Guest post by Frank Lansner, civil engineer, biotechnology.
(Note from Anthony – English is not Frank’s primary language, I have made some small adjustments for readability, however they may be a few passages that need clarification. Frank will be happy to clarify in comments)
It is generally accepted that CO2 is lagging temperature in Antarctic graphs. To dig further into this subject therefore might seem a waste of time. But the reality is, that these graphs are still widely used as an argument for the global warming hypothesis. But can the CO2-hypothesis be supported in any way using the data of Antarctic ice cores?
At first glance, the CO2 lagging temperature would mean that it’s the temperature that controls CO2 and not vice versa.
Click for larger image Fig 1. Source: http://www.brighton73.freeserve.co.uk/gw/paleo/400000yrfig.htm
But this is the climate debate, so massive rescue missions have been launched to save the CO2-hypothesis. So explanation for the unfortunate CO2 data is as follows:
First a solar or orbital change induces some minor warming/cooling and then CO2 raises/drops. After this, it’s the CO2 that drives the temperature up/down. Hansen has argued that: The big differences in temperature between ice ages and warm periods is not possible to explain without a CO2 driver.
Very unlike solar theory and all other theories, when it comes to CO2-theory one has to PROVE that it is wrong. So let’s do some digging. The 4-5 major temperature peaks seen on Fig 1. have common properties: First a big rapid temperature increase, and then an almost just as big, but a less rapid temperature fall. To avoid too much noise in data, I summed up all these major temperature peaks into one graph:
Fig 2. This graph of actual data from all major temperature peaks of the Antarctic vostokdata confirms the pattern we saw in fig 1, and now we have a very clear signal as random noise is reduced.
The well known Temperature-CO2 relation with temperature as a driver of CO2 is easily shown:
Fig 3.
Below is a graph where I aim to illustrate CO2 as the driver of temperature:
Fig 4. Except for the well known fact that temperature changes precede CO2 changes, the supposed CO2-driven raise of temperatures works ok before temperature reaches max peak. No, the real problems for the CO2-rescue hypothesis appears when temperature drops again. During almost the entire temperature fall, CO2 only drops slightly. In fact, CO2 stays in the area of maximum CO2 warming effect. So we have temperatures falling all the way down even though CO2 concentrations in these concentrations where supposed to be a very strong upwards driver of temperature.
I write “the area of maximum CO2 warming effect “…
The whole point with CO2 as the important main temperature driver was, that already at small levels of CO2 rise, this should efficiently force temperatures up, see for example around -6 thousand years before present. Already at 215-230 ppm, the CO2 should cause the warming. If no such CO2 effect already at 215-230 ppm, the CO2 cannot be considered the cause of these temperature rises.
So when CO2 concentration is in the area of 250-280 ppm, this should certainly be considered “the area of maximum CO2 warming effect”.
The problems can also be illustrated by comparing situations of equal CO2 concentrations:
Fig 5.
So, for the exact same levels of CO2, it seems we have very different level and trend of temperatures:
Fig 6.
How come a CO2 level of 253 ppm in the B-situation does not lead to rise in temperatures? Even from very low levels? When 253 ppm in the A situation manages to raise temperatures very fast even from a much higher level?
One thing is for sure:
“Other factors than CO2 easily overrules any forcing from CO2. Only this way can the B-situations with high CO2 lead to falling temperatures.”
This is essential, because, the whole idea of placing CO2 in a central role for driving temperatures was: “We cannot explain the big changes in temperature with anything else than CO2”.
But simple fact is: “No matter what rules temperature, CO2 is easily overruled by other effects, and this CO2-argument falls”. So we are left with graphs showing that CO2 follows temperatures, and no arguments that CO2 even so could be the main driver of temperatures.
– Another thing: When examining the graph fig 1, I have not found a single situation where a significant raise of CO2 is accompanied by significant temperature rise- WHEN NOT PRECEDED BY TEMPERATURE RISE. If the CO2 had any effect, I should certainly also work without a preceding temperature rise?! (To check out the graph on fig 1. it is very helpful to magnify)
Does this prove that CO2 does not have any temperature effect at all?
