Climate as a heat engine

More models…..the climate is a convection system with a million variables including local thermodynamics. This complexity is immune to modeling. It would be refreshing to hear from quackitists and quackademics that we really dont have a clue about climate or weather and that most likely a trace chemical necessary for life mostly emitted by gaia has not much to do with anything….

“If you fill a balloon of air in the upper atmosphere and bring it down to ground level, the air in it will be warmer than the air at ground level”
Assuming you mean the upper troposphere that would be because the air was originally humid and cooled during uplift at the moist lapse rate.
If you then capture dried out air and bring it down then it warms at the dry lapse rate which is faster and so it ends up warmer than the surface air.
I have argued elsewhere that the mechanical warming on the descent phase of the convective cycle is what warms the surface above the S-B prediction and not DWIR (Downward Infrared Radiation)

Jan:
I know what you’re getting at.
But I feel the comparison of the Earth’s climate system with a Carnot engine is inappropriate.
A Carnot engine is a closed system – that is, it deals with an energy differential between two sources, these closed off from the outside. It acts by transferring energy from a warm region to a cool region of space and, in the process, converting some of that energy to mechanical work.
The Earth’s climate is an open system – with a constant input of energy from the Sun and a constant emission of that energy to space after conversion into terrestrial IR. Therefore the efficiency of the conversion does not matter.
To say that the earth will become “stormier” in a warmer world is (Meteorologically) correct. (supposing an unchanging LR). But there are exceptions.
A warmer world will have more evaporated water to release LH and therefore convective cells will have more power available to push up through the atmosphere to counter that LR.
In subtropical zones where Coriolis force can act on systems of thunderstorms, and in combination with westerly travelling waves in the upper air will make Hurricanes, Typhoons, Cyclones more powerful, as they derive their energy from SST’s, which will be higher in a warmer world.
The argument is applicable to tornadoes as well with, in the US, more moisture drawn up from the Gulf being overridden by dry Arctic sourced air – then the CAPE (convectively available energy) available will be greater. The spin will still be sourced from a backing/increasing wind with height over the top/through the Cumulonimbus cloud.
It is true though that if we accept that a warming world will not warm uniformly, and that the Arctic would warm more, then this would reduce the thermal contrast between Equator and Pole and so make less energy available to Earth’s “heat engine” via a weakening of the Polar jet-stream. However though this would serve to weaken the central pressure and hence wind gradients of mid-latitude Lows, due to the increased “waviness” of the jet then we will be more prone to “stuck” weather patterns giving regionally disparate flood/cooler and drought/hotter weather. These regional zones would shift around but would make rainfall patterns much less predictable.
Likewise Monsoon rains are likely to be disrupted via differences in ocean heating via current flow and they will contain more rain when they arrive.

Stephen Wilde says:
December 28, 2013 at 9:07 am
“If you fill a balloon of air in the upper atmosphere and bring it down to ground level, the air in it will be warmer than the air at ground level”
Assuming you mean the upper troposphere that would be because the air was originally humid and cooled during uplift at the moist lapse rate.
If you then capture dried out air and bring it down then it warms at the dry lapse rate which is faster and so it ends up warmer than the surface air.
I have argued elsewhere that the mechanical warming on the descent phase of the convective cycle is what warms the surface above the S-B prediction and not DWIR (Downward Infrared Radiation)

Your example leaves out one important element — the latent heat of the water vapor that “disappears” as the air dried out, is actually simply moving heat energy to a new location.
A practical example of this case is the issue with down slope winds like the chinook winds we have here in Colorado which can cause “local” warming on the front range. In the winter time these winds doming out of the west fall several thousand feet (about 7,000 – 8,000 ft) after crossing the continental divide dropping into the Denver basin, and can warm 20-30 degrees causing 40-50 degree days in the front range corridor while just 30-40 miles east of Denver temps are in the 20’s and 30’s.
From the local perspective the air has “warmed” but you are forgetting the cold side of the equation. The reason these winds warm on the down slope is that they had a significant moisture content as the were upslope winds on the western side of the continental divide and during that orographic lifting the moisture dropped out as snow. This released a lot of latent heat of freezing as the ice crystals formed and that is the heat that shows up on compression as dry air.
If the wind has low humidity or the temperatures on the western slope are not cold enough to cause rain or snow the winds in the lee of the mountains are bone chilling cold bora winds not warm Chinook winds. The warming is local there is an equal and opposite cooling captured in the snow pack on the western slope that will not be released back into the atmosphere until spring when the snows melt.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orographic_lift
If that latent heat of condensation and freezing is radiated away from the cloud tops to deep space at the top of the convection column, and has left the the system and the down drafts will be much cooler than the air that went up. This happens every day in thunderstorms. You have 80+ deg F moist air rising int he updraft, and cold rain and hail falls out as the air is lifted, but much of that latent heat is released at high altitude as IR radiation to space. The resulting cold down drafts will be in the 50 deg F range and the combined result of the cool down draft and the chilling effect of the cold rain and melting hail is cooler (has less total heat content) than the original warm moist air that entered the storm in the updraft phase.
You have to consider the entire cycle and due to specific circumstances sometimes a drop in elevation can result in heating of the air and at other times a net cooling. It all comes back to the water cycle and where and under what conditions the moisture gains or loses energy as latent heat.

Warming gives less efficiency: doesn’t this classically describe a (temperature) negative feedback process?

