From the University of Exeter, this press release below and not a peep in it about the El Niño earlier this year that would have helped to degassify CO2 from the warmer portions of the Pacific ocean. But hey, its got a connection to UEA, so we know it’s quality work, right?
Global CO2 emissions back on the rise in 2010
Global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions – the main contributor to global warming – show no sign of abating and may reach record levels in 2010, according to a study led by the University of Exeter (UK).
The study, which also involved the University of East Anglia (UK) and other global institutions, is part of the annual carbon budget update by the Global Carbon Project.
In a paper published today in Nature Geoscience, the authors found that despite the major financial crisis that hit the world last year, global CO2 emissions from the burning of fossil fuel in 2009 were only 1.3 per cent below the record 2008 figures. This is less than half the drop predicted a year ago.
The global financial crisis severely affected western economies, leading to large reductions in CO2 emissions. For example, UK emissions were 8.6% lower in 2009 than in 2008. Similar figures apply to USA, Japan, France, Germany, and most other industrialised nations.
However, emerging economies had a strong economic performance despite the financial crisis, and recorded substantial increases in CO2 emissions (e.g. China +8 per cent, India +6.2 per cent).
Professor Pierre Friedlingstein, lead author of the research, said: “The 2009 drop in CO2 emissions is less than half that anticipated a year ago. This is because the drop in world Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was less than anticipated and the carbon intensity of world GDP, which is the amount of CO2 released per unit of GDP, improved by only 0.7 per cent in 2009 – well below its long-term average of 1.7% per year.”
The poor improvements in carbon intensity were caused by an increased share of fossil-fuel CO2 emissions produced by emerging economies with a relatively high carbon intensity, and an increasing reliance on coal.
The study projects that if economic growth proceeds as expected, global fossil fuel emissions will increase by more than 3% in 2010, approaching the high emissions growth rates observed through 2000 to 2008.
The study also found that global CO2 emissions from deforestation have decreased by over 25% since 2000 compared to the 1990s, mainly because of reduced CO2 emissions from tropical deforestation.
“For the first time, forest expansion in temperate latitudes has overcompensated deforestation emissions and caused a small net sink of CO2 outside the tropics”, says Professor Corinne Le Quéré, from the University of East Anglia and the British Antarctic Survey, and author of the study. “We could be seeing the first signs of net CO2 sequestration in the forest sector outside the tropics”, she adds.
Editors’ notes
The Global Carbon Project
The Global Carbon Project was formed to assist the international science community to establish a common, mutually agreed knowledge base supporting policy debate and action to slow the rate of increase of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. The project is working towards this through a shared partnership between the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP), the International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change (IHDP), the World Climate Research Programme (WCRP) and Diversitas. This partnership constitutes the Earth Systems Science Partnership (ESSP).
More information available at: http://www.globalcarbonproject.org/carbonbudget
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Nonoy Oplas says:
November 22, 2010 at 12:49 am
Actually, less than half of one tenth of 1 percent of all gases. Never has so much been dramatised over so little…..
I know, weather isn’t climate but what about the irrefutable consensus among the AGW establishment that CO2 and only CO2 is responsible for the warming of our atmosphere? And if this is true, why do they have to fiddle with our temperature data sets and lie between their teeth about, well … everything?
EUROPE http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp4.html
ALASKA USA http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp2.html
EAST ASIA http://wxmaps.org/pix/temp5.html
In fact, warm anomalies have become scarce on all the wxmaps including the SH.
This entirely defies the AGW clams.
Global carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions – the main contributor to global warming – show no sign of abating and may reach record levels in 2010, according to a study led by the University of Exeter (UK)….”
lets repeat the salient facts
c02 is the MAIN contributor to global warming. RECORD levels in 2010
The obvious implication is that 2010 was indisputably the hottest year in recorded history
SteveE says:
November 22, 2010 at 2:18 am
addendum:
displacing 1934 as the previous record
Juraj V. says: (November 22, 2010 at 2:00 am) Roger, since it passed through eagle eyes of moderators, not THAT bad. Google “o rly owl” 🙂
Ah… Got it, Juraj. I wonder why that was forbidden? (And thank, bl57~mod.)
The emerging twin terror of climate change awkwardness is ocean acidification. Not many people realise that the top few hundred m of the ocean is where a lot of the study is, with catastrophic changes in pH from 8.1 to 7.9 or so.
