Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
I’m a long-time ocean devotee. I’ve spent a good chunk of my life on and under the ocean as a commercial and sport fisherman, a surfer, a blue-water sailor, and a commercial and sport diver. So I’m concerned that the new poster-boy of alarmism these days is sea-water “acidification” from CO2 dissolving into the ocean. Heck, even the name “acidification” is alarmist, because sea water is not acid, nor will it every be. What we are seeing is a slight reduction in how alkaline the sea water is.
There is a recent and interesting study in GRL by Byrne et al., entitled “Direct observations of basin-wide acidification of the North Pacific Ocean“. This study reports on the change in ocean alkalinity over a 15 year period (1991-2006) along a transect of the North Pacific from Hawaii to Alaska. (A “transect” is a path along which one measures some variable or variables.) Here is the path of the transect:
Figure 1. Path (transect) used for the measurement of the change in oceanic alkalinity.
I love researching climate, because there’s always so much to learn. Here’s what I learned from the Byrne et al. paper.
The first thing that I learned is that when you go from the tropics (Hawaii) to the North Pacific (Alaska), the water becomes less and less alkaline. Who knew? So even without any CO2, if you want to experience “acidification” of the ocean water, just go from Hawaii to Alaska … you didn’t notice the change from the “acidification”? You didn’t have your toenails dissolved by the increased acidity?
Well, the sea creatures didn’t notice either. They flourish in both the more alkaline Hawaiian waters and the less alkaline Alaskan waters. So let’s take a look at how large the change is along the transect.
Changes in alkalinity/acidity are measured in units called “pH”. A neutral solution has a pH of 7.0. Above a pH of 7.0, the solution is alkaline. A solution with a pH less than 7.0 is acidic. pH is a logarithmic scale, so a solution with a pH of 9.0 is ten times as alkaline as a solution with a pH of 8.0.
Figure 2 shows the measured pH along the transect. The full size graphic is here.
Figure 2. Measured ocean pH from the surface down to the ocean bottom along the transect shown in Figure 1.
The second thing I learned from the study is that the pH of the ocean is very different in different locations. As one goes from Hawaii to Alaska the pH slowly decreases along the transect, dropping from 8.05 all the way down to 7.65. This is a change in pH of almost half a unit. And everywhere along the transect, the water at depth is much less alkaline, with a minimum value of about 7.25.
The third thing I learned from the study is how little humans have changed the pH of the ocean. Figure 3 shows their graph of the anthropogenic pH changes along the transect. The full-sized graphic is here:
Figure 3. Anthropogenic changes in the pH, from the surface to 1,000 metres depth, over 15 years (1991-2006)
The area of the greatest anthropogenic change over the fifteen years of the study, as one might imagine, is at the surface. The maximum anthropogenic change over the entire transect was -0.03 pH in fifteen years. The average anthropogenic change over the top 150 metre depth was -0.023. From there down to 800 metres the average anthropogenic change was -0.011 in fifteen years.
This means that for the top 800 metres of the ocean, where the majority of the oceanic life exists, the human induced change in pH was -0.013 over 15 years. This was also about the amount of pH change in the waters around Hawaii.
Now, remember that the difference in pH between the surface water in Hawaii and Alaskan is 0.50 pH units. That means that at the current rate of change, the surface water in Hawaii will be as alkaline as the current Alaskan surface water in … well … um … lessee, divide by eleventeen, carry the quadratic residual … I get a figure of 566 years.
But of course, that is assuming that there would not be any mixing of the water during that half-millennium. The ocean is a huge place, containing a vast amount of carbon. The atmosphere contains about 750 gigatonnes of carbon in the form of CO2. The ocean contains about fifty times that amount. It is slowly mixed by wind, wave, and currents. As a result, the human carbon contribution will not stay in the upper layers as shown in the graphs above. It will be mixed into the deeper layers. Some will go into the sediments. Some will precipitate out of solution. So even in 500 years, Hawaiian waters are very unlikely to have the alkalinity of Alaskan waters.
The final thing I learned from this study is that creatures in the ocean live happily in a wide range of alkalinities, from a high of over 8.0 down to almost neutral. As a result, the idea that a slight change in alkalinity will somehow knock the ocean dead doesn’t make any sense. By geological standards, the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is currently quite low. It has been several times higher in the past, with the inevitable changes in the oceanic pH … and despite that, the life in the ocean continued to flourish.