” the maximum theoretical efficiency decreases with increasing temperatures. ”
This is a misleading statement. You get the math correct a paragraph or two later, but I can think of cases where your statement is wrong. Depending on the starting temperature differential, if Th is increasing at a higher rate then Tc, then efficiency can still go up. Ex. Th increasing at 3 times the rate of Tc: Th=100, Tc=50 e=50%, Th=400, Tc=150 e=62.5%.
I think what you meant to say is that if temperatures are increasing equally, then efficiency goes down. And for any case where Tc is increasing faster than Th efficiency goes down along with a fair number of cases where Th is increasing faster but not fast enough than Tc.
Efficiency also doesn’t tell the whole story. You should also state explicitly that the mechanical work is a function of the efficiency and the amount of heat transferred. But since the source for all of our heat is the sun and that is “constant” then a lower efficiency will result in less mechanical work done.
Finally, the cold sink in your car example is the air at the exhaust (and ambient air around the engine) and not the intake. They happen to come from the same pool but in principle they don’t have to. I could have a tank of hot air that I inject into the cylinders, expand, and exhaust and still get work from the system. Turbo’s have intercoolers because colder air is denser air, and Turbo’s are all about recovering some of the waste heat to better aspirate the engines.
p.s. You also have an “of cause” buried in there.

[snip – chemtrail garbage – policy violation -mod]

I grew up on the southern edge of the Sahara and one memory I have of my weekly chores was refilling the kerosene tank at the bottom of our refrigerator, and cleaning the long glass mantle of its weekly accumulation of black soot. Later in life I learned that this refrigerator was an absorption unit and that the “working fluids” were anhydrous ammonia, hydrogen gas, and water. The entire working fluid system was sealed and had no moving parts, yet it continuously provided ice in the freezer section and cold air in the refrigerator section off of heat generated by burning a miniscule amount of kerosene (about a quart/day). This type of “engine” achieves its remarkable cooling by both phase change and multiple Carnot cycle expansion/contraction/pressure changes of the working fluids. At the heart of the engine is the “expansion” and boiling of liquid ammonia/hydrogen gas mixture inside the freezer coils that created the chilled freezer surfaces. This gas mixture is condensed and separated by mixing with water. Since ammonia is highly soluble in water but hydrogen is not, the ammonia dissolve (absorbs) into the water but the hydrogen does not and collects above it as purer hydrogen gas. The water/ammonia mixture is then collected at the bottom of the refrigerator and percolation “boiled” using the heat of a kerosene fired flame to boil the ammonia out of the water. The “hot” ammonia gas is cooled at the top of the refrigerator by passing it through a heat exchanger, and the liquid ammonia is mixed with hydrogen gas again, collected and piped back into the freezer compartment where it begins the cycle again. The mixing and “asborption” of this type of “heat engine” is capable of extractng heat from one location (freezer coils) and moving it to another (ammonia condensing heat exchanger) using even greater heat as the energy source that drives all the cycles. My point in telling this story is that, just as Leonard Weinstein has stated, the addition of just a single phase change, where the volume and density of the working fluid changes significantly, signficanty increases the efficiency of the engine. In the case of the climate system the primare working fluid is not the air – rather it is water! The addition of two phase changes (from vapor all the way to solid), describes a thunderstorm and accounts for astoundingly high energy transfer!

Correction:
Automobiles MAY have had better “efficiency” on cold days in the era of carboraters …because the mixture was more proper.. BUT, since your engine coolent is controlled by a thermostat, the “sink” temp for an Otto Cycle, Auto Engine is almost completely constant the year around. (Whereas for a power plant, cooled with river water, for example…when the river goes to 35 F, the sink DOES allow a greated Delta T and the efficiency is up!)
Now, for the reality of the Otto cycle, the ambient temperature ALSO influences the amount of energy needed to go from AMBIENT to the combustion temp. THE GREATER ENERGY USED HEATING THE air up as it comes into the combustion cycle, causes a NET ENERGY LOSS (it takes away from the heat conversion to mechanical. Therefore, Otto cycle engines would tend to LOSE a little efficiency during colder weather.
DON’T LOOK FOR IT, as you are idling, warming up, stoping and starting MORE and your net mileage is going to go down, no matter!

It’s not the cooler air which improves a gas engine’s efficiency, it’s the density. Colder air is more dense, which means it can be mixed with more fuel, increasing the rotational torque generated by the piston’s downward movement. Likewise, turbochargers increase the density of the air in the cylinder, even though they heat the air during compression. This is why an intercooler is used, to reduce the temperature of the pressurized air back down to the ambient intake. Drag and drift guys have been known to even spray Nitrous Oxide over the outside of the intercoolers, because as it evaporates it can carry away dramatic amounts of heat, increasing the intercoolers’ efficiency.
Carbureted engines did not adjust well for air density in colder climates, other than the natural increase in venturi effect efficiency as density improved, so they typically were set to run rich, and just leaned out as the air got colder, increasing power slightly for the air they could ingest. Up to a point, leaning out the air/fuel ratio can increase power slightly, but can increase the chance of “knock” (pre-detonation of the mix in the cylinder before the piston is close to top dead center). Modern fuel injected motors run much leaner right from the start, and the sensors keep the motor on the ragged edge for both fuel efficiency and power. When the air temps go down, power does increase slightly, but within a range of only 3-5%. Hardly enough to be felt by the seat of your pants for most drivers. Modern fuel systems can adjust up to a 7-8% range within their pre-programmed parameters, which generally covers all situations outside of a really bad tank of gas.

