fear this may devolve into a large scale exercise in confirmation bias. Meanwhile, human inputs race ahead ever higher, while the rate of change of atmospheric CO2 continues to stall with temperatures.
The ministy of truth will not be pleased. So I hope you will find someone to co-write that paper. This will be a killer for the climate justice department.
From JAXA on meaning of Ibuki:
http://global.jaxa.jp/press/2008/10/20081015_gosat_e.html
The green smear (mentioned above) across the N. hemisphere on early Ibuki flux data map reflected (seasonal) net absorption for July 2009 in many middle and upper latitude sub-continent regions of the N. Hemisphere.
However,
http://global.jaxa.jp/press/2012/12/20121205_ibuki_e.html
FrankK says:
July 5, 2014 at 11:12 pm
Frank, I’ve said a number of times, I never get my science from lectures, for several reason. First, they are waaaay to slow, I find them incredibly boring. Second, it’s hard to go back and check what they said before. Third, video is a passive medium, where you just turn off your brain and let the info soak in … not good for science. Fourth, they are either unreferenced or poorly referenced. Fifth, they tend to lead to anonymous people making ridiculous claims …
As a result, I’ve passed up many invitations to see Salby’s video. If he wants to get it out there, he should write it up.
My “analysis is somewhat flawed”? I love guys like you, that wave their hands, don’t provide a scrap of actual data, and claim I’ve made some unknown mistake.
Frank, SCIAMACHY measures the CO2 percentage in the atmosphere. The IBUKU satellite measures the net local emission/absorption of CO2. These are very, very different things.
Next time, don’t turn off your mind and watch video, it’s obviously impairing your scientific judgement.
w.
Bart says:
July 6, 2014 at 11:12 am
No, it will not. Sink areas will show up with lower CO2 concentration, we know this from observations over for instance farmland.
Sink areas does not “draw” CO2 for surrounding areas, they just remove some of the CO2 from the air in the sink area, which results in an area with air depleted of CO2.
/Jan
Jan Kjetil Andersen says:
July 5, 2014 at 11:51 pm
Anyone who thinks there can be “any meaningful talk of compensation between nations” regarding reparations based on CO2 is either a congenital idiot, a deluded green, or a rent-seeker. The idea that there are more meaningful or less meaningful ways to talk about reparations based on CO2, when we have no evidence that CO2 is anything but beneficial, is an insult to science.
w.
Greg Goodman says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:03 am
Thanks, Greg, but I’ve been using the Mac for over 500 posts on WordPress to date, and I’ve only had that problem happen once before.
w.
Bart says:
July 6, 2014 at 11:12 am
I do agree with you that measuring CO2 concentrations, as the satellite does, and calculating CO2 fluxes from these concentrations is rather questionable. But as usual, I disagree with your last graph:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em4.jpg
The sink rate caused by the increased CO2 pressure in the atmosphere still is too small to absorb all human emissions and still is largely within natural variability.
The natural variability is entirely caused by the influence of temperature variations on the growth and decay of (tropical) vegetation, which can be seen in the opposite rate of change variation of CO2 and δ13C:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_dco2_d13C_mlo.jpg
data from Wood for Trees and Carbon Tracker for the δ13C measurements at Mauna Loa.
As one can see: the temperature rate of change drives the CO2 rate of change and the δ13C rate of change both with a lag. Temperature variability is not the driver of the slope, as there is no slope at all in the temperature rate of change, while there is in the CO2 and δ13C rate of changes.
Temperature itself also is not the driver for the slope in CO2 or the CO2 rate of change: the short term variability is the result of temperature variability on vegetation, but the longer term trend in vegetation is opposite: more uptake with higher temperatures…
That means that two separate processes are at work: temperature variability which causes the CO2 uptake variability by vegetation, but a separate process that increases the CO2 level over time. Not so difficult to know what that is in my opinion…
That’s just amazing. Africa net contributor to CO2 emissions almost as much as North America and Europe put together!
It’s time for Africans to consider deindustrializing…
Such are the marvels of the CO2 footprint religion.
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
At July 6, 2014 at 12:25 pm you say to Bart
Well, it could be many things, but the most likely is transition from the Little Ice Age (LIA).
Richard
richardscourtney says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:26 am
If those Australian “red dots” are NOT because of concentrated human habitation, then are you claiming that it is just a coincidence that they are right on top of Sydney and Melbourne? And what on earth does that have to do with Africa?
It is not “improbable” that burning dung and wood emits CO2. Nor is it “improbable” that there are lots of people in sub-Saharan Africa doing just that. You can’t just wave your hands and say “extremely improbable”, Richard, that goes nowhere.
My essay neither says nor implies any such thing. I have made it abundantly clear that there are natural sources and sinks. And I have pointed out that places like Norway and Canada are likely natural sinks, irrespective of human activity.
No. That shows that the plants inhale CO2 in the summer and give off CO2 in the winter. The magnitude of that swing is indeed larger than the annual human contribution, but that swing is not a “natural imbalance”. In addition, the sum of the natural swings to date is ~ 0 … can you say the same for the sum of the human contribution?
Nope. I said I reported on the only full calendar year. In fact, the data goes from June 2009 through October 2011, a total of 29 months. Not being an idiot, I looked at all of the 12-month contiguous datasets, and found that there is little variation between them. So I picked the full calendar year and posted that graph.
Look, folks, if you think you’ve found some huge flaw in my work, don’t foolishly jump up like richard just did to proclaim that I’m wrong, wrong, wrong … ASK BEFORE ACCUSING!
Richard, stuff your “confirmation bias with respect to attribution”. I made it very, very clear that my ideas about attribution were SPECULATION, not claims. If you think that they are wrong, that’s fine … but claiming confirmation bias is a bridge too far.
On the other hand, me, I caution you about assuming I’ve made some mistake simply because I haven’t reported everything that I’ve analyzed.
I’d also caution you about confusing Australia and Africa. The red dots representing Sydney and Melbourne are not dependent on your claims about dung fires south of the Sahara …
w.
Greg Goodman says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:30 am
Say what??? RACook has given the reasons why the Antarctic is neither a net absorber nor a net emitter of CO2. It’s because ice neither absorbs nor emits much CO2. And the IBUKU data confirm his reasons.
For you to claim that this result means that they are “fabricating” the polar regions is a measure of your lack of comprehension coupled with a willingness to accuse others of scientific malfeasance … a bad combination.
w.
Joel O’Bryan says:
July 5, 2014 at 10:29 pm
…
One thing I always wondered about the Keeling Curve is, why it doesn’t seem to show economic slowdowns, like the 2009-2010 worldwide recession? Man-made CO2 output must have slowed but did a 2nd derivative of the Keeling Curve show this?
While some of the rise in CO2 concentration must be due to burning fossil fuel, I believe that most of it comes from poison-based agriculture killing soil organisms. CO2 is the basis of life (which makes me HATE alarmists) and the converse is: killing all those organisms causes decay, releasing their carbon back into the atmosphere as CO2. Earthworm counts have been done in India after 10 000 Indian farmers committed suicide after planting Monsanto’s seeds. It was found that this particular agriculture harmed the soils, (which means it is not sustainable) and that accounted for the crash in productivity which caused the despair.
Agriculture is not much affected by economic trends.
tokyoboy says:
July 6, 2014 at 4:04 am
Thanks, TB. I’ve fixed it in the text, I’m leaving it in the graphics, too much hassle to change.
w.
Jan Kjetil Andersen says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:09 pm
A sink does draw in material from surrounding areas. Depending on the level of activity, I would expect a dip might exist in the central portion, with an elevated “lip” about it. The area around a powerful source would be the inverse, spiking in the middle, with a surrounding trough.
You can’t extrapolate general behavior from the specific case of particular swatches of farmland. It may behave like that in general, or it may not.
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:25 pm
“But as usual, I disagree with your last graph”
As usual, you ignore the fact that, since at least 2000, the rate of emissions continues steadily marching up, while atmospheric concentration is at a constant rate, completely in line with the temperature “pause”.
“…but the longer term trend in vegetation is opposite: more uptake with higher temperatures…”
As usual, you propose a mechanism which would lead to observable phase distortion in the temperature to CO2 relationship, which is completely unobservable in the data.
Willis:
I am astonished that at July 6, 2014 at 12:33 pm you say to me
Ye Gods Man!
I did NOT claim you were “wrong, wrong, wrong”. You cannot cite or quote any statement I made which did BECAUSE I MADE NO SUCH ACCUSATION(S).
But I did warn about confirmation bias. I said and you quoted my having said
Your response to that even handed warning was to say
I did NOT say you were wrong. That is your imagination.
I did NOT suggest you had made “some mistake”. That, too, is your imagination.
I did NOT “confuse Africa and Australia”, I used them as illustration of a point.
Do you remember this?
THE USUAL REQUEST: If you think that someone is wrong about something, please QUOTE THEIR EXACT WORDS. I SHOUT BECAUSE THIS IS IMPORTANT. QUOTE THEIR WORDS so that we can all understand exactly what you are objecting to.
Your objections to my points are fallacious.
And some of your points are psychological projection. For example, in your article you wrote
I accepted that you were telling the truth when YOU wrote “2010, the only full calendar year of data in the dataset” and I commented
Your response to that says
Willis, choosing 2010 as being a typical year is NOT the same as having 2010 as “the only full calendar year”.
I object to your saying I am wrong, wrong, wrong for commenting on what you say in your article because – you now say – I should have known what you wrote is wrong.
We had a terrible thread on WUWT last week where serious contributors to WUWT attacked each other. I regret that you seem to have adopted attack mode against me in this thread for no apparent reason.
Richard
Steve Fitzpatrick says:
July 6, 2014 at 6:28 am
I hate it when folks do this. You say that ocean uptake compared to global flus is “inconsistent with earlier estimates of of net ocean sequestration” … but which “earlier estimates”, and exactly how is it “inconsistent”? Without those details, your contribution as it stands is useless.
More to the point, Ibuki shows a net ocean flux of about -1.5 gigatons per year. There’s an “earlier estimate“, which is -2.0 ± 0.6 gigatons per year … so the IBUKI measurement is not even one standard error from the earlier estimate.
w.
Bart says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:57 pm
Jan Kjetil Andersen says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:09 pm
“Depending on the level of activity, I would expect a dip might exist in the central portion, with an elevated “lip” about it.”
There may be evidence for such behavior in the red ring surrounding the Congo Basin in Willis’ map. The Congo Basin has been called “the planet’s second lung”, ranked immediately below the Amazonian rainforest.
richardscourtney says:
July 6, 2014 at 1:08 pm
I said nothing of the sort. I said that you should ask before accusing, and I stand by that 100%.
w.
Willis Eschenbach says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:10 pm
As I read your article, it is a comment on the fact that some people think that a compensation between nations is meaningful. I took that as a precondition for the discussion.
If it had been meaningful, you show with your numbers that it would have the rather insane effect of transfer money from Congo to Scandinavia. I am commenting that this would not be so if you count the manmade emissions only, which is the only sensible way to measure it if you talk about compensations.
However, I am not in favor of compensation between nations, I am not a deluded green or a rent seeker, and I do not think I am an idiot either. I am just following up what I thought the article was all about. I think your comment is rather respect less. Let us have a civilized discussion.
If you take that as a precondition then I see no reason to discuss whether rich or poor nations have the highest emissions or sinks. The basis for your article then falls apart.
/Jan
Perhaps also about the Amazonian region itself. How else to explain the elevated red regions in Peru?
MattS says:
July 6, 2014 at 8:45 am
Sounds good, Matt … which is why I supplied all of the data as a CSV text file. That way, people who want some other analysis can have an easy way to do it.
w.
ladylifegrows says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:38 pm
In the Western countries hardest hit by the recession, emissions in 2009 fell noticeably, due to drops in manufacturing, transport & other economic sectors. The Global Carbon Project (grain of salt required, if not indeed an entire mine) calculated that 2009 emissions declined by 6.9% in the US, 7% in Germany & 11.8% in Japan. The Great Recession actually began in Q3 of 2008, however.
But despite these big drops in the West, global emissions fell by only one or two percent, because of continued economic growth in the developing world, especially China, whose emissions rose by 8% in 2009, while India’s grew by 6.2%. China, as you may know, emerged as the world’s top energy user during that decade.
Here are the annual CO2 growth rates as recorded at Mauna Loa:
year ppm/yr
1959 0.94
1960 0.54
1961 0.95
1962 0.64
1963 0.71
1964 0.28
1965 1.02
1966 1.24
1967 0.74
1968 1.03
1969 1.31
1970 1.06
1971 0.85
1972 1.69
1973 1.22
1974 0.78
1975 1.13
1976 0.84
1977 2.10
1978 1.30
1979 1.75
1980 1.73
1981 1.43
1982 0.96
1983 2.13
1984 1.36
1985 1.25
1986 1.48
1987 2.29
1988 2.13
1989 1.32
1990 1.19
1991 0.99
1992 0.48
1993 1.40
1994 1.91
1995 1.99
1996 1.25
1997 1.91
1998 2.93
1999 0.93
2000 1.62
2001 1.58
2002 2.53
2003 2.29
2004 1.56
2005 2.52
2006 1.76
2007 2.22
2008 1.60
2009 1.89
2010 2.44
2011 1.84
2012 2.66
2013 2.05
Note that the biggest annual gain was in 1998, the warm El Niño year.
