Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
According to the current climate paradigm, if the forcing (total downwelling energy) increases, a combination of two things happens. Some of the additional incoming energy (forcing) goes into heating the surface, and some goes into heating the ocean. Lately there’s been much furor about what the Levitus ocean data says about how much energy has gone into heating the ocean, from the surface down to 2000 metres depth. I discussed some of these issues in The Layers of Meaning in Levitus.
I find this furor somewhat curious, in that the trends and variations in the heat content of the global 0-2000 metre layer of the ocean are so small. The size is disguised by the use of units of 10^22 joules of energy … not an easy one to wrap my head around. So what I’ve done is I’ve looked at the annual change in heat content of the upper ocean (0-2000m). Then I’ve calculated the global forcing (in watts per square metre, written here as “W/m2”) that would be necessary to move that much heat into or out of the ocean. Figure 1 gives the results, where heat going into the ocean is shown as a positive forcing, and heat coming out as a negative forcing.
Figure 1. Annual heat into/out of the ocean, in units of watts per square metre.
I found several things to be interesting about the energy that’s gone into or come out of the ocean on an annual basis.
The first one is how small the average value of the forcing actually is. On average, little energy is going into the ocean, only two-tenths of a watt per square metre. In a world where the 24/7 average downwelling energy is about half a kilowatt per square metre, that’s tiny, lost in the noise. Nor does it portend much heating “in the pipeline”, whatever that may mean.
The second is that neither the average forcing, nor the trend in that forcing, are significantly different from zero. It’s somewhat of a surprise.
The third is that in addition to the mean not being significantly different from zero, only a few of the individual years have a forcing that is distinguishable from zero.
Those were a surprise because with all of the hollering about Trenberth’s missing heat and the Levitus ocean data, I’d expected to find that we could tell something from the Levitus’s numbers.
But unfortunately, there’s still way too much uncertainty to even tell if either the mean or the trend of the energy going into the ocean are different from zero … kinda limits our options when it comes to drawing conclusions.
w.
DATA: Ocean temperature figures are from NOAA, my spreadsheet is here.
richard verney says:
June 21, 2013 at 2:09 am
Richard, in the English language, when we do something and the end result is that something ENDS UP BEING WARMER, we call that “warming the object”.
And by the same token, if we do something and the end result is that some object ends up cooler, we call that “cooling the object”.
The world ends up warmer if we add GHGs than if we don’t. So we say that GHGs warm the world.
Now, you seem to think that this is a horrible, terrible misuse of the english language. But since everyone knows what is meant by it, where is the misuse?
The addition of GHGs to an atmosphere without them results in more downwelling energy striking the surface. This ends up with the surface being warmer that it was without the GHGs.
Now, I and the rest of the world call such a process, where energy is added to an object and it ends up warmer as “warming”.
You can call that process “slowing the cooling” if you wish, Richard. But since that terminology neither increases peoples understanding nor gives us any further insights into the physical process, and simply confuses people and leads to meaningless semantic arguments … what’s the point?
I used to think that grammar Nazis were bad. But they are nothing compared to scientific grammar Nazis. You have a long road ahead if you think you’ll change things so that people no longer say say “Boy, that jacket you gave me really warmed me up”, and instead they start saying “Boy, that jacket you gave me really slowed my heat loss”.
Adding GHGs to the atmosphere increases the energy striking the surface. As a result of that additional energy striking the surface, THE SURFACE ENDS UP WARMER than it would be without the GHGs.
Now, us bozo normal people out here call such a process, where an object ends up warmer than it would otherwise be because more energy is striking the object, we call that process “warming” the object.
As I have said, you can call it what you damn well please, because regardless of what you call it the end result is the same—the object ends up warmer than it would be otherwise.
But no matter what you call it, other folks will just go on calling it “warming”, because the object ends up warmer. Or as the Online Thesaurus says:
warm – make warm or warmer; “The blanket will warm you”
As the thesaurus entry clearly demonstrates, the language doesn’t care about the process. The language doesn’t care that the blanket is not a heat source. “Warming” refers to the end result, that the object ended up warmer than it otherwise would have been. It does not refer to or care about the details of the process.
You can rail against that all you want, claim it’s not logical and all the rest, and you’ll be 100% right … so what? Language isn’t logical, never was, and never will be, despite the best efforts of all the world’s grammar Nazis.
w.
kadaka (KD Knoebel) says:
June 21, 2013 at 3:41 am
/////////////////////////////
It is not pedantic. It goes to the processes involved.
If one is only talking about slowing the rate of cooling, it is possible to achieve this result without the need to apply any energy. That may tell you a lot about a system, or feasability or expense of achieving something.
