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Guest Post by Thomas Fuller
You readers here at Watts Up With That have been very kind to me during my guest-blogging stint here, and I’d like to express my thanks for the cordial reception I have found, especially since I’m well aware that my views are not really congruent with those of many viewers. You all are certainly more open-minded and accommodating than the audience at many other internet locations. (Okay, enough sucking up–get on with it!)
However, one commenter on my last post had the audacity–the sheer audacity–to criticize my writing because this is a science blog after all, and my guest posts have not been about the science. Well, touche and all that, my dear sir, but well, I’m not a scientist.
We are not really at the point where only scientists can say intelligent things about climate change.
Two reasons: First, the basics are pretty well understood. CO2 should cause about a 1.5 to 2.1 degree Celsius rise in temperatures if we double its concentration in our atmosphere. (If it doesn’t, it’s because other forces are counteracting it, not that it doesn’t exist.) This really is not very controversial at all.
Second, the controversial part of the discussion is not going to be settled any time soon. We really do not know the sensitivity of the atmosphere to a doubling of CO2 concentrations. We are not likely to know for at least 30 years–and that’s if we’re lucky, according to Judith Curry.
To offer the extreme and absurdist example, as Roger Pielke Jr. points out on his weblog, we could achieve our emission reduction goals overnight, by switching from BP’s estimate of our 2009 emissions of CO2 to the IEA’S estimates of the same. There’s quite a bit of uncertainty out there.
So, despite their protestations, climate scientists at this point have about as much ‘clout’ in deciding what we should do as anybody else. So your comments and my guest posts here are not automatically dismissable as coming from the rabble. What we write on this weblog and others should be evaluated on the merits of what we say. Of course, people who have been studying the biology, chemistry, geology and ecological interactions of this planet should be treated with quite a bit more respect, and many climate scientists got their start in one of those fields–by no means am I trying to exclude them from the conversation, just because they can’t point at a red dot on a thermometer and say ‘that’s where we’ll be in 90 years.’
It is my own belief that other things we do here on this Earth have an impact on this planet, and that we should be aware of the impacts and in some cases work to lessen them. It is a happy coincidence that lessening these other impacts may also serve to reduce the impacts of whatever climate change we may be causing with CO2.
In the past century we have gone from cultivating about 3% of the world’s land for agriculture to about 33%. And of course this has had an effect on the planet, and of course that includes this planet’s climate. It has changed the albedo of the land and it has changed the level and movement of moisture over (and around) the cultivated areas. The vertical columns of air that shape what we perceive as weather are hugely affected by this. As they are by creation of manmade reservoirs behind the 850,000 dams we have built.
We have cut down forests, and not only for agriculture. They’re recovering in the developed world, but not in the emerging nations that still need the wood for fuel and the land for space. And again, this has affected the entire ecology and that does include climate.
(Digression–with the increasing urbanisation of this planet, some of these effects will lessen. More of us will live in cities, occupying a smaller space. Technology will reduce the amount of land needed for agriculture, despite our growing population. Some things will get better–maybe a lot of things, if we work for them.)
I could go on, but the point is clear enough for you to either agree or disagree. We are changing our planet, and one poorly understood change is the composition of the atmosphere.
Had the IPCC and others been savvy enough to look at all the changes we are making instead of just focusing on the ‘flavor of the month,’ I think the science–and our options–would have been more clearly expressed and more believable.
Instead, they focused on CO2 and treated all who disagreed as the rabble I mentioned before. What they wanted was a rabble alarmed. What they got was a rabble in arms.
We Talk About Politics Because The Science Is Uncertain
You readers here at Watt’s Up With That have been very kind to me during my guest-blogging stint here, and I’d like to express my thanks for the cordial reception I have found, especially since I’m well aware that my views are not really congruent with those of many viewers. You all are certainly more open-minded and accommodating than the audience at many other internet locations. (Okay, enough sucking up–get on with it!)
However, one commenter on my last post had the audacity–the sheer audacity–to criticize my writing because this is a science blog after all, and my guest posts have not been about the science. Well, touche and all that, my dear sir, but well, I’m not a scientist.
We are not really at the point where only scientists can say intelligent things about climate change.
Two reasons: First, the basics are pretty well understood. CO2 should cause about a 1.5 to 2.1 degree Celsius rise in temperatures if we double its concentration in our atmosphere. (If it doesn’t, it’s because other forces are counteracting it, not that it doesn’t exist.) This really is not very controversial at all.
Second, the controversial part of the discussion is not going to be settled any time soon. We really do not know the sensitivity of the atmosphere to a doubling of CO2 concentrations. We are not likely to know for at least 30 years–and that’s if we’re lucky, according to Judith Curry.
To offer the extreme and absurdist example, as Roger Pielke Jr. points out on his weblog, we could achieve our emission reduction goals overnight, by switching from BP’s estimate of our 2009 emissions of CO2 to the IEA’S estimates of the same. There’s quite a bit of uncertainty out there.
So, despite their protestations, climate scientists at this point have about as much ‘clout’ in deciding what we should do as anybody else. So your comments and my guest posts here are not automatically dismissable as coming from the rabble. What we write on this weblog and others should be evaluated on the merits of what we say. Of course, people who have been studying the biology, chemistry, geology and ecological interactions of this planet should be treated with quite a bit more respect, and many climate scientists got their start in one of those fields–by no means am I trying to exclude them from the conversation, just because they can’t point at a red dot on a thermometer and say ‘that’s where we’ll be in 90 years.’
It is my own belief that other things we do here on this Earth have an impact on this planet, and that we should be aware of the impacts and in some cases work to lessen them. It is a happy coincidence that lessening these other impacts may also serve to reduce the impacts of whatever climate change we may be causing with CO2.
In the past century we have gone from cultivating about 3% of the world’s land for agriculture to about 33%. And of course this has had an effect on the planet, and of course that includes this planet’s climate. It has changed the albedo of the land and it has changed the level and movement of moisture over (and around) the cultivated areas. The vertical columns of air that shape what we perceive as weather are hugely affected by this. As they are by creation of manmade reservoirs behind the 850,000 dams we have built.
We have cut down forests, and not only for agriculture. They’re recovering in the developed world, but not in the emerging nations that still need the wood for fuel and the land for space. And again, this has affected the entire ecology and that does include climate.
