Eco Worriers: “CO2 is a pollutant!” Gaia: “Tell that to the biosphere.” Biosphere: “Yumm, burp!”
The SeaWiFS instrument aboard the Seastar satellite has been collecting ocean data since 1997. By monitoring the color of reflected light via satellite, scientists can determine how successfully plant life is photosynthesizing. A measurement of photosynthesis is essentially a measurement of successful growth, and growth means successful use of ambient carbon. This animation shows an average of 10 years worth of SeaWiFS data. Dark blue represents warmer areas where there tends to be a lack of nutrients, and greens and reds represent cooler nutrient-rich areas which support life. The nutrient-rich areas include coastal regions where cold water rises from the sea floor bringing nutrients along and areas at the mouths of rivers where the rivers have brought nutrients into the ocean from the land.
See an animation of the Earth;s Biosphere: 512×288 (30 fps) MPEG-1 10 MB. More here at NASA SVS
With less heat and less carbon dioxide, the planet could become less hospitable and less green
Lawrence Solomon
Financial Post, Don Mills, Ontario
Saturday, June 07, 2008
Planet Earth is on a roll! GPP is way up. NPP is way up. To the surprise of those who have been bearish on the planet, the data shows global production has been steadily climbing to record levels, ones not seen since these measurements began.
GPP is Gross Primary Production, a measure of the daily output of the global biosphere –the amount of new plant matter on land. NPP is Net Primary Production, an annual tally of the globe’s production. Biomass is booming. The planet is the greenest it’s been in decades, perhaps in centuries.
Until the 1980s, ecologists had no way to systematically track growth in plant matter in every corner of the Earth — the best they could do was analyze small plots of one-tenth of a hectare or less. The notion of continuously tracking global production to discover the true state of the globe’s biota was not even considered.
Then, in the 1980s, ecologists realized that satellites could track production, and enlisted NASA to collect the data. For the first time, ecologists did not need to rely on rough estimates or anecdotal evidence of the health of the ecology: They could objectively measure the land’s output and soon did — on a daily basis and down to the last kilometer.
The results surprised Steven Running of the University of Montana and Ramakrishna Nemani of NASA, scientists involved in analyzing the NASA satellite data. They found that over a period of almost two decades, the Earth as a whole became more bountiful by a whopping 6.2%. About 25% of the Earth’s vegetated landmass — almost 110 million square kilometres — enjoyed significant increases and only 7% showed significant declines. When the satellite data zooms in, it finds that each square metre of land, on average, now produces almost 500 grams of greenery per year.
Why the increase? Their 2004 study, and other more recent ones, point to the warming of the planet and the presence of CO2, a gas indispensable to plant life. CO2 is nature’s fertilizer, bathing the biota with its life-giving nutrients. Plants take the carbon from CO2 to bulk themselves up — carbon is the building block of life — and release the oxygen, which along with the plants, then sustain animal life. As summarized in a report last month, released along with a petition signed by 32,000 U. S. scientists who vouched for the benefits of CO2: “Higher CO2 enables plants to grow faster and larger and to live in drier climates. Plants provide food for animals, which are thereby also enhanced. The extent and diversity of plant and animal life have both increased substantially during the past half-century.”
From the 2004 abstract: Our results indicate that global changes in climate have eased several critical climatic constraints to plant growth, such that net primary production increased 6% (3.4 petagrams of carbon over 18 years) globally. The largest increase was in tropical ecosystems. Amazon rain forests accounted for 42% of the global increase in net primary production, owing mainly to decreased cloud cover and the resulting increase in solar radiation.
Lush as the planet may now be, it is as nothing compared to earlier times, when levels of CO2 and Earth temperatures were far higher. In the age of the dinosaur, for example, CO2 levels may have been five to 10 times higher than today, spurring a luxuriantly fertile planet whose plant life sated the immense animals of that era. Planet Earth is also much cooler today than during the hothouse era of the dinosaur, and cooler than it was 1,000 years ago during the Medieval Warming Period, when the Vikings colonized a verdant Greenland. Greenland lost its colonies and its farmland during the Little Ice Age that followed, and only recently started to become green again.
