Engelbeen on why he thinks the CO2 increase is man made (part 3)

D. Patterson,
“Among the many flaws in the essay, the assumption that anthropogenic sources are the only possible explanation for increased d13Carb increases is among the fatal flaws to the argument.”
I think the article is saying that d13 is decreasing not increasing.

Roger. If methane is a “fossil fuel” and Saturn’s moon Titan is a big ball of methane it must mean one of two things.
Since the scientific concensus claims hydrocarbons are based on organic matter, and who can argue against scientific concensus, Titan was obviously a life bearing moon.

“I am left wondering who it is that says human beings are not adding CO2 to the atmosphere. That is true while at the same time adding more water vapor.
CH4 + 2O2 => 2H2O + CO2
More molecules of water are added to atmosphere by at least 2:1 and reducing O2. The real story then is that we will not be able to breath at some point in the distant future because we have burned up all the oxygen.”
Your equation was great, and then your conclusion became incredibly silly. At higher CO2 concentrations, all photosynthetic organisms photosynthesize at a higher rate, converting more CO2 BACK to O2. You have to include this equation as well.
Your conclusion assumes that there are no other chemical reactions going on than the one you listed, and that O2 is the “limiting reagent” for the equation you listed. Let me assure you that there are BIG reactions going on all of the time which counterbalance the reaction that you showed, and as such, it is HIGHLY unlikely that O2 is the limiting reagent.
Something truly bizzare would have to happen for the world to run out of Oxygen any time in the next few billion years.

When CO2 charged blood (venous blood) retention in the brain , brain begins to manufacture the most fantastic theories about CO2. Be very careful GWRS. as this condition leads to Auto-immune Illnesses.

Thanks Nylo,
I have added links to co2 http://antonuriarte.blogspot.com/ the Blog of Antón Uriarte, San Sebastián, Gipuzkoa, España.
It is good to see not all is lost in Spain!

This analysis is deeply flawed – there is not one mention of methane. One commenter touched upon it indirectly by mentioning that the analysis fails to consider bacteria. Methane is produced by bacteria, bacteria have twice the preference for carbon 12 as do plants (see the diagram in the OP showing methane at -50 compared to organic sources at -24, and methane released in the atmosphere degrades in less than a decade into CO2 and water vapor. As well, “fossil” methane exists in huge quantities as methane hydrate in both permafrost and in sea floor sediments both of which release the gas when warming occurs.
Methane concentration in the atmosphere more than doubled (715ppb in 1890 to 1732ppb in 1990) since the beginning of the industrial revolution. Interestingly the growth in atmospheric concentration has slowed significantly in the past decade.
Good article: “The Other Greenhouse Gas”
http://www.scienceline.org/2007/03/env_knight_ipcccows/
At any rate there’s an elephant in the room named “Methane” that can handily explain the decline in atmospheric C13. Why is there mention of it in the OP?
Engelbeen on manmade CO2: FAIL