My conclusion? To mis-quote Mark Twain, “The reports of the ocean’s death have been greatly exaggerated.”
[UPDATE] Several people have asked how I know that their method for separating the amount of anthropogenic warming from the total warming is correct. I do not know if it is correct. I have assumed it is for the purposes of this discussion, to show that even if they are correct, the amount is so small and the effect would be so slow as to be meaningless.
[UPDATE] WUWT regular Smokey pointed us to a very interesting dataset. It shows the monthly changes in pH at the inlet pipe to the world famous Monterey Bay Aquarium in central California. I used to fish commercially for squid just offshore of the aquarium, it is a lovely sight at night. Figure 4 shows the pH record for the inlet water.
Figure 4. pH measurements at the inlet pipe to the Monterey Bay Aquarium. Inlet depth is 50′ (15 metres). Light yellow lines show standard error of each month’s measurements, indicating a wide spread of pH values in each month. Red interval at the top right shows the theoretical pH change which the Byrne et al. paper says would have occurred over the time period of the dataset. Photo shows kids at the Aquarium looking at the fish. Photo source.
There are several conclusions from this. First, the sea creatures in the Monterey Bay can easily withstand a change in pH of 0.5 in the course of a single month. Second, the Byrne estimate of the theoretical change from anthropogenic CO2 over the period (red interval, upper right corner) is so tiny as to be totally lost in the noise.
This ability to withstand changes in the pH is also visible in the coral atolls. It is not widely recognized that the pH of the sea water is affected by the net production of carbon by the life processes of the coral reefs. This makes the water on the reef less alkaline (more acidic) than the surrounding ocean water. Obviously, all of the lagoon life thrives in that more acidic water.
In addition, because of the combination of the production of carbon by the reef and the changes in the amount of water entering the lagoon with the tides, the pH of the water can change quite rapidly. For example, in a study done in Shiraho Reef, the pH of the water inside the reef changes in 12 hours by one full pH unit (7.8 to 8.8). This represents about a thousand years worth of the theoretical anthropogenic change estimated from the Byrne et al. paper …
The sea is a complex, buffered environment in which the pH is changing constantly. The life there is able to live and thrive despite rapidly large variations in pH. I’m sorry, but I see no reason to be concerned about possible theoretical damage from a possible theoretical change in oceanic pH from increasing CO2.
[UPDATE] I got to thinking about the “deep scattering layer”. This is a layer of marine life that during the day is at a depth of about a thousand meters. But every night, in the largest migration by mass on the planet, they rise up to about 300 meters, feed at night, and descend with the dawn back to the depths.
Looking at Figure 1, this means they are experiencing a change in pH of about 0.4 pH units in a single day … and alarmists want us to be terrified of a change of 0.002 pH units in a year. Get real.
Phil-
I’m always amazed when people invoke the Permian extinction—If we could walk the Permian we would need no scientist to tell us the world was turning hostile to life. Remember the Siberian Traps were not just flood basalts but had upwards of 20% pyroclastic flows.
In a real mass extinction you don’t need statistics or models to know your in trouble.
Mattb says:
June 21, 2010 at 12:41 am
Well, your post is fascinating, Mattb, but it’s totally content-free. In addition, you recommend a paper that has already been recommended by someone else, and which we’ve already discussed. You really should read the entire thread before commenting if you want to appear as though you are paying attention.
Come back when you can spell “Willis” (which you managed to mis-spell in two ways) and “pretty graphs”, and bring some science with you, and you’ll be more than welcome. Random nasty sniping as you have done, on the other hand, adds nothing to the discussion and is not welcome in polite society anywhere.
Matt Ridley says:
June 21, 2010 at 5:18 am
For those unaware of his work, Matt Ridley is the author of “The Rational Optimist”. He is obviously a man who never noticed that bad news is what sells newspapers …
Matt, I had not seen the paper you reference. It is a very interesting meta-analysis which backs up my contentions. It says that marine species are much more resilient than people claim, and that most of them don’t even notice the small changes in pH that are predicted (but may not occur) by the end of the century.
There’s an interesting overview of the paper here, worth reading.
