Guest Post by Ira Glickstein
The Unified Theory of Climate post is exciting and could shake the world of Climate Science to its roots. I would love it if the conventional understanding of the Atmospheric “Greenhouse” Effect (GHE) presented by the Official Climate Team could be overturned, and that would be the case if the theory of Ned Nikolov and Karl Zeller, both PhDs, turns out to be scientifically correct.
Sadly, it seems to me they have made some basic mistakes that, among other faults, confuse cause and effect. I appreciate that WUWT is open to new ideas, and I support the decision to publish this theory, along with both positive and negative comments by readers.
Correlation does not prove causation. For example, the more policemen directing traffic, the worse the jam is. Yes, when the police and tow trucks first respond to an accident they may slow the traffic down a bit until the disabled automobiles are removed. However, there is no doubt the original cause of the jam was the accident, and the reason police presence is generally proportional to the severity of the jam level is that more or fewer are ordered to respond. Thus, Accident >>CAUSES>> Traffic Jam >>CAUSES>> Police is the correct interpretation.
Al Gore made a similar error when, in his infamous movie An Inconvenient Truth, he made a big deal about the undoubted corrrelation in the Ice Core record between CO2 levels and Temperature without mentioning the equally apparent fact that Temperatures increase and decrease hundreds of years before CO2 levels follow suit.
While it is true that rising CO2 levels do have a positive feedback that contributes to slightly increased Temperatures, the primary direction of causation is Temperature >>CAUSES>> CO2. The proof is in the fact that, in each Glacial cycle, Temperatures begin their rapid decline precisely when CO2 levels are at their highest, and rapid Temperature increase is initiated exactly when CO2 levels are their lowest. Thus, Something Else >>CAUSES>> Temperature>>CAUSES>> CO2. Further proof may be had by placing an open can of carbonated beverage in the refigerator and another on the table, and noting that the “fizz” (CO2) outgasses more rapidly from the can at room temperature.
Moving on to Nikolov, the claim appears to be that the pressure of the Atmosphere is the main cause of temperature changes on Earth. The basic claim is PRESSURE >>CAUSES>>TEMPERATURE.
PV = nRT
Given a gas in a container, the above formula allows us to calculate the effect of changes to the following variables: Pressure (P), Volume (V), Temperature (T, in Kelvins), and Number of molecules (n). (R is a constant.)
The figure shows two cases involving a sealed, non-insulated container, with a Volume, V, of air:
(A) Store that container of air in the ambient cool Temperature Tr of a refrigerator. Then, increase the Number n of molecules in the container by pumping in more air. the Pressure (P) within the container will increase. Due to the work done to compress the air in the fixed volume container, the Temperature within the container will also increase from (Tr) to some higher value. But, please note, when we stop increasing n, both P and T in the container will stabilize. Then, as the container, warmed by the work we did compressing the air, radiates, conducts, and convects that heat to the cool interior of the refrigerator, the Temperature slowly decreases back to the original Tr.
(B) We take a similar container from the cool refrigerator at Temperature Tr and place it on a kitchen chair, where the ambient Temperature Tk is higher. The container is warmed by radiation, conduction and convection and the Temperature rises asymptotically towards Tk. The Pressure P rises slowly and stabilizes at some higher level. Please note the pressure remains high forever so long as the temperature remains elevated.
In case (A) Pressure >>CAUSES A TEMPORARY>> increase in Temperature.
In case (B) Temperature >>CAUSES A PERMANENT>> increase in Pressure.
I do not believe any reader will disagree with this highly simplified thought experiment. Of course, the Nikolov theory is far more complex, but, I believe it amounts to confusing the cause, namely radiation from the Sun and Downwelling Long-Wave Infrared (LW DWIR) from the so-called “Greenhouse” gases (GHG) in the Atmosphere with the effect, Atmospheric pressure.
Some Red Flags in the Unified Theory
1) According to Nikolov, our Atmosphere
“… boosts Earth’s surface temperature not by 18K—33K as currently assumed, but by 133K!”
If, as Nikolov claims, the Atmosphere boosts the surface temperature by 133K, then, absent the Atmosphere the Earth would be 288K – 133K = 155K. This is contradicted by the fact that the Moon, which has no Atmosphere and is at the same distance from the Sun as our Earth, has an average temperature of about 250K. Yes, the albedo of the Moon is 0.12 and that of the Earth is 0.3, but that difference would make the Moon only about 8K cooler than an Atmosphere-free Earth, not 95K cooler! Impossible!
