For a another view on the CO2 issue, please see also the guest post by Tom Vonk: CO2 heats the atmosphere…a counter view -Anthony
Guest Post by Ferdinand Engelbeen
There have been hundreds of reactions to the previous post by Willis Eschenbach as he is convinced that humans are the cause of the past 150 years increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. For the (C)AGW theory, that is one of the cornerstones. If that fails, the whole theory fails.
This may be the main reason that many skeptics don’t like the idea that humans are the cause of the increase and try to demolish the connection between human emissions and the measured increase in the atmosphere with all means, some more scientific than others.
After several years of discussion on different discussion lists, skeptic and warmist alike, I have made a comprehensive web page where all arguments are put together: indeed near the full increase of CO2 in the atmosphere is caused by the human emissions. Only a small part might have been added by the (ocean) warming since the LIA. That doesn’t mean that the increase has a tremendous effect on the warming of the earth’s surface, as that is a completely different discussion. But of course, if the CO2 increase was mainly/completely natural, the discussion of the “A” in AGW wouldn’t be necessary. But it isn’t natural, as the mass balance proves beyond doubt and all other observations agree with. And all alternative explanations fail one or more observations. In the next parts I will touch other items like the process characteristics, the 13C and 14C/12C ratio, etc. Finally, I will touch some misconceptions about decay time of extra CO2, ice cores, historical CO2 measurements and stomata data.
The mass balance:
As the laws of conservation of mass rules: no carbon can be destroyed or generated. As there are no processes in the atmosphere which convert CO2 to something else, the law also holds for CO2, as long as it stays in the atmosphere. This means that the mass balance should be obeyed for all situations. In this case, the increase/decrease of the CO2 level in the atmosphere after a year (which only shows the end result of all exchanges, including the seasonal exchanges) must be:
dCO2(atm) = CO2(in1 + in2 + in3 +…) + CO2(em) – CO2(out1 + out2 + out3 +…)
The difference in the atmosphere after a year is the sum of all inflows, no matter how large they are, or how they changed over the years, plus the human emissions, minus the sum of all outflows, no matter how large they are, wherever they take place. Some rough indication of the flows involved is here in Figure 1 from NASA:
From all those flows very few are known to any accuracy. What is known with reasonable accuracy are the emissions, which are based on inventories of fossil fuel use by the finance departments (taxes!) of different countries and the very accurate measurements of the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere on a lot of places on earth, including Mauna Loa.
Thus in the above CO2 mass balance, we can replace some of the items with the real amounts (CO2 amounts expressed in gigaton carbon):
4 GtC = CO2(in1 + in2 + in3 +…) + 8 GtC – CO2(out1 + out2 + out3 +…)
Or rearranged:
CO2(in1 + in2 + in3 +…) – CO2(out1 + out2 + out3 +…) = – 4 GtC
Without any knowledge of any natural flow in or out of the atmosphere or changes in such flows, we know that the sum of all natural outflows is 4 GtC larger than the sum of all natural inflows. In other words, the net increase of the atmospheric CO2 content caused by all natural CO2 ins and outs together is negative. There is no net natural contribution to the observed increase, nature as a whole acts as a sink for CO2. Of course, a lot of CO2 is exchanged over the seasons, but at the end of the year, that doesn’t add anything to the total CO2 mass in the atmosphere. That only adds to the exchange rate of individual molecules: some 20% per year of all CO2 in the atmosphere is refreshed by the seasonal exchanges between atmosphere and oceans/vegetation. That can be seen in the above scheme: about 210 GtC CO2 is exchanged, but not all of that reaches the bulk of the atmosphere. Best guess (based on 13C/12C and oxygen exchanges) is that some 60 GtC is exchanged back and forth over the seasons between the atmosphere and vegetation and some 90 GtC is exchanged between the atmosphere and the oceans. These flows are countercurrent: warmer oceans release more CO2 in summer, while vegetation has its largest uptake in summer. In the NH, vegetation wins (more land), in the SH there is hardly any seasonal influence (more ocean). There is more influence near ground than at altitude and there is a NH-SH lag (which points to a NH source). See figure 2:
The net result of all these exchanges is some 4 GtC sink rate of the natural flows, which is variable: the variability of the natural sink capacity is mostly related to (ocean) temperature changes, but that has little influence on the trend itself, as most of the variability averages out over the years. Only a more permanent temperature increase/decrease should show a more permanent change in CO2 level. The Vostok ice core record shows that a temperature change of about 1°C gives a change in CO2 level of about 8 ppmv over very long term. That indicates an about 8 ppmv increase for the warming since the LIA, less than 10% of the observed increase.