If one is talking about warming something, then one needs to apply some form of energy. That leads you to a different insight into the system.
If you are unable to understand the importance of this distinction then you have my sympathies. One does not achieve understanding and knowledge without properly and correctly identifying the processes involved.
richard verney says:
June 21, 2013 at 4:33 pm
“If one is talking about warming something, then one needs to apply some form of energy.”
There is a constant stream of energy coming in from the Sun. It must be constantly dissipated to maintain thermal equilibrium. If you inhibit that release, it will build up behind the obstacle, just like a dam inhibits the flow of water in a stream, and causes it to pool up behind the dam.
Willis Eschenbach says, June 21, 2013 at 12:36 pm:
“The addition of GHGs to an atmosphere without them results in more downwelling energy striking the surface. This ends up with the surface being warmer that it was without the GHGs.
Now, I and the rest of the world call such a process, where energy is added to an object and it ends up warmer as “warming”.”
But Willis, there isn’t more downwelling energy striking the surface. There is less going out. Do you seriously not see the difference? You need to get this. Your ‘downwelling’ energy would never ADD energy to the object (the surface of the Earth) because it is always simultaneously, instantaneously and continuously countered by a larger IR flux of ‘upwelling’ energy. You cannot separate the two. They are not independent fluxes. The ‘net’ is on average always negative seen from the perspective of the surface. There is radiative LOSS.
So, the surface on average gains 168 W/m^2 of internal energy by positive radiative heat transfer from the Sun. At the same time, with our particular atmosphere, it theoretically sheds a ‘net’ radiative energy flux of 324-390, resulting in an actual loss of internal energy by way of radiation of -66 W/m^2. 168 W/m^2 in, 66 out. There is thus 102 W/m^2 missing for there to be balance. Well, the surface doesn’t lose energy through radiation only, it isn’t a black body in a vacuum, but also has large convective losses, in fact on average precisely 102 W/m^2 worth (all according to T&K97).
And we have 168 W/m^2 coming in and (-66-102=) -168 going out. Balance.
So where in this do you see the atmospheric ‘flux-specific’ restriction to cooling? Where is the 288K global mean surface temperature coming from with 168 coming in and 168 going out? The Moon’s surface has on average 298 W/m^2 coming in and 298 going out. Why, then, is the mean global surface of the Moon not a lot warmer than the Earth’s surface? Why is it rather 90K colder? It seemingly has nothing to do with the magnitude of the ‘net’ energy fluxes striking and escaping the surface …
There is no doubt that what our atmosphere is doing radiatively is depriving the surface on a daily basis of 44 % of its potential radiative energy gain from the Sun, compared to the situation of the Moon, without an atmosphere. The restriction is on the radiative warming, not on the cooling. The Earth’s surface simply cools as much and as fast as it needs to with the 168 W/m^2 coming in. The incoming heat transfer sets the target for the outgoing. Had the surface gained 100 W/m^2, it would’ve shed 100 W/m^2. Had it gained 300 W/m^2, it would’ve shed 300 W/m^2. That’s all there is to it …
Bart says, June 21, 2013 at 6:16 pm:
“There is a constant stream of energy coming in from the Sun. It must be constantly dissipated to maintain thermal equilibrium. If you inhibit that release, it will build up behind the obstacle, just like a dam inhibits the flow of water in a stream, and causes it to pool up behind the dam.”
Bart, the release isn’t inhibited. That’s the point. 168 W/m^2 comes in, (-66-102=) -168 goes out. Just what’s needed. There isn’t just radiative energy loss. There is radiative AND convective loss for the surface. Together they maintain the balance … Where do you see the flux restriction making up the radiative GH surface warming effect?
Willis 12:36pm: “The world ends up warmer if we add GHGs than if we don’t. So we say that GHGs warm the world.
Now, you seem to think that this is a horrible, terrible misuse of the english language. But since everyone knows what is meant by it, where is the misuse?
The addition of GHGs to an atmosphere without them results in more downwelling energy striking the surface. This ends up with the surface being warmer that it was without the GHGs.
Now, I and the rest of the world call such a process, where energy is added to an object and it ends up warmer as “warming”.”
The misuse is you say both GHGs warm the “world” and “the surface being warmer”.
GHGs can’t increase mean temperature of the entire world system, they can only do so to the surface from reducing the energy reaching great height. The “surface being warmer” is the correct use of language in the above context.
From richard verney on June 21, 2013 at 4:33 pm:
Mister Verney, I do know the processes involved, I do know the distinction. I also know I expect anyone with enough of a grasp on the English language to understand what I mean when I refer to a mean from a study of people who are mean, to understand what is meant by warming up by putting on a sweater.
