Guest post by Thomas Fuller
Before I start, I’d like to remind readers that as a guest poster, the opinions I voice here are not those of Anthony Watts, and should not be taken as having been endorsed by Watts Up With That.
I am going to propose an idea based on my position as a Lukewarmer regarding climate change. I fully expect to get a lot of criticism from commenters here, and I welcome it. My idea is new (at least to me), and if it is a good idea it will be sharpened by your criticism–and of course, if it is rubbish, best to know quickly, right?
I think the debate on climate change needs some new ideas and criticism too. So blast away–but please bring your A game. I neither need nor want to see the equivalent of ‘you suck, dude.’
Families, businesses and yes, even governments, need to make plans for the future. Those plans used to include assumptions about the physical environment, although most of those assumptions were passive acceptance of the status quo. However, it is now difficult to make assumptions because various theories of climate change and its effects have people wondering if their homes will be threatened by sea level rise, drought, hurricanes or floods.
Because of the competing number of possible futures (the IPCC has many scenarios and many more have been pulled from the science fiction rack and offered up to us), people are somewhat paralyzed by too many choices. I think it is time to recognize that all of use engaged in the debate about climate change are not doing the rest of the world any favors. We are making their life more difficult because they cannot make plans with any confidence.
If there is one dataset that I trust regarding the Earth’s climate, it is the measurement of atmospheric concentrations of CO2. It has been freely available for examination, it is replicated by measurements in more than one site, and in my mind survived criticism from people such as the late Ernst Beck. I trust the numbers.
The numbers show that concentrations of CO2 were 315 ppm in 1958, when Mauna Loa started measuring. Concentrations now are 390 ppm. That is a rise of 19%. The central question in climate change is, ‘What is the sensitivity of the earth’s atmosphere to a doubling of the concentrations of CO2?’ Is the atmosphere easily influenced by CO2, producing more water vapor and adding to temperature rise, or is the atmosphere largely indifferent? Despite protestations from both sides, the honest answer is we don’t know now, and we are not likely to know for another 30 years.
Temperatures appear to have risen globally, although the accuracy of the data is not yet fully determined. The rise since 1958 appears to be about 0.5 degrees Celsius.
If these were the only statistics available to us, we would quickly conclude that the sensitivity of the earth’s atmosphere to all human-related activities might well be 2.5 degrees Celsius. This would lead to the supposition that, if concentrations of CO2 rise to about 600 ppm, which certainly seems possible, that the Earth’s temperature will rise about another 2 degrees C. Since it’s based on measurement of temperatures, it can be presumed to include all the effects we are having on temperatures, not just CO2.
And I am arguing, no–proposing, that we do exactly that. Attempts to refine models and measurements have been unsuccessful and have served to heighten suspicion and muddy the debate. I have seen very credible arguments for sensitivities that are both higher and lower, but these arguments are based on data or models that have much higher levels of uncertainty associated with them, ranging from differing ways of measuring tropospheric temperatures to analysis of varves from Finnish lakes.
I don’t see undisputed data that will allow us to do better than the 40 years of good data we have now. So I think we should provide a ‘rough and ready’ estimate of 2 degrees C climate change this century to the public, business and politicians, so they can start making plans for the future.
It should obviously come with an asterisk and error bars, and should be presented as ‘crude, but the best we can really do at this time.’ Much like earlier and simpler climate models have often done better in handling projections of future climate, our rougher and cruder metrics may serve us better for now.
We need to stop throwing sci-fi fantasies out as plausible outcomes. We need to provide a range of outcomes based on measurements that we trust.
We also need not to be distracted by elements of the debate that have only served a political purpose. Current temperatures are not unprecedented. There was a MWP and a LIA. Sea level is rising at 3 mm per year. The ice caps are not going to disappear this millenium.
None of that really matters. Temperatures are rising, and more quickly than they have often in the past. (Yes, they have risen this quickly on occasion.) It is the speed of change and the numbers of people those changes will affect that are actually of more concern than the total temperature rise. The people in developing countries are actually more vulnerable than the last time there was a big quick rise–hunter gatherers didn’t have homes and could just move out of harm’s way, and they were few enough in number that they would not have been labeled ‘climate refugees.’
