UPDATED – see below
Monckton provides these slides for discussion along with commentary related to his recent post on CO2 residence time – Anthony
There is about one molecule of 13C in every 100 molecules of CO2, the great majority being 12C. As CO2 concentration increases, the fraction of 13C in the atmosphere decreases – the alleged smoking gun, fingerprint or signature of anthropogenic emission: for the CO2 added by anthropogenic emissions is leaner in 13C than the atmosphere.
However, anthropogenic CO2 emissions of order 5 Gte yr–1 are two orders of magnitude smaller than natural sources and sinks of order 150 5 Gte yr–1. If some of the natural sources are also leaner in CO2 than the atmosphere, as many are, all bets are off. The decline in atmospheric CO2 may not be of anthropogenic origin after all. In truth, only one component in the CO2 budget is known with any certainty: human emission.
If the natural sources and sinks that represent 96% of the annual CO2 budget change, we do not have the observational capacity to know. However, we do not care, because what is relevant is net emission from all sources and sinks, natural as well as anthropogenic. Net emission is the sum of all sources of CO2 over a given period minus the sum of all CO2 sinks over that period, and is proportional to the growth rate in atmospheric CO2 over the period. The net emission rate controls how quickly global CO2 concentration increases.
CO2 is emitted and absorbed at the surface. In the atmosphere it is inert. It is thus well mixed, but recent observations have shown small variations in concentration, greatest in the unindustrial tropics. Since the variations in CO2 concentration are small, a record from any station will be a good guide to global CO2 concentration. The longest record is from Mauna Loa, dating back to March 1958.
The annual net emission or CO2 increment, a small residual between emissions and absorptions from all sources which averages 1.5 µatm, varies with emission and absorption, sometimes rising >100% against the mean trend, sometimes falling close to zero. Variation in human emission, at only 1 or 2% a year, is thus uncorrelated with changes in net emission, which are independent of it.
Though anthropogenic emissions increase monotonically, natural variations caused by Pinatubo (cooling) and the great el Niño (warming) are visibly stochastic. Annual changes in net CO2 emission (green, above) track surface conditions (blue: temperature and soil moisture together) with a correlation of 0.93 (0.8 for temperature alone), but surface conditions are anti-correlated with δ13C (red: below).
The circulation-dependent naturally-caused component in atmospheric CO2 concentration (blue above), derived solely from temperature and soil moisture changes, coincides with the total CO2 concentration (green). Also, the naturally-caused component in δ13C coincides with observed δ13C (below).
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ADDED (the original MS-Word document sent by Monckton was truncated)
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The naturally-caused component in CO2 (above: satellite temperature record in blue, CRU surface record in gray), here dependent solely on temperature, tracks not only measured but also ice-proxy concentration, though there is a ~10 µatm discrepancy in the ice-proxy era. In the models, projected temperature change (below: blue) responds near-linearly to CO2 concentration change (green).
In the real world, however, there is a poor correlation between stochastically-varying temperature change (above: blue) and monotonically-increasing CO2 concentration change (green). However, the CO2 concentration response to the time-integral of temperature (below: blue dotted line) very closely tracks the measured changes in CO2 concentration, suggesting the possibility that the former may cause the latter.
Summary
Man’s CO2 emissions are two orders of magnitude less than the natural sources and sinks of CO2. Our emissions are not the main driver of temperature change. It is the other way about.
Professor Salby’s opponents say net annual CO2 growth now at ~2 μatm yr–1 is about half of manmade emissions that should have added 4 μatm yr–1 to the air, so that natural sinks must be outweighing natural sources at present, albeit only by 2 μatm yr–1, or little more than 1% of the 150 μatm yr–1 natural CO2 exchanges in the system.
However, Fourier analysis over all sufficiently data-resolved timescales ≥2 years shows that the large variability in the annual net CO2 emission from all sources is heavily dependent upon the time-integral of absolute global mean surface temperature. CO2 concentration change is largely a consequence, not a cause, of natural temperature change.
