Jo Nova writes:
Murry Salby was sacked from Macquarie University, and Macquarie struggled to explain why, among other things, it was necessary to abandon, and strand him in Paris and hold a “misconduct” meeting in his absence. Since then he has been subject to attacks related to his previous employment. I’ve asked him to respond, which he has at length in a PDF (see below). The figures listed below refer to that PDF, which encompasses 15 years of events.
I don’t have the resources (unlike the National Science Foundation, the NSF) to investigate it all, but wanted to give Murry the right of reply.
On closer inspection the NSF report used by people to attack Salby does not appear to be the balanced, impartial analysis I would have expected. Indeed the hyperbolic language based on insubstantial evidence is disturbing to say the least. Because of the long detailed nature of this I cannot draw conclusions, except to say that any scientist who responds to a question about Murry Salby’s work with a reference to his employment is no scientist.
Remember the NSF report was supposedly an inhouse private document. It was marked “Confidential”, subject to the Privacy Act, with disclosure outside the NSF prohibited except through FOI. Desmog vaguely suggest there “must have been an FOI”, but there are no links to support that. In the end, a confidential, low standard, internal document with legalistic sounding words, may have been “leaked” to those in search of a character attack.
My summary of his reply:
See: http://joannenova.com.au/2013/08/murry-salby-responds-to-the-attacks-on-his-record/
The PDF:
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Bart says:
August 24, 2013 at 10:17 am
Ferdinand think! If rising CO2 concentrations of the oceans cannot drive atmospheric levels up because it then starts pushing down faster, then nothing can raise the CO2 level. Even your assumed influx of human produced CO2 would just create faster downwelling.
That is NOT what I said or implied:
As I said, an increase in temperature will rise the CO2 levels in the atmosphere, but that rise will stop when the increase in pCO2(atm) is the same as the increase in pCO2(aq) caused by the increase in water temperature, that is at 16 ppmv/K:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/upwelling_temp.jpg
Taking the estimate of 40 GtC/yr upwelling as base (any other estimate will give the same result), with a 1 K increase in temperature the upwelling flux will go up (4.5%) and the downwelling flux will go down, leading to an increase of 16 ppmv CO2 in the atmosphere. At that moment the fluxes are restored at 40 GtC/yr (or any other estimate of the original fluxes).
The human input of course will increase the downwelling ánd decrease the upwelling, as any increase of CO2 in the atmosphere will do. Not enough to absorb all human input, because the exchange speed is not fast enough.
J_T_D stays:
“Graph2 is the one quoted frequently here to claim that “CO2 follows temperature”.”
Your Graph1 is a simple overlay, which does not show any cause and effect like the graphs I posted clearly show. Graph 3 is only CO2, which does not show a relationship with temperature, therefore by itself it is meaningless for the purpose of this discussion.
Anyone with average intelligence can clearly discern that when T rises, CO2 rises afterward. And when T falls, CO2 falls — later.This is a pattern that is constantly repeated, from months, to hundreds of milliennia.
I have asked over and over for anyone to post a similar chart showing that when temperature rises, CO2 follows. Since there are no such charts — but there are many charts showing that CO2 is a function of temperature — your argument has no merit. None at all.
Since you are unable to accept the very obvious fact that ∆CO2 follows ∆T, as the real world shows, your comment above is meaningless. For whatever reason, you are unable to accept physical reality or empirical evidence. I don’t know why, but religion could explain your refusal to look at the clear and extensive empirical evidence, and not see what is there. Thus, your mind is mad up and closed tight. You have made your decision, and all the facts in the world mean nothing to you. But for me, and others, real world facts are everything. They tell the true story of cause and effect.
I don’t expect j_t_d to see reality. He is hopelessly a Believer that “carbon” is a big threat. But he completely lacks any empirical evidence to support his beliefs. I trust that most other readers will simply look at the temperature/CO2 record, and decide for themselves which is the cause, and which is the effect. And once again I ask and challenge J_T_D to post a chart showing that ∆CO2 is the cause of ∆T. If he can do that, I’m all ears. But if not, he is showing that his belief system trumps realiy. It happens all the time. Fanatic Muslims come to mind…
Bart says:
August 24, 2013 at 10:23 am
But, BOTH the variation AND the trend ARE THE SAME here. Human inputs also have a trend (top plot). There is no room to fit additional trend in the first plot.