So, I call for all those involved in the climate debate to throw down their weapons, embrace this practical solution as being of use to the rest of the world, climb aboard the Peace Train and sing Kumbaya. Right.
No, have a look at this–tell me if it’s remotely possible that the skeptic community could sacrifice its current temporary, but very real advantage in the debate and agree that a rough metric that acknowledges warming but puts sane boundaries on it would be of use to the rest of the world.
Again, I’d like to thank readers who have made it this far for listening to a different side of the debate in a forum where you are more comfortable seeing the failings of your opponents exposed. If you find the gaping flaw in my logic, my idea can die quickly, if not quietly. If you see merit in my proposal, any indication of such would be warmly welcomed.
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Another point and one that maybe a bit off topic but not entirely so. CO2 is continuously being released by animal respiration, volcanoes, burning and other sources and is continuously being converted back to carbohydrate by plant photosynthesis and carbonate rock via ocean absorption. The numbers I have seen suggest that fossil fuel burning only constitutes about 5% of this total annual exchange. The warmist claim is that even though this is a small fraction it builds up year over year. Implicit in that suggestion is the further suggestion that the “natural” CO2 exchange is in effect a very finely balanced open loop system so that even a slight perturbation starts a monotonic trend.
That is simply not the way natural systems operate – for example it would mean that every volcanic eruption would jack up the CO2 level on an essentially permanent basis. It doesn’t because natural systems have considerable negative feedback which stabilises them. In the case of CO2 this is not conjecture. We know farmers artifically boost the level of CO2 in glass houses to about 1000 ppm to increase the rate of conversion of CO2 to carbohydrate. This costs money and would hardly be done unless there was a payoff in significantly more plant mass (ie: mass of carbohydrate formed) to sell. And by significantly I mean considerably more than a 5% increase. We also know this effect is very fast, farmers don’t wait a century to get payoff from their investment, the increase occurs within a single year growing cycle. So what makes us think that CO2 will continue to rise if we keep burning fossil fuel. It may rise to a new equilibrium level but the strong negative feedback will ensure there is a new equilibrium level. Indeed, what is surprising is that a 5% increae in CO2 emission could lead to as large a rise as we have seen so far which begs the questionas to whether there is another and larger natural effect working in parallel. I note in this context that recent NASA satellite data suggesting that plant growth in the temperature zone has substantially increased (the figure I saw was 30% increase although that may be questionable).
Of course the other side will argue that increased plant growth leads to increased decay and presumably increased consumption of vegetation by animals hence more animals so increasing CO2 release again. Probably true (and this again shows the negative feedback inherent in the biosphere) but that is simply another way of saying that our burning of fossil fuels will simply increasing the fecundity of life on earth. More carbon in the biosphere leads to more intensity of life on earth. What we are really doing in that case is simply returning to the biosphere carbon that accidentally got sequestered eons ago as coal and oil to the detriment of life on earth. Is increasing the intensity of life on earth bad? Are warmists syaing we should be reducing it or are they saying it was at the exact optimum? What possible basis is there for saying its was at the exact optimum – simply maintaining the status quo? This is one of the things that worries me about environmentalism. They pick one moment in history and insist that is the optimum to be maintained for all time. Why that moment and why is it always a few years or decades before the present? To me it is simply saying, there has been a change and man must be responsible, all change is bad therefore man is bad.
If a bacterium evolved one day that oxidised coal would we feel the need to do everything we could to destroy such a bacterium? Or would we consider it a natural phenomenon to which we should adapt?
