Guest post by Ira Glickstein
Some people claim that there’s a woman to blame,
But I know, it’s my own damn fault..
The original Jimmy Buffet lyrics say “woman to blame” but I changed it to “human” in the title of this post. Perhaps I should have left it as “woman” since, without their civilizing influence, we men would still be huddled in caves, wearing bearskins, and human-caused global warming would not be an issue. In 1880, WS Gilbert said women were the really civilized humans, while Darwinian Man, even when well-behaved, was nothing more than a Monkey Shaved :^)
This is the fourth of my Tale of the Global Warming Tiger series where I allocate the supposed 0.8ºC warming since 1880 to: (1) Data Bias, (2) Natural Cycles, and (3) AGW (human-caused global warming), the subject of this posting. Click Tiger’s Tale and Tail :^) to see my allocation and read the original story.
ANTHROPOGENIC GLOBAL WARMING (AGW)
This posting is about how human activities, particularly burning of fossil fuels and land use changes have contributed to the global warming experienced since 1880. According to Willis Eschenbach’s excellent WUWT posting (with the same title as mine – great minds think alike :^);
I think that the preponderance of evidence shows that humans are the main cause of the increase in atmospheric CO2. It is unlikely that the change in CO2 is from the overall temperature increase. During the ice age to interglacial transitions, on average a change of 7°C led to a doubling of CO2. We have seen about a tenth of that change (0.7°C) since 1850, so we’d expect a CO2 change from temperature alone of only about 20 ppmv.
Thus, about 80% of the CO2 rise from about 280 ppmv to 390 ppmv since 1880 is due to human activities.
I estimate that 0.1ºC of the supposed 0.8ºC warming is AGW, where we humans are to “blame” (assuming that that tiny amount of warming will make much of a difference, or, even if it does, that it will turn out to be bad).
In comments to my previous postings in this series, some WUWT readers have suggested that the entire supposed 0.8ºC warming since 1880 is data bias. In other words, there has actually been no net warming at all. I disagree. Even if the terrestrial temperature record since 1880 is questionable, particularly in light of repeated “adjustments” by the official climate Team that appear to overstate the warming, it seems to me the satellite data, available since 1979, clearly proves there has been considerable net warming since that date.
Other WUWT readers agree we are in a warming cycle but claim that natural processes are responsible for ALL the warming. Their main argument is that rising CO2 and other carbon gas levels do not cause much if any warming, and, even that amount of warming is counteracted by additional clouds that raise the Earth’s albedo. I agree the great majority of warming is natural, but I think it is clear that human activities are responsible for some of it. Yes, clouds almost certainly have a net negative feedback (despite virtually all the official climate Team models to the contrary), but, for the negative cloud feedback to work, temperatures must rise at least a little bit to generate the additional clouds.
DESCRIPTION OF MY GRAPHIC
The above graphic traces my estimate of the actual warming since 1880, and my projection several decades into the future. To liven it up I have drawn the curves atop a photo of some white-roofed houses in Greece and quoted from The Independent, 27 May 2009, under the headline Obama’s climate guru: Paint your roof white! they say:
Some people believe that nuclear power is the answer to climate change, others have proposed green technologies such as wind or solar power, but Barack Obama’s top man on global warming has suggested something far simpler – painting your roof white.
At the time, Anthony posted the news on WUWT, suggesting:
Maybe now NOAA will get rid of all remaining rooftop climate monitoring stations or stations sited over asphalt …
An alert reader, E.M. Smith, went further and wrote:
Lets start a surface stations project to paint the black roofs and asphalt under temperature stations white. We can do it to “save the planet from global warming and offset carbon”… and it would actually work to get the global temperature record down too ….
Undoubtedly, land use changes such as clearing forests and paving large areas with asphalt and erecting buildings have generally reduced the albedo of the Earth and thus increased warming. I don’t think Secretary Chu’s white roof idea will have much effect, but, any effect it does have will be in the direction of reducing warming, and I doubt it could ever be so successful that it pushes us into catastrophic global cooling!
Natural Cycles: The green line represents net warming not under human control or effect, and it shows a rise of about 0.4ºC since 1880.