As one can see in Fig. 3 below, there is a variability of +/- 1 ppmv (2 GtC) around the trend over the past 50 years, while the trend itself is about 55% of the emissions, currently around 2 ppmv (4 GtC) per year (land use changes not included, as these are far more uncertain, in that case the trend is about 45% of the emissions + land use changes).
We could end the whole discussion here, as humans have added about twice the amount of CO2 to the atmosphere as the observed increase over the past 150 years, the difference is absorbed by the oceans and/or vegetation. That is sufficient proof for the human origin of the increase, but there is more that points to the human cause… as will be shown in the following parts.
Please note that the RULES FOR THE DISCUSSION OF ATTRIBUTION OF THE CO2 RISE still apply!
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My training, Physical Chemistry. I have also done plenty of background reading on many of the issues surrounding CO2. The more I learn, the more I realise how little we know! These comments are just to encourage you all to read more widely.
The Natural sink rate is NOT 4 GT. That is just the current equilibrium reaction to human additions. Given humans increase CO2 emissions, this figure would rise from chemical equilibrium processes. It is also climate related, so may fall or rise based in decadel climate cycles.
The C12/C13 ratio isn’t very useful. In any chemical process involving CO2, HCO3-,CO3–, the slight difference in the atomic weights will indeed change the rate of the reactions. The problem is that there are so many processes in the carbon cycle, that any conclusions are based on conjecture. Different biochemical pathways in different organisms confuse the results.
Ice Core CO2 data is highly problematical, and modern results have been adjusted to suit the ruling paradigm.
Plant Stomata react more accurately to CO2 concentration, as has been determined in experiments. (More CO2 means fewer stomata, as plants exchange CO2 more efficiently) Historical collections of leaves can be used to determine past CO2 levels. In most cases, researchers are bound by the modern paradigm, and get confused by the low stomata counts of the past. Stomata cannot measure very high CO2, but only indicate high C)2. Higher CO2 levels over 325ppm are underestimated. When reading stomata research, you need to filter out the ruling paradigm when the problematical ice-core data is used to calibrate the stomata, when it should be the reverse.
Rapid atmospheric changes are well known from past reconstructions:
See http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC129389/pdf/pq1902012011.pdf
& http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/Reference_Docs/Late_Holocene_CO2_3000-4300_BP_Jessen_etal_2005.pdf
Changes of close to 100ppm in a century are quite common.
Which brings me to historical CO2 chemical determinations. Chemists have had excellent methods for determining CO2 since the Early 1800s’. From early measurements, CO2 in the Atmosphere appears to have dropped from about 400-500 ppm in 1800 to about 300ppm by 1900. Over the 20th Century the CO2 has risen back.
Now, of course humans are adding to the CO2, but there is a natural increase as well.
This means that the equilibrium sink of human CO2 emissions must be much higher than 4Gt, and I suspect probably close to 6Gt. If we go into a climate reversal, and the seas start absorbing CO2, we may start to see a decline, which will be slow due to mankind’s added emissions.
At this stage, total CO2 is unlikely to be any higher than in other times in the past 100 years.
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
August 5, 2010 at 2:06 pm
Paul Birch says:
August 5, 2010 at 12:06 pm
The mass balance claim is a non sequitur. We know that the total fluxes are far higher than the anthropogenic flux and we know that many of the other components are variable, but we do not know how variable. We simply do not know how much CO2 there would have been in the atmosphere at this time in the absence of anthropogenic emission.
“Fluxes, no matter how large, add anything to the atmosphere, as long as these are in balance. Only the unbalance adds or removes mass to/from a reservoir. Human emissions are one-way additions. These add to the reservoir(s).”
I presume you meant “don’t add anything…”. But your argument is still a non sequitur, because the natural fluxes are not in balance over any timescale. Sometimes they have been hugely out of balance. We have no independent measurement that could tell us whether or not they have been in balance over the past century, or by how much they have been in imbalance. Secondly, it does not follow that the natural fluxes are the same as they would have been in the absence of man-made emissions; you can’t assume their sum is unchanged; indeed, your own argument requires that it has changed, since the increase does not equate to the anthropogenic flux. Thirdly, human activities are not all “one-way”; agriculture and irrigation are obvious counter-example; less obvious are things like ploughing and engineering works that mobilise sediments, fertilising coastal waters and increasing natural CO2 take-up by plankton. In principle, such effects could even outweigh the direct CO2 emissions (they probably don’t, but it is not absurd to suppose that they might).
