We still need to study nature’s contribution to trend
Published Saturday, September 27, 2008, Fairbanks AK News-Miner
Recent studies by the Hadley Climate Research Center (UK), the Japan Meteorological Agency, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, the University of East Anglia (UK) and the University of Alabama Huntsville show clearly that the rising trend of global average temperature stopped in 2000-2001. Further, NASA data shows that warming in the southern hemisphere has stopped, and that ocean temperatures also have stopped rising.
The global average temperature had been rising until about 2000-2001. The International Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) and many scientists hypothesize rising temperatures were mostly caused by the greenhouse effect of carbon dioxide (CO2), and they predicted further temperature increases after 2000. It was natural to assume that CO2 was responsible for the rise, because CO2 molecules in the atmosphere tend to reflect back the infrared radiation to the ground, preventing cooling (the greenhouse effect) and also because CO2 concentrations have been rapidly increasing since 1946. But, this hypothesis on the cause of global warming is just one of several.
Unfortunately, many scientists appear to forget that weather and climate also are controlled by nature, as we witness weather changes every day and climate changes in longer terms. During the last several years, I have suggested that it is important to identify the natural effects and subtract them from the temperature changes. Only then can we be sure of the man-made contributions. This suggestion brought me the dubious honor of being designated “Alaska’s most famous climate change skeptic.”
The stopping of the rise in global average temperature after 2000-2001 indicates that the hypothesis and prediction made by the IPCC need serious revision. I have been suggesting during the last several years that there are at least two natural components that cause long-term climate changes.
The first is the recovery (namely, warming) from the Little Ice Age, which occurred approximately 1800-1850. The other is what we call the multi-decadal oscillation. In the recent past, this component had a positive gradient (warming) from 1910 to 1940, a negative gradient (cooling — many Fairbanksans remember the very cold winters in the 1960s) from 1940 to 1975, and then again a positive gradient (warming — many Fairbanksans have enjoyed the comfortable winters of the last few decades or so) from 1975 to about 2000. The multi-decadal oscillation peaked around 2000, and a negative trend began at that time.
The second component has a large amplitude and can overwhelm the first, and I believe that this is the reason for the stopping of the temperature rise. Since CO2 has only a positive effect, the new trend indicates that natural changes are greater than the CO2 effect, as I have stated during the last several years.
Future changes in global temperature depend on the combination of both the recovery from the Little Ice Age (positive) and the multi-decadal oscillation (both positive and negative). We have an urgent need to learn more about these natural changes to aid us in predicting future changes.
Syun-Ichi Akasofu is a former director of the Geophysical Institute and the International Arctic Research Center, both on the campus of the University of Alaska Fairbanks.
“I should, perhaps, clarify that a bit”
I don’t see why, it’s easy enough to google and find out. The Venusian atmosphere is reported to contain a trace percentage of water vapor, which is H2O.
Glenn (12:08:22) :
but a supposed authoritative scientist such as yourself would not claim no water on Venus, just to mention *one* blatant error. You make so many of them I don’t need to illuminate them all.
Who’s standards? You question motives quite often, Leif.
No [show me some], I question your errors not why you make them.
From your favorite Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Venus_(planet)#Atmosphere
“Because of the lack of any moisture on Venus[…]”
“In the absence of the greenhouse effect caused by the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the temperature at the surface of Venus would be quite similar to that on Earth.”
A good explanation of what happened to Venus’ water is here:
http://www.vanderbilt.edu/AnS/physics/astrocourses/AST101/readings/water_on_venus.html
If you look hard enough you’ll find traces of water. Even on the Sun!
Glenn (12:52:16) :
I don’t see why, it’s easy enough to google and find out. The Venusian atmosphere is reported to contain a trace percentage of water vapor, which is H2O.
Sure there are traces everywhere, even on the Sun, but the important question is if it makes any difference, and the amounts are so minute that they don’t. This should be evident to everybody. As I’ve said, hunting with Google without any understanding of what goes on and what is important is a rather fruitless exercise. This blog is a good place to learn more.
Glenn (12:52:16) :
To put things in perspective:
the amount of Venusian water vapor is about one-half of one-billionth of the Venusian atmosphere, compared with a water vapor content of 1/400th of the atmosphere on Earth, so water vapor is important on Earth, but hardly on Venus.
Glenn (10:00:49) : “No H2O on Venus.” Troll.
Leif Svalgaard (10:15:15) :Troll.
Have you adopted a new signature?
I would love to know what purpose is served by allowing this kind of exchange?
Mr. Glenn needs a time-out and Leif would have been the better by skipping the words of his question, posting only the question mark.