Jan Kjetil Andersen says:
July 6, 2014 at 1:16 pm
Thanks for the reply, Jan. My apologies that I didn’t understand what you meant when you said:
I took that to mean that you wanted to start “meaningful talk of compensations”. My bad.
I don’t follow that. We’ve been told that money is owed, e.g. the UK owes money to India, because it is “polluting” the planet with CO2. I’m merely pointing out that on a net basis, India emits much more CO2 than the UK. How does that “fall apart” when I point out that there is no real-world actual basis for reparations because there is no observable damage?
I’m just trying to point out the foolishness of their position.
All the best,
w.
Willis Eschenbach:
At July 6, 2014 at 1:14 pm you say to me
Good. Perhaps you will adopt the practice you advocate because I made no “accusation” and I object to your accusation that I did.
I wrote, and your reply I have quoted here ignores
I stand by that 100%.
Richard
Bart says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:57 pm
<iAs usual, you propose a mechanism which would lead to observable phase distortion in the temperature to CO2 relationship, which is completely unobservable in the data.
Except if the trend in CO2 and dCO2/dt increase has litle to nothing to do with temperature, as is the case if human emissions are the cause of the increase of both and temperature is only responsible for the variability, as can be seen in the zero slope of dT/dt…
Richard Courtney, you say, and rightly:
However, you’re the guy who tried to bust my chops for only analyzing one year of data, without asking if I had analyzed more than that. And based on your misunderstanding, you went on to scold me on the basis that there was some big change due to the El Nino, when in fact their wasn’t. Plus you said I was a victim of “confirmation bias”.
In response, I said you should ask before making a bunch of statements that wouldn’t hold up.
I’m tired to the bone of being everyone’s whipping boy, Richard. I’m sick of folks assuming I’m too dumb to analyze all of the data. I’ve had it up to here with people who take a quick superficial read of my work, don’t look at the underlying data, don’t ask me any questions about what I’ve done, but just start in with some ludicrous claim that the red dots over Sydney and Melbourne must be wrong, because Africa is blah blah blah … here you go, your very claim:
Are you truly claiming that the red dots over Sydney and Melbourne are merely a galactic coincidence? That’s the dumbest thing I’ve read in the whole thread. What does Sydney have to do with Mali?
Now, I don’t mind dumb. I encounter that every day. But when someone accuses me of “confirmation bias” based on some cockamamie industrially-dumb claim about Africa, yes, Richard, I will bite back. Don’t lecture me about “confirmation bias” unless you have clear evidence of it.
I regret that my words have upset you, but that’s what happens when you accuse a man of “confirmation bias” without evidence. It’s a mistake to poke a grizzly bear with a stick. But let me take back whatever it is that you were offended by, apologize for whatever you are angry about and start over. Here we go:
My main message was, and is, ASK BEFORE ACCUSING, and I stand by that. If you think I’ve done something foolish or wrong, ASK FOR CLARIFICATION before you start in on my supposed errors.
You want to have a discussion, Richard, I’m your man. You want to accuse me of confirmation bias and not using all of the data without asking first, not so much …
w.
Willis Eschenbach
July 6, 2014 at 1:11 pm
I stand corrected, I had remembered, based on O2 concentration studies (apparently mistakenly), that the ocean was responsible for about 3/4 of the net CO2 uptake; recent studies actually suggest closer to half.
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 6, 2014 at 1:50 pm
No exceptions.
Willis Eschenbach says:
July 6, 2014 at 1:27 pm
Apology accepted.
I see, and it is a good point-
However, if one counts the manmade emissions, only we get another picture. I would guess that the warm areas of the globe has more natural sources and the cold areas more natural sinks since CO2, like all gases, dissolves more easy in cold water than in warm. That was what I was pointing out.
If you then answer, as I perhaps erroneous interpreted it, something like; yes the numbers would be different with manmade emissions only, but it doesn’t count because CO2 compensation is idiotic anyway, then I think the basis for the article falls apart. Sorry if I in a haste misinterpreted you.
/Jan
milodonharlani: During the recession, China’s export industry slowed down as well. Yet the Mauna Loa readings show no effects whatsoever.
What is likely is that, as 98% of the CO2 is dissolved in oceans,
and as, according to the sea levels as indicators of dilation, the oceans warmed since the Little Ice Age,
the extra CO2 is mostly due to the chemical balance shift due to ocean warming.
Rather than due to human activity.
****
If you have a closed soda bottle and you inject extra CO2 in the air part of it, most will dissolve in the water and the CO2 in the air part will change little.
If you warm the bottle, the CO2 levels in the air part of the bottle will change a lot.
Lady life grows says, “Earthworm counts have been done in India after 10 000 Indian farmers committed suicide after planting Monsanto’s seeds. It was found that this particular agriculture harmed the soils, (which means it is not sustainable) and that accounted for the crash in productivity which caused the despair. Agriculture is not much affected by economic trends.”
Price volatility affects farmers more than any thing else besides an outright blight, infestation, or drought. What a silly string of statements. Organic activists are really getting outrageous and irresponsible in the claims they make on websites like these.
If any one wants to really understand how organic cotton or organic food crops are grown, please, take 3 minutes to watch this brief video by Leonard Gianessi, who discusses the use of hundreds of hours of bent over laborers to weed on organic farms. I promise you will not be sorry, and you will have a choice whether you want to pay five times more for organic products that use bent over human beings to pull weeds, or if you want to buy from a conventional grower who controls weeds with herbicides and by so doing spares slave labor, and increases yields by 30-50% in general.
Willis
I read this earlier today and thought it seemed like quite a nice bit of work. I don’t know anything about this data, I assume some changes in spectral responses as a proxy for CO2 flux, but assuming all these measurements are sound then this is a nice bit of work. Sure, you could knit-pick with your explanations or rather assumptions but I read those more as after thoughts…more like suggestion for further work. The analysis is interesting and certainly raises interesting questions. Good stuff.
Sorry nitpick 😉
And if we are concerned about the earthworms, the place to look is wind farms, which are copious sources of infrasound. Earthworms are very sensitive to lower notes as Darwin found out with his worm farm which was sitting on his piano.
The vibration from worthless windturbines is enough to break the enormous concrete pads they are set in. What do you think those vibrations in farm areas are doing to the worms? And yet they are continually placed all over the countryside in the UK, over the protests of the local residents, in order to meet EU targets for renewables.
ref:
Adrian O says:
July 6, 2014 at 2:13 pm
China’s exports naturally were hurt, yet its CO2 emissions continued to grow, albeit perhaps at a lower rate.
I’d like to think that the whole ~120 ppm gain since c. AD 1850 owes entirely to naturally warmer seas, but IMO evidence from the hotter than Holocene Eemian interglacial suggests not. The highest estimate or observation of peak Eemian CO2 I’ve seen is about 330 ppm. The Holocene Optimum was warmer than now, although not as hot as the Eemian, & I don’t think its concentration exceeded 300 ppm (could be wrong). Even allowing for imprecision, IMO some substantial portion of the apparent rise since the end of the Little Ice Age thus is most likely man-made.
Not that that is a bad thing. So far, it has been good for plants & other living things. Anthropogenic catastrophe is not in the cards.
Adrian O says:
July 6, 2014 at 2:13 pm
Human emissions are reasonably well known, because of fossil fuel sales (taxes). These show only a small dip during the recent economical crisis. See:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em2.jpg
emissions still twice the increase in the atmosphere, which is far more variable.
What is likely is that, as 98% of the CO2 is dissolved in oceans
A non-argument: if it doesn’t exchange with the atmosphere, that doesn’t matter at all. If it does exchange, the quantities exchanged don’t matter at all. All what matters is the difference of what is released and what is absorbed en that is currently more sink than source. See:
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/feel2331/mean.shtml
the extra CO2 is mostly due to the chemical balance shift due to ocean warming
No it isn’t. The equilibrium between the ocean surface waters and the atmosphere increases with 17 ppmv for a maximum 1°C temperature increase since the LIA. That is all. Vegetation absorbs more CO2 with higher temperatures. The average result over the past 800,000 years is 8 ppmv/°C. Thus 8 ppmv maximum since the LIA. The measured increase is over 100 ppmv since about 1850. Reason why the net flux is from the atmosphere into the oceans and not reverse, because of the elevated pressure.
Really late, but here is what I see, and it credits what I learned in soil science way back when.
The cooler areas of the temperate climates and the warmer subpolar are net sinks as a result of their climate and diurnal periods. Let me explain:
During the short summer, the extended diurnal period allows for a flush of growth in the photosynthesizing plants. The soils remain cool or frozen just below the rooting zone. As the OM elevation increases, so does the permafrost. While the accumulation rate varies as well as the permafrost elevation, the general direction is an increase in depth. Only in sun facing slopes or in aquatic habitats does decomposition exceed the rate of accumulation of organic matter, with the exception of acidic bogs with floating mats of OM. THE ACIDIC NATURE IN THESE habitats serves to preserve OM. It is this easily observed state, verified by peat accumulation, as well as the prevelance of organic soils that this CO2 data substantiates.
As the observations move toward the equator, the ratio of release:uptake approaches 1:1, then again reaches an opposite imbalance.
Various geographical, anthropogenic, and climatological influences do overcome the general ratio. These are rain shadows, agriculture and urbanization, oceanic currents such as the gulf steam.
[Define your terms for other readers who don’t know your specialty. OM elevation = ?? .mod]
Willis Eschenbach says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:05 pm
“Frank, SCIAMACHY measures the CO2 percentage in the atmosphere. The IBUKU satellite measures the net local emission/absorption of CO2. These are very, very different things.”
You are incorrect W. IBUKI (not IBUKU) measures only CO2 concentration.
http://global.jaxa.jp/activity/pr/brochure/files/sat02.pdf
Emission of CO2 is “estimated”… from models. Would those be the same models that the IPCC uses to make its claim that increased CO2 comes only from humans? Even their estimates indicate that’s a long way from the truth.
En Passant says:
July 5, 2014 at 10:42 pm
I do love people who come to my threads to proudly announce that they are not reading my threads for the highest moral reasons … if I’m “not on your reading list” as you say, En Pissant, then what are you doing here?
In any case, I spoke out against Dave Evans’ shameful hiding of his data and code when he published his second post on the subject. We’re now up to … hang on, let me check … no less than eleven posts on the subject, and he is still hiding his code and data. If I tried that, people would bust me heavily, and rightly so—that’s not science in any form.
After fighting for years against scurvy folks like Michael Mann and Phil Jones doing the same thing, there’s no way I can condone David Evans hiding his code and data. It would be the rankest hypocrisy on my part were I to do so.
To forestall your obvious objection, yes, very likely someday David’s code and data will eventually be made public, just as Mann’s and Jones’s code and data were eventually made public … so what? The eventual release of Mann’s and Jones’s code and data did not somehow make their secrecy scientifically acceptable, no more than it does for David when and if he finally decides to join the ranks of transparent scientists who are open about all of their work.
Now, I see that you disagree with my position on revealing data and code, and that’s your choice. And I absolutely don’t want this thread to become a referendum on the previous dispute, so let me invite people NOT to comment on it. I’ve retired from that fray entirely, I have no further interest in it at the moment other than countering your attack above. The discussion continues over at David and Jo’s place, so please comment there if you feel you have to comment. As I told David, I’m out of there, I’ll weigh back in when he comes to his senses and publishes his results.
And while I have no problem with you holding that position, I don’t see that standing foursquare for hiding data and code as you are doing gives you some kind of high moral position to lecture me … but I’m sure it makes sense to you.
Finally, you seem to think that I care if some anonymous internet fly-by-night who supports hiding data and code reads my work or doesn’t read my work … you do what you have to do, En, it makes no difference to me. I much prefer dealing with honest transparent scientists and the folks who support them, so I assure you, you won’t be missed.
w.
Of course, now the the US has build their infrastructure using coal for many years, they want to phase out coal via international agreements so they can deny it to the developing world, thereby locking in the US development head start. And if it takes some payments to corrupt third world leaders to keep the rest of the world in poverty, it is a small price to pay to guarantee American dominance.
The Chinese have a somewhat different plan in mind. Under the Chinese plan, the US is going to be on the hook for hundreds of billions in reparations for cumulative emissions, having been for many years the worlds biggest CO2 polluter. The US has backed themselves into a corner, with the EPA’s determination that CO2 is harmful, the US can hardly argue that their years and years of record emissions haven’t harmed the rest of the world. Well, they can of course argue, just not credibly.
It is going to take some serious coin under the table to stack the deck. vote for us, get a world bank loan. set for life. vote against us, forget about it.
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 6, 2014 at 1:31 am
Thanks, Ferdinand, interesting comment. A quick look around the web shows CO2 solubility in rainwater to be 1.2E-5 moles/litre at 355 ppmv CO2 (bottom of page).
Since one mole of CO2 weights 44 grams, this is equal to 528 milligrams per litre at 355 ppmv CO2, or about 595 mg/l at 400 ppmv. This is about 450 times the number you give … so at this point I’m in mystery.
What is the source of your figures?
Best regards,
w.
johnmarshall says:
July 6, 2014 at 1:34 am
John, you are very frustrating … you raise a fascinating possibility but provide absolutely no evidence to back it up.
Regards,
w.
michael hart says:
July 6, 2014 at 2:15 am
Perhaps you could explain to us how the satellite results are “occasional sparse measurements” …
w.