The sharp Pinatubo-driven cooling of 1991-2 and the sharp Great-el-Nino-driven warming of 1997-8, just six years later, demonstrate the large temperature-dependence of the highly-variable annual increments in CO2 concentration. This stochastic variability is uncorrelated with the near-monotonic increase in anthropogenic CO2 emissions. Absence of correlation necessarily implies absence of causation.
Though correlation between anthropogenic emissions and annual variability in net emissions from all sources is poor, there is a close and inferentially causative correlation between variable surface conditions (chiefly temperature, with a small contribution from soil moisture) and variability in net annual CO2 emission.
Given the substantial variability of net emission and of surface temperature, the small fraction of total annual CO2 exchanges represented by that net emission, and the demonstration that on all relevant timescales the time-integral of temperature change determines CO2 concentration change to a high correlation, a continuing stasis or even a naturally-occurring fall in global mean surface temperature may yet cause net emission to be replaced by net uptake, so that CO2 concentration could cease to increase and might even decline notwithstanding our continuing emissions.
Natural temperature change and variability in soil moisture, not anthropogenic emission, is the chief driver of changes in CO2 concentration. These changes may act as a feedback contributing some warming but are not its principal cause.
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Thanks, Christopher, Lord Monckton. Very good article.
You write that “the CO2 concentration response to the time-integral of temperature very closely tracks the measured changes in CO2 concentration, suggesting the possibility that the former may cause the latter.”. Well, yes!
The IPCC got it backwards because they were looking to corroborate a hypothesis and forgetting to try and find ways to falsify it. The corroboration proved to be weak and elusive, the falsification, much stronger, was at hand but unseen. Confirmation bias or malice?
William Astley says:
November 23, 2013 at 1:10 pm
To explain that observation using the IPCC’s model, the missing sink must magically increase hiding more CO2 which does not make sense. How does one explain that observation?
Both the oceans and the biosphere are expanding sinks when the pCO2 (~ppmv) in the atmosphere increases: the absorbance of the oceans (and plant alveoles water) inreases in ratio with the pCO2 difference between atmosphere and water. As CO2 increases, the uptake increases.
For the oceans, at the warm upwelling zones, an increase of pCO2 in the atmosphere will decrease the pCO2 difference, thus reducing the influx of CO2 from there.
Both human emissions and increase in the atmosphere are slightly quadratic increasing over time. That leads to a slightly quadratic increase in sink capacity over time and an incredible fixed ratio between human emissions and increase in the atmosphere.
Some warned for a saturation of the (deep) oceans, decreasing the % uptake of human emissions, but for the moment there is not the slightest sign for such a decrease.
A temperature increase of 1 K causes a CO2 increase of ~16 ppmv in seawater, the 100+ ppmv increase caused by human emissions by far exceeds that.
When detailed CO2 change latitudinal analysis is done on the CO2 rise, the rise occurs in the Southern hemisphere which does not make sense as the majority of the anthropogenic source is in the Northern hemisphere.
I suppose that theory comes from Tom Quirk? It is anyway wrong: the NH CO2 measurements lead the SH measurements with 6 months to 2 years:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/co2_trends_1995_2004.jpg
CH4 is primary inorganic
I don’t think many geologists will agree with that, but that is not a point of interest for me. Even if it is all inorganic, there are no signs (in atmospheric levels) that it is increasing rapidely.
And indeed we will see what happens if the earth cools, I am pretty sure that CO2 levels still will increase, be it somewhat less fast…
[ .. “(and plant alveoles water)” .. ? Phrase missing? Mod]
Jquip says
>the only manner in which I can attempt to justify the 13C depletion is IFF this can be reflected in >animal preferences for C4/CAM plants as a food source: Corn, sugar cane, etc.
Could corn used to make ethanol for motor fuels make a difference?
Wise words from Janice re: thanksgiving dinner
“1. Don’t talk about politics, AGW, or religion at the table if you want to enjoy your meal (wait until during your stroll between dinner and dessert).”