The only thing that will be served is turning WUWT into a “free speech” for all “food fight.”
REPLY – I know we have severe disagreements. That’s the point of all this — to provide a forum for disagreement on this highly controversial subject. We should be able to totally disagree and remain agreeable. It pains me to see any sniping. Please, please let’s be nice to each other. Let us all on either side of the debate (and various sub-debates) set an example of noblesse oblige and civility for all the world to see. ~ Evan
The orbital effects are always present, yet ice ages are relatively rare.
Yes. But what i meant was that during some periods ice ages seem to correspond with eccentricity (c. every 100k years, but more “recently” seem to show more correspondence with obliquity (c. every 50K years). And then of course there are combination effects.
One is led to wonder what would cause a switch in correspondences.
I want to do a graph of this, at least a rough one showing 0 to 100% phases of the three Milankovitch cycles (the 4th cycle, inclination, is trickier because of its “hit and miss” aspect, but also seems to be a roughly 100k-year cycle).
garron (18:44:36) :
Mr. Glenn needs a time-out and Leif would have been the better by skipping the words of his question, posting only the question mark.
Yes, I know, but I’m only human and I have endured a fair amount of outright abuse from this gentleman, so now and then [rarely] I bite back, even when I shouldn’t [Psalm 37:11].
I fear you are confusing cause and effect. The magnitude of the forcing effect of CO2 is independent of the magnitude of the resulting feedback.
Well, John, my objection here is much the same as the others. The direct forcing alone doesn’t do it. (And yes, the degree of direct forcing is in some dispute.) The biggest objection is to the feedback effects.
If positive feedback effects are not at work, then it would seem that AGW may be real but relatively trivial.
To me this is the crux of it. It seems that the ice ages and interglacials of the past million years or two started when the current continental configuration became set. Which tells me that ocean currents and orbital cycles are the main drivers of climate on millennial scales.
I’ll add on the subject of review: On ANY highly controversial matter peer review alone won’t do. Not in science. Not in history either, for that matter.
Only independent review will do. Lots of it.
And for that to occur ALL data, methods, algorithms, code, and operating manuals MUST be released. No more closed shops.
I regard any agency that will not fall all over itself to make all such documents available to potential critics with the same suspicion I reserve for a poker dealer who won’t let you cut the cards. It simply won’t do.
The problem with “explaining” how Venus got the way it is is that it wold be complete speculation. Did the heat come first or the CO2? No way to know.
“Yes, I know, but I’m only human and I have endured a fair amount of outright abuse from this gentleman, so now and then [rarely] I bite back, even when I shouldn’t [Psalm 37:11].”
I have endured quite a bit of abuse from you, Leif, and not always have I responded to it. But to capture your own phrase “to put this in perspective”, you claimed there is no water on Venus. Had I not called you on this clear falsehood, some may have accepted your word for it. And as you say, this blog is a good place to learn more. Venus’ atmosphere is said to contain .002% water vapor, from your own previous Wiki reference. How does that match your “the amount of Venusian water vapor is about one-half of one-billionth of the Venusian atmosphere”? I’m not real strong on math, but .002% is 20 parts per million, not 0.5 parts per billion. Don’t go off again on CO2 or unequivocal statements about what you think Venus had eons ago or the Sun.
It makes for nice rhetoric, but is and was irrelevant to your original statement and the truth.
Note – It would be wise if you and Leif took a break from this for a while as it seems it is becoming a battle of personalities, not data. – Anne
Leif Svalgaard (12:13:07) :
” anna v (10:49:44) :
“” It is hard to get that much extra H2O in the atmosphere. Tell me how?”
By boiling the Oceans? What would the ocean temperatures be, not only in the tropics, put all 75% of the planet?””
Except that the oceans on Venus disappeared billions of years ago.”
I am sorry if I misunderstood the post I was quoting. I was talking of earth’s paleoclimate (75% H2O is a clue).
anna v (08:19:23) : 4/10
Now you are going to Venus and have said :
‘ Leif Svalgaard (14:31:17) : 2/8
Bob B (12:57:17) :
Leif the plot I supplied shows temperature not a function of CO2 as far as I am concerned.
Looks like a pretty good function to me [although a bit rough, there are better ones around]. Venus is another good example. You need to double up 18 times to get to Venus and the Sun is about twice as strong [so say 6 degrees], yielding a 100 degree increase to 400K, which is not quite there yet [need to get up to 700K] so maybe the greenhouse effect is even bigger.’
Why does it have to be greenhouse, i.e. the ten lines or less of CO2 that capture a tiny part of the infrared spectrum? Seems to me pure speculation, after accepting that CO2 drives temperatures.