The lighter green line is my projection of Natural Cycles assuming that Solar Cycle #24 will have a low Sunspot peak of 60 or less in 2013 or later, and that the following SC #25 and SC #26 will be similarly low and long. It is virtually certain SC #24 will be low, but pure speculation regarding SC #25 and SC #26. Of course, the varying strengths of ocean oscillations and volcanic eruptions and other hard to predict events may affect natural processes in either direction from my projections.
I have sketched a thin green line that indicates what may happen if we get a series of particularly strong events, similar to the El Niño that caused global temperatures to peak in 1999, and/or if subsequent Solar Cycles return to their previously high Sunspot levels.
AGW The violet line represents the sum of Natural Cycles and AGW and it shows an additional net rise of about 0.1ºC since 1880.
The lighter violet line is my projection assuming human activities will continue more or less as they have in the past, with minimal reductions in human-generated carbon gases and land use patterns, showing an additional nearly 0.1ºC rise between 2011 and 2050, for a total AGW since 1880 approaching 0.2ºC.
I have sketched a thin violet line indicating what may happen if Natural Cycles follow the thin green line projection and if, in addition, humans accelerate emissions of carbon gases and land use patterns that reduce the Earth’s albedo.
WHY AGW IS REAL
According to Roy Spencer, PhD:
Greenhouse components in the atmosphere (mostly water vapor, clouds, carbon dioxide, and methane) exert strong controls over how fast the Earth loses IR energy to outer space. Mankind’s burning of fossil fuels creates more atmospheric carbon dioxide. As we add more CO2, more infrared energy is trapped, strengthening the Earth’s greenhouse effect. This causes a warming tendency in the lower atmosphere and at the surface. As of 2008, it is believed that we have enhanced the Earth’s natural greenhouse effect by about 1%.
Absent the greenhouse effect of the atmosphere, the Earth would be cooler by about 33ºC, and 1% of that is 0.33ºC, which is more than the 0.1ºC I have allocated to AGW and that does not even include land use effects. But, again according to Spencer:
Net feedbacks in the real climate system — on both short and long time scales — are probably negative. A misinterpretation of cloud behavior has led climate modelers to build models in which cloud feedbacks are instead positive, which has led the models to predict too much global warming in response to anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions.
He explains that IPCC climate models assume a feedback of from 0.9 to 1.9 W m-2 K-1, and that any value below 3.3 represents positive feedback, while any level above that is negative feedback. He concludes from his study of satellite data that:
the line slopes diagnosed from the satellite data … might actually be an UNDERESTIMATE of the true feedback occurring, which could be 7 W m-2 K-1 or more.
If that turns out to be true, then the actual sensitivity to CO2 doubling would be far less than the 2ºC to 5ºC or more projected by the IPCC. Indeed it could be 0.5ºC, or even less. As current CO2 levels are about 390 ppmv we are about 40% to a doubling from historic 280 ppmv levels, the actual temperature rise due to the human component of AGW could be 0.2ºC.
In addition, burning of fossil fuels has a side effect of increasing light-colored aerosols that reflect Sunlight and thus prevent some of it from reaching the surface, counteracting some of the warming due to atmospheric CO2. Efforts to clean the air are said to have reduced such aerosols and, inadvertently, caused more warming.
Please note that I have low-balled my AGW value by about half because I discount the approximately 20% of rise in CO2 levels as due to the temperature rise itself causing less CO2 to be absorbed by the polar and winter temperate oceans and more to be emitted by the equatorial and summer temperate oceans and I also believe there are other negative feedback components yet to be exposed. I expect some WUWT readers will challenge even my low estimate and I request you back your challenges up with science-based reasoning, which I would love to hear.
CONCLUSIONS AND REQUESTS
If readers have additional information or corrections to what I said about AGW, or if there are other related factors I missed, I would appreciate detailed comments to improve my summary.
It seems to me that my estimate of 0.1ºC for AGW is justified, and perhaps a bit understated. I am open to hearing the opinions of WUWT readers who may think I have over- (or under-) estimated this component of the supposed 0.8ºC rise in global temperatures since 1880.