I recall same sister and older brother arguing about Bill (depends on the meaning of is) Clinton and Ronald RayGuns. They didn’t speak to each other again for some time after.
Happy dysfunctional Holidays!
Ferdinand Engelbeen (November 23, 2013 at 3:56 pm)
> Short term (1-3 years) response: 4-5 ppmv/K
> Medium to (very) long term (50 years to 800,000 years) response: 8 ppmv/K
> Current times (last 50+ years) response: 140 ppmv/K ???
From Bart’s “hard evidence” graph looking at 1997-1998, I see about 0.26 ppm CO2 rise for about 0.18K temperature rise which is a little under 1.5 ppm/K.
The seasonal global temperature cycle is driving the annual change in CO2. It acts as a pump, which flow is temperature dependent. The airborne fraction will decrease further with the cooling and at some point it will reach zero, in spite of the record human emissions.
In reply to:
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
November 23, 2013 at 4:31 pm
William Astley says:
November 23, 2013 at 1:10 pm
To explain that observation using the IPCC’s model, the missing sink must magically increase hiding more CO2 which does not make sense. How does one explain that observation?
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
Both the oceans and the biosphere are expanding sinks when the pCO2 (~ppmv) in the atmosphere increases: the absorbance of the oceans (and plant alveoles water) inreases in ratio with the pCO2 difference between atmosphere and water. As CO2 increases, the uptake increases.
For the oceans, at the warm upwelling zones, an increase of pCO2 in the atmosphere will decrease the pCO2 difference, thus reducing the influx of CO2 from there.
Both human emissions and increase in the atmosphere are slightly quadratic increasing over time. That leads to a slightly quadratic increase in sink capacity over time and an incredible fixed ratio between human emissions and increase in the atmosphere.
William:
You are stating nonsense. The percentage of CO2 absorbed by the ocean must increase to explain the observations. The IPCC models predicted that the percentage of CO2 absorbed by the ocean will decrease due to increasing ocean temperature and increased ph of the ocean.
I see from your comment that you have are completely ignorant concerning the deep methane hypothesis for the formation and evolution of the earth’s atmosphere and oceans. The alternative hypothesis is the late veneer hypothesis which cannot explain the anomalously low amount of noble gases in the earth’s atmosphere and is not supported by chemical analysis of ancient geological formations.
Sloan Deep Carbon Workshop (Sponsored by the US department of Energy)
https://www.gl.ciw.edu/workshops/sloan_deep_carbon_workshop_may_2008
http://www.pnas.org/cgi/reprint/99/17/10976
We know the half-life for CO2 in the atmosphere is about 5 years based on bomb 14C (rate constant k= -0.1354 /yr). That provides information about the magnitude of the total flux from sinks and sources. My estimate of the total flux of CO2 out of the atmosphere then is about 413 Gton/yr based on 400ppmv CO2 and 5.3×10^6 Gton total atmosphere [1]. This CO2 flux quantity compares well with the IPCC estimate of about 450 Gton/yr [2,3].
The anthropogenic contribution is about 36 Gton/yr [4].
The Mauna Loa net flux is about 2ppmv/yr which is about 16 Gton/yr increase [5]. This CO2 increase is 0.5% of total CO2, and about 4% of the CO2 flux. Is it anthropogenic?
A claim that 57% of human CO2 (hCO2) is absorbed [2] doesn’t make much sense. Is it 57% of hCO2 over all time? Each year? We can estimate the steady-state amount of hCO2 if the rate of production is constant as Co and the rate constant of absorption is k. The steady-state amount would be Co/k. The value is about 7.39 *Co using the k from 14C decay (see above). Using ORNL CO2 estimates of world CO2 production [6] from 1751 to 2010, we can estimate the current (2010) amount of hCO2 in the atmosphere since 1751. A correction factor of 0.935 is applied to the input hCO2 quantities to correct for discrete calculation by year rather than say daily. Atmospheric hCO2 increases exponentially, just as the yearly human inputs increase exponentially. The constant ratio is 1/k.