Word search:
Chaos: 0 / 0
Dissipative: 0 / 0
Nonlinear: 0 / 0
(Far from) equilibrium: 0 / 0
Turbulence: 0 / 0
Null points

Stephen Wilde on December 28, 2013 at 9:07 am
“If you fill a balloon of air in the upper atmosphere and bring it down to ground level, the air in it will be warmer than the air at ground level”
An air filled balloon in the upper atmosphere, if brought down to ground level would become shrivelled and almost empty of air, the tiny amount of air present at ground atmospheric pressure would quickly equilibrate with the rubber walls of the balloon, destroying any heat information. Suggest revision of experimental design.

Jean Parisot says:
December 28, 2013 at 12:05 pm
I think DonV has an important point: ” In the case of the climate system the primare working fluid is not the air – rather it is water!.” It’s not CO2 it’s the sun and water.
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No the primary working fluid is the air. The oceans are a moderator not a driver. For example take the oceans out of the equation. You will find that the poles will be colder and the equator will be hotter. This will give a greater temperature difference and much stronger winds. You can see this at the moment where the South Pole is colder than the North Pole since there is no water anywhere near the SP to moderate the temps there. You will probably find that Central Siberia is colder than the NP for the same reasons.

Mike Jonas says:
December 28, 2013 at 1:09 pm
What they fail to realize is that storm increase is due to Polar Jet intrusion, as it is today.. They miss the very basic concept of what is driving the air mass changes. Go figure..

TB says:
December 28, 2013 at 1:17 pm
The details that you refer to don’t matter in the scheme of things because at any given moment 50% of the atmosphere is rising and 50% is descending.
What goes up must come down.
It doesn’t deny the greenhouse effect, it IS the greenhouse effect.
The GHE is the consequence of mechanical processes and not radiative processes.

This heat engine model does make me wonder about the weather 15,000 years ago. Were the storms stronger then? Were the tropics colder? Were there three Hadley cells in the Northern Hemisphere, or only one? If only one, there would be quite a collision of warm and cold air masses. I have no way to evaluate it, but perhaps such a change could drive ice formation over the northern continents.
As a crude idea, let’s say a very strong cold air mass diving west from North America toward the equator could drive a mass of warm moist air into the North Pacific. The angular momentum of the equatorial air would drive it eastward over the continent, where the moisture would be deposited as snow. Perhaps a similar flow of cold air from Europe drove moist air from the Atlantic back north and over the continent.
I am just wondering if a radical change or complete breakdown of the Hadley cell structure in the north might be a feature of ice ages, and how that hypothesis might be tested. Perhaps the Younger Dryas was a temporary return of the ice age air flow. Are there any obvious triggers for such a change?
Using our heat engine model, it seems a possible explanation is the temperature difference between an icy mid-continent and equator would be much greater and the northern tropical Hadley cell energy would increase, while the others would decrease. Consequently, it seems to me the tropical cell would grow to cover a greater span of latitudes. Even if the three-cell structure remained, the northern polar and subtropical cells would be anemic compared to a very energetic north tropical cell.
Does this scenario make any sense at all?
Holy crap! I checked Google…
http://www.fields.utoronto.ca/programs/scientific/10-11/biomathstat/Langford_W.pdf
Not sure they have the right conclusions, but the idea of a single Hadley cell is supported. Unfortunately, it seems they think a reduced temperature difference between the equator and poles drives it. Well, if the cold goes farther south, then perhaps the conditions are met just the same.

It seems everyone want to go back to GHG’s rather than look at the functions of the heat transfer due to temperature imbalance/air mass movement. The more I look at this comparison to a Carnot Engine the GHG has little or no effect on the system when looked at from this point of view.
Given the recent studies and papers out showing that GHG’s have been massively overstated in their cumulative effects I’m inclined to look more closely at this point of view.

The wind then performs ‘work’ moving waves, trees, ice, dust etc.

On a general point, what is wrong with accepting we’re crap at modelling nature. It’d save us a lot of money: USGS, MetOffice, EPA…etc.

While not near so elegantly I recently wrote about how the thermal energy in the oceans was transformed into kinetic energy when thermal differentials created the currents in the seas.
http://carolinacowboy.wordpress.com/2013/12/19/speaking-of-heat/

Steve B says
“No the primary working fluid is the air. The oceans are a moderator not a driver.”
I’m sorry but I disagree. I chose my ‘ammonia refrigerator’ example for a reason. In this refrigerator the energy source is heat from a kerosene flame. There are three molecules trapped in the system – Water, Anhydrous Ammonia, and Hydrogen. The water never boils, and the hydrogen never condenses. Only the ammonia CHANGES PHASE. So the working fluid is ammonia, not water and not hydrogen (although both are needed to make the system work efficiently). It is the ammonia that does the heavy lifting, that stores and then releases the vast majority of the heat transferred in this system.
In our climate system WATER is the working fluid. No other atmospheric gas changes phase and in so doing takes on immense amounts of energy for transport vertically AND laterally. Air cannot even come close to handling the same amount of energy because except for water vapor none of the gases that make up air change phase! The only way they can store and transport energy is through their heat capacity. Even the molar heat capacities of water are greater than those of air:
Air (room temp. and press.) 29.9 (J/mol·K)
Water 74.5 (J/mol·K)
But the energy that is transferred to water during phase change and that is subsequently transported by wind is typically reported in kilo Joules/mole – thats thousands of joules! So the value of the latent heat of vaporization and latent heat of fusion are:
Water 40,680 (J/mol)
Ice 6,000 (J/mol)
Since neither CO2 nor N2 nor O2 ever change phase they don’t participate in this massive heat transfer process. Sure they carry the water and participate in the expansion and contraction of the gases as they rise and fall, but they only carry a very small amount of the energy that water does.
No, I’m sorry but I disagree with you, Steve B. Water is definately the working fluid in our climate system. But I do agree with your statement that water is a “moderator”. Without water as the working fluid “moderating” (or in Willis’ words “governing”) the climate system our planet would be a much more extreme place to live in.

chris y says: “The cyclone wind speed v can be estimated with this model and other assumptions, giving
v = sqrt((Ts – To)E/To)
where Ts=300K, To=200K and E is a variable related to coupling efficiency of energy between the ocean surface and the atmosphere.”
There’s the problem with your analysis. E, the coupling efficiency, is a temperature-related variable, and could reduce the velocity or even send it the other direction.

