Reposted from Jennifer Marohasy
The Available Evidence Does Not Support Fossil Fuels as the Source of Increasing Concentrations of Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide (Part 1)
Because the increase in the concentration of atmospheric carbon dioxide has correlated with an increase in the use of fossil fuels, causation has been assumed.
Tom Quirk has tested this assumption including through an analysis of the time delay between northern and southern hemisphere variations in carbon dioxide. In a new paper in the journal Energy and Environment he writes:
“Over the last 20 years substantial amounts of CO2 derived from fossil fuel have been released into the atmosphere. This has moved from 5.0 gigatonnes of carbon in 1980 to 6.2 gigatonnes in 1990 to 7.0 gigatonnes in 2000… Over 95% of this CO2 has been released in the Northern Hemisphere…
“A tracer for CO2 transport from the Northern Hemisphere to the Southern Hemisphere was provided by 14C created by nuclear weapons testing in the 1950’s and 1960’s.The analysis of 14C in atmospheric CO2 showed that it took some years for exchanges of CO2 between the hemispheres before the 14C was uniformly distributed…
“If 75% of CO2 from fossil fuel is emitted north of latitude 30 then some time lag might be expected due to the sharp year-to-year variations in the estimated amounts left in the atmosphere. A simple model, following the example of the 14Cdata with a one year mixing time, would suggest a delay of 6 months for CO2 changes in concentration in the Northern Hemisphere to appear in the Southern Hemisphere.
“A correlation plot of …year on year differences of monthly measurements at Mauna Loa against those at the South Pole [shows]… the time difference is positive when the South Pole data leads the Mauna Loa data. Any negative bias (asymmetry in the plot) would indicate a delayed arrival of CO2 in the Southern Hemisphere.
“There does not appear to be any time difference between the hemispheres. This suggests that the annual increases [in atmospheric carbon dioxide] may be coming from a global or equatorial source.”
********************
Notes
‘Sources and Sinks of Carbon Dioxide’, by Tom Quirk, Energy and Environment, Volume 20, pages 103-119. http://www.multi-science.co.uk/ee.htm
The abstract reads:
THE conventional representation of the impact on the atmosphere of the use of fossil fuels is to state that the annual increases in concentration of CO2 come from fossil fuels and the balance of some 50% of fossil fuel CO2 is absorbed in the oceans or on land by physical and chemical processes. An examination of the data from: i) measurements of the fractionation of CO2 by way of Carbon-12 and Carbon-13 isotopes; ii) the seasonal variations of the concentration of CO2 in the Northern Hemisphere; and iii) the time delay between Northern and Southern Hemisphere variations in CO2, raises questions about the conventional explanation of the source of increased atmospheric CO2. The results suggest that El Nino and the Southern Oscillation events produce major changes in the carbon isotope ratio in the atmosphere. This does not favour the continuous increase of CO2 from the use of fossil fuels as the source of isotope ratio changes. The constancy of seasonal variations in CO2 and the lack of time delays between the hemispheres suggest that fossil fuel derived CO2 is almost totally absorbed locally in the year it is emitted. This implies that natural variability of the climate is the prime cause of increasing CO2, not the emissions of CO2 from the use of fossil fuels.
Data drawn from the website http://cdiac.ornl.gov/trends/co2/contents.htm .
Tom Quirk has a Master of Science from the University of Melbourne and Master of Arts and Doctor of Philosophy from the University of Oxford. His early career was spent in the UK and USA as an experimental research physicist, a University Lecturer and Fellow of three Oxford Colleges.
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ATTN: Ferdinand Englebeen
RE: Reporting the Concentions of Atmospheric Gases.
The concentration of gases in the atmosphere is reported for Standard Dry Air (SDA), which is air that contains only nitrogen, oxygen, the inert gases and carbon dioxide (i.e., the fixed gases) and is at STP (i.e., 273.2 K and 1 atm pressure). One cubic meter of SDA has 385 ml of carbon dioxide, i.e., 385 ppmv or 17.2 millimoles.
Standard Dry Air exist nowhere on earth because real air or local air is never at STP and _always_ contains water vapor and varying amounts of clouds, the climatologists’ worst nightmares.
The composition of real air is always site specific. In fact these is no unifrom temporal and spatial distribution of the fixed gases in absolute amounts per unit volume in the real atmosphere. The relative ratios of the fixed gases is quite uniform and is independent of site, elevation, local geography, etc. except for minor local variations, e.g., in big cities. This is origin of the term” well-mixed atmospheric gases”
The ideal gas law is usually shown as PV = nRT which upon rearrangement is:
n/V = P/TR. This means inter alia the absolute amount of the gases per unit volume will be a function of the weather.