But the variation and the trend ae from completely independent processes, where the short term variability is caused by short term temperature variations and your “trend” is completely arbitrarily attributed to temperature, while the accumulation of human emissions gives an extremely good fit, without leaving much room for temperature:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_co2_acc.jpg
dbstealey says:
August 24, 2013 at 11:33 am
db, have a look at:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/temp_co2_acc_1960_cur.jpg
and compare the increase in the atmosphere with the temperature trend. In the temperature trend, there are three distinct periods: 1960-1976, 1976-1998 and 1998-current. That is flat, increasing, flat. Not so for the CO2 trend, which follows the total increase of human emissions at an incredible constant ratio.
Thus in the case of the fast (1-3 years) variability and in all cases pre-industrial back to 800 kyr, CO2 changes followed temperature changes, but that is not the case for the past 50 years…
Phil. says:
August 24, 2013 at 10:52 am
Amazing. Even when I anticipate the lame reaction, you go and do it anyway. Please see here.
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
August 24, 2013 at 11:25 am
You keep ignoring the dynamic nature of this system, and pushing your static solution. How can I make it any simpler for you than my “fizzy drinks” example? Did you even read it?
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
August 24, 2013 at 11:37 am
“But the variation and the trend are from completely independent processes…”
Mere assertion on your part, and completely unphysical. Your short term, being presumably proportional to temperature, is 90 degrees out of phase with actual CO2 variations. It is a very poor fit.
Phil. says:
“What a troll you are Bart.”
You are no one to talk. Bart raised a specific point — exactly where is the upwelling originating — and you revert to name-calling because you can’t answer the question.
If you’re in a mind to label someone a troll, go look in the mirror.
===========================
Ferdinand,
Thank you for the chart. When you can post a chart like the ones I’ve posted, which show changes in temperature, regularly and repeatedly following changes in CO2, then your argument will have much better credibility. But so far, the only charts I have ever seen show that T changes, then CO2 follows.
As you know, the chart you posted was just another overlay, which does not show the cause and effect relationship that the charts I posted explicitly show. You will go a long way toward convincing me [as you did regarding human CO2 emissions] that the rise in CO2 has the endlessly predicted global warming effect. If it does, I need to see a direct cause and effect between ∆CO2, and a subsequent ∆T. But so far, nada. I’ve explained before that I’m a “show me” kind of guy. If ∆CO2 causes ∆T… show me.
Scientific skeptics have empirical evidence, but the alarmist crowd have only their models, and their opinions. The claim has always been that rising CO2 will cause serious global warming. Well, if so, here is your chance to prove it. Try to find me a chart that isn’t a simple overlay, but which shows a clear cause and effect between rising CO2 and rising temperature.
I’ve posted this note a few times before. I met Jan Veizer in 2002 and I like his work.
“the carbon cycle is essentially driven by solar energy via the water cycle intermediary.”
Read this last sentence from the Abstract again and again.
Regards, Allan
Coupling of water and carbon fluxes via the terrestrial biosphere and its significance to the Earth’s climate system
Paul R. Ferguson1 and Jan Veizer
Received 17 January 2007; revised 14 June 2007; accepted 13 August 2007; published XX Month 2007.
Terrestrial water vapor fluxes represent one of the largest movements of mass and
energy in the Earth’s outer spheres, yet the relative contributions of abiotic water vapor
fluxes and those that are regulated solely by the physiology of plants remain poorly
constrained. By interpreting differences in the oxygen-18 and deuterium content of
precipitation and river water, a methodology is developed to partition plant transpiration
(T) from the evaporative flux that occurs directly from soils and water bodies (Ed) and
plant surfaces (In). The methodology was applied to fifteen large watersheds in North
America, South America, Africa, Australia, and New Guinea, and results indicated that
approximately two thirds of the annual water flux from the ‘‘water-limited’’ ecosystems
that are typical of higher-latitude regions could be attributed to T. In contrast to
‘‘water-limited’’ watersheds, where T comprised 55% of annual precipitation, T in high-
rainfall, densely vegetated regions of the tropics represented a smaller proportion of
precipitation and was relatively constant, defining a plateau beyond which additional
water input by precipitation did not correspond to higher T values. In response to variable
water input by precipitation, estimates of T behaved similarly to net primary productivity,
suggesting that in conformity with small-scale measurements, the terrestrial water and
carbon cycles are inherently coupled via the biosphere. Although the estimates of T are
admittedly first-order, they offer a conceptual perspective on the dynamics of energy
exchange between terrestrial systems and the atmosphere, where the carbon cycle is
essentially driven by solar energy via the water cycle intermediary.