It is often left unsaid that over 90% of the volume of the oceans is already below this figure,
See http://www.geoffstuff.com/image008.jpg which I took from http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/OceanAcidification.htm (Thank you)
Therefore, one might expect that upwelling as well as CO2 should be considered when making noises about ocean acidification.
SteveE says: November 22, 2010 at 2:06 am
The CO2 that nature emits (from the ocean and vegetation) is balanced by natural absorptions (again by the ocean and vegetation). Therefore human emissions upset the natural balance, rising CO2 to levels not seen in at least 800,000 years.
Not part of the biosphere are we?
Juraj V. says:
November 22, 2010 at 2:45 am
Juraj and others…
Not confirmed by satellite data.
http://climate4you.com/images/OLR%20versus%20CO2%20Global.gif
Yes, confirmed by satellite data:
http://www.sp.ph.ic.ac.uk/news/newsmar01.html
CO2 and methane have absorbed more outgoing radiation.
But as your graph shows (and also the “earth shine” project shows), the total outgoing radiation is far more variable than what the changes in GHGs give. Probably due to changes in cloud cover, which are far more important for climate than the changes in GHGs…
The same for more backradiation (measured in Europe): most is from increased water vapour and clouds, not from CO2.
SteveE says:
November 22, 2010 at 2:06 am
John Marshall says:
November 22, 2010 at 1:27 am
CO2 does NOT drive climate! Our emission of CO2 is but 3% of the global annual CO2 atmospheric budget all the rest-97% is from natural emitters. The hypothesis of greenhouse warming does not stand up to serious scrutiny so will eventually be shown to be false.
The University of Exeter has connections with the Hadley Center which is down the road. The connection with CRU at the UEA is through Hadley Center
———————————————-
The CO2 that nature emits (from the ocean and vegetation) is balanced by natural absorptions (again by the ocean and vegetation). Therefore human emissions upset the natural balance, rising CO2 to levels not seen in at least 800,000 years.
Someone does not understand Henry’s Law.
You may notice clouds – although not many AGW proponents are good at clouds…
All those water droplets in clouds are very cold pure water with a surface area that exceeds the oceans and CO2 will rapidly dissolve in them. Therefore they wash CO2 from the atmosphere extremely efficiently like an industrial scrubber. When the droplets reach the surface as rain if the solute gets warmer then CO2 may outgas again in accordance with Henry’s Law.
The higher the vapor pressure of CO2 the more will dissolve. This is basic physical chemistry. There is no ‘natural balance’ by nature or Gaia – there is a standard gas law balance based on vapor pressure and temperature.
“R. de Haan says:
November 22, 2010 at 2:58 am”
It’s worse than that. It’s ONLY those CO2 emissions from human activity and burning fossil fuels. Just that ~3% of the total annual volume, which is claimed to be driving driving climate distruption. The other ~97% it totally natural and is in “balance”.
/sarc
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
November 22, 2010 at 3:32 am
With El Nino in 2010 certainly, more heat evaporates and so more cloud cover and more rain.
Kevin Trenberth, head of climate analysis at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Colorado, said: “We have seen rapid warming recently, but it is an example of natural variation that is associated with changes in the Pacific rather than climate change.”
It could be said that El Nino is only a weather event
Hide the decline! It’s a travesty!
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/graphs/HadCET_graph_ylybars_uptodate.gif
Hoist by their own petard despite manipulating the data base in 1992 to the extent that it correlates poorly with the sites used from 1772.
Apart from a risible article last week in the Daily Telegraph by that arch idiot Geoffrey Lean and some crap in the Independent, the silence surrounding the imminent bunfight in Cancun is deafening. It would appear that part at least of the UK MSM are reconsidering their position, or at least accepting the incongruity of trumpeting the AGW nonsense just as for the third year running bitter cold and snow sidles down throughout the country from a self evidently freezing Arctic.
This is one travesty that is in great danger of becoming a norm.
Rise in CO2 should be a good news (if it is GW effective, which I doubt).
Substantial cooling is on the way
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/EW.htm
which should be of far greater concern than the current so called AGW.
Global Frigging Warming
“All we need now is to switch off the heating of all the MPs who still believe in global warming and we might start seeing some sense – impossible though that might seem. Better still, strip them naked, couple them up in a chain gang and have them paraded round Parliament Square, chanting “global warming is nigh”, until they drop from hypothermia or exhaustion, whichever comes sooner”.
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2010/11/global-frigging-warming.html
The reality is that most of the world will continue to increase consumption of fossil fuels, the USA, Canada, will not be duped into following the lead of the EU into self imposed bankruptcy.