In my first and second and third postings in this Tale of the Global Warming Tiger series, I asked for comments on my allocations: to: (1) Data Bias 0.3ºC, (2) Natural Cycles 0.4ºC, and (3) AGW 0.1ºC. Quite a few readers were kind enough to comment, either expressing general agreement or offering their own estimates.
What do you think? I have been keeping a spreadsheet record of WUWT reader’s opinions, which I appreciate and value greatly, along with their screen names, and I plan to report the results in the next posting of this series:
Is the Global Warming Tiger a Pussy Cat? – If, as many of us expect, natural processes lead to stabilization of global temperatures over the coming decades, and perhaps a bit of cooling, we will realize the whole Global Warming uproar was like the boy who saw a pussy cat and cried tiger.
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I read that somewhere and thought it made sense. Most polar regions are below freezing and, in winter, so are some temperate regions. Thus, if water vapor was the only GHG (i.e., no CO2 or other GHG at all), the water vapor would precipitate out as rain/snow, and deplete the water vapor content of the atmosphere. This would further cool the polar and winter temperate zones, causing more rain/snow, and so on. Eventually, the summer temperatures would also drop below freezing and the Earth would turn into a snowball, frozen through an through, including the oceans.
Given the CO2 and other GHG, which do not precipitate out except at very, very low temperatures, that keeps the “greenhouse” effect going in the polar and winter temperate zones, and thus the Earth does not fall into the cooling to freezing spiral.
Any experts out there to support or refute that theory? If it is true, we can credit CO2 with not only being “plant food” but also for keeping us from freezing over.
You missed the point that, absent the GHG, the longwave radiation from the Earth would pass through the atmosphere and out to space un-impeded. The GHG absorb and reflect about half of it back down to Earth where it helps warm the surface, and is then emitted back towards space, where half of it is impeded, and so on and on.
Meanwhile, Sunlight, consisting of shortwave UV. visible, and near-IR, passes through the atmospheric GHG and warms the Earth, which responds by emitting more longwave radiation that is impeded by the GHG, and so on. That is how it works!
Ira said:
“Most polar regions are below freezing and, in winter, so are some temperate regions. Thus, if water vapor was the only GHG (i.e., no CO2 or other GHG at all), the water vapor would precipitate out as rain/snow, and deplete the water vapor content of the atmosphere. This would further cool the polar and winter temperate zones, causing more rain/snow, and so on. ”
Yes that is how I understood the proposition, but….
The drier and cooler air near the poles would cause faster evaporation when the air returned over the equatorial regions hence replenishing the loss and maintaining overall humidity and a water cycle.
Evaporation is faster under drier air and air with a larger emperature differential from the water surface so I can’t see that proposition working.
I’d really like an answer to that conundrum because AGW proponents are currently using the idea to upgrade the significance of GHGs.
onion2 says:
January 31, 2011 at 2:48 pm
If we assume IPCC levels of CO2 power (like 3C per doubling) and factor in the higher temperature change at the poles, that particular 40ppm fall should cause about 1C cooling.
Actually about 0.4C, but as Ira already said: the drop of 40 ppmv CO2 was in a period that the temperature was rather constant during some 5,000 years. Only in the last 2,000 years, there is a temperature drop. As most of the effect of more or less CO2 is within 30 years, that should be seen as zero lag on a thousand year scale. Thus 80% of the CO2 drop had no measurable effect on temperature…
I also have plotted the corrected temperature, according to Jouzel (less temperature variations than by Petit and Fisher) and the CH4 and d18O (from N2O) trends too. The is inversely correlated to ice sheet formation (actually land occupation by plants…):
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/eemian.html
That shows that the ice sheet formation was at maximum when temperatures were at minimum, before CO2 started to drop. The ice sheets started to decline at the last 2,000 years of the CO2 drop, while tempatures show a dip. That is quite contradictory. Thus it seems that the net effect of 40 ppmv less CO2 is unmeasurable within the accuracy of the Vostok ice core measuremements (anyway much lower than the average 3°C/2xCO2 of the climate models).