2) In the following quote from Nikolov, NTE is “Atmospheric Near-Surface Thermal Enhancement” and SPGB is a “Standard Planetary Gray Body”
NTE should not be confused with an actual energy, however, since it only defines the relative (fractional) increase of a planet’s surface temperature above that of a SPGB. Pressure by itself is not a source of energy! Instead, it enhances (amplifies) the energy supplied by an external source such as the Sun through density-dependent rates of molecular collision. This relative enhancement only manifests as an actual energy in the presence of external heating. [Emphasis added]
This, it seems to me, is an admission that the source of energy for their “Atmospheric Near-Surface Thermal Enhancement” process comes from the Sun, and, therefore, their “Enhancement” is as they admit, not “actual energy”. I would add the energy that would otherwise be lost to space (DW LWIR) to the energy from the Sun, eliminating any need for the “Thermal Enhancement” provided by Atmospheric pressure.
3) As we know when investigating financial misconduct, follow the money. Well, in Climate Science we follow the Energy. We know from actual measurements (see my Visualizing the “Greenhouse” Effect – Emission-Spectra) the radiative energy and spectra of Upwelling Long-Wave Infrared (UW LWIR), from the Surface to the so-called “greenhouse” gases (GHG) in the Atmosphere, and the Downwelling (DW LWIR) from those gases back to the Surface.
The only heed Nikolov seems to give to GHG and those measured radiative energies is that they are insufficient to raise the temperature of the Surface by 133K.
… our atmosphere boosts Earth’s surface temperature not by 18K—33K as currently assumed, but by 133K! This raises the question: Can a handful of trace gases which amount to less than 0.5% of atmospheric mass trap enough radiant heat to cause such a huge thermal enhancement at the surface? Thermodynamics tells us that this not possible.
Of course not! Which is why the conventional explanation of the GHE is that the GHE raises the temperature by only about 33K (or perhaps a bit less -or more- but only a bit and definitely not 100K!).
4) Nikolov notes that, based on “interplanetary data in Table 1” (Mercury, Venus, Earth, Moon, Mars, Europe, Titan, Triton):
… we discovered that NTE was strongly related to total surface pressure through a nearly perfect regression fit…
Of course, one would expect planets and moons in our Solar system to have some similarities.
“… the atmosphere does not act as a ‘blanket’ reducing the surface infrared cooling to space as maintained by the current GH theory, but is in and of itself a source of extra energy through pressure. This makes the GH effect a thermodynamic phenomenon, not a radiative one as presently assumed!
I just cannot square this assertion with the clear measurements of UW and DW LWIR, and the fact that the wavelengths involved are exactly those of water vapor, carbon dioxide, and other GHGs.
Equation (7) allows us to derive a simple yet robust formula for predicting a planet’s mean surface temperature as a function of only two variables – TOA solar irradiance and mean atmospheric surface pressure,…”
Yes, TOA solar irradiance would be expected to be important in predicting mean surface temperature, but mean atmospheric surface pressure, it seems to me, would more likely be a result than a cause of temperature. But, I could be wrong.
Conclusion
I, as much as anyone else here at WUWT, would love to see the Official Climate Team put in its proper place. I think climate (CO2) sensitivity is less than the IPCC 2ºC to 4.5ºC, and most likely below 1ºC. The Nikolov Unified Climate Theory goes in the direction of reducing climate sensitivity, apparently even making it negative, but, much as I would like to accept it, I remain unconvinced. Nevertheless, I congratulate Nikolov and Zeller for having the courage and tenacity to put this theory forward. Perhaps it will trigger some other alternative theory that will be more successful.
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UPDATE: This thread is closed – see the newest one “A matter of some Gravity” where the discussion continues.
Richard S Courtney says: January 3, 2012 at 2:42 am
Are you trying to adopt the Joel Shore method of obfuscation: i.e. pretend an imaginary reality then claim reality must obey your imagination?
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There ain’t no such animal as adiabatic lapse rate in the real world – there is always exchange of energy with the surroundings – there is always moisture in the air. You may be comnfusing environmental lapse rate. A very variable quantity nominally abot 6,5K/km.
Thought
If you take a suitably proportioned (to allow for correct volume change with altitude) tube of aerogel 10km long.
Rotate it to be horizontal the temperature will eventually stabilise to some average.
Now rotate it to be vertical (big end at top)
The air at the bottom will compress (and heat) and the air at the top will expand (and cool).
I would suggest that eventually – because of the molecular collisions and motion the air temperature will average out over the full height to the same value as when horizontal.
What do you suggest would happen?
Joel Shore says:”…entire Earth-atmosphere system is only absorbing 240 W/m^2 from the sun.”
Several folks have stated above so not directed specific to Mr. Shore.