Dave Springer said at 1:06 pm
….What was the total biomass of the planet in 1880 and what is it today? Is total biomass growing or falling?…. There’s so much missing data that these hasty conclusions trying to be passed off as settled science is laughable.
What was the Soil Microbe level in 1880? 1955? 2009?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/04/28/new-ground-truth-microbiotic-negative-feedback/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/03/25/earth-follows-the-warming-soils-add-100-million-tons-of-co2-per-year/
This analysis could not distinguish whether the carbon was coming from old stores or from vegetation growing faster due to a warmer climate. But other lines of evidence suggest warming is unlocking old carbon…..
What was the energy/heat and CO2 output of sea floor vents in 1880? 1955? 2009?
http://pubs.usgs.gov/gip/dynamic/exploring.html
http://www.rdmag.com/News/2010/03/Environment-Research-Evidence-Of-Hydrothermal-Vents-On-The-Seafloor-Near-Antarctica/
What was the CO2 ppm Global Average in 1880? 1955? 2009?
http://www.pensee-unique.eu/001_mwr-083-10-0225.pdf
What was the Soil Respiration rate in 1880? 1955? 2009?
http://www.biogeosciences-discuss.net/7/1321/2010/bgd-7-1321-2010-print.pdf
What was the extent/mass of Arctic Sea ice in 1880? 1955? —–
(Hmm, where is that post/study of sea ice and CO2?)
I could go on but this kinds of sums it all:
From all those flows very few are known to any accuracy.
Surely you jest…..?
The Engineer says:
August 5, 2010 at 2:05 pm
The question still remains though. The rise in CO2 before the start of the 20th century was greater than can be explained by human emissions. The rise in CO2 in the first half the twentieth century can just be explained by human emissions if we assume that nature doesn’t increase absorption, while after 1950 nature suddenly decide to absorb HALF of human emissions.
This would seem to be a rather large conundrum unless you can explain it ?
The difference is probably in vegetation: based on the increase vs. emission rates (and d13C changes), the specialists on that matter suppose that until the last decades, vegetation was a source of CO2, nowadays an increasing sink. The first pages of the essay by Pieter Tans give an oversight:
http://esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/co2conference/pdfs/tans.pdf from page 5 on.
Not sure in how far human influences on land use change are included in the terrestrial emissions.
Further, in the first century, the emissions were quite low, within the natural variability…
BillD says:
Anyone who does not understand that the burning of fossil fuels is the main cause of the regular increase in CO2 that is has been documented over the last 50+ years is clearly unable to understand basic science.
Anyone who makes unsupported blanket statements of this sort is clearly unable to understand the scientific method, and thus “basic science”.
Certain findings are widely and clearly demonstrated in science and do not need support by citation and documentation. In my view, the conclusion that fossil fuel burning accounts for the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere fits into that category. That assumes that one has at least read evidence at the basic textbook level. Another well-accepted finding is that the earth follows an orbit around the sun. At one point these issues may have been cotroversial, but the controvery has long since been settled.
===========================================
Nice try, but that ancient orbit-sun controversy is a completely unworthy and false analogy to the current “controversy” CAGW myth-religion, the science of which is so far from being “settled” that it hurts just to type this.
And the REAL reason that you might say that “certain findings are widely and clearly demonstrated in science and do not need support by citation and documentation” on this issue is because…there is NONE to be found.
No TRUE documentation.
Just model conjectures.
Please produce the definitive measured real-world, real-time, hard evidence showing real-world (not modeled) direct cause and effect between humans, increased CO2, and how it is causing or will cause catastrophic climate change.
Smokey and many others on here have waited for a long time to see just that…and we we are all still waiting.
Let’s see the hard evidence!
Chris
Norfolk, VA, USA
Ferdinand,
The surface ocean flux of 1,020GT is the really interesting figure. The amount added by humans is a small percentage of that. Less than 1%
If there is a downward trend in the ocean surface flux of less than 1/2% of absorption annually, we are off the hook.
Fish stocks have diminished. Some of this is due no doubt to human consumption, but if it also indicates an increasing scarcity at the base of the food chain, then such a trend is perfectly possible.
How could we measure such a small trend?