Marc77 says:
December 28, 2013 at 8:53 am
“The upper atmosphere might be cold, but it cannot be used to drive a convection cell”
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Marc,
No, it is energy loss to space from radiative gases that allow buoyancy loss and subsidence in air masses driving convective circulation in the Hadley, Ferrel and Polar tropospheric convection cells.
Without radiative gases, tropospheric convective circulation in our atmosphere would stall and the atmosphere would trend isothermal through gas conduction. Such an atmosphere would be far hotter than our current atmosphere, as it’s temperature would be driven by surface Tmax.
Climate pseudo scientists have relied for years on the confusion most people encounter though the difference between adiabatic heating and cooling of air masses undergoing vertical circulation, and diabatic processes such as energy gained through surface conduction, release of latent heat and intercepted LWIR and energy lost via LWIR to space.
It is diabatic processes that drive buoyancy changes. It is diabatic processes that drive convective circulation.
When radiative and non-radiative energy transports in our atmosphere are solved for simultaneously it is clear that the NET effect of radiative gases in our atmosphere is atmospheric cooling at all concentrations above 0.0ppm.

NZ Willy says:
December 28, 2013 at 10:14 am
“Don’t overlook the Coriolis force as a primary driver of large-scale wind.”
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I have noted a number of folk making this mistake recently.
Coriolis forces are not a driver of atmospheric circulation. Coriolis forces have no influence on air masses at rest within a rotating reference frame. Air masses must be put in motion before Coriolis forces affect their movement.
It is radiative and non-radiative heating of air masses at low altitude and radiative cooling of air masses at high altitude that drive atmospheric circulation. Coriolis forces then influence the pattern.
One of the most notable effects of rotational forces is the division of tropospheric convective circulation into three main cells north and south of the equator. If the planet rotated slower there would only be two giant Hadley cells.

Bill H says:
December 28, 2013 at 2:23 pm
“It seems everyone want to go back to GHG’s rather than look at the functions of the heat transfer due to temperature imbalance/air mass movement. The more I look at this comparison to a Carnot Engine the GHG has little or no effect on the system when looked at from this point of view.”
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Not quite everyone..;-)
However, radiative gases* have a huge effect on atmospheric circulation. Without these gases, the atmosphere has no effective cooling mechanism. It is radiative energy loss at altitude that allows buoyancy loss, subsidence of air masses and continued tropospheric convective circulation in the Hadley, Ferrel and Polar cells. The result of this circulation is the pneumatically generated lapse rate cause by vertical circulation across the pressure gradient of the atmosphere. Just this factor alone makes our atmosphere far cooler on average than an atmosphere without radiative gases.
Some have claimed that the surface temperature differential between the equator and the poles could drive circulation powerful enough to generate the observed lapse rate in the absence of radiative energy loss at altitude. However the physics of gas conduction dis-allows this. The surface is far better at conductively heating a moving gas atmosphere in a gravity field than it is a conductively cooling it. The pole to equator surface temperature differential would not be realised in the gas atmosphere above. Further, surface friction and gas conduction within the atmosphere would would resist such circulation.
*the use of the term “greenhouse gases” as opposed to radiative gases is non-scientific. Use of that term is a wholly political effort to control the language to control the “narrative”. It implies that the radiative greenhouse effect is a valid hypothesis. In the case of both anthropogenic global warming and the radiative greenhouse effect, the hull hypothesis still stands.

@TB:
That is why the Earth’s lapse rate is like a sideways ‘W’ due to composition variations as one goes up. That ‘W’ shape is a consequence of the circulatory contortions necessary to net out to the ‘ideal’ gravity induced lapse rate.

