I used to be really big on solar energy, putting panels on my house as well as a local school when I was on the school board. But that may all be for naught. There’s a new boogeyman in the world of global warming: Nitrogen Trifluoride
On Lubos Motls The Reference Frame he has as pointed out that a greenhouse gas emitted during the production of solar panels and HDTVs, nitrogen trifluoride (NF3) that is used for cleaning the electronics, is about 17,000 times more potent a greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide.
The concentration of NF3 in the atmosphere was artificially increased by a factor of 20 during the last two decades. The measurements of the concentration surpassed the previous estimates by a factor of five.
According to the Scripps Institute; ” the present 5,400 tons in the atmosphere…is on the rise at 11 percent per year” – that will stay there for 700+ years – creates the equivalent warming of all Finland’s CO2 emissions.
According to Lubos, given the fact that the solar panels produce about the same percentage of the global energy as Finland, it is reasonable to guess that the state-of-the-art solar panels that would replace fossil fuels would cause a comparable amount of warming per Joule as fossil fuels.
So let’s just say – everything causes global warming, and leave it at that.
For reference, I’ve listed some other common industrial gases below:
Global Warming Potentials Of Gases
(100 Year Time Horizon)
GAS GWP
========================
Carbon dioxide (CO2) 1
Methane (CH4) 23
Nitrous oxide (N2O) 296
Hydrofluorocarbons
HFC-23 12,000
HFC-125 3,400
HFC-134a 1,300
HFC-143a 4,300
HFC-152a 120
HFC-227ea 3,500
HFC-43-10mee 1,500
Fully Fluorinated Gases
SF6 22,200
CF4 5,700
C2F6 11,900
C4F10 8,600
C6F14 9,000
The concept of the global warming potential (GWP) was developed to compare the ability of each greenhouse gas to trap heat in the atmosphere relative to another gas. In this case, CO2 is the reference gas. Methane, for example, has a GWP of 23 over a 100-year period. This means that on a kilogram for kilogram basis, methane is 23 times more potent than CO2 over a 100-year period.
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It doesn’t matter what we put into the atmosphere, it’s cooling anyhow.
All molecules are not created equal. But for the Global WarmAl Worshipers, they are all greenhouse gases regardless of their origin and concentration.
The Sun of Man doesn’t care which molecule is what and where, it will keep going through its natural cycles of solar activity as it always did.
The NF3 is easy to deal with. Filters could capture it in the process or it could be rapidly replaced with an alternative. Have they ever tried soap and water?
I’d like to go on record as offering the first NF3-offset. Go ahead, buy you solar panel and HDTV, just send me $100 as an indulg….I mean, NF3 offset.
Pretty much like carbon-offsets, I won’t do much of anything with the money, but you’ll feel better. Right?
You see, if people would only honour the Precautionary Principle, nasty surprises like this would never, ever, ever occur.
OK, so we replaced CFC-14 (or similar) with NF3 for cleaning electronics. What is the GHG number for Freon? Oh, I forgot, we saved the Ozone that Freon wasn’t really destroying. How much does NF3 cost? Looks like we didn’t gain much.
I doubt solar panels will produce anything near full output for 30 years, even without hail stones. The cover glass darkens, the material degrades. When I could still climb minor mountains, I found solar panels at monitoring stations along the way totally trashed by forces of nature.
Where does the 17,000 come from? I find it hard to believe that NF3 could absorb 17k as much light, would have to be darker than coal dust.
Using incandescent lights to heat your house only makes sense if you have expensive whole house heat. Electric heat costs 3-5 times as much as gas. If you do it on a local basis, the reading lamp next to your chair, a little better, but a 100 watt bulb isn’t going to take much chill out of the air.
I just wear a hat.
Lol. The High School I went to looked like a fortress, literally. No large windows, only narrow, arrow-slit type windows, and then in only some of the classrooms. Three stories, large and imposing facade.
Here’s the only picture I could find in a quick search:
http://scholar.lib.vt.edu/faculty_archives/principalship/w/images/218wildman-school2.jpg
The interior was large and open, except for science classrooms. I guess in case some chemistry experiment went wrong.
…a solar cell produces electricity for only approx. 30 years…
————–
And the amount of energy produced by the cell will gradually decline over that time.
Even green fool-aide drinkers should understand that it is more GHG friendly for me to utilize the power company generated heat from my lightbulbs than for me to use my home furnace which is less thermally efficient and therefore generates more GHGs per thermal unit.
————
You are neglecting the losses in electrical conversion and transportation.
Most modern heaters get efficiencies in the 80 to 90%. I’ve never heard of an electrical generator that has efficiencies that high.
“My gut instinct is that solar cells are still a net-plus for the climate.”
Odd, my gut instinct is that they make no difference whatsoever.
——–
My gut says that they are a net minus.
And since my gut is bigger than either of yours, mine wins.
You see, if people would only honour the Precautionary Principle, nasty surprises like this would never, ever, ever occur.
————
If people properly followed the Precautionary Principle, nothing would happen. Period.
Fun with SF6:
“Most modern heaters get efficiencies in the 80 to 90%. I’ve never heard of an electrical generator that has efficiencies that high.”
By definition, an electrical heater is 100% efficient. It is a resistance that transforms all the electricity into heat. The electricity transport and the rest of the house’s thermal insulation is never used in the calculation of the efficiency of the heating device.
This non-scientist doubts that NF3 will persist in the atmosphere for 700 years. Is there any experimental research that supports this contention. It seems counter-intuitive. What is the proof?
As I recall experimental research indicates that CO2 lasts in the atmosphere for 5-12 years. Modelers assume that it lasts 100 years. Which is correct? What is the proof?
Thanks everyone!
Jeff Norman wrote:
Dihydrogen Oxide (H2O) is a 4.
So water is 4x more potent than CO2? When I looked at Wiki (yes I know it is a four letter word), it pointed out that water vapor is not calculated because it depends on concentration and temperature. I know we are all waiting for Aqua on that one.
So, in conclusion in a stable gas, with a known amount of water and temperature, H20 might be 4x stronger than CO2? I am not sure if I am convinced.
Ed Scott
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html
I think I have seen it before, but I took a closer look this time:
Table 4a. helped with the overall effect for sure.
Marcus
..”water vapor is not on a “GWP” list is that an emission of a kg of H2O would mostly condense out in a fairly short time”
You make a fair observation and reminds me why Anthony runs such a great site. CO2 is a greenhouse gas, but we don’t know its true effect on water vapor.
However, there is always wapor in the air, and I just find it incomplete when water is not listed with its ranking compared to other gases.
Again thanks everyone. I am a little smarter and wiser thanks to you.
Regarding the short flying time of water…
It might be true that water has a short life-fly time in the atmosphere but when it “drops” down it is still water, so technically the lifetime of water is very very long!!! Moreover, when liquid water absorbs the heat in the atmosphere it will bring down that heat to the ground & ocean, so in fact, removing that heat from the atmosphere only to be radiated slowly back to the atmosphere. Condensation is another business where the heat is actually returned, in part, to the atmosphere.
The case of CO2 is way different. For CO2 to be removed from the atmosphere, it has to react. There are lots of different paths that CO2 can take to be removed. But contrairely to water condensing, the CO2 will transfer the extra little thermal energy to the reaction, most likely on the ground, vegetation or ocean.
Ray,
“Moreover, when liquid water absorbs the heat in the atmosphere it will bring down that heat to the ground & ocean, so in fact, removing that heat from the atmosphere only to be radiated slowly back to the atmosphere”
That is a little wrong. There are other people here that can explain this much better, but I’ll like to take a stab at it.
Water on the surface absorbs heat and evaporates. Being warmer than the surrounding air it rises. At altitute it looses the heat and condenses, falling to the ground as rain, that is colder than the initial vapor. This occurres because at altitute there is less atmosphere above the vapor so the heat in the vapor, continuosly radiating in all directions, looses more heat into space, than is reflected back by the atmosphere above it. This is a negative feedback.
Now, this is not always true. If there is not enough vapor to form rain drops, we get thin high level clouds. They form a cover that will reflect heat downwards. That would be positive feedback.
The big question, is how much rain versus high level clouds. The Aqua satellite might know.
P.S. Please don’t trash me too badly. I am aware that this is a grade school answer.
According to the all knowing Wiki, Finland is ranked 48th in CO2 emissions producing 0.2% of the worlds CO2 “pollution”. Rhode Island is the smallest of 50 states with only 0.04% of the the land. I guess it would actually be closer to Connecticut or New Jersey.
Didn’t mean to offend the Fins.
I’m not sure how they affect the UHI, but PV panels typically operate at 30-40 deg C above ambient at full sun. They will keep a dark roof cool, but a white roof will do more for keeping your house (and probably the planet) cool.
D. Quist,
Of course I did not give the whole picture as to the different phase changes of water. But in your simplified senario, you have a net zero effect. The extra heat I was talking about was that of the infrared absorption from the sun. It is clear that both ground radiated and sun infra red radiations will be abdsorbed by the water molecules. As well, I was also talking specifically about liquid water droplets in suspension in the air. The water molecules don’t rise up from the ground to the upper atmosphere because they are warmer, the zeroth law of thermodynamics applies here. The rise due to diffusion and to some other extend to a concentration gradient.
But back to the real life time of molecules… what’s the probability that a water molecule falling on the ground will take flight again back to atmosphere? We could put a fairly high probability since most of them will be on a surface and those fallying on a body of water will not sink at the bottom but pretty much stay at the surface and take flight again (at least for the majority).
This is absolutely not the case for CO2. Once it is absorbed, a very small fraction might take flight again. Most are chemically absorbed and chemically created.
Ray
Every raindrop contains CO2. When the water vapor in the atmosphere condenses into water droplets they also dissolve molecules of CO2, (and O2). This is why ice cores can be used as proxies for both CO2 levels and temperatures. (Although there is some controversy as to how accurate they are,)
As the old song has it:
“Every time it rains it rains – carbon sequestration.
“Don’t you know each cloud contains – carbon sequestration.”
My attempt to turn this into pennies from heaven by pointing out that I live in damp, soggy, Southern England, (where as I look out of my window it’s currently falling as sleet), and the rain that falls on my land should be saleable as carbon credits have not so far met with success.
paminator (08:08:16) :
Werner Weber- CO2 has an atmospheric half-life of 3 to 7 years, demonstrated by ten’s of peer-reviewed studies dating back to the early 1960’s. Any numbers higher than this range (your 50 year number or the IPCC’s 100+ year number, for example) make assumptions about carbon cycles and carbon sequestration, which is nonsensical. . . .
I assumed that the time CO2 hung around was calculated by taking the annual flux and dividing that into the total supply. That got me around 57 years, depending on how you figured the flux on the rising CO2 curve. Is there some other method?
RE Paminator up there a ways: on CO2 half life.
I’m with you Paminator on the absurdity of the claimed 200 year “residence time” for man made CO2.
The Mauna Loa CO2 data shows a 6ppm p-p annual cycle, and if you look at that “triangular” waveform, you sill see that it goes down in five months, and up in seven months; and if you look at the raw data closely, you will see that it is not quite triangular, but is a single time constant integrated square wave with a 7:5 duty cycle. Of course the first chap at ML who saw that data, did an immediate reduction to compute the integration time constant of that effect; yeah fat chance trying to find that time constant anywhere on NOAA.
The other thing you can’t find on NOAA any more is that 10 or so year global pole to pole three dimensional plot of the CO2 data.
When you could find it, it shows that at the north pole, that 6 ppm amplitude has grown to 18 ppm (confirmed to me, by Dr Steve Piper at Scripps (CO2 guru)).
So the growth cycle can remove 18 ppm of CO2 from the polar atmosphere (north) in just five months. My eye guesses that the time constant can’t be any more than 3-4 years tops.
A couple of rednecks ata bar were goofing around, and they spied the young black laborer quietly downing his beer at the other end of the bar, and decided to hassle him.
“Hey young fella; what do you think is man’s greatest invention?” The young laborer thinks for a few seconds, and then responds. “Ah reckon it’s the thermos flask in mah lunchbox.”
“What’s so special about a thermos flask?”
“Wahl just think; it keeps the hot coffeee hot, and it keeps the iced tea cold; ain’t that amazing?”
“It keeps the hot hot, and it keeps the cold cold; what’s the big deal?”
“Yeah; But how do it know !?”
So how do the atmosphere know to only hang on to man made CO2 for 200 years ? There’s a bright young black laborer still wondering on that .
Mike McMillan-
Look up T. Segalstad. He posted a summary of the actual experimentally measured lifetimes of CO2 in the atmosphere. In one interview, he summarized the situation on CO2 lifetime-
“It is a search for a mythical CO2 sink to explain an immeasurable CO2
lifetime to fit a hypothetical CO2 computer model that purports to show
that an impossible amount of fossil fuel burning is heating the
atmosphere,” Prof. Segalstad concludes. “It is all a fiction.”
I think his position is quite clear. He is, by the way, an expert reviewer for some of the IPCC reports.
Go to http://folk.uio.no/tomvs/esef/esef0.htm
Click on ESEF Volume 2 to download the pdf file. Lots of information about CO2.
If we are going to use CO2 atmospheric lifetimes of more than 5-7 years, then we also must use water vapor lifetimes of more than a few days. You eventually can sequester water in the form of ice or permafrost underground, but I would guess the ‘IPCC’ lifetime of water vapor in the atmosphere is also many years.
What a stupid game this is.
Where is that school? I really like the architecture (even “evil” solar cells)!
Ray
I think you are still mixing things up a bit.
Water vapor rises through the atmosphere due to thermal convection, not through “diffusion and to some other extend to a concentration gradient” as you propose. If it is vigorous you get cumulus clouds reaching tens of thousands of feet into the air. At the top of the cloud heat is radiated into space. These clouds reflect a substantial part of the solar energy back into space at the same time due to its high albedo. The result is that water in this case is a cooling agent, with a negative temperature feedback. This energy conveyor is very active around all of the tropics where most of the solar energy reaches earth. CO2 simply increase the pace of this.
As for CO2 balance, one can argue that the oceans absorbes more when it cools, and releases it when it warms.
If we have a warm year, we get more biomass that will absorb CO2. However, neither process removes CO2 permanently. Biomass decays, releasing CO2, oceans warm up releasing CO2. This changes with seasons and with short term climate change. The only permanent removal of CO2 occure when it is disolved in water, and and as a weak acid reacts to exposed rock and other materials. Only then is there a permanent removal of CO2. I forget, certain sealife use CO2 for their shells. As they die most of it falls to the bottom and is removed from circulation.