As the global temperatures continue to drop for most of the next 30 years, while the total global release of CO2 doubles, the stances of those blatantly name calling the realists will fade as self embarrassment is the best mouth closer of shouting fanatics.
The big buck has been passed on to “Ocean acidification” didn’t you watch the transfer of connection to CO2 / power plant shut down as televised on CSPAN from: STATEMENT TO THE SUBCOMMITTEE ON ENERGY AND ENVIRONMENT OF THE UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
Hearing on “Rational Discussion of Climate Change: the Science, the Evidence, the Response”
JER0ME says:
November 22, 2010 at 3:05 am
SteveE says:
November 22, 2010 at 2:18 am
320–530 ppm of H2S leads to pulmonary edema with the possibility of death. That’s only a tiny percentage but it’ll have a big effect on your life!
What has that got to do with CO2? Can you really not tell the difference between H2S and CO2? back to school, matey.
CO2 is not even noticeable until about to 10,000 ppm. That’s right, 10,000, or more than 25 times the current concentration, and one we will never, ever reach, even if we burn ALL the oil, coal and gas in the world right now.
An enhanced greenhouse effect from CO2 has been confirmed by multiple lines of empirical evidence. Satellite measurements of infrared spectra over the past 40 years observe less energy escaping to space at the wavelengths associated with CO2. Surface measurements find more downward infrared radiation warming the planet’s surface. This provides a direct, empirical causal link between CO2 and global warming.
Links please? (and ones we can actually believe in, not watermelon echo-chambers)
——————–
WRT H2S please read the context it was mentioned in, it was in response to a comment that CO2 is a tiny fraction of the atmosphere and can’t possible have an effect. I was using H2S as an example of something that in tiny fractions can have a massive effect on life.
And here’s a couple of links for you:
http://www.eumetsat.int/Home/Main/Publications/Conference_and_Workshop_Proceedings/groups/cps/documents/document/pdf_conf_p50_s9_01_harries_v.pdf
http://ams.confex.com/ams/Annual2006/techprogram/paper_100737.htm
If the oceans get wamer how can they absorb more co2 – don’t they have to get colder to hold more carbon dioxide? my soft drinks certainly do. So how does that work with the acidification theory?
SteveE says:
November 22, 2010 at 2:18 am
“Satellite measurements of infrared spectra over the past 40 years observe less energy escaping to space at the wavelengths associated with CO2”
Well… good! That means the satellites are working because it is well known the CO2 in the atmosphere has increased.
The thing not mentioned is what happened (increase, decrease, stayed the same) at wavelengths NOT associated with CO2.
Here’s the deal. When CO2 absorbs longwave in its narrow absorption band it gets a bit warmer (excited). In its excitement it bumps into neighboring atoms and molecules which are most likely to be nitrogen (70% of the atmosphere), oxygen (21%) and so forth. When it bumps into one of those it transfers some of its excitement to them (the bumped warms up, the bumper cools down). Those other molecules then radiate the extra energy in a broad (called continuous) spectrum.
So you see, while the long wave radiation in CO2 absorption bands must decrease at top of atmosphere when there is more CO2 the long wave radiation outside its absorption bands must increase. Total radiation remains the same.
If you already knew that, Steve, then you’re lying by omission because you clearly wanted to imply that the total radiation escaping to space has a measured decrease which is emphatically not the case. If you did not know that then please write it down and don’t forget to mention it next time. Energy coming in equals energy going out. Since extra CO2 doesn’t change the energy coming in it will not change the energy going out. What it does is it raises the temperature somewhere in the column of air (models predict high in the troposphere) and when the temperature rises it causes radiation to escape faster into space which maintains the balance between energy in and energy out. This is how insulators work. CO2 is an insulator. Write that down too. Insulators do not trap energy or add energy. Insulators slow down the transport of energy which causes temparature to rise on the hot side of the insulator. The temperature rise accelerates the rate of energy transfer through the insulator and restores balance. If this did not occur the earth would quickly burn up and blow away. Fortunately the laws of thermodynamics don’t work that way and there’s no violation of those laws.
