[Note: Jim sent me this in response to an group email pointing out yet another hopeless alarmist website climatetruth.org. He says it is his stock response, written somewhat like a poetry or haiku, and some of you may find it handy – Anthony]
By Jim Goodridge, former California State Climatologist
It is hard to disagree with receding glaciers.
The increase in atmospheric CO2 is undeniable.
Yet as skepticism survives it is not about facts – but about cause.
There are those who would interpret facts to fit their agendas.
The Smithsonian Intuition initialized a solar constant measurements project
In about 1910 using the finest pyranometers available
They were not able to measure solar variation closer than 1%
The variation due to atmospheric water vapor was close to 2%
Thirty years of solar constant numbers were not usable for that objective
Solar constant measurements were made from orbiting satellites starting in 1978.
Measurements were made normal to the suns rays.
They were corrected for the mean Earth Sun distance
The resulting solar constant measurements were made to an accuracy of 0.1%.
They were found to vary as the historic Sunspot Numbers.
Sunspot numbers are available since 1700.
Sunspot numbers are cyclic and repeat every eleven years.
Taking the sunspot numbers since 1900 and plotting an 11-year running average
Results in a graph showing an increasing sunspot trend for 110-years
The Hadley Center has a 110-year sea surface temperature record
The trends in sea surface temperature and sunspot trends are similar
The effect of rising SST is lower solubility of dissolved CO2
The increase in atmospheric CO2 is consistent with rising SST
Where there is a need to support a conservation ethic.
The increase in CO2 was attributed to tailpipe emissions perhaps in error.
Some say that a skeptic is a thing of evil
Some should not consider alternatives.
If your job depends on a specific interpretation
Perhaps you should ignore the solar evidence.
Our lives are filled with self-delusion it is handy to deceive others
“Aside from skeptics in the history of philosophy
Others were strangers to the first principals of intellectual honesty”
Objectivity is the goal. Skepticism is a tool.
OHD, yes, the atmosphere cannot cool radiatively without these GHGs. It might cool by conduction to a cold surface.
Bomber_the_Cat says:
December 10, 2011 at 4:10 am
Rosco says:
December 10, 2011 at 1:04 am
“Besides GHGs are not the only gases in the atmosphere which are heated and therefore radiating IR.”
Yes they are. Only the ‘greenhouse gases’ absorb and emit infrared radiation. The main constituents of the atmosphere, oxygen and nitrogen, do not. It is the radiation from the greenhouse gases that make the Earth’s surface warmer than it would without greenhouse gases.
AGWSF does like to push the meme ‘everything above absolute zero emits infrared’, so how come oxygen and nitrogen don’t?
And, how come hot air (nitrogen and oxygen) doesn’t?
@ur momisugly Robert Brown:
“…So cold that all the warming seen
From then until now
May be simply explained
By natural variation
Regression to the mean
Excursion beyond
With CO_2 the minor factor
Not the Smoking Gun
Playing second fiddle to
Earth’s variable Sun.”
Sir, this is brilliant. I hope you enjoyed composing it as much as I enjoyed reading it.
Don
You don’t need a
weathermanclimate scientistTo know which way the wind blows
We can accept your facts, but without quantification, these statements are entirely useless. They tell us exactly nothing. You need to demonstrate significance, without significance your statements are mere flatulence. Can you not understand this? Besides, we may cool for the next hundred years (touch wood). GK
Let’s cut the crap.
Isn’t “emitting infrared radiation” just another way of saying “cooling down”?
wuwt has no standards of truth or accuracy (apparantly)
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2011/12/10/oh-pleeze/
harvey says:
December 10, 2011 at 9:15 am
You are grossly misinformed. Higher level of CO2 in the atmosphere makes plants grow faster/larger, use less water in the process, and extend the growing season in the higher latitudes. This helps virtually the entire living world and is an unimpeachable case of the greatest good for the greatest number. Deal with it.
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
December 10, 2011 at 12:05 pm
We are in agreement but more important Henry’s Law is in agreement with us. I must have mistaken you for someone else when I responded a week ago because I thought you were supportive of Ernst Beck’s survey which IMO is flawed beyond use.