This blossoming Earth could now be in jeopardy, for reasons both natural and man-made. According to a growing number of scientists, the period of global warming that we have experienced over the past few centuries as Earth climbed out of the Little Ice Age is about to end. The oceans, which have been releasing their vast store of carbon dioxide as the planet has warmed — CO2 is released from oceans as they warm and dissolves in them when they cool — will start to take the carbon dioxide back. With less heat and less carbon dioxide, the planet could become less hospitable and less green, especially in areas such as Canada’s Boreal forests, which have been major beneficiaries of the increase in GPP and NPP.
Doubling the jeopardy for Earth is man. Unlike the many scientists who welcome CO2 for its benefits, many other scientists and most governments believe carbon dioxide to be a dangerous pollutant that must be removed from the atmosphere at all costs. Governments around the world are now enacting massive programs in an effort to remove as much as 80% of the carbon dioxide emissions from the atmosphere.
If these governments are right, they will have done us all a service. If they are wrong, the service could be all ill, with food production dropping world wide, and the countless ecological niches on which living creatures depend stressed. The second order effects could be dire, too. To bolster food production, humans will likely turn to energy intensive manufactured fertilizers, depleting our store of non-renewable resources. Techniques to remove carbon from the atmosphere also sound alarms. Carbon sequestration, a darling of many who would mitigate climate change, could become a top inducer of earthquakes, according to Christian Klose, a geohazards researcher at Columbia University’s Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory. Because the carbon sequestration schemes tend to be located near cities, he notes, carbon-sequestration-caused earthquakes could exact an unusually high toll.
Amazingly, although the risks of action are arguably at least as real as the risks of inaction, Canada and other countries are rushing into Earth-altering carbon schemes with nary a doubt. Environmentalists, who ordinarily would demand a full-fledged environmental assessment before a highway or a power plant can be built, are silent on the need to question proponents or examine alternatives.
Earth is on a roll. Governments are too. We will know soon enough if we’re rolled off a cliff.
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“In the age of the dinosaur, for example, CO2 levels may have been five to 10 times higher than today, spurring a luxuriantly fertile planet whose plant life sated the immense animals of that era.”
And where are the dinosaurs now… oh that is right they are all dead. I hope we don’t end up like the dinosaurs.
http://green4u.wordpress.com
MA,
From your post you say:
“Fortunately, this is rapidly becoming a non-issue. Every industrialized country on the planet accepts the reality of AGW. Obama is very clear on the threat and the urgency with which it needs to be addressed. It is one of his priorities when he becomes president. ”
You are right that all of this will become a non-issue. In a few years when things get really cool all you screamers will be very quiet. All we’ll hear is teeth chattering. Why don’t you go back to Deltoid, deSmogBlog Gristmill or similar and hang with your buds and rant and rave.. Do you ever wonder why sites like RealClimate and others of a similar vain don’t don’t include this site and Climate Audit or Icecap or similar in their blog roll? Because they can’t stand other opinions. They don’t want to be questioned. They know it all. The science is settled, the debate is over.
Baloney
Hey, how about a real name instead of a pseudonym to hide behind.
Retired Engineer: Question: what is the ‘normal’ level of CO2?
Perhaps a better question is what is the ‘normal’ level of change in CO2? The concern isn’t so much the magnitude as much as it is the velocity. I’m quite sure higher CO2 concentrations would be beneficial for plant life in general. But the benefits are not likely to be evenly distributed among all plant life. Either way, the faster it happens, the more uncertainties there are. It just goes without saying. Likewise, I’m quite sure that whatever climate change occurs is likely to have both advantages and disadvantages in the long run. But in the short run, the faster it happens the more stress is applied to various forms of life — including human life and particularly the economies of said human life.
Related to the latter, I fear that questions regarding energy — just energy, pure and simple — have gotten hijacked by the super-heated (pun alert) debate about climate change. It appears that many think we don’t have to change the current energy equation if climate change is a myth. Not only that, but it appears that those who most fervently believe that climate change is a myth are also those who most fervently believe that fossil fuel supplies are essentially infinite. I have news for you — the two are not connected. And both those on the left and right have to understand that. There are very good reasons to advocate alternative energy sources besides climate change.
Once you get over that intellectual hump I think you’ll find that there very well might be very good reasons to advocate some alternative energy sources over others, in certain areas and at certain times, and advocate some policy implements over others, in certain areas at certain times. In short, the challenge facing us is simply not amenable to any sort of simple, cookie-cutter, black/white, either/or answer. We have to diversify, and get flexible. To the extent that we don’t, I fear we’re going to get our collective butts kicked.