Furthermore, there is no guarantee that the modest rise to a higher equilibrium temperature caused by increased CO2 isn’t matched by a corresponding decrease in equilibrium temperature caused by something else. CO2 doesn’t exist in a metaphorical vacuum. It is one (small) component in a much larger system. For instance if downwelling longwave from CO2 rises then it must necessarily increase the evaporation rate of water at the surface. If the evaporation rate increases it increases the amount of heat (latent in this case) carried upward by rising water vapor. This heat is then released when a cloud forms. So the “extra” downwelling radiation in this case is quickly transported back up and released high in the air by way of a faster water cycle where the energy that increases the water cycle speed is caused by CO2. So it won’t raise surface temperature at all because the energy carried off by the water vapor is LATENT where latent in this case means it won’t register on a thermometer. You may want to google “latent heat of vaporization” if you don’t understand how you can have increased energy without increased temperature. It’s related to phase change from, in this case, liquid to gas.
Moreover, when that cloud forms far removed the surface it is extremely reflective of short wave radation (from the sun) which then cools the surface underneath by shading it and sending the sun’s energy straight back out into the frigid void of space before it ever reaches the surface. As well, the CO2 between the bottom of the cloud and the surface now acts as insulator in the other direction insulating the ground against the heat released by the condensing water vapor.
Where CO2 is very very important to keeping our world warm is when the air is very very dry. The only way to dry the air is to freeze the water vapor out of it and freeze the surface so evaporation can’t replenish it. When that happens there is no negative feedback happening anymore and our good friend and insulator, CO2, helps warm things up enough so the frozen surface melts, evaporation and cloud formation resume, and we’re back in our comfort zone where life can flourish.
Let me know what part or parts of that you don’t understand.
It’s just weird no one wants to talk nuclear power. It’s as if the CO2 worship religion forbids real answers, and just wants your money. really weird.
If CO2 is your God, shouldn’t nuclear power be our God?
Or is de-develop the USA the real goal of these goof balls.
Robert says: November 22, 2010 at 1:19 am
The real meaning of such a statement is that the warmists simply haven’t a clue what they’re talking about. They are so intent on perpetuating the AGW nonsense that they continue to extrapolate figures and invent trends in data using the bad maths and statistics that are an integral parts of the warmist dogma.
So Robert, are you suggesting that people will continue burning less fuels and will continue producing less CO2? You are predicting the warmist are wrong? Perhaps you are predicting a continued global recession and the Chinese and Indians cutting back on their economic development?
I am not saying warmist are right about all their other conclusions, I’m just saying you do yourself no favors by taking a position against a statement that is almost certainly true –> that people will keep burning more and more fuels as long as those fuels are readily available and that this will continue to raise CO2 levels for at least a few more decades.
“This is because the drop in world Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was less than anticipated….”
Heh, they were alarmists towards the global economy, too! It wasn’t as bad as they thought?
Roger 3.55 commented on the CEt figures
The latest CET figures (the oldest dataset in the world) shows a curious thing-that, as claimed, temperatures have been plummeting over the past few years. (h/t Roger)
This from the 1772 CET record (the preferred measure of Hadley) shows anomalies up to this month;
http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/graphs/HadCET_graph_ylybars_uptodate.gif
However we also have the much older CET records (also maintained by Hadley but curiously underused) which enables us to take a further step back in time to 1660.
http://homepage.ntlworld.com/jdrake/Questioning_Climate/_sgg/m2_1.htm
The changeability of our climate from the earliest days should be self evident by eyeballing the charts. We have ample contemporary evidence as well. For example anyone browsing the diary of Samuel Pepys for January 1660/61-the year the Royal Society was established- would read;
“It is strange what weather we have had all this winter; no cold at all; but the ways are dusty, and the flyes fly up and down, and the rose-bushes are full of leaves, such a time of the year as was never known in this world before here.”
Over one hundred years later- after the renewal of one of the most savage episides of the Little Ice Age- we have this comment from America.
“The temperature of the winter season, in northern latitudes, has suffered a material change, and become warmer in modern, than it was in ancient times. … Indeed I know not whether any person, in this age, has ever questioned the fact.” —Noah Webster, 1758-1843 (founder- Websters dictionary)
Here is just a snapshot of evidence of the constantly changing climate the world experiences, without any input from man.
First we need to put any increase in temperatures into context by remembering that the much cited Arrhenius actually backtracked in another later paper, that oddly never seems to get quoted.
Arrhenius originally estimated that halving of CO2 would decrease temperatures by 4 – 5 °C (Celsius) and a doubling of CO2 would cause a temperature rise of 5 – 6 °C[4]. In his 1906 publication, Arrhenius adjusted the value downwards to 1.6 °C (including water vapour feedback: 2.1 °C).
