Steve Fitzpatrick writes in with a short essay:
On May 11 you reposted a blog from Dr. Roy Spencer, where he suggests that much of the increase in atmospheric CO2 could be due to warming of the oceans, and where he presents a few graphs that he claims are consistent with ocean surface temperature change contributing more than 80% of the measure increase in CO2 since 1958. Dr. Spencer’s suggestion is contradicted by many published studies of absorption of CO2 by the ocean, with some studies dating from the early 1960’s, long before “global warming” was a political issue. In this post I offer a simple model that shows why net absorption of CO2 by the ocean is most likely the main ocean effect.
If the rise in CO2 is being driven by human emissions, then the year-on-year increase in atmospheric CO2 ought to be a function of the rate of release of CO2, less any increase in the rate of removal of CO2 by increased plant growth and by absorption and chemical neutralization of CO2 by the ocean. Both ocean absorption and plant growth rates should increase with increased CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. To simplify things, I focus here only on ocean absorption.
On the other hand, surface temperature changes ought to have a relatively rapid effect, because the surface of the ocean is in contact with the atmosphere and so can quickly absorb or desorb CO2 as the water temperature changes. In fact, the ocean surface continuously absorbs CO2 where the temperature is falling, mostly at high latitudes, and emits CO2 where the water is warming, mostly at lower latitudes. Cold upwelling water from the deep ocean warms at the surface and desorbs CO2, while very cold water at high latitudes absorbs CO2 before it falls to the deep ocean. An increase in average ocean surface temperature will cause more CO2 to be emitted from surface water, but this effect is limited to a very small volume fraction of the ocean. Effects due to rapid temperature changes (annual time scale and less) are limited to a relatively thin layer, while the gradual absorption/neutralization process takes place at a rate controlled by ocean circulation and replacement of the surface water with upwelling (and “very old”) deep ocean water.
Any change in sea surface temperature should add to or subtract from the atmosphere’s CO2.
Annual change = (Annual emissions) – K1 * (CO2 – 285) + K2 * (delta SST)
Where “CO2” is the atmospheric concentration, K1 is a unitless “ocean uptake constant”, and K2 is a sea surface absorption/temperature constant, with units of PPM per decree C. Delta SST is the year-on-year change in average sea surface temperature. K1 is related to how quickly surface water is replaced by deeper water, and it should be a relatively small number, since ocean circulation and mixing are slow. K2 should be a relatively large number, since surface water temperature changes are relatively fast and we know that there is a strong short-term correlation between the rate of change of CO2 concentration and SST changes.
The model performs an iterative calculation (a step-wise approximation of integration) of the evolution of CO2 in the atmosphere. Each year a change in CO2 is calculated using the above equation, that change is added to the atmospheric CO2 concentration from the previous year, and the process is then repeated. The calculation starts with 1959, using a starting CO2 concentration of 315 (the value from Mauna Loa in 1958).
Measured CO2 values and measured year-on-year changes are from Mauna Loa. Average SST’s are from GISS. CO2 emissions, expressed as PPM potential increase in CO2 in the atmosphere, are based on worldwide carbon emissions (according to CDIAC at Oak Ridge) converted to an equivalent weight of CO2, divided by an assumed atmosphere weight of 5.3 X 10^9 million tons. This result was scaled by a constant factor of 0.7232, which is 28.96/44 = 0.6582 (to convert weight fraction CO2 to volume fraction), multiplied by 1.099 to match up with the range of CO2 emissions that Dr. Spencer used in his May 11 blog post. Note that nobody really knows the total carbon emissions, so different sources offer different estimates of total emissions. The final two years of CO2 emissions I had to estimate beacause the CDIAC data ended in 2006. I assumed an equilibrium ocean CO2 level of 285 PPM. I optimized K1 and K2 by hand so that the model had a reasonable fit with the data; the values were 0.0215 for K1 and 5.0 for K2. So the model equation is:
Annual change = (Annual emissions) – 0.0215 * (CO2 – 285) + 5.0 * (delta SST)
The graph titled “Annual Increase in CO2” compares the measured and calculated year-on-year changes along with the potential increase from fossil fuels.
The graph titled “Correlation: Model Increase vs. Mauna Loa Increase” shows that the model does a decent job of capturing the year-on-year temperature driven change in atmospheric CO2.
I suspect that if the model used monthly data and the 6-month lag between SST changes and CO2 changes that Dr. Spencer used, then the model fit would be better.