I’ll go out on a limb and suggest a solution that will cause me much derision–cold fusion. Ok, now that the laughter is subsiding, I’ll change the name to LENR–Low Energy Nuclear Reactions (for the same reason current researchers changed it). And you can laugh all you want, but the phenomena is real and a lot of countries are feverishly working on it and filing patents, too (Israel and Japan are foremost). Unfortunately, that would preclude the US, because energy policy here only accepts what the physicists believe to be possible, i.e. high temp nuclear fusion; unfortunately, they’re so stuck to their blackboards covered with theoretical equations that they never venture into a laboratory to seriously study LENR. Chemists, on the other hand, have no such laboratory avoidance and continually make progress in this fascinating field because they actually run experiments (reminds me of the warmers w/ their theoretical computer models vs the rest of the science community with their observations of the natural world). Such research into LENR indicates there’s enough energy in a liter of heavy water to run a home energy unit for decades without refueling–a unit half as tall as a fridge would provide all the space heating, electricity generation, and air conditioning needed. No more connection to the electric grid; no deliveries of wood, coal, fuel oil or gas; no controversial CO2 generated, either. ETA? Several years. They already have a second-generation medical device that operates on the principle of LENR. This isn’t science fiction anymore.
Countries that have stable populations, educational opportunities, and agricultural land are consuming more food. Meaning that, yes, overall, on average, we are all getting fatter. But that statistic leaves a false impression as there is no such thing as “average”. Given current and (astounding) predicted population growth, food production in developing countries will not keep pace. Not only will it continue to be more expensive to produce food, the very countries that food is needed in will not be able to buy it. The bottom line is that both population growth, and hunger/malnutrition is expected to increase disproportionately in developing counties.
Over and over, the single most important mitigating factor in the ability of developing countries keeping pace with population growth in terms of economic status and improved nutrition is female education.
If you want to solve the real problems facing this world, if you want the most bang for your buck, if you want to solve several problems (population growth, CO2, malnutrition, stalled economies, etc) with one fix, send females to school.
That we won’t do that relates to the fact that those who might be talked into providing this will not get rich themselves, but the women will, along with the country they live in. But alas, there is no personal rewards (money and power) waiting for those in power who would do this. It is a non-dramatic, no-prestige, non-glamorous thing to do. It doesn’t play well on the mega-screens and no one will get elected President for doing it.
Pamela Gray:- that is well put and seems right to me, there is however 2 major hurdles in its path, thay are IMHO islam and communism (and perhaps catholicism?) all these make women less than men, none more so than islam who deny women education specificly, neatly proving your point. So yet again we bang our heads on the same roadblocks.
Why I cannot and will not accept that the world should agree to plan for a 2.5 degree rise in temperature due to man’s emissions of CO2.
Firstly, that would require me to accept that CO2 causes, and has caused, a rise in earth’s average temperature. It doesn’t. And it didn’t. Selected temperature measurements indicate an increase. That is not science, that is agenda-driven bad science. Dr. Richard Feynman would be appalled at what modern climate scientists are attempting.
Secondly, agreeing to agree just to end the controversy is not acceptable, when one side is clearly wrong and the other side is clearly right. To agree is to admit defeat, to admit that there really is something to the AGW concept, and that something must be done about it.
Thirdly, to agree at this point on the AGW issue, when there are so many, many problems with AGW’s data acquisition, data manipulation, suppression of dissenting views, and agenda-driven opportunists, will only encourage such shoddy and shady behavior in future scientifically-related matters.
No, there are definite principles at stake in the skeptic position on AGW.
Bring me accurate, unbiased data. Bring me a theory that accounts for all of that data – not just the few portions of the data that happen to agree with the theory, such as cities that experience UHI. Bring me a theory that meets all the requisite criteria of sound science, including meeting all the elements of process control. When that is done, then we can discuss ways and means to meet the challenge.
Until then, I, at least, will continue to do all I can to stop this madness. The world has far too many pressing problems based on real data and valid interpretations of that data to waste time and resources on fictional problems such as AGW.
Insular establishment thinking has so much to answer for. People who release this personally, and it takes effort, have a duty to perform.
It is IMHO 97% (vague guess) of humans want/need to be led.
Question.
Can those of us- 3%- Officially start something new.
Concerns for this are filtering through.
NO PERSONAL MONEY GAIN INVOLVED.
Its our humanity our garden of eden.
Given current and (astounding) predicted population growth, food production in developing countries will not keep pace. [October 21, 2010 at 8:26 pm]
Pamela Gray: Cite? This has been predicted for some time — most infamously in Paul Ehrlich’s The Population Bomb (1968) — but keeps failing to occur, so its proponents keep moving the goalposts further into the future.