If correct identification was really all that important for achieving understanding and knowledge, then please direct your efforts towards the correct usage of mean and average. Technically a “running mean” should have no meaning, yet it is universally recognized and understood, and used by those who are achieving understanding and knowledge.
I learned electronic circuits by visualizing the flow of positive charges from V+ to Ground (V-), as indicated by the diode and transistor arrowheads. Thus your pedantry about proper and correct identification of processes, which is the proper and correct identification of what you are engaging in, being so necessary in the pursuit of understanding and knowledge, likely impresses me less than others. Likewise for the generations who have learned chemistry by Bohr electron shell model without ever having heard of the Pauli exclusion principal.
Kristian says:
June 21, 2013 at 6:42 pm
“That’s the point. 168 W/m^2 comes in, (-66-102=) -168 goes out.”
This is precisely where you err, Kristian. Think of it this way.
What if I described a traffic flow though a tunnel to you as “20 cars per minute come in, and 20 cars per minute go out”. Can you tell me how many cars there are in that tunnel?
That is the problem. Watts is a measure of energy rate, not energy. It tells you how much energy is coming out and going in per unit of time, but it does not tell you how much energy there is.
Or, in my earlier analogy, I tell you that water is flowing into a reservoir behind a dam at 100,000 gallons per minute. Downstream from the dam, I measure the flow rate as 100,000 gallons per minute. How much water is contained in the reservoir?
If I make the dam higher, after the flow has been reestablished and we have 100,000 gal/min coming in, and 100,000 gal/min flowing out, has the water level behind the dam A) risen, B) stayed the same, or C) dropped?
Willis Eschenbach says:
June 21, 2013 at 10:18 am
Please don’t project your ignorance on the rest of us. I’ve looked at the issue of float drift and distribution in some detail here.
You discuss how some areas of the ocean are sampled more than others. An issue if you want to determine the precise average temperature of the ocean, but no one is really interested in this.
What they are interested in how much the oceans have warmed or cooled overall, and sampling some areas more than others is pretty much irrelevant to that question, especially given climate scientist’s love of gridding. Sampling some areas more than others might give you a somewhat higher or lower answer than the real answer, but you will get in the general area and with the right sign.
Drift is a completely different issue, and you confuse drift with drifts effect on gross spatial sampling. Not the same thing at all.
regards
Bart says, June 21, 2013 at 10:45 pm:
“Watts is a measure of energy rate, not energy. It tells you how much energy is coming out and going in per unit of time, but it does not tell you how much energy there is.”
I’m not the one introducing the usage of W/m^2 to describe Earth’s energy budget situation, Bart. It’s people like Trenberth and Kiehl. The entire scientific industry promoting the radiative GHE.
I’m perfectly aware that the Watt represents power, energy per second, and that W/m^2 represents power density, energy per second per square metre. You don’t have to tell me this.
The point is, the Earth system is practically a closed system constantly gaining and losing energy. There is continuous energy throughput. It gains its energy from the Sun (its hot reservoir) and it loses it to space (its cold reservoir). It is the rate of this energy gain vs. the rate of this energy loss that we’re after. If the Earth system gains energy at a faster rate that it manages to rid itself of energy, then energy will start accumulating inside the system, its internal energy content will increase and the system will thus start warming.
168 W/m^2 IN is exactly the same rate as 168 W/m^2 OUT, Bart. The rate IN isn’t faster that the rate OUT. Ergo, balance. In the longterm, the Earth system maintains this balance at the surface, at the ToA and at every layer in between. There is no room for any accumulation only looking at the energy fluxes. Flux-wise, the only way to increase the energy content of the system and thereby raise its temperature, is by increasing the INCOMING (positive) heat (168 W/m^2) or by reducing the OUTGOING (negative) heat (-168 W/m^2).
So how is the Earth system able to contain energy at all? Where does its storage of energy originally come from?
Mainly two phenomena working together:
1) The thermal mass (heat capacity) of air (atmosphere), earth (land) and particularly water (ocean),
and
2) The weight of the atmosphere upon the surface restricting the rate of energy escaping the surface through convective and evaporative means.
This originally set the necessary surface temperature (with the specific mean solar flux) enabling the surface to maintain flux balance. From this ground temperature, then, the lapse rate set the temperature profile of the troposphere.
Kristian
And how much energy per second per square metre is a black-body at 288 K radiating?
lgl says, June 22, 2013 at 2:26 am:
“And how much energy per second per square metre is a black-body at 288 K radiating?”