It is also due to how those layers with different composition absorb energy directly from the sun.
The reversal of lapse rate in the stratosphere is primarily due to heating of that layer directly by absorption of UV ( UVB and UVC) by ozone. At the top of the stratosphere temperatures are only slightly below the freezing point of water. Above the stratosphere, the lapse rate again resumes but slightly steeper than in the troposphere due to the very low moisture content. The very top layers of the atmosphere are warmer again due to being actively heated by the sun through several mechanisms, direct energy absorption in the UV and x ray bands, heating due to effects of the solar wind, and electrical currents and dissipation of waves (like breaking waves at a beach) that develop in the very top layers of the atmosphere, and probably direct heat absorption from in falling dust and micrometeors into the upper layer of the atmosphere.
This is one of the problems with “simplified models” we often use to make sense of the mechanics of how heating in the atmosphere results in ground temperatures warmer than prevailing theory says the should be according to SB and why N&Z proposal about gravitational potential energy and how it defines the total warming not some trace gas in the atmosphere is so controversial.
Every time we try to simplify the situation too much to help get our head around the processes we simultaneously introduce false realities that sometimes become the focus of debate. People forget that in specialize thought experiments and analogies we sometimes set traps for ourselves and get sucked into debating some quirk of the “mental model” just like we do with “computer models” and lose site of the forest for the trees.
I can’t explain the exact physics of the gravitational heating hypothesis in the context of the real world, but I also cannot find any escape clause that would allow the conservation of energy considerations to be ignored.
I think we are in a position much like when scientists first began to realize that Newtonian physics did not work well in certain realms (the very small and the near light speed domains for example) and they first began to embrace quantum and relativistic considerations.
It is my expectation that once sufficiently open minded researchers start looking for and gathering the appropriate data instead of just presuming GHG’s are the cause of heating we might finally dig out the exact mechanics. You obviously cannot prove or disprove a concept you refuse to even investigate, or you presume is so well grounded that it need not be examined in light of new information.
Just like we complain that the AGW advocates are only looking for confirmation and not falsification, we need to be careful not to look only for confirmation of a gravity based lapse rate but also those tests which would specifically prove it could not be true. This does not include just declaring it must be nonsense but actively defining what must be true if it is valid and what test would prove that it fails. To do that we first need legitimate methodical unbiased experiments that examine if it might exist and making reliable repeatable tests of various explanations for what N&Z pointed out in their papers.
Waving your hands and saying it cannot be true is no more valid than waving a computer print out and saying “the models say so”.

Glad to see we are finally getting some examination of the atmospheric-heat engine aspect of the earth, but how about the rotation of Earth in the Sun’s magnetic and gravitic fields? The rotating field of Earth should act like a both generator and motor one would think, and the tides rise and fall several feet, which must involve quite a lot of heat energy moving all that water. Are there tides in the core as well? Piers Corbyn’s solar powered weather forecasts also shows a correllation between solar activity and earthquakes. Is there electromagnetic and gravitic heating in our planet?

chris y says: “The cyclone wind speed v can be estimated with this model and other assumptions, giving v = sqrt((Ts – To)E/To), where Ts=300K, To=200K and E is a variable related to coupling efficiency of energy between the ocean surface and the atmosphere.”
jorgekafkazar says: There’s the problem with your analysis. E, the coupling efficiency, is a temperature-related variable, and could reduce the velocity or even send it the other direction.
chris y says: For the record, this is Kerry Emanuel’s analysis, not mine.
jorgekafkazar says: Noted. This was only one of your three points, and it originated with Emanuel’s paper, as you stated.
chris y says: I agree that E is likely temperature dependent. However, at least some of the temperature dependence of the energy coupling between ocean and air has already been accounted for in the model.
jorgekafkazar says: The quantification remains moot, models being only models.
chris y says: There are other problems with using the Carnot model for cyclones, like energy transport with water vapor.
jorgekafkazar says: ” Agreed, but I’m unconvinced that the inclusion of a water vapor cycle will result in increasing efficiency, rather than decreasing. I strongly suspect that more evaporated water vapor will not produce more available energy for wind velocity. Most of the extra energy will be (1) lost through vertical convection or (2) expended as latent heat converted to potential energy, which is ultimately lost in rain impacting the oceans’ surface.

Konrad said:
“The good news is that all planets and moons in our solar system that have managed to retain an atmosphere have sufficient radiative gases to allow the radiative cooling necessary to drive this circulation.”
In fact, the necessary convective overturning is induced by uneven surface heating causing air parcel density differentials plus the gravity induced decline in temperature with height which allows the uplift of less dense parcels.
Radiative cooling within the atmosphere is not needed.
If the atmosphere is radiatively inert then the effective radiating height stays at the surface and convective overturning settles at a speed which delivers kinetic energy back to the surface via adiabatic warming on descent sufficient to supply the energy needed by the surface to radiate as much to space as is received from space.
Fantasies about isothermal atmospheres are not realistic.

Larry Ledwick says:
December 28, 2013 at 5:21 pm
I said:
“That is why the Earth’s lapse rate is like a sideways ‘W’ due to composition variations as one goes up. That ‘W’ shape is a consequence of the circulatory contortions necessary to net out to the ‘ideal’ gravity induced lapse rate.”
Larry said:
“It is also due to how those layers with different composition absorb energy directly from the sun.”
Yes, I agree.
But the distortions in the gravity induced lapse rate created by direct absorption from the sun are also ‘corrected’ by circulation changes.
Even the stratosphere has a circulation albeit very slow due to low air density and I suspect similar movements in the higher layers too but they would be so weak that they have never been measured.
Suffice it to point out that if internal system parameters could cause a long term net divergence from the ‘ideal’ lapse rate then the atmosphere could not be retained.