The graph titled “Measured CO2 versus Ocean Uptake Model” shows the final result of the calculation.
The evolution of CO2 in the atmosphere calculated by the model between 1958 and 2008 is reasonably close to the Mauna Loa record. The model suggests that about 2.15 PPM equivalent of emitted CO2 is currently being absorbed, or about half the total emissions.
My only objective is to show that the CO2 released by human activities, combined with slow ocean absorption/neutralization and sea surface temperature variation, is broadly consistent with the measured historical trend in atmospheric CO2, including the effect of changing average SST on short term variation in the rate of CO2 increase. Temperature changes in ocean surface waters cause shifts of a few PPM up and down in the rate of increase, but surface temperature changes do not explain 80% to 90% of the increase in atmospheric CO2 since 1958, as suggested in Dr. Spencer’s May 11 post. Because of its relatively high pH, high buffering capacity, enormous mass, and slow circulation, the ocean is, and will be for a very long time, a significant net sink for atmospheric CO2.
With a bit of luck, continuing flat-to-falling average surface temperatures and ocean heat content will discredit the model predictions before too much economic damage is done.
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JamesG –
The author has assumed that rising ocean temperatures have the effect of releasing CO2 – no one disagrees with this and he in fact does make that assumption (it’s his K2 parameter).
The author has further assumed that if there is a break in equilibrium (ocean and atmospheric concentrations are not matched correcting for the rest of the physics) then there will be a net transfer one way or the other. This is his K1 parameter.
These seem like infinitely reasonable assumptions to me. If there is another effect he should have included, please mention it. This is only a model, after all. The difference between what this author has published and the vast climate community is that they take their models MUCH more seriously than the author at least seems to.
Assuming the model has SOME validity, the fit itself would have resulted in the correct signs for his constants and rough order-of-magnitude correctness. If the model has no validity, neither the signs nor the magnitude have any meaning.
I agree with you and others that I’d like to see more than a little bit more transparency in the calculation, however. What are the assumptions that go into “(Annual Emissions)” for instance. If THAT were broken up between “natural” and human emissions (which would then also require uptake mechanisms on both land and sea to be specifically modeled) then I think this would be something more than just an interesting exercise. But, to be completely fair, he has placed essentially the same level of sophistication in his model as the Spencer model he’s responding to.
OT
Notice anything odd about the sudden downturn in melt rate? When compared to Cryosphere graphs I don’t see it. Plus the pictorial graphic has odd looking dark gray slices in it on the nsidc site that are not consistent with Crysophere.
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/daily.html
Frank (04:47:36) and Alberto (05:13:48)
Of course plankton consume CO2, just like land plants. The increase in CO2 uptake by land plants is documented, I am not familiar with the effect of increases dissolved CO2 on the rate of plankton uptake; it could be that the rate also increases. However independent of plant effects, there is a large (and well documented) physio-chemical absorption of CO2 by the ocean that is driven by the large temperature changes between tropics and high latitudes. I purposely ignored the plant effects to simply the analysis, but a more complete analysis would have to take these into account.
The point of the post was not to show a perfect model, but to note that the measured change in atmospheric concentration of CO2 is consistent with addition of CO2 from human activities combined with a partial removal of this extra CO2 at a rate that is proportional to the increase in atmospheric concentration, combined with a sea surface temperature driven variation. It does not matter if the slow removal is by physio-chemical absorption by the ocean or by plant absorption or both. So long as the total increase in removal rate is approximately proportional to the increase in CO2, then the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere ought to evolve roughly as the model shows; which is also how the measured concentration has evolved.
James G has summed up a lot of my ideas on the flaws in this model, but I would just like to point out that the grahhs presented here illustrate how well you can ‘tune’ a model. The correlation between observed and and model predicted CO2 levels are excellent – because that is how the model was built.
What this illustrates is – in my opinion – not a scientific argument but a legal one. In a scientific argument a theory (or model) is developed in such a way that it can be falsified – that is tested to see if it holds up. In a legal approach, evidence is selected/presented in such a way as to support a theory (or model).
This is a fundamental issue with today’s society that goes beyond AGW, but is most tellingly illustrated by it.
An economist who uses data to build their model is accused of ‘data-mining’ and will have trouble getting papers published on the basis that the assumptions which have to be bult in to make the model fit the data are made with a exisiting knowledge of the desired outcome. This may sound counter-intuitive (and sounded plain silly to me when I first came across it), but given that there are no experimental data (only observations), it makes sense since there is no other way of falsifying your model.