For: Ira Glickstein & others
http://www.google.com/search?q=geologist+on+global+warming&hl=en&sa=X&tbs=tl:1,tl_num:100&prmd=ivns&ei=oWdITbeSG6D48gTn84HeCA&ved=0CF8QywEoBA
Maybe this timeline link will help some see the evolution and information on the AGW dispute . . . I’m sure google will someday make it so that they can be automatically downloaded into an excel spread sheet for analysis. . . But I find the timeline, interesting. I hope the link works, as they are still working out the ‘kinks in their links’
Ira said You missed the point that, absent the GHG, the longwave radiation from the Earth would pass through the atmosphere and out to space un-impeded. The GHG absorb and reflect about half of it back down to Earth where it helps warm the surface, and is then emitted back towards space, where half of it is impeded, and so on and on.
You’re missing my point, but it could be that I’m just not very good at explaining it. Greenhouse gases in the real world also COOL the earth. The Water Cycle is the main greenhouse gas and its function is very much to take heat away from the Earth in its cycle of evaporation, condensation and precipitation.
It is an unproven assumption that “without GHG the earth would be colder”. Without water the Earth would be some X°C HOTTER (*). Think deserts compared with coastal regions where water cools the atmosphere. Water retains heat much longer than say CO2 which will lose its heat practically instantly. This aspect of the GHgases is excluded in the AGW scenario, probably because it means including convection and discussing real heat which always travels in the direction hot to cold.
Where is the proof that “without GHgases the Earth would be 33°C colder? How do you get that figure?
Or maybe you (generic who concentrate on IR) just don’t hear it, the very first reply here mentions the cooling aspect of GHgases being paramount. The models include cooling by clouds on the way to Earth from the Sun, reflecting back, but not the cooling from Earth by taking heat into the atmosphere.
So first, prove these assumptions that keep being bandied about as if fact; that GHgases add 33°C warmth to the Earth; that back-radiating IR heats the surface, (extraordinarily, because the Earth is presumably still warmer than the atmosphere from which the ‘half’ IR is supposedly radiating back to it adding heat ad infinitum and creating a runaway greenhouse effect).
If you can explain how you (generic “climate scientists, skeptic and not), came by these assumptions so they make sense to me, I should grateful.
(*)how much the Earth would be hotter without the water cycle, it’s 67°C http://www.newworldencyclopedia.org/entry/Evaporation
and here: http://www.biofuels.com/water-cycle/
Thank you Ira very much for your very long and comprehensive response (Ira Glickstein, PhD says February 1, 2011 at 10:34 am) to my comment on your original article. It was very much appreciated.
It is however going to take me a long time to digest all that you have written. In short, yes I have read Spencer’s “Global Warming Theory in a Nutshell” many times including last night as you suggested and again today. – And no, I never was taught that a greenhouse works because the glass passes shortwave light (UV, visible and near IR). A conventional “Hothouse”, I was taught, worked because it stopped convection. – My education (the type that lets you have papers as proof) started in 1947 and ended in 1964. – That may give you a clue that I shall never again have a 70eth birthday celebration. – I think you may well be a lot younger than that.
However as I said at the start of this piece it will take me a me a long time to digest all that you have written and thou I do feel I should perhaps explain why I am not quite ready to accept Dr. Spencer’s basic explanation of global warming theory an early response from me may therefore quite easily turn into some kind of circular conversation or argument. That, I believe nobody wants.
Well, Stephen, if it turns out that carbon gases (or some other gases with very low freezing temperatures) are necessary to keep Earth from freezing over, won’t that help the skeptic side by showing that CO2 is essential to life as we know it on Earth for two reasons: (1) is plant food, and (2) by not precipitating out CO2 keeps it warm enough so the water vapor does not precipitate and eventually cause Earth to freeze over?
I came up with a thought experiment. The Moon, as we know, has no atmosphere, and experiences a mean daytime temperature of 107ºC and a nightime temperature of -153ºC, for an average of -23ºC, which is below freezing. OK, so we transport salt water, and keep it in liquid form, and distribute it all over the Moon to the point is covers around 70% of the surface, as the oceans do on Earth. Then, we let Nature take its course.
Well, on the daytime side of the Moon, the water will heat up and boil, creating a water vapor atmosphere of sorts that should further heat the daytime surface by “greenhouse” effect, unless clouds form and block the Sun, which might reduce temperatures, but it would definitely be above freezing. Meanwhile, on the nighttime side of the Moon, the water would freeze solid, at least on the surface.