No. For some reason the temperature falls are not as fast as the temperature rises. So although CO2 certainly does not dominate temperature trends then: Could it be that the higher CO2 concentrations actually is lowering the pace of the temperature falls?
This is of course rather hypothetical as many factors have not been considered.
Fig 7.
Well, if CO2 should be reason to such “temperature-fall-slowing-effect”, how big could this effect be? The temperatures falls 1 K / 1000 years slower than they rise.
However, this CO2 explanation of slow falling temperature seems is not supported by the differences in cooling periods, see fig 8.
When CO2 does not cause these big temperature changes, then what is then the reason for the big temperature changes seen in Vostok data? Or: “What is the mechanism behind ice ages???”
This is a question many alarmists asks, and if you can’t answer, then CO2 is the main temperature driver. End of discussion. There are obviously many factors not yet known, so I will just illustrate one hypothetical solution to the mechanism of ice ages among many:
First of all: When a few decades of low sunspot number is accompanied by Dalton minimum and 50 years of missing sunspots is accompanied by the Maunder minimum, what can for example thousands of years of missing sunspots accomplish? We don’t know.
What we saw in the Maunder minimum is NOT all that missing solar activity can achieve, even though some might think so. In a few decades of solar cooling, only the upper layers of the oceans will be affected. But if the cooling goes on for thousands of years, then the whole oceans will become colder and colder. It takes around 1000-1500 years to “mix” and cool the oceans. So for each 1000-1500 years the cooling will take place from a generally colder ocean. Therefore, what we saw in a few decades of maunder minimum is in no way representing the possible extend of ten thousands of years of solar low activity.
It seems that a longer warming period of the earth would result in a slower cooling period afterward due to accumulated heat in ocean and more:
Fig 8.
Again, this fits very well with Vostok data: Longer periods of warmth seems to be accompanied by longer time needed for cooling of earth. The differences in cooling periods does not support that it is CO2 that slows cooling phases. The dive after 230.000 ybp peak shows, that cooling CAN be rapid, and the overall picture is that the cooling rates are governed by the accumulated heat in oceans and more.
Note: In this writing I have used Vostok data as valid data. I believe that Vostok data can be used for qualitative studies of CO2 rising and falling. However, the levels and variability of CO2 in the Vostok data I find to be faulty as explained here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/12/17/the-co2-temperature-link/
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Leif Svalgaard (14:57:19) :
Looks like more model nonsense. How any reputable scientist can claim the output of the solar cycle is controlled by a random process each time amazes me. The 14C record is anything but a random event and follows a curve of solar power that matches exactly the power of the angular momentum curve.
Usoskin fudges his own graph to eliminate “Dalton” type events knocking out 2/3’s of the previous grand minima. How would his model explain grand minima events every 172 yrs avg…..hardly random.
Foinavon:
It is apparent that I did not write with sufficient clarity for you to understand me. So, I write to try to clarify.
Firstly, let me agree with one of your points. I said the rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration which is independent of temperature is “a steady and unwavering 1.5 ppmv per year”. You rightly point out that this was a ‘simplification too far’ in that the rise has increased. Yes, you are right.
For precision, I should have said the rise has a steady and unwavering increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration which is independent of temperature of 0.4 per cent per year and is about 1.5 ppmv per year since measurement began at Mauna Loa in 1958.
But then you wrongly assert:
“When emissions are low the rate of increase of atmospheric CO2 is low, and when emissions are high the rate of increase of CO2 is generally high. That’s entirely as we might expect.”
That assertion is factually incorrect. In fact, the anthropogenic emissions do not relate to the change to atmospheric CO2 concentation at all.
Any two variables will seem to agree if they are given sufficient smoothing. As I said, the annual pulse of anthropogenic CO2 into the atmosphere should relate to the annual increase of CO2 in the atmosphere if one is directly causal of the other, but their variations greatly differ from year to year. Indeed, in some years the equivalent of almost all the anthropogenic emission stays in the air and in other years almost none. And I took the trouble to explain why annual data need not agree but smoothing over at most 3-years should. And I pointed out that IPCC use 5-year smoothing because 2-year, 3-year and 4-year smoothings fail to provide agreement between the anthropogenic emissions and the observed change to atmospheric CO2 concentation.