Avogadro’s number = 6.0221415 × 10^23
molecules per mole of gas
One mole of an ideal gas at STP occupies 22.4 liters
1000 L per m^3
1000/22.4=44.6 moles per m^3
44.6 x 6.022E23=2.69E25 molecules
cubed root of above 299,569,488 moles per m^2
number of CO2 in above 113836 molecules
240 W/m^2/113839 molecules per m^2 = .0021 W per CO2 molecule
390 W/m^2/113839 molecules per m^2 = .0034 W per CO2 molecule
I doubt this highly.
CO2 is a minor greenhouse gas. Water is the dominant absorber.
cubed root of above 299,569,488 moles per m^2
Should read molecules per m^2 not moles.
Joel Shore says:
January 3, 2012 at 7:38 am
“The major piece of experimental evidence is that the temperature of the Earth’s surface is such that it is emitting 390 W/m^2 while the entire Earth-atmosphere system is only absorbing 240 W/m^2 from the sun.”
Thank you, Joel. But, is the entire Earth-atmosphere system really only absorbing 240 W/m^2 from the sun? This, again, seems to be a calculation without experimental confirmation. I’d print more of my thoughts on this, but it is a sidetrack from the main thing I want to bring up at this moment.
Anyway, the calculations appear assume that temperature is wholly determined by incoming flux minus outgoing S-B. This ought to be able to be expressed as an ordinary differential equation, something like
dT/dt = f(S – sigma*eps*T^4)
where T is temperature, S is incoming flux, and the rest is S-B radiation, and f() is a monotonic function which converts from energy flow to temperature. Setting dT/dt to zero then gives the quasi-steady state temperature.
However, the heat equation says there is another term proportional to thermal diffusivity and the Laplacian of the temperature distribution, so that we would get a partial differential equation for the temperature as a function of time and space, perhaps of the form
pT/pt = f(S – sigma*eps*T^4) + alpha*del^2(T)
where “p” denotes the partial differential operator. That extra term would capture the influence of the energy required to establish temperature gradient divergence, which must be substantial for the spherical Earth if temperature isosurfaces are to exist at given altitudes. The “alpha” term is the thermal diffusivity, which very much depends on density.
It may be of interest for someone to try calculating (I might work on it a little when I have time):
A) a representative thermal diffusivity coefficient for the Earth’s atmosphere
B) the Laplacian of T assuming an isosurface at Earth radius
C) the effective energy flux the term would represent which, wouldn’t it be fascinating if it came out to something near 150 W/m^2?
Konrad says:
January 2, 2012 at 1:13 am
Great, thanks, Konrad, we’re getting somewhere. Now all I need is a few numbers and an explanation.
1. You say that if there is an atmosphere with no ghgs, the planet will be warmer than a planet with no atmosphere. What is the actual series of steps by which this happens?
2. How much does an atmosphere raise the planets temperature?
For example, you say:
I fear that is no explanation at all. Other than the trivially small amount of energy needed to initially warm the denser gas, why and how will a denser gas “trap more energy”?
My basic question is this. The nature of non-GHG gases is that they don’t absorb or radiate in either the shortwave or longwave bands. So how do they slow down the radiation to space of the energy of the planet’s surface? Because that’s what you have to do to raise a planet’s temperature. The GHGs slow it down by absorbing some of it, then radiating part of that back to the surface.
But how are non-GHG gases supposed to slow down radiation to space? It’s not by the warming and cooling of the atmosphere, that’s a net-zero process, and trivially small to boot because of the small thermal mass of the boundary layer.
Because that is your claim, that somehow perfectly transparent gases slow down radiation to space … but neither you nor anyone else has explained how transparent gases slow down radiation to space. Saying that they will “conduct and trap more energy” is just handwaving.
What energy do they “trap”, and how do they “trap” it, and what happens when the “trap” is full, and how much do they “trap”?
w.
PS—Like many folks, Nikolov seems to have misunderstood the lapse rate. The lapse rate does not ensure that the bottom of the atmosphere is warmer than the top.
It ensures that the top of the atmosphere is cooler than the bottom. And since the temperature of the bottom-most layer of the atmosphere is set by the surface temperature …
Willis, I think I see your oversight as regards non GHG gases.
They warm up from conduction from the solar irradiated surface below and from each other.
Gravity holds more of them near the surface so there are more of them bouncing around sharing energy with each other by collision and conduction.
Every collision and sharing of energy between molecules reduces the rate of energy loss to space and the delay builds up in proportion to the number of molecules in a given space.
So the greater the density, the greater the delay in energy loss to space and the higher the temperature can get.
Meanwhile radiative energy loss occurs from the ground below and if the non GHG molecules get hotter than the ground they pass it back to the ground via conduction before the ground can radiate it out to space.