(Digression–with the increasing urbanisation of this planet, some of these effects will lessen. More of us will live in cities, occupying a smaller space. Technology will reduce the amount of land needed for agriculture, despite our growing population. Some things will get better–maybe a lot of things, if we work for them.)
I could go on, but the point is clear enough for you to either agree or disagree. We are changing our planet, and one poorly understood change is the composition of the atmosphere.
Had the IPCC and others been savvy enough to look at all the changes we are making instead of just focusing on the ‘flavor of the month,’ I think the science–and our options–would have been more clearly expressed and more believable.
Instead, they focused on CO2 and treated all who disagreed as the rabble I mentioned before. What they wanted was a rabble alarmed. What they got was a rabble in arms.
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Murray
September 4, 2010 8:35 am
Tom, your error on CO2 doubling has been well addressed. However there are several other key bits. Chiefio has illustrated claerly that the apparent warming since ca 1975 is mainly an artifact of data collection and manipulation. McKittrick has estimated that the warming that has been measured as raw data is probably 50% due to UHI and other land use change. Other evidence points strongly to a solar warming influence. What we have then since ca 1975 is a reported 0.7 degrees C warming that is probably >70% due to land use change and artifacts. Of the remaining 0.2 degrees, maybe 30% is due to CO2. So CO2 going up from 320 to 380 ppm gives <0.1 degrees C warming. On a logarithmic scale doubling from 280 (so called preindustrial level) to 560 ppm might give 0.4 degrees warming. However, with CO2 continuing to increase we have no warming for the last 13 years since late 1997. Given the rate of ocean/land takeup, there is unlikely to be enough fossil fuel available to raise atmospheric concentration above 560 ppm. The IPCC gets their high warming from claimed and modelled positive feedback due mainly to water vapor. However there is no evidence for positive feedback from water vapor, and some evidence plus simple logic for negative feedback. I'm not a scientist either, just a fairly numerate engineer who likes to try to look at things holistically. It is really hard to be even a "lukewarmer" when you look at the whole picture dispassionately.
Pamela Gray
September 4, 2010 8:46 am
Most people that believe humans are destroying the planet tend to disregard (or are uneducated about) historical evidence of natural disasters, sudden blooms in flora and fauna, and equally sudden extinctions, all without significant input from humans. If you think forest land is being cleared now, you should have been around when fires roared across the face of the Earth unimpeded by human attempts to suppress.
One example, the numbers of cows currently grazing in the US equals the number of buffalo that once did the same thing. Now if the buffalo were still around in previous numbers, and we ADDED cows to grazing, we would surely be seeing land stress.
I always wonder why folks want buffalo back and for cows to go away. It wouldn’t make a tinker’s dam bit of difference in grazing affects.
Richard M
September 4, 2010 8:50 am
Tom, at least you’re getting an education here. Hopefully, you will use the facts presented to help understand the truth about climate. I believe as you increase your understanding you will be less and less middle of the road and much more skeptical.
BTW, the even 1C/doubling number is completely questionable based on Miskolczi’s work (unless you want to call that a feedback).
Curious Canuck
September 4, 2010 8:51 am
Very well stated. The public policy aspect, as Monckton so cleverly realized is as fundamental the science aspect, so he gives us Science and Public Policy. Many articles cited here are news stories, sometimes even opinion pieces, such as Terry Corcoran’s completely dismantling of Jonathon Kay at the National Post. The reason the discussion extends beyond the science is that the policies promoted by the climate scientists interact with many different aspects of everyday life. So, relevant points can be recognized by not only scientists, but lay people and people in fields related to politics, economics, commerce, statistics and many more areas. For example, it doesn’t take a Ph. D. in a recognized climate science to realize 2+2 doesn’t equal 5, nor even Mathematics for that matter. The dissenting opinion is valid regardless of the source as long as it’s clearly demonstrated.
We are an interested and discriminating readership, but we’re also a very understanding one. From what I can tell the majority of the reader’s on WUWT don’t discount information out of hand, anymore than the embrace it as fact, based on someone’s CV.
Thank you Anthony and all of WUWT for bringing us so many diverse points of view on science, the problems and benefits, as well as discussion on their implications in our lives.
John Whitman
September 4, 2010 8:51 am
Doing some bait dangling there GM?
Wrong bait. Go back to your bait collection and try again.
John
H.R.
September 4, 2010 8:53 am
GM says:
September 4, 2010 at 7:25 am “Unfortunately, the inescapable conclusion is that there isn’t much difference between the motivations and intelligence level of flat-earthers on one side and the majority of the crowd around here on the other.”
Peer reviewed cite, please? Data, plots, and references? ;o)
None? Well then ext time that, as an anonymous poster (arf! woof! woof! arf! for all we know), you state your opinions of the intelligence of a host of unknown (arf! woof! woof! arf! for all you know) posters would you mind prefacing your remarks with an “IMO”? That said, let’s you and me meet by the water bowl this evening and discuss CAGW over some kibbles and bits or the roadkill of the day.
Sweeping ad hom generalizations, presumably presented as an argument in support of your position, aren’t cutting it with this dawg.
John Q Public
September 4, 2010 8:56 am
The IPCC was never about science. It was about manipulating naive people into bringing political pressure to force governments to do the IPCC’s bidding.
The IPCC has dragged both science and the UN through the mud. Is it any wonder that there are people calling for its abandonment.
David Ball
September 4, 2010 9:11 am
Energy use and distribution affects us ALL. It is inherently political in the sense that we (in a democratic society) have the right to express our opinion on this subject. It is a part of the interface between science and politics. Unfortunately due to the vast holes in our knowledge of the climate, what we should do becomes very vague. Opinions are all over the map as to best practices. I have maintained that to prepare only for warming is a dangerous thing to do. As a person who lives in an area of weather extremes, cold is the most deadly to deal with if unprepared. The arrogance of some posters “certainty” of what is going to happen is laughable. The funniest part to me was when they tell us that “hurricanes will increase exponentially” and then there is a 5 year lull (so far) in hurricane numbers and intensity. Almost as if the statement nullified the outcome. She is a sly one that ol’ mother nature.