Surrounded by an infinite heat sink vacuum: 390 W/m^2. Thanks for showing us how the 390 W/m^2 flux in the T&K97 diagram is calculated. It is not measured. It is derived from a formula. From measuring the actual radiative ‘heat’ going up from the surface, one can then arrive at the inferred ‘back radiation’ flux from the atmosphere: (390-66=) 324 W/m^2.
Sorry, forgot to explain how exactly the 390 W/m^2 flux is derived. You first assume that the surface of the Earth is a black body in a vacuum at 0 K. Then you measure its physical temperature. Apply the Stefan-Boltzmann equation and voilà! No upward radiative flux needs to be measured or detected in any way …
@Ian H
>>Eric H. says:
>>June 19, 2013 at 6:38 am
>Some of my own ponderings: 1) If it cannot be shown that CO2 is heating the ocean then CAGW is done as a theory.
>I’ve seen this depth of penetration argument made a numnber of times. Beware of it because it is false.
>Just think about the day night temperature cycle over the ocean. During the day SWR heats the ocean. And at night it cools back down again mostly by radiating LWR to the sky. The amount of heat that it loses at night by radiating LWR is approximately equal to the amount gained during the day by absorbing SWR – else the oceans would have boiled by now.
[Large snip]
Let’s look at this again.
You have constructed a mental picture of how LWIR pads things in a way that reduces heat loss and also which results in warmer oceans. CO2 pads thing (a little). The problem with your model of heat transfer is that you treat water on a micro scale as if it was water on a huge scale (where heat cannot get from one portion of the water to another). Conduction is not considered and the value of evaporation as a cooling factor underestimated. On a micro scale water is a pretty good conductor. On a macro scale it is not.
As Willis has previously shown, convection vertically cools horizontally through the mechanism of thunderstorms. That is, vertical atmospheric convection produces cooling at the surface even though the surface is horizontal and does not move.
IR received at the surface only promotes evaporation, 1 for 1. It is important to mention here your ‘stirring argument’. If the water got warmer from LWIR just below the surface instead of evaporating, the heat would go down by conduction, with or without stirring. Consider the time interval between energy received at the surface (there is no penetration to speak of, water is completely opaque to IR – it might as well be black paint). The surface heats immediately and evaporates water. Place wet paint out of the sun but where it can get radiant heat from a wall. While there is still paint thinners available, it gets cooler! The temperature change is related to the volatility of the thinners and the local environment and incoming power.
At night there is both convection of heat from below, and, right near the surface, conduction. Significant heat conduction in air (gases) is difficult without movement but water is far better – 22 times better in fact. One cannot model water on a micro scale as ‘needing to move’ as if the heat is ‘trapped’ in it (which with gas it is, mostly).
Heat conduction in water from http://physics.info/conduction/
Air at sea level 0.025 Watts/m●K
Water 0.561 Watts/m●K
The argument that LWIR heats water fails at the surface. The sea surface cools at night primarily by evaporation, just as in the day and the heat to do so comes from within. Even though the surface is the equivalent of black paint at IR wavelengths, evaporation is still by far the largest component. The air just above the surface is always supersaturated. If the wind blows, it carries away the water vapour. If there is atmospheric convection, there is cooling by wind.
The math favours cooling. The human body cools in the same manner. http://hyperphysics.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/thermo/sweat.html
The radiative cooling of a human (which is much warmer than the ocean surface) is minor compared with the evaporative cooling from sweat which can reach 2.4 kW. Pointing a small heater at a human increases their evaporative cooling rate. Stepping into the sunlight causes the same effect though somewhat complicated by the short wave heating which we are not considering because we are looking at night time warming.
If one ran a series of very thin pipes just under the surface of the ocean and pumped heated liquid through them, the result would be more evaporation. Even very high power, like an electric kettle with the coil at the top, would promote to a vast degree, evaporation. Stirring such a kettle would indeed cause the water to be heated, but these conditions are worlds away from an ocean receiving an additional Watt per sq m at its skin.
One Watt additional heating at the surface would evaporate an additional 36g per 24 hours. If all that heat were to be stirred into the top metre of ocean, it would raise the temperature 0.02 degrees and the next day, being slightly warmer, evaporation would increase by 36 g. In fact it is not stirred in. It never gets that far.
In conclusion, the idea that LWIR heats bodies of water is groundless, given the conditions we have on planet Earth.
Kristian
So it’s just a strike of luck the measurements here are in perfect agreement with the S-B equation? http://scienceofdoom.com/2010/07/31/the-amazing-case-of-back-radiation-part-three/
What about all the measurements of DLR. Are they just made up too? http://scienceofdoom.com/2010/07/24/the-amazing-case-of-back-radiation-part-two/
… and Kristian
who has ever measured the “actual radiative ‘heat’ going up from the surface” and how?