Citation: Ferguson, P. R., and J. Veizer (2007), Coupling of water and carbon fluxes via the terrestrial biosphere and its significance to the Earth’s climate system, J. Geophys. Res., 112, XXXXXX, doi:10.1029/2007JD008431.
dbstealey says: August 24, 2013 at 12:41 pm “you revert to name-calling because you can’t answer the question.”
So that is why people revert to name calling…
Bart says:
August 24, 2013 at 12:26 pm
You keep ignoring the dynamic nature of this system, and pushing your static solution. How can I make it any simpler for you than my “fizzy drinks” example? Did you even read it?
Did you even read my reply?
The Coke contains CO2 pressurized in the liquid at ~5 bar, that is 5,000,000 microatm. If you open the bottle, it will equilibrate with the atmosphere at 0.0004 bar, that is 400 microatm.
Even if the atmospheric CO2 pressure doubled to 800 microatm, that would have a negligible effect on the total CO2 released from the Coke.
The oceans at the upwelling places contains CO2 pressurized at 750 microatm. As there is open contact with the atmosphere at 400 microatm, that will give a certain flux of CO2 out of the oceans, estimated around 40 GtC/yr. If the atmospheric CO2 pressure doubled to 800 microatm, that would simply reverse the flux the other way out at 5.7 GtC/yr.
Thus your Coke example has not the slightest relevance for what happens between the oceans and the atmosphere, where any change of CO2 level in the atmosphere has as much effect as any change in CO2 pressure in the ocean surface.
And ignoring the dynamic nature of the system is exactly what you do: simply ignoring that there is an effect of the CO2 increase in the atmosphere on upwelling and downwelling fluxes…
dbstealey: “Anyone with average intelligence can clearly discern that when T rises, CO2 rises afterward.”
Except when it doesn’t. As has been pointed out ad nauseum now the late twentieth century roughly linear rise in CO2 has preceded rather than lagged temperature. Not only that but YOUR graph and Bart’s graph and Bart’s model all show that temperature does not account for that linear growth. To show a relationship on that time scale for either CO2 concentration or dCO2/dt that linear trend needs to be removed.
Credit ti Bart in so far as he has at least tried to engage with that issue but in general it has been ignored.
“Well, if so, here is your chance to prove it. Try to find me a chart that isn’t a simple overlay, but which shows a clear cause and effect between rising CO2 and rising temperature.”
A strawman dbstealey and I doubt that you suddenly know so little about the AGW hypothesis to think it claims that there is a simple causal relations between rising CO2 and rising temperatures that always dominates the other factors that effect CO2 levels (which include temperature) and the factors that effect temperature. Never mind that you will simply dismiss any graph that challenges your position as “overlay”.
Nyq Only says:
“So that is why people revert to name calling…”
Now you’re starting to understand.
================================
Ferdinand,
In the Coke example, you are completely leaving out the ∆T, which is also essential to outgasing. Yes, pressure makes a difference. But I have shown that T makes a measurable difference, and you are avoiding that fact. If you open two Cokes, and put one in the refrigerator and one at room temperature. The colder one will contain more CO2. Even at the same pressure.
dbstealey
I know my post at 4:15 am is a bit long, but you should have tried a bit harder to read it. Graph1 is there to remind everyone of the basic. Graph3, with all the extra information from graph2 removed, is there to make it clear that the trend in that graph is zero and that all the oscillations sum to zero, which means that all the contributions from any phenomena displayed in that graph sum to absolutely nothing .Therefore they do not contribute to the general rise seen in graph1. Got it?
Then I return to graph2 and point out that an alternative interpretation to argument that it shows that short term fluctuations in temperature cause a rise in CO2, by stimulating a source, is that the fluctuations are modulating a sink instead. In reality of course given the complexity of the problem, it could be a mixture of both. I am just puzzled by the fact that no-one seems to have noticed the alternative and equally valid possibility.
Oh, and this
I don’t expect j_t_d to see reality. He is hopelessly a Believer that “carbon” is a big threat.
is just a gratuitous insult, and not even true.
One way of interpreting Veizer (above) is to hypothesize that a naturally-driven warmer Earth creates a bigger Water Cycle and a bigger coupled Carbon Cycle. Atmospheric CO2 is just one of the intermediate variables in this huge equation, and atmospheric CO2 tends to increase in a naturally bigger Carbon Cycle.