The Moon rotates on its axis once every 28.5 Earth days, which will give the whole surface an opportunity to either freeze solid or to remain liquid, or alternate between those states. Note however that when the nightime surface, which has ice on top, rotates into Sunlight, the ice will have a high albedo that will reflect most of the Sunlight.
So, what would happen over the longer term? The averge temperature now is -23ºC, below freezing. The water vapor atmosphere would certainly raise that average temperature somewhat, but would it get over freezing?
I think the water on the Moon would eventually freeze solid such that there would only be a bit of water vapor on the side where the Sun shines, but not enough to act as a GHG when that area falls into darkness. What do you think? Anybody know?
‘richard verney says:
February 1, 2011 at 9:09 am
They expect you to prove that they are wrong. Whilst I have enjoyed reading all your series of articles (and whilst I share your view that in the end this is likely to turn out to be a pussycat), regretfully I feel that this falls short of proving them wrong.’
I, sir, disagree with you. “CO2 drives the climate” is still an unproven hypothesis. It is up to them to prove that they are right. So far they have not done so.
Can this paper go to all those governments currently taxing the hell out of us(currently, and with even more draconian plans for the future) – unless of course, they have decided that ‘the science is settled’ – in which case of course we must just lay back and take the medicine. Never mind that it is for a non-existent malaise…
Regarding old construction worker’s comments at February 1, 2011 at 10:44 pm, I do not disagree that those proposing the AGW theory should prove their theory. That is obviously correct.
What I am commenting upon is the Trenberth reversal of proof. The reality is that to make progress with the ‘Team’ it is necessary to prove them wrong as opposed to simply pointing out problems with their data or that the data is open to different interpretations etc. Whilst Trenberth’s proposal to reverse the burden of proof is only a recent suggestion, in practice this has been accepted for a long time. This is the effect of the mantra that the ‘science is settled’, the ‘debate is over’, the MSM’s acceptance of the AGW theory and acting as a mouthpiece for that theory rather than seeking to question those who propose it, the biased reporting by the BBC, the fact that most Governments have accepted the theory and are adopting policies supposedly justified by that theory etc.
One needs to be realistic as to what is happening/going on, it is no use crying about what ought to be going on. The reality is that unless Mother Nature shows beyond doubt that natural drivers are king, the burden is on the sceptics to prove that AGW theory is false and the degree of proof expected is high.
I agree with you that natural drivers are king and that human activities have been a minor component in the warming since 1880. However, you seem to imply that “AGW” is false when I believe it is more proper to say that “CAGW” (Catastrophic Anthropogenic Global Warming) is false. Or, are you simply saying that the warmists are trying to force we skeptics to prove “AGW is false”? If it is the latter, then we have been assigned an impossible burden. AGW, strictly speaking, is not false, what is false is CAGW.
I try to use reason and base my opinions on scientific principles and factual observations, and I assume those who happen to disagree with me do the same, unless there is incontrovertable evidence to the contrary. I believe members of the official climate Team really believed in CAGW (“tipping point”, “runaway” warming) and, like Chicken Little when he was hit on the head by an acorn and thought the sky is falling, thought they were warning and thus saving the world. When, starting about a decade ago, the DATA started to trend against their MODELS, based on their theory of high CO2 sensitivity (CO2 continuing rapid rise but temperatures tending to stabilize in terms of statistical significance) they re-analyzed the DATA to “adjust” it to match their MODELS.
Bottom Line: If we flatly say “AGW is false” (humans have had absolutely no influence on warming since 1880), or if we say there has been absolutely no warming since 1880 (it is all Data Bias) I think we lose the majority of honest observers who have been listening to both sides and have not yet made up their minds. Of course, everyone can decide for themselves, but I think it is true and we should admit that there has been warming (but not as much as claimed by the official climate Team because they have Biased some of the Data) and that some small part of it is due to human activities (but not as much as claimed by the official climate Team because their MODELS are overly sensitive to CO2). I would then add that there is no evidence a modest increase in CO2, or in average temperatures, is in any way detrimental to human life on Earth, and such increases may be, overall, beneficial.