“”” Phil. says:
June 20, 2010 at 8:26 pm
John M says:
June 20, 2010 at 5:59 pm
Once again, we here the precision of 0.001. And yet…
“These data were collected before the practice of purifying indicators was adopted, so a correction for mCP impurities was applied to the 2006 pH data: 0.001 units at pH 7.4, increasing to 0.005 at pH 8.1 [Yao et al., 2007]. ”
So the corrections are greater than the precision?
That’s frequently the case, that’s why we do calibrations, you do know what precision means don’t you? “”
I’d lose a lot of hats, if I hung them up on bets as to how accurately somebody can measure something. Even in my career, I seen some bloody clever people come up with interesting ways to measure things much better than historical methods. I recall that early radiocarbon dating methods were of low precision, because people used actual decay observations (of a highly random process) to determine abundances. Then came mass spec methods that let you actually count individual atoms by nuclide species, and the whole game changed.
When I was at University, doing Physics, we had this one hour lab to use a Fabry Perot 1 cm long Etalon to measure two or three lines in the Neon Spectrum to about 0.1 percent; showing that it was so much more precise than a prism spectrometer.
So I got interested in the workings of the Fabry Perot device, and did some extra research on the method. About two weeks later, I presented the Professor, with what amounted to a PhD thesis on the Fabry Perot Etalon; along with a listing of about 22 lines in the Neon Red spectrum, which I had accurately measured to one part in 10^7, with their cracker box Etalon.
Can’t really tell if the Professor appreciated it or not; because he made me spend the next week rewriting the experimental manual on that particular part of the curriculum; to restore that device to its real place in measurment technology.
I think that Willis has presented so much data on so much variability in every which way of oceanic pH values; that defending a narrow ledge on a hill, on the basis of a bet that one can’t measure (or even resolve) pH to better than 0.01 is one hell of a sorry way to die.
I expected oceanic pH to be variable; I had no idea that it was all over the map like Willis points out. I’m even surprised to find that electrolytic cell methods can do 0.01; so it is very nice to know that there’s new technology in that area; but I don’t think that Ocean problems are dependent on being able to do that.
CRS, Dr.P.H. says:
“I watched the Georges Bank fishery disappear before my eyes in the early 1980′s, and the Atlantic menhaden industry is disappearing as we type….so I get a bit protective of the seven seas! Of the plethora of ills associated with fossil carbon, oceanic acidification is at least plausible. The rest, including runaway Venus effect? Bah!”
The collapse of the George’s Bank was the result of subsidies that created too many boats chasing too little fish. And as the cod populations became smaller and the economics less compelling- more subsidies were added such that we fished them to near exhaustion. Catch quotas were enacted but to make sure that they had no consequences monies were not provided for enforcement. To make sure that under the unlikely scenario that someone might actually get caught- fines were set at a percentage of the days catch. See the NAS study Managing our Marine Fisheries and the shorter Wm Royce lecture on the history of fishery management. spo.nmfs.noaa.gov/mfr504/mfr5047.pdf
Subsidies are also involved with the menhaden fishery. Remember a crisis was invoked when those Russian trawlers started showing up off our coasts. We declared a 200 mile economic limit and the Feds now had 197 miles of coastline under their control.
Most people are surprised to learn that prior to our declaration of the 200 mile limit in the 70s there were two relatively small government agencies- The Bureau of Sport Fisheries and the Bureau of Commercial Fisheries. The crisis demanded action and the Nat Mar Fish Serv was formed. NMFS is the old Bur of Commercial Fisheries and the Bur of Sport Fisheries was dissolved. Subsidies started to flow out of Washington to build our own commercial fleet and as a result our fish stocks began to decline. Ted Stevens and cronies got the salmon and Pacific groundstocks, the Bush Family got the menhaden and the Kennedy cronies got the tuna. Currently the commercial fin fishery is allocated 98% of all fin fish (biomass). Sport Fishing is allocated 2% despite generated twice the income, more jobs and actually pays taxes (not being subsidized), pays a wholesale tax on equipment and fuel and 35 million participants. How much subsidy is flowing- well the 1999 Federal Investment Task Force tried to find out but had to concede defeat saying there was so much money flowing through so many agencies with so little paper work that they couldn’t even begin to estimate. (In fairness the real money flows to the large processors not the guys trying to eke out a living)
The National Academies in a number of studies over more than a decade had enumerated the problems and the solutions. In the recently reauthorized Magnuson Stevens Act- hailed by environmentalists as a great victory— not a single NAS recommendation made it into the bill and several that NAS said were the cause of fishery decline were actually added.