Clouds are much more efficient in trapping infrared, and from what I have heard there are clouds on Venus:
Wikipedia: Venus is covered with an opaque layer of highly reflective clouds of sulfuric acid, preventing its surface from being seen from space in visible light;
also there may be volcanism heating from below.
Any guess is as good as you arithmetic: It is hot, there is CO2, must be CO2.
The earth’s paleoclimate does not show strong correlations with CO2, and has been studied for many years. In addition, the 2 or 3 degrees per century of the IPCC come from feedback from H2O heating. CO2 by itself gives a meager 1.,1.5 degrees heating. ( ignoring the logarithmic argument).
I am wading in here on the Great Venus Thermal Debate.
There is still a LOT about the climatology of the good old Earth that we don’t know and we live here. Can you just imagine how much we don’t know about Venus? I just am astounded that we are trying to even begin to compare the climatology of Venus to Earths in anything but the most HYPOTHETICAL manner.
If I am not mistaken, Venus is receiving about 4 times the TSI as the Earth. The transparency of the atmosphere is totally different than the Earth which makes sense because the chemical composition is totally different. The CO2 saturation curve is totally different because of the difference in TSI. The same is true for all the other components in the atmosphere.
There is just no way to compare the two. It is not even Apples and Oranges but more like Oranges and Potatoes. Every planetary scientist I know laughs when anyone tries to compare causes for the temperatures on Venus to the causes of Earth’s warming, even the ones that support AGW.
OK… this is how the greenhouse works on Venus.
From: http://burro.astr.cwru.edu/stu/venus.html
Well, John, my objection here is much the same as the others. The direct forcing alone doesn’t do it. (And yes, the degree of direct forcing is in some dispute.) The biggest objection is to the feedback effects..
Well, I have directed you towards numerous studies, both paleo- and modelled that indicate that the effects of the feedbacks after a doubling of CO2 is in the range stated. The earliest of these is nearly three decades old and so has stood up to that amount of scrutiny.
The major feedback is the increase in water vapour, and an interesting confirmation that the models treat the water vapour feedback correctly came after the eruption of Pintubo. This caused a significant and measurable global cooling and enabled a valuable planet-wide experiment – was the resulting drying of the atmosphere consistent with that predicted by the models? Here’s the answer.
McIntyre is engaging in little more than a rhetorical trick – ask a question then continually declare yourself dissatisfied with the answers. His complaint is the lack of a ‘proof’ of the feedback estimates in the literature, when the method by which climate sensitivity is calculated is actually laid out in detail in the IPCC reports and supporting papers. (WG1 Chapters 9 & 10. )
(As an aside, Viscount Monckton claims to have discredited the IPCC climate sensitivity calculations in his APS <a href=”http://www.aps.org/units/fps/newsletters/200807/monckton.cfmpaper” paper, whereas Steve McIntyre claims not to be able even to find these calculations. Can anyone explain? ).
The second half of the trick is to take the normal conservative language used in science and emphasise and exaggerate the discussions of the uncertainties that exist, then complain about lack of ‘engineering quality’ or ‘proof’. This, of course, is a misunderstanding of basic scientific reality. Science deals in the balance of evidence, not proof; there are not two categories of science – ‘settled’ and ‘not settled’, there are degrees of certainty.
No, what McIntyre (and others) have to do is either show (preferably in a professional manner ) where the large body of studies are wrong in their methods or conclusions or else produce his own estimate for climate sensitivity and present it for review. So far he has done neither.
JP.
More on Venus –
To the question of which came first, the heat or the CO2, the answer is BOTH. Venus never had a biosphere to reduce the original CO2 atmosphere and has always received about 300% more solar energy.
When you read that billions of years ago, Earth and Venus had similar atmospheres, that is correct, but life developed on the Earth and ultimately converted the CO2 to the very corrosive (and poisonous to life) O2. [In doing so, life nearly wiped itself out which resulted in the formation of the ‘modern cell’ and the ability to burn sugars with O2 for the energy needed to convert ATD back to ATP – but that is another story – see below.] Venus, burdened with the additional solar energy, never developed ‘life’ and therefore never purged the primal CO2 from the atmosphere. And so it goes.
As a biology related aside, the process used by plants to make sugar is fairly complex as a result of the absorption of the chloroplasts, but despite the common meme that plants convert CO2 into O2, the truth is more complex and interesting. Basically the plant uses the CO2 to form a sugar by combining with H liberated from H20. Two O radicals combine to form 02. During this process, some of the energy captured from the Sun by the chloroplasts is used to convert ATD to ATP.