Stephen Wilde says:
December 28, 2013 at 9:01 pm
——————————————————
“In fact, the necessary convective overturning is induced by uneven surface heating causing air parcel density differentials plus the gravity induced decline in temperature with height which allows the uplift of less dense parcels.
Radiative cooling within the atmosphere is not needed.”
Stephen,
you keep insisting that uneven surface heating can drive vertical circulation across 10 to 15 Km of the troposphere. This is contradicted by empirical experiment. In tall gas columns, Rayleigh Bernard circulation requires energy loss at a higher point than energy input. Heating and cooling at disparate locations at the base of the column simply causes weak horizontal circulation, resisted by surface friction, with layers above this rising to toward surface Tmax. While the atmosphere may appear shallow, the pressure gradient creates a far greater virtual height in terms of Rayleigh Bernard circulation.
There is no “gravity induced decline in temperature with height”. There is a gravity induced pressure gradient. It is vertical circulation across this gradient that pneumatically generates the observed lapse rate. Without vertical circulation fast enough to overcome the speed of gas conduction, the lapse rate would disappear and the atmosphere would trend toward isothermal.
In arguing for strong vertical tropospheric convective circulation in the absence of radiative cooling at altitude, you have aligned yourself with Joel shore, Nick Stokes and sadly Kevin E. Trenberth.
Not even Dr. Pierrehumbert wanted to go that far. In 1995 he tried the far more subtle – “Well of course initially radiative gases start vertical tropospheric circulation and cause atmospheric cooling, but, uum, err, after a certain point the unicorn to rainbow ratio goes negative and radiative gases then cause atmospheric warming and anyway, err, uum, just shut up!” (Delivery of these claims does require hand-waving at near humming bird speeds).
The power of radiative cooling at altitude is huge. Radiative gases are radiating as LWIR to space more than TWICE the net flux radiative flux into the atmosphere from surface and directly intercepted solar combined. They are also radiating to space all the energy entering the atmosphere through surface conduction and the release of latent heat.
You are claiming that atmospheric conduction back to the surface could match this and generate vertical circulation fast and high enough to generate the currently observed lapse rate. The physics of gases in a gravity field say no way, no how. The surface is far better at conductively heating the atmosphere than it is a conductively cooling it. During the day, gravity moves colder gas to the surface maximising conductive flux into the atmosphere. During the night, gravity moves colder gas to the surface minimising conductive flux out of the atmosphere.
If your atmospheric model requires strong vertical tropospheric circulation to continue and the observed tropospheric lapse rate to exist in the absence of radiative gases, then your model has failed for the same reasons as the AGW and RGE hypotheses fail.

Doug Huffman says:
December 28, 2013 at 8:52 am

Actual heat engines, to which Carnot’s physics apply,

Carnots physics apply to all arrangements creating mechanical energy from thermal energy. The point is that you cannot get around it independent of how complex or simple the system is.
/ Jan

Mario Lento says:
December 28, 2013 at 7:19 pm

I’m just nit picking. The statement: “The warm element for a car engine is the exploding fuel inside the cylinders and the cold element is the air intake” Is correct in what point is being made –except, car nuts don’t like to call the burning an explosion. It is really a controlled burn. The flame front is well controlled so that the energy can effectively convert heat into mechanical motion when it is needed, and then expelled.

Thank you for the correction and good explanation Mario.
/ Jan

Konrad says:
December 29, 2013 at 12:16 am
phlogiston says:
December 28, 2013 at 10:23 pm
“The idea that radiative (or any other) cooling is needed to drive air down in Hadley circulation makes no sense.”
——————————————————————————————-
Actually, prior to the inanity of the failed global warming hypothesis, it used to be rather standard meteorology –
“Air convected to the top of the troposphere in the ITCZ has a very high potential temperature, due to latent heat release during ascent in hot towers. Air spreading out at higher levels also tends to have low relative humidity, because of moisture losses by precipitation. As this dry upper air drifts polewards, its potential temperature gradually falls due to longwave radiative losses to space (this is a diabatic process, involving exchanges of energy between the air mass and its environment). Decreasing potential temperature leads to an increase in density, upsetting the hydrostatic balance and initiating subsidence.”
A huge political effort was put into keeping the findings of the first IPCC report ambiguous. After 1990 a great amount of work was put into saving global warming. This included inventing “strongly positive water vapour feed back”, erasing the MWP that disproved it and cooking up radiative-convective circulation models that negated the role of radiative gases in driving vertical tropospheric circulation.
Phlogiston, instead of siding with Kevin E. Trenberth and claiming no role for radiative gases in tropospheric convective circulation, perhaps you should be asking why climate “scientists” were so desperate to trash working meteorology theory.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Konrad:
I have discussed this with you on another thread I believe.
It seems you still do not appreciate the effect of mass air convergence aloft a Hadley Cell.
As air moving N will converge to a westerly Sub-tropical jet and sink as a result. (Err has too!)
Radiative cooling is NOT needed. It happens but that is not the driver.
The radiative cooling will be offset by subsidence warming anyway.
And this: “Actually, prior to the inanity of the failed global warming hypothesis, it used to be rather standard meteorology”
Did not get a mention in my professional training my friend.
As I’ve told you before and provided links to the mathematics of it.

norah4you says:
December 28, 2013 at 7:13 pm

The data in the bloggarticle above is only one out of many where incorrect data is used to prove (sometimes disaprove) thesis drawn from incomplete datamodels.

Which data? I have only presented a model and some examples.
There are no climate data in my article.
/ Jan

TB says:
December 28, 2013 at 9:35 am

But I feel the comparison of the Earth’s climate system with a Carnot engine is inappropriate.
A Carnot engine is a closed system – that is, it deals with an energy differential between two sources, these closed off from the outside. It acts by transferring energy from a warm region to a cool region of space and, in the process, converting some of that energy to mechanical work.