Most of our serious environmental problems are subsidy driven- from fisheries to agriculture. And the declaration of a crisis is a sign that the government is about to make a problem worse.
And given the fact that the government failed to address the very real ongoing habitat and disease problems associated with near shore shell fish for 50 years- I’m a bit cynical as to why they are now concerned with what may happen to shellfish in 100 years from CO2
I wanted to return to Chris’s comment, viz:
We can fit a polynomial to the changes in CO2 to give us a “business as usual” extrapolation into the future. This assumes both a continued growth and an annually increasing growth in emissions in line with the historically increasing growth in emissions.
This gives doubled CO2 (560 ppmv), but not by mid-century. It doesn’t occur until 2070. And by 2100, this does not give 800 ppmv as Chris says. Instead, it gives 675 ppmv …
Using the Bryne observations of .0005 change in pH from a 1 ppmv change in CO2, this indicates that the pH change from now until the year 2100 will not be on the order of 0.4 units as Chris claims. Instead, it will be on the order of 0.14 units …
This is quite near the 0.1 unit pH change that folks claim has occurred since pre-industrial times … I have asked several times for evidence that that change did anything deleterious to the ocean, with no takers.
We have another estimate of the relationship between pH and CO2 levels, based on the interesting Science Magazine paper cited by Gail Combs above. This gives a relationship of 0.0008 pH units per 1 ppmv change in CO2. This would increase the estimated pH change by 2100 to 0.23 units, which is still very small. We don’t know which figure is nearer the truth. But using either one, we’re not talking about a large change compared to the natural oceanic pH changes that occur daily, monthly, annually, decadally, or on a century long basis.
It is worth noting, however, that both of those figures are smaller than the canonical figuresfor the change in pH for a given change in CO2, which is 0.0012 units per 1 ppmv. This is more than double the Bryne figure, and 50% higher than the figure from the Science paper cited by Gail.
When baking soda is wet it absorbs (reacts with) atmospheric nitrogen and it becomes urea, (NH2)2CO, that is why it smells like urine…so “rotten” CO2 it’s pee!!
Our blood is like the sea water, it is buffered,…that is why when you suffer a heart attack doctors give you a baking soda injection. Life is kept by buffering and buffering is an equilibrium of opposing electrical charges (ions)….that is why, also, we living beings have a skin (a holoscience guy would call it a plasma “double layer”) which protect us from any sudden change in the surrounding “environment” but which, unfortunately, does not protect us from a political motivated and funded post normal science which can harm us but more gravely our most sensitive individuals, like our kids. (those pernicious radiations come directly from hell).
Make the following experiment: Open carefully a gas filled water bottle, take it to you mouth (be very, very carefful, I mean that opening below your nose), drink a little…did you feel it sour?….No, you didn’t, didn’t you?..and it was oversaturated with CO2!!
Now go and find that guy who cheated you, and tell him you won’t believe him anymore!
Pat Moffitt says:
June 21, 2010 at 11:47 am
The collapse of the George’s Bank was the result of subsidies that created too many boats chasing too little fish….
—-
Thanks, Pat, I know the story all too well. This was stoked by record high prices for atlantic cod & groundfish, and the fisherman got greedy and used smaller & smaller nets, decimating the broodstock. Toss in the Spanish and others, and it was a recipe for disaster. We are watching history repeat itself in Antarctic waters (krill). Dead penguins, anyone?
The moral of the story is that, although it looks vast, the ocean and its resources can be rather easily pushed to the brink.
I remember watching Soviet factory ships off of Cape Ann in Mass., processing herring and dumping raw wastewater over the side. Oh well.
Regarding effects of oceanic acidification, this is something of a biological possibility that I am unwilling to discount without more study. The climate crew are late to adopt this one (ask the folks at Scripps), but now they have embraced it in their slimy grasp, since all of their other death-spiral scenarios have gone awry. Watch for more and more alarmism over this in coming months.