I am puzzled by your commenting:
“There’s a very large literature that indicates that interannual variation in the enhancement of atmospheric CO2 relates to ENSO, and its effects on tropical forest growth largely, and thus is bound to correlate with the interannual temperature variation since the latter two phenomena (ENSO and global temperature anomaly) are correlated.” etc.
My post pointed out that several studies have shown a relationship between temperature and variations in atmospheric CO2 concentration. As I said, Calder named this his ‘CO2 thermometer’ a decade ago. So, your comment agrees with my post, and I am puzzled as to why you think it does not.
From that you make a completely illogical conclusion saying;
“Thus as our emissions add whatever yearly increment of CO2 to the atmosphere (the persistent and increasing rise in atmospheric CO2 since the start of the industrial age), so internal climate variation, and especially ENSO, provides “noise” on the rising trend largely through ENSO-related effects on tropical forest productivity… “
Your use of the word “Thus” is totally unfounded and is denied by my main point that you failed to mention. That main point was that the pH of the oceans is lowest in their most productive regions where upwellings of water from deep ocean occur, and this suggests the ocean pH is changing to alter the atmospheric CO2 concentration.
Also, you suggest that a “start” to reading the literature on causes of changes to atmospheric CO2 concentration would be Zeng (2005).
I beg to differ, and I suggest that a more cogent – and certainly a much more comprehensive – “start” to reading the peer-reviewed literature on this is
Rorsch A, Courtney RS & Thoenes D, ‘The Interaction of Climate Change and the Carbon Dioxide Cycle’ E&E v16no2 (2005)
Richard
Robert Bateman (15:11:26) :
Would it surprise you to learn that there is a tendency for the counts to be higher the closer one got to the North Magnetic Pole? Would really have to pull in all the stations to get a more definative look, but there is a possibility it might tell us more than we already know.
No, this is no surprise at all. This is the way the Earth’s magnetic field filters the cosmic rays [working in essence as a mass-spectrometer] .
gary gulrud:
That is because Spencer didn’t know what he was doing and plotted the exact same thing twice! That is why the results were identical! See here: http://tamino.wordpress.com/2009/01/19/a-bag-of-hammers/
(I am a rather dessicated English Geologist, 29 years resident in Western Australia, currently transfixed by TV footage of London under heavy snow..)
I am sure you will all enjoy the current bar chart under Climate Timeseries Graph for Southern Hemisphere Annual Mean Surface Temperature, from the excellent website of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology. It shows six years of very definite cooling trend, and a very notable longer term cyclical overprint.
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/silo/reg/cli_chg/g_timeseries.cgi?variable=global_t®ion=sh&season=0112
The cyclical repetitions and 6 year downward progress of this chart have been intriguing and entertaining me for some time now and I cannot wait for the next bar to be added. (The related ones for Global and Northern Hemisphere show a more subdued signal, possibly due to the encroachment of industrialised microclimates on northern weather stations).
That is an excellent contribution by Frank Lansner. The fact that historical global temperature rise PRECEDES atmospheric CO2 rise in the Vostok Ice Core Data has always been the glaring error in the theory that anthropogenic CO2 emissions alone are driving global warming (and the appalling flaw in the Al Gore self-promotional video). And the potential that the Vostock graphs show for a catastrophic return to the more usual conditions of deep glaciation of this ‘Recent’ geological period has always been the resounding message that they convey. No wonder most of the Pleistocene biodiversity and megafauna were wiped out before we came along!
Whatever it is that has driven the global temperature variations shown in the Vostok ice core data, it certainly isn’t any of our doing, and it certainly hasn’t stopped. We should by all means stop man-made CO2 pollution. It is a horrid spike on an otherwise natural and rather pretty graph. But never imagine that we are controlling global temperature cycles by doing so. Something else is going on there, and it is much bigger than us and probably beyond our influence.
“” Phil. (10:10:22) :
George E. Smith (11:44:37) :
“” DAV (13:05:59) :
George E. Smith (11:09:07) : At Vostok Temperatures, the atmosphere has to be essentially devoid of water vapor or water in any form, and quite often it can be devoid of CO2 as well, with CO2 ice on the ground.