The total hCO2 emitted is 1303 Gton worldwide since 1751. My estimate for the amount of hCO2 in the atmosphere is about 200 Gton, which equates to 85% absorbed. If the 2ppmv CO2 increase were due to hCO2, or 16 Gton/y. Since most of the hCO2 in the atmosphere is from prior years, the yearly increase of hCO2 is much lower, only about 4.5 Gton/yr currently. However, the Mauna Loa increase is about 4 times the yearly hCO2 increase. The rate constants for hCO2 increase and atmospheric CO2 increase differ by an order of magnitude.
I attempted to fit atmospheric CO2 with the known change in hCO2 (assuming the 14C rate constant is correct, half-life ~5 years). A differential equation assuming a fixed natural outgassing of natural CO2 (nCO2) plus exponentially increasing hCO2 was solved [Eq. 1, see Notes] to fit the Mauna Loa data. A value of 342 Gtons/yr nCO2 fits 1959, or 400 Gtons/y nCO2 fits 2010. The conclusion is natural outgassing has increased from about 340 Gtons/y in the first half of the 20th century to about 400 Gtons/y in the latter half. The nCO2 outgassing rate could be much higher now.
CO2 total = No/k * (1 – e ^ -kt ) + Ho/(h+k) * (e ^ ht – e ^ -kt ) + (No + Ho) * e ^ -kt [Eq. 1]
The bomb CO2 flux estimate could be a bit low since it was derived from old data. The rate could be higher now because organisms could easily respond to higher CO2 levels and net consume more of it than they did 40 years ago. A hallmark of life is homeostasis. If the biosphere were not capable of handling perturbations, life would have largely gone extinct long ago. Only simple organisms in stable environments like underground would persist.
It is much more likely biology is quite capable of handling a slight imbalance of CO2 such as the human contribution. The increase in CO2 is probably due to a shift in the equilibrium. Perhaps the various rate constants associated with different fluxes are affected by temperature. We know average temperatures have increased very slightly over the last century. Some ascribe this increase to CO2 increases. It is very hard to believe the slight change in CO2 can affect the radiation of energy to space at night significantly. Clearly, water vapor would dominate any changes in IR emission and re-radiation back to the surface. Consequently, it is more likely CO2 changes are an interesting footnote in climate change, but not a driver.
Notes
In equation 1, No is nCO2 outgassing rate from sources, -k is the CO2 loss rate constant, i.e. CO2 to sinks. Ho is the starting hCO2 amount, and h is the rate constant for hCO2 increase per year. The parameter t is the number of years since 1751. -k = -0.13541, h = 0.03482, Ho = 0.005, and No varied as described. It is important to start the time well before 1959 to have the nCO2 values stabilized by 1959. See the basic solution strategy in my post a few days ago [8].
Refs
1 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Earth
2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide_in_Earth's_atmosphere
3 http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/ar4/syr/en/contents.html
4 http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Global_Carbon_Emissions.svg
5 http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/
6 http://cdiac.ornl.gov/ftp/ndp030/CSV-FILES/
7 ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends/co2_annmean_mlo.txt
8 http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/11/21/on-co2-residence-times-the-chicken-or-the-egg/#comment-1481426
dikranmarsupial says:
November 23, 2013 at 1:42 pm
“This is because the long term increase in CO2 is caused by the mean value of the derivative of the CO2 measurements.”
You have not been much involved with the discussion, and so do not realize this has nothing to do with my argument.
The offset is arbitrary, because it has to be, because the temperature anomaly offset is arbitrary to begin with. But, it is beside the point. Yes, the integration of the offset provides the linear term in the CO2 graph. But, it does not provide either the variation, or the quadratic term. It is the fact that integrating temperature anomaly fits both those items with the same scale factor that we know that temperature is driving CO2.
Your SkS article is wrong. Trivially wrong on the “mass balance”, and beside the point otherwise.
Nick Stokes says:
November 23, 2013 at 2:57 pm
“Is that a response to a 1°C rise?”