Doug in Seattle
September 4, 2010 9:21 am
Mr. Fuller:
Granted that humans likely have some effect on planetary processes, but with few exceptions studies of such impacts are focused almost entirely on CO2. Pielke, Sr. is a notable exception, but, if you read the CRU emails, he has been marginalized as a crank by the “mainstream” climate science establishment. This same marginalization has been applied to Hans Storch, Willie Soon, Richard Lindzen, and many other fine scientist who written and spoken the truth.
I have not seen or heard anything from the AGW luminaries that suggests this state of affairs is changing. The white washes from the three panels investigating the CRU leaks and at Pen State ignored the problem. Our National Academy even allowed the publication of a black list of skeptics this spring.
Until I see and hear something of substance from the science establishment that this type of behavior is wrong, science in general, and climate science in particular, will continue to be no better than dirty politics in my estimation – and I am a practicing scientist.
Tom,
One of my favorite quotes is from renowned Climatologist Dr. Reid Bryson. (who died in 2008)
Bryson said. “You can go outside and spit and have the same effect as doubling carbon dioxide.”
Gail Combs
September 4, 2010 9:29 am
About the statement:
In the past century we have gone from cultivating about 3% of the world’s land for agriculture to about 33%.
Ed MacAulay says:
September 4, 2010 at 4:58 am
,,,Seems a strange ratio of increase. The population for 1850 was around 1.5 billion, soon, 2011, to be 7 billion, a 5 fold increase….
________________________________________________
A bit of information on agriculture. “1850 – About 75-90 labor-hours required to produce 100 bushels of corn (2-1/2 acres) with walking plow, harrow, and hand planting
1987 – 2-3/4 labor-hours required to produce 100 bushels (1-1/8 acres) of corn with tractor”
From: http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blfarm1.htm
Seems the 3% to 33% increase is a bit off. It looks like someone multiplied by 2 instead of dividing when doing the back of the envelope calculation.
Charles Higley
September 4, 2010 9:30 am
One of our current problems is that some of the ideas being applied to “fix”global warming are themselves doing real, current damage.
The biofuels industry is just plain wrong. It is clear that it does not work and represents a net loss of money and energy by the time the fuel is produced.
What the industry has done, which is just what the ecofreaks want, is to drive up the cost of food such that there are food shortages in poor countries and the resulting starvation and unrest. This goes directly to their agenda for slowing down or decreasing world population growth as well as to create the unrest that can lead to a call for a world government.
Subsidies for biofuels should be terminated and the programs cancelled. It is simply stupid to commandeer food to make fuel or to displace food crops for “fuel” crops.
We cannot assume that the programs created to fight “climate change” do not have ulterior motives in line with a political agenda.
Dr. Dave
September 4, 2010 9:30 am
I’m still hung up on that 1.5-2.1 deg C increase due to a doubling of CO2. I guess I’ll have to go back and recheck my references, but I seem to recall Singer, Michaels, Spencer and Lindzen all quoting a theoretical increase of 1 deg C (+/- 0.2 deg C). I believe Michaels even described the math in detail and suggested it can be simulated in the laboratory. No one knows if it holds true in the open atmosphere, but in theory each doubling should yield about 1 deg C of warming. So once we hit 550 ppm we would have to increase to 1,100 ppm to squeeze out another degree of warming from CO2.
Recently Sprencer has predicted only 0.6 deg C from a doubling of CO2 by the year 2100. I suspect heretofore uncharacterized feedback systems may negate most of this or natural variability will utterly eclipse the signal.
So…as long as we’re raising a herd of unicorns with the wonders of modern urbanization and growing limitless crops on a sand lot, why should we presume that mankind will be producing and using energy the same way as we do today 90 years from now? We had airplanes in 1920 but I’m pretty sure no one at that time worried about airport congestion in the year 2010. If you want a cleaner planet provide electricity to the 1/3 of the population who has no access.
rbateman
September 4, 2010 9:31 am
I am of the opinion that man is able to alter the climate, but only the aspect of where it vents itself, not how much.
Man does not build immovable objects, for the very ground built upon is subject to mass-alteration by the climate, and therefore man is not capable of opposing the irresistable force of climate.
For that reason alone, talk of permanent change in climate due to man is a reality measured only in a few lifetimes.
500 to 1,000 yrs after collapse of civilization, the climate will have managed to obliterate most change man has imposed.
So, if man makes too much alteration in one place, natural climate will eventually cauterize the wound by means of brute force.
The Planet will save itself. Not so mankind.
John Whitman
September 4, 2010 9:31 am
My new JW self-imposed policy statement: I will no longer use the trite stereotyped fashionable empty-content terms:
Luke-warmer
Warmist
Warmista
Skeptic (sceptic for you British)
Denier
Consensus
The list goes on ad museum.
If you see me using any of them, please call me on it.
John
Tenuc
September 4, 2010 9:32 am
Thomas Fuller says:- “Instead, they focused on CO2 and treated all who disagreed as the rabble I mentioned before. What they wanted was a rabble alarmed. What they got was a rabble in arms.”
Yes, the plan was that everyone in the world would agree that the coming apocalypse could only be solved by controlling global CO2, which would require a world government – see UN Agenda21 which puts in place the first steps – http://www.un.org/esa/dsd/agenda21/
However, few people believed in the alarmist scare of CAGW, and as time goes on the proportion of non-believers grews bigger and bigger – fuelled by the hockey stick lies, the Climategate revelations and the IPCC misleadingAR4. What was planned to unite us has now become divisive, with a few believers and a large group who smell a scam!
Time for the global governance brigade to go into damage limitation mode. It’s difficult as most people no longer believe the propaganda served up by the MSM. Science itself can no longer be trusted, rather it is seen by many as some strange cargo cult religion, where belief comes before facts, unfalsifiable theories are seen as consensus gospel and computer models are given more credence than observation.
It will be interesting to see what those seeking global power will throw at us next. I’m sure the plan is in place, so we all need to be alert and ready to nip it in the bud. Pareto analysis tells us they have to have 80% acceptance from the people of the globe for a world government to have a chance of long term success. Without this high level of support human conflict will continue and they are very aware that we are many, but they are few. Apply critical thinking to everything you read, and shout loud and long if you smell a rat!