Anthony
Thanks again for your tireless efforts and exceptional approach. A brief scan of the recent posts column on the sidebar illustrates almost perfectly why you and this blog have enjoyed such well earned success. No one in this debate can claim a monopoly on the truth and in terms of the climate it will, in my view at least, probably be many years or even decades before anyone can with well justified confidence claim to have achieved an inkling of certainty. The path to better understanding can only be traveled successfully if we agree to deal with each with an attitude of honesty and mutual respect and the forum you have provided here is, sadly, a rare exception in promoting that attitude.
Thanks again and as an old tee shirt I used to own proclaimed “Illegitami Non Carborundum”.
Dave Andrews says:
August 5, 2010 at 2:28 pm
Slioch, 5th Aug 10.30am
According to the US EIA, world CO2 emissions from the consumption and flaring of fossile fuels increased from 18.5 billion metric tons in 1980 t0 29.2 billion metric tons in 2006.
An increase of 58%
At the same time CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere increased from 339ppm to 382ppm. An increase of 13%
So where do you find any correlation between the two figures?
You are comparing the year-by-year increase of fossil fuel consumption with the overall increase of CO2 over the same period, not the year-by-year increase of CO2… But more about that in part 2.
http://gerlach1991.geologist-1011.mobi/
The volcano science for undersea volcanoes is certainly not settled
Dr A Burns says:
August 5, 2010 at 2:31 pm
“… That is sufficient proof for the human origin of the increase …”
You have got to be kidding ! What rubbish !!
Warming in the past has caused atmospheric CO2 conc. increases … you know, the bit that Mr Gore tried to hide … there is nothing to say it is still not happening.
If you can show that global temperatures have been falling, yet atmospheric CO2 conc has been increasing, you might have an ounce of credibility !
As already said several times: the effect of temperature is about 8 ppmv/C over long term. The LIA was maximum 1 C colder than today (not even taking Mann’s hockeystick in consideration), thus that makes 8 ppmv extra. But we see over 100 ppmv extra.
Further 1945-1975: cooling trend, CO2 rising. 2000-2010 no temperature trend, CO2 strongly rising.
Paul Birch says:
August 5, 2010 at 2:46 pm
We do not know! The natural cycle is so variable and uncertain, our understanding of all the relevant mechanisms so lacking, and our inability to carry out controlled experiments so limiting, that the realistic error range of any supposedly comprehensive “prediction” would far exceed the magnitude of the observed increase.
Neither in the (smoothed) ice cores, nor today with very accurate measurements, there is any large variability visible: both the temperature swing over the seasons as the year-by-year variability show some 4 ppmv/C change, nothing more, over the past 50+ years. Thus the possibility of large swings is rather questionable.
Further, if we stop all emissions today, and the levels wouldn’t drop, then the IPCC is right to claim that (part of) the emissions would stay in the atmosphere forever?
Steven mosher says:
August 5, 2010 at 2:25 pm
I’m waiting for someone to argue that our burning of fossil fuels DIMINISHES
the C02 in the atmosphere.
Challenge accepted!
More fossil fuels burnt means more CO2 and soot in the atmosphere.
This causes the formation of additional, larger water droplets to form in clouds.
More CO2 dissolves into these larger droplets…
And by a cruel twist of fate the quantity of dissolved CO2 is greater than that released by burning fossil fuels.
I can not prove it is right! You can not prove it is wrong! But we both can speculate!
If you are not willing to take up that argument and offer proof, then the balance of the evidence is that we do add C02 to the atmosphere. The current value would be lower BUT FOR our additions.
The problem is about evidence… or more precisely the LACK OF EVIDENCE…
The balance of speculation is NOT PROOF – JUST SPECULATION…
And you talk about science – rolls eyes!
I see the estimation for outgassing of CO2 from the oceans using ice cores are flawed because the planet over the past 160 years has a much higher rise in CO2, yet with only rough 0.8c rise in global temperatures.
Therefore the data from the ice cores must be incorrect for measurement of CO2 in the air at the time because these are only proxies and don’t match much more accurate recent trends in ppm of CO2 and global temperatures.
The more accurate estimations don’t show a 1c rise in temperature per 8ppm of CO2, but ~139 ppm per 1c rise in global temperatures. This is if only CO2 warmed the climate, which it didn’t.
Therefore as climate is still dominated by natural cycles and any trend from CO2 is still underlying, natural cycles must be at least 50 percent of the warming. (the past decade shows this)
Hence, using more accurate instruments the current planet shows a 1c rise/ 278 ppm of CO2 at the lowest.
My conclusion is the outgassing of CO2 from the oceans is much higher than claimed from using ice cores. Looks a figure at least 35 times the value currently given.