The real question is, if the oceanic food web is impacted by carbon acidification, what’s to be done about it? The USA and developed nations can’t do much by themselves, as long as China continues their long march towards modernization.
This represents a very large-scale variation of the old “acid rain” problem that trashed ecosystems like the Finger Lakes region of NY. You can scrub sulfur, but CO2, not so much. Cap & trade won’t solve that one.
So, as “global warming” sets into the sunset due to the ongoing Grand Solar Minimum and the distortions of the climatologists & advocates, watch for more & more alarmism/panic over oceanic acidification.
I just laugh! The solution won’t be easy, but there are some good alternatives being kicked around. Just get the damn atmospheric people out of the way.
Enneagram says:
June 21, 2010 at 12:30 pm
When baking soda is wet it absorbs (reacts with) atmospheric nitrogen and it becomes urea, (NH2)2CO, that is why it smells like urine…so “rotten” CO2 it’s pee!!
In your dreams! Go away and learn some chemistry.
To correct the bad link I gave: http://www.ipsl.jussieu.fr/~jomce/acidification/paper/Orr_OnlineNature04095.pdf. This and other links are available via the first link I gave, http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ocean_acidification#Acidification.
Ref [11] there requires subscription access, but it’s also available here: http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/home/pubs/outstand/feel3087/feel3087.shtml
CRS, Dr.P.H. says:
June 21, 2010 at 1:10 pm “Regarding effects of oceanic acidification, this is something of a biological possibility that I am unwilling to discount without more study.”
I don’t have a problem with studying this but as the FOARAM Act shows- that is not we are going to do. Foaram funding assumes the deleterious effect of ocean acidification- and provides grants to demonstrate the deleterious effects. When funding limits the answers we can learn nothing.
Phil. says:
June 20, 2010 at 8:26 pm
“you do know what precision is, don’t you?”
Certainly. But if my financial guy came to me telling me my net worth to +/-$0.01, but with an “adjustment” from 5 years ago of -$26,237.56, I don’t know about you, but I’d be asking questions.
But more to the point, the stated precision requires taking into account both the precision of the today’s measurements and the precision of the correction made for the impure indicator compound used in the past. I guess that assumes that the level of impurity was always the same. You’re not a synthetic chemist I take it.
But if you want to talk accuracy instead of precision, back to my reference from 2004:
I’m asking what I think is a reasonable question. The recent paper we are discussing has few experimental details on errors and uncertainty. They cite references from the late 80s/early 90s as their basic technique. I am citing a paper from 2004 that shows greater levels of uncertainty for the technique.
Can you provide me with the level of detail needed to show current levels of precision and accuracy are higher than stated in the 2004 paper?
George E. Smith
“…defending a narrow ledge on a hill, on the basis of a bet that one can’t measure (or even resolve) pH to better than 0.01 is one hell of a sorry way to die.”
Probably wise council, but that would take all the fun out of it.
The technique we’re debating does not use an electrolytic cell, but is a spectrophotometric technique based on spectral changes in a pH-sensitive organic probe molecule. I’m interested in the pH techniques as a chemist, and also because I think it fits with the general tendency of researchers in “hot” areas (not just climate science) to overhype their results and the certainty of their results (at least in the PR releases they seem to be addicted to).
It is amazing work, but like everything else, can be oversold And like it or not, ocean pH is becoming the new poster child for the “we need to do something” advocates.
Sorry WILLIS – “running too fast” is how you excuse your sloppy typing maybe you could afford the same latitude to us mere mortal posters. Very Moncktonesque of you to dismiss me with patronising smugness rather than address the issues.
As always GREAT post Willis.
This may have been linked before, but the following is not a study but a survey of studies on the issue. Not an easy read….but a tour de force, nonetheless.
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/originals/acid_test.html
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Pat Moffitt says:
June 21, 2010 at 3:40 pm
CRS, Dr.P.H. says:
June 21, 2010 at 1:10 pm “Regarding effects of oceanic acidification, this is something of a biological possibility that I am unwilling to discount without more study.”
I don’t have a problem with studying this but as the FOARAM Act shows- that is not we are going to do. Foaram funding assumes the deleterious effect of ocean acidification- and provides grants to demonstrate the deleterious effects. When funding limits the answers we can learn nothing.