Josualdo says:
July 6, 2014 at 9:22 am
Nor could you if I were to change the map, the countries there are too small to distinguish.
Which is why I provided the country-by-country breakdown in text format, so everyone could see it and analyze it for themselves. “As has already been said twice”, to quote you, that data is here.
w.
Re Figure 1: What’re the two rather high-level (red) spots in north central Canada (I’m guessing north Saskatchewan, northeast of Calgary/Edmonton, northwest of Lake Winnipeg)?
Secret mega-doughnut factories?
Willis,
WRT CO2 dissolved in rain, you are clearly correct about the amount dissolved (~0.528 mg/liter). But I think this amount is still not very important. For example, if average global rainfall is ~1 meter per year (just as an example), the total dissolved CO2 in that rain is about 0.528 gram per year per square meter, equivalent to 0.528*(12/44)/365 = 0.000395 gC/M^2/day, versus 0.026 gC/M^2/day global average flux from your post above (that is, about 1.5% of the global average emitted flux). So in the short term, rain carrying CO2 to the surface is probably not very important. In the very, very long term, that CO2 in rain can dissolve mountains, of course.
Willis,
Sorry, my comment above was based on mis-reading your earlier comment to Ferdinand. The solubility is in fact 1.2 * 10^-5 mole/liter, which is equal to 0.528 MILLIGRAM per liter, not 0.528 gram per liter…. your dissolved weight (0.528 g/liter) is too high by a factor of 1000. Which is why the flux of CO2 dissolved in rainfall it is not significant compared to the global average flux.
Steve, you are right. I was figuring micrograms instead of milligrams. Second time I’ve made that mistake in public … dang, I hate that, but wrong is wrong, and I certainly was wrong. It’s about half a milligram of CO2 per litre,
And I agree with all of your figures, except one. The problem is that you are using global average rain, while I’m talking about tropical rain. That is often three or more metres per year, meaning that it is 5% of the net rather than 1.5%.
However, that still might not be enough to explain the variation. Like I said, its’s all speculation on my part . Another possibility is that the ITCZ is an area of general upwelling of deeper water, which might make it different than the surrounding area.
Having said that, the amount of CO2 in air, unless I’m wrong again, is:
1.29 g/m3 air density * 400 / 1000000 CO2 by volume * 44/29 density ratio CO2 to air ≈ 3/4 of a milligram of CO2 per cubic metre of air
So a litre of rainwater has about 2/3 of the amount of CO2 as a cubic metre of air … and 3 metres of rain on one square metre of area is 3,000 litres of rain. This is enough to absorb 10% of the CO2 in a 20 kilometre tall column of air.
I think this is the difference between local and global … or else I’ve just made another error.
Ah, well, since the science is settled, I guess we’ll just have to ask the scientists … do I need the sarc tag?
w.
I thought that slightly(sometimes not so slightly) acidic rainfall on carbonaceous rock was a net emitter of CO2? Isn’t this one of the major worldwide sources of atmospheric CO2 releases?
Willis:
This is a genuine attempt to return to serious discussion and to escape from the situation whereby I try to defend myself against your unfounded accusations and attacks delivered for no stated reason. This attempt to return to rationality is not me ‘running away’: it is because I see no purpose in the ‘war’ you seem to want. And I suspect the attack is not personal because I am not the first person subjected to it; e.g. your recent unfounded and unreasonable attack on the excellent Tony brown. So, I will attempt to return to rationality by explaining the scientific issues in my post at July 6, 2014 at 12:26 am which is here.
I stand by my scientific points that said
The importance of the ENSO issue was subsequently emphasised by milodonharlani who – in his post at July 6, 2014 at 1:24 pm – listed “the annual CO2 growth rates as recorded at Mauna Loa” and said
Clearly, in these circumstances it is not clear as to whether attribution of atmospheric CO2 rise is predominantly anthropogenic or natural. The new satellite may provide data to assist the attribution. And, therefore, I see no logical objection to my even-handed caution that said
That caution is important for several reasons, not least that governments are adopting an assumption of anthropogenic cause and are distorting energy and environmental policies on the stated basis of that assumption. Indeed, your essay comments on demands for distorted economic policies of “reparations” based on the assumption.
(Sadly, your unfounded attack at my having quoted and accepted your statement about 2010 being “the only full calendar year of data in the dataset” has hindered discussion in this thread of effects of assumed anthropogenic emission.)
My comments concerning Australia and Sub–Saharan Africa pertain directly to this attribution issue.
Unfortunately, you went berserk because I wrote
Firstly, I need to say that there was – and is – no need for me to rehearse my arguments against your suggestion because – as I said – there is no data to resolve which of us is right. Your attack on me for saying that truth is unfounded: I allowed your assertions to stand and merely said I don’t agree which gives you the effective ‘last word’.
The Australia issue is simple. The two cities are islands of net emission surrounded by a large sea of net sequestration with result that the area has more than complete sequestration of the CO2 from the cities. This demonstrates that the CO2 emissions from industrialisation can be – in this case they are – completely sequestered locally. Emissions that are completely sequestered locally do not contribute to global rise in atmospheric CO2 emission.
And, as I said, this provides the question I stated; viz.
And I quoted your answer to that question saying that your answer can be debated. Your response was to pretend that I had confused Australia and Sub-Saharan Africa. No, I did not. I asserted that the same principles which govern emission and sequestration apply in Australia and in Sub-Saharan Africa. Biomass is replaceable and its replacement sequesters CO2 but fossil fuel burning only releases CO2. The per capita energy use (provided by biomass) of Sub-Saharan Africans is much less than the per capita energy use (provided by fossil fuels) of Australians.
These are scientific issues with serious scientific and political implications. As I said in conclusion of my post which induced your attacks
Richard
Willis
You realise that that in Australia The Climate Council’s, Professor Will Steffen who recently endorsed the sacked Australian Climate Commission’s latest (pre Abbott) report “Abnormal Autumn” saying ‘we have had an abnormally warm autumn, off the back of another very hot ‘angry summer’ and went on to say ‘Climate Change is here, it’s happening, and Australians are already feeling its impact’ will be in emergency session with his other ‘crowd funded, independent organisers like Tim ‘Flim’ Flannery and a certain cartoon illustrator.
Will and his mates furiously Cooking up left handed arguments against the IBUKU study and developing a climate algorithm similar to that applied to the Australian Land Temperature series, all derived and heavily weighted against using the 600 or 700 years of coal that we must keep in the ground and of course China and India who are burning all our exported coal will be trying ship at least any reparation/carbon tax back to it’s suppliers, same with Russia’s latest gas deals!!
I can see this developing into either a dung fight or bunfight and more torturing of the data. Or they may seek to export their populations to us to even up the statistical headcount. All political hot topics here at present.
Willis,
A liter of air weighs about 29/22.4 = 1.29 gram, so a cubic meter of air weighs ~1290 grams. The weight of CO2 is then 1290*(44/29)*(400/1000000)= 0.78 gram of CO2 per cubic meter of air, while a liter of rainwater dissolves ~0.528 milligram of CO2. It would take a cubic meter of rainwater to dissolve ~2/3 of the CO2 in a cubic meter of air, not a liter.
Ferdi: “As one can see: the temperature rate of change drives the CO2 rate of change and the δ13C rate of change both with a lag. ”
The lag is because it is T not dT/dt that you should be plotting. Adding a 12mo filter to Bart’s plot makes it a lot clearer. The lag disappears and the true causal relationship becomes evident.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/derivative/mean:12/mean:9/mean:7/plot/hadsst2sh/from:1959/scale:0.3/offset:0.1/mean:12/mean:9/mean:7
I have posted this relationship a long time ago but Bart’s idea of using SH only does seem to provide a closer correlation.
Willis,
WRT the pattern of ocean surface flux: if there were no thermohaline circulation, then the ocean would be most everywhere a net absorber of CO2, since rising atmospheric CO2 means the concentration of dissolved CO2 in the ocean dissolved lags far behind the atmosphere. But with thermohaline circulation, the tropics are a net emitter due to the warming of upwelling cold water (which contains a lot of CO2). The pattern in the Pacific is especially clear because of the strong upwelling near South America, which warms a lot as it is pushed westward by the trade winds. The slight net absorption to the north (starting near the average position of the convergence zone) is most likely due to the effect of rising atmospheric CO2 concentration, combined with a relative lack of upwelling/warming water in that region.
Ferdi: “the short term variability is the result of temperature variability on vegetation, ”
Doesn’t seem to be borne out by data:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/derivative/mean:12/mean:9/mean:7/plot/crutem4vnh/from:1959/scale:0.12/offset:0.1/mean:12/mean:9/mean:7
Ferdi says: It is also clear in monthly data:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/month_2002_2004_4s.jpg
South Pole CO2 data also go down in Austral spring and up in fall and δ13C goes opposite, thus caused by vegetation, despite the larger ocean area and less forests. The lag between Mauna Loa and Barrow is clear, the lag between SH and NH too, but as Samoa is in the influence of the ITCZ, it receives irregular extra CO2 from the NH peak during several months.
===
Thanks that is clearer.
The peak of MLO and Barrow show no lag. The trough about 1mo. The early rise at Barrow seems only slightly reflected in MLO. Claiming an overall lag between the two looks very tenuous.
“the lag between SH and NH too,”
Hey they’re in anti-phase because of the seasons. Who is lagging who? Trying to use that to support causation is a non starter.
Rob R says:
July 6, 2014 at 5:42 am
Thanks for bringing me up to date on NZ farming. It was over 20 years ago I was down your way, so it looks like things have changed.
Venison is the most tasty meat I’ve ever eaten. No wonder the nobility used to reserve it all for themselves. Unfortunately most of it in Europe has been grazing a bit too near Chernobyl, so I avoid it.
Never seen any NZ venison for sale here, if I saw some from a non polluted country I’d jump for it.
If you like venison you’ll love elk and moose will be off the charts.
Ferdi: The area covered by ice isolates the waters for more CO2 uptake.
Indeed which means that the cold water sink will have a strong annual variation related to ice coverage.
CO2 Alert Canada:
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=970
The sharp trough does not look like a gradual onset of leaf decay but it does look a lot like the rapid trough in ice coverage :
http://www.climate4you.com/images/NSIDC%20GlobalArcticAntarctic%20SeaIceArea.gif
and it matches in timing to within about a week.
stevefitzpatrick says:
July 7, 2014 at 3:48 am
Dang decimals, always messing me up … I’m gonna give up on them, never use them again … you’re right, of course.
w.
SELF-DELUSION
To Willis and anyone attempting to quantify planetary sources and sinks of CO2:
Make no mistake –
For the UN FCCC, ALL planetary sources + sinks (ocean, soil, forests, savannah, etc.) are part of the GAIA COMMONS. The UNFCCC considers ALL HUMAN activities which produce CO2 (power plant, manufacturing and transportation, farming, ranching, etc., …) to be transgression against Gaia… with the caveat that the countries which for the time being are too poor to purchase climate indulgences receive a wink and a UN-sanctioned quota of climate sinning… for a tbd time.
The ONLY sinks which will be given credit (towards mitigating the coming climatic disaster, and thereby receiving the UN seal of sustainability) are those projects which have been earmarked by the UNFCCC and have been paid for using climate guilt funding. The rest is treated as a collective GIVEN.
Whatever CO2 flux data is derived through instruments (satellite-based or otherwise) will be processed in such a manner as to conform to the above principles.
Expecting anything else is self-delusion.
Kurt in Switzerland
Willis Eschenbach says:
July 6, 2014 at 4:48 pm
Dear Willis,
I see that the rain problem is already resolved by Steve Fitzpatrick. I had my CO2 solubility data from:
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/gases-solubility-water-d_1148.html
The solubility is about 3.3 g/l at 0°C and 1 bar CO2.
As far as I remember from an older calculation, it needs 400 m3 of saturated air to form 1 l of rain, which means that the reduction of CO2 concentration at the height of cloud formation is negligible. The same for where it pours down. Thus I don’t think the current or even future satellites can measure these small CO2 level changes.
But as the water quantities involved are enormous, the total amounts circulating over the different areas may be huge. Despite that, it takes millions of years for CO2 to make the beautiful caves in carbon rocks…
As mentioned by others, the satellite(s) don’t measure CO2 fluxes. As far as I know, they measure CO2 column concentrations and calculate fluxes by a model, calibrated by ground stations (like tall towers measuring at different heights). Most fluxes over land are mixing in the first few hundred meters (over the oceans there is little difference with height). If they can measure at different levels near ground then they can directly calculate fluxes, but that would question the resolution in area they claim…
Greg Goodman says:
July 7, 2014 at 4:17 am
The lag is because it is T not dT/dt that you should be plotting. Adding a 12mo filter to Bart’s plot makes it a lot clearer. The lag disappears and the true causal relationship becomes evident
I fully disagree. Any temperature caused rise or reduction of CO2 follows temperature with a lag. That is the case for the last 800,000 years. It can be calculated that for short term variations the lag of CO2 is about pi/2 after temperature variability (*).
If you take the derivatives of both temperature and CO2, you shift the results pi/2 backwards with as result that temperature variations and CO2 variations show a perfect match in timing. But that has no physical meaning at all. dT/dt variations cause dCO2/dt variations with a lag.