Gnomish
September 4, 2010 9:37 am
I’m about sick of the CO2 fetishism. I’m truly sick of the fetishists.
By Avogadro, the ideal gas constant has the same value for all gases, so PVT = PVT regardless of the molecule.
1 mole of gas molecules, any kind = 24.45 litres at 298K ( 24.85C, 76.7F) and 101.325 kPa (14.696 psi, 1 atm)
In 1000 liters of air, at STP there are 1000/24.45 = 40.9 moles. As in a previous illustration, let the water component be 1% = 10 liters = 4.09 moles. It doesn’t matter what the other gases are for this.
At the critical temperature of water vapor, this 10 liters condenses and occupies 4.09 * 18g * 1g/cc = 736.20 cc.
So the 1000 liters of air would now be 990.74 liters.
Insofar as PVT = PVT for gases, if the pressure alone changes, it means (using 24.85C and 1 atm)
PVT start is 14.696 psi*1000*(24.85C+273.15K)
final P is
14.696 psi*0.990.74, or 1% pressure drop
To get a 1% pressure drop by changing the temperature alone you need to do from 298 to 292.04 = 5.96 degrees. http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/4959/hadleypump.jpg http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/spesific-heat-capacity-gases-d_159.html
Gas or Vapor kJ/kg
Air 0.287
Carbon dioxide 0.189
Water Vapor 0.462
Steam 1 psia.
120 – 600 oF
That’s what it takes to change the temperature 1 degree K.
When CO2 changes from 1 to -1 C, a change of 2 degrees C, it radiates 2(0.189 kJ/kg) = 0.378 . http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enthalpy_of_vaporization
When water vapor changes from 1 to -1 (and condenses) it radiates 2257 kj/kg + 2(0.462 kJ/kg) = 2257.853776 kJ/kg.
It does this every single time you see a cloud.
But CO2 has no phase change so it carries no heat – the numbers:
All gases at the same temperature have the same number of molecules per unit volume. (Avogadro)
Water, being light, masses 18g/mole and CO2 masses 44 g/mole
Using 1 mole of air, just to make math easy:
We lowball the water in the atmosphere at 1% of the molecules
So, in a mole of atmosphere, we have 0.01 moles of water = 0.18g
now we highball the CO2 at 500ppm which is 0.0005, or 1/2000 of a mole of CO2.
1/2000 * 44g/mole = 0.000484 moles of CO2 = 0.021296g
So in our mole of air with but 1% H2O and a generous 500ppm CO2-
the water condensing radiates 0.18g * 2257.853776 kJ/kg = 406.41367968 J
while the CO2 radiates 0.021296g * 0.378 kJ/kg = 0.008049888 J
the ratio of 0.008049888/406.41367968 = .00001980712855516645290496438242332
or as much to say that water vapor in the example carries 50486.873814890343815963650674393 times more heat than the CO2 does.
And that’s just rain. If it turns to snow- multiply by 5-6.
Meanwhile, Venus is a ball of active volcanoes with a dry heat pump to radiate it poorly.
That is why Earth’s climate doesn’t resemble that of Venus.
Forget about CO2.
All things radiate as blackbodies (or maybe a bit grayish) and noting that while water does not change temperature as it changes phase, it radiates many hundreds of times more energy in the process than any other gas.
Therefore, the blackbody spectrum may not change a whit, but –
There are a number of things that water gas does which are scarcely mentioned. It seems to be considered nothing but a personal assistant to CO2.
However there are many things that water does which define the atmosphere, the lapse rate and the thermal equilibrium.
In the first place, it evaporates. When it does, 3.7 teaspoons of liquid becomes one liter of gas. This happens without temperature change. No change occurs in the black body spectrum.
The expansion increases the local pressure above what a dry gas can under the same conditions.
At the same time, water is much lighter than any other gas in our atmosphere (except the traces of He and H), , massing a measly 18g/mole – so it rises straight up, shifted by coriolis effect as it billows wider and wider.
When it finally condenses, at the same temperature as the surrounding gas, it radiates the one spectrum throughout its phase change, indicating no higher temperature while it radiates 406.41367968 J and changes back to 3.7 teaspoons from (a bit less than, now) a liter of gas, producing a local low pressure drop of 1% that draws the atmosphere below up to fill it. (To get a 1% pressure drop by changing the temperature in a dry gas you need to do from 298 to 292.04 = 5.96 degrees.)
If water is but one percent of the volume, (using a sample volume of 100 liters that started at STP) the constituents would radiate their share as well, depending on the specific heat-
um… well, the other gases don’t radiate any more than they gain from below or sideways, or the temperature would actually drop- but for a one degree drop:
N2 (89.3g = 78%) 1.039 kJ/kg = 92.J
O2 (13.1g= 20%) 0.915 kJ/kg = 12.0J
CO2 (0.02g = 500ppm) 0.189 = 0.008J
H2O (18g = 1%) 0.462 kJ/kg = 406.41367968J
Water does more work than everything else combined – without changing its blackbody spectrum.
(Compared to the CO2, water moves 50,000 times more energy from surface to space but CO2 does its tiny part to cool the planet, too.)
Joel Shore
September 4, 2010 9:38 am
Gail Combs says:
Orthodox climate scientists assume “early anthropogenic greenhouse gas emission prevented the inception of a glacial that would otherwise already have started…
No…Ruddiman’s view is only a hypothesis. Climate scientists have found it interesting but I don’t think most of them have yet been convinced by it. For one thing, it would tend to imply a climate sensitivity at the high end of the IPCC estimates or higher. For another, there are other perfectly valid reasons for expecting that this interglacial would be longer-lived than the average interglacial (I believe the main reason being the small eccentricity of the earth’s orbit around the sun at this point…and analogies to the last interglacial ~400k years ago when this was similarly the case).
The biggest problem with CAGW theory, is it assumes no changes in the energy from the sun as received by the earth.