———–
REPLY: Thanks, Pat, you know yer stuff! Here’s a link for everyone:
http://www.us-ocb.org/documents/2008-2009_OCB_OA_highlights.pdf
We OBJECTIVE scientists have an opportunity to get something right in terms of the study of atmospheric carbon deposition! I look forward to seeing some real science being performed for once!
Instead of the legacy of spooky old James Hansen, trying to frighten children with his nightmare-inducing scare-stories about Earth de-evolving into another Venus, we have a great opportunity to accurately measure biota, ocean alkalinity, and ascertain mitigation/remediation steps if needed. Scripps are way ahead on this one.
I’m actively involved in this work with University of Illinois in Urbana and will keep you posted on developments. No matter what we find, it only matters if China and India come onboard. We think they will.
CRS, Dr.P.H. –A request in this new era of ocean acidification- put in a good word whenever possible for oyster rehab (Dermo, MSX and habitat loss) I have seen too many critical environmental issues hijacked in my career. And lets spend most of the early monies on formulating what data is needed and its collection before we jump to the answer . You mention Scripps- the home of one of my heroes- John Isaacs- a man who many years ago took the time to talk some sense into a very young man just starting out in the field.
Pat Moffitt says:
June 21, 2010 at 8:19 pm
CRS, Dr.P.H. –A request in this new era of ocean acidification- put in a good word whenever possible for oyster rehab (Dermo, MSX and habitat loss) I have seen too many critical environmental issues hijacked in my career. And lets spend most of the early monies on formulating what data is needed and its collection before we jump to the answer . You mention Scripps- the home of one of my heroes- John Isaacs- a man who many years ago took the time to talk some sense into a very young man just starting out in the field.
—
You’ve got a deal! I’ll be back to WUWT sometime when we are closer to publication. VERY interesting stuff going on at my alma mater in Urbana!
Mattb says:
June 21, 2010 at 6:45 pm
Mattb, I did a quick mental subtraction of 8.05 minus 7.65 and got 0.5 … so sue me. Unless you can assure us that you have never made a mathematical error because you were moving too fast, to call that “Monctonesque” and abuse me for a simple subtraction mistake is arrogant, unpleasant, and puerile.
It is, however, typical of people who have nothing of substance to say. Hey, I made a math error. Unlike a mainstream climate scientist like Michael Mann (see the half-dozen posts on the Tiljander fiasco) I admitted to my error. It makes no difference to the substance of my claims. Get over it. You want to get on someone’s case for an error? Go bother Michael.
Pat Moffitt says:
June 21, 2010 at 8:19 pm
This to me is one of the biggest tragedies of the onslaught of global warming alarmism. Global warming has stolen all of the spotlight away from what are very real environmental issues.
In Fiji, a friend and I were concerned about the foreign longline fishermen raping the Fijian waters. He went to talk to the local Greenpeace folks to see if he could enlist their assistance, only to be told that they couldn’t assist the fish … because they were putting all of their energy into fighting climate change.
So yes, indeed, put in a good word for the oysters and all of the other real issues that the watermelon greens have forgotten about in their drive to halt all progress and turn back the clock.
Sorry Willis – I missed an i in your name – sue me. I don’t give a rats about your maths mistake, and all I did was highlight your own arrogant, unpleasant and purile response to me. On one hand you make out me missing an “i”is somehow worthy of comment, an other other hand I’m arrogant and purile for asking for the same leeway you afford yourself. Note – of course I think your 0.5 is of zero consequence, but so was my Wills.
earth to Eschenbach… am I getting through?
Mattb, you came in here and started mouthing off with your very first sentence by saying:
You went on to accuse me, without a scrap of scientific argument or a single citation, with “playing with smoke and mirrors and pwetty gwaphs”, as though there were something wrong with my graphs because they are interesting to look at … do you think your cheap innuendo actually fools or convinces anyone? My graphs stand or fall on the numbers they portray, and you can’t find anything wrong with the numbers so you attack how they look???
You then invited me “to actually go though the scientific papers that actually investigate the consequences of ocean acidification, like say http://www.ipsl.jussieu.fr/~jomce/acidification/paper/Orr_OnlineNature04095.pdf”
without noticing that I had already done exactly that.
You closed by saying that “quite frankly your arguments would only be remotely compelling to an audience that knows very little about the actual science”, as though you had provided some actual science in your post, or would recognize it if you saw it.