As alluded to earlier, animals burn this sugar with O2, convert ATD to ATP and release CO2 and H20.
Sugars are hydrocarbons as is oil. In any clean burning process using hydrocarbons, the only ‘waste’ products should be CO2 and H2O.
I find myself continually humbled by the complexity and grandeur of the world.
anna v (22:21:08) :
“” It is hard to get that much extra H2O in the atmosphere. Tell me how?”
By boiling the Oceans? What would the ocean temperatures be, not only in the tropics, put all 75% of the planet?””
Except that the oceans on Venus disappeared billions of years ago.”
I am sorry if I misunderstood the post I was quoting. I was talking of earth’s paleoclimate (75% H2O is a clue).
So, the Great Venus Debate is based on a misunderstanding, it seems. But it did expose some of the skewness of the whole issue. The crowd that denies CO2 having any effect on the Earth going so far as to deny it has any effect on Venus either, even ascribing the heat instead to H20 in spite of Venus being ‘bone dry’ [H2O only existing as a trace component with highly variable minute concentrations].
The description [Dee] of how the Water got lost is marred by the use of the present tense instead of the past tense:
“So, as water rises in Venus’ atmosphere and reaches this region, UV light dissociates it into two hydrogen atoms and one oxygen atom. The hydrogen is much lighter than the water molecule was, and so it easily escapes Venus’ atmosphere.”
And of this gem:
“The water will usually quickly recombine with a carbon or carbon monoxide molecule to form carbon monoxide or carbon dioxide. “.
Somehow suggesting that the water is recycled [‘recombine’]. But the water is gone, it is the oxygen that combines with carbon.
When the Venusian oceans disappeared billions of years ago, the run-away greenhouse effect was obviously a combination of both CO2 and H2O with H2O even being the main culprit. Both that was a very long time ago and the heat trapped then is not what is around today. As Wikipedia correctly points out: “In the absence of the greenhouse effect caused by the carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the temperature at the surface of Venus would be quite similar to that on Earth”.
On Venus:
It is my understanding that gas under pressure heats up. When the molecules of gas are forced together the get all excited and they show this exitement as heat. How much of Venus high temperature is down to adiabatic heat caused by the 92 bar pressure at ground level? One datum that points to this might be the fact that there is a layer of Venusian atmosphere where the pressure is earth-like and the temperature is earth-like.
Much is sometimes made of the high ‘dark-side’ temperatures on Venus. The Venusian day is very long, but there are 300mph winds on Venus which are pretty good at distributing the heat. The winds are faster than the day-length and circulate in the opposite direction.
The clouds of sulfuric acid mention above are such good reflectors of solar energy that it is reckoned that the amount of this energy that reaches ground level is about the same as on Earth. These clouds though are pretty good ‘blankets’ which trap the heat, including the adiabatic heat, in Venus atmosphere.
All in all, I would have to agree with those commenters above who say that attempting to draw conclusions about Earth’s climate from Venus is misleading to say the least.
“No, what McIntyre (and others) have to do is either show (preferably in a professional manner ) where the large body of studies are wrong in their methods or conclusions or else produce his own estimate for climate sensitivity and present it for review. ”
Steve McIntyre is doing what he knows how to do. He is auditing. That is what he does. There are not many people watching what is happening in the cozy climate science community, but because of the efforts of McIntyre, our host here, and a few notable others, the truth is getting out.
Kevin B (06:02:34) :
It is my understanding that gas under pressure heats up. When the molecules of gas are forced together the get all excited and they show this exitement as heat. How much of Venus high temperature is down to adiabatic heat caused by the 92 bar pressure at ground level?
It is the act of compression [not the pressure as such] that heats the gas. A standard 200 bar [twice the pressure of Venus’ atmosphere] compressed air container is not hot to the touch. As the pressure built up slowly billions of years ago there was plenty of time to radiate away any heat. Whatever clouds there were [and are] cannot trap the heat indefinitely over billions of years.