The rate of population growth has basically been falling since the 1960s. Human population is expected to peak around 9 billion sometime in this century.
Educating and empowering women has already played a role in humanity’s increasing success. Unless Islam takes over, it’s a trend that is already in motion and I believe unstoppable.
Hi Tom,
sorry for joining a bit late, but I still want to ask an old question of mine:
With ln(390/280)/ln(560/280) =48%
is ist quite clear that we can approximately attribute about half a Kelvin of the measured increase in the last 100 years to CO2 (a little less in my opinion, some may say it’s a bit more). There is the issue of the delayed warming which would have to boost that up by a factor 3 in order to get the 3K per doubling of atmospheric CO2.
I don’t think there is any basis for that .. the oceans seem pretty unimpressed with the warming so far, they will just cycle downward along their 60year cycle.
Do you aggree, that if the oceans cycle down, that there is no big delayed warming effect and the warming from CO2 ist most likely about 1K with half of it already past us? I think we should definitely answer that question, before taking any dramatic actions.
All the best,
LoN
Thomas Fuller: Many here decline to accept your lukewarm 2C scenario because they don’t accept that the climate scientists have won that argument. I can understand that.
The problem I see with your scenario is that unless one can show that a gradual 2C increase has dire consequences there is little reason for it to reconcile the skeptic and climate change communities.
A British friend says that climate change advocates threatened people in the UK with a Mediterranean climate and the response was “That sounds nice.” I’d much rather live at the peak of the Medieval Warming Period than the bottom of the Little Ice Age. It’s an ice age that frightens me.
I suspect the climate change folks will be more upset with you than WUWT posters, since much of the force of the climate change arguments come from the uncertainty that the warming might be as high 4.5C with the doubling of CO2. Even I start getting nervous of temperatures in that range in that amount of time.
There is no reason to upend the world economy and infrastructure on account of a 2C rise by 2100. We wouldn’t have do anything extraordinary to meet that eventuality, assuming it were the case.
There will be better energy solutions in the future. In the meantime fossil fuels and nuclear power will bridge the gap.
But, as I say, it is the climate change movement that will be the most unhappy with your League of 2.5 since it denies them the leverage to demand the changes on their agenda.
@MarkR
First, a cop-out: not my words, but Vaclav Klaus’.
Second, read Willis Eschenbach’s guest post on this blog (posted October 22, 2010). He makes my point, only better, from the other side (i.e. How trivial the expected/projected rise is, even for the Puppies!)
Man’s chief virtue is his adaptability. I suspect that Gaia (if you believe in/accept her – on that, I’m agnostic) is much the same. She survived many Ice Ages.
Up in the comments a time or three people mention how CO2 lags temperature in the ice cores. I’ll take it as given, then, that at least those people believe that ice cores provide reasonable representation of those variables. They also observe that CO2 generally lags temperature, which I agree with.
They then conclude that the current rise in CO2 is also temperature driven, or at least cannot be human-driven. That’s more than a touch odd, given that the ice core records, themselves, show that this is an unsupportable conclusion. I take up the question at moderate length in a CO2 and temperature for 800,000 years.
In brief, you can plot the CO2 levels versus the temperatures (from 1000 years earlier), and you find a very good correlation curve. Linear fit with R^2 of 0.79. Everything falls within the expected range of variation — except for the most recent CO2/temperature pair. The most recent pair is ca. 10 standard deviations away from the fit (read the article for details).
Whatever relationship held between ice core isotopic temperature and CO2 the previous 799,000 years, does not hold any longer.
It’s not 2.5 deg, it’s likely barely 1 degC for a doubling of CO2.
With deference to T.J.Nelson(http://brneurosci.org/co2.html), a linear increase in temperature requires an exponential increase in CO2. Each doubling of CO2 will cause the same temperature increase. Although CO2 hasn’t doubled since 1900, we can calculate a proportion based on the observed CO2 and temperatures. Between 1900 and 2000 CO2 increased from 295 ppm to 365 ppm. The temperature increase about .57 degC. In proportion:
ln(365/285)= k x .57
k=.3735
doubling CO2
ln(2)=.693
dT=.693/.3735= 1.85 deg. C as an upper limit for temperature change due to a doubling of CO2.
