Source: NOAA http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
In the graph above, the black line is the seasonally adjusted value while the red is the monthly mean. This is based on data through March. May is normally the peak month. Here we see how Mauna Loa CO2 has lagged in its annual rise. The likely culprit: Pacific ocean cooling due to La Nina and increased solubility of CO2 in water.
This graph certainly supports the notion of the ocean’s importance in CO2 trends, something Roy Spencer did a guest post on CO2 and oceans here on this blog and was roundly criticized for it in some circles.
Given that May is normally the peak month for CO2, and because we still see a strong La Nina, the result could be a lower CO2 max in 2008 than 2007 for Mauna Loa. This has happened before in the 60s and 70s in the last cool PDO phase (lasting til 1977). Even if it stays even with last year’s level, this tells us a lot and sheds doubt on these ideas:
1. Anthropogenic accumulation (civilization is still producing CO2)
2. A CO2 residence time of several hundred years seems unlikely now
3. Giegengack’s thesis that if man stopped emitting CO2, the earth would emit more to compensate, the premise being that since man has for the first time “upset the balance” and is pressing CO2 into the earth, then once the balance is restored the earth will resume emitting it instead.
The global data plot below doesn’t show the same trend as Mauna Loa, so it appears that this CO2 dropoff at Mauna Loa is a regional effect due to Hawaii’s proximity to cooler ocean temperatures.
It will be interesting to see in the coming months what happens globally, should we see a drop-off or leveling of global CO2 in response to our quiet sun and La Nina, it will be difficult for AGW proponents to explain. Nature will indeed be the final arbiter of this debate.
We live in interesting times. Hat tips to Joe D’Aleo and Alan Siddon for portions of this post.
UPDATE: Lucia at the Blackboard has posted an interesting rebuttal to criticisms of this simple presentation above. It is worth a read.
dscott re: Chris Knight:
Uhmmm I believe the hypothesis of Keeling, et. al., that the signal riding atop the Mauna Loa trend is in fact biogenic, is just that, a conjecture.
Check Spencer’s paper at the link, 2nd. paragraph.
anna v,
I think we can agree that many things are unknown, particularly things about the future. When it comes to the future the best we can hope for is a reasonable degree of uncertainty.
I don’t know for a fact that I will wake up tomorrow and my life will continue on more or less as it has. None the less, I continue to make my best guesstamations under the (unproven) assumption that I will be here tomorrow. My guesstamation could change at any time depending upon facts that are presented to me as I go through my life. Differentiating “facts” from “implications” from “pure BS” is an important step here.
In this case the FACTS are that someone published a paper saying that they used a technique indicating that there are many more bumps that are likely volcanoes (active and extinct) on the floor of the ocean than were previously thought. Obviously there are some more detailed facts presented in the paper, but I think I have summarized the big one as far as “certainty” and “significance” goes.
YES, I can agree with you that the amount of heat entering the oceans is not known exactly. I would say the same thing about carbon or any other single factor you care to mention.
Can we also agree that this paper makes no claim as to there being 200,000 active volcanoes under the ocean?
I hope that we can also agree that to misrepresent or overstate facts is not a good thing and is to be avoided, whether the statement is “the debate is over” or “there are 200,000 active volcanoes under the ocean”.
Peace,
Arch
Arch Stanton (07:53:23)
I am sorry, but nobody is claiming 200.000 active volcanoes on the ocean floor, not I and not the authors of :
http://environment.newscientist.com/article/dn12218#comForm
quote:
“The programme found 201,055 volcanoes over 100m tall. Previously, satellite data had identified 14,164 volcanoes over 1500 m high.”
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2007/2007GL029874.shtml for subscribers it is GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 34, L13304, doi:10.1029/2007GL029874, 200
Sure, we can agree that the number of active volcanoes versus inactive ones is not known. You, and I, had a guess from the number of active and inactive volcanoes in the Philippines, trying to gauge an upper limit. That does not a claim make, or a misrepresentation either.
And I would like to see an effort of measuring this ratio in a real sea bed. Even if limited in area it will give a much better estimate.