No. It doesn’t assume that. In fact, solar effects are believed to be responsible for some of the early 20th century warming…although there is still disagreement about exactly how much. A problem is that the changes in solar output are just too small to explain the warming that we’ve seen (in the absence of some positive feedback that selectively enhances only the solar forcing), and this is becoming only truer still as the estimates of the magnitude in 20th century variation in solar output are now lower than they were no too long ago (as Leif has talked about). Another problem is that the warming that we have seen does not show the right pattern either in space or time to be explained by solar variation. (I.e., the warming that has occurred over the last ~35 years has come at a time when solar has not increased and the warming has been accompanied by a significant cooling of the stratosphere, which is not what would be expected for the solar forcing but is expected for a greenhouse gas forcing.)
Those who advocate solar forcing as explaining the warming are in the double bind of having to explain both why the solar forcing ends up being selectively enhanced by positive feedbacks and why the known greenhouse gas forcing ends up being suppressed by negative feedbacks.
Mike Patrick
September 4, 2010 9:40 am
I am confused. First, the world’s temperature changes due to unpredictable chaotic climate change. Then, after an appreciable time lag (500 to 800 years), the atmospheric CO2 starts to fluctuate up or down to follow the climatic temperature change. CO2 causes increased growth in plants when it goes up. Doing all we can to reduce CO2 serves what positive purpose?
Barry Moore
September 4, 2010 9:41 am
In general quite a useful post there are many aspects to how humans have influenced our climate certainly soot, fly ash, land use change has had an effect. The urban heat island has effected the statistics more than the actual temperature. I agree with others the 3% to 33% statistic is a bit misleading especially since the land is only 29% of the earth’s surface and is that the percentage of the total possible arable land or the entire 29%?. Because by the time you consider the Antarctic continent, northern Canada, Siberia, the Australian outback, the Sahara etc it seems a little high.
I must take issue with the assumption of the increase in temperature with a doubling of CO2. This prediction is based on empirical data and includes related effects such as increased forcing by increased water vapour in the atmosphere so it is virtually impossible to separate out just the CO2 effect, this is the sort of misinformation which the IPCC are very prone to.
Many papers have been written by eminent Physicists mathematically analyzing the effect of CO2 in strict accordance with the laws of physics. All reach the conclusion that the effect of CO2 is saturated and no longer has any impact on temperatures. The IPCC have produced 4 reports and have not included a single paper by a physicist proving the greenhouse gas effect as described by the IPCC.
I believe that if such a paper existed it would be trumpeted front and center by the IPCC, their deafening silence on this issue speaks for itself.
Joel Shore says:
Even if you believe that there is a vast conspiracy among the nearly 20 groups that have developed these models that has hidden this fact, you could still have expected one of the skeptics to have used one of the publicly-available models like NASA GISS Model E to demonstrate this. And yet, this hasn’t happened.
______________
Joel,
Thanks for this interesting defence of the climate models. How do the models deal with C02? I seem to recall an article by Lintzen or someone that showed the models introducing a significant positive effect of increasing C02. Every model used a slightly different figure for it… I think that was one of his complaints, but they all ratcheted up the future temperature by that process. Isn’t that all it takes to effect a “conspiracy” or at least a consensus?
Joel Shore
September 4, 2010 9:49 am
David Ball says:
The funniest part to me was when they tell us that “hurricanes will increase exponentially” and then there is a 5 year lull (so far) in hurricane numbers and intensity.
Could you familiarize me with where that statement “hurricanes will increase exponentially” comes from? Because all of what I heard were predictions that the intensity is likely to increase somewhat but that it is unclear what would happen to total numbers. (I could quote the relevant statements from IPCC AR4 but it is easy enough for you to look them up yourself.)
Furthermore, nobody ever said that this change would be so dramatic that it would swamp the significant variability that occurs year-to-year or even decade-to-decade. So basically, you have just knocked down a total strawman. Yesterday, I could just as easily said, “The weather service claims that because of the seasonal cycle, temperatures should be dropping significantly over the next few months…and yet it has been warmer in Rochester this week than it was for most of the last few months.” (I say “yesterday” because today we have finally gotten a break in our late summer heat wave.)
Dave Worley
September 4, 2010 9:51 am
If agriculture is killing us then the situation will take care of itself.
Tom, your error on CO2 doubling has been well addressed. However there are several other key bits. Chiefio has illustrated claerly that the apparent warming since ca 1975 is mainly an artifact of data collection and manipulation. McKittrick has estimated that the warming that has been measured as raw data is probably 50% due to UHI and other land use change. Other evidence points strongly to a solar warming influence. What we have then since ca 1975 is a reported 0.7 degrees C warming that is probably >70% due to land use change and artifacts. Of the remaining 0.2 degrees, maybe 30% is due to CO2. So CO2 going up from 320 to 380 ppm gives <0.1 degrees C warming. On a logarithmic scale doubling from 280 (so called preindustrial level) to 560 ppm might give 0.4 degrees warming. However, with CO2 continuing to increase we have no warming for the last 13 years since late 1997. Given the rate of ocean/land takeup, there is unlikely to be enough fossil fuel available to raise atmospheric concentration above 560 ppm. The IPCC gets their high warming from claimed and modelled positive feedback due mainly to water vapor. However there is no evidence for positive feedback from water vapor, and some evidence plus simple logic for negative feedback. I'm not a scientist either, just a fairly numerate engineer who likes to try to look at things holistically. It is really hard to be even a "lukewarmer" when you look at the whole picture dispassionately.
Most people that believe humans are destroying the planet tend to disregard (or are uneducated about) historical evidence of natural disasters, sudden blooms in flora and fauna, and equally sudden extinctions, all without significant input from humans. If you think forest land is being cleared now, you should have been around when fires roared across the face of the Earth unimpeded by human attempts to suppress.
One example, the numbers of cows currently grazing in the US equals the number of buffalo that once did the same thing. Now if the buffalo were still around in previous numbers, and we ADDED cows to grazing, we would surely be seeing land stress.
I always wonder why folks want buffalo back and for cows to go away. It wouldn’t make a tinker’s dam bit of difference in grazing affects.
Tom, at least you’re getting an education here. Hopefully, you will use the facts presented to help understand the truth about climate. I believe as you increase your understanding you will be less and less middle of the road and much more skeptical.
BTW, the even 1C/doubling number is completely questionable based on Miskolczi’s work (unless you want to call that a feedback).