I am not saying that the climate is a Carnot engine. No such engine exists because the Carnot engine is only a concept for an ideal heat engine. But the point is that all such mechanisms which convert differences in heat into mechanical energy have to obey the same fundamental physical laws. The Carnot theorem is fundamental because it is a direct consequence of the second law of thermodynamics.
Whether it is two or more sources and sinks does not matter, if it helps one can also imagine that the climate system is modeled by a zillion microscopic heat engines, the concept is the same.
By showing that a Carnot engine has less efficiency when all temperatures are risen equally much, then I will argue that one can assume that a real heat engine working on the same temperature ranges should also have less efficiency if all other data is considered to be unchanged.
You may say that the last assumption will be wrong, and yes, as I have written above, they will not be unchanged; we can assume that the cold areas of the planet will heat more than the warm areas, but that will only reduce the efficiency of the heat engine further.
/ Jan

chris y says:
December 28, 2013 at 10:54 am

There are at least 3 interesting conclusions one can take from this simple model.
1. If the sea surface temperature warms by 1K, then Ts=301K, To=200K, and the wind velocity is predicted to increase by 0.5%. There is no way to discern this tiny change.

Here you only rise the temperature for the warm element and let the cold temperatures remain unchanged. Of cause the wind will increase then, you need no model to understand that, but no one believe that only the warm parts of the planet will heat up.

2. If the climate models are to be believed, then the tropical troposphere should warm more than the surface. For example, if the sea surface warms 1C, the troposphere hot spot should warm 1.5C. That is, Ts=301K and To=201.5K. Then, the cyclonic wind velocity is predicted to DECREASE by 0.6%. Go figure…

This is a more realistic scenario which confirms what the article says.

3. Because we know that sea surface temperature changes of 5C (eg from 25 C to 30 C) can have a huge impact on cyclonic wind speeds (provided other conditions like wind shear are also just right), the Carnot model is useless for predicting wind speeds.

No, because the Carnot theorem is a fundamental principle, it will always apply when heat differences are converted to mechanical energy. How can you claim that it apply if you change the temperature by 1 C as in your point 1 and 2 above, but not when you change it with 5 C?
/ Jan

gbaikie says:
December 28, 2013 at 10:50 pm

Ah, I wonder if this would apply to what I call a pipelauncher.

This was a really original and funny idea gbaikie, I enjoyed reading it.
Much of what you say is correct, but unfortunately it will not work. However, I think this is an excellent problem for physics or math students, let them try to figure out why this will not work.
Well, the answer is that you will have to accelerate not only the rocket but also the column of water inside the cylinder below the rocket. The mass of that water column will increase with the length of the pipe and will limit the launching speed of the rocket considerably. I have not done the math, but I will guess it will be less than 100 mph.
/ Jan

Stephen Wilde says:
December 29, 2013 at 3:42 am
“…you can get an isothermal structure in a tall glass column if vertical circulation is constrained”
Glass?!
While I may use silica micro spheres vacuum packed in vacuum metallised mylar in the original experiments, due to inhalation risk I only provide instruction for replication using EPS foam.
AGW believers may be trying to build these things!
Everybody take out a circle of paper and a safety crayon….

Konrad, this is what you said and I mistyped.
“In tall gas columns,”

Konrad says: “Coriolis forces are not a driver of atmospheric circulation. Coriolis forces have no influence on air masses at rest within a rotating reference frame.”
Oh, bad call. You would be right if the atmosphere was perfectly homogeneous, but of course it’s full of local variations like changes in pressure, clouds, etc. These inhomogeneities want to travel in great circles over the Earth (what we surface-dwellers would call “straight lines”), but the Earth’s rotation follows a great circle only at the equator — elsewhere, the rotation is seen as having a lateral shear as it follows a small circle. A high-density air mass is pushed to the left in the Northern Hemisphere (to higher-latitude, slower-rotating places), so travel leftwards around the low-pressure cores of hurricanes — so counter-clockwise in the NH. So the Coriolis force is a terrific driver of winds as it “grabs” all the inhomogeneities in the air and forces them into motion.

noaaprogrammer says:
December 28, 2013 at 5:00 pm

Now that gravity has been introduced into this discussion, what effect does any atmospheric tides due to the moon have?

noaaprogrammer
Good question.
Atmospheric tides are regular oscillations in the atmosphere which can result in mechanical energy such as wind.
These tides are a phenomenon with very different sources. Some of the tides are generated by the periodic heating of the atmosphere by the Sun. The atmosphere is heated during the day and not heated at night. This effect is similar to a heat engine as discussed in this article.
However, atmospheric tides are also powered by the gravitational pull of the Moon and the Sun similar to ordinary tides. This is a source for mechanical energy that is not powered by a heat engine. The source is the rotational energy of the earth.
This means that some of the mechanical energy in the weather system is not created by a heat engine, but it is a very small part.
/ Jan

own-gbaikie says:
December 28, 2013 at 10:50 pm
Ah, I wonder if this would apply to what I call a pipelauncher.
This was a really original and funny idea gbaikie, I enjoyed reading it.-
I am glad you found it amusing.
*Much of what you say is correct, but unfortunately it will not work. However, I think this is an excellent problem for physics or math students, let them try to figure out why this will not work.*
Such results I would find extremely interesting.
“Well, the answer is that you will have to accelerate not only the rocket but also the column of water inside the cylinder below the rocket.”
It’s like the scotty quote from star trek.
No the water doesn’t move [assuming acceleration is constant].
So water after one starts some accelerate [say 1 gee] then after this water inside pipe doesn’t move-the pipe moves pass it.
-The mass of that water column will increase with the length of the pipe and will limit the launching speed of the rocket considerably. I have not done the math, but I will guess it will be less than 100 mph.-
It seems it would have limit due to nature of water- things have problems going over speed of sound in water. So near terms I tend to think max speed would be around 300 mph.
As first type of it’s kind probably realistic to shoot for max of about 200 mph.
But I it could over time be developed so one was getting up to speed of sound. But don’t expect
supersonic speeds without running across unexpected problem. And it gets progressive
harder to do such speeds- particularly if gee have to be 1 or less gees of acceleration.
And if going to go as fast as 200 mph, this pipelauncher would leap a distance out of the water, unless one adds some sort of braking featues.
But one think if not in windy conditions, one have bottom of pipe leave the water by somewhere
around say 100 feet or so.
Also if column water pushed down is say 50, as soon bottom of pipe was 50 feet from the surface
one can’t accellerate, so one could decrease acceleration near the top so you not pushing water down to 50- say lower acceleration so it was instead 20 feet [or something like that.
If want to be fancy, you make that water leap up into the air after the rocket. Or you make to column of water accelerate, somewhat Such a “move” could used to help brake the rocket by some amount- [but too much vacuum] and it could crush the pipe- which would be bad.
Many people have said that 100 or 300 mph isn’t not significant for rocket which ulitimately travels 17,000 mph. But there are reason why couple hundred miles hour would significantly improve a rockets proformance. So like add, say 20% to it’s payload.