Yes, I saw Spencers thread previously, conjecture based on sound reasoning is a good beginning of a hypothesis. But I believe he could broaden that to include NH land plants to give a more robust biofeedback. Given the large CO2 uptake rates of the biosphere, even the AGW people have to admit that prior to the 1970s of so called man’s contribution of CO2 with fossil fuel a sine wave existed in the CO2 readings. They also have to admit to the plant and animal CO2 balance and in doing so admit that if balance is disturbed CO2 either goes up or down depending on what changes. It logically follows there is more than one way to disturb the balance. Simply excluding variables and not studying them is not science, but activism.
dscott:
You may not have understood the implications of Spencer’s work. The trend and sinoid signal riding on it are of the same origin. Seasonal and longterm ocean heating are inescapably indicated.
The NH growth spurt, late April thru July would seem a bit too short to be represented in the curve (acknowledging filtering of course).
Moreover, the recent shortfall needs explanation in terms of the responsible fluence.
[…] CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is roughly 380 parts per million, or 0.000380 of the atmosphere, or 0.038 per cent of the atmosphere. Since modern measurements of CO2 have begun, CO2 concentrations have steadily increased–although the rate of increase may have temporarily slowed, as measured at Mauna Loa. […]
anna v (11:37:35) wrote:
“I am sorry, but nobody is claiming 200.000 active volcanoes on the
ocean floor, not I and not the authors of :
http://environment.newscientist.com/article/dn12218#comForm”
Your apology is accepted, however it is only 33% right.
I agree with you that that you and the authors of the paper never claimed 200,000 active volcanoes on the ocean floor. When did I ever say you did?
Your original post (over on the Coal thread) was (apparently) in response to: (reprinted with reply from Anthony)
Alan Chappell (15:26:57) :
“there are about 200,000 active volcano’s under our oceans, fortunately the Co2 that they produce does not exist, as they are under water and that means that it does not count, Co2 is like whiskey I need it to suvive. ( and also branch to add to the whiskey)
REPLY: 200,000 ? That number seems very high. What is your source?”
Your first response to me in this thread was in response to my comment to
Alan Chappell (06:37:56) :
“Lizi,
I would like to give you a few points to look at, first if you go to the article; “Scavenger Hunt, find the lump of coal” on this Blog, and look at anna v (21:27:46) you will see that she has some references to Co2, one of which is referring to Prof. Ian Plimers statement that ‘ the Milos (Greece) hot spring which is about the size of a table produces 2% of the worlds Co2 atmospheric levels, now when you consider that a ‘ New Scientist’ ref. by her show that there is, confirmed, over 300,000 active volcanoes under our oceans I think you need to leave the worrying about human Co2 emissions to Al Gore.”
My initial post to Allen Chappell:
Arch Stanton (11:08:10) :
“Allen Chappell,
“I followed Anna’s links and I can’t seem to find anywhere in the article where it is stated that the 200,000+ undersea volcanoes (not 300,000) are active (as reported repeatedly by folks here). When I follow the article link to the abstract from AGU they specifically say that this includes “seamounts”. Seamounts are not active volcanoes.”
As for the Milos (an extinct volcano) hot spring CO2 claim from Professor Plimer; I would like to know where he gets this “factoid” from (and what it means, as it is worded to vaguely to understand clearly). I have been unable to find a source for it myself. Does anyone here know?”
was meant to point out (to Allen) that he was spreading a rumor concerning the 300,000 [sic] active volcanoes on the ocean floor. I thought I made it very clear that the purpose of my post was that the (200,000) volcanoes were not necessarily active and that Allan was mistaken in his interpretation of that paper. It would appear that you had also been in agreement with him since you responded more than once to his posts claiming a certain number of active volcanoes on the ocean floor and you failed to correct him when he claimed that you had posted such a link to proof of said “active” volcanoes.
My point is a very minor one. I simply wanted to stop a silly rumor before it got bigger.
Alan Chappell (01:59:31) :
The paper you cited was very clear (as scientific papers generally are) that they were simply counting volcanoes and seamounts over a certain size.