Absolute or specific humidity of water vapor can vary from about 0-5% by volume. Actually specific humidity is never, ever 0 %. Not even in the Atacama Desert, one of the driest places on the planet.
Clouds are floating pools of liquid water in the atmosphere, and as they move about can release water vapor in an instant or take execess water vapor out the air, which can come down as rain, hail, or snow.
The water droplets in clouds can readily absorb and release carbon dioxide, and these processes are a function of local temperature and pressure. Rain is sat with carbon dioxide and will bring it down to the surface of the earth.
All of the above boil down to this: It is not possible to model climate in an atmosphere of real air with any useful skill and accuracy without making a great many simplifing assumptions.
Here is a recent paper on atmospheric CO2 budgets which appeared in the PNAS – perhaps the leading scientific journal – http://www.pnas.org/content/104/47/18866.abstract . It is just one of very many recent papers.
The lack of a response by a sceptic in two years tells you that there is NO sceptic capable of refuting this and similar analyses. Instead they hide outside of the reach of peer review on blogs and E&E.
Andrew (14:03:50) :
In other words, you have ? + emissions = ? + increase
Besides you qualify the knowns with “reasonable” and “good”
That makes the whole thing subjective, don’t you think?
Andrew
Andrew,
The emissions are as accurate as the fossil fuel sales inventories are known (that is a matter of taxes…). So these may be somewhat underestimated (due to under-the-counter sales…). But I have read somewhere an estimate of 4 +0.5/-0.25 ppmv for current average yearly emissions. The CO2 levels in the atmosphere are known to an accuracy of +/- 0.1 ppmv (for 95% of the atmosphere, the other 5% is undefined and practically udefinable).
That are yearly values. The 50+ year trend is +60 ppmv, similar at all measuring places with the same +/- 0.1 ppmv absolute error, while the accumulated error in emissions may be fully or only partly systematic. Anyway, in all cases the emissions are near twice the increase in the atmosphere.
And we can rewrite the formula as follows:
natural sources + emissions = natural sinks + increase in the air
(that is a matter of conservation of mass)
or
X + emissions = Y + increase
or written in a different way:
X – Y = increase – emissions
where
X – Y = 4 GtC – 8 GtC
or
X-Y = -4 GtC
No matter the real amount of carbon released by natural sources, the natural sinks MUST be 4 GtC larger than the sources, as that is what disappears from the emissions out of the atmosphere. And the real height of X (and thus of Y) doesn’t matter at all. It may be 10, 100 or 1,000 GtC which circulates through the atmosphere within a year, that doesn’t add anything to the total mass of CO2 in the atmosphere:
For X = 10 GtC, Y = 14 GtC
For X = 100 GtC, Y = 104 GtC
For X = 1,000 GtC, Y = 1,004 GtC
Thus the real value of the natural sources and sinks doesn’t matter at all for the mass balance, because we know the real difference between these two…
See for the past 50 years:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em.jpg
VG
Your link needs a stop before pdf
Patrick Kirk (15:28:25) :
Well, by the ’simple arithmetic’ you’ve set up, mathematically speaking the difference between Natural Carbon Sources and Natural Carbon Sinks must always equal -4 Gt/yr.!
Well, yes. It MUST be -4 GtC/yr, as that is what is missing from the emissions and not found in the atmosphere. Thus 4 GtC is gone somewhere in the oceans and/or vegetation (there is no destruction and no escape of CO2 to space…).
In reality, these are averages and there is a year by year variability in sink capacity of +/- 2 GtC, mainly as result of temperature changes (see the link in the previous message). But that doesn’t change the fact that over the past 50 years there was no net addition of nature to the atmospheric CO2 mass and all of the CO2 increase (except some 6 ppmv from ocean warming LIA-current) was caused by the emissions…
“”” Ferdinand Engelbeen (13:16:46) :
George E. Smith (09:41:54) :
Well I see in that color map, a global variation of more than 15 ppm of mid tropospheric CO2 abundance. (why do people keep on saying “by volume”). If they can identify the molecules as being of different species; why not just report abundance by molecular species. In the atmosphere there is only one volume; the total sample volume, so to measure any individual species by volume, you have to extractr every last specimen of a species from the sample, and none of any other species, and then reduce each to STP before you can measure its volume.
Simply counting molecules allows you to use an infinitesimally smaller sample.
ppmv in dry air is used instead of ppm by weight (wet or dry), simply because every (ideal) gas has the same volume and the same number of molecules for the same amount of moles in the mix: one mole (~32 g) of oxygen has the same volume as one mole (~28 g) of nitrogen,… This makes calculations of mixing ratios easier, no matter the sample size.
Why “dry”? Because water shows an enormous gradient from ground level up to high in the sky, the same volume of CO2 (compared to the O2/N2 level) would go up with height as the water vapor content drops. This is completely artificial, as the ratio between CO2 and O2/N2 doesn’t change with height… “””
OK so I’ll bite. I grab a one litre flask of air at some height and place. Of course none of those gases present are ideal gases; but not to worry, I’m sure we can get the right ppmvs within a factor of 3:1 which is good enough for climate models. Well of course this was real earth air I grabbed so despite the inconvenience it does have water vapor in it. I still have a single volume of this non-ideal gas mixture; and it doesn’t show any immediate signs of settling out into layers with the heaviest species at the bottom.
I’m sure there’s a way to look at it and know how much of each spevcies is in there by volume of course. Counting heads would do it; but that would be abundance by molecular species instead of volume.
I still say it is much easier to specify the relative numbers of molecules of each species present; and then that doesn’t matter whether the gases are ideal or not, or if there is water present.
Those MMGWCC folks are really determined to eliminate water from consideration in climate effects aren’t they.
Well when the models include water in its correct vapor, liquid and solid phases present at any time; I’ll start to pay some attention to what the climate models tell us happened years ago; even though we know from observations what that was.
Notice in that July snapshot above that places that have a lot of ice and snow; such as Antarctica, Greenland, and the Himalaya ranges show a lot of low carbon blue.
Sort of gives you the idea that the original moisture in the air, that created those ice and snow fields in the first place dissolved a lot of CO2 (which is more soluble in colder water) and whisked it out of the air, upon precipitation.
But that explanation can’t be right because it assumes wet air instead of the dry air that climatology deals with.
George
Ohioholic (13:50:52):
One thing I notice looking at that graph is that flooded areas and CO2 have a better correlation than delta temp.
Yes, the correlation is better and it is due to an increase in the release of CO2 from oceans as the oceans get warmer and reversed.
Another is that the time series is severely skewed. I wish that the periods were a little more even, but point taken, nonetheless.
I’d like it also; however, I marked the periods on the graph considering the beginning and the end of each era. Anyway, I take your suggestion into consideration, so I’ll try to scheme more even periods.
Also, the flooded areas is at an all time low.
Indeed, the trend of the Earth’s temperature is towards cooling. Each time, Earth gets colder and colder. By no means had we thought about a warming similar to the Paleocene warmhouse, not even to the warming of the early Pleistocene. With permission of Leif Svalgaard: The cooling trend of Earth is obvious.
Julie L (15:30:23),
Thank you for your link to the story on Freeman Dyson. I just finished it, and it was great! What an amazing guy.
“But that doesn’t change the fact that over the past 50 years there was no net addition of nature to the atmospheric CO2 mass and all of the CO2 increase (except some 6 ppmv from ocean warming LIA-current) was caused by the emissions…”
This statement contradicts itself.
“In reality, these are averages and there is a year by year variability in sink capacity of +/- 2 GtC, mainly as result of temperature changes (see the link in the previous message).”
If there is a range of 50% in the variability, how do you have confidence in the fixed figure?
Ferdinand Engelbeen (13:40:29),
I respect your view, and I posted Beck’s site, as I have before, because it’s interesting. As I’ve said previously, I’m not endorsing it, but IMHO it is as valid as Keeling’s single point data source.
It should be kept in mind that many of the readings that Beck reports were taken aboard ships during ocean crossings, and on remote, windswept coastlines away from civilization. Keeling’s data is taken at high altitude, on the side of a volcano. How do we know that Keeling’s data is not an artifact of the local ocean and the prevailing trade winds?
When satellite CO2 data becomes available, the question should be answered. In the interim, the planet continues to cool no matter what CO2 is doing.
James P (15:36:46) :
So, by your own admission, the natural sources and sinks are not known, but you are assuming they remain constant!
Simple arithmetic indeed…
I hope I made it clear that I don’t assume that the natural sources and sinks are constant, but that the absolute flows are not important at all, because we know the difference between the sources and sinks, as that can be calculated from two known variables: emissions and increase in the atmosphere. That shows that in the past 50 years, nature had no contribution to CO2 levels (except for a small increase due to a temperature increase)…
Re: Roger Sowell (12:08:21) :
“The concept of cutting tropical forests down and having them “replaced with mud and the occasional oil palm” is a bunch of bull-****. It is dang near impossible to keep a bare patch of ground bare wherever there is warmth, sun, and rain. Ask any farmer”‘
..Yes Roger, of course you get regrowth, incredibly vigoruously in the tropics. But it still takes time, and the return of full tree cover is supressed by farming practices, eg. in farming oil palms. My suggestion was simply that this progressive reduction in full, mature, natural vegetative cover might cause part of the above CO2 signal.
“City-boys, these AGW scientists. Somebody ought to take them on a field trip to a farm. Ask them to find and photograph the bare dirt areas”
..Maybe in your back yard. But out here the wheat paddocks that replaced the evergreen eucalypt forest are bare dirt for seven months of the year, as there is negligible rainfall between October and April and the grounwater is mostly saline. (I don’t know, you city boys!)
DJ
from the abstract at the link you provided at (15:43:51) :
“All of these changes characterize a carbon cycle that is generating stronger-than-expected and sooner-than-expected climate forcing.”
Which climate forcings would those be? The ones increasing the Antarctic ice? The ones making the winters colder and setting record low temperatures? The ones that are decreasing the (controversial) global temperatures since 1998? The ones causing the sea levels stabilize or decrease? The ones making the sea surface temperatures decrease?
Have you got anything that shows a forcing? From factual, measured information, not some computer-generated predictions?
Seriously. This non-peer-reviewer, just-a-blog-commenter would like to know. I am fighting my very hardest to repeal California’s Global Warming Solutions Act of 2006 (aka AB 32) and if I am fighting the wrong battle, then it is high time I found that out…
Jerry, “Who is Tom Quirk?”
Here’s a more complete bio. He’s a bright guy – he was once my Physics tutor. He was a particle physicist in those days. But I think this is a new field for him.
Harold Pierce Jr (15:38:51) :
Thanks for the explanation,
In ground based stations where CO2 is measured, water vapor is trapped in a cold trap at -70°C, reducing water vapor over ice to very low values. In other circumstances, water vapor is measured at another IR frequency band than CO2 and CO2 values are corrected for the water vapor present.
In all cases, CO2 levels are reported for “dry air”, to make CO2 level comparison possible between different places…
DJ (15:43:51) : wrote
Here is a recent paper on atmospheric CO2 budgets which appeared in the PNAS – perhaps the leading scientific journal – http://www.pnas.org/content/104/47/18866.abstract . It is just one of very many recent papers.
The lack of a response by a sceptic in two years tells you that there is NO sceptic capable of refuting this and similar analyses. Instead they hide outside of the reach of peer review on blogs and E&E.
——————————
“All of these changes characterize a carbon cycle that is generating stronger-than-expected and sooner-than-expected climate forcing.”
….. is the conclusory sentence of the abstract. I’ll read the full paper tomorrow, when I have more time, but I think that Mother Nature has already refuted that last sentence.
Incidentally, I have 13 papers in PNAS, and I never considered it to be THE leading scientific journal.
Off topic, I know I’m guilty and apologize in advance but has anyone even added up the extra ppb molecules of co2 that has been building up in the atmosphere the last 50 or 60 years? The math is beyond me as well as volume of atmosphere. Does the extra amount come close to or exceed the amount generate by fossil fuel emissions? I will probably ask this question again since its so late in the thread. I doubt anyone is still reading this one. )
“That shows that in the past 50 years, nature had no contribution to CO2 levels (except for a small increase due to a temperature increase)…”
X – Y does not = increase – emissions? Hmmmmmmm, interesting math. Of course, this simple equation is now falsified, so where is it’s replacement?
Ohioholic (16:53:27) :
“But that doesn’t change the fact that over the past 50 years there was no net addition of nature to the atmospheric CO2 mass and all of the CO2 increase (except some 6 ppmv from ocean warming LIA-current) was caused by the emissions…”
This statement contradicts itself.
“In reality, these are averages and there is a year by year variability in sink capacity of +/- 2 GtC, mainly as result of temperature changes (see the link in the previous message).”
If there is a range of 50% in the variability, how do you have confidence in the fixed figure?
The 6 ppmv from increased temperature is over the past few hundred years, but the real increase is about 100 ppmv in the past 160 years. Thus temperature is not the cause of the increase…
The -4 GtC in the example is not a fixed figure, it is the average of the past few years.
The +/- 2 GtC is around the trend, which is nowadays increasing with about 4 GtC/year. Thus the measured increase in the atmosphere is 2-6 GtC/yr, while the emissions are 8 GtC/yr. Thus the natural sink capacity varies between 6-2 GtC/yr, the difference between the relative stable increasing emissions and the variability of the increase. Or simply look at the emissions, increase in the atmosphere and calculated sink capacity in the graph of the past 50 years:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em.jpg
(2.1 GtC = 1 ppmv in the graph)
Howarteh (17:38:35):
Off topic, I know I’m guilty and apologize in advance but has anyone even added up the extra ppb molecules of co2 that has been building up in the atmosphere the last 50 or 60 years? The math is beyond me as well as volume of atmosphere. Does the extra amount come close to or exceed the amount generate by fossil fuel emissions? I will probably ask this question again since its so late in the thread. I doubt anyone is still reading this one.
Well… I’ve read your post. The current mass per m^3 of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is 0.00063 Kg/m^3. It is supposed that it was 0.00045 Kg/m^3 some 200 years ago. However, chemical analysis show it has been fluctuating between 0.00063 Kg/m^3 and 0.00069 Kg/m^3, with or without fossil fuels. I don’t know the other figures you’re asking for; however, if you give me a real specific data on how much ppmV from the current 380 ppmV of CO2 were produced by “fossil” fuel burning, I could give you a specific answer.
Study of hemispheric CO2 timing suggests that annual increases may be coming from a global or equatorial source
I too, seem to be generating carbon around my equator!
“The estimates of CO2 emissions are based on the sales of the different fossil fuels”
So, you have two unknowns and an estimate based on an assumption. Why would you expect the result to differ from the assumption?
Howardteh “Does the extra amount come close to or exceed the amount generate by fossil fuel emissions? “
We’ve burnt about 321 Gigatons carbon since 1751. The atmosphere weighs about 5148000 Gt; an addition of 100 ppmv CO2, which is a bit less the rise we’ve seen, implies an extra 213 Gt carbon in the air. That’s about 66% of what we’ve burnt.
Half of these emissions have occurred since the mid 1970s.
Dear Ferdinand,
I cannot resist but question your conclusions . . please have a look at some points I made:
– the dC13 ratio before 1850 are meaningless (don’t tell you anything about the CO2-concentration or its change)
– conservation of mass is not the issue here since all anthropogenic CO2 would disapear in the noice of the marine CO2-content
– “the biosphere is removing about half of the total amount removed” ?? There is no “total amount removed”, CO2 is on the raise
– “ the biosphere and the oceans are net sinks for CO2 and can’t be the cause of the CO2 increase of the atmosphere” Why not? Has to be shown! How about: Oceans dump additional CO2 regardless of the source on short time-scales until they are in near-equilibrium with the atmosphere, which they could be right now – the current level and the raise to it could be produced by the oceans and Toms paper supports that. (The fact, that the oceans turn into a net sink for CO2 if you add a source does not prove, that the current level is due that additional source – in a bucket the water level is determined by the rim, not an additional influx)
– “leading to the conclusion that the ENSO events are the dominant cause of the d13C decrease (which is impossible, as the oceans are positive contributors to d13C)” aeh well this one I perhaps didn’t understand correctly . . I thought that proves that during ENSO events less CO2 is absorbed by the oceans and thus the d13 in the atmosphere decreases
– “But a continuous addition, as is happening with CO2 in the NH, takes indefinitely to mix into the SH. That is the case as well as for absolute CO2 levels as for d13C levels.” Well, this is the strongest prove of Toms point! The depletion of C13 should be a monotonic raising function according to your theorie, but it has hickups, which means, there are other net sources of CO2 at least sometimes
– In http://www.ferdinand engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/ d13c_trends.jpg and the explanation for it, you seem to explain not a trend or variation, but compare the absolute C-ratios. Why isn’t a correlation (= time stamping the signature at different places) of the trend’s variation a valid way to find the lag? Seems good to me, there is an event, which affects the signal and I look when it shows up at different places -> lag time is found
I hope the points are clear, please ask me to elaborate if neccessary
__
Best regards,
LoN