Theo Goodwin says:
August 5, 2010 at 2:39 pm
Ferdinand Engelbeen writes:
“I don’t see any reason that the oceans should absorb CO2 faster than the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere. That isn’t seen in the figures either: the increase in emissions and the absorption rate (oceans + vegetation) follow each other with a near constant ratio.”
Of course you don’t, because you have not investigated it. I just offered that example as one alternative hypothesis. There are a million others. And we should all be honest and admit that all of them have to be investigated scientifically before we can claim that they can be taken for granted. That’s how science works. It is not engineering.
Sometimes it helps to have had a working life as an engineer, to bring some scientists back on their feet… Of course I did look at the emission/absorption rates and they fit magically. But I can’t show all background I have sampled in over four years in one page. Thus that point is for the next part.
Don’t underestimate what science already has investigated about the CO2 cycle, as well in the atmosphere as in the oceans…
Hi Ferdinand!
You say that pH controls pCO2 and therefore a decade of stagnation in CO2 is no problem for the idea that increasing human CO2 outlet controls CO2 levels?
But pH levels have stagnated too:
http://hidethedecline.eu/media/pH%20in%20oceans/e1.jpg
http://hidethedecline.eu/media/pH%20in%20oceans/d9.jpg
Summa: we have constant pH and CO2 for a decade, so why should not the human emissions result in increased pCO2 according to your thoughts?
Yes, then you also mentions temperatures. They have stagnated too in the period – so in what way should temperatures explain that human CO2 emmisions does not lead to increased pCO2 in oceans?
And finaly, you mention that BIOLIFE could be a reason that pCO2 is indeed stagnating while human CO2 outlet is increasing:
YESYESYES!!! Say it again 🙂
Thats just the point, human outlet appaers more and more chess-mate by natures forces, and therefore what ever we humans do the CO2-levels are still less under human control while the Earths biosphere is awakening and… eating CO2 faster and faster.
We cant make CO2 increase as Hansen and co believes even if we wanted too 🙂
K.R. Frank Lansner
Sorry, a few mistakes
Should be ppmv and any contribution from CO2 is underlying, plus not 35 times, but 17 times.
Can this be corrected and this deleted?
Ross Jackson says:
August 5, 2010 at 3:03 pm
My training, Physical Chemistry. I have also done plenty of background reading on many of the issues surrounding CO2. The more I learn, the more I realise how little we know! These comments are just to encourage you all to read more widely.
The Natural sink rate is NOT 4 GT. That is just the current equilibrium reaction to human additions. Given humans increase CO2 emissions, this figure would rise from chemical equilibrium processes. It is also climate related, so may fall or rise based in decadel climate cycles.
Historical data, ice cores and stomata data will be handled at the end parts. Historical data and stomata data have their own biases and problems…
Of course the current natural sink rate is about 4 GtC, that is about 55% of the current emissions. The same ratio for over 50 years now. That is the response to a disturbance of a physical equilibrium. The equilibrium may fall or rise with temperature, but we are far away from that equilibrium…
The logic seemed solid at first – We’ve added more CO2 to the atmosphere than is there now, so nature must have absorbed CO2 rather than added CO2. But there is a simple counter proof to demonstrate that that logic does not always hold. Water vapor. By burning fossil fuels we have released a great deal of water vapor into the atmosphere, but the concentration has risen only slightly if at all. That means nature is absorbing rather than adding to the water vapor in the atmosphere. Yet if we stopped adding water vapor, nature would just stop absorbing it and the levels would stay about the same. If somehow we managed to instantly remove all the water vapor from the atmosphere, nature would start rapidly adding water vapor to the atmosphere instead of removing it as it is doing now. It may well be that much of the water vapor in the atmosphere was put there by us, but that doesn’t mean the level would be any different if we hadn’t put it there. Of course my counter example doesn’t prove that we didn’t increase the CO2 levels.
Good to see the criticism of this work.
I fully agree with those that say we can’t conclude that man is the major contributor to increases in atmospheric CO2 until we know much more about other carbon sources/sinks – almost all living things, volcanoes, forest fires and oceans – just to name a few – clearly there is a lot that could be influencing atmospheric CO2 levels.
We can be sure man has emitted large amounts of CO2 from burning fossil fuels which can be roughly estimated. However, how can we be sure that this is what drives the overall CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere without knowing any of the other natural processes to any degree of accuracy?