From the synchronous δ13C changes in opposite direction it is proven that the short term variations are caused by temperature variations on (tropical) vegetation:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_dco2_d13C_mlo.jpg
But vegetation is not the cause of the trend of dCO2/dt as its trend is zero to negative from the oxygen balance. The same for the trend in dT/dt: zero with a slight offset to accommodate for the small increase in temperature over time (which gives less than 10 ppmv CO2 extra, not 100+).
What causes a linear increase of dCO2/dt is the slightly quadratic increase of CO2 emissions which leads to a slightly quadratic increase of CO2 in the atmosphere and thus a linear increase of dCO2/dt.
Further, if you try to match the exact slopes of dCO2/dt with T, you influence the amplitudes of the variability. The lower the slope of T, the lower the factor between the slopes must be, which makes that the amplitude gets smaller too. If dCO2/dt is caused by dT/dt and the slope is caused by human emissions, there is no problem at all…
(*) 4th comment by Paul_K at:
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/10/21/diary-date-murry-salby.html?currentPage=2#comments
Greg Goodman says:
July 7, 2014 at 4:39 am
Hey they’re in anti-phase because of the seasons. Who is lagging who? Trying to use that to support causation is a non starter.
You hardly can see a lag in increase of CO2 in the seasonal changes if the increase is much smaller than the seasonal variability, but if you look at a longer time frame it is clear:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/co2_trends.jpg
In 1959 the difference between the South Pole and Mauna Loa was smaller than today: the lag increases over time together with the increase in human emissions mainly in the NH.
Greg Goodman says:
July 7, 2014 at 5:45 am
The sharp trough does not look like a gradual onset of leaf decay but it does look a lot like the rapid trough in ice coverage
Ice coverage and temperature are linked, but leave formation and temperature are linked too. But one can distinguish between the two by looking at the δ13C changes: as these go up with CO2, then the oceans are responsible, if δ13C goes opposite to CO2, then vegetation is responsible.
In this case, vegetation is responsible.
Indeed there is a variation in sink speed in the North Atlantic, but the sink place shifts with the ice edge, as the main increase in density is around freezing ice…
(*) 4th comment by Paul_K at:
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/10/21/diary-date-murry-salby.html?currentPage=2#comments
Thanks for the link, I’d not seen that discussion and Paul_K is highly competent with sort of thing. He explains it well. But I’m not sure that you got the significance. The exponential response is the reason why short term change , like the fast changes over the last few decades is close to T matching d(CO2)/dt yet the ice core record indicates T more closely matching CO2 , with a lag.
The time-constant of the response lies somewhere between those two extremes.
It is the finality of the relaxation response that gives a delta_CO2 proportional to delta_T
All of this is a description of CO2 change that is caused by temperature. The part you minimise, yet the short term record clearly shows it.
If you think that Paul’s post agrees with your idea of short term change matching temp to CO2 directly you have not understood it.
The roughly 9mo lag is pi/2 of the dominant circa 3 y variability that is left once you filter out the annual cycle. However the form is a very poor match because it is the derivative that dominates the response at that scale and the derivative is not just a rescaled and shifted version of the time-series for anything other than a single harmonic function.
F: but if you look at a longer time frame it is clear:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/co2_trends.jpg
Now you’re just retreating to where you started that I’ve already pointed out does not work. You’re just hiding any variability by plotting quantities that are cumulative integrals. You rate of change plot clearly showed that the series are simply lagged.
oops I mean : are NOT simply lagged,
Ferdi says: From the synchronous δ13C changes in opposite direction it is proven that the short term variations are caused by temperature variations on (tropical) vegetation:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_dco2_d13C_mlo.jpg
===
So why is the variation much greater at Alert and in Germany if it’s caused in the tropics?
Greg Goodman:
You respond to Ferdinand at July 7, 2014 at 10:00 am by asking
I am sure Ferdinand can come up with a possible explanation but – as with all possibilities – its validity is not demonstrated by its being possible.
Your question emphasises the need for additional spatial information which it can be hoped the new satellite will provide. I think the bulk of CO2 emissions (both natural and anthropogenic) are sequestered near their emission sources, but there is so little data that my opinion cannot be shown to be right or wrong.
At present there is so little data that almost anything is possible as an explanation of the observations of atmospheric CO2 concentration.
Richard
From the Bishopshill link :Oct 27, 2013 at 9:04 AM | Paul_K
“Incidentally, the entire lecture is brilliant and his arguments are very coherent with one exception in my mind – well worth watching. Even though I remain ultimately unconvinced by his dismissal of the human addition to CO2, wherein I believe he sets up a logical paradox, he left me convinced that we have underestimated the strength of the temperature control knob on atmospheric CO2. ”
That puts him close to Gosta Pettersson’s position. If you want to argue with guys like that you’ll need to brush up on your maths.
Greg Goodman says:
July 7, 2014 at 9:51 am
You’re just hiding any variability by plotting quantities that are cumulative integrals.
Different lags for different processes… The seasonal lag is a matter of temperature within a year, separate for each hemisphere, the lag over the full period is a matter of extra CO2 source and the speed of exchanges for small differences in concentration between altitudes and latitudes/hemispheres.
The seasonal changes show some lag between altitudes, but that is not the main interest: the main interest is the lag of the year by year increase. That hardly shows up in the seasonal variability, except if you make yearly averages. It is the yearly averages which show that the increase is first in the NH and year after year increasing, including an increasing lag between NH and SH. Just plot all the yearly (or even monthly) data of Mauna Loa and the South Pole since the start of the measurements: the difference between the two increases over time.
Greg Goodman says:
July 7, 2014 at 9:52 am
So why is the variation much greater at Alert and in Germany if it’s caused in the tropics?
Different processes with different time frames involved:
The seasonal changes are dominated mainly by the uptake/release in the NH extra-tropical forests. Process:
– temperature increase: CO2 decrease, δ13C increase
– temperature decrease: CO2 increase, δ13C decrease
The 2-3 years inter-annual changes (like ENSO) are dominated by tropical vegetation: Process:
– temperature increase: CO2 increase, δ13C decrease
– temperature decrease: CO2 decrease, δ13C increase
The pre-industrial long term changes are dominated by the oceans. Process:
– temperature increase: CO2 increase, little change in δ13C
– temperature decrease: CO2 decrease, little change in δ13C
The past 1.5 centuries are dominated by humans. Process over the past 50+ years:
– temperature increase: CO2 increase averaged over 3 years, fast drop in δ13C
– temperature decrease: CO2 increase averaged over 3 years, fast drop in δ13C
Conclusion:
While the seasonal and inter-annual changes both are caused by vegetation, they are opposite in reaction to temperature changes and from different parts of the globe. The longer term change is mainly from the oceans, where vegetation again is an increasing sink with elevated temperatures (outside the tropics: longer growing seasons, increasing area after ice melt), but the ocean equilibrium with the atmosphere is dominant.
At present there is so little data that almost anything is possible as an explanation of the observations of atmospheric CO2 concentration.
Richard
Well not quite but it does require some proper physics and maths to eliminate certain possibilities.
Human emissions can’t explain the decadal scale variability , a simple relaxation model driven by temperature can. That is a lot more convincing than just roughly matching two slowly increasing integrals and concluding it accounts for the change.
Greg Goodman says:
July 7, 2014 at 9:42 am
From Paul_K:
The output response is phase-shifted relative to any sinusoidal temperature input; as response times get larger, the phase shift asymptotes to a shift of exactly pi/2. Hence, putting any realistic (i.e. long) transient response in place brings temperature exactly into phase with dCO2/dt.
and
The main message is that the observation of an approximate scale relationship between temperature and the time derivative of CO2 does not allow us to conclude that there is a simple underlying relationship of the form dCO2/dt = k(T-Te)
What we see is that the CO2 variability lags T variability and dCO2/dt lags dT/dt variability because the CO2 shift caused by a temperature shift takes time to complete. Here for the (deep) ocean exchanges of ~40 GtC/year:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/upwelling_temp.jpg
From seasons to ice ages, there is a straightforward relationship between temperature changes and CO2 changes of between 4 and 8 ppmv/°C over time frames from months to multi-millennia. Now in the past 50 years of increasing human emissions, there should be a new relationship of over 100 ppmv/°C without any influence from human emissions?
Greg Goodman:
At July 7, 2014 at 11:15 am you say to me
Hmm. Human emissions may be responsible for an alteration to the equilibrium state of the carbon cycle system and – thus – be the cause of the observed change to atmospheric CO2 concentration.
Ferdinand says the CO2 emissions from human activity directly cause the observed rise to atmospheric CO2 concentration.
I say the he CO2 emissions from human activity cannot directly cause the observed rise to atmospheric CO2 concentration but may be an indirect cause although recovery from the Little Ice Age (LIA) is more likely.
and I have been arguing this for a decade and since before publication of this
Rorsch A, Courtney RS & Thoenes D, ‘The Interaction of Climate Change and the Carbon Dioxide Cycle’ E&E v16no2 (2005)
The matter can be summarised as follows.
It is possible that the equilibrium of the carbon cycle system has been disturbed and the system is adjusting to the new equilibrium. Some processes of the carbon cycle have rate constants of years or decades and, therefore, the system takes decades to adjust to a new equilibrium.
Using that assumption we demonstrated it is possible to model the atmospheric CO2 rise indicated by the Mauna Loa data as being caused by any one of several mechanisms with either a natural or an anthropogenic cause. Each of our models matched the data to within reported measurement error for each year.
The assumption of anthropogenic CO2 overloading the carbon cycle induces the IPCC to use its Bern Model which requires unjustifiable 5-year smoothing to obtain agreement between that model’s output and the empirical data.
Also, the dynamics of the seasonal variation indicate that the carbon cycle can sequester all of the emitted CO2 (both natural and anthropogenic) of a year but it does not. This apparent paradox is explicable by the assumption that the equilibrium of the carbon cycle system has been disturbed and the system is adjusting to the new equilibrium.
The seasonal atmospheric CO2 variation happens as a result of the carbon cycle processes with short rate constants (hours, days, weeks and months).
The observed annual rise in atmospheric CO2 happens as a result of the carbon cycle processes with long constants (years, decades and centuries).
If the assumption is correct that the equilibrium of the carbon cycle system has been disturbed so the system is adjusting to the new equilibrium, then the observed rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration is a result of whatever has caused the equilibrium to change. The most likely cause is the rise in global temperature which is observed as recovery from the Little Ice Age (LIA), but other causes are possible and the anthropogenic emission of CO2 is one of them.
Hence, it is possible (although unlikely) that the anthropogenic CO2 emission is causing the rise in atmospheric CO2.
Richard
From seasons to ice ages, there is a straightforward relationship between temperature changes and CO2 changes of between 4 and 8 ppmv/°C over time frames from months to multi-millennia.
like I said you have not understood the relaxation response:
ΔCO2 = Asin(ωt) – Aωτcos(ωt) + Aωτexp(-t/τ’)
Note the ω in the second terms coeff. also note that A is frequency dependent for both terms.
This is exactly the same model that I discussed here in modelling temp response to radiative changes:
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=399
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
I doubt there is any aspect of the atmospheric CO2 rise causation issue you and I have not disputed over the years.
One such issue again arises in your post at July 7, 2014 at 11:31 am where you say
Greg Goodman writes at July 7, 2014 at 11:49 am to provide one possible refutation of that.
My refutation is more fundamental than his.
You are assuming the carbon cycle system was the same in the last ice age as now. But there is only thing we know with certainty about that: We know the carbon cycle system is now very different from what it was in the ice age because the carbon cycle system is driven by biota and temperature variations which are not the same now as they were in the ice age. So, we know your assumption is invalid but we do not know the reality.
As I said, we need much more data to resolve the true cause of the observed recent rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration: at present, almost anything is possible as an explanation.
Richard
Greg Goodman says:
July 7, 2014 at 11:49 am
like I said you have not understood the relaxation response:
ΔCO2 = Asin(ωt) – Aωτcos(ωt) + Aωτexp(-t/τ’)
Indeed, I have some memory left of that kind of formulae from 45-50 years ago, but never used them again…
The problem I see with this kind of theoretical exercises is that it is all frequency analysis, which largely explains the short term response of CO2 to temperature, but human emissions have no frequency (or maybe an extremely long one) and no detectable response to the small variations in human input.
Thus all you do is trying to explain a long term trend from short term variability, while one of the largest input factors, about twice the observed increase in the atmosphere AND twice the inter-annual variability, goes undetected in a frequency analyses…
richardscourtney says:
July 7, 2014 at 12:02 pm
You are assuming the carbon cycle system was the same in the last ice age as now.
Richard, I never said or even implied that. Of course the carbon cycle now is different from ice ages. But why should it be different with the MWP or the Roman warm period and how different with the LIA?
The drop in CO2 between the MWP and the LIA is ~6 ppmv for a drop of ~0.8°C or 8 ppmv/°C, the same ratio as for the difference between all glacial and interglacial intervals. The current increase is 100+ ppmv with a temperature increase not higher than the MWP-LIA drop. Human emissions over the same time span were near 200 ppmv.
Do you really think that the current increase has nothing to do with human emissions?
Kinetic resolution (and spatial resolution, as discussed by Bart and Ferdinand upthread). Of course it depends on which fluxes are being investigated. For example, if a satellite passes overhead and makes a single measurement in the air column above an area of ocean at midday and again, say, 24 hours later at midday, what does that say about the daily photosynthetic flux? Not much probably, even if the two measurements differ significantly, and they may be the same within experimental error.