So they do ‘trap’ energy.
They ‘trap’ it by a process of passing the parcel between themselves and the ground via conduction over a period of time.
When the ‘trap’ is full they pass the energy back to the surface which radiates it out to space.
They trap an amount proportionate to density.
Do you see it now ?
Bart says:
It is measured, or at least based on various measured quantities…and the amount that the Earth is actually emitting to space, as seen from satellites, is also measured and is the same (within the experimental errors, which are not more than 5 or 10 W/m^2.
No…what I am saying is that if the entire earth-atmosphere system is only absorbing 240 W/m^2 and the surface is emitting 390 W/m^2 back out into space by radiation then you’ve already got a problem. It doesn’t matter how the heat is moving around within the atmosphere. The only solution is that the atmosphere is absorbing some of the surface’s emissions, a fact that is well-confirmed, in spectral detail, by satellite measurements.
Look, at this point you are simply flailing about wildly. Show at least a little scientific objectivity and admit when nonsense is nonsense. This “unified theory” is really exposing how desperate many people are to believe what they want to believe at all costs!
Joel Shore and JJThoms:
At January 3, 2012 at 2:42 am I wrote:
“We are talking about how a planet heated by a Sun maintains a lapse rate that always ‘seeks’ the adiabatic lapse rate.”
Joel Shore responds at January 3, 2012 at 7:51 am by saying;
“If it does always seek the adiabatic lapse rate, it is doing a piss-poor job in the stratosphere! In fact, the lapse rate does not always seek the adiabatic lapse rate. Rather, the adiabatic lapse rate is a stability limit…i.e., lapse rates greater than the adiabatic lapse rate lead to convection, which indeed then does drive the lapse rate to the adiabatic lapse rate. However, lapse rates less than the adiabatic lapse rate are stable.”
That is absolutely classic Joel Shore obfuscation. It is a distinction which makes no difference.
“Lapse rates greater than the adiabatic lapse rate … drive the lapse rate to the adiabatic lapse rate”.
“lapse rates less than the adiabatic lapse rate are stable” but conditions which permit them are transient.
JJThoms says at January 3, 2012 at 8:23 am
“ There ain’t no such animal as adiabatic lapse rate in the real world – there is always exchange of energy with the surroundings – there is always moisture in the air. You may be comnfusing (sic) environmental lapse rate. A very variable quantity nominally abot 6,5K/km.”
Seeking the adiabatic lapse rate (which is what I said) is NOT achieving the adiabatic lapse rate.
I am not confusing anything (n.b. I am not Joel Shore), and your point is why conditions permitting lapse rates less than the adiabatic lapse rate are transient.
Richard
The iceman cometh:
It is what it is. The radiative effects of each element making up the natural greenhouse effect can be calculated. CO2 contributes either ~9% or ~25% (if I remember correctly), depending on whether you measure by how much the forcing falls if you remove or measure by how much the forcing goes up if you start with an IR-inactive atmosphere and add it in.
However, CO2 and the other non-condensable gases play a very important role because they control the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere (because that is a strong function of the temperature). Hence, the best available evidence that we have is that if you remove the condensable greenhouse gases, you lose most of the greenhouse effect once such feedbacks are taken into account (see http://www.sciencemag.org/content/330/6002/356.abstract )
Joel Shore says:
January 3, 2012 at 11:56 am
“Look, at this point you are simply flailing about wildly.”
Ah, no. If I were insisting that I knew that the current prevailing paradigm is wrong, and pulling everything but the kitchen sink in to try to maintain my intransigence, then I would be flailing. But, I am not doing that. I am discussing alternatives which may or may not have been previously considered to make sure something is not missing.
I am not saying greenhouse theory is wrong, though I have suggested that I think Doppler broadening has to be key to it if it is right – I do not see how you can absorb more than a negligible width (or widths) out of the radiation distribution without it. Nor am I saying the alternative is right. I am just trying to look at the problem from all sides before forming a conclusion. That is what real scientists do.
It is more or less an academic exercise because I do not think the increase in GHGs would be driving temperatures higher for a variety of reasons, particularly the negative feedback from clouds. Or, for that matter, that recorded temperatures to date have been observably anomalous. In fact, every indication right now is that we are heading into another ~30 year cooling cycle, such as is evident in the temperature record every ~60 years.
“…what I am saying is that if the entire earth-atmosphere system is only absorbing 240 W/m^2 and the surface is emitting 390 W/m^2 back out into space by radiation then you’ve already got a problem.”