Now you want to highlight my “arrogant” response? BWA-HA-HA-HA … My friend, you came in here with nothing but snide remarks and personal attacks and enough attitude to sink a large ship. You don’t have the standing to say a single word about my or anyone else’s attitude. You got your nastiness thrown back in your face, and now you want to complain? I don’t apologize for doing that. That’s what happens when you walk in the door with personal attacks instead of science, you get the same treatment as when a puppy messes on the floor – you get your nose rubbed in it.
If you want to discuss the science, fine. If you think that there are material errors in my work, you are welcome to point them out. If you have scientific papers that support your claim, please cite them, I’m here and more than happy to discuss any scientific issues you care to raise.
But starting out with personal attacks, innuendo, and general unpleasantness? Sorry, that’s poor tactics that will get you bounced out of polite conversations anywhere on the planet. You should try posting under your own name so that you have to stand behind your words, you might actually get some traction. At present, all you are doing is giving a bad name to decent people who honestly believe in the AGW hypothesis and are willing to have a scientific discussion and debate about the issues …
CO2 says:
June 20, 2010 at 9:10 am
tallbloke says:
June 20, 2010 at 5:01 am
“2) (And you didn’t try to address this one, presumably because you know you’ve been caught with your pants round your ankles) Co2 dissolved in water forms an acid. Yet you state that “A warmer ocean holds less CO2. Ocean’s with less CO2 become more acidic”.
I should have added, “Because of other factors”, a warmer ocean…
Ocean acidity is not only a simple function of CO2 disolving in water, it involves the bio-mass from Phyto-plankton and Zooplankton down, which sequester CO2 drawing on the disolved CO2 carrying it to both the deep waters and the ocean floor. This is referred to as the solubility pump and the biological pump. This bio-mass of Phytoplankton and Zooplankton, residing close to the surface, is threatened by the warming of colder oceans, resulting in less absorbtion of CO2, increasing the disolved CO2 level, hence acidity. The whole issue is far more complex than a discussion about Ph, acidity and alkaline. While a warmer ocean may absorb less CO2, the CO2 level will still increase if the rate of sequestration drops disproportionally.
Oh dear. Trying to hide your error with extra complication and further errors doesn’t change the incorrectness of your original statement. How is the warming of oceans going to increase the disolved(sic) co2 level, CO2?
tallbloke says:
June 20, 2010 at 5:01 am
1) if the ocean is not acidic to begin with (it isn’t) , then it can’t become “more acidic”, only less alkaline. It can undergo a process of acidification however, as Chris said.
what’s the difference between ‘a process of acidification’ and more acid?
One is correct the other (yours) is wrong.
As for the pants, they don’t need ironing yet.
Correct, they need washing first.
Okay. So mankind puts a little dab of CO2 into the atmosphere that was never intended by Nature. But, plants gobble up CO2. So, plant life expands commensurately by absorbing our little dab extra of CO2. And so, all is good. I am not any kind of scientist, but that line of thought makes a lot of sense to me. Does science not back up that simple line of reasoning?
Smokey says:
June 21, 2010 at 7:05 am
CO2,
The human component of CO2 emissions is about 3%. The rest is natural CO2 outgassing.
Where is your god now?
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Natural CO2 outgassing, what do you mean by natural? It depends on water temperature and since the oceans are warming and outgassing more CO2, is that still natural? I presume that by natural you mean that it is the oceans doing it of their own accord. However, if the warming of the oceans is caused by an unnatural phenomenon like humans, doesn’t that change the meaning of natural?
Over the past 10,000 years the atmospheric CO2 level has fluctuated no more than 10-15 ppm around an equilibrium of 280ppm. We are now at 394ppm, a rise of 114ppm over just 200 years.
Quote; “A massive store of excess carbon inaccessible to the carbon cycle for many 10’s of millions of years is being rapidly reintroduced into the system in an extraordinarily short time period. Not surprisingly the atmospheric CO2 concentration is rising very rapidly indeed. The atmospheric CO2 concentration is out of equilibrium (there’s a large nett flux into the atmosphere from previously long-sequestered sources), and the atmospheric CO2 concentration is being driven up towards some new equilibrium concentration.”
My God? That would have to be Neptune.