I disagree with the 33 deg assumption. If STP (standard temperature and pressure) means anything then 0 deg is the temperature to use and “GHG” only add 15 deg max not 33.
If molecules of N2, O2, CO2 and H2O get heated, to say 300 K, conductively on a surface, what happens to each. If N2 and O2 cannot ,according to some, shed this heat via IR because they cannot absorb IR (Kirchoffs Law) then aren’t they the true trappers of heat? If 99% per cent of the atmosphere can get heated but is not able to shed the heat why are we talking about CO2.
You mention the half up and down of IR from GHG’s but do not mention that for each altitude the lapse rate will have the molecules lower in temperature so less energy and less energy goes down. Work in being done against the force of gravity so energy must be expended.
“A black body at 288K has about 0.1% of its spectrum at wavelengths less than 3.9 micron and roughly 8% in the range 14.5 to 15.5 micron, giving an absorptivity/emissivity of radiation from such a body for CO2 of less than 0.05.” From Jennifer Marohasy blog.
So 8% can heat up the surface?
Human CO2 is 3% of atmospheric CO2. So we would be 3% of 8% of any added heat caused by IR absorption. That’s a small number and I don’t think it can be measured.
old construction worker said . . . “CO2 drives the climate” is still an unproven hypothesis. It is up to them to prove that they are right. So far they have not been able to do so.
Remember, “Spontaneous Generation theory” history . . . .
richard verney said: Governments have accepted the theory and are adopting policies supposedly justified by that theory etc.
One needs to be realistic as to what is happening/going on, it is no use crying about what ought to be going on. The reality is that unless Mother Nature shows beyond doubt that natural drivers are king, the burden is on the skeptics to prove that AGW theory is false and the degree of proof expected is high.
This is the speech, argument, of an autocrat, or a huckster . . . . which is why there are so many behavioral cycles. . . . For example, in our economy, the system has failed because there are those that think they can tax directly, without apportionment . . . the result, the productive capacity quits. In another way, how many fences did Tom Sawyer paint for Huck Finn. . . . or how many times will you participate in a coin toss when the rules are Heads I win . . . . Tails you lose . . . Just one more time, no!
Not me! The rules change or I don’t “play”, and this my friend is human nature . . .
It’s why kings, get their head chopped off, and thugs seem to just disappear sometimes.
. . . and you say, . . . unless Mother Nature shows beyond doubt that natural drivers are king. How many times has she done it and how many MORE times does “she” have to do that . . . . and by who’s definition? Go put on your Burka . . . . NOW! And give me that 10% you owe GOD! . . . NOW!
We all know that famous quote . . . . . . . . . . “Knowledge is Power . . .
but, not many know the rest of it which is . . . . & Ignorance is Control”
Mike Haseler says
February 3, 2011 at 12.25
in reply to Myrrh: “What fingerprints? The Vostok graph like others of its ilk shows clearly that something is forcing,”
Then Myrrh, the task is pretty simple. Show statistically that the signal (forcing) to noise (natural variation) ratio is higher enough to make your (bogus) assertion of 95% confidence.
Mike Haseler, you’re mixing up contexts here. There are two distinct aspects in my post. The paper I linked to was CO2’s statistical significance in the noise re climate variation, the Vostok reference was to climate cycles, not to be confused. You yourself made the point that these two were different.
Are you really the same Mike Haseler who first replied to KR by pointing this out?
Because the tone of your reply to me here is at odds with it.
My Vostok/fingerprint was a reply to the Mike who was adding to KR’s post, and to his first link which stated:
“A natural cycle requires a forcing, and no known forcing exists that fits the fingerprints of observed warming – except anthropogenic greenhouse gases.”
So this is about CYCLES, of which you said to KR – “climate cycles are predictable, climate variation isn’t (that’s why it’s [climate variation] dealt with statistically).”
Sorry Mods, continual interruptions, my last post should be elsewhere. On the Roy challenge, and I messed it there too – forgot the close italics after quoting Mike Haseler. Time for a break.