The 390 W/m^2 figure is a derived quantity based on temperature. It is potentially balanced to some extent by the divergence of the temperature gradient which is part of the standard heat equation. I am suggesting this may well be the term which actualizes the principle which Stephen Wilde @ur momisugly January 3, 2012 at 11:16 am somewhat inchoately describes as “the greater the density, the greater the delay in energy loss to space and the higher the temperature can get.” It doesn’t require any new heretofore undiscovered physics. It’s a known effect. And, I do not see anywhere it has been taken into consideration.
Richard S Courtney says:
Given the confusions that exist around here, it is important to clearly understand WHY the lapse rate in the troposphere tends to be near the adiabatic lapse rate. And, the reason is a combination of the fact that the troposphere is strongly heated from below and cooled from above (because of the combination of much of the sunlight being absorbed at the Earth’s surface and of the radiative effects of greenhouse gases) AND that lapse rates higher than the adiabatic lapse rate are unstable to convection.
The reason it is important to have this understanding is so one does not then fall prety to ignorant statements (made by people like Postma, among others) to the effect of “The adiabatic lapse rate is all you need to explain the elevated surface temperature of the Earth; there is no need to consider greenhouse gases.”
Willis Eschenbach says:
January 3, 2012 at 10:32 am
“Now all I need is a few numbers and an explanation.”
//////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////
First, about the numbers. It should be clear from the huge number of comments about the Nikolov and Zeller hypothesis over several blog sites that none of the numbers being used are answering the question. This seems to be because the physical system at play is not clearly understood. The first step to resolution is empirical testing to confirm the mechanism. Numbers to quantify this come second. It should be clear after over a thousand comments without resolution that this question will not be answered from behind a computer keyboard. I would also note that more money has now been spent on internet connection fees and electricity by all involved in commenting than a simple and robust empirical experiment would have cost.
As to the question “how does an atmosphere raise a planets temperature”, the answer appears to be by transferring energy from a part of the planet that can radiate energy easily (the solid surface) to another part of the planet that cannot radiate easily (the gases in the atmosphere).
Conduction by gas in contact with the surface removes heat from the surface faster than it would have been lost by radiation alone. The heat in the gas atmosphere then leaves the planet slower as the gas atmosphere is a poor radiator. The denser the atmosphere, the more heat it can absorb. The denser the atmosphere the higher the viscosity, and the slower the convection speed.
The important question here is the one Ira is asking a few comments earlier. By what means do nitrogen and oxygen lose heat to space?
“The important question here is the one Ira is asking a few comments earlier. By what means do nitrogen and oxygen lose heat to space?” It is not an important question, because the answer is known – they can’t. I thought they could, but when I dug deeper I realized I was wrong.
The only means by which they could lose heat to space is by radiation (or by leaving the planet). For radiation, at thermal equilibrium absorption = emission, which is known as Kirchoff’s Law. Once you have differences in temperature, then heat is transferred according to T^4 law. But if you don’t have absorption, then you can’t have emission, and the symmetrical diatomic gases O2, N2 etc don’t absorb radiation – therefore they don’t heat up by radiation and they don’t cool by radiation. I hope that answers the question.
I said:
Well, having looked yet again at this issue, I am apparently now in the position of not only admitting that I was wrong, but admitting that I was wrong twice (i.e., wrong about being wrong) and I am now going back to my original claim on this! I just looked over Gerlich & Tscheuschner and, more importantly, Arthur Smith’s very nice reply to them ( http://arxiv.org/abs/0802.4324 ), and I now realize the mistake that cba and I were both making: We were imagining the polar angle theta to denote latitude and phi to denote longitude. However, the integral is more easily carried out if you make theta = 0 correspond to the point on the earth where the sun is directly overhead because you have symmetry about such an axis. And, in fact, the integral is then what Nikolov et al have written down.
So, my conclusion is back to this: Nikolov et al.’s calculation of T_sb is carried out correctly but uses an extremely questionable approximation, namely that the planet’s temperature distribution is determined by that necessary to balance the local (in both space and time) insolation. I.e., it assumes no heat storage and no movement of heat about the planet. [The whole necessity of having to make any assumption at all about the temperature distribution could be eliminated by performing a fit of the pressure vs the ratio of the amount of power emitted by the surface to the total amount absorbed by the planet and its atmosphere from the sun, although these values for the various celestial bodies might be more difficult to come by.]
At any rate, this problem is relatively minor in relation to the more serious problems that we have identified with their “theory”.