Egads, how many times does one need to explain this?! The ‘heat flux’ is what’s measured/detected. Its value is then used as input to derive a theoretical ‘individual’ flux, like the DLR. The individual radiative energy fluxes are simply calculated, derived from this measured heat flux and the temperature of the measuring instrument. Of course these flux values will match the S-B equation. They’re arrived at using (a modified version of) the S-B equation:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pyrgeometer#Measurement_of_long_wave_downward_radiation
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2013/04/26/pyrgeometers-untangled/
Kristian
So it’s the S-B law you are rejecting? Experiments show it works. http://www.phywe.com/index.php/fuseaction/download/lrn_file/versuchsanleitungen/P2350101/e/P2350101.pdf
Here down to 672 K. At which temperature is it not valid any more?
Kristian says:
June 22, 2013 at 1:56 am
“It is the rate of this energy gain vs. the rate of this energy loss that we’re after.
No, we are interested in how much energy is stored on the Earth. The average temperature on the Earth is related to how much energy is stored.
“168 W/m^2 IN is exactly the same rate as 168 W/m^2 OUT, Bart. The rate IN isn’t faster that the rate OUT. Ergo, balance.”
The evidence indicates, to the best of our knowledge, that there is, in fact, a slight imbalance between these two. The Earth appears to have been warming steadily, overlaid with a cyclical variation acting over a period of approximately 60 years, with some other lesser variations, since accurate temperature records began to be kept.
I agree that there is little indication that this behavior is due to CO2 accumulating in the atmosphere. To add further opprobrium to the proponents of AGW, it is evident that humans have little effect on atmospheric CO2 levels in the first place.
But, I believe the jury is still out as to whether the lack of correlation of CO2 with global temperatures is because of a fundamental misunderstanding of greenhouse dynamics, or a neglect of countervailing negative feedbacks.
And, that has not been the point of my discussion with you. The point has been that you have phrased your diatribes, tinged with a bit of what comes across as hysterical ranting, in terms which indicate that you do not understand the basic greenhouse argument, and you cannot effectively argue against something you do not understand. In particular, this weird division of radiational energy flows into “heat” and “non-heat” immediately pigeonholes you as someone who does not understand the problem, and you will fail to gain traction every time you advance it.
Radiational energy is radiational energy. There is no division into heat and non-heat. Radiational energy gets stored as heat when it is absorbed by materials. Because there is so much water on the planet and in our bodies, and water absorbs infrared wavelength radiation preferentially, we feel heat from IR more than from other bands. But, that does not make radiation in other bands inconsequential, as there are plenty of other materials on the Earth which absorb them.
David Riser wrote:
Ximinyr were just going to have to agree to disagree. I get what your saying but your not getting what Willis is saying. I am decent at math.
No, I don’t agree to this, and you’re not decent at math.
The example OHC(Y)=kY is an explicit example of a warming ocean where Willis’s method says it is not warming.
That falsifies his methodology.
It’s a simple as that.
Q.E.D.
Bart says:
Would you agree that a zero mean in “forcing” does mean a zero trend in OHC(t)?
Willis didn’t find a zero mean forcing.
He found a positive mean forcing, with a certain standard deviation.
It’s still positive.
It’s like you’re at a casino with a die that rolls 3.1 +/- 2.
Would you bet that that die, over the long term, is going to average out to 3?
Of course you would not.
It’s exactly the same here.
And the example OHC(Y)=kY, which is independent of any considerations of statistics, whos that Willis’s methodology is wrong and hence his conclusion is false.
It’s clear, though I know he wants to pretend otherwise.
Willis wrote:
In the real situation, the ocean heat content doesn’t rise regularly like in your imaginary condition.
So all you have shown is that if you assume that the OHC is rising monotonically, then my procedure gives a monotonic trend …
False.
Please, Willis — I assume you know basic algebra.
My example is of a world where the ocean is definitely warming.
You seem to understand that much.
Yet “your procedure” finds a trend of zero (0) for the term you call “forcing.”
Right?
The trend of forcing is zero?
Right.
So then, what use is your “forcing” if it’s trend fails to diagnose an obviously warming ocean?
Ximinyr says:
June 22, 2013 at 2:34 pm
“Willis didn’t find a zero mean forcing.”
Which parts of “…how small the average value of the forcing actually is…”, “…neither the average forcing, nor the trend in that forcing, are significantly different from zero…”, or “…in addition to the mean not being significantly different from zero…” did you not understand?