George Landis has a good paper on Venus here:
http://gltrs.grc.nasa.gov/reports/2003/TM-2003-212310.pdf
He writes:
“In the early solar system, about four billion years before present, the sun was approximately twenty-five percent less luminous than it is today. Under these conditions, it is plausible to suggest that Venus was much more Earthlike than it is today. As the solar luminosity increased, Venus became trapped in a runaway moist greenhouse effect. [3] The rising temperature increased the evaporation of water vapor from the oceans; this increased water vapor in the atmosphere increased the trapping of infrared radiation, which increased the heating of the planet. Eventually this feedback loop resulted in the oceans boiling dry (and hence releasing very large amounts of greenhouse gas into the atmosphere), and shortly thereafter any surface carbonate rocks decomposed into the primary minerals plus carbon dioxide, releasing their carbon dioxide back into the atmosphere. The thick carbon dioxide atmosphere and intense greenhouse effect results in the high atmospheric pressure (about 90 bar) and high temperature (approximately 450C) found on the surface of Venus now”
and concludes that:
“Venus is the best laboratory in the Solar system for study of the greenhouse effect. If we are to understand climate change on Earth, we can learn by comparing and contrasting the history and climate of the Earth with that of its nearby neighbors, Venus and Mars.”
He’s done exactly that with respect to the hockey stick and the way many studies have used the same denrochronology data. They’re basically making crap up.
Leif
I’m sure you’re right about adiabatic heat leaking away, but sometimes a big cloud of gas and dust gets together and gravitational forces pull the gas together and sometimes the pressure gets so great that the gas molecules fuse together and generate even more heat which causes more fusion and before you know it, you have a runaway fusion effect and a star is born.
Now I realise that interstellar gas is pulled together by gravity and the pressure is constantly increasing, which might combat the fact that the adiabatic heat is dissipating, whereas on Venus… Well why is the pressure at Venus surface 92 times that on Earth? Surely, under that pressure and temperature, the atmosphere would blow away? And if the atmosphere can’t blow away, then surely the pressure will create heat?
I understand that Venus is very volcanically active so the CO2 and Sulfer is being constantly replaced, but won’t that add to the pressure that the gas is under?
I don’t doubt that there is a greenhouse effect on Venus, but I’m not quite ready to give up on the pressure theory yet.
Kevin B (11:50:53) :
A contracting proto-star is so big that it is hard to radiate the heat away. A dead elephant will feel warm to the touch a lot longer than a dead mouse. The heat content changes with the cube of the size, while the surface that radiates away the heat only changes with the square of the size, so the heat wins if the size is large.
why is the pressure at Venus surface 92 times that on Earth?
Because all the CO2 that were in the rocks is now in the atmosphere. If you put all the CO2 sequestered in the Earth’s rocks into the atmosphere, it too much be about as thick.
Surely, under that pressure and temperature, the atmosphere would blow away? And if the atmosphere can’t blow away, then surely the pressure will create heat?
The pressure at the surface is the weight of all the material [CO2] above it, so you have a crushing weight [1500 pounds per square inch] holding down the atmosphere, that’s why it doesn’t blow away. And constant pressure does not generate heat, if it did, then surely the atmosphere would blow away, but so would the planet itself and the Earth too as the pressure of 4000 miles of rock is truly gigantic.
I understand that Venus is very volcanically active so the CO2 and Sulfer is being constantly replaced, but won’t that add to the pressure that the gas is under?
Although there seems to be 1600 volcanoes on Venus there is great doubt as to any of them is active. In perhaps one case some ash has been observed. Some variations of the trace elements [sulphur dioxide] have been observed, but it is not known if that was due to volcanic activity or to processes in the atmosphere. The ‘hunt’ is on to find an active volcano, but so far no luck, so we cannot say that Venus is volcanically very active.
At http://www.universetoday.com/guide-to-space/venus/does-venus-have-volcanoes/
you will find:
But does Venus have any volcanoes right now? Unfortunately, we just don’t have enough data to go on. Venus is shrouded in thick clouds of carbon dioxide in its atmosphere, so you can’t have an orbiter easily take photographs of the planet’s surface.
There is no water on the surface of Venus, and scientists know that the planet has no plate tectonics, like we have here on Earth. There are no continents. And so Venus doesn’t have the same regions of volcanism as we have on Earth. So right now, scientists have no idea if there are volcanoes on Venus. There could be a few spotty regions across the planet, where there is some activity, but none have been seen erupting in the present.
Leif Svalgaard (08:41:52) : “. . . .The thick carbon dioxide atmosphere and intense greenhouse effect results in the high atmospheric pressure (about 90 bar) and high temperature (approximately 450C) found on the surface of Venus now”
and concludes that:
“Venus is the best laboratory in the Solar system for study of the greenhouse effect. If we are to understand climate change on Earth, we can learn by comparing and contrasting the history and climate of the Earth with that of its nearby neighbors, Venus and Mars.”
– – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – – –
Lief,
The conclusion, as a scientific endeavor, is obvious. However, it does not scale to significance to the current AGW debate.
This has turned into a delightfully informative discussion. But, can anyone here cite one Venusian fact or theory significant to dealing with environmental and subsistence issues facing our great grand children?