Probably worth repeating what Greg Goodman said upthread;
Other fluxes are also operating, not just lateral&vertical transport of CO2 by atmospheric motions. Surface exchange, thermo-chemical sources/sinks due to mixing/upwelling from below (where the satellite can’t measure, presumably). The satellite wasn’t even there to take measurements at midnight when the daily (negative) photosynthetic flux was reversed and positive due to respiration. Thermo-chemical processes may reverse in the opposite direction.
Many more rapid measurements=greater kinetic (time) resolution and may allow resolution of some of these fluxes. Whether the new satellite can start to make inroads into these fluxes would be interesting. I’m fairly sure the existing satellite doesn’t. The models are losing a lot of carbon as well as heat. If the Japanese satellite data had resolved the problems they would have turned the volume up to 11, trumpeted it from the rooftops, and saved NASA the price of a satellite.
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
You are being disingenuous in your post at July 7, 2014 at 12:45 pm when you ask me
You know full well that I do not have any idea as to whether the cause of the “current increase” in atmospheric CO2 is natural, or is anthropogenic, or is some combination of natural and anthropogenic causes.
In reality nobody knows because their is not sufficient information for anybody to know. Despite that there are people who claim to know the “current increase” is natural while others – including you – claim to know the “current increase” is anthropogenic.
As to your assertion concerning the MWP and LIA, that is merely an iteration of your misplaced belief that ice cores are sample bottles. That proxy data does NOT indicate actual historical atmospheric CO2 concentration.
Richard
Willis Eschenbach says:
July 6, 2014 at 12:33 pm
[In reply to this statement by richardscourtney] “However, that is not true. The natural emission varies with the time of year (this is the Mauna Loa variation)”
“No. That shows that the plants inhale CO2 in the summer and give off CO2 in the winter.”
—————-
And Sam C asks …. by what mechanism or process does plants or plant biomass give off or emit prodigious amounts CO2 in the winter time?
Surely not by rotting or decaying because that would be in direct violation of Nature’s Dry Storage & Refrigerator-Freezer Law that controls microbial decomposition of plant and animal biomass.
Now I don’t have a PhD ….. so you probably won’t believe or take my word for the above …. but that is no excuse for anyone to IGNORE or avert their eyes and their mind to the USDA mandates and/or recommendations for the storage and preservation of plant and animal biomass.
The following “source link” if for the State of California …. but all States ….. and all Public Health Departments abide by the USDA mandates and rules. To wit:
Proper Storage Temperatures and Moisture Conditions
http://www.cde.ca.gov/ls/nu/fd/mb00404.asp
The USDA mandates, rules and/or recommendations are based in their entirety on ….. Nature’s Dry Storage & Refrigerator-Freezer Law.
Humans are not very productive if they get too cold or too dry, ….. and neither are most all microorganisms. They both “slow down” as the temperatures decreases below 60F … and “stop” all activity when frozen solid.
milodonharlani says:
July 6, 2014 at 3:01 pm
“I’d like to think that the whole ~120 ppm gain since c. AD 1850 owes entirely to naturally warmer seas, but IMO evidence from the hotter than ….”
————–
Me thinks that your 1st mistake is in assuming that that “c. AD 1850” CO2 figure is accurate or correct.
Samuel C Cogar:
Thankyou for your support at July 7, 2014 at 1:09 pm.
As you say, that comment by Willis can be debated. However, his entire post which you address is an abberation which it would be kindly to forget. It is mostly aggressive rant and is entirely illogical; for example. and pertaining to your point, he asserts that the seasonal variation is not a natural imbalance of emission and sequestration without his providing any suggestion of what else it could be.
I suggest that it is best to ‘move on’ from that post.
Richard
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 7, 2014 at 1:12 pm
I’m aware of measurements higher than 280 ppm in the 19th century, but they were taken in or near cities in smoky, CO2 rich industrial Europe. I’d be happy if it could be conclusively demonstrated, for instance, that CO2 was higher during the Medieval Warm Period (or even the LIA) than now, but it really doesn’t matter, since CO2 isn’t mainly responsible for whatever warming may actually have occurred since the 19th century & continued growth in the life-giving gas won’t produce any catastrophes. Higher ocean temperatures increase atmospheric concentration, but not IMO enough to account for the supposedly observed gain.
“The problem I see with this kind of theoretical exercises is that it is all frequency analysis, which largely explains the short term response of CO2 to temperature, but human emissions have no frequency (or maybe an extremely long one) and no detectable response to the small variations in human input.
Everything can be broken down in to series of frequencies even a linear rise. That is the basis of Fourier analysis.. If there’s no detectable response to the small variations in human input your hypothesis has a problem.
“Thus all you do is trying to explain a long term trend from short term variability, while one of the largest input factors, about twice the observed increase in the atmosphere AND twice the inter-annual variability, goes undetected in a frequency analyses…”
No, what I’m doing is showing that if the short term variations are well explained by temperature then someone needs to assess what the long term is instead of assuming it’s negligible and making baseless comparisons to the flip between two difference states of the climate system.
The human emissions will not go undetected in a frequency analysis.
While you can be quite informative at times, you are clearly well out of your zone of competence on this stuff. I suggest you stop trying to discuss something you do not understand.
richardscourtney says:
July 7, 2014 at 1:01 pm
that is merely an iteration of your misplaced belief that ice cores are sample bottles. That proxy data does NOT indicate actual historical atmospheric CO2 concentration.
Of course, if you don’t like the data, the data must be wrong.
Ice cores indeed are little sample bottles. Not snapshots of ancient atmospheres, but time weighted averages over the period that the pores in the snow were still open to the atmosphere.
These averages are between a decade for the past 150 years to 560 years for the past 800,000 years.
That are not proxies, but accurate (1.2 ppmv – 1 sigma) direct measurements of CO2 itself.
BTW, the ice cores show a similar trend as coralline sponges for δ13C changes with a resolution of 2-4 years:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/sponges.gif
Coralline sponges show the same δ13C changes as the surrounding seawater, which is in close contact with the atmosphere. Quite remarkable that the “sample bottles” in ice cores show similar changes over the past 600 years…
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
Your post at July 7, 2014 at 1:39 pm is silly. Ice cores are NOT sample bottles for a variety of regions which we have repeatedly discussed.
However, if ice cores were sample bottles then their indications of atmospheric CO2 concentration would have similar temporal resolution to the stomata data: they don’t.
Richard
Greg Goodman says:
July 7, 2014 at 1:33 pm
No, what I’m doing is showing that if the short term variations are well explained by temperature then someone needs to assess what the long term is instead of assuming it’s negligible and making baseless comparisons to the flip between two difference states of the climate system.
OK, I was out of my depth for frequency analyses, but I am well aware of what happens with (physico-chemical) processes.
As the plot of the inter-annual variability shows, temperature causes an increase of the CO2 rate of change and an opposite decrease of δ13C, which is a response of vegetation on this kind of temperature variability. Further investigation has shown that it was mainly a response of tropical vegetation on temperature and rain patterns, but that is not important here. What is important is that the response is from vegetation.
The longer term trend over the past 1.5 decade shows that vegetation is a net absorber for CO2 of about 1 GtC/year and increasing.
Ergo, the temperature influence on short-term CO2 rate of change variability and the temperature influence on longer term CO2 rate of change are opposite to each other in the case of vegetation.
That leaves the question of what caused the long term increase of CO2 and its rate of change.
There is no reason to use temperature as the driver of the recent increase: historical ratios show some 8 ppmv/°C. Henry’s Law gives 17 ppmv/°C as change in equilibrium for the oceans (without counting the reaction by vegetation). Vegetation is a proven net sink and the oceans are (sparsely) measured net sinks for CO2. Moreover, ocean releases would increase the atmospheric δ13C level, while there is a record decrease observed.
There are a lot of reasons to accept that human emissions are the cause: that fits all observations while all alternatives I have heard of violate one or more observations…
If there’s no detectable response to the small variations in human input your hypothesis has a problem
The year by year change of human emissions is maximum some 0.2 ppmv. After all absorption processes some 0.1 ppmv of that variability may be left. The detection limit of Mauna Loa is somewhat better than 0.2 ppmv. Thus these small variations over a year go undetected. That was reason for Bart even at the beginning of the discussions to discard human emissions as cause of the increase…
My question exactly. How does this breakdown per capita?
richardscourtney says:
July 7, 2014 at 1:56 pm
However, if ice cores were sample bottles then their indications of atmospheric CO2 concentration would have similar temporal resolution to the stomata data: they don’t.
Richard, you know that this can’t be true: ice cores are sample bottles of a mix of several years of air. Their resolution is a matter of snow accumulation rate which gives the years needed to seal the pores from the atmosphere into isolated bubbles. But ice core CO2 still is directly measured as CO2, even if it is a mixture of several years. For those interested in the age distribution, see fig.11 in:
http://courses.washington.edu/proxies/GHG.pdf
Stomata data are CO2 proxies, with all the problems that gives: reacting on local CO2 levels over land, already biased compared to “background”, a bias which may change with climate, wind direction and land use changes in the main wind direction…
Thus bluntly said: if there is a discrepancy between stomata data and ice core data averaged over the same period longer than the resolution of the ice core, then the stomata data are certainly wrong…
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
At July 7, 2014 at 1:56 pm I wrote
At July 7, 2014 at 2:49 pm you have replied saying
Yes, Ferdinand. And sample bottles do not take several years to seal while several processes happen to their contents while they seal.
We could go through all this yet again, but there is no need because your answer confirms that ice cores are not sample bottles, and their contents do not have the annual resolution of stomata data because they do not perform like sample bottles.
Richard
There is nothing new here.
At the turn of the century scientists produced peer reviewed papers while working at Princeton University and undertook to measure CO2 on the ground by taking measurements off the coast of North America in the Pacific, and took measurements at various points across North America. They observed that the prevailing air blowing in from the Pacific from Eurasia, had elevated CO2 levels which were generally reduced or ocasionally added to, as the air traversed across America on the prevailing winds. Coastal California industry elevated the levels but the CO2 was bio-sequestered and lowered as it transited across California’s agricultural lands and then western forest, rangelands and grasslands before being severely depleted in the rich agricultural wheat and cornfields of mid America. CO2 levels elevated a bit in the American “Ruhr Valley” industrial cities before falling once again until it raised a bit on the Eastern Seaboards cities before exiting into the Atlantic. But the air going into the Atlantic was depleted in CO2 versus the air entering from the Pacific indicating that America was a vast CO2 sink despite its industrialization and advanced civilization.
Many Americans grew wealthy transforming that bio-sequestered CO2 into lumber, paper, meat and agricultural products. They used the wealth, to purchase industrial products of increasing cost and sophistication, like our transportation vehicles cars, trucks, locomotives and planes which don’t pollute like their predecessors once did.
The Greens managed to suppress and ignore this information for a decade or more as it didn’t fit their agenda of Global Warming and western “Guilt” and “Blame America First”, as a source for their elitist skimming of funds.
Proving once again Abe Lincoln’s aphorism is true. “You can fool some of the people all the time; and all the people some of the time; but you can’t fool all the people, all of the time”. The Truth is coming out.
stas peterson:
Thankyou for your post at July 7, 2014 at 4:05 pm.
It is good to see that some sanity and empirical reality has been returned to this thread.
Importantly, the kinds of issues which you report for the continental US require consideration for the entire planet. The satellites provide the possibility of obtaining information which will allow such considerations to displace all the various models based on assumptions and beliefs.
Richard
Have a look at this link. Well worth a read:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2683560/Green-group-lobbyists-drafted-White-House-energy-policy-tit-tat-revenge-against-secret-Bush-Cheney-oil-industry-meetings.html
All of this begs the question (formal sense). It assumes CO2 is harmful, in defiance of all biology. Consider that over geological time, all the O2 in the atmosphere is sourced and sustained by CO2 breakdown by vegetation.
As for land vs. ocean, a recent NASA satellite survey indicated that the Amazon balanced on a diurnal basis, but the runoff into the oceans fed and stimulated a major plankton bloom in the Atlantic, boosting O2 levels.
richardscourtney says:
July 7, 2014 at 3:11 pm
You’re good at word games that distract attention from the essence: that ice cores show real ancient CO2 levels, while stomata data are proxies with all the problems this entails.
See the similarity between ice core data and the South Pole data with an overlap of ~ 20 years (1960-1980):
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/law_dome_sp_co2.jpg
And the problems of the calibration of stomata data with direct measurements and… ice core data over the past century:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/stomata.jpg
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
I strongly object to your psychological projection at July 8, 2014 at 12:30 pm where you write.
NO! How dare you?!
Stomata data and ice core data are proxies. They each have uses but neither is a direct measure.
YOU are using “word games” by pretending the ice cores act as sample bottles. THEY DO NOT!
I cited evidence that they do not and you agreed it, but you tried to overcome that by saying the “bottles” trapped average air of several years (actually it is decades). No sample bottle collects a temporal average amount of sample.
Stomata data and ice core data are useful proxies for ancient atmospheric CO2 concentration. But it is plain wrong to accept either as a direct measure. Indeed, the stomata data are the nearer to a direct measure because stomata of present day leaves grown in atmospheric CO2 values under laboratory conditions can provide direct calibration for stomata data. No such calibration is possible for the ice core data.