Probably not entirely. See here for details on what I will call “my” hypothesis.
eric1skeptic says:
November 23, 2013 at 5:17 pm
“From Bart’s “hard evidence” graph looking at 1997-1998, I see about 0.26 ppm CO2 rise for about 0.18K temperature rise which is a little under 1.5 ppm/K.”
You aren’t using the right units. The equation is dCO2/dt = 0.19*T + 0.14. The derivative is in units of ppmv/month, so the scale factor is 0.19 ppmv/month/K.
Janice Moore says:
November 23, 2013 at 11:13 am
I wonder why A-th-y gives the sneeringly dismissive label “Salby’s Slide Show” to Dr. Murry Salby’s excellent lecture given in Hamburg on April 18, 2013… . And why doesn’t Mr. Goodman (and others) watch that entire lecture (and read Dr. Salby’s book) and comment on THAT instead of the truncated-almost-to-the-point-of-distortion version of Dr. Salby’s work above?
>>>>>
Janice, if you are not accepted here as the World’s authority on science experts, will you then become an (screaming monkey) alarmist?
Hint: “Sneeringly dismissive” works both ways….
Janice Moore: THANK you for this wonderfully cogent mathematical lecture on what we KNOW about CO2. Perfect!
Bart says:
November 23, 2013 at 6:30 pm
“The equation is dCO2/dt = 0.19*T + 0.14.”
Note that this can be rewritten as
dCO2/dt = k*(T – Teq)
with k = 0.19 ppmv/month/K and Teq = -0.14/0.19 = -0.74 degC.
If the RSS temperature anomaly were to fall to -0.74 degC, and conditions which give rise to these values continued, then atmospheric CO2 would stop rising, except potentially for whatever tiny portion is due to increasing human inputs.
Thanks, James V. Yeah, I think a LOT of us “share your pain” when we would just like to be “points of light”… . Did you find any of those sources I gave you helpful; were they even in the ballpark? Hope so.
Well, try to keep the “FUN in dysfunctional” and have a great day with the family.
Janice
Maybe you’ll have as much fun as these folks did!
Ferdinand, ” As photosynthesis by preference uses 12CO2, that means that relative more 13CO2 is left in the atmosphere”
Photosynthesizing creatures do not do it for charity, they do it for their own respiration. We should thank them every morning because they produce an excess of hydrated Carbon we freeloaders live by.
The biological Carbon cycle is like a giant motor. It sucks in 12CO2, converts it to 12carbohydrate, and then burns it off as 12CO2. The faster you run it, the more 12C you will measure at any point in the system because it dwarfs the inorganic cycle in speed and efficiency. Photosynthesis does not deplete the atmosphere of 12C because organic respiration replenishes it apace.
Throttle the motor back by any means, you will measure more 13C.
This is the situation in an ice age. Go back to the early Triassic when it is very hot. The motor is pegged and Carbon is limiting. Now you can deplete the atmosphere (and everything else) of 12C with biological activity.
Fredinand,
“The average from plant decay and of fossil fuel burning is around -25 per mil, thus hardly distinguishable.”
Doesn’t Salby suggest that temperature increases biological activity in the soil, which would have the same effect as burning fossil fuels ?
“But there are two possibilities to differentiate between fossil fuel emissions and plant decay:
– the 14C content of fossil fuel is zero:…”
From what I can see 14C follows temperature over the past thousand years. It looks well removed from the graph of man’s C emissions.
Hoser says: November 23, 2013 at 6:06 pm
“A claim that 57% of human CO2 (hCO2) is absorbed [2] doesn’t make much sense. Is it 57% of hCO2 over all time? Each year?”
Here’s a plot over time.
“It is much more likely biology is quite capable of handling a slight imbalance of CO2 such as the human contribution.”
Slight? The amount of C we’ve emitted is about equal to the entire mass of vegetation. How can it be hidden?
MARIO LENTO!!!!!
Am I glad to see you. HOW ARE YOU??