My take basically boils down to there being a natural equilibrium point in the typical interglacial regime of 280ppm CO2. As with most systems out of equilibrium the farther out of equilibrium it is the faster/harder the system drives back towards equilibrium. This as anthropogenic CO2 emission has risen we observe a constant rate of 50% of those emissions being removed from the atmosphere. No matter how much we emit half of it gets taken up by natural sinks. This is so very characteristic of equilibrium systems I can’t imagine any other plausible explanation. There doesn’t seem to be much room for doubt that anthropogenic emission is what’s driving the system further out of equilibrium by releasing geologically sequestered CO2 in the process of fossil fuel consumption.
Jim D says December 10, 2011 at 4:41 pm:
“OHD, yes, the atmosphere cannot cool radiatively without these GHGs. It might cool by conduction to a cold surface.”
========
Fine Jim D. All I need now is empirical proof for your statement and I shall ditch the law of nature which has fooled me all along, you know the one about “all objects that have a temperature above zero Kelvin (K) must radiate energy” and all that jazz.
Looking forward to your return posting! – And merry Christmas –
Jim D says:
December 10, 2011 at 4:41 pm
“OHD, yes, the atmosphere cannot cool radiatively without these GHGs. It might cool by conduction to a cold surface.”
Nonsense. A fundamental law of physics is that all matter with a temperature above absolute zero emits thermal radiation. This applies to subatomic particles to say nothing of whole elements or compounds. All matter in motion emits thermal radiation. Write that down.
Dave Springer says:
December 11, 2011 at 6:37 am
With respect Dave, because you make some very knowledgeable posts, you are wrong about atmospheric gases such as nitrogen and oxygen absorbing and emitting radiation in the long wave infrared region – which is what you imply. If they did, then they would all be greenhouse gases. What is the absorption spectra for nitrogen for instance|? Check it out! It absorbs in the ultraviolet, but not in the infrared.
Gases at atmospheric pressure do not approximate to blackbodies.
Let’s write it down.
Nitrogen is not a blackbody and does not absorb nor radiate in the long wave infrared.
Oxygen is not a blackbody and does not absorb nor radiate in the long wave infrared.
CO2 is not a blackbody but does absorb and radiate at a wavelength of around 15 microns.
Jim D is correct. “The atmosphere cannot cool radiatively without GHGs”
Some good comments Dave, but I have trouble with that one statement. Sounds to me like you are relying on intuition, for that (which doesn’t mean it is wrong). I think you could be correct for ice age equilibrium, but I don’t consider that normal for the Earth. We may be establishing a new equilibrium, that will finally end the cyclic ice age glaciation, for the benefit of all. Of course, that is merely my intuition. In any event it would be interesting to note how you arrived at 280 ppm. GK
harvey says:
December 10, 2011 at 9:15 am
You seem to be in the camp that believes that warming is a good thing. That nothing bad can come from it. Probably not for you. But talk to the people in the Netherlands and Bangladesh.. oh but they are of no concern to you…
================================================
Since the Netherlands are sinking, and Bangladesh is gaining land mass due to sedimentation…
….what’s your point?
How much would we have to lower CO2 levels to create another ice age….to catch up with sinking land?
Blackbodies, which are idealized objects emit at all wavelengths and produce a blackbody spectrum. No object is a perfect blackbody as they are limited in what wavelengths they can emit by the behavior of their molecules. Gases are the least perfect having few or no thermal wavelengths where they can emit. Try detecting thermal radiation from pure O2 and N2. You won’t.
G. Karst says:
December 11, 2011 at 8:10 am
From Dave Springer:
My take basically boils down to there being a natural equilibrium point in the typical interglacial regime of 280ppm CO2.
Some good comments Dave, but I have trouble with that one statement. Sounds to me like you are relying on intuition, for that (which doesn’t mean it is wrong).
That is a matter of looking to the past levels of temperature and CO2. Over the glacials/intergalcials of the last 800,000 years the ratio between CO2 levels and SH ocean temperature proxies (dD and d18O) is about 8 ppmv/°C. See:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/Vostok_trends.gif
The correlation gets even better if one takes into account that CO2 lags the temperature changes.