Here’s some simple numbers that are averages. There’s 341W/m^2 coming in to the Earth system from the Sun when averaged over the whole Earth. There is about 30% reflected back to space which is the albedo. That means about 239 W/m^2 average is absorbed. For the Earth to be in balance at a temperature, the average radiated power leaving the Earth system has to balance the incoming 239 W/m^2. The average current surface temperature is around 288k and for an emissivity of 1 in the IR, that means the surface radiates away 390W/m^2. Note a 0.95 emissivity would radiate away 370 W/m^2. Earth nowadays has about a 62% cloud cover which is responsible for the vast majority of the albedo but is also responsible for blocking a good deal of surface radiation that would otherwise pass through the atmosphere to space. Clouds aren’t the only factor as there are particulates floating around which are not molecules with line spectrums.
What all of these tidbits boil down to is that the surface emits around 390 W/m^2 on average and the Earth system must emit to space only about 239W/m^2 on average. That means the atmosphere must block 390-239 = 151 W/m^2 more than it contributes to outgoing radition. About 2/3 of this amount is attributed to ghg absorption and the rest must be clouds and non ghg factors. Essentially, co2 contributes about 28 W/m^2 of absorption and h2o vapor contributes the lion’s share.
Note that these are all averages of the real world except for the detailed line by line calculations for the total and specific contributions to the 151 W/m^2. A black body airless object with a reasonable distribution of incoming power and relatively low average temperature variation would have to radiate the average 239 W/m^2 corresponds to 255K indicating a 33 deg C rise due to the atmosphere. Also, there is no reference as to how much impact conduction and convection have somewhere in the atmosphere nor is there a model of the atmosphere.
These combine to show that 33 deg C / 151 W/m^2 = 0.218 deg C rise per W/m^2 increase in absorbed power or increased average incoming power or due to the decrease of albedo. This is a sensitivity to small changes. Multiplying by the 3.7 W/m^2 increased absorption due to a co2 doubling results in a 0.8 deg C rise. Note that this has all of the feedbacks (average) present in the atmosphere. A straight radiative calculation assuming 61% of the surface emission escapes to space indicates that for a 1 W/m^2 increase in outgoing power would raise the temperature by 0.3 deg C/W/m^2 increase or 1.1 deg C rise for a co2 doubling. Here’s the evidence that the actual feedbacks in the atmosphere are net negative on average and result in a temperature increase only 73% of the required temperature change for a simple model calculation without feedbacks.
When one looks at what is involved in the modeling estimates by Lacis and Hansen that claim significant positive feedbacks, it get’s even more interesting. They use one dimensional modeling and choose assumptions that maximizes the feedback. The most offensive is the assumption that a rise in temperature results in less cloud formation. That means, among other things, that Earth is currently at its maximum sustainable cloud cover. Why? At lower temperatures, there is less h2o vapor present and the evaporation cycle must diminish. Because of their assumption, warmer temperatures will result in less cloud formation and that leaves us at some magical maxima. Hence, there is no way to achieve a cloud cover greater than 62% and a decrease in cloud cover will increase the average temperature. That, along with efforts to minimize cloud cover albedo effects and maximize thermal blocking are combined to imply that it really doesn’t have a significant effect. Amazing how the average cloud albedo is taken by these guys to be the minimum cloud albedo of the one cloud type which has the lowest reflectivity. I suspect that if you call them on it there will be some claim of it being best to err on the ‘safe’ side when dealing with poorly known details.
cba says:
Nope.,.It does not have the feedbacks included. Monckton is confused about the same point (as was Willis in a post a few months ago) and I have explained to him in gory detail with analogies why he is incorrect ( http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/12/30/feedback-about-feedbacks-and-suchlike-fooleries/#comment-848206 and http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/12/30/feedback-about-feedbacks-and-suchlike-fooleries/#comment-848211 ).
The basic point is this: The 151 W/m^2 includes the greenhouse effects of water vapor (and clouds). However, in doing this calculation, you are making the assumption that all of the water vapor is a forcing, not a feedback. Or, to put it another way, you are assuming that you have to remove all the water vapor explicitly in order to get that 33 deg C temperature drop. What the climate scientists, backed by various experimental evidence, theoretical considerations, and climate model simulations ( http://www.sciencemag.org/content/330/6002/356.abstract ), would say is that if you remove just the condensable greenhouse gases (which are just some fraction of the 151 W/m^2), most of the water vapor would also condense out and you would lose most of the warming effect of the water vapor, hence dropping by almost that fall 33 deg C. (You would also increase the ice albedo of the planet.) Even if you don’t believe this scenario, you can’t prove that it does not occur by assuming that it does not occur…That is a circular argument.
So, you are not correct in thinking that you have done a calculation that includes all of the feedbacks (as feedbacks). The only feedback that you have clearly included properly as a feedback is the negative feedback due to the lapse rate (because you calculated the temperature change at the surface). So, your 0.8 deg C result is the result that you get including the one known negative feedback and NONE of the known positive feedbacks (nor the cloud feedback, of unknown sign).