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Svante_Arrhenius
Modern estimates factor in highly imaginative and wholly unsubstantiated feedbacks to attain even higher temperatures. Rationally, doubling conventional pre industrial Co2 concentration may cause up to .5C temperature increase (but what concentration level are we doubling from and from what temperature base?)
It is an inconvenient truth that we have been this way before with temperatures, even in the little Ice Age.
http://www.blackwellpublishing.com:443/content/BPL_Images/Content_store/Sample_chapter/9780631222736/higgit.pdf
(Page 8)
http://books.google.co.uk/books?id=u-sOAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA5&lpg=PA5&dq=olive+trees+england+middle+ages&source=bl&ots=WTPpDWDyWH&sig=WXhrKVnyRESur0RPFsuqutmllJs&hl=en&ei=YQPCSs-pF4mw4Qad87iLCA&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=4#v=onepage&q=olive%20trees%20england%20middle%20ages&f=false
By Hubert Lamb, page 12 and 13 about 1730’s
Defining climate trend as a 30-yr trend one can plot the CET trends for a sliding 30-yr window:
http://www.leif.org/research/CET1.png
The following, condensed from the records of the Hudson Bay Company, demonstrate that climate change is not a new phenomena.
“Over the fifteen years between 1720 and 1735, the first snowfall of the year moved from the first week of September to the last. Also, the late 1700s were turbulent years. They were extremely cold but annual snow cover would vary from ‘extreme depth to no cover’. For instance, November 10th 1767 only one snowfall that quickly thawed had been recorded. June 6, 1791 many feet of snow in the post’s gardens. The entry for July 14, 1798 reads ‘…53 degrees colder today than it was yesterday.”
The current warming is clearly not unprecedented. Such swings occur regularly
This comes from the extensive weather records of Thomas Jefferson; (the warm weather of the early 1700’s has given way to intense cold then another period of warmth)
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~HYPER/JEFFERSON/ch07.html
“A change in our climate however is taking place very sensibly. Both heats and colds are become much more moderate within the memory even of the middle-aged. Snows are less frequent and less deep. They do not often lie, below the mountains, more than one, two, or three days, and very rarely a week. They are remembered to have been formerly frequent, deep, and of long continuance. The elderly inform me the earth used to be covered with snow about three months in every year. The rivers, which then seldom failed to freeze over in the course of the winter, scarcely ever do so now. This change has produced an unfortunate fluctuation between heat and cold, in the spring of the year, which is very fatal to fruits. From the year 1741 to 1769, an interval of twenty-eight years, there was no instance of fruit killed by the frost in the neighbourhood of Monticello. An intense cold, produced by constant snows, kept the buds locked up till the sun could obtain, in the spring of the year, so fixed an ascendancy as to dissolve those snows, and protect the buds, during their development, from every danger of returning cold. The accumulated snows of the winter remaining to be dissolved all together in the spring, produced those over flowings of our rivers, so frequent then, and so rare now. “
(from observation 1772 to 1779)
Coming back towards the modern era (H/t Richard)
This is what a farmer from Buchan in North East Scotland, one of the snowiest parts of lowland Britain, wrote in the agricultural section of the local newspaper during the exceptionally mild winter of 1933/34.
“1934 has opened true to the modern tradition of open, snowless winters. The long ago winters are no precedent for our modern samples. During the last decade, during several Januarys the lark has heralded spring up in the lift from the middle to the end of the month. Not full fledged songs but preliminary bars in an effort to adapt to our climatic change”
It then goes on to say;
“It is unwise to assume that the modern winters have displaced the old indefinitely”
and also;
“Our modern winters have induced an altered agricultural regime”
Ample evidence of the changeability of our climate and there is very much more. That we seem to be back to the 1730’s values according to the Hadley graphs is curious as it was followed by other periods of intense cold. Is history going to repeat itself?
It would be a more constructive debate if we could all agree that AGW is being used as the rationale to demand a step change in mans habits, rather than that it has any merit as a proper scientific concept as it continually ignores current and past evidence of climate change.
Changing our ways is a good debate in itself-it clouds the issues to have a non existent sword of Damocles hanging over us.
tonyb
Nonoy Oplas says:
November 22, 2010 at 12:49 am
I’m getting tired of this argument, please look into the effects of visiting a place with CO at 400 ppm. Also, look in to the effect of the first 100 ppm of of CO2. Feel free to argue the IR window is saturated and that leads to the logarithmic response of CO2, but please don’t claim is 400 ppm of something is always negligable.