CO2 The Real Greenhouse Gas ™, more is better! 🙂
You know I never realized how accurate it was to call CO2 a greenhouse gas. Not just a greenhouse gas, The Greenhouse Gas, the one that will turn your Greenhouse Green! Because Greenhouses love it and add it to the atmosphere to make the plants thrive. Especially since we know that the Greenhouse Effect is misnamed since it has nothing to do with why greenhouses warm, and only applies to the atmosphere.
Steve Sip, I had the same thought. When people and politicians realize they have been conned into believing the non-existent certainty and consensus proclaimed for AGW, there will be a serious backlash against science lasting a long time.
Thanks for the reply to my question about the temp station survey, Anthony; I`ve not heard from the True Believer yet, but he is in England, so I may receive a reply later.
Avfuktare Krypgrund VIND
“CO2 levels will not decrease rapidly because oceans cool”
Ok, so how do you explain this diagram created from Mauna Loa data?
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2056/2471196255_c3318ee700_o.jpg
To me it seems that CO2 increase per year is rather well correlated with earths temperature even though we add some CO2 to the carbon cycle each year.
Perhaps the greens instinctively crave the hard times necessary to reset their minds. Some people can’t tolerate prosperity.
Robert in Calgary:
I could easily provide a temperature graph and demonstrate a statistical correlation. However, I am well aware that this particular forum would likely either discredit my data sources or my analysis, so I and other will refrain from wasting our time posting empirical data. As for your challenge about posting May’s 2008 temperatures, I’ll warn you as I’ve warned many others – you’re barking up the wrong tree. Bear in mind that yesterday was a record-setting high temperature weather day across the the Eastern US; it may be an unscientific conjecture, but I’m not going to be surprised if the global average temperature for June shoots way upwards.
MA,
What is your real name? Why do you hide behind a pseudonym? Why are you afraid to let people know who you are? Come into the light, MA. I definitely put more stock in real people than I do in phantoms. Why I even read REALCLIMATE. Again, put your name where your mouth is. Mike Bryant, Texas
Humm,
Interesting discussion. Taking a leap of faith that I won’t be dumped in the garbage heap for talking about God for a moment…
OK those of you who are still with me, What about this as a sort of generalization. Many of those on the AGW seem to indicate this planet is extremely fragile and delicate. Any human push or pull is apt to create some kind of horror from which it will never recover.
Yet I meet many who believe in a Creator who think the mind that put this all together probably did a pretty good job of bracing it for the humans It created. (PS check your greek, God has no sex) Maybe because It knew us so well.
Anthony, enjoy the Blog. Like the science, and no, I don’t think the earth is 6K years old.
Mike
[…] As CO2 levels increase in the atmosphere, so does vegetation. Why? Plants need carbon dioxide for photosynthesis. WattsUpWithThat […]
Mr. Watts
Your posting of the SeaWiFS animation just below your title that biomass loves CO2 seems to indicate that you believe that SeaWiFS data shows increasing oceanic photosynthesis levels or biomass over recent decades correlated with increasing CO2. However, I cannot find any articles which agree with that point and have found many that seem to contradict it.
Can you clarify the point in including the SeaWiFS animation? Is it just a cool pic otherwise unrelated to your title?
REPLY: You first. What articles contradict it? Links please.
This is good to hear.
But the biosphere in my neck of the woods got off to a slow start this year.
Also been a snowy June for the N. Rockies. Cascades expected to receive 6-12″ of snow down to 2500 ft tonight.
And the Plains getting hit hard with rain. Not good for crops. Satellite will be seeing more water than plants here for a while.
And the west coast of Washington is still cold. 50f in Seattle area right now, been that way for more than a week. So while the east coast might be having a heat wave, other major areas in the country are very cool. So it evens out.
REPLY: You first. What articles contradict it? Links please.
Sigh… doesn’t it always come down to this?
Meanwhile, the cost of energy keeps going up. Meanwhile, China and others keep rolling up long-term deals, intellectual property, and market share that will persist for years to come. In the end, IMO, this kind of conversation is stupid on so many levels.