Claiming that either stomata data or ice core data are not proxies is a “word game” called falsehood.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
July 8, 2014 at 12:47 pm
Richard, where I used to work they had to sample waste water in ratio to the exit flow. That was collected in one flask, sealed and sent to the government. Still one sample bottle, but the weighted average over a few weeks of waste water flows. It allowed the government to calculate the exact water pollution from the factory after waste water treatment.
Ice cores do the same for air: they sample air over a certain time frame as a weighted, asymmetric average, more from recent years than from earlier years. That allows researchers to exactly measure the average CO2 level over a certain time frame.
That time frame depends of the snow accumulation rate and is less than a decade for 2 out of 3 Law Dome ice cores and up to 600 years for the Vostok ice core.
And like it or not: ice cores CO2 is directly measured as CO2. Calling a direct measurement a “proxy” is a distortion of the truth.
Richard,
Indeed, the stomata data are the nearer to a direct measure because stomata of present day leaves grown in atmospheric CO2 values under laboratory conditions can provide direct calibration for stomata data. No such calibration is possible for the ice core data.
Besides that there is no “calibration” needed for CO2 in ice cores (except for the analytical methods themselves), the 20 year overlap with atmospheric measurements and additional measurements in firn top down until sealing depth confirmed that ice cores are reliable for ancient air averages.
And do you really believe that one can calibrate stomata (index) data in a laboratory? I like to see the data and compare them to field data (the absolute data, not the calibrated ones!).
Even if the stomata data are not influenced by other variables than CO2 at all (which is not true), they are reflecting local CO2 levels “averaged” over the previous growing season. Any idea how the local CO2 level changed over the centuries in the main wind direction(s) with changing land use?
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
re your post at July 8, 2014 at 2:08 pm.
If you really have managed to convince yourself that ice cores are sample bottles then you have deluded yourself.
As you know, the ice core proxies provide different ice age and gas age for the same core sample. That also demonstrates the ice does NOT act as a sample bottle.
Look, I keep telling you that the ice core data and the stomata data are proxies. I do not need to pretend that either of them provides a direct measurement because I am not claiming either method provides a direct measurement. You are making that claim while I am saying neither is a direct measurement. But I do know that one proxy (stomata) can be calibrated for known conditions and the other (ice) cannot.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
July 8, 2014 at 2:27 pm
Richard, what has a difference in age between ice and enclosed gas to do with the quality of the ice data or the gas data? Simply nothing. The ice is only a container for the air mixture, which is younger in average than the surrounding ice for the simple reason that the pores still are open years to centuries after the snow did settle.
As several stomata series are based on oak leaves, how do you calibrate the stomata data from leaves of a 500 year old oak in a laboratory under known conditions? But even in the case of experiments in greenhouses, 48% of all species tested respond as expected to changes in CO2. In open top chambers, which resemble more real life conditions, that is reduced to only 13%, due to increased influence of confounding factors… See:
http://droyer.web.wesleyan.edu/RPP.pdf
Chapter 4 is also of interest: “Potential confounding factors”.
This Stomatal Index study found Allerød pollen zone (c. 12,760 cal yr BP) of c. 400 to 425 ppm. The authors note, “This datapoint is constructed with only two leaves and may be an outlier (although note concurrent peak in the Loss On Ignition record).”
http://www.academia.edu/2949675/Stomatal_proxy_record_of_CO2_concentrations_from_the_last_termination_suggests_an_important_role_for_CO2_at_climate_change_transitions
I don’t think that CO2 does play an important role in glacial/interglacial transitions, but even this one possibly spurious result should give pause to wonder how reliable CO2 reconstructions are from all proxy data.
milodonharlani says:
July 7, 2014 at 1:29 pm
“Higher ocean temperatures increase atmospheric concentration, but not IMO enough to account for the supposedly observed gain.”
————
milodonharlani, it is your stated ….. “supposedly observed gain”, …. the yearly one of “1.5 to 2 ppm” that is, …. that IMO defines the higher or increasing ocean temperature as the culprit responsible for said yearly increase in atmospheric CO2 concentrations.
And my above claim of culpability is based solely on the ….”supposedly observed bi-yearly gain and loss” …… of an average “6 ppm” of atmospheric CO2 as measured at the Mona Loa research facility in Hawaii.
The above stated “1.5 to 2 ppm” average yearly increase in CO2 ppm ….. as well as said average “6 ppm” bi-yearly cycling (increases/decreases) of atmospheric CO2 can easily or readily be observed either on the Keeling Curve Graph or on NOAA’s ERSL data base of monthly average CO2 ppm calculations for every month from April 1958 thru to the month of June 2014.
Keeling Curve graph: http://blogs.redding.com/redding/dcraig/600px_mlo_record.jpg
NOAA’s ERSL data base: ftp://aftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/products/trends/co2/co2_mm_mlo.txt
Now concerning the “accounting for” the supposedly observed gain, IMO there is insufficient knowledge of all the different emitters and sinks of CO2 for anyone to make even a reasonable guess as to the primary source(s) of said gain ….. let alone calculate an exact amount or quantity of said CO2. The only figure that is reasonably accurate is the calculated daily average of CO2 ppm as measured high in the atmosphere atop Mona Loa where the “noise” caused by H2O vapor is nil to nothing. And subsequently, the calculated weekly, monthly and yearly CO2 ppm averages are also reasonably accurate.
Now Mother Nature performs several different functions or actions that one could describe as being “cyclic”, but none of which could be described as being truly cyclic that “cycles” on a specific time/date year after year after year except the seasonal or equinox cycles that are determined by the earth’s orbit around the Sun.
Now both the Keeling Curve Graph and/or NOAA’s ERSL data base defines a “steady and consistent” 1.5 to 2 ppm average yearly increase in CO2 ppm for every year in succession for the past 56 years ….. as well as a “steady and consistent” average 6 ppm bi-yearly cycling of atmospheric CO2 for every year in succession for the past 56 years.
Now there is nothing else in the natural world, nor is there anything that humanity has or is doing …… that is or has been “steady and consistent” for each and every year for the past 56 years, … therefore the primary driver of the 6 ppm bi-yearly cycling of atmospheric CO2 ppm has to be the seasonal changes in the temperature of surface water of the world’s oceans.
And this can be verified by the “yearly high” and “yearly low” of the CO2 ppm that always occurs “just like clockwork” following the Spring and Fall Equinoxes ….. with the “yearly high” always occurring around mid-May of each year …… and the “yearly low” always occurring last days of September or first days in October of each year. The “yearly high” in mid-May lags behind the Spring equinox simply because it requires more days to “cool down” the surface waters of the Southern Hemisphere ocean than it does to “warm them back up” after the Fall equinox. The 6 ppm variance is due to the different in the ocean “surface area” of the Northern and Southern Hemispheres.
To view a Keeling Curve graph with included equinox and ppm notations, click this url link:
http://i1019.photobucket.com/albums/af315/SamC_40/keelingcurve.gif
richardscourtney says:
July 8, 2014 at 2:27 pm
Said to” Ferdinand Engelbeen:
“Look, I keep telling you that the ice core data and the stomata data are proxies. I do not need to pretend that either of them provides a direct measurement because I am not claiming either method provides a direct measurement. You are making that claim while I am saying neither is a direct measurement”
——————
My learned opinion is, ….. you are both wrong.
The ice core proxies do not provide a direct measurement of atmospheric CO2 …… whereas stomata proxies do provide a direct measurement of atmospheric CO2.
Keeling proved that there was TOO DAMN MUCH NOISE to measure CO2 ppm at or near the surface due to the different air masses moving in and out of the area. H2O vapor ppm will screw up the count. And so will snowfall. And it’s not always snowfall that traps the CO2, wind blown snow will trap it quicker. And pack it tight, too, Much, much tighter than falling snow, which has to “settle” to become tightly packed.
Plants do not grow forty-eleven stomata on each leaf because it figures there won’t be very much CO2 in the air. Nor do they only grow 1 dozen stomata on each leaf because it figures there will be great amounts of CO2 in the air. The stomata are produced as the leaf grows to full size … and the number of stomata is determined by the amount of CO2 in the air at the time of leaf growth.
Thus, the number of stomata per leaf “surface area” …. is equivalent to a thermometer reading at “time n’ place”.
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 8, 2014 at 5:24 pm
IIRC correctly my first ever public comment on global warming in the 1980s was that science doesn’t know all the sinks, so how can we even estimate what CO2 might be in 2100, for starters. Or maybe it was about this interglacial compared to previous ones. But what I said then about sinks hasn’t changed much in the subsequent 30-odd years (some very odd indeed).
But I don’t overly concern myself with the source of increased CO2, whether human or natural, since its climatic effect is so limited. Would be nice to know, but for policy purposes doesn’t really matter, since even if the presumed increase is all our fault, so far it’s a good thing & likely to remain so.
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 8, 2014 at 5:24 pm
Now there is nothing else in the natural world, nor is there anything that humanity has or is doing …… that is or has been “steady and consistent” for each and every year for the past 56 years, … therefore the primary driver of the 6 ppm bi-yearly cycling of atmospheric CO2 ppm has to be the seasonal changes in the temperature of surface water of the world’s oceans.
You are right and wrong on several counts:
– Natural increase/decrease is quite constant over every season again, but the increase after a full seasonal cycle is not constant. It is slightly quadratic increasing over time and so are human emissions. The latter are two times higher than the observed increase over time:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_co2_acc_1900_2011.jpg
There is a near fit between human emissions and increase in the atmosphere at 50-55% of the emissions. The fit of temperature with the CO2 increase is more problematic.
– The global seasonal change in CO2 parallels the global seasonal change in temperature: 5 ppmv/°C. The historical long term change over decennia to multi-millennia is 8 ppmv/°C. The current increase is over 100 ppmv/°C seems quite unlikely caused by temperature as the maximum increase since the LIA is some 1°C.
– The seasonal changes are not caused by the oceans: that would increase CO2 levels and the 13C/12C ratio with higher temperatures, but we see lower CO2 with higher temperatures and an inverse change of the 13C/12C ratio, which shows that it is vegetation which is dominant:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/seasonal_CO2_d13C_MLO_BRW.jpg
The SH has less vegetation and more ocean and shows little variation over the seasons.
– Any warming of the oceans will not give more than 17 ppmv/°C extra CO2 in the atmosphere (Henry’s Law). Not 100+ ppmv. The 100 ppmv above the temperature controlled equilibrium actually pushes more CO2 into the oceans.
The ice core proxies do not provide a direct measurement of atmospheric CO2 …… whereas stomata proxies do provide a direct measurement of atmospheric CO2.
The first is nonsense: they measure CO2, CH4, CFC’s, Ar, N2, O2 and any gas you want directly in the air bubbles either by crushing the ice under vacuum and GC or NDIR apparatus or by sublimating all ice and trapping all gases cryogenically and measuring them successively over a mass spectrometer for the mass of different isotopes. The only drawback is that the ice core bubbles are a mixture of several years to centuries, depending of snow accumulation rate.
The second is nonsense too: according to Tom van Hoof, stomata specialist, most of the stomata growth is based on the average CO2 level in the previous growing season. But even so, stomata (index) levels are influenced by drought and several other factors. And last but not least, stomata data are by definition measured in plants which grow on land, where there is a huge bias (and lots of variability) compared to “background” CO2 as measured over Antarctica. Nobody knows how the bias changed over the centuries… Here the local bias at Giessen, Germany, semi-rural, over a few years compared to Mauna Loa:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/giessen_mlo_monthly.jpg
To use your thermometer example: stomata data is equivalent to trying to deduce a global average temperature from a thermometer placed over an asphalt parking lot…
1st response to: Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 9, 2014 at 1:25 am
“You are right and wrong on several counts:”
——————–
Of course I’m RIGHT on the only “count” that matters.
===================
“– Natural increase/decrease is quite constant over every season again, but the increase after a full seasonal cycle is not constant.”
—————-
DUH, the increase after a full seasonal cycle has also been quite constant for the past 50 years …. with an average increase of 1 to 2 ppm per year. To wit:
year ——————— CO2 ppm – % increase — avg ppm increase/decade
Decade end 1940 – ____ 300 ppm est.
Decade end 1950 – ____ 310 ppm – 3.1% (avg 1.0 ppm/year)
Decade end 1960 – ____ 316 ppm – 3.2% (avg 0.6 ppm/year)
Decade end 1970 – ____ 325 ppm – 2.7% (avg 0.9 ppm/year)
Decade end 1980 – ____ 338 ppm – 3.8% (avg 1.3 ppm/year)
Decade end 1990 – ____ 354 ppm – 4.5% (avg 1.6 ppm/year)
Decade end 2000 – ____ 369 ppm – 4.3% (avg 1.5 ppm/year)
Decade end 2010 – ____ 389 ppm – 5.1% (avg 2.0 ppm/year)
Year end _ 2012 – ____ 393 ppm – 1.0% (avg 2.0 ppm/year)
And the exponential INCREASE in world population has no effect on it, to wit:
Increases in World Population & Atmospheric CO2 by Decade
year — world popul. – % incr. — Dec CO2 ppm – % incr. — avg increase/year
1940 – 2,300,000,000 est. ___ ____ 300 ppm
1950 – 2,556,000,053 – 11.1% ____ 310 ppm – 3.1% —— 1.0 ppm/year
1960 – 3,039,451,023 – 18.9% ____ 316 ppm – 3.2% —— 0.6 ppm/year
1970 – 3,706,618,163 – 21.9% ____ 325 ppm – 2.7% —— 0.9 ppm/year
1980 – 4,453,831,714 – 20.1% ____ 338 ppm – 3.8% —– 1.3 ppm/year
1990 – 5,278,639,789 – 18.5% ____ 354 ppm – 4.5% —– 1.6 ppm/year
2000 – 6,082,966,429 – 15.2% ____ 369 ppm – 4.3% —– 1.5 ppm/year
2010 – 6,809,972,000 – 11.9% ____ 389 ppm – 5.1% —– 2.0 ppm/year
2012 – 7,057,075,000 – 3.62% ____ 394 ppm – 1.3% —– 2.5 ppm/year
Based on the above statistics, to wit:
Fact #1 – In 70 years – population increased 198% – CO2 increased 29% – Heat Islands increased est. 300/400+%
Fact #2 – Atmospheric CO2 has been steadily and consistently increasing at a rate of 1 to 2 ppm per year for the past 70 years, …… whereas human generated CO2 releases have been increasing exponentially every year for the past 70 years.