[By the way, Monckton quotes a different number (or range), 86-125 W/m^2 for the total forcing from the Kiehl and Trenberth paper and I am a bit confused about which one of the various numbers in that paper is the most sensible to use. I kind of think that yours is, but then, as I say, you have clearly included the negative lapse rate feedback while not including any of the others. With the number that Monckton quotes, he does get an answer that is closer to the actual no-feedback value of 1.1 deg C, although whether this is meaningful or just due to fortuitous cancellations of the lapse rate feedback and an erroneous choice for the total forcing is unclear to me. But, at some point, this is all a mootpoint because the real problem is that you are not calculating a sensitivity that includes feedbacks in the proper way.]
P.S. – cba, You might want to read my recent post here too, http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/12/29/unified-climate-theory-may-confuse-cause-and-effect/#comment-852111 , as I have concluded that the calculational error that we thought Nikolov was making in computing T_sb is not a calculational error but is due to a different definition of the “polar angle” theta than you and I were assuming: I.e., if one takes theta = 0 the point on the Earth where the sun is overhead then you get symmetry that makes the integration easier (i.e., the integration of the azimuthal angle is trivial). That is what Nikolov did.
Konrad says:
January 3, 2012 at 1:07 pm
Thanks, Konrad. But if the physical system at play is “not clearly understood” … then what are they writing the paper about?
Couldn’t disagree more. First I need a crystal clear explanation of what you call “the mechanism”. Only then can I design an experiment to determine if said mechanism works.
I’m sorry, but I can’t make sense of that. If there is only nitrogen and oxygen in the atmosphere, then the only thing that can radiate is the surface. That means that (on average) the surface is pinned to a temperature determined by emissivity and TSI/4.
It has to stay at that temperature. If there were a mechanism such as you/Nikolov propose that warmed the surface, it would immediately be radiating more energy than it is intercepting … sorry, no can do.
If there are no GHGs, then the only way for the atmosphere to warm and cool is to exchange heat with the surface. In such a situation, during the day the surface warms the atmosphere. During the night the atmosphere warms the surface.
But that is a zero sum game. What the atmosphere gains during the day, it loses during the night.
If there are no GHGs, then it is by heat exchange to the surface. Say a planet with no GHGs is receiving, on average, 235 W/m2 of solar energy. The planet’s been there a long time so it’s at some kind of equilibrium.
1. The only thing that can radiate energy to space in that system is the planetary surface.
2. At equilibrium, that planet’s surface must emit on average 235W/m2 of energy. This means that the temperature of the surface is fixed. No matter what the atmosphere does, the surface will still be radiating 235 W/m2 of energy.
So what Jelbring and you and Nikolov propose can’t happen by the laws of thermodynamics. If a GHG-free atmosphere could somehow warm the surface of such a planet, it would be emitting more energy than it is absorbing. Can’t do that.
All the best,
w.
Bart says:
What the heck does that mean? Are you saying that heat flows from the (generally) colder atmosphere to the (generally) warmer earth’s surface in violation of the 2nd Law? [And, even if it did, that wouldn’t solve the problem because the 240 W/m^2 represents all of the energy absorbed by the Earth + atmosphere. Really, the deficit for the earth’s surface is 390 W/m^2 out by radiation vs. 160 W/m^2 in via radiation. I’m giving you another 80 W/m^2 absorbed by the atmosphere as a freebie, because for example one could argue that some of it will reach the Earth’s surface once the greenhouse gases are removed..]
Look, you guys can wave your hands around all you want but it won’t get you around conservation of energy. The fact that we even have to have this conversation is embarrassing!
Joel Shore (January 3, 2012 at 7:51 am):
Correction. Lapse rates less than the adiabatic lapse rate are unstable under downward movement of energy by the back radiation. This movement continues to increase the lapse rate until it exceeds the adiabatic lapse rate. While the system is in this state, convection drives the lapse rate downward.
The only plot I could find of the measured Earth emission spectrum was here in figure 3. It appears from this that the spectrum is following something closer to a 300 degK isocline. So, why are people calling out numbers in the high 300’s?
At lower wavenumbers, it appears more like following the 275K isocline. Then comes the H2O/CO2 dip, and suddenly we are at 300K. Why?
Is it possible that the greenhouse effect, rather than masking out the emissions in the given wavenumber range, is actually just shifting them up (i.e., lower in frequency/energy?)
Joel Shore says:
January 3, 2012 at 4:39 pm
“What the heck does that mean?”