The small component caused by the combustion of fossil fuels could be relatively insignificant in this huge dynamic equation. Also, humanmade CO2 is apparently consumed rapidly close to its source by local increased botanic activity.
What if we have a period of significant global cooling and atmospheric CO2 starts to decrease, despite continued growth in the combustion of fossil fuels, would that be adequate proof?
It will never happen, you say?
The evidence suggests that it already has happened, during the last very mild global cooling period from ~1945-1975.
BTW, fossil fuel consumption increased rapidly during this global cooling period.
_____________
Annualized Mauna Loa dCO2/dt “went negative” a few times in the past (calculating dCO2/dt from monthly data, by taking CO2MonthX (year n+1) minus CO2MonthX (year n) to minimize the seasonal CO2 “sawtooth”.)
These 12-month periods when CO2 decreased are (Year and Month ending in):
1959-8
1963-9
1964-5
1965-1
1965-5
1965-6
1971-4
1974-6
Allan MacRae says:
August 24, 2013 at 12:44 pm
“the carbon cycle is essentially driven by solar energy via the water cycle intermediary.
Allan, I have not the slightest problem with that, it is also called the seasonal cycle and other cycles of longer duration which influence the water cycles and thus plant growth. But what we see is that the CO2 levels increase faster than what the temperature-CO2 relationship showed over any period in the past 800,000 years. Seems not temperature or water cycle driven…
Bart at 10:23 am
“But, BOTH the variation AND the trend ARE THE SAME here. Human inputs also have a trend (top plot). There is no room to fit additional trend in the first plot. Ergo, there is no room for them. The temperature dependent process explains all, and human inputs have little impact, QED.
A perfect example of your circular argument. Before you can say that there is no room for an additional human input, you have to prove it is not already in your first graph. There is no point saying that the trend and the variation are the same, if you do know their cause to begin with.
And a drive by to your discussion with Ferdinand. If a phenomenon, solubility of CO2 in water in this case, depends on more than one variable, and two or more are varying simultaneously, then to find the relative magnitudes of different contributions, you actually have to do a calculation. You cannot just hand wave with facile analogies.
Bart: ‘If rising CO2 concentrations of the oceans cannot drive atmospheric levels up because it then starts pushing down faster, then nothing can raise the CO2 level. ”
No, the argument only applies to where carbon dioxide is in solution. Burning stuff to produce CO2 would be unaffected.
Allan MacRae says: August 24, 2013 at 1:07 pm
“What if we have a period of significant global cooling and atmospheric CO2 starts to decrease, despite continued growth in the combustion of fossil fuels, would that be adequate proof?”
No, it wouldn’t hurt Bart’s case obviously but again all it really doors is put another nail in the coffin of the strawman claim that temperature never effects CO2. If we can find somebody who makes that claim we can all gang up and tell them how wrong they are.
dbstealey says: August 24, 2013 at 12:59 pm “Now you’re starting to understand.”
Sure – you say other revert to name calling because they can’t answer the points raised presumably because you resort to name calling when you can’t answer the points raised.
For example your comaprison of Jimmi to “Fanatic Muslims” was presumably because you can’t answer Jimmi’s points.
Thanks for explaining this to us all. I did wonder why you sometimes posted cogent and reasoned arguments and other times posted insults.
dbstealey says:
August 24, 2013 at 12:59 pm
In the Coke example, you are completely leaving out the ∆T, which is also essential to outgasing. Yes, pressure makes a difference. But I have shown that T makes a measurable difference, and you are avoiding that fact. If you open two Cokes, and put one in the refrigerator and one at room temperature. The colder one will contain more CO2. Even at the same pressure.
In the Coke example temperature is largely irrelevant: Bart used that example as that gives a lot of CO2, no matter the levels in the atmosphere. Even if a cold Coke contains 2 times more CO2 than one at ambient temperature in equilibrium with CO2 of the atmosphere, that hardly matters. According to:
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/gases-solubility-water-d_1148.html
1 liter of Coke at 5 bar and 20°C may contain 8.5 g CO2. In equilibrium with the atmosphere, again at 20°C that contains only 0.68 mg CO2, over 10,000 times less. At 0°C that doubles to 1.36 mg, hardly a difference in the release of CO2 starting at 5 bar…
Thus neither temperature nor atmospheric CO2 pressure make any difference in the Coke example. But both make a lot of difference when the pressure differences are a lot smaller as is the case for ocean-atmosphere exchanges.