Ira, just a couple of observations that probably don’t matter much re CO2. Examining all of the pre-industrial records, and even allowing for local concentrations. projecting trends back it seems likely that the preindustrial level was more like 310 ppm, and the difference is either lost in the ice or is lost when the core depressurizes. Also if you take into account all of the warming biases, and if they are additive (probably not) they could account for all of the warming since at least 1975. However I agree with your satellite comment. GH theory does say that the troposphere will warm more than the surface, and now that the new La Nina has offset the recent El Nino, we have satellite warming of about 0.3 degrees C since 1979 for the troposphere. That leaves less than 0.3 for the surface, or less than the 1944 t0 1976 cooling, so yes, warming since 1976 (the upside of a 60 year cycle), but no warming since the 1938-44 peak. That leave very little room for CO2. There seems to have been more warming 1910-1944 than recently, which could be accounted for by being on the upside of three natural cycles, the 60 year and 1000 year are obvious, and the 180 year is reasonable conjecture. If the 180 year peaked about 1940-45, then the recent warming had two upsides and one downside, thus not as great as 1910-45, which seems to be the case. If all of this conjecture is good there is little to no room for a CO2 contribution. See my Chaotic Climate piece here http://www.agwnot.blogspot.com/ which goes into more detail, and which Anthony refuses to publish, even though it is no more conjectural or less diplomatic than your post. I think we are going into a cooling much more severe than your projection, and it is all due to natural cycles.
For a 3rd comment I shall begin mine just like all good stories do; “Once upon a time” – all those who were seriously skeptical of the claim that a trace-gas which we call CO2 was driving all, the as yet unknown – to modern man, factors that make up the climate through it’s “claimed ability” to warm the Earth like it has never been warmed before. – They were skeptical, seriousy!
This claim that CO2” was warming the whole Earth had a very simple rebuttal; The case was, is – and always will be the other way round, – i.e. if you warm, say a piece of coal up to a temperature where it catches fire, then from there on, CO2 is produced. – Easy , peasy. – I.E. Warming comes first, and then CO2 is produced.
I am not a rich person, but I will promise to buy – for the use of yourself and your best science -mates, – say 4 or maybe even 5 bottles of compressed CO2 for you to do with what you like as long as you can produce heat from that CO2. Yes, you are allowed to use as many matches to “set fire to it “as you need – just as I needed matches to set fire to the coal.
But of course; if you cannot demonstrate as a fact that CO2 can cause warming then you pay for the bottled gas yourself – as I do not make a habit out of giving away free “electrical fire extinguishers”
However, all that said – any skeptical claim with evidence from Ice Cores included, was soon parried with a rebuttal from the “warmists” who agreed that, – in each case of; “At the beginning of an Interglacial period”, the Sun would start the warming off, but very soon the rising levels of CO2 would “take over and amplify” that warming.”
Warmists were never challenged as to where the temp. and CO2 graph lines crossed over, nor were they pressed to explain why ice core graphs show the Earth always starts to return back to glaciations at a time when CO2 levels are at maximum.
As, at the time, unfortunately, I did not follow “The Day to Day Development” of the global warming debate very closely, so I feel justified in saying that by now I am staggered to find that skeptics are actually siding with the “warmists” by saying:
“Come on, its obvious, – we are guilty, – but how guilty are we?
“Not very much” they answer themselves, because CO2 can only produce or cause x% of the warming. (That’s a small x)
Shall I laugh, or should I cry? It has by now become an argument about percentages!
O H Dahlsveen says:
February 4, 2011 at 3:29 pm
Clearly CO2 does not cause warming in the sense of introducing additional energy to the system.
However in slowing down the rate of energy loss by the system whilst solar energy input remains the same it does increase the total energy content of the system for a rise in temperature.
See here:
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=1562&linkbox=true&position=5
“Greenhouse Confusion Resolved”
So in the end it does indeed boil down to climate sensitivity i.e. percentages and whether the real world climate effect of more CO2 is significant in relation to natural variability.
For reasons that I have set out in detail the effect of more human CO2 must be insignificant and unmeasurable on timescales of less than millennia.
In summary the real world effect of a bit more energy in the system is merely to alter air circulation speed and positioning a bit. Since solar and ocean induced shifts are so large any human effect is not discernible.