“””” This adds to the evidence that fossil fuel burning is the main cause of the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere… “”””
Well Englebeen; thanks very much for a very well detailed presentation of the whole Carbon Isotope question. It is certainly the most readable and informative presentation of that subject I have ever seen; so I am going to print it out and add itto my collection of Climate related papers.
However with regard to the heading I pasted from your paper. It’s nt the first time I have seen that stated. Everybody pushing the man-made GW story says that; so I guess it must be true.
Well no it doesn’t. What you have presented does not make that case. What it does establish, is that it is quite apparent that somewhere along the line of the recent history of Atmospheric CO2 and its changes, a NEW SOURCE of carbon started to be incorporated into the total carbon cycle (short term) as a result of human burning of fossil fuels. It DOES NOT prove that that particular source of new carbon is responsible for the increased amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
Now let me make myself clear on this point. I am NOT arguing that CO2 is NO going up in the atmosphere; I am not arguing that human activities are NOT the cause of (at least some of) that increased CO2 in the atmosphere. I’m simply saying that our burning of fossil fuels is certainly releasing to the atmosphere a new source of carbon that exhibits a difefrent signature; but the isotope argument doesn’t prove that all of the increase consists of fossil fuel carbon.
We could illustrate the point by saying; suppose that we discovered in America a humungous expanse of new petroleum; that just came gushing out of every well we put down there and gave us a dirt cheap local source of super high quality petroleum that we exploited to the maximum. But this source of petroleum is weird; it contains a sizeable percentage of Argon; for unknown reasons; and so much Argon that we don’t know what to do with it; so we just let it vent off as we let the oil gush out.
We can expect that if we had been collecting data on Argon in the atmosphere all these years; that we would start to see an upturn in the amount of Argon in the atmosphere as we extracted more of this weird oil and vented the Argon.
Somebody who observed this data and knew of this particular deposit; could reasonably conjecture that we must be tapping that pool of weird oil.
Same thing with the CO2 isotope story. Yes it demonstrates that carbon from fossil fuel sources is entering the environment as a result of our use of fossil fuel deposits. It does not prove that that is the cause of the increase in atmopsheric CO2 (although that very well might be true).
Many years ago, I was involved in the deposition of epitaxial Gallium Arsenide Phosphide, onto Gallium Arsenide wafers to make LEDs. We made our own Epitaxial Reactors, and I personally designed and built a part of the reactor that handled and controlled the gas mixtures.
We would start the process, by injecting into the reactor (after a purging cycle) a stream of Hydrogen that contained a low percentage of Arsine (AsH3). This gas would percolate through a fine long capillary that was wound up inside a three litre bottle that filled with the gas, and then exited out the other end of the bottle to the reactor to grow a layer of pure GaAs on the wafers. After establishing a steady growth and growing a base layer of GaAs, the gas flow of the Arsine mixture was dropped about about 40% ans simultaneously a new source of Hydrogen replaced the missing gas; and the new source contained Phosphine (PH3) , so the total hydrogen flow rate into the capillary remained unchanged; but now the composition changed from only an Arsine additive to a 60/40 mix of AsH3/PH3; and the change was instantaneous. This mixture was injected into the capillary and thence into the three litre bottle which was already full of Hydrogen plus a 100% content of Arsine. So the reactor continued to grow a 100% gallium Arsenide epi layer; but as the new mixture was added into the three litres of hydrogen mixture, the percentage of Arsine slowly dropped, while the percentage of Phosphine slowly increased; all automatically controlled by simple gas mixing laws; with no process controlelrs needed. The changing gas mixture now started to deposit a changing composition epi layer slowly grading from 100% gaAs to a GaAs0.6P0.4 mixed crystal that made the then highest efficiency Red LEDs. The smooth grading process followed the normal exponential time constant curve dictated by the volume of the bottle and the lenght and diameter of the capillary , along with the total flow rate.
Actually, it was a bit more complicated than that, since we put three such capillary/bottles in series to give a synchronous three pole low pass filter, that changed the grading profile to a near Gaussian transition.
The final gas composition mixture entering the reactor to grow the material could have been monitored; and simply revealed how the composition slowly changed merely as a result of an instantaneous step change in starting conditions launched by doign the Arsine Phosphine switch.
Same thin is happening with the earth atmosphere; the fossil fuel content of the atmospheric carbon continues to increase; because we have continuously been using a new source of energy that contains that carbon and releasing its end product (CO2 ) to the atmosphere. The fact that the total CO2 is going up, is a quite separate issue fromt eh fact that we burn fossil fuels.
And I repeat; Iam NOT claiming that humans are not the source of the increase in CO2; I don’t know what is; It is interesting that it is just 800 years since the mediaeval warm period when the earth Temperatures were hotter than now; and 800 years seems to be the propagation delay enshrined in the paleo records of Temperature rise followed by CO2 rise 800 years later .(and fall too).
And again; thanks for the very detailed exposition; which I must digest in more detail.

Well done and clearly laid out.

The NASA map certainly puts the Kibosh on the notion that CO2 in the atmospehre is well mixed; and that appears to be a starting assumption in climate models. It clearly isn’t even approximately well mixed. To me; well mixed would eman that no matter where or when I took a sample of the atmosphere and analysed it, I would get the same composition on a molecular species (and isotopic) basis; at least within limits of differences that are of no consequence to any climate argument; and of course excluding taking a sample up somebody’s tailpipe or chimney.
One thing does puzzle me. The oceans and the atmosphere are presumably somewhat near equilibrium in the Henry’s Law sense as to the segregation of CO2 between atmosphere and ocean. And we are told that the carbon in deep water storage, is not getting out into the atmosphere. So why is it that the CO2 isotopic composition of the near surface ocean water, and the near surface atmosphere don’t match. Is somebody claiming (proof please) that the Henry’s Law Segregation at the interface is highly isotope dependent. I haven’t heard that claim made before. Why isn’t the ocean exchanging exactly the same isotopic CO2 with the atmospehre whether releasing or taking up ?