You can take this kind of calculation further by using and effective CO2 level that includes other green house gases, which reduces the temperature increase to around 1.02 deg.C.
Assuming the correlation between CO2 and temperature really shows causation and that a degree or so C doesn’t cause dramatic changes in the mechanisms working in radiation absorption and in the atmosphere, it appears that not much is going to happen to the climate.
By basing this calculation on the actual temperature and CO2 measurements all the unknown possible causes, such as water vapor, clouds, etc., are taken into account. There is no need to make any assumptions about mechanisms or cause and effects. Just based on the actual data, a temperature rise of 1 deg. C for a doubling of CO2 over many years just does not look like a game changer.
Hi, Robert. A few comments on your post.
You state that your analysis of the ice-core record disproves two conjectures: 1) that the current CO2 rise is due to past temperature increases; and 2) that CO2 in the atmosphere can’t be affecting current temperatures.
There are other reasons to believe the current rise in CO2 is due to human influence, or that CO2 affects temperature to some (disputed) degree. However, the ice-core data is incapable of providing any information on this issue for the modern era (i.e., the last half of the 20th century up until now). The reason for this is the “yardstick” for measuring temperature and CO2 levels from the ice-core data is fairly crude. I’m assuming you used data from the Vostok ice core? As I recall, the precision for this data is 700 yrs, +/- 200. This is due to the very low rate of precipitation, and the long amount of time before the CO2 becomes “trapped” in the ice.
So essentially, your analysis is using “smoothed” data. Trying to measure an annual effect using ice core data is kind of like trying to measure a person’s height using your car’s odometer. In other words, it is entirely possible that CO2 levels have a much larger range in the past, and are simply smoothed out in the ice-core data.
This mistake of comparing the crude precision of ice-core data with the high precision of modern measurements is made all the time, especially in the press. Al Gore’s presentation is a particularly well-known example. But if anyone else has some more information on this, I’d be glad to read it … I’m not an expert in ice-core data.
Robert Grumbine,
I’m not sure what you’re trying to say, whether you agree that CO2 lags temperature or not. Here are some charts which show that CO2 levels follow temperature changes:
click1
click2 [same chart data, different source]
click3 [5 month time scale]
On very long time scales, the correlation breaks down and CO2 has no relation to temperature, or to Ice Ages and interglacials:
click4
There does seem to be an ≈800 year correlation:
click5
click6
The evidence shows that additional atmospheric CO2 is very beneficial:
click7
click8
click9
click10
The evidence clearly shows that CO2 concentration follows temperature. Effect cannot precede cause, therefore the current rise in CO2 is a function of past warming, not a significant cause of current warming. And the evidence shows that CO2 is quite beneficial to the biosphere – but there is no evidence showing that increased CO2 levels are harmful in any way.
Draw your own conclusions.
Everyone keeps talking about “we” but who is this “we”?
Do the proponents of policy action presume to speak for everyone in the world, including those who disagree with them, including those whose lives, liberties or property would be ruined by such policies?
We are not the state, and the state is not us. It’s a completely unscientific furphy to think so.
The intellectual hazard of the physical scientists is that they keep applying to society the same method of thinking that they apply to inanimate things. Why don’t “we” do an adjustment here (coercion-based confiscation of zillions of dollars worth of property belonging to other people), and why don’t “we” do an adjustment there (shut down the production of food on a massive scale at a time when people are going hungry), and why don’t “we” presume to control the whole world’s ecology and economy and climate, when the last attempt by central governments to control just the economy resulted in the biggest mass murders in history?
Human beings are not animals on a farm owned by government! People’s lives and liberties are not chemical compounds to be manipulated in the laboratory of a white-coated value-free scientist in the person of the State.
The assumptions that the State is a superbeing over and above society, that it transcends individual self-interest for the greater good, that it represents the people more than the people represents themselves, that it speaks from a position of superior knowledge, capacity or virtue – these are mysticism with no basis in evidence or reason.
Thus even if the climatological premises were conceded, the advocates of policy action would still not have got to square one in justifying any policy action whatsoever.