Very well stated. The public policy aspect, as Monckton so cleverly realized is as fundamental the science aspect, so he gives us Science and Public Policy. Many articles cited here are news stories, sometimes even opinion pieces, such as Terry Corcoran’s completely dismantling of Jonathon Kay at the National Post. The reason the discussion extends beyond the science is that the policies promoted by the climate scientists interact with many different aspects of everyday life. So, relevant points can be recognized by not only scientists, but lay people and people in fields related to politics, economics, commerce, statistics and many more areas. For example, it doesn’t take a Ph. D. in a recognized climate science to realize 2+2 doesn’t equal 5, nor even Mathematics for that matter. The dissenting opinion is valid regardless of the source as long as it’s clearly demonstrated.
We are an interested and discriminating readership, but we’re also a very understanding one. From what I can tell the majority of the reader’s on WUWT don’t discount information out of hand, anymore than the embrace it as fact, based on someone’s CV.
Thank you Anthony and all of WUWT for bringing us so many diverse points of view on science, the problems and benefits, as well as discussion on their implications in our lives.
Doing some bait dangling there GM?
Wrong bait. Go back to your bait collection and try again.
John
GM says:
September 4, 2010 at 7:25 am
“Unfortunately, the inescapable conclusion is that there isn’t much difference between the motivations and intelligence level of flat-earthers on one side and the majority of the crowd around here on the other.”
Peer reviewed cite, please? Data, plots, and references? ;o)
None? Well then ext time that, as an anonymous poster (arf! woof! woof! arf! for all we know), you state your opinions of the intelligence of a host of unknown (arf! woof! woof! arf! for all you know) posters would you mind prefacing your remarks with an “IMO”? That said, let’s you and me meet by the water bowl this evening and discuss CAGW over some kibbles and bits or the roadkill of the day.
Sweeping ad hom generalizations, presumably presented as an argument in support of your position, aren’t cutting it with this dawg.
The IPCC was never about science. It was about manipulating naive people into bringing political pressure to force governments to do the IPCC’s bidding.
The IPCC has dragged both science and the UN through the mud. Is it any wonder that there are people calling for its abandonment.
Energy use and distribution affects us ALL. It is inherently political in the sense that we (in a democratic society) have the right to express our opinion on this subject. It is a part of the interface between science and politics. Unfortunately due to the vast holes in our knowledge of the climate, what we should do becomes very vague. Opinions are all over the map as to best practices. I have maintained that to prepare only for warming is a dangerous thing to do. As a person who lives in an area of weather extremes, cold is the most deadly to deal with if unprepared. The arrogance of some posters “certainty” of what is going to happen is laughable. The funniest part to me was when they tell us that “hurricanes will increase exponentially” and then there is a 5 year lull (so far) in hurricane numbers and intensity. Almost as if the statement nullified the outcome. She is a sly one that ol’ mother nature.
Mr. Fuller:
Granted that humans likely have some effect on planetary processes, but with few exceptions studies of such impacts are focused almost entirely on CO2. Pielke, Sr. is a notable exception, but, if you read the CRU emails, he has been marginalized as a crank by the “mainstream” climate science establishment. This same marginalization has been applied to Hans Storch, Willie Soon, Richard Lindzen, and many other fine scientist who written and spoken the truth.
I have not seen or heard anything from the AGW luminaries that suggests this state of affairs is changing. The white washes from the three panels investigating the CRU leaks and at Pen State ignored the problem. Our National Academy even allowed the publication of a black list of skeptics this spring.
Until I see and hear something of substance from the science establishment that this type of behavior is wrong, science in general, and climate science in particular, will continue to be no better than dirty politics in my estimation – and I am a practicing scientist.
Tom,
One of my favorite quotes is from renowned Climatologist Dr. Reid Bryson. (who died in 2008)
Bryson said. “You can go outside and spit and have the same effect as doubling carbon dioxide.”
About the statement:
In the past century we have gone from cultivating about 3% of the world’s land for agriculture to about 33%.
Ed MacAulay says:
September 4, 2010 at 4:58 am
,,,Seems a strange ratio of increase. The population for 1850 was around 1.5 billion, soon, 2011, to be 7 billion, a 5 fold increase….
________________________________________________
A bit of information on agriculture.
“1850 – About 75-90 labor-hours required to produce 100 bushels of corn (2-1/2 acres) with walking plow, harrow, and hand planting
1987 – 2-3/4 labor-hours required to produce 100 bushels (1-1/8 acres) of corn with tractor”
From: http://inventors.about.com/library/inventors/blfarm1.htm
Seems the 3% to 33% increase is a bit off. It looks like someone multiplied by 2 instead of dividing when doing the back of the envelope calculation.
One of our current problems is that some of the ideas being applied to “fix”global warming are themselves doing real, current damage.
The biofuels industry is just plain wrong. It is clear that it does not work and represents a net loss of money and energy by the time the fuel is produced.
What the industry has done, which is just what the ecofreaks want, is to drive up the cost of food such that there are food shortages in poor countries and the resulting starvation and unrest. This goes directly to their agenda for slowing down or decreasing world population growth as well as to create the unrest that can lead to a call for a world government.
Subsidies for biofuels should be terminated and the programs cancelled. It is simply stupid to commandeer food to make fuel or to displace food crops for “fuel” crops.
We cannot assume that the programs created to fight “climate change” do not have ulterior motives in line with a political agenda.
I’m still hung up on that 1.5-2.1 deg C increase due to a doubling of CO2. I guess I’ll have to go back and recheck my references, but I seem to recall Singer, Michaels, Spencer and Lindzen all quoting a theoretical increase of 1 deg C (+/- 0.2 deg C). I believe Michaels even described the math in detail and suggested it can be simulated in the laboratory. No one knows if it holds true in the open atmosphere, but in theory each doubling should yield about 1 deg C of warming. So once we hit 550 ppm we would have to increase to 1,100 ppm to squeeze out another degree of warming from CO2.
Recently Sprencer has predicted only 0.6 deg C from a doubling of CO2 by the year 2100. I suspect heretofore uncharacterized feedback systems may negate most of this or natural variability will utterly eclipse the signal.
So…as long as we’re raising a herd of unicorns with the wonders of modern urbanization and growing limitless crops on a sand lot, why should we presume that mankind will be producing and using energy the same way as we do today 90 years from now? We had airplanes in 1920 but I’m pretty sure no one at that time worried about airport congestion in the year 2010. If you want a cleaner planet provide electricity to the 1/3 of the population who has no access.