Some times I go sit in some of the hot springs in the Long Valley area. I would never claim that I have sat in an “active volcano” despite what the folks in town might call it. Let’s stick to more precise language. It’s hard enough to understand things when accurate definitions are used.
Arch
anna v
In (11:38:10) I meant you were 66% right.
😉
Arch Stanton was the grave next to the ‘Unknown Soldier’, and in which grave the payroll was buried, in the epic “The Good, the Bad and the Ugly”.
I see no analogous treasure here whatever.
Hey Anthony, the Mauna Loa figures for April should be released any day now. Want to take bets on if April 2008 will be lower than April 2007? If it comes in lower, the blogosphere is going to explode with people screaming at each other over whether temperature or CO2 is the driver and what role La Nina plays in it.
REPLY: Yep, keep a watch for me, hitting the road again tomorrow. I just bought an electric vehicle and I’m driving to S. Cal to pick it up. I’ll explain why somebody like me needs an electric vehicle in a future post.
I’ll be watching and will report on this thread.
Basil: Who reads the morning paper any more, when there’s much more interesting stuff on blogs?
Yep!
Mauna Loa CO2 Up… Still Below Trend
This is very odd, they have the Mauna Loa chart updated http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/ but not the supporting data. ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends/co2_mm_mlo.txt
Eyeballing the chart it looks like April 2008 is higher than April 2007, same for the global marine chart and data.
As they say:
“The last year of data are still preliminary, pending recalibrations of reference gases and other quality control checks.”
IMHO, CO2 data are more suspect than GISSTemp, just better established and less readily disputed. Hansen caught his mojo from Keeling.
Gary,
How much have the “calibrated” the CO2 reading before? Surely not on the order of 1 or 2 ppm? What would be the reasoning used to perform such an adjustment of the data? There is no UHI effect on Mauna Loa or do they have to account for the volcano offgasing CO2? Or the prevailing winds bringing CO2 from the errupting volcano Kilauea, after all they are on the same island?
Here’s a USGS page showing the monitoring of the Mauna Loa volcano: http://volcano.wr.usgs.gov/maunaloastatus.php Here’s a little history of the monitoring: http://hvo.wr.usgs.gov/maunaloa/current/monitoringdata.html
dscott:
The Beck paper at Icecap and Kaufmann paper at NZClimateScience, taken together, indicate that drying the sampled air with H2S04 under-reports the CO2 by 20ppm.
The CDIAC data are plainly smoothed and the data sheet for the Siemens black box measuring the CO2 using IR spectrometry, the calibration methods used, etc., are seemingly unavailable.
Therefore, my suspicions are not ‘proven’, but there is scope for them to be held.
dscott:
Kauffman paper:
http://nzclimatescience.net/images/PDFs/ccr.pdf
In a day or two we should have the May CO2 graph update. I was rather surprised at April’s resurgence so I have to wonder if May will level off or actually show and increase as well. Can we use the lessening rate of increase as an issue citing the negative PDO as the cause???
The new CO2 data and graph is out today, they set a new record for May. ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends/co2_mm_mlo.txt This seems very suspicous to me when you look at how the graph looks in relation to the other years.
No surprise here, May 2007 to May 2008 saw an increase of 1.95
I found this note interesting in light of the suspicious jump in the May and June numbers. It was in the explanatory notes at ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends/co2_mm_mlo.txt which lists the monthly data from Mauna Loa:
“NOTE: In general, the data presented for the last year are subject to change, depending on recalibration of the reference gas mixtures used, and other quality control procedures. Occasionally, earlier years may also be changed for the same reasons. Usually these changes are minor.”
So, it is possible that someone has his statistical thumb on the scale in terms of that recalibration function. Anyone know more about how that statistical work gets done, and if there is room for monkey business?
[…] Mauna Loa CO2 January to July trend goes negative first time in history 4 08 2008 Back on April 6th of this year I made an observation about the trend in the CO2 data from the Mauna Loa Observatory dropping and possibly “leveling off”. […]