Allan MacRae says on August 24, 2013 at 12:44 pm
“the carbon cycle is essentially driven by solar energy via the water cycle intermediary.”
Ferdinand Engelbeen says on August 24, 2013 at 1:09 pm
“Allan, I have not the slightest problem with that, it is also called the seasonal cycle and other cycles of longer duration which influence the water cycles and thus plant growth. But what we see is that the CO2 levels increase faster than what the temperature-CO2 relationship showed over any period in the past 800,000 years. Seems not temperature or water cycle driven…”
__________
Thank you Ferdinand, I understand your point and I do sincerely respect you. Several of us have been discussing this question for many years.
However, I do wonder if we really have accurate atmospheric CO2 data pre-1958. There seem to be significant irregularities in our estimates of absolute historic CO2 concentrations. Is it possible or even probable that these historic estimates of CO2 concentrations are only relatively accurate with respect to each other, but are significantly offset from truly accurate values?
I have often pondered the late Ernst Beck’s data. It is entirely possible that some of Ernst’s historic CO2 data is inaccurate, but is it not probable that some or even much of it has merit?
For example, is it not entirely possible that CO2 concentrations circa-1940 (at the end of the previous global warming cycle) were as high as today’s values?
Best personal regards, Allan
Allan MacRae says:
August 24, 2013 at 2:48 pm
Allan I have had several years of discussion with the late Ernst Beck about the reliability of the historical CO2 data. The problem was not the method (except in a few cases), which in general was accurate within +/- 3% or +/- 10 ppmv. The main problem is where the samples were taken.
From modern measurements we know that the best places are over the oceans, high on mountains and in deserts. These show the lowest variability from hour to hour and day by day. That is an interesting criterium to test the reliability of the historical data: large variability equals a place (or a method) not suitable for “background” measurements.
If one looks at the data taken over the sea surface and/or coastal with wind from the oceans, these are all around the ice core data of the same average age. Unfortunately there are none around 1942.
But the stomata data (which have their own problems) don’t show anything special around 1942 (310 ppmv in the scale):
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/stomata.jpg
if there was a real peak around 1942, the SI index should be at the bottom of the graph.
Neither is something special to see in coralline sponges (resolution 2-4 years):
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/sponges.gif
Moreover, such a peak and decay of 80 ppmv in only 7 years up and 7 years down is enormous: the equivalent of burning 1/3rd of all land vegetation on earth and its regrowth…
Thank you Ferdinand,
I cannot interpret the stomata data but the sponge data looks very interesting.
What did Ernst say about the sponge data?
Regards, Allan
jimmi_the_dalek:
At August 23, 2013 at 2:06 pm
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/08/11/murry-salby-responds-to-critics/#comment-1398478
you wrote
Since then you have provided your post at August 24, 2013 at 4:15 am
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/08/11/murry-salby-responds-to-critics/#comment-1398870
I have not addressed that post because it would be unfair to address that when I have been assuming it was your “teaser” and your “answer” is awaited.
Is my assumption right so I should wait your “answer” or should I address your existing post?
Richard
Allan MacRae says:
August 25, 2013 at 3:39 am
The stomata index data are calibrated againts direct measurements (1960-2000) and ice core + firn data (1900-1960) over the previous century. If the ice core data were wrong and Beck’s compilation was right, then the calibration against ice cores of around 1942 of 310 ppmv would show a dip of the SI at around 5% for 380 ppmv in the atmosphere.
The stomata index is the % alveoles on total cells in the leaves, which % more or less depends of the average CO2 level over the previous growing season. The main problem is that those leaves by definition grow over land, with a local/regional CO2 bias depending of what happens in the main wind direction. The SI may be calibrated for the past century, but there is no way to know how the local/regional bias changed over the centuries. Like as in many places the landscape in the main wind direction may have changed thoroughly over the centuries, including industrialisation in the last part. Even the main wind direction may have changed in certain periods of history like between the MWP and LIA…
Ernst did reject the stomata data for that reason. I can’t remember if the sponges data ever were discussed with him, as these are quite recent, but my memory isn’t that good anymore…
Richard
The post at 4:15 am Aug 24th, is intended as different interpretation of those graphs demonstrating at a) you cannot get information about a trend from detrended data and b) the detrended data has an alternative interpretation anyway.