This article is just another example of the lack of scientific rigor prevalent today. Correlations and back of the envelope assumptions are NOT how I was taught Physics. You have to quantify the unknowns BEFORE you can draw conclusions.
So humans have added carbon….and?
Are we to assume then that warming is caused by humans? Or would that just be conflation?
Adding co2 to earths atmosphere does not warm the earth. There are other factors enacted in earths climate system from increased co2 that results in cooling the earth.
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Scarlet Pumpernickel says:
August 5, 2010 at 3:23 pm
http://gerlach1991.geologist-1011.mobi/
The volcano science for undersea volcanoes is certainly not settled
_____________________________________________________________
You can say that again. We do not even know how many undersea volcanoes there are or how active they are.
Thousand of new volcanoes revealed beneath the waves “…This is over 10 times more than have been found before.
The team estimates that in total there could be about 3 million submarine volcanoes, 39,000 of which rise more than 1000 metres over the sea bed. “
Submarine Ring of Fire 2004 Exploration, NOAA-OE “bubbles of liquid CO2 escape from the white chimneys and surrounding seafloor “
Submarine Volcanoes “Currently there are over five thousand active volcanoes underwater “
Iceland: Volcano emitting 150-300,000 tonnes of CO2 daily ” “
And RUSSIA and Alaska: Volcano Activity Notifications
Paul Birch says:
August 5, 2010 at 3:08 pm
I presume you meant “don’t add anything…”. But your argument is still a non sequitur, because the natural fluxes are not in balance over any timescale. Sometimes they have been hugely out of balance. We have no independent measurement that could tell us whether or not they have been in balance over the past century, or by how much they have been in imbalance. Secondly, it does not follow that the natural fluxes are the same as they would have been in the absence of man-made emissions; you can’t assume their sum is unchanged; indeed, your own argument requires that it has changed, since the increase does not equate to the anthropogenic flux. Thirdly, human activities are not all “one-way”; agriculture and irrigation are obvious counter-example; less obvious are things like ploughing and engineering works that mobilise sediments, fertilising coastal waters and increasing natural CO2 take-up by plankton. In principle, such effects could even outweigh the direct CO2 emissions (they probably don’t, but it is not absurd to suppose that they might).
The accurate measurements we have in the past 50+ years show that the unbalance in natural fluxes is not more than +/- 2 GtC, which causes the year-by-year variability. Over the past 150 years we have two ice cores (Law Dome) with 8 years resolution. Any one year peak of 40 GtC or a sustained change of 4 GtC over a period of 10 years would have been noticed above the accuracy of the cores. Thus it seems very unlikely that there were very large unbalances in recent times. Of course the further back, the more coarse the resolution is.
As far as we know, there was a balance between temperature and CO2 levels: besides the possible year-by-year unbalances, there is a good correlation between the two even over thousands of years. That balance now is disturbed by the human emissions.
Agreed that humans also can help to sequester some CO2, but until now the emissions still by far overwhelm the sequestering…
Jeremy says:
August 5, 2010 at 4:19 pm
This article is just another example of the lack of scientific rigor prevalent today. Correlations and back of the envelope assumptions are NOT how I was taught Physics. You have to quantify the unknowns BEFORE you can draw conclusions.
BRAVO! Standing ovation.
Robinson says:
August 5, 2010 at 8:26 am
To be honest this discussion is really not very interesting. Does anyone still dispute the fact that mankind has increased the amount of Co2 in the atmosphere
I was thinking the same thing.
I think the reader is supposed to make the mental leap that this human caused increase in co2 proves humans are causing global warming, and also the predicted disasters from global warming are on the way from it. But all of us have gone around in that circle argument so many times that those who don’t think mankind is bringing disasters to earth from their car exhaust expect proof, a deeper explanation, that co2 actually does warm the earth and that these disasters are inevitable. Otherwise we are just running over the same old tedious ground.
But I do thank Anthony for this post since this comment thread is providing plenty of good reasoning why people should question every aspect of ‘global warming’. The more the ‘science’ of manmade global warming is brought out into the light the more people will see how poor the case is.
Milwaukee Bob says:
August 5, 2010 at 3:10 pm
From all those flows very few are known to any accuracy.
Surely you jest…..?
All these flows are of not the slightest interest, as we know the balance at the end of the year: 4 GtC more sink than source. Thus without the human addition of 8 GtC/year, there would be a loss of 4 GtC in the first year.
You don’t need to know all detailed transactions of your bussiness during the day to know what your loss or profit was at the end of the day: just count what is in your cash register…