The CO2/climate change debate is the perfect eample of why this matters – you start by saying that CO2 drives global temperature and then collect supporting evidence and build models with this in-built assumption. No falsification is possible in this process.
I’m not the first to point this out – heck people all over the place have been pointing out that this isn’t science for years now, but models such as the one presented here still seem to fall into this trap. Devloping a model which shows great correlation to poorly understood data just shows your skill in model tuning and reveals no underlying scientific causation.
This does not mean it has no value, but its value lies in whether it can be used to predict future CO2 levels – in the same way that weather forecasting uses models of past meteological data to forecast weather patterns. However, weather forecasters has a long history of success (or failure) to point to in validation of their models. Come back in, say, 10 years and see if your predicted values still match observations. Then it may be accepted as a useful model for predicting future CO2 levels, but even then it may not get us closer to knowing how CO2 and temperature are linked.
Is coal the number one enemy?
In tonight’s film we have an interview with the eminent Nasa climate scientist Dr James Hansen.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/ethicalman/2009/05/is_coal_the_number_one_enemy.html
Wondering Aloud (06:17:37) :
‘Don’t forget Dr. Spencers purpose was to show that a simpler model fit the data as well or better than the popular one. He did just that, I didn’t see him claiming that this was all there was to it. His model does fit the paleo record and fits the current data as well or better than any of the popular AGW models.’
If you take a look at Dr. Spencer’s curves, you will see that there large differences between the hind-cast and measured CO2 concentration for 1958 to the present. The simple model I presented hind-casts the measured concentration reasonably well (no big differences in the shape of the curves), and also does a fair job of hind-casting the annual (temperature driven) variation in the year-on-year increases. In other words, the model I presented is a much better fit to the Mauna Loa data.
I have also been following the jet stream. It would not be a reason for these odd slices in the nsidc picture. Neither would the Arctic temps. Arctic current temps also have not changed much. There is no reason I can see for the increased melt rate. This could be satellite issues again.
http://squall.sfsu.edu/gif/jetstream_norhem_00.gif
Why is it that people rarely discuss CO2 uptake by whatever biochemical pathway it is that lays down limestone? It seems that there has been much more CaCO3 laid down through geologic time than coal and petroleum.
I wish what you say were true, however, I believe that we are headed down a bad road and there is no way this bus is going to turn around. At the moment, the Dem’s are hell bent on passing “Climate Legislation” at all costs. They are well on their way to fast tracking this suicidal bill, and I see nothing stopping it. “We The People” can scream all we want, but our politicians don’t give a rats ass what we say or think. I am sorry to sound so pessimistic, but I am becoming very scared at this point.
There is much more to this than simple CO2 pumping and vegetation use to match up the curves. The quadrillions of tons of limestone represent fixing of not an insignificant amount of the CO2 that dissolves in the ocean and settles to the bottom, and the points of
JamesG (05:18:37) :
on the greater importance of vegetation CO2 demand (I like his doable experiment with deserts) than is accorded by IPCC makes the curve fit of the model highly artifactual. Isn’t there a bit of tautology in the derivation of the model – using results to generate the equation?
Hank (06:57:10) :
“Why is it that people rarely discuss CO2 uptake by whatever biochemical pathway it is that lays down limestone? It seems that there has been much more CaCO3 laid down through geologic time than coal and petroleum.”
Egad Hank! You slipped your post in while I was awaitng moderation!!
I am not a fluids chemist, but I read some time ago that decreased ocean CO2 uptake due to rising SSTs since 1800 would only account for 7 ppm of the increase in atmospheric concentration. In considering ocean uptake, and the rate of ocean uptake we also have to account for partial pressures, and, as noted by some above, ocean biota. I have recently read of another biota phenomenon discovered in the mid Atlantic that takes up CO2 and produces carbonates at a rate that surprised the researchers, but I didn’t keep the url. Because the IPCC had to assume very slow mixing between surface and deep ocean, in order to get their long CO2 half life in the atmosphere, I did some digging about 3 years ago, with what I think are very interesting results. Anthony, how would I send you this info so you can decide whether or not to post it? It’s 3 pages or so long, so I don’t want to just add it here. Murray
Rainwater has the ability to wash CO2 out of the atmosphere, and may be an important mechanism in the ocean – atmosphere exchange.