Fact #3 – Global Temperatures have been steadily and consistently increasing a few hundredths or tenths of a degree for the past 70 years, ……. whereas human created infrastructure, housing, vehicles, etc. (Heat Islands) have been increasing exponentially every year for the past 70 years.
Conclusions:
Given the above statistics, it appears to me to be quite obvious that for the past 70 years there is absolutely no direct association or correlation between:
• Increases in atmospheric CO2 ppm and world population increases.
• Increases in Average Global Temperature and world population increases.
• Increases in Average Global Temperature and Heat Islands construction increases.
• Increases in Average Global Temperature and atmospheric CO2 ppm increases.
But then of course, …… I am not looking through Rose Colored Glasses.
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 9, 2014 at 6:31 am
Given the above statistics, it appears to me to be quite obvious that for the past 70 years there is absolutely no direct association or correlation between:
– Increases in Average Global Temperature and atmospheric CO2 ppm increases.
Agreed with this and all other points. The correlation is between human emissions and increase in the atmosphere:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/acc_co2_1900_cur.jpg
Human emissions are not only caused by population growth but also by increasing industrialization and increasing wealth… That gives a slope in the year by year increase rate of CO2:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em2.jpg
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
At July 9, 2014 at 8:45 am you say of CO2
Well, yes and no.
The atmospheric rise is very close to linear so almost anything which is rising does correlate to it. The human CO2 emissions are cumulatively increasing so, yes, they correlate with the atmospheric increase.
But the human emissions vary and their variations don’t match variations in the atmospheric rise so, no, their correlation with the atmospheric increase is not good: in some years almost all the human emission seems to be sequestered and in other years almost none of the human emission seems to be sequestered. There are reasons which justify 3-year smoothing of the data. The IPCC uses unjustifiable 5-year smoothing of the data to obtain a match between observations and its CO2 model because the correlation is not adequate without the unjustifiable amount of smoothing.
Richard
2nd response to: Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 9, 2014 at 1:25 am
“The global seasonal change in CO2 parallels the global seasonal change in temperature: 5 ppmv/°C. The historical long term change over decennia to multi-millennia is 8 ppmv/°C. The current increase is over 100 ppmv/°C seems quite unlikely caused by temperature as the maximum increase since the LIA is some 1°C.”
————————
Ferdinand, me thinks you associating and/or correlating ….. apples to rutabagas. I really don’t care what your calculated global average temperature is or your calculated global seasonal change in temperatures are. As far as I am concerned those calculated average temperatures are …. “much ado about nothing”.
The premise of my aforementioned claim is based solely on the temperature of the water in the world’s ocean basin. But iffen you want, you can include all the water in the inland seas, lakes, rivers, swamps and canals ….. given the fact that they are also sinks and emitters of CO2.
The average air temperature does not translate directly to the water temperature and bout everyone but imbeciles and children know that to be a fact. Imbeciles and children, on the 1st “HOT” day in April or May, will jerk their clothes off and “jump into” a lake, river or large swimming pool ….. and quickly freeze their testicles “off” iffen they have a pair.
On a side note, CO2 emissions do, per se, parallel the near surface air temperatures because biomass will rot, decay and/or decompose quicker n’ faster when said temperatures are >60F. That is why it “always stinks in the city” …. on the first warm days of Spring. The microorganisms launch their “attack” on the winter “build-up” of dead biomass.
==============
“The seasonal changes are not caused by the oceans: that would increase CO2 levels”
—————
YUP, and that is exactly what I told you is happening. The ocean waters have been gradually “warming” ever since the LIA ended. And they “warm up” and “cool down” on a bi-yearly CYCLE relative to the equinoxes. And unless you can point out another “steady n’ consistent” natural cycle to explain it …. then you are just “spinning your wheels” and getting nothing resolved.
=========
“and the 13C/12C ratio with higher temperatures, but we see lower CO2 with higher temperatures and an inverse change of the 13C/12C ratio, which shows that it is vegetation which is dominant”
—————
GIMME A BREAK, …… association does not equal causation.
You don’t have a clue what all the “sinks n’ sources” are for 13C isotope. Some hardwood trees sequester 13C deep in the soil …. and you don’t know how much is there ….. or if or when it is outgassed …. or consumed by another organism.
==============
“The second is nonsense too: according to Tom van Hoof, stomata specialist, most of the stomata growth is based on the average CO2 level in the previous growing season.”
———
Are you trying to be funny or what? You have been basing your argument on a 1 to 2 ppm/year CO2 increase during the past 200+- years …. and now you criticize me for a past 1 year increase in CO2.
And ps: some plants do have a “memory” for reacting to a “repeated” environmental stimuli, …. but it is not logical for evolution to “assume anything” about the future. And I don’t think plants care much about biases and variability of CO2 because they are only sucking it in during photosynthesis activity.
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 9, 2014 at 11:17 am
Samuel,
I think we do agree that higher temperatures give more CO2 in the atmosphere.
I think we do agree that both atmosphere and surface (ocean + land) waters increase in temperature in spring/summer. Ocean waters a lot slower than land, but increase they do. Thus oceans release more CO2 in spring/summer and absorb more CO2 in fall/winter.
But what do we see in the atmosphere? A firm drop in CO2 in spring/summer. And a firm increase of the 13C/12C ratio.
It doesn’t matter what kind of plants that (re)start to grow in spring: all plants together absorb more CO2 in spring/summer than the debris of the previous year can emit (including bacteria, insects and animals), simply because each year the whole biosphere is a net and increasing sink for CO2 and preferably 12CO2, thus leaving relative more 13CO2 in the atmosphere, no matter if that is by C3 or C4 plants or where it is stored.
Conclusion: plant growth and decay dominates the seasonal cycle.
YUP, and that is exactly what I told you is happening.
If the cooling between the warm(er) MWP and the LIA doesn’t drop global CO2 levels with more than 6 ppmv, why would a smaller to similar increase in temperature between the LIA and current temperatures give an increase of 100+ ppmv, against all solubility laws for CO2 in seawater, at exactly the same start years and curvature as humans emitted twice the amounts in the same time frame?
Are you trying to be funny or what? You have been basing your argument on a 1 to 2 ppm/year CO2 increase during the past 200+- years …. and now you criticize me for a past 1 year increase in CO2.
We were discussing the reliability of stomata data vs. ice core CO2 data. The former are based on year by year variable, but also increasing local CO2 levels (no matter if that is over the previous growing season or momentary in spring). These depend on agriculture, industry, planting forests, draining swamps, weather, climate,… in the main wind direction. The latter are based on CO2 levels as measured in 95% of the atmosphere, but smoothed over a decade to several hundred years.
Thus while stomata data have a better resolution, their reliability as CO2 indicators is far more questionable.
richardscourtney says:
July 9, 2014 at 10:47 am
But the human emissions vary and their variations don’t match variations in the atmospheric rise so, no, their correlation with the atmospheric increase is not good: in some years almost all the human emission seems to be sequestered and in other years almost none of the human emission seems to be sequestered.
The problem of the human emissions is that they hardly vary: the year by year variation, including the increase over the years is maximum 0.2 ppmv/year. As about halve the emissions (in quantity) remains in the atmosphere, that gives 0.1 ppmv/year, which is under the detection limit of Mauna Loa.
The net result is that no variability of the human emissions shows up in the Mauna Loa data and all variability around the trend is caused by natural variability.
Meanwhile we know that the year by year variability is caused by (tropical) vegetation as the inverse relationship between CO2 ups and downs and 13C/12C ratio ups and downs shows. But vegetation is not the cause of the increase in the atmosphere, as the biosphere as a whole is a net and increasing absorber for CO2.
Human emissions do more than accommodate for the rise in the atmosphere, they are near double the rise. Human emissions are not responsible for the variability around the rise, vegetation is, but vegetation is not responsible for the rise.
As usual, correlation in this case is not causation but more important: non-correlation doesn’t prevent causation here because the variability and the trend are not caused by the same processes.
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
Your post at July 9, 2014 at 1:43 pm replies to my post at July 9, 2014 at 10:47 am.
Ferdinand, please read my post again because I think our two posts are saying the same things in different words.
You and I disagree about much in this subject. In my opinion, if that disagreement is to be useful then we need to recognise the things we do agree. (What one infers from the points we agree is something else.)
Richard
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
I apologise if this post is a duplicate bur my first version vanished.
Your post at July 9, 2014 at 1:43 pm replies to my post at July 9, 2014 at 10:47 am.
Ferdinand, please read my post again because I think our posts say the same things in different words.
You and I disagree about very much of this subject. In my opinion, if that disagreement is to be useful then we need to be clear about the things we do agree. (What is inferred from the things we agree is something else).
Richard
Mods:
I have twice tried to post a reply to Ferdinand saying he and I are agreeing (which is unusual).
My posts have vanished. This post is both a test to see if it vanishes,too, and to ask you to check the ‘bin’ and to retrieve one of my posts if it is there.
Richard
Ferdinand Engelbeen :
This is my fourth attempt to post in response to you. All my previous posts have vanished so please forgive me if this becomes a duplicate.
Your post at July 9, 2014 at 1:43 pm replies to my post at July 9, 2014 at 10:47 am.
Ferdinand, please read my post again because I think we are saying the same things in different words.
You and I disagree about very much in this subject. In my opinion, if our disagreement is to be useful then we need to be clear about the things we do agree. (What we infer from the things we agree is something else).
Richard
Ferdinand Engelbeen :
This is my third fifth attempt to post in response to you. All my previous posts have vanished so please forgive me if this becomes a duplicate.
Your post at July 9, 2014 at 1:43 pm replies to my post at July 9, 2014 at 10:47 am.
Ferdinand, please read my post again because I think we are saying the same things in different words.
You and I disagree about very much in this subject. In my opinion, if our disagreement is to be useful then we need to be clear about the things we do agree. (What we infer from the things we agree is something else).
Richard
Ferdinand Engelbeen :
This is my sixth attempt to post in response to you. All my previous posts have vanished so please forgive me if this becomes a duplicate.
Your post at July 9, 2014 at 1:43 pm replies to my post at July 9, 2014 at 10:47 am.
Ferdinand, please read my post again because I think we are saying the same things in different words.
You and I disagree about very much in this subject. In my opinion, if our disagreement is to be useful then we need to be clear about the things we do agree. (What we infer from the things we agree is something else).
Richard
I have not been keen on rehashing Ferdinand’s same old rationalizations on this thread. It is very simple, really. Over the past half century, the rate of change of CO2 concentration is proportional to temperature anomaly with respect to a particular baseline. To reconstruct CO2 of the past half century to high fidelity, all you need is the temperature data. Human inputs are largely superfluous.
The genuinely interesting thing about the data Willis has unearthed, to me, is the pattern exhibited in the neighborhood of large sinks, as I pointed out here regarding the neighborhood of the Congo Basin, and here regarding the Amazonian Basin. I hypothesized that, in the neighborhood of a large sink, you might see a ring of elevated CO2, and that hypothesis seems to ring true (pun intended) in these areas. It could be my eyes playing tricks on me, but other areas of high concentration also appear they might be part of a ring or crescent surrounding other potential powerful sink areas.
It stands to reason – rapid depletion of CO2 would lower the partial pressure in the immediate area, causing other CO2 to rush in, in an attempt to equalize the partial pressure, and forming a “lip” of elevated CO2 in the surrounding area. So, my question is, which of the apparent “hot spots” are due to release from a local source, and which indicate buildup on the boundary of a sink area?
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 9, 2014 at 1:20 pm
“But what do we see in the atmosphere? A firm drop in CO2 in spring/summer.”
———————
Absolutely correct you are on that. As well as a firm increase in CO2 in fall/winter. An almost identical 6 ppm increase as there was a drop (decrease).
But what else we see is far more important. And that is, we see that firm drop “begin” at almost exactly the same time each year, following the Vernal (March) equinox, …. just like it has been doing said for the past 56 years.
And we also see that firm increase “begin” at almost exactly the same time each year, following the Autumnal (September) equinox, …. just like it has been doing said for the past 56 years.
And they have been doing that very same thing, give or take 5 or 7 days, for the past 56 years regardless of late Springs, early Falls, warm/hot air temperatures, cool/cold air temperatures, droughts, floods, hell or high water.
Now I can predict within 2 or 3 days when said “high” and ”low” CO2 ppm counts will occur, …. but you sure as ell can’t even get close to predicting said via your Average Surface Temperature calculations.