I have been praying my head off ever since I saw your post (re: getting a medical for racing — lol, I knew that’s what it was (or some kind of machine operation).
I hope that your long absence (what a time to be missing in action, here — sheesh) just means you’ve been out burning rubber, doing drifts, and going 0 to 60 in less than 5 seconds.
And, thank you for your VERY generous and kind words. Boy, Mr. Lento, if you only knew what I’ve been going through here for the past week or so (lots of snarls and a few insults)… . I needed you! Gunga Din came alongside, though, and Bart said something super sweet today, so that helped a lot.
Well, keep the rubber side down and LET ME KNOW HOW YOU ARE DOING!
Your WUWT pal,
Janice
This should make my point clearer: http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/mean:12/from:1997/to:1998/scale:0.1/offset:-36.3/plot/rss/from:1997/to:1998
The red line is CO2 divided by 10. The offset is irrelevant since we only care about the change. The green line is temperature with no scaling or offset. The graph shows CO2 rising from Jan 1997 to Jan 1998 by 0.16 times 10 or 1.6ppm. Over that same interval temperature rises 0.35K for a ration of 4.6 ppm / K.
It is also clear (and a similar result) when removing the averaging of CO2 over time: http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/from:1997/to:1998/scale:0.1/offset:-36.3/plot/rss/from:1997/to:1998 in this latter graph the CO2 rises 1.2 ppm while temperature rises 0.35 K for a ratio of 3.4 ppm / K.
Uh, Geran? Is that YOU?
I just hoped that people would watch Dr. Salby’s lecture. Some people’s comments make it pretty clear that they have not. I hoped they would decide for themselves, not take my word for it.
If I have been “sneeringly dismissive” as A-th-y was in his title “Salby’s Slide Show,” please quote what I said, for, believe it or not, I really don’t know what you are talking about v. a v. me doing that to anyone here.
Puzzled by your bitterness, but hopeful that we’ve just had a miscommunication….,
Janice
(I thought, when I asked you for forgiveness 3 weeks ago or so, you said that you had forgiven me for saying you were acting “like a screaming chimpanzee.” Are you still angry with me about that? Geran, again I tell you, I am sorry. I hope you realize that I meant that.)
Nick Stokes, “Slight? The amount of C we’ve emitted is about equal to the entire mass of vegetation. How can it be hidden?”
Um, down to the depths of the deepest boreholes we have drilled, into the mesosphere, and most importantly in the jars of ocean water stored several years before they are tested at Scripps.
“Nick Stokes
It is much more likely biology is quite capable of handling a slight imbalance of CO2 such as the human contribution.”
Slight? The amount of C we’ve emitted is about equal to the entire mass of vegetation. How can it be hidden?”
Nick, just for a moment imagine that that Faraday, playing with electrodes and water, came up with cold-fusion and that humankind was able to generate electricity from surface nuclear fusion (in a fictional universe). Now human-kind continues it progress in much the same way, but there amount of fossil fuels burnt is trivial, and they never quite get into concrete.
What would the atmospheric CO2 level be?
My guess is that in the fictional world the Greens would be worrying about global cooling caused by human emission of phosphates and nitrates into the worlds oceans.
The sheer mass of primary nutrients supplied to photosynthetic marine organisms in cold-fusion world would drop atmospheric [CO2] below 250 ppm. The loss of this green house gas would cause global cooling, with no bounce back from the little ice age and now all our food plants would by carbon restricted, as the pCO2 drops, the ability to feed the population is becoming increasingly difficult. Cold fusion world is in a bind, the only way to grow enough food is to keep mining phosphates and making nitrates, to put on he fields, but this ends up in the aquasphere, making CO2/DIC the limiting nutrient. The seas bloom and the world cools.
Some heretical climate scientists suggest digging up coal and burning it, but these geoengineers are treated with scorn as the amount of coal needed to raise the steady state level of CO2 back to 280 ppm is huge, and calculations show that the residency time is only 12 years.
Dr. Burns, “From what I can see 14C follows temperature over the past thousand years. It looks well removed from the graph of man’s C emissions.”