The Ocean’s Biological Deserts Are Expanding
By Richard A. Kerr, ScienceNOW Daily News, 25 January 2008
http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2008/125/1
For those without access, a similar article here:
Study Shows Ocean “Deserts” are Expanding
http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2008/20080305_oceandesert.html
Now that I’ve shown you mine, can you explain the point of the SeaWiFS animation being included with this thread?
REPLY: Thank you for providing those. As you note, the top link is behind a green wall, you have to be either a member or pay for the article, which I’m unwilling to do. I’ve already paid for this research once via taxes, I won’t pay a second time to view taxpayer funded research. I suggest that nobody else does either.
The second article, does contradict my post, yes, and it illustrates how different researchers can arrive at different conclusions from the same data. Interestingly, they also use SEAWIFS imagery to illustrate the point in the article.
I also use SEAWIFS imagery to illustrate the point, and your point in questioning that is?
Counters: My SWAG for the UAH-2TLT for the first week of June is -0.20
Green4U: If the dinosaurs had a space program, they wouldn’t be extinct.
Oh, I can’t resist.
“There was only one phony: Spice Girl Geri Halliwell…. – Michael Fox, the actor, and Perry Mason, the fictional lawyer in a TV series — were actually bona fide scientists.”
Then why have all their names been scrubbed from the list? Again, you provide no evidence for any of your assertions, whereas I have – even though you deny *that* reality as well.
“Still waiting for that proof on the bogus names.”
Again: http://thingsbreak.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/oregon-petition-redux/ – or do you need me to copy and paste it all on here? Or do you need someone to investigate every one of the 31,000 before you realise you’ve been suckered?
Just to humor you, I picked a few names from the list at random that looked likely to be unique:
‘Karl Spangler Quisenberry’. Guess what? Karl must be communicating from the grave because he’s been dead since 1978 – http://www.authorandbookinfo.com/ngcoba/qu.htm .
And another: ‘Florentino V. Quiaot’. He’s alive, so that’s good, but he’s a civil engineer – http://www.fasaesocal.org/docs/FASAE%20SoCal%20Membership%20Database%20as%20of%20072107.pdf . His opinion matters why?
Another: ‘Keith J. Quanbeck’ – an agricultural engineer this time – http://www3.abe.iastate.edu/abe100/PDF/Degrees/AgEngrBSGrads.pdf
Another: ‘Kefu Xue’ – an electrical engineer – http://www.engineering.wright.edu/~kxue/
Another: ‘Edward J. Zuperku’ – an anesthesiologist – http://www.anesthesiology.org/pt/re/anes/abstract.00000542-200108000-00034.htm
And one more: ‘Yijing Xu’ – a genealogist – http://www.genealogy.math.ndsu.nodak.edu/id.php?id=64584
And, of course, this all makes the unsafe assumption that these people know they are on the list and agree with the propaganda that it stands for. Even if they do agree, they have no qualifications that would make their opinion any more important than the kid who serves you at McDonalds.
Is the penny beginning to drop yet? The cognitive dissonance must be deafening by now.
Here’s the thing Einstein, when you publish a list of signatories you need to provide evidence that those signatures are verified and correspond to real people who have the qualifications that they claim. The Oregon Petition provides no such thing. It’s unverified bullshit, as I’ve already said. It’s been completely discredited and is a laughing stock in the reality-based community. Even the wingnut author (who has expressed doubts about evolution – surprise ,surprise) admits:
“When we’re getting thousands of signatures there’s no way of filtering out a fake,” – http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19980501&slug=2748308
Also, your comment regarding me referring to the “wrong list” can also be easily shown to be as clueless as everything else:
old = http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p333.htm
new = http://www.petitionproject.org/gwdatabase/Signers_By_Last_Name.php?run=a
Any fool can see that they’re identical. So, the ‘new’ list is just the same pile of unverified names from a decade ago. And you believe it. It must sting when you realise what an easy mark you’ve been.
Given your lack of skeptical process and evidence-based thinking, it becomes clear how you can also believe anthropogenic climate change is a hoax / conspiracy / giant global mistake by virtually every reputable scientist on the planet.
P.S. Whoever commented about the ‘flying on a plane’ being a poor analogy – you were right. The idiots who get on the plane are only going to kill themselves. The idiots who ignores the reality of climate change are going to take the rest of us with them, along with tens of thousands of species of plant and animal. I’ll work on a better analogy. Thanks.