If you do not know what it means, how can you criticize it? Maybe reading my comment at January 3, 2012 at 9:15 am would help. I’m asking for information to help make a judgment. I do not know why you think that is embarrassing. I do not know how you think scientific innovation happens, but it is not by accepting everything you are told without question or full understanding.
Willis Eschenbach says:
“My basic question is this. The nature of non-GHG gases is that they don’t absorb or radiate in either the shortwave or longwave bands. So how do they slow down the radiation to space of the energy of the planet’s surface? Because that’s what you have to do to raise a planet’s temperature. The GHGs slow it down by absorbing some of it, then radiating part of that back to the surface.”
Konrad says:
“As to the question “how does an atmosphere raise a planets temperature”, the answer appears to be by transferring energy from a part of the planet that can radiate energy easily (the solid surface) to another part of the planet that cannot radiate easily (the gases in the atmosphere).”
re: Willis Eschenbach
if greenhouse affect only refers to radiant aspect, then it’s not a greenhouse affect.
But a greenhouse has little to do radiant aspects- a greenhouse works by preventing convection.
So, I think the use of term “greenhouse effect” is referring keeping a planet warm- by whatever means.
And there are different ways this can be done.
But before going on, I get the idea that the only way heat can leave earth is by radiation.
What seems to missing generally is that infrared heat [as in not hot balls stars- as in room temperature heat] does not radiate quickly into space.
A human in spacesuit has lots of warmth- spacesuit have be designed to shed heat- having blocks of ice is an easy way to do this.
Same goes for all spacecraft- they are designed to passively get rid of heat.
Only because of spacecraft design were the Apollo 13 crew cold- a in simple tin can they would have been sweating.
So space itself is a “greenhouse”- it stops all convection and conduction, leaving rather inefficient way getting rid of heat- radiation.
How earth gets rid of all it’s heat, could a bit of mystery. Except, that earth doesn’t absorb “all this heat”. It absorbs a small fraction of the sunlight. It absorbs a small amount of sunlight that hits the ground.
Which brings us to the point, any atmosphere allows for more energy to be absorbed.
Denser atmosphere allows [generally] more energy from sunlight to be absorbed.
And the energy absorbed in the ground or in the air, does not vanish as soon as the sun isn’t shining- if it did, it would require a massive surge of energy to leave the planet.
The planet stores far more energy than the cumulative heating from the Sun for centuries of sun shining on earth.
If the true average temperature [not just the atmosphere] were to lower by 10 C, it would take centuries to warm back up to “normal temperatures”.
So the earth storing heat is a “greenhouse effect” [for want of a better term].
Or the heat capacity of earth.
This is for daily cycles and long term, if you have more atmosphere, then atmosphere will have more heat capacity.
Which means in a desert, the temperature would drop less during the nite.
Next point about denser atmosphere. [Denser than say an identical earth with 1/2 of Earth’s current atmosphere.]
It could absorb heat and give heat quicker. It’s a better battery.
Now, for me, I am unresolved about what sheds the most heat- atmosphere or land and ocean surface. It doesn’t matter much, because I think people mostly believe the atmospheric heat loss occurs in less dense air. Or with twice the atmosphere it losing heat at about same air density as less dense atmosphere.
At different factor, because the surface will have higher loses from convection, the ground will be slighter cooler- even less chance of frying eggs on a sidewalk.
One factor is heat inversion- this in general inhibits convection. And with denser air, perhaps one has more heat inversion [don’t know].
Come on, folks, this is not that complicated. The Sun radiates energy, and the surface AND the IR-interactive gases (the “GHGs”) absorb energy. The surface and the air both absorb energy. The surface radiates and the GHGs help “spread” all the IR energy to the non-GHGs through collisions (It does not matter what percentage of GHGs there is–same difference–reason for all the confusion). The air gets warmer and STORES HEAT, but the convection ensues. The GHGs high in the atmosphere emit directly to space, as does the surface in the “window.” It gets warmer in the day and colder at night. It is no more complicated than that!
AND the water also STORES a lot of energy for “tomorrow.”
There is no need for some “backradiation” to help this very simple process.
The end.
Well, my apologies if my rambling while trying to find any weakness I could in the greenhouse argument offended anybody. I’ve chased down every lead I could find. I’ve looked at all the evidence I could find, and I’ve made calculations based on density considerations which I believe are in the ballpark of what to expect. I see no mechanism of significant size relating to atmospheric density which can lead to significant impedance (or capacitance, for a better electrical analogy) of heat. It looks to me that the greenhouse interpretation is very likely to be correct.
The main bit of evidence that convinces me is that yawning gap in the outgoing radiation measured by satellites where the water vapor absorption spectrum lies. That energy’s got to go somewhere, and if it isn’t coming out the top of the atmosphere, it’s going to heat things up.