Of course it follows temperature. It is coming from the oceans, whose outgassing follows temperature, not from fossil fuels which contain no 14C.
gopal panicker says:
>‘CO2 is absorbed and emitted at the surface’…what about rain ?…CO2 is fairly soluble in water…with the tiny volume of a cloud droplet…and the very high ratio of surface to volume..all raindrops should be saturated with CO2…IMHO this should be the main mechanism for removal of CO2 from the atmosphere…and the reason why CO2 has not risen as fast as emissions…assuming all the other processes remain the same
++++++
Thank goodness this is getting some attention. It is amazing to see such a large CO2 stripping mechanism missing from the conversation.
Greg Goodman says:
>Salt water absorbs much more but rain must help the reaction rate by scrubbing the air.
Um….no. I think fresh water presently absorbs (very rapidly) 1128 ppm at sea level and the oceans are about 620 ppm because they are a) salt water and b) full of CO2-strippers.
Ferdinand Engelbeen says:
>Fresh water may absorb some CO2, but with 0.0004 bar in the atmosphere the quantities are very low.
I think 1128 ppm is high. Water sucks it in like a molecular sponge. You can taste the difference by boiling some water and leaving it to cool in a closed cup, and tasting the same boiled water open to the air for 24 hours. The taste difference is the change in pH by absorption of CO2. Henry’s Law and alla that.
>I calculated it some time ago: if the rain absorbs CO2 to saturation at the (cold) place of formation, drops to the ground and evaporates again, 1 mm of rain (1 l/m2) will give an increase of 1 ppmv in the first meter (1 m3) of air. That is all. Simply negligible…
Well, most rain falls into the ocean. Rain that falls and runs into rivers has by definition not evaporated. Rain is, net, a CO2 stripping mechanism. When water droplets form they are very small and absorb CO2 rapidly with a huge surface area per gram. Then they join hands to fall. Clouds >0° C are full of CO2 – far more concentrated than open air per cubic metre.
fhhaynie says:
>I think the absorption of CO2 in tropical clouds is controlling the global concentration and distribution. Water droplets get colder with altitude. Equilibrium between air and water is maintained as the air rises. Some of that water falls as rain but some at the top of the clouds freezes. When it freezes, it releases CO2 into the upper atmosphere where it is transported toward the poles where it is absorbed by cold polar water (not ice).
Lots of CO2 is transported north within the clouds using water droplets as vehicles. The Northern Hemisphere loses liquid water and accumulates a great deal of winter ice and snow which of course contains no CO2. This applies to all soil that freezes, lake surfaces (which have less CO2 than water drops, BTW) resulting in a rather obvious NH Winter increase in the global CO2 level. It is not plants breathing that we see at Mauna Loa, it is the cryosphere.
The ‘cold polar water’ is only uncovered in summer which allows it to absorb CO2. Combined with the melting of all the ice and snow, the CO2 level drops – and it drops far more than anything we do or do not emit. I saw it claimed years ago by some alarmist that the rise in NH winter CO2 was caused by, ‘industrialized nations burning fossil fuels to keep warm’. No number attached, of course.
http://www.newclimatemodel.com/evidence-that-oceans-not-man-control-co2-emissions/ has the quote: “The relatively low CO2 quantities above the equator are due to the clouds and rain of the Intertropical Convergence Zone.”
It would be great if these types of posts were written more like a paper with the conclusions summerized at the start of the page in an abstract rather than having to wait until the bottom of the page. What I mean by this is that the point of the post is not really about the fact that “Monckton provided some slides…” It is more that
“Natural temperature change and variability in soil moisture, not anthropogenic emission, is the chief driver of changes in CO2 concentration. These changes may act as a feedback contributing some warming but are not its principal cause.” Which is a fantastic start and makes the post seem extremely interesting and tells us what the whole post is about before we dive in and explore the rationale.
Certainly not being critical here, just suggesting a way to structure the posts which for me would be more appropriate.