In the high(er) resolution ice cores of Law Dome can be seen that the difference between the MWP and the LIA is about 6 ppmv less for ~0.8°C cooling. Since then the temperature increased with about the same amount. Thus the current CO2 level without human emissions would be around 285 ppmv. See:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/law_dome_1000yr.jpg
Part of the previous interglacial (the Eemian) was 2°C warmer than this one, the CO2 levels reached 310 ppmv…
Jim D says:
Try detecting thermal radiation from pure O2 and N2. You won’t.
Satellites measure temperature of the atmosphere, based on the radiation intensity of… oxygen,
Ferdinand, no they don’t, unless you mean ozone.
Ferdinand,
What are your thoughts on the Japanese satellite map that shows China, Africa and India [and many more of the less developed nations] emitting all of the excess CO2 in the atmosphere, while The U.S. and Europe are net CO2 sinks [CO2 absorbers]?
The satellite appears to show conclusively that we in the West are not the “carbon” problem [even if CO2 is a problem, which is unlikely, and for which there is no evidence]. Should reparations for carbon emissions be paid to the U.S. and Europe by China, India, Africa and the other net CO2 emitters? Or is this just a political scam under the guise of “carbon pollution”?
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
December 11, 2011 at 9:21 am
“Satellites measure temperature of the atmosphere, based on the radiation intensity of… oxygen”
That is correct. Satellites estimate the temperature of the atmosphere by sensing microwave radiation from the oxygen18 isotope in the atmosphere. The frequency of this microwave radiation is about 60GHz, it is not infrared and is irrelevant to greenhouse warming.
It is very useful though for establishing a satellite temperature record.
BtC, thanks, I stand corrected. Spencer’s AMSU does it this way. They use the very low energy in the microwave rotation bands. Microwave is about two orders of magnitude longer than IR thermal radiation, and emission there is at least ten orders of magnitude below the IR emission of GHGs, since Planck’s Law goes as wavelength to the fifth power. My statement about no thermal radiation from O2 and N2 is still correct, because microwaves are not thermal radiation by its normal definition.
Dave Springer says:
December 11, 2011 at 6:37 am
Nonsense. A fundamental law of physics is that all matter with a temperature above absolute zero emits thermal radiation. This applies to subatomic particles to say nothing of whole elements or compounds. All matter in motion emits thermal radiation. Write that down.
Better yet write down that it is false, it does not apply to subatomic particles nor does it apply to gas molecules in the IR frequency range.
Smokey says:
December 11, 2011 at 9:47 am
What are your thoughts on the Japanese satellite map that shows China, Africa and India [and many more of the less developed nations] emitting all of the excess CO2 in the atmosphere, while The U.S. and Europe are net CO2 sinks [CO2 absorbers]?
What the Japanese satellite measures are mainly the natural flows. Human emissions are too small to be detected, except where relative huge emissions are concentrated (e.g. in and around towns with a huge concentration of cars, houses and factories). But indeed it is very interesting to see that the main natural sinks are in the temperate and near polar forests, while the tropical forests seems to be net emitters.
But one need to be cautious: the satellite measures the whole air column for CO2. In the equatorial band, the oceans emit huge quantities of CO2, while the polar oceans absorb a lot of CO2. This is spread from West to East over the same latitude band, thus what you see over the land parts is already a mix of what happens in the oceans in the same band plus over land locally. Land clearing may be measurable if concentrated in relative small areas…
The rise and fall of sunspot activity over a 110 year period is shown in Vukcevic’s charts along with the temperature response. This is not what the “Greens” and governments, trying to push carbon tax, want to want to hear. Government agencies like the CSIRO, ABC, NASA,, NOAA, and BBC along with the varies government weather channels are commissioned to debunk any correlation. So expect lots of junk data and weather forecasts.
Jennifer says:
December 10, 2011 at 10:18 am
You need to be a bit careful with the data in Woodfortrees. I have used GISS temperature anomalies data from the site for about 10 years and starting to lose faith in the data. Basically the 1860’s has miraculously become cooler and the later years warmer. I am not sure where the problem lies.
Check out Vukcevic’s charts that shows the approximate 110 year sunspot cycle harmonic