I am of the opinion that man is able to alter the climate, but only the aspect of where it vents itself, not how much.
Man does not build immovable objects, for the very ground built upon is subject to mass-alteration by the climate, and therefore man is not capable of opposing the irresistable force of climate.
For that reason alone, talk of permanent change in climate due to man is a reality measured only in a few lifetimes.
500 to 1,000 yrs after collapse of civilization, the climate will have managed to obliterate most change man has imposed.
So, if man makes too much alteration in one place, natural climate will eventually cauterize the wound by means of brute force.
The Planet will save itself. Not so mankind.
My new JW self-imposed policy statement: I will no longer use the trite stereotyped fashionable empty-content terms:
Luke-warmer
Warmist
Warmista
Skeptic (sceptic for you British)
Denier
Consensus
The list goes on ad museum.
If you see me using any of them, please call me on it.
John
Thomas Fuller says:- “Instead, they focused on CO2 and treated all who disagreed as the rabble I mentioned before. What they wanted was a rabble alarmed. What they got was a rabble in arms.”
Yes, the plan was that everyone in the world would agree that the coming apocalypse could only be solved by controlling global CO2, which would require a world government – see UN Agenda21 which puts in place the first steps – http://www.un.org/esa/dsd/agenda21/
However, few people believed in the alarmist scare of CAGW, and as time goes on the proportion of non-believers grews bigger and bigger – fuelled by the hockey stick lies, the Climategate revelations and the IPCC misleadingAR4. What was planned to unite us has now become divisive, with a few believers and a large group who smell a scam!
Time for the global governance brigade to go into damage limitation mode. It’s difficult as most people no longer believe the propaganda served up by the MSM. Science itself can no longer be trusted, rather it is seen by many as some strange cargo cult religion, where belief comes before facts, unfalsifiable theories are seen as consensus gospel and computer models are given more credence than observation.
It will be interesting to see what those seeking global power will throw at us next. I’m sure the plan is in place, so we all need to be alert and ready to nip it in the bud. Pareto analysis tells us they have to have 80% acceptance from the people of the globe for a world government to have a chance of long term success. Without this high level of support human conflict will continue and they are very aware that we are many, but they are few. Apply critical thinking to everything you read, and shout loud and long if you smell a rat!
I’m about sick of the CO2 fetishism. I’m truly sick of the fetishists.
By Avogadro, the ideal gas constant has the same value for all gases, so PVT = PVT regardless of the molecule.
1 mole of gas molecules, any kind = 24.45 litres at 298K ( 24.85C, 76.7F) and 101.325 kPa (14.696 psi, 1 atm)
In 1000 liters of air, at STP there are 1000/24.45 = 40.9 moles. As in a previous illustration, let the water component be 1% = 10 liters = 4.09 moles. It doesn’t matter what the other gases are for this.
At the critical temperature of water vapor, this 10 liters condenses and occupies 4.09 * 18g * 1g/cc = 736.20 cc.
So the 1000 liters of air would now be 990.74 liters.
Insofar as PVT = PVT for gases, if the pressure alone changes, it means (using 24.85C and 1 atm)
PVT start is 14.696 psi*1000*(24.85C+273.15K)
final P is
14.696 psi*0.990.74, or 1% pressure drop
To get a 1% pressure drop by changing the temperature alone you need to do from 298 to 292.04 = 5.96 degrees.
http://img534.imageshack.us/img534/4959/hadleypump.jpg
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/spesific-heat-capacity-gases-d_159.html
Gas or Vapor kJ/kg
Air 0.287
Carbon dioxide 0.189
Water Vapor 0.462
Steam 1 psia.
120 – 600 oF
That’s what it takes to change the temperature 1 degree K.
When CO2 changes from 1 to -1 C, a change of 2 degrees C, it radiates 2(0.189 kJ/kg) = 0.378 .
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Enthalpy_of_vaporization
When water vapor changes from 1 to -1 (and condenses) it radiates 2257 kj/kg + 2(0.462 kJ/kg) = 2257.853776 kJ/kg.
It does this every single time you see a cloud.
But CO2 has no phase change so it carries no heat – the numbers:
All gases at the same temperature have the same number of molecules per unit volume. (Avogadro)
Water, being light, masses 18g/mole and CO2 masses 44 g/mole
Using 1 mole of air, just to make math easy:
We lowball the water in the atmosphere at 1% of the molecules
So, in a mole of atmosphere, we have 0.01 moles of water = 0.18g
now we highball the CO2 at 500ppm which is 0.0005, or 1/2000 of a mole of CO2.
1/2000 * 44g/mole = 0.000484 moles of CO2 = 0.021296g
So in our mole of air with but 1% H2O and a generous 500ppm CO2-
the water condensing radiates 0.18g * 2257.853776 kJ/kg = 406.41367968 J
while the CO2 radiates 0.021296g * 0.378 kJ/kg = 0.008049888 J
the ratio of 0.008049888/406.41367968 = .00001980712855516645290496438242332
or as much to say that water vapor in the example carries 50486.873814890343815963650674393 times more heat than the CO2 does.
And that’s just rain. If it turns to snow- multiply by 5-6.
Meanwhile, Venus is a ball of active volcanoes with a dry heat pump to radiate it poorly.
That is why Earth’s climate doesn’t resemble that of Venus.
Forget about CO2.
All things radiate as blackbodies (or maybe a bit grayish) and noting that while water does not change temperature as it changes phase, it radiates many hundreds of times more energy in the process than any other gas.
Therefore, the blackbody spectrum may not change a whit, but –
There are a number of things that water gas does which are scarcely mentioned. It seems to be considered nothing but a personal assistant to CO2.
However there are many things that water does which define the atmosphere, the lapse rate and the thermal equilibrium.
In the first place, it evaporates. When it does, 3.7 teaspoons of liquid becomes one liter of gas. This happens without temperature change. No change occurs in the black body spectrum.
The expansion increases the local pressure above what a dry gas can under the same conditions.
At the same time, water is much lighter than any other gas in our atmosphere (except the traces of He and H), , massing a measly 18g/mole – so it rises straight up, shifted by coriolis effect as it billows wider and wider.
When it finally condenses, at the same temperature as the surrounding gas, it radiates the one spectrum throughout its phase change, indicating no higher temperature while it radiates 406.41367968 J and changes back to 3.7 teaspoons from (a bit less than, now) a liter of gas, producing a local low pressure drop of 1% that draws the atmosphere below up to fill it. (To get a 1% pressure drop by changing the temperature in a dry gas you need to do from 298 to 292.04 = 5.96 degrees.)
If water is but one percent of the volume, (using a sample volume of 100 liters that started at STP) the constituents would radiate their share as well, depending on the specific heat-
um… well, the other gases don’t radiate any more than they gain from below or sideways, or the temperature would actually drop- but for a one degree drop:
N2 (89.3g = 78%) 1.039 kJ/kg = 92.J
O2 (13.1g= 20%) 0.915 kJ/kg = 12.0J
CO2 (0.02g = 500ppm) 0.189 = 0.008J
H2O (18g = 1%) 0.462 kJ/kg = 406.41367968J
Water does more work than everything else combined – without changing its blackbody spectrum.
(Compared to the CO2, water moves 50,000 times more energy from surface to space but CO2 does its tiny part to cool the planet, too.)
Gail Combs says:
No…Ruddiman’s view is only a hypothesis. Climate scientists have found it interesting but I don’t think most of them have yet been convinced by it. For one thing, it would tend to imply a climate sensitivity at the high end of the IPCC estimates or higher. For another, there are other perfectly valid reasons for expecting that this interglacial would be longer-lived than the average interglacial (I believe the main reason being the small eccentricity of the earth’s orbit around the sun at this point…and analogies to the last interglacial ~400k years ago when this was similarly the case).
No. It doesn’t assume that. In fact, solar effects are believed to be responsible for some of the early 20th century warming…although there is still disagreement about exactly how much. A problem is that the changes in solar output are just too small to explain the warming that we’ve seen (in the absence of some positive feedback that selectively enhances only the solar forcing), and this is becoming only truer still as the estimates of the magnitude in 20th century variation in solar output are now lower than they were no too long ago (as Leif has talked about). Another problem is that the warming that we have seen does not show the right pattern either in space or time to be explained by solar variation. (I.e., the warming that has occurred over the last ~35 years has come at a time when solar has not increased and the warming has been accompanied by a significant cooling of the stratosphere, which is not what would be expected for the solar forcing but is expected for a greenhouse gas forcing.)
Those who advocate solar forcing as explaining the warming are in the double bind of having to explain both why the solar forcing ends up being selectively enhanced by positive feedbacks and why the known greenhouse gas forcing ends up being suppressed by negative feedbacks.
I am confused. First, the world’s temperature changes due to unpredictable chaotic climate change. Then, after an appreciable time lag (500 to 800 years), the atmospheric CO2 starts to fluctuate up or down to follow the climatic temperature change. CO2 causes increased growth in plants when it goes up. Doing all we can to reduce CO2 serves what positive purpose?
In general quite a useful post there are many aspects to how humans have influenced our climate certainly soot, fly ash, land use change has had an effect. The urban heat island has effected the statistics more than the actual temperature. I agree with others the 3% to 33% statistic is a bit misleading especially since the land is only 29% of the earth’s surface and is that the percentage of the total possible arable land or the entire 29%?. Because by the time you consider the Antarctic continent, northern Canada, Siberia, the Australian outback, the Sahara etc it seems a little high.
I must take issue with the assumption of the increase in temperature with a doubling of CO2. This prediction is based on empirical data and includes related effects such as increased forcing by increased water vapour in the atmosphere so it is virtually impossible to separate out just the CO2 effect, this is the sort of misinformation which the IPCC are very prone to.
Many papers have been written by eminent Physicists mathematically analyzing the effect of CO2 in strict accordance with the laws of physics. All reach the conclusion that the effect of CO2 is saturated and no longer has any impact on temperatures. The IPCC have produced 4 reports and have not included a single paper by a physicist proving the greenhouse gas effect as described by the IPCC.
I believe that if such a paper existed it would be trumpeted front and center by the IPCC, their deafening silence on this issue speaks for itself.
OssQss says:
September 4, 2010 at 5:34 am
It is interesting that few link the IPCC CO2 initiative to the larger UN Agenda 21 initiative….
____________________________________________________
Several of us have.
Start at comment
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/06/sustainability-teaching-lack-of-ethical-dimension/#comment-424114
and skip to comment
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/06/sustainability-teaching-lack-of-ethical-dimension/#comment-424598
and read from there. Actually read the whole article plus comments.
Mr. Fuller, please take a look at this pdf. It may cool your lukewarmishness.
http://rps3.com/Files/AGW/EngrCritique.AGW-Science.v4.pdf
Joel Shore says:
Even if you believe that there is a vast conspiracy among the nearly 20 groups that have developed these models that has hidden this fact, you could still have expected one of the skeptics to have used one of the publicly-available models like NASA GISS Model E to demonstrate this. And yet, this hasn’t happened.
______________
Joel,
Thanks for this interesting defence of the climate models. How do the models deal with C02? I seem to recall an article by Lintzen or someone that showed the models introducing a significant positive effect of increasing C02. Every model used a slightly different figure for it… I think that was one of his complaints, but they all ratcheted up the future temperature by that process. Isn’t that all it takes to effect a “conspiracy” or at least a consensus?
David Ball says:
Could you familiarize me with where that statement “hurricanes will increase exponentially” comes from? Because all of what I heard were predictions that the intensity is likely to increase somewhat but that it is unclear what would happen to total numbers. (I could quote the relevant statements from IPCC AR4 but it is easy enough for you to look them up yourself.)
Furthermore, nobody ever said that this change would be so dramatic that it would swamp the significant variability that occurs year-to-year or even decade-to-decade. So basically, you have just knocked down a total strawman. Yesterday, I could just as easily said, “The weather service claims that because of the seasonal cycle, temperatures should be dropping significantly over the next few months…and yet it has been warmer in Rochester this week than it was for most of the last few months.” (I say “yesterday” because today we have finally gotten a break in our late summer heat wave.)
If agriculture is killing us then the situation will take care of itself.