Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
It has been known for some time that the “Pacific Warm Pool”, the area just northeast of Australia, has a maximum temperature. It never gets much warmer than around 30 – 31°C. This has been borne out by the Argo floats. I discussed this in passing in “Jason and the Argo Notes“, and “Argo Notes Part 2“. I’d like to expand on this a bit. Let me be clear that I am by no means the originator of the claim that there is a thermostat regulating the maximum ocean temperature. See among many others the Central Equatorial Pacific Experiment. I am merely looking at the Argo data with this thermostat in mind.
First, Figure 1 shows the distribution of all of the ~ 700,000 surface temperature measurements taken by Argo floats to date.
Figure 1. A “histogram” shows how many data points fall in each of the 1°C intervals shown along the bottom axis. The maximum is in the interval 28°-29°C.
The number of temperature records peaks around 29°C, and drops quickly for temperatures above 30°C. This clearly establishes the existence of the mechanism limiting the oceanic temperatures.
What else can the Argo data tell us about this phenomenon? Quite a bit, as it turns out.
First, a look at the year by year evolution of the limit, and how it affects the temperatures at different latitudes.
Figure 2. Annual temperature variations measured by all northern hemisphere argo floats that exceeded 30°C. Temperature observations are colored by latitude. Click on image for full-sized graphic.
A couple points of interest. First, the cap clearly affects only the warm parts of the year. Close to the equator, that is most of the year. The further from the equator, the less of the annual cycle is affected.
Second, the majority of the breakthroughs through the ~30° ceiling that do occur are from areas further from the equator, and are short-lived. By and large, nobody exceeds the speed limit, especially those along the equator.
Figure 3 is a closeup of the years since 2005. I chose this starting point because prior to that the numbers are still changing due to limited coverage. To show how the mechanism is cropping the tops of the warmer parts of the year, I have added a Gaussian average (129 point width) in dark gray for each two-degree latitudinal band from 0°-2°N up to 10°-12°N.
Figure 3. Annual temperature variations measured by all northern hemisphere argo floats that exceeded 30°C. Dark lines have been added to highlight the average annual swings of the data by latitude band. Click on image for full-sized graphic.
As you can see, the warm parts of the yearly cycle have their high points cropped off flat, with the amount cropped increasing with increasing average temperatures.
Finally, here is the corresponding plot for the southern hemisphere:
Figure 4. Annual temperature variations measured by all southern hemisphere argo floats that exceeded 30°C. Click on image for full-sized graphic.
Note that there is less of the southern ocean that reaches 30°C, and it is restricted to areas closer to the equator.
Next, where are these areas that are affected by the temperature cap? I had always thought from the descriptions I’d read that the limitation on ocean temperature was only visible in the “Pacific Warm Pool” to the northeast of Australia. Figure 5 shows the areas which have at some point been over 30°C.
Figure 5. Locations in the ocean which are recorded at some time as having reached or exceeded 30°C.
Figure 5a. A commenter requested a Pacific-centered view of the data. We are nothing if not a full-service website.
Clearly this mechanism operates in a wider variety of oceans and seas than I had realized, not just in the Pacific Warm Pool.
Finally, here is another way to consider the effect of the temperature maximum. Here are the average annual temperature changes by latitude band. I have chosen to look at the northern hemisphere area from 160 to 180 East and from the Equator to 45°N (upper right of Figure 5, outlined in cyan), as it has areas that do and do not reach the ~ 30° maximum.
Figure 6. Average annual temperature swings by latitude band. Two years (the average year , shown twice) are shown for clarity.
Note that at say 40°N, we see the kind of peaked summer high temperatures that we would expect from a T^4 radiation loss plus a T^2 or more evaporative loss. It’s hard to get something warm, and when the heat is turned down it cools off fast. This is why the summer high temperature comes to a point, while the winter low is rounded.
But as the temperature starts to rise towards the ocean maximum, you can see how that sharp peak visible at 40°N starts first to round over, then to flatten out at the top. Curiously, the effect is visible even when the temperatures are well below the maximum ocean temperature.
Speculations on the mechanism
I want to highlight something very important that is often overlooked in discussions of this thermostatic mechanism. It is regulated by temperature, and not by forcing. It is insensitive to excess incoming radiation, whether from CO2 or from the sun. During the part of the year when the incoming radiation would be enough to increase the temperature over ~ 30°, the temperature simply stops rising at 30°. It is no longer a function of the forcing.
This is very important because of the oft-repeated AGW claim that surface temperature is a linear function of forcing, and that when forcing increases (say from CO2) the temperature also has to increase. The ocean proves that this is not true. There is a hard limit on ocean temperature that just doesn’t get exceeded no matter how much the sun shines.
As to the mechanism, to me that is a simple question of the crossing lines. As temperature rises, clouds and thunderstorms increase. This cuts down the incoming energy, as well as cooling the surface in a variety of ways. Next, this same process moves an increasing amount of excess energy polewards. In addition, as temperature rises, parasitic losses (latent and sensible energy transfers from the surface to the atmosphere) also go up.
So … as the amount of total radiation (solar + greenhouse) that is warming any location rises, more and more of the incoming solar radiation is reflected, there are more and more parasitic losses, more cold water and air move from aloft to the surface as cold wind and rain, and a greater and greater percentage of the incoming energy is simply exported out of the area. At some point, those curves have to cross. At some point, losses have to match gains.
When they do cross, all extra incoming energy above that point is simply transferred to the upper atmosphere and thence to the poles. About 30°C is where the curves cross, it is as hot as this particular natural system can get, given the physics of wind, water, and wave.
I make no overarching claims for this mechanism. It is just one more part of the many interlocking threshold-based thermostatic mechanisms that operate at all temporal and spatial scales, from minutes to millennia and kilometres to planet-wide. The mechanisms include things like the decadal oscillations (PDO, AMO, etc), the several-year Nino/Nina swings, the seasonally opposing effects of clouds (warming the winters and cooling the summers), and the hourly changes in clouds and thunderstorms.
All of these work together to maintain the earth within a fairly narrow temperature band, with a temperature drift on the order of ± 0.2% per century. It is the stability of the earth’s climate system which is impressive, not the slight rise over the last century. Until we understand the reasons for the amazing planetary temperature stability, we have no hope of understanding the slight variations in that stability.
My regards to you all,
w.
UPDATE (by Anthony):
Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. has some praise for this essay here:
JustTheFactsPlease said:
“I take your point and wondered as I wrote it if I should qualify it a bit more. Heat convection just doesn’t move anywhere near the amount of energy that is moved by evaporation and rise of water vapor”
The only point I was making was that over deserts convective activity plus inflow from surrounding regions is (from observations) enough to cap temperatures around 35 to 40C whereas over oceans evaporation plus convection tends to cap surface temperatures around 30C.
The rest of your two posts are pretty much agreed and not really relevant to the specific point I made.
In all situations it is atmospheric pressure (set by the strength of the gravitational field and the mass of the atmosphere) that sets the slope of the dry adiabatic lapse rate underlying the whole upward energy transfer process so that ultimately it is that atmospheric pressure that determines the temperature cap over land and water, indeed for the entire planet.
That is not a new unsupported assertion by me. It is a consequence of the scientifically settled Gas Laws as taught to me over 40 years ago.
I have yet to hear anyone suggest a reason why the Gas Laws do not provide a sufficient description of the observed atmospheric temperature profile without needing to invoke radiative physics at all.
Atmospheric pressure even determines the energy cost in latent heat terms of a given amount of evaporation and so controls the rate of energy transfer from ocean to air and so in effect controls the temperature of the air too.
I should have added radiation to the list of ways that the desert temperatures are capped. It is higher over deserts due to lower humidity.
richard verney says:
Your comment is awaiting moderation.
February 14, 2012 at 3:01 pm
Willis
Further to my last post, I should have added
(x) If notwithstanding the point made in (ix) above regarding the difficulties of overturning the very top microns layer of the ocean, if there is some process whereby the top microns layer (say the top 20 to 30 microns) is overturned, do you accept that in view of the temperature profile of the top microns layer this would tend to cool the ocean not warm it? When considering the answer to this, please note that the top 20 to 30 microns is cooler than the ocean below. I provide a link showing how the temperature increases from about 5 microns to about 1/2 mm and thereafter remains fairly constant for the next 5 to 6 metres.
Willis Eschenbach says: February 13, 2012 at 5:13 pm
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Willis
I am not going to comment on the heat loss point since other have already commented upon that.
I may be mistaken, but is there not an obvious error with the figures you use? Please correct me if I am mistaken.
My understanding is that the net loss figure of 490 w per m² is taken from your ARGO data covering the buoys between 0° to 30° latitude, or am I mistaken?.
My understanding of the 170 w per m² is not the incoming solar for the 0° to 30° latitude region of the globe, but instead is some global average, or am I mistaken?.
If my understanding is correct, you are obviously not comparing apples with apples, nut as I say, I may have misundestood the source of the figures that you use.
Willis Eschenbach says:
February 13, 2012 at 6:59 pm
There are hundreds of buoys in that area. The graph only shows those locations that have been above 30°C. All of the data in Figure 6 came from those hundreds of buoys. In the whole area … hang on …
OK. I just wrote the program to calculate it. The area 0-45°N, 160-180°E shown in Figure 6 has 28,899 observations from a total of 518 different floats over the period of record.
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Willis, thanks for the clarification and my apology for failing to realize that Fig. 5 displayed only those locations above 30°C.
all that downwelling warmer water in the western Pacific, in areas such as the Mindanao dome, is the “battery” that is charged during La Nina, to be released during El Niño. Problem is, it seems the battery is not being fully discharged, and some of the excess is spilling into other ocean basins, and thus, total ocean heat content is going up.
R Gates, the rather obvious error in your argument is that you assume the ‘battery is not being fully discharged’.
Your conclusion is in fact your initial assumption.
This is called tautological reasoning.
Stephen Wilde says:
February 14, 2012 at 11:56 am
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Stephen
I have dealt with the ocean skin point. If you are interested, see my post of 14th February at 2:27pm. It might save you some time in searching for data on that point.
Willis
I am sure that you have understood my point with respect to the significance of the temperature profile of the very top layer of the ocean.
At the risk of being a bore, In a nutshell, it is:-
(i) that warming of the ocean really begins at about the 0.4mm depth downwards and this is at a depth that DWLWIR just cannot and does not penetrate; and
(ii) above about 0.4mm the ocean is actually losing heat. At most DWLWIR is only reaching the very upper most area where the ocean loses heat; and
(iii) it is the shorter wavelength of solar irradiance that penetrates the depths from 0.4 mm and below and it is solar, and solar only, that heats the oceans..
Joules Verne says:
February 14, 2012 at 6:56 am
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Joules
You might not have been following the earlier post by Willis, Jason and ARGO Notes. Had you followed that post, you would have noted that I have reviewed thosands of ship;s logs with hundreds of thousannds of entries and I noted that from this empirical data source, I had observed numerous entries above 30degC some going up to 36degC, These cover oceans around many parts of the globe such as in and around the Red Sea (often about 32 to 34 degC), off the East coast of Africa (about 32deg C), off the coast of Ghana/Ivory Coast (often 32 to 35degC), off both the West and East coast of India (often 30 to 33 degC), in and around Indonesia (often 30 to 32 degC), similarly over 30 deg C off the coast of China and Japan, in the Gulf of Mexico (often 30 to 32 degC), off the coast of Guatamal (often 30 to 32degC), in the Med just out of Suez and morth coast of Edypt etc..
In addition to my own extensive personal experience in this matter, I posted links detailing current sea temperatures over 30 degC, one of which was 35degC. .
richard verney said:
February 14, 2012 at 5:58 am
… I have several times asked Willis (and others) to explain the physical mechanism involved.
I said I thought his claim was untrue, and said put up or shut up, either support his allegation or withdraw it.
And now, for some unknown reason, Stephen Wilde says:
February 14, 2012 at 11:56 am
Why are you responding at all, Stephen? Are you a sock puppet for richard or something? You have no standing in this matter.
I said nothing to or about you. I want Richard to either support or withdraw his allegation. You can’t help him do either one. Stop interfering.
w.
PS—Why is the ocean warmer with DLR than without it? I’ll go over it slowly for richard. The downwelling radiation … strikes the ocean and it is … absorbed within the first millimetre.
There you have it.
“Absorbed”, of course, means “is converted to thermal energy”. Unless you think that “converted to thermal energy” means “cools the ocean”, we have to assume it leaves the ocean warmer than it would be without that additional thermal energy.
How does this affect the bulk heat of the ocean? Suppose the ocean is at say 29°C, and it is nightime (for simplicity only, same process occurs all the time).
The ocean is radiating energy at around 470 W/m2. If there is no DLR, then all of that 470 W/m2 has to come from the ocean. As a result, it cools quickly, because it is constantly losing 470 W/m2 of energy.
Over the tropical ocean, however, the DLR is often 400 W/m2. So if the ocean is radiating at 470 W/m2 and it is absorbing 400 W/m2 … then the ocean is constantly losing only 70 W/m2 of energy.
Note that the entire upper ocean ends up warmer from this process, despite the fact that only the top skin absorbs the DLR. The important point is that it is absorbed, it is converted to thermal energy, and as such it slows the cooling of the entire upper ocean.
Stephen, see my post referred to above, “Radiating the Ocean”. Here is a comment where I’m explaining this very concept in response to … why heck, it’s in response to richard verney. In that post I say:
So as usual, when richard claims I haven’t explained it, it is as false as the rest of his claims. I explained it directly to him.
And since I see your name all over that same thread, Stephen … why are you sticking your nose in this again?
Stephen Wilde says:
February 14, 2012 at 11:56 am
I’ll do nothing of the sort. I would be mad to respond to such a vague and unformed allegation. Either quote the claim that you think I made or pick another topic.
I am willing to defend my own words all day long.
Defending your curious mis-interpretation of my words is something I won’t do at all.
w.
Stephen Wilde says:February 14, 2012 at 12:03 pm
Well, gosh, Stephen, let’s see what you might have read if you’d actually read the comment in context:
So while you are babbling on about CO2 rising and the sea surface temps and various unconnected things, everyone else has noticed that we were talking about the Minnett experiment … do try to keep up, there’s a good chap.
w.
Willis has written an interesting enough piece, and the comments should tend back to that direction. Why do these discussions always have to go back to arguments that question the very fundamentals of thermodynamics and radiation? There’s really no point in rebelling for the sake of rebelling (even if the topic is mildly related to AGW), or pushing science backwards by continuing to debate the well-understood textbook stuff. It’s so self-evident that infrared energy can heat water (and it’s an easy enough experiment to do yourself with a pot of water and an IR lamp) that discussing it is pointless, as are other sorts of “greenhouse effect violates thermodynamics” lines of thought. It’s also misplaced altogether in that adding CO2 does not predominately affect the surface temperature by just radiating more IR energy downward to the surface (especially in the moist tropics when the lower atmosphere is already radiating closely to a blackbody at its temperature). Instead, the whole atmosphere is warming up as a column since the whole planetary budget is out of balance, and the increased temperature of the troposphere couples to the sea surface via increased IR radiation (by increasing T, not just by directly adding CO2) and the other heat fluxes as well.
My SkS reply should be out tomorrow (I’m finished, but the order in which articles are posted there is up to the mods)
Chris Colose says:
February 14, 2012 at 6:01 pm
“ It’s so self-evident that infrared energy can heat water (and it’s an easy enough experiment to do yourself with a pot of water and an IR lamp) that discussing it is pointless”
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Heat lamp?!
Well, there is a lot about SkS that is self evident from that comment…
If this is the limit of SkS understanding then there is indeed a point in discussing the issue. For a start I have done a number of experiments into the issue of the effect of LWIR on water that is free to evaporatively cool, and I am confidant in stating that you are wrong. Firstly you should not use an IR lamp in any such experiment as a large amount of the radiation produced is far too short wave to be relevant to the CO2 question. Secondly you cannot create any significant heating of a body of water from heating the surface as you claim, as the water due to convection will keep any surface water from significantly heating the water below it. Even scientists who promote AGW only claim that DWLWIR can slow the rate of cooling of water (not heat it) by supposedly altering the thermal gradient across the skin evaporation layer.
Instead of claiming that discussion is pointless, maybe you could do the actual experiment to measure the real issue – possible alteration of cooling rates of warm water. Make sure to maintain airflow and thereby evaporation over your water samples. Also make sure to use an IR source no hotter than the water samples. Or you could do some research and find some links to repeatable controlled lab experiments in which this has been done.
Chris Colose says:
February 14, 2012 at 6:01 pm
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I am sure I must be misunderstanding you. You think that CO2 radiation spectrum can heat a body of water???????……….Naw…you can’t think that as that is a physical impossibility.
You must be talking about SW….right?
@Willis Eschenbach says: February 14, 2012 at 5:43 pm
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Willis
I am not sure whether that response was directed at Stephen or at me. If it was intended to be your detailed explanation of the PHYSICAL PROCESS whereby DWLWIR heats the oceans (as requested in my post of February 14, 2012 at 5:58 am), it would be an understatement to say that I am disappointed.
I appreciate you going slowly for my benefit (which I take was a dig at my mental faculties) but when we are talking about microns to assert that “ The downwelling radiation … strikes the ocean and it is … absorbed within the first millimetre” is the sort of response that would make a politician proud.
So let us have a look at that claim I am sure that you are familiar with this. I attach a link to the accepted absorption characteristics of water to DWLWIR. See http://scienceofdoom.files.wordpress.com/2010/10/dlr-absorption-ocean-matlab.png
For the purposes of this exercise I will use the global average figures that you used in your “Radiating the Ocean Post” of 15th August 2011.
As I understand matters, you allege (on global average figures) that there is some imbalance between the amount of energy the oceans lose by way of radiation (390 w/m²) and evaporation (70 w/m²) and sensible heat (30 w/m²) totalling some 490 w/m² , and the amount of solar energy they receive of some 170 w/m² such that the oceans require approximately some 320 w/m² to stop them freezing. You argue that the shortfall in required energy of some 320 w/m² to balance the books (and hence to stop the oceans from entering a downward spiral leading to their freezing) is provided by back radiation (DWLWIR) set out in the K&T energy budget (ie., 321 w/m²).
The issue is quite simple. How much of this alleged 320 w/m² do the oceans actually receive? The answer lies in the absorptive characteristics of water, the details of which are set out in the above link, and the loss of water in evaporation to the atmosphere.. So let us examine the data and see what it reveals.
(i) You will note from this that 20% of all the available DWLWIR is absorbed in the 1st micron of the ocean. So of the claimed 320 w/m² DWLWIR some 64 w/m² is absorbed and does not find its way to a lower depth.
(ii) You will note from the absorption data that a further 40% of the available DWLWIR is fully absorbed within the next 3 microns. So of the 320 w/m² DWLWIR some 128 w/m² is absorbed in this layer and does not find its way to a lower depth. This means that in the first 4 microns some 192 w/m² of the available 320 w/m² DWLWIR has been fully absorbed and is contained in the first 4 micron layer and does not find its way to a lower depth.
(iii) You will note from the absorption data that a further 20% of the available DWLWIR is fully absorbed within the next 4 microns. So of the 320 w/m² some 64 w/m² is absorbed in this layer and does not find its way to a lower depth. This means that in the first 8 microns some 256 w/m² of the available 320 w/m² DWLWIR has been fully absorbed and is contained in the first 8 microns of the ocean and does not find its way to a lower depth.
(iv) The important point to note is that by the time you get to 10 microns some 84% of all the available DWLWIR has been fully absorbed, ie., some 269 w/m² of the available 320 w/m² has been fully absorbed leaving only about 51 w/m² to penetrate and be absorbed in the slightly deeper environs of the top layer and by the time you get to 20 microns some 88% of all the available DWLWIR has been fully absorbed, ie., some 282 w/m² of the available 320 w/m² has been fully absorbed leaving only about 38 w/m² to penetrate and be absorbed in the slightly deeper environs of the top layer.
Now herein lies the problem. The oceans are evaporating. I believe that you understand this, since this was the central thrust of your last couple of posts. This evaporation takes place from the top 10 to 20 microns of the ocean. This means that all the DWLWIR energy that was absorbed in the first 10 to 20 microns does not lie in the ocean but is actually in the atmosphere. It is being carried upwards and away with the convective currents!!! Please do not underestimate the significance of that.
Whilst I do not accept the energy imbalance you claim, even if you are correct, that there is an energy imbalance of some 320 w/m² between what is coming out and what is going into the ocean, it would appear that DWLWIR cannot and does not provide the required amount of energy to fill that gap. As a consequence of ongoing evaporation, at most, there is only about 51 w/m² finding its way to a depth of 90 microns (ie., 0.09mm). I point out that whilst this lies within the first mm it is well short of 1 mm. We are talking of orders of magnitude!!!.
Thus in summary all the DWLWIR that is absorbed in the top microns of the ocean surface which top microns are evaporated cannot and does not find its way into the oceans in order to heat the oceans. Any and all DWLWIR that is absorbed in the top microns which are evaporated from the ocean lies not in the ocean but in the atmosphere above the ocean. The issue here is that somewhere between 84% to 88% of all DWLWIR absorbed by the oceans lies within the evaporation layer such that it does not find its way into the ocean at all. There is at most only about 12% to 16% of the DWLWIR absorbed by the oceans at a depth below the evaporation layer.
In practice, it would appear that there is no practical way that DWLWIR can to any significant extent find its way into the ocean so as to provide the oceans with the energy which you allege is missing.
Willis, there are many people who are frequent commentators on this site who hold similar views to me. In this regard, I am sceptical of the entire GHE theory. I do not dispute that we measure a DWLWIR signal but question precisely what it is we are measuring (and that is not as silly as it may sound) and precisely what this ‘energy’ source is capable of and in particular its capacity to perform sensible work. That said, I can however, see the potential for DWLWIR to have some effect over land. On the other hand, I find it all but incomprehensible to see how DWLWIR can have any significant effect over water. Due to the wavelength of DWLWIR and the absorption characteristics of water, DWLWIR cannot penetrate to any great degree. That would be a significant problem if that were all. However, this problem is compounded by the fact that water evaporates, and evaporation occurs in the very layer wherein DWLWIR is absorbed almost exclusively. The result is that all but no DWLWIR can get past the evaporation layer. That being the case, it cannot and does not contribute any significant amount of energy to the ocean. It would appear that it cannot explain why on the radiative theory the oceans do not freeze. It does not provide the missing energy required by that theory to stop the oceans from freezing. This in itself suggests that there is a fundamental flaw striking at the heart of the radiative energy theory. I consider that those advancing the theory fail to fully appreciate the differences between land and water and in particular the consequences of evaporation. Water is a very special beast.
If there is anything that you dispute in the above come back with your detailed response describing the PHYSICAL PROCESS whereby the DWLWIR is absorbed by the oceans at a depth below the evaporation layer.
Let us see whether we can be constructive and shine some light on this very important issue.
PS. I am pleased that you reviewed your April 2011 Article. You will see that this supports what I contended, namely, that we have been arguing about this for a long time. Your response did not explain the PHYSICAL PROCESS involved as to how DWLWIR which has little penetrative qualities can find its way past the evaporation layer of the ocean. There is a PHYSICAL BARRIER and it gives rise to a fundamental problem, namely that DWLWIR only penetrates to microns and those very microns are the very microns of sea water evaporated away such that any energy entrapped in those microns is contained in molecules which lie in the atmosphere above the ocean not in the ocean itself.
Konrad
You might be interested in my recent posts addressed to Willis. These posts shed some light on why DWLWIR cannot in practice heat water to any significant effect; approxinately 85% of it is whooly absorbed in the layer of water which is evaporating. Iy seems probable that DWLWIR to the extent that it does anything serves only to increase the rate of evaporatioin. It is even conceivable that it results in a net cooling rather than a warming.
My posts might help explain why the experiments you conducted suggested that DWLWIR does not heat a body of water.
richard verney says: February 14, 2012 at 9:19 pm
“Now herein lies the problem. The oceans are evaporating. I believe that you understand this, since this was the central thrust of your last couple of posts. This evaporation takes place from the top 10 to 20 microns of the ocean. This means that all the DWLWIR energy that was absorbed in the first 10 to 20 microns does not lie in the ocean but is actually in the atmosphere. It is being carried upwards and away with the convective currents!!!”
Well, let’s just do some arithmetic on that. Down IR, global ave 333 W/m2. Latent Heat Evap 2260 KJ/Kg. So if that’s true, a sq m is losing 0.14 gram/sec, or 4.6 tonnes/year. That’s about 4.6 m/year.
OK, it gets replenished by rain. But where in the ocean does it rain 4.6 m/year?
richard verney: February 14, 2012 at 9:19 pm
“….. This evaporation takes place from the top 10 to 20 microns of the ocean. This means that all the DWLWIR energy that was absorbed in the first 10 to 20 microns does not lie in the ocean but is actually in the atmosphere…..”
Richard, I appreciate all the detailed information you bring to the debate, but a question:
Is there a physical law which makes it necessary that every single water molecule heated by DWLWIR is evaporated off the surface?
Nick Stokes says:
February 14, 2012 at 9:45 pm
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Nick
I am not claiming that the DWLWIR is driving the evaporation of the oceans (albeit it may be contributing thereto). I am saying that due to the absorption characteristics of water in relation to the the wavelength of DWLWIR, whatever photonic energy there may be in DWLWIR is almost entirely entrapped (as a result of absorption) in whatever quantity of water that is being evaporated from the oceans, such that DWLWIR does not to any significant extent get absorbed by the ocean thereby heating the ocean..
I am not sure how much rain falls over the ocean. I suspect that there is little realiable data. However, there are some very wet places on land such as the Amazon (100 inches),and Lloro in Colimbia 520 inches, to name but a couple.. I seem to recall that in India one year over 1000 inches fell..
richard verney says:
February 14, 2012 at 9:19 pm
YOU are disappointed? You attack me with false allegations, and now YOU are disappointed? I couldn’t care less if you are disappointed, richard. I’m still waiting for you to apologize. I had said:
You haven’t had the cojones to do either one. Instead, you’re all disappointed, poor man. You have neither supported your claim that I had not explained my position, nor have you retracted it and apologized for your mistake. I have linked to exactly where I explained it to you directly. Everyone knows that your statement was a false accusation, that your claims were in fact bull as I had said.
So you can retract your unpleasant claims, and we can talk further. Or not. I don’t much care which, the claims in the rest of your post are laughable in either case. But I’m done with you until you retract your false allegations.
w.
Folks, as an example of the ridiculous nature of richard’s claims, he says (emphasis mine):
OK, so he is claiming that in addition to the losses he mentions from latent (70 W/m2) and sensible heat (30 W/m2) loss from the surface, that there is also some 282 W/m2 going upwards as evaporation.
Here’s why that claim is so foolish. It takes about 75 W/m2 for one year to evaporate a metre of water from the surface. So that means that richard’s 282 W/m2 is evaporating about 4 metres of water.
This is in addition to the one metre of water already accounted for (the 70 W/m2 latent heat richard discussed in his post).
Here’s the problem. What goes up must come down. If we’re evaporating 5 metres of water from the surface every year, we must be getting that much rain every year.
So richard doesn’t realize it, but he is claiming that the global average rainfall is 5 metres (16.5 feet) per year … and if you believe that, you’ll likely have no problem swallowing the rest of richard’s cockamamie theories.
In fact, global average rainfall is about a metre (39 inches).
w.
Nick writes “OK, it gets replenished by rain. But where in the ocean does it rain 4.6 m/year?”
And makes an excellent point. I’m not a “Its all evaporation” believer myself but I do accept the result DLR cant penetrate the ocean.
So looking at Nick’s suggestion further, the wiki suggests about 1m of global average rainfall and this means approaching 1.5m of ocean evaporation. IMO this means about 1/3 of the energy absorbed in the top few microns is used in evaporation and about 2/3 of the energy is radiated. None goes into the ocean bulk though. If Chris, Willis or anyone wants to suggest how then they’re going to need to suggest a plausible physical mechanism.
“Is there a physical law which makes it necessary that every single water molecule heated by DWLWIR is evaporated off the surface?”
No, but that is not necessary. All that is necessary is for the timing of evaporation to be brought forward on average. Thus molecules with some extra heat from DWLWIR might not evaporate immediately but would evaporate earlier than they otherwise would have done or would pass on the energy to molecules that do evaporate.
The clincher though is that the latent heat taken up by the evaporative event is five times the energy required to provoke that evaporation so evaporation is well able to mop up all DWLWIR that is available.
And, surprise, surprise that 5:1 ratio is set by atmospheric pressure as witness the lower boiling (or evaporating) temperature at the top of Everest.
I just returned to my home on my (not so idyllic) tropical island, 100 km north of the equator, in the midst of a tropical rainstorm. It seem to me droplets are far bigger in these rainstorms, one only needs to get hit by a few to be soaking wet.
But, that aside, it occurred to me that here was another part of the cooling cycle at work. I took a digital probe thermometer, and I caught some rain in a thin walled plastic container. The temperature was 25.6 degrees C. The ambient (air) temperature at the time was 29.2 degrees C. I don’t know what the ambient air temperature was before the storm, but, mid-afternoon around here, almost certainly it was somewhere between 32 and 33 degrees C.
I’d guess the temperature of ambient air approaching sea level would relate to both the rate of evaporation from the surface and that from a falling droplet.
So, here is another part of the cooling mechanism at work. All that water which evaporates from the sea convects upwards, condenses, losing its energy, then falls to earth (or more likely the sea) cooling the surface.