REPLY: Thanks for stepping up instead of just calling us morons. One blog post, i.e. one opinion doesn’t negate everything.
http://thingsbreak.wordpress.com/2008/05/21/oregon-petition-redux/
So, he thinks the list is bogus, so do you. We acknowledge your dislike, but dislike does not equate to truth.
Yes there are some deceased on the list, any list that large is bound to have deceased people on it. Plenty of climate science documents cited today have researchers listed on it that are now deceased. Should we throw them out?
And finally, you had me going there for a moment, with these two links:
old = http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p333.htm
new = http://www.petitionproject.org/gwdatabase/Signers_By_Last_Name.php?run=a
I looked at them both, and you are correct, the names lists of “A”‘s match between the two exactly.
But your thinking missed this critical detail, each “A” list has this at the top:
Signers A
900 Signers Out of 31,072 Total in US
31,072 is the magic number…both of the lists are the NEW lists, your assertion that one list is old (which would have about 18,000 signatories) and the other is new (Which would have 31,000) is thus falsified.
They updated the list both at the old (oism.org) and new (petitionproject.org). So all you’ve done is shown they have the same list published at both websites and that they agree. Yes, “Any fool can see that they’re identical.” but not just any fool can make a claim that one is ten years old and the other isn’t without reading the header.
P. S. Forgot this one:
“When we’re getting thousands of signatures there’s no way of filtering out a fake,” – http://community.seattletimes.nwsource.com/archive/?date=19980501&slug=2748308
But apparently, the screening process works, otherwise the blogger that I mentioned, BigCityLib, aka Michael J. Murphy, who by his own admission created a false name and lied to get on the list, failed to do so, again by his own admission. So apparently the screening works.
Counters: A high pressure ridge stalled and some of the eastern U.S. experienced high or record high temperatures; I live on the east coast of Florida where the high today was 91 (normal). (shrug).
Syl:
“Your paradigm seems a bit skewed. Man is not separate from nature but a part of it. ”
We have a special status: the only living form that can affect the Earth’s environment willfully. This goes with responsability. To “try” stuff (like putting 28 000 000 000 tonnes of extra material in the air every year) and “hope” for the best to happen is not responsible.
At the moment, volcanoes output of CO2 in the atmosphere is roughly 1% of the total extra greenhouse gas put in the atmosphere. If tomorrow all dormant volcanoes started “fuming”, and brought their total CO2 contribution to man made level, all would speak of a natural catastrophy. Yet, when we are responsible for such level of outputs, we call this: the industrial revolution. How comforting.
I’m not saying all human activity should stop. I’m not even saying that extra CO2 is dangerous, or even contribute to global warming. I think it does, but it’s not my point.
I’m saying: we live in such a cramped space, let’s be careful about how we transform it. We don’t know the consequences of our actions for sure.
Go ahead, but is this AGW thing a deep plot to discredit science?
I would characterize it this way: AGW is a plot to gain power. Those who are trying do not care about the reputations of science, lest they would be more careful.
Do you think that Gore considers the damage he may be doing to the reputation of science? I doubt it. Nothing in his past shows that he ever loved science and truth, in the way that many of us do.
It’s always funny, and a little bit frustrating, when people of MA’s persuasion argue by just name calling. I mean, it is not enough for them to say, “I disagree and here is why”, which he still can’t seem to do, but they have to follow it up with, “your stoopid” or your all “morons” cause you don’t agree with me! OT a little, but this is the common attitude of most extreme liberals IMO, and is why it is nearly impossible to have an intelligent discussion with them. Anyway….I leave it to you all who are more qualified to put MA in his/her place as from what I have seen so far, he is floundering in the mud of his own slinging.
If 99 engineers told you a plane was likely to crash and 1 said that it wouldn’t, you’d be pretty dumb to get on it.
Oh please, not this tired old, inappropriate analogy. Airplanes are made by engineers. The climate wasn’t made by humans, and we’re still trying to understand it. Extremely poor analogy.
Thanks Jeff Alberts for this point. Problem is is that people like MA BELIEVE we created our climate! And he calls us “creationist” whackos. 🙂
That’s the part I’m trying to understand. How does SeaWiFS illustrate your point? SeaWiFS shows declining ocean productivity during a period of increasing CO2. How does this illustrate your point?
REPLY: well by the article I cited, the researchers claim an increase. As I pointed out – different conclusions from the same data.