From a global water balance, I found an estimate of total global rainfall that came to about 100,000 Gt/yr (as H2O) over land, and 400,000 Gt/Yr over the oceans. CO2 is fairly soluble in water, and the colder the water, the more CO2 it can hold. The CO2 in ‘natural’ rainwater lowers the pH from neutral 7 to around 5.7. Since the observed pH of rainwater is similar to calculated pH at CO2 saturation, that suggests that rainwater, if not saturated with CO2, is fairly close to holding as much as it can. At saturation, the dissolved CO2 in water would be 0.23 g CO2/100g water at 10 deg C, at 15 deg C dissolved CO2 is 0.20 g/100g and at 20 deg C the dissolved CO2 would be 0.18 g/100g.
Global average air temperature is around 15 deg C, but that varies widely over the planet, and of course the temperature of rainwater in the top of a cloud may not be the same as an average ground temperature. Just to get a rough idea of the magnitude of CO2 in rainwater, I did a couple calculations using the CO2 solubility at 20 deg C (warmer, holds less CO2) and at 10 deg C (colder, holds more CO2). Rainfall over land calculates as 49 to 68 Gt CO2/yr (as Carbon so we can compare to the atmospheric CO2 estimates). And for the ocean rainfall, it comes to 183 Gt/yr to 252 Gt/yr (as carbon). The land rainfall could end up ‘stored’ in a river or lake, go into the soil or plants, or could splat on a parking lot and re-release the CO2 to the air when the water evaporates. My guess is the ocean rainfall could most likely be incorporated into the ocean and the CO2 with it (there is way more CO2 dissolved in the oceans than ‘free’ in the atmosphere).
So how much is that compared to CO2 estimates in the atmosphere? For CO2 in the atmosphere (around 380 ppm at the time I did the calculation) it was estimated that the atmosphere contained about 750 Gt (Gt =gigatons, CO2 expressed as equivalent amount of Carbon). The amount of CO2 that is cycled into and back out of the atmosphere is estimated to be on the order of 150 to 220 Gt per year due to a variety of natural (volcanism, forest fires, vegetation decay, ocean offgassing, etc) and man-made (burning organic fuels, etc) sources. The man-made CO2 totals come to about 6-8 Gt (as carbon) each year, which is only about 3 to 5% of the total emitted CO2. Atmospheric CO2 is also removed via plant growth, absorption into the oceans, etc. The net increase in atmospheric CO2 appears to be around 1.5 ppm per year, which is about 3 Gt/yr (as carbon).
Note that these estimated rainfall CO2 values are about the same size as the total carbon cycle estimates of 150 to 220 Gt per year. This does not necessarily mean that the estimates (theirs or mine) are incorrect.The rainfall CO2 may show up in other parts of the global estimates such as an overlap of the land rainfall CO2 ending up in the plant growth CO2 estimates. Similarly we know that as ocean water warms, it releases CO2, and since we don’t have very good measurements of that released CO2, it could be that rainfall is just returning some of that unmeasured CO2 to the ocean for a ‘net’ value much lower than my calculation. And of course, my estimates include assumptions about CO2 saturation in rain water, and about the temperature of rain water. Snow or other frozen forms of precipitation may not hold much, if any CO2. Still, even if my estimates are 10 times too high, there is potentially still a lot of CO2 in rain water.
The trick may not be ‘removal of CO2 from the atmosphere’, but whether it is captured in some way vs recycled back into the atmosphere.
We do know that only half of our emissions are ending up in semi-permanently in the atmosphere.
Actually, its roughly between 30% (when it is colder) and 70% (when it is warmer).
Either the oceans, vegetation or soils are absorbing the difference or some combination of all three are.
Dr. Roy Spencer presents the ocean evidence and …
bill presents some nice charts showing high latitude NH vegetation/phytoplankton/soils are contributing in some manner.
The satellite data doesn’t really help since its evidence doesn’t have much of a logical pattern.
So let’s nail this down since the pro-AGW scientists seem to want to ignore this issue.
“Annual change = (Annual emissions) – K1 * (CO2 – 285) + K2 * (delta SST)”
Where does the 285 come from? Ice cores?