Max Hugoson says:
December 28, 2013 at 10:49 am

Automobiles MAY have had better “efficiency” on cold days in the era of carboraters …because the mixture was more proper.. BUT, since your engine coolent is controlled by a thermostat, the “sink” temp for an Otto Cycle, Auto Engine is almost completely constant the year around.

Max, take a look at what happens inside the cylinder if we use the laws of an ideal gas
PH = (TH/TL)*PL
PH = high pressure after the fuel has burnt
PL = pressure before the burning
TH = Temperature in the cylinder after the fuel has burnt
TL=Temperature in the cylinder before the fuel has burnt
Let’s assume that the burning will rise the temperature by 500K
Let’s assume a cold day is TL = 300 K and a warm day it is 350K
On a cold day you then have PH= 800/300*PL = 2.67*PL
On a warm day you have PH = 850/350 * PL = 2.44*PL
That means you get a higher pressure, which gives more effect a cold day. The energy used is the same, in both cases it rise the temperature with 500K, but you get more effect out of it when you start with a colder gas.
/ Jan

In regards this:
However, I think this is an excellent problem for physics or math students, let them try to figure out why this will not work.*
Lets paste some notes I made about various pipelaunchers.
This is bunch of notes about generally tending to make them on *small side*
40 feet in diameter.
20 squared is 400, times pi is 1256 sq ft.
1 psi is 144 lbs per square foot. 1256 sq ft
is 180,864 lb force.
1″ walls: working pressure: 100 psi. Burst 200 psi
1/2″ ??: 50 working and 100 burst
http://www.texaspipe.com/barlows_formula.html
40,000 psi .5″ is 83.3 psi
.25 is 52 psi
40 foot diameter is 125.6 feet circumference.
100 foot length is 12560 square feet
1000 foot is 125600 square feet.
cubic feet of steel 40 dia and 1000 feet long which is 1/4 thick walls:
125600 divided by 48 is 2616.6 cubic feet
Cubic foot of steel weighs 489 pounds
1,279,550 lbs [640 tons]. creates 7 psi by it’s weight
30 feet in diameter.
15 square is 225, times pi is 706.5 sq ft.
1 psi is 101736 lbs of force.
1/4″ wall at 40000 is 69 psi
Circumference: 94.2 feet
1000 foot lenght is 94200 square feet
94200 divided by 48 is 1962.6 cubic feet of steel
Weighs 959,662.5 lbs [480 tons]
Creates 9.4 psi from it’s own weight.
30 feet diameter 2000 feet long
959,662.5 lbs x 2 is 1,919,325 lb [960 tons]
It’s mass creates 18.87 psi
To accelerate 1 gee, requires 37.7 psi
2000 ft long pipelauncher accelerating Falcon 9:
Gross weight of Falcon 9:
“Falcon 9 v1.1 performance was still 13.15 tonnes LEO or 4.85 tonnes GTO, but gross
liftoff mass had risen to as much as 505.846 tonnes. Liftoff thrust was 600.109 tonnes
for v1.1 and 1,800.327 tonnes for Heavy.”
http://www.spacelaunchreport.com/falcon9v1-1.html
So 600.109 tonnes [661.5 tons]
Say total including tower: 760 tons
1520000 + 1,919,325 lb is 3,439,325 [1720 tons]
To float requires 33.8 psi
To accelerate 1 gees require 67.6 psi
To accelerate for 10 seconds at 1 gee the distance traveled vertically is
10 second squared times 1/2 of 9.8 m/s/s [or 100 times 16 feet].
Resulting in the 2000 foot tall pipelauncher having it’s top [capped end]
1600 feet above waterline and 400 feet below the waterline.
And traveling at speed of 98 m/s [352.8 kpm- 219.2 mph]
98 m/s is about 320 feet per second
General conditions at 10 second mark: Air in pipe will be about 68 psi.
The air temperature in pipe will be around 100 C [200 F]. One will be spraying
liquid air and with burner burning Kerosene during the 10 seconds. One can also use
water [which at these pressure will boil above 100 C- but surfaces might exceed
the air temperature- and air will be very dry- so it will evaporate due partial pressure
of water vapor]. At or before the 10 second mark, the buring of kerosene is stopped.
And the continuation of spraying liquid air without heat added would reduce air pressure.
And upward continuation of velocity will also lower the air pressure.
So at 10 second mark air pressure is about 68 psi, if air pressure drops to 34 psi such air
pressure would still cause aceleration [33.8 psi causes it to float- 34 psi would cