From the “CO2 is there anything it can’t do department” comes this ridiculous piece of research making the rounds in the MSM that worries about something that has not been observed to happen…oh, wait.
![Temporal variation of carbon at pressure levelZ[thinsp]=[thinsp]-6(altitude [sim] 101[thinsp]km) from the NCAR global mean model simulation.](https://i0.wp.com/www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/carousel/ngeo1626-f3.jpg?resize=302%2C240&quality=83)
Observations of increasing carbon dioxide concentration in Earth’s thermosphere
J. T. Emmert, M. H. Stevens, P. F. Bernath, D. P. Drob & C. D. Boone
Carbon dioxide occurs naturally throughout Earth’s atmosphere. In the thermosphere, CO2 is the primary radiative cooling agent and fundamentally affects the energy balance and temperature of this high-altitude atmospheric layer1, 2. Anthropogenic CO2 increases are expected to propagate upward throughout the entire atmosphere, which should result in a cooler, more contracted thermosphere3, 4, 5. This contraction, in turn, will reduce atmospheric drag on satellites and may have adverse consequences for the orbital debris environment that is already unstable6, 7.
However, observed thermospheric mass density trends derived from satellite orbits are generally stronger than model predictions8, 9, indicating that our quantitative understanding of these changes is incomplete. So far, CO2 trends have been measured only up to 35 km altitude10, 11, 12. Here, we present direct evidence that CO2 concentrations in the upper atmosphere—probably the primary driver of long-term thermospheric trends—are increasing. We analyse eight years of CO2 and carbon monoxide mixing ratios derived from satellite-based solar occultation spectra. After correcting for seasonal–latitudinal and solar influences, we obtain an estimated global increase in COx (CO2 and CO, combined) concentrations of 23.5±6.3 ppm per decade at an altitude of 101 km, about 10 ppm per decade faster than predicted by an upper atmospheric model. We suggest that this discrepancy may explain why the thermospheric density decrease is stronger than expected.
Paper (paywalled) available here.
Here’s a press release from one of the co-authors:
The researchers report evidence that CO₂ levels are increasing faster than expected in the upper atmosphere, which seems to be cooling and contracting at a pace that current models have not predicted. Reduction in atmospheric drag brought on by the resulting decrease in density could keep space junk in orbit longer, creating more congestion by orbital debris.
“CO₂ increases close to the Earth’s surface cause temperatures to rise but, surprisingly, CO₂ higher up results in just the opposite,” Bernath said. In the upper atmosphere, the density of CO₂ is too low to maintain greenhouse warming. Instead, the gas absorbs heat from its surroundings and radiates much of it away from Earth.”
Bernath’s work with the team of researchers derives from his role as mission scientist for the ACE satellite project, which has been collecting important information about ozone chemistry, climate change and air pollution since 2004.
Before joining ODU in 2011 as the chemistry chair, Bernath was a faculty member with the University of York in England and, earlier, with the University of Waterloo in Canada. While at Waterloo, he proposed the Canadian satellite project and assembled a scientific team to analyze data that the satellite instruments recorded and dispatched back to Earth.
During the past four decades Bernath has been credited with seminal discoveries in molecular spectroscopy and atmospheric chemistry, resulting in his election as Fellow of the Optical Society of America. He was granted a Ph.D. from MIT in 1981 and received the 2009 Alouette Award of the Canadian Aeronautics and Space Institute and the 2004 Excellence in Research Award from the University of Waterloo. Earlier this year, he was given the Faculty of Science Distinguished Alumni Award of the University of Waterloo.
The primary instrument on the ACE satellite, which is in orbit about 400 miles above the Earth, is a Fourier Transform Spectrometer (FTS) that analyzes the types and quantities of gases in the atmosphere. From the absorption of sunlight during sunrise and sunset, ACE is able to determine the composition of the atmosphere at various heights.
Data from the ACE-FTS has set the standard for measurements of the concentrations of constituents in the Earth’s middle atmosphere. This instrument routinely measures approximately 35 gas species in the atmosphere; some of these are in the parts-per-billion range in concentration.
When the project team led by Emmert checked measurements from 2004-12 by ACE-FTS at altitudes of about 60 miles, it found CO₂ concentrations that were surprisingly high. “To date, CO₂ trends have been measured only up to 35 kilometers (22 miles). Here, we present the first direct evidence that upper atmospheric CO₂ concentrations – the likely primary driver of long-term thermospheric trends – are increasing,” the researchers report.
The eight years of satellite-based solar occultation spectra they studied showed a trend of 23.5 parts per million increase of CO₂ per decade. “This rate is 10 ppm/decade faster than predicted by an upper atmospheric model, which may explain the stronger than expected thermospheric density decrease,” according to the article in Nature Geoscience.
Several possible explanations for this trend are considered by the authors, such as swings in solar activity. They even estimate the amount of CO₂ that may have been deposited in the upper atmosphere by the exhaust of orbital launch vehicles, but the total of 2,700 metric tons above 50 miles high cannot explain the overall trends they found.
If the thermosphere becomes more clogged with space junk, this would present a hazard for active launch vehicles and satellites. Although, some scientists have pointed out that cooling of this outer layer of the atmosphere could be good news for satellites such as the International Space Station, which should be able to stay in orbit longer without firing booster rockets.
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Stephen Brown says:
November 12, 2012 at 2:33 pm
“CO2 increases close to the Earth’s surface cause temperatures to rise but, surprisingly, CO2 higher up results in just the opposite,”
Isn’t CO2 just simply amazing! It warms and it cools the atmosphere.
===
So which is greater, the warming near the Earth’s surface or the cooling in the upper atmosphere? Is there enough cooling to cancel out the warming? At what density does CO2 magically switch from warming to cooling? There sure seem to be a lot of unanswered questions. Is that always the case with “settled science”?
I’ve always been about the right to work, but it’s obviously way past time for massive lay-offs in the science field.
They’ve created a non-existent, yet omnipotent, ‘monster under the bed’, which can be used to justify employment.
They should have no trouble developing new clientele as palm readers.
Wait. The main constituents of the atmosphere are nitrogen (N2) & oxygen (O2). The CO2 molecule is heavier than either, so its concentration will necessarily drop off faster with height than either. So even in a well-mixed atmosphere–e.g., with winds–how the blazes does it get out to the thermosphere?
Color me confused.
Space debris can only threaten satellites which orbit at the same altitude.
Drag on space debris is also drag on satellites.
If they’re right it just means there’s an altitudinal adjustment to drag coefficients, but the problem remains – no worse no better. You want to launch lower so your space debris falls sooner then you’re going to have to deal with a faster decay in the orbit of your primary payload.
It’s silly of them to focus so much on one side only (a brief mention at the end, “some scientists point out…”, why don’t THEY point it out? It’s so bloody obvious Joe Average can point it out!)
Again, it is difficult to create a critique on a article based on a synopsis and press release, but my first reaction is “How can they make such an absurd claim based on their reported observations?”
I am not doubting that they have recorded increases in the CO2 and CO concentrations in the thermosphere over the past 8 years, that evidence is recorded with recognized methods, but to then conclude that that results in a per decade increase is ludicrous at best. The sample size is too small to come to an annual conclusion, let alone a decadal conclusion – this same sort of analysis was applied to the economy before, and during, the housing bubble much to our misfortune.
This piece of garbage is not science, it is speculation based on inadequate evidence.
Marvel Comics needs to come out with a new character, CO2 man – able to do anything and everything and even opposite things at once.
Kev-in-Uk says:
Nature Geoscience? – shouldn’t that become Nature Neoscience?
Or maybe Nature Pseudoscience?
Chris R. says:
November 12, 2012 at 5:46 pm
Wait. The main constituents of the atmosphere are nitrogen (N2) & oxygen (O2). The CO2 molecule is heavier than either, so its concentration will necessarily drop off faster with height than either. So even in a well-mixed atmosphere–e.g., with winds–how the blazes does it get out to the thermosphere?
Color me confused.
Diffusion. All gases are miscible. Gravitational fractionation does not occur in the atmosphere until you get to the top (the thermosphere), where the translational velocity of the lighter gas molecules/atoms reach escape velocity easier relative to the heavier ones, but eventually all of them escape somewhat. At the surface, if you restrict convection or advection (say with a greenhouse or a silo) you can get displacement effects from a local flux and/or chemical reaction.
IIR correctly NASA noted that satellites had excessive drag due to an expanded atmosphere some 3-4 years ago, since then they reported that it stop being a problem as the upper atmosphere had shrunk back again. Can’t find the links though (I’m trying to recover data from a PC fail).
kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
November 12, 2012 at 4:48 pm
Forest and prairie fires yield “natural” CO2 much hotter than what comes from my chimney or exhaust pipe. Shouldn’t that be the type propagating higher faster than the notably different Anthropogenic CO2 molecules?
Good point! I was debating whether to put a sarc by my last reply, however your comment about “ocean outgassing” was on my mind and I thought there was some truth to what I said.
However I still do not understand the cooling aspect. Does it block some of the sun’s light from reaching Earth in the first place? And if so, does it do so to a larger degree with 390 ppm than with 280 ppm?
The sentence in red seems to say that more CO2 in the thermosphere has a cooling effect, no?
That seems interesting.
Gunga Din said:
November 12, 2012 at 2:38 pm
A CO2 molecule is kind of like a dog. The ones Man has made all have “dog tags”. The ones without a “dog tag” are feral and therefore harmless.
——————————————
Feral molecules? Ah! Free range CO2
DaveA has it – ALL orbiting bodies would be affected. We know from satellite data that CO2 in the upper atmosphere radiates only in CO2-specific bands, energy which was contained internally (bond flexing and stretching) and absorbed from longwave IR, in identical bands from other CO2 molecules in the upper atmosphere and lower – NOT from molecular collisions with other gas molecules. More modifying the physics to meet the “projection” and to fit the meme.
Michael Moon says:
November 12, 2012 at 2:19 pm
“Actually, a CO2 molecule has a dipole moment such as water and many polymers which can be heated in a microwave. I am asking for help from someone who knows more than I do about this. “Equipartition,” ok, checking. Tampax? Really? Nolo, you can go back to sleep now…”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/05/co2-heats-the-atmosphere-a-counter-view/
“This contraction, in turn, will reduce atmospheric drag on satellites and may have adverse consequences for the orbital debris environment that is already unstable”
And that’s a problem allowing satellites to stay up longer with less fuel burn and less supervision.
More Co2 would have allowed Iridium to keep going.
The debris are mostly tiny pieces (doesn’t make them any less destructive) hardly affected by the atmosphere.
These bozos are so used to quoting out output of CO2 as a mass, rather than a proportion of total production, they are blinded by the numbers.
WE produce 3-4% of the total not 97%. Idiots.
The graph at the top of this post is NOT the data , it’s the NCAR model output.
The headline graphic from the paper is this:
http://i49.tinypic.com/muive0.png
Less impressive. (But interesting none the less).
Moon, you appear to be incorrect, and not carefully reading responses that would clarify.
Listen then talk.
When I read the following an alarm bell started ringing somewhere:
” After correcting for seasonal–latitudinal and solar influences, we obtain an estimated global increase in COx …”
“Explain away how colder atmospheres don’t warm planetary surfaces. Use any Laws of physics you wish.” Cold things cannot warm up warm things, the heat transfer goes the other way. If you don’t already know this I invite you to sit back down, keep quiet, and learn something.
The Atmosphere is one thing. It is largely composed of N2 and O2, which have no dipole moments, hence cannot absorb outgoing Infrared radiation. CO2 does have a dipole moment as the learned Poor Yorek has confirmed in his obfuscating way. This means that Co2 can absorb IR in its 15 micron band. This means that where 15 micron IR is emitted it can warm the CO2, CO2 is 390 ppm right now. That means that 999,610 ppm of the atmosphere is NOT CO2.
The re-radiaton claim is that this tiny fraction of CO2, instead of merely warming up a little itself, “Re-Radiates” a photon, which is light, both a particle and a wave, and this light heats the Earth’s surface. If this happened there would be a positive feedback which is the same thing as a perpetual motion machine, completely impossible, from where comes this new energy?
We mechanical engineers have to study these things in school. I happened to go to the Number 3 ME school in the US, the glorious U of Michigan. My Heat Transport final was traumatic. Had to pass to graduate and go to work, if I failed 4 more months of school. The lab was 10% of the grade, but Professor Wang threw out the midterm for poor grading by his TA. So, the final was 90% of the grade. Two hour test, one problem, 180 kids in there, NO ONE finished it. I was never so happy with a B+ in my life, thought I had been in a train wreck. My point is, if you have not studied this, your questions alone are perfectly capable of making you sound foolish, so beware Nolo and the rest of you liberal-arts types.
Michael Moon:
At November 13, 2012 at 6:14 am you ask
I answer: the “new energy” comes from the Sun.
I am surprised that you – being a mechanical engineer – think this would require a perpetual motion machine because several devices operate in similar fashion; e.g. water pumps which use the downward flow of water to raise some of the flowing water to an elevation greater than the source of the water, heat pumps which use some of a heat energy flow to move heat from a cooler material (e.g. the ground) to a hotter region (e.g. inside a building), etc..
Richard
Oh come on. Do you not know what “positive feedback” means? I only entered this thread to comment on the absurd nature of the original story. “Re-radiation” is a warmist meme, and I wondered if anyone could back it up. I am not going to lecture on physics here, any more anyway. One last time, cool things cannot warm warmer things, it requires positive feedback, which is the same as perpetual motion machines. You people need to read some books.
Micheal Moon says: My Heat Transport final was traumatic.
I’m not surprised since you don’t even understand the basics of thermodynamics. Go and join Cotton , you could publish paper together and change the world of physics.
A photon does not have passport with a stamp in it saying what the temperature of the emitting body was , neither does the target body have a means of choosing whether you think it is allowed to absorb a photon which hits it. Neither does the emitting body have a check around before deciding which direction to let fly its photons.
In the same way, there is no reason why a molecule of a cold body cannot transfer some energy to a molecule of a hot body in a collision. The laws of thermodynamics are statistical results applied to entire systems.
If I put a wood burner in the middle of an empty room and let things settle to equilibrium, it will attain a stable temperature. If I then surround it by a thick cylinder of matt black cast iron at 1 deg C less than the temperature of the surface of the wood burner, the burner temp. will start to rise instantly.
How can this be ?!!! Is this “colder” body defying the 2nd law? Is this perpetual motion ??
No, there is now an almost identical IR flux in both directions whereas before the burner was radiating significant energy to its surroundings.
If you ever get to design a bridge make sure you get your name clearly marked at the toll booths at each end, that way we’ll know to do a U-turn.
Michael Moon,
I went to Engineering School too. Remember calculating the heat loss from a cooling pond when there was little to no wind (convection minimized)? Did you not have to account for the GHE by either subtracting the “apparent sky temperature” from the ponds temperature in the Stefan-Boltzman equation or by estimating the downwelling radiation based on environmental conditions?
A good explanation of what I’m talking about is here:
http://www.asterism.org/tutorials/tut37%20Radiative%20Cooling.pdf
Explain two things without radiant heat loss being slowed by downwelling radiation:
1) Why does a cloudy winter night stay warmer than a clear winter night?
2) Why is there greater difference in day time to night time temperatures in the desert compared to areas with higher humidity? (ie: Why does it get so cold in the desert at night?)
I am an EE. I took a thermo course too. P Solars explanation is sufficient. The argument that atmospheric gasses can’t raise surface temperature because the surface is warmer than the atmosphere is a fail.
The scientific argument is against the ‘C’, not the ‘AGW’.