The lowest value in the Mauna Loa data set is ~315. Plant Stomatal Index (SI) studies suggest that the ice core CO2 data are wrong. The SI data show that Holocene warm periods routinely experienced 330ppm to more than 360ppm CO2…
Wagner et. al. present an atmospheric CO2 reconstruction from SI data showing a rapid increase of atmospheric CO2 from ~260ppm to >340ppm from about 9,930 BP to about 9,685 BP and then a rapid drop inc CO2 from ~340ppm to ~300 ppm three centuries later.
All of these sharp and fast variations of CO2 concentrations occurred without an ounce of fossil fuel being burned…Apart from a few campfires. There aren’t a whole lot of reasonable explanations other than changes in oceanic uptake caused by temperature changes.
Plant SI data can be empirically demonstrated to be quantitative accurate…The ice core data cannot be empirically tested for quantitative accuracy.
JamesG (05:18:37)
Wow, hard to know where to start.
It is clear that changes in ocean temperature cause net changes in atmospheric CO2, and I do not dispute that. It is also clear that the ocean surface has warmed (slightly) since 1958, but the vast majority (the deep ocean) has not changed much in temperature. The sinking of cold (and CO2 rich) water at high latitudes requires the surface temperature fall enough that the water is slightly more dense that water that lies below, generating deep convection. So the deep ocean only receives an influx of very cold water, and does not respond much to surface warming. The circulation is very slow, and water that up-wells at low latitudes sank at high latitudes centuries ago. This water warms and releases CO2, of course, but the quantity released for any specific increase in temperature depends on the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere when that water was last in contact with the air… which was centuries ago. The relatively small increase in ocean surface temperatures (less than a degree over the last century) is not sufficient to cause that much extra CO2 to be released (I mean, you can get some deep ocean water, warm it up, and see how much CO2 comes out as a function of temperature!). Finally, were the rate in rise of atmospheric CO2 caused mainly by an increase in ocean temperature, then the rising ocean temperatures between 1900 and 1944 (about 0.29C) should have caused a large increase in atmospheric CO2 than was observed, comparable to the increase in CO2 measured between 1958 and present, which had a ocean temperature increase of about 0.36C.
With regard to assumptions, please see my comment to Frank and Alberto (I only sent the English reply, perhaps one of them would translate my reply to Spanish).
With regard to local variation in CO2 concentration, there can be some local variation for sure (the air in a growing corn field is lower in CO2 than at Mauna Loa, air down-wind of metropolitan areas will be higher in CO2 than Mauna Loa). The increases in CO2 at Mauna Loa are almost perfectly tracked by measured increases at the south pole, although with a slight off-set (about 5 PPM, I remember). The annual northern hemisphere oscillation (mostly from summer plant growth in the northern hemisphere, but probably with some other seasonal effects) is almost completely absent in CO2 measurements taken at high latitudes in the southern hemisphere.
Just for the record, I think that global warming predictions are grossly exaggerated by climate models, and I am quite certain they will ultimately be refuted by data, since they grow ever further from the data. But I also think that the data linking atmospheric increases in CO2 (and fluorocarbons, and methane, and ozone) to human activities is very clear.
Somewhat OT…
HadCRUT’s number for April is finally in:
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcrut3/diagnostics/global/nh+sh/monthly
It is up, slightly, over March. But not enough to matter. Basically, the “trend” is flat right now, and down from 2-3 years ago. No indication yet, of a resumed warming trend.
@Steve Fitzpatrick,
I just relaized my post sounded like crticism of your work. I didn’t mean it that way. My point was that maybe the “285” in the equation should be a bit higher.
JamesG (05:18:37) :
‘on the greater importance of vegetation CO2 demand (I like his doable experiment with deserts) than is accorded by IPCC makes the curve fit of the model highly artifactual. Isn’t there a bit of tautology in the derivation of the model – using results to generate the equation?’
With regard to ‘a bit of tautology’: Perhaps, but certainly no more than in Dr. Spencer’s original post. The question is, are Dr. Spencer’s hindcast curves close to the measured CO2 record? I think a fair answer is no. I developed the model only to show that a very simple absorption plus temperature model would track the measured CO2 pretty well, certainly much better than Dr. Spencer’s temperature-only model, and account for the short term variation just as well.
The curve fit may be less ‘artifactual’ than it might at first seem. Any increase in CO2 uptake that is proportional to the increase in CO2 above the starting point would generate pretty much the same curve (and match the historical record reasonably well). The increase in uptake could be dominated by by faster growth of plants, by increased dissolution/neutralization by the ocean, or a combination; it won’t change the final curve much. Both increased absorption/neutralization and increased plant growth rate ought to be almost linear with respect to increased CO2, at least over a modest range of CO2 increase.