============
“It doesn’t matter what kind of plants that (re)start to grow in spring: all plants together absorb more CO2 in spring/summer than the debris of the previous year can emit (including bacteria, insects and animals), ”
——————
One thing for sure, Ferdinand, I agree with your above statement because, like my Refrigerator/Freezer Law, it negates the “junk science” claim that wintertime rot n’ decay of biomass is the cause of increasing CO2 ppm.
And I won’t argue the C12/13C “thingy” at this time because I really haven’t studied it that much and would only be paraphrasing or mimicking much of my commentary. And I really don’t like doing said because that makes one vulnerable to someone else’s thinking.
===========
And Ferdinand, I don’t understand the reason for these 2 conjoined “quotes” in your above post, to wit:
“Conclusion: plant growth and decay dominates the seasonal cycle.
YUP, and that is exactly what I told you is happening.”
————-
I’ll accept authorship of the 2nd one, but not the 1st one cause its contrary to my thinking.
===================
“If the cooling between the warm(er) MWP and the LIA doesn’t drop global CO2 levels with more than 6 ppmv, why would a smaller to similar increase in temperature between the LIA and current temperatures give an increase of 100+ ppmv, against all solubility laws for CO2 in seawater, at exactly the same start years and curvature as humans emitted twice the amounts in the same time frame?”
—————-
Well now, iffen that question was directed at me, my answer would be:
Me thinks your “6 ppmv” figure is an estimated guess based on proxy data and I consider ALL proxy data as reference data ONLY and not to be used as FACTUAL science evidence. And likewise for your stated “100+ ppmv” figure.
============
“We were discussing the reliability of stomata data vs. ice core CO2 data. The former are based on year by year variable, but also increasing local CO2 levels (no matter if that is over the previous growing season or momentary in spring). These depend on …..”
—————
Me thinks you were obfuscating a tad bit there in your above commentary.
Bart says:
July 9, 2014 at 11:29 pm
Bart, since our latest discussions I have plotted the δ13C rate of change together with the CO2 rate of change. That shows that the short term variability in CO2 rate of change is mainly caused by vegetation:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_dco2_d13C_mlo.jpg
and the variability in vegetation uptake is quite certainly caused by temperature variability.
But vegetation is certainly not the cause of the positive trend in rate of change of CO2, as it is a proven, increasing, sink for CO2 based on the oxygen balance. Thus at maximum the CO2 rate of change caused by the influence of temperature on vegetation is zero, but in general slightly negative. That is the opposite to the observed slopes. The same for the δ13C slope: the observed slope is strongly negative, but increasing CO2 uptake by vegetation gives a positive slope in δ13C and a zero to positive slope in δ13C rate of change, while the observed slope in δ13C rate of change is slightly negative.
Thus even if temperature causes both the short term variability and the slope of the rate of change, that are two separate, independent processes. That also means that the factor used to match the slopes and the factor needed to match the amplitude of the variations are independent of each other.
Moreover, as there is no link between the short term variability and the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere or the increase of the rate of change of CO2, there is no obvious reason to think that temperature is the main driver for the observed CO2 increase in the atmosphere. The more that there is another candidate which fits both the increase in the atmosphere and the increase in rate of change: human emissions…
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 10, 2014 at 8:31 am
I’ll accept authorship of the 2nd one, but not the 1st one cause its contrary to my thinking.
Sorry, the formatting was not very good: the first sentence was my emphasizing of the end result, the second was a new quote out of your reply…
Then about your thinking: all you need to know about the 13C/12C ratio is that ocean’s CO2 is higher in 13C/12C ratio, while CO2 from plants and (indirect) plant eaters is much lower in 13C/12C ratio compared to the 13C/12C ratio in the atmosphere.
That makes it quit easy to know where the CO2 changes in the atmosphere originate. If CO2 levels go up and δ13C (a measure of the 13C/12C ratio) goes up, then the oceans are the cause. If δ13C is going down with increasing CO2 levels, then vegetation (or fossil vegetation by humans) are the cause.
In the case of the seasonal changes, δ13C goes up when CO2 goes down and δ13C goes down when CO2 goes up. Thus vegetation is dominant. That also can be seen by the fact that there is hardly any seasonal variation in the SH: more ocean and less vegetation.
Thus your reasoning is not what the observations show. BTW, you underestimate the amounts of CO2 delivered from bacterial life even at -20°C if isolated under a snow deck…
Me thinks you were obfuscating a tad bit there in your above commentary
As discussed with Richard: ice cores are not proxies, they are direct measurements of ancient CO2 levels (and many more gases), be it a mix of several years to several hundred years. The current increase is over 100 ppmv, but if you only accept the direct measurements, it is already over 70 ppmv. That would even be measurable in the worst resolution ice cores over the past 800,000 years…
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 10, 2014 at 11:41 am
“In the case of the seasonal changes, δ13C goes up when CO2 goes down and δ13C goes down when CO2 goes up. Thus vegetation is dominant. That also can be seen by the fact that there is hardly any seasonal variation in the SH: more ocean and less vegetation.”
———————–
Ferdinand, now that sounds reasonable and logical, but ………..
At the December solstice the furthest reaches of the SH oceans “technically” start their cool down along with the ingassing of CO2 and at the Vernal (March) equinox the entire SH oceans are “technically” in cool down mode and sucking up CO2. Now I said “technically” because the actual cooling of the surface water is delayed due to the horrendous volume of “warm” sub-surface water.
Now by mid-May the aforesaid “delay” is terminated and the entire SH ocean is “sucking up” CO2 and the atmospheric CO2 ppm starts decreasing. …… And the δ13C ppm decreases also, but probably not by very much or for very long …. if this has anything to do with it, to wit:
Excerpted P# 2417 of: http://www.ncrs.fs.fed.us/pubs/jrnl/2008/nrs_2008_doctor_001.pdf
“Seasonal trends
Downstream transects were also sampled in June and July, 2003. Downstream increases in υ13C DIC were greater and more rapid in the summer months than during the snowmelt periods (Figure 9). The transect samples collected in June and July showed an increase in υ13CDIC of 3‰ within the first 20 m of stream flow, while in the snowmelt period a 3‰ increase in υ13C-DIC took place over a distance of 450 m.
The rationale for using the carbon isotope value of DIC as a tracer of stream-flow processes stems from the large υ13C difference generally observed between soil waters which obtain most of their DIC from respired soil CO2, and groundwater which obtains DIC from a mixture of soil CO2 and carbonate minerals (Deines et al., 1974).
Due to this difference (often of the order 10‰), the υ13C of DIC can discriminate between soil water and groundwater contributions to streamflow during recharge events (Kendall et al., 1992).”
—————————
Ferdinand, according to the above study the outgassing of CO2 from freshwater sources in the Northern Hemisphere will be extremely high in δ13C during the months of June thru September. The δ13C from soil CO2 and carbonate minerals dominate.
Now whatta ya got to say about that?
@ Ferdinand:
“BTW, you underestimate the amounts of CO2 delivered from bacterial life even at -20°C if isolated under a snow deck…”
———————-
OH GOOD GRIEF, ….. you are comparing one (1) snow deck to the entire Northern Hemisphere?
I don’t care where you are at, …. if the temperature drops below 60F most all microbial reduction of dead biomass starts decreasing also and continues to slow up as the temperature decreases to 32F. That is why your Mother owns a refrigerator. (it’s just not for beer, ya know)
Cold temperatures do not affect molds as much but they don’t cause rotting or decaying either. A “moldy” piece of beef taken from the “cooler” sure makes for fine eating after it is has been “grilled” to medium-rare status.
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 11, 2014 at 9:08 am
Now by mid-May the aforesaid “delay” is terminated and the entire SH ocean is “sucking up” CO2 and the atmospheric CO2 ppm starts decreasing
That doesn’t fit the curves. The main downward trend in CO2 and upward trend of δ13C in May-June is in the NH, while the SH shows a slight increase in CO2 and little change in δ13C. There is little exchange between the hemispheres (10% of all air mass over a year) which makes that also CO2 changes are only slowly distributed between the hemispheres.
That report is about fresh water, not the oceans.
While fresh water is warming faster that the ocean surface, pure fresh water contains about 1% of the CO2 (as DIC) than seawater. That is because fresh water in general is slightly acidic, while seawater is slightly alkaline. But of course if rainwater flows over carbonate rock it gets more alkaline and gets higher DIC by dissolving some of the rock.
Because the low quantities dissolved in fresh water, I don’t think that this plays much role in the seasonal variation, the more that most of the time the δ13C was far below atmospheric δ13C (currently at -8 per mil), thus most releases out of fresh water would lower the δ13C of the atmosphere, while we see a maximum during the summer months. This points BTW to the influence of soluble organic debris in the waters (which is measured as DOC = dissolved organic carbon)
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 11, 2014 at 9:37 am
if the temperature drops below 60F most all microbial reduction of dead biomass starts decreasing also and continues to slow up as the temperature decreases to 32F
You forget that snow isolates and that microbiological decay is exothermic. Why do you think that a lot of animals (and humans in earlier times) shelter under snow or in a pile of compost?
Of course it slows down in winter and more in steppe than in forests and more to the North than in areas where winters are less harsh, but vegetation decay goes on all winter…
But we have been there before…
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 11, 2014 at 2:57 pm
“That doesn’t fit the curves.”
——————
Ferdinand, one of the only “fit the curves” thingy that gets my attention is a tight fitting pair of jeans on a well proportioned female.
==============
“The main downward trend in CO2 and upward trend of δ13C in May-June is in the NH, while the SH shows a slight increase in CO2 and little change in δ13C.”
————–
SO, ….. that is EXACTLY what my above quoted scientific study PROVES is occurring. And how can there be a slight increase in CO2 in May-June in the SH when the ocean waters there have been ingassin CO2 ever since the Winter solstice occurred four (4) months earlier.
“There is little exchange between the hemispheres (10% of all air mass over a year) which makes that also CO2 changes are only slowly distributed between the hemispheres.”
——————–
Ferdinand, quit trying to “bedazzle” me. First you said that “δ13C goes up and down”. And now you are saying “δ13C only goes up and down in the NH”.
So tell me big boy, ….. just where in hell in the NH are you actually conducting your measurement of atmospheric δ13C?
And the “amount of time” between exchanges in/of the hemispheric air masses ….. depends on where one is standing. If one is standing on the Equator they are pretty damn quick.
But if one is measuring said exchanges between Mauna Loa Observatory, Hawaii, @ 20°N, 156°W …. and the Halley Research Station, Antarctica, @ 75°S, 26°W, …… said exchanges can be pretty damn slow in comparison because those locations are one fourth (1/4) the world away from each other. But, ….. their monthly/yearly CO2 ppm measurements still “track” each other steady n’ consistently year after year after year, …… to wit: http://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu/images/graphics_gallery/original/mlo_spo_record.pdf
============
“That report is about fresh water, not the oceans.”
—————
WOW, and when did you get your 1st clue that it was fresh water?
You are getting me irritated, Ferdinand. I do not require or have need of your juvenile orientated Science lecture on the Environment, nor need of you telling me what I read in that cited study, therefore if you would restrict your commentary to actual, factual evidence or proofs that supports your argument or negates mine …… then we will get along a lot better.
Highers, and lowers, and curvers, and averagers …… mean nothing to me, OK.
==============
“…. that most of the time the δ13C was far below atmospheric δ13C (currently at -8 per mil), thus most releases out of fresh water would lower the δ13C of the atmosphere,”
————-
Really now? So, the more the outgassing of δ13C CO2 into the atmosphere increases, ……. the more the atmospheric δ13C CO2 ppm quantity decreases. That’s AMAZING.
=================
“You forget that snow isolates and that microbiological decay is exothermic”
————–
YUP, and so is the detonation of a stick of dynamite exothermic. The subject is not how much energy a biological reaction will generate, ….. the subject is the minimum temperatures required for a biological or chemical process to occur.
And in that you are apparently inferring or claiming that all the CO2 produced via the microbiological decay underneath that snow pack is escaping into the atmosphere, ….. then you are defacto claiming that all Ice Core proxy data is FUBAR. Of course I will agree with you that it is FUBAR ….. but not for the same reason.
Ferdinand, ask your Mommy what the “secret” is to making great chocolate fudge candy when “heating” the ingredients for said in a pot on top of a stove “burner”?
A Night Class in Bacteriology and/or Organic Chemistry would do wonder for your thinking and reasoning abilities concerning the above subject matter.
Samuel C Cogar says:
July 12, 2014 at 11:03 am
Sorry, but I don’t think that further discussion will help you understand what happens with CO2 over the seasons…
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
July 12, 2014 at 11:23 am
You are correct on that point …. because it requires facts, evidence, logical reasoning and/or intelligent deductions to suay my understanding of a specific entity.
Willis Eschenbach,
I just watched Dr Spencer’s Keynote Speech at !CCC9.
Do you think it would be information to lay his “Global Greening” chart over you “Net CO2 FLUX” chart in this thread?
Lets try that again
Willis Eschenbach,
I just watched Dr Spencer’s Keynote Speech at [ICCC9].
Do you think it would be informative to lay his “Global Greening” chart over your “Net CO2 FLUX” chart in this thread?
PMHinSC says:
July 14, 2014 at 1:32 pm
If you can get me his chart I’m happy to try …
w.