This is nonsense, there is no way to get CO2 ice there with a partial pressure of less than 0.001 atm! Check out the phase diagram of CO2:
http://scifun.chem.wisc.edu/chemweek/CO2/CO2_phase_diagram.gif “”
Well I believe you are right; it does look like that is nonsense (thanks for the phase diagram by the way). I will have to remember that next time I talk with the chap who told me he was walking around on CO2 snow at the south pole when he was there once making insolation measurements.
George
“” Leif Svalgaard (11:22:59) :
Robert Bateman (09:08:06) :
why the sunspots are getting lower in contrast?
Is it just weakening magnetic fields independent of Solar Cycle?
The physics is this: a lower magnetic field means that pressure balance must be achieved by a higher temperature. The contrast decreases as the temperature difference with the rest of the photosphere decreases.
Now, why the magnetic field should be lower, we don’t know. “”
That’s very interesting Leif. Is the magnetic field not just the effect of a rotating mass of plasma. I would think that a vortex of charged particles would constitute a circulating current and create a magnetic field that depended on the rotation rate. Is the magnetism some other effect ?
George
Just found some more giveaway NASA pics, thanks to Frank Lansner’s posts on his Danish forum. I’ve used all the NASA Antarctica pics in series, captioned “Warming Antarctica by Paintwork” so if anyone is still reading this thread, have fun – the composite is a stunner.
Lucy: I don’t know how they got those images of the Arctic to show the ice progression, but I sure would like to see it go from Sept to Jan.
This is a wake up call. Few realize it. I hope that by the time it becomes obvious that the world is running out of CO2, either we’ve figured out how to liberate it en masse (which, despite claims regarding burning of carbon based fuels, is not yet realistic technology – the amount of liberation I refer to far exceeds anything possible presently). Or, we’ve left the Earth and started terraforming other places into new homes. Yes, I know these events are probably far in the future. But, the technology may take a long, long time to mature. Time’s a waisting.
I’d like to see a comparison of the total volume of CO2 In Mars atmosphere vs Earth, especially when Earth was at an all time low.
I’m wondering if the CO2 lag behind temperature fall is due to plant growth tapering off thus consuming less CO2?
This article is (at best) nothing more than an example of very poor skill in data presentation and the danger of subsequent inferences based therein.
If the author does have greater skill than is apparent here, then it has been deliberately played down and the inferences made are purposefully misleading.
Much more is wrong with the article but the thing to concentrate on is the graphs. Really look at the graphs! Tune out the distracting visual clutter that adds nothing to the information and look.
It’s really easy to make a series of consistent, clean and simple graphs. It takes effort or stupidity to make such a mess of it as these.
I came across an article in Real Climate (http://realclimate.org/) on how we have already reached the tipping point of C02 warming effect titled
“Irreversible, Not Unstoppable” and was surprised to see a reference to this article here in WUWT which apparantly contradicted the RC article.
Quote from RC article below…
Jonas Says:
2 February 2009 at 3:06 AM
Interesting Article…
But, I’m a bit confused about reading this article on CO2 and it’s
warming effect noted in Antartic ice core samples.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/01/30/co2-temperatures-and-ice-ages/
Can someone please explain …?
[Response: What’s to explain? The climate affects the carbon cycle – over ice age timescales it seems to be mainly through ocean processes (solubility, production, stratification) which takes time to work through. CO2 is still a greenhouse gas, and so the combination is an amplification of the cycles which are driven by orbital wobbles. None of this is controversial. – gavin]
@waspbloke
If you wish to present some kind of argument you failed to do so.
I agree that things are surpricingly simple. This however is an embarrassment to the “2500 leading scientists” behind IPCC, not to me.
Your next step is to explain from fig 5. how CO2 can be the real cause of the major temperature differences.
Joel Shore (16:12:16) :
You are still in here Joel…..and I was waiting for that paper to back up your previous statements. Do I conclude you relinquish your statement?
Hi Foinavon,
You stated that we could use the formula T = (3.0/log(2))*(log(C))-9.39 to analyse CO2’s forcing effect.
This was in support of Hansen’s having “nailed” it which in turn was in support of the IPCC’s selected model projection
which much of future policy is being based on.
From these graphs if we ignore extrema and only look at periods of monotonic increase then we have the situation of
CO2 increasing from roughly 220 ppm to 280 ppm a 60 ppm change and we have a temperature change from -6 to 1 or 7 K change in Temperature. (I’m looking at the graphs only so there could be some errors in my calcs but I’d be happy to redo them if you can point me to the raw data).
From your formula we get Delta(T) = T(280) – T(220) = 1.04. So according to you and Hansen 6 K or roughly 86% of that change was due to natural variation
even at what I think is an overly optimistic view of doubling CO2 causing a 3 degree rise in temperature.
Sorry I should have said I used Fig 2. in my calculations
foinavon:
“When emissions are low the rate of increase of atmospheric CO2 is low, and when emissions are high the rate of increase of CO2 is generally high. That’s entirely as we might expect.”
Agreed! The accumulated emissions and the accumulation in the atmosphere show a near fit over the past 100+ years, with increasing emissions leading to increasing accumulation and increasing uptake by nature:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_emiss_increase.jpg and
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/acc_co2_1900_2004.jpg
The temperature-CO2 link is much weaker and besides the short term variation of about 3 ppmv/°C around the trend not responsible for the trend itself.
Richard Courtney:
That assertion is factually incorrect. In fact, the anthropogenic emissions do not relate to the change to atmospheric CO2 concentation at all.
The year by year variability of CO2 increase speed has only a weak correlation with the emissions, simply because the noise caused by the influence of temperature on the sink speed is larger on a one-year scale than the influence of variations in human emissions (which are much smaller). That doesn’t say anything about the long-term influence of temperature or emissions on CO2 levels in the atmosphere. One need to compare the accumulated emissions and the longer term changes in temperature to the accumulation in the atmosphere, not the derivatives of them. If one does that, the above graphics show that the emissions give a near fit of the trend, without visible influence of temperature on longer term.
SteveSadlov (17:34:24)
Since the world has maintained a broadly steady CO2 concentration for the last 20 million years (up and down a bit during ice age transitions and during periods in the Miocene), we’re in no danger of “running out of CO2”!
Pearson, PN and Palmer, MR (2000) Atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations over the past 60 million years Nature 406, 695-699
@frank Lansner
Ok, I’ll keep this as simple as I can for you.
Proper treatment of data is the bedrock of good science. You need to describe your method for processing the data and provide statistics to validate the treatment you use.
I can superimpose any series of cyclical data, one cycle on top of the other, stretching and pulling them to fit, then iron out all the worst kinks and present them in a grand unified graph, which I then go on to monkey around with in ways that completely depart from the actual data I started with. But is it a scientifically sound thing to do?
The simplest treatments are most often the best.
What precisely you have done with these data is unclear, your reason for doing so is not established, your subsequent presentation is messy and your inferences are neccessarily contrived.
For those reasons, I would not even begin to try and explain your fig. 5.
And FYI, you know nothing about me or what side of the debate I sit on, all you know about me is that on the evidence of this article, I judge your expertise to be woefully lacking.
Richard S Courtney (15:27:49)
That’s not true. And the issue isn’t “precision” but “accuracy”! One only needs to inspect the Mauna Loa record to see that. Here it is again:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
Clearly if the rate of increase in the early part of the record was in the range 0.7-0.9 ppm/yr and it’s now averaging close to 2 ppm per year, one can hardly assert that “and is about 1.5 ppmv per year since measurement began at Mauna Loa in 1958”. After all if we’re interested in year on year (interannual) variability one may as well deal with the variability truthfully!
The scientific evidence indicates otherwise Richard. There’s a large scientific literature on this[***]. The interannual variability is ENSO-related and seems to be due largely to ENSO related changes in tropical forests (water-stressed and forest-fire prone during and shortly after El Nino’s and so suppressed “pull down” of CO2 from the atmosphere; growth-efficient during and shortly after la Nina events and therefore more efficient “draw down” of CO2 from the atmosphere).
Not really….if one wants to understand scientific issues surely we should be addressing the science.
[***] A large amount of data indicates that interannual variability in CO2 uptake and release has only a small contribution from the oceans; e.g. :
Bousquet, P., et al. (2000), Regional changes in carbon dioxide fluxes of land and oceans since 1980, Science, 290, 1342–1346.
Ciais, P., J. W. C. White, M. Trolier, R. J. Francey, J. A. Berry, D. R. Randall, P. J. Sellers, J. G. Collatz, and D. S. Schimel (1995), Partitioning of ocean and land uptake of CO2 as inferred by δ-13C measurements from the NOAA Climate Monitoring and Diagnostics Laboratory Global Air Sampling Network, J. Geophys. Res., 100(D3), 5051–5070.
Feely, R. A., et al. (2002), Seasonal and interannual variability of CO2 in the equatorial Pacific, Deep Sea Res., Part II, 49, 2443–2469
Lee, K., et al. (1998), Low interannual variability in recent oceanic uptake of atmospheric carbon dioxide, Nature, 396, 155–159.
Le Quéré, C., et al. (2003), Two decades of ocean CO2 sink and variability, Tellus, B55(2), 649–656.
Roedenbeck, C., S. Houweling, M. Gloor, and M. Heimann (2003), CO2 flux history 1982–2001 inferred from atmospheric data using a global inversion of atmospheric transport, Atmos. Chem. Phys., 3, 1919–1964.
Hi Frank
My above post was definately not in support of the article n Real Climate. I wanted to point out Gavin’s response which I though was odd as he’s admitting that the long term forcings of the earth’s orbit (Milankovic cycle) is an overriding force when compared to CO2. Supporters of AGW rarely make such statements !
Ferdinand:
You accurately quote me as saying:
“That assertion is factually incorrect. In fact, the anthropogenic emissions do not relate to the change to atmospheric CO2 concentation at all.”
Then you say:
“The year by year variability of CO2 increase speed has only a weak correlation with the emissions, simply because the noise caused by the influence of temperature on the sink speed is larger on a one-year scale than the influence of variations in human emissions (which are much smaller). ”
No! That completely ignores the point that I have stated (twice) above when I wrote:
“Any two variables will seem to agree if they are given sufficient smoothing. As I said, the annual pulse of anthropogenic CO2 into the atmosphere should relate to the annual increase of CO2 in the atmosphere if one is directly causal of the other, but their variations greatly differ from year to year. Indeed, in some years the equivalent of almost all the anthropogenic emission stays in the air and in other years almost none. And I took the trouble to explain why annual data need not agree but smoothing over at most 3-years should. And I pointed out that IPCC use 5-year smoothing because 2-year, 3-year and 4-year smoothings fail to provide agreement between the anthropogenic emissions and the observed change to atmospheric CO2 concentation.”
My point is an empirical fact: i.e. the anthropogenic emissions do not relate to the change to atmospheric CO2 concentation.
And arm waving about “noise” does not alter that fact.
Richard
Richard
Richard S Courtney (03:58:58)
apols for “butting in”. But in case Ferdinand is still in his cozy bed, we might as well establish two very straightforward points.
POINT ONE: In fact the “annual pulse” does relate to emissions. When emissions were low in the early part of the CO2 record, the CO2 increment was low (0.7-0.9 ppm/yr on average). Now that out emissions are higher, so the annual increment is much higher (averaging around 2 ppm/yr). Likewise Ferdinand’s linked plots [see Ferdinand Engelbeen (02:54:18)] show the straightforward relationship between emissions and accumulated atmospheric CO2.
Here’s the Mauna Loa record again:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
POINT TWO: Yes, of course there is interannual variability that “piggybacks” on the rising anthropogenic trend. We know pretty well that this is largely the result of ENSO-related effects on tropical forest productivity. Sometimes this effect is large (especially shortly after strong El Nino’s and La Nina’s..)
Something that simply isn’t true can’t be “an empirical fact” Richard!
A straightforward discussion of the nature and cause of interannual variability in CO2 accumulation isn’t “arm-waving”. Of course like any “noise” (random fluctuations about a trend) the origin of the noise may be fully identifiable. And it seems to be in this case. It’s ENSO-related effects, as just described. Presumably at some point we’ll fully understand the nature and origins of ENSO, and so the fluctuations won’t necessarily be “random” anymore! However it’s perfectly appropriate to describe not-cumulative variation of a parameter (CO2 increment) around a trend as “noise”, especially if we’re clear about what we’re discussing…