JamesG (05:18:37) :
Thanks for the link on the Nevada facility
http://www.unlv.edu/Climate_Change_Research/NDFF/co2_treatment.htm
It is remarkable
1) that they do not give the data in the standard Keeling curve.
2) that the meaning is hidden between fumigations , what are fumigations?
And no data after 2007.
here is the south pole CO2 http://cdiac.esd.ornl.gov/trends/co2/graphics/South_Pole_CO2.jpg
Have a look at Beck’s page :
http://www.biokurs.de/treibhaus/180CO2_supp.htm
in contrast
Steve wrote:
[An increase in average ocean surface temperature will cause more CO2 to be emitted from surface water…]
Steve, this basis for your argument is flawed because the relationship describing the solubility of CO2 in water versus temperature is exponential, not linear.
http://jcbmac.chem.brown.edu/myl/hen/CO2Water.gif
For this reason a, say, 2 degree change of SST in low-latitude warm waters does not represent the same change in solubility as a 2 degree change in SST in high-latitude cold waters. It is quite possible for the average global SST to remain constant over time, while the absorption/desorption of CO2 from the ocean changes dramatically due to temperature-driven changes in solubility. The correlations you have described are merely coincidence, because the mechanism you have described is incorrect, or incomplete.
A better way to approach this would be to use gridded SST data to calculate the solubility change for those specific temperatures in each grid cell over time, and then averaged globally, and compare that to atmospheric CO2. That would be interesting.
You also wrote:
[With a bit of luck, continuing flat-to-falling average surface temperatures and ocean heat content will discredit the model predictions before too much economic damage is done.]
I assume here you are referring to the economic damage Obama and the Democrat-controlled congress intend to inflict upon America with cap-and-trade, and I whole-heartedly agree. A cooling climate will be the best way of eliminating this foolish AGW nonsense.
RobP (06:48:14) :
‘Come back in, say, 10 years and see if your predicted values still match observations. Then it may be accepted as a useful model for predicting future CO2 levels, but even then it may not get us closer to knowing how CO2 and temperature are linked.’
If I am lucky enough to be around in 10 years, I will do just that!
But please note that I was not trying to make a perfect prediction, I was only trying to point out that a temperature-only driven increase in atmospheric CO2 (as proposed by Dr. Spencer on May 11) is not at all consistent with the 1958 to 2008 record, while a rather simple model (where CO2 emissions and concentration dependent uptake are primarily responsible) is more consistent with the record, and also explains just a well the temperature driven variation in CO2 increase that Dr. Spencer noted. The test of any model (my very simple model or complex climate models) is how well they predict the future, not how well they predict the past, since hind-casts can always be optimized by ‘curve-fitting’. My great frustration with climate modelers is how they ALWAYS argue that we can never have a legitimate test of the model, saying something like: “It would take 100 years, and by then it will be too late, since the ocean will have flooded New York and Washington!”. This kind of non-sense from the modelers ought to bring loud laughter all around, not new laws limiting carbon releases.
Dave Middleton (07:55:17) :
@Steve Fitzpatrick,
I just relaized my post sounded like crticism of your work. I didn’t mean it that way. My point was that maybe the “285″ in the equation should be a bit higher.
What are your thoughts on Spencer’s assumption of equilibrium between ocean and atmosphere for CO2 at an SST anomaly of -0.2ºC?
Pamela Gray (06:41:30) & Pamela Gray (06:57:00)
Yes, looks like NSIDC is having issues with the satellite data feed again. Or rather, more severe issues of late than normal. At least in the imagery they’re carrying for the Arctic (so far); the Antarctic seems to be bearing up so far. Contrast their image with the latest from IARC-JAXA:
http://www.ijis.iarc.uaf.edu/cgi-bin/seaice-monitor.cgi?lang=e
A bit OT but related to CO2 policy related to perceived changes in CO2 in the atmosphere: If CO2 sequestration underground for fossil fuel electrical plants becomes a worldwide solution, I think it reasonable to predict that given the enormous volumes involved, there would be growing potential for horrendous accidents of a breach, or even a more modest leak that could fill up a valley and suffocate all non plant residents of the valley. It could also push out formation brines, natural gas, hydrogen sulphide and petroleum.