I just want to point out that I am proposing a 2 degree temperature rise this century from all causes, not just CO2.
But it seems that CO2 is the only one we have any hope of controlling and even that is doubtful.
I still believe that temperatures are rising, that we probably have something to do with it, and that people, businesses and governments would benefit greatly from some kind of signposts on what they may expect over the course of their lifetimes.
This is reasonable, up to the point where we try to control the global temperature. People living in California should also know what they can expect from earthquakes and volcanoes. We can sketch out the “might happens” but we are a long way from being able to make useful predictions of what, where, and when. Or when the next pandemic will occur, or the next global war, or the next big asteroid strike, or the next ice age. A while back we were trying to figure out how to make rain; we’ve given up on that and moved on to bigger things, most likely with even less chance of success.
I do not at all consider it unscientific to take the best two measurements we have–CO2 concentrations and satellite measurements of temperature–and say with appropriate caveats that if trends continue we might see 2 degrees C of warming over the next century.
Yet it is unscientific, starting with “if trends continue”. No amount of caveats can cover that we do not know enough climate to say anything more than “might happen” or “could happen”, and anyone who makes these claims is an activist not a scientist if they do not also say “or it may not”.
smokey, ted carmichael:
I think my attempt at presenting the argument briefly was unsuccessful. Your concerns are interesting and worth discussing but a) it seems comment sections here aren’t left open very long and b) I just broke my wrist, which is slowing me down greatly.
two suggestions:
a) make your comments over at my blog on that article — my comment sections are open indefinitely (never closed one yet — a luxury of my place being quieter) and your thoughts and concerns are on topic.
b) be patient and make your comments at my place the next time i post a ‘question place’ note. (or put them up on one that’s already posted — just realize that it’ll be a while before i can do much more than approve comments)
I’ll note hat the ‘question place’ is open to all. check out comment polucy and link policy first, The latter is quite a bit more open than you might expect. Also, my latest post, beyond telling readers about the break, asks for suggestions of things they’d like to see. Y’all are welcome to contribute your suggestions too.
Fact: Over the past 400,000 years or so temperatures and CO2 concentrations have varied in a sinusoidal pattern.
Why should I even consider accepting your presumption of a linear increase?
In looking at the Vostok ice core charts, even an admitted non-scientist like you, might reasonably conclude that we are at or near the next high point in the cycle. Yet, you are concerned about warming. Why?
Your initial post gave me the impression that you were a scientist involved somehow in climate study. In that frame of reference your post was silly. Your responses to commenters reveal more political motivation with a genuine effort at being reasonable. You appear to be saying, that among your friends there is a consensus that warming is a fact… an alarming fact… and something must be done. Seeing yourself as rational and reasonable you ask us to to the same and accept your modest assumption as being something reasonable to plan for, whether or not it proves true.
But… what of the other possibility? What if temperatures suddenly plunge and we find our little planet plunging into the next ice age? Why not prepare for that? Surely the UN can put together a panel of “scientists” to model the catastrophic consequences of too much cooling and come to consensus that will “assure us” that the science is settled or as the imminent Industrial Engineer, and head of the IPCC, Dr. Pachauri would say, “loud, articulate and incontrovertible.”
Of course the answer to all my questions is ‘politics.’ It is for political reasons, not scientific that you ask me to accept a linear assumption to a a non-linear equation. It is for political reasons that you worry about the warming contingency plan and not one for cooling. And it is for political reasons that you offer such a reasonable “compromise” and complain about the difficulties in engaging in rational debate with conservatives.
While I appreciate your effort in engaging in “debate” I most value the discussion thread and the abundance of “skeptical” viewpoints articulated so well. But I am left baffled by what a “luke-warmer” is. From what I’ve seen here, a luke-warmer appears to regard science only as a means to political ends, and thinks it’s reasonable and rational to introduce political means as part of the scientific method.
You have asked us to accept some “reasonable” (as defined by you) number, you have asked skeptics to, “agree that a rough metric that acknowledges warming but puts sane boundaries on it would be of use.”
The simple answer is No. It is of no use. It’s silly, naive, and utterly unscientific. You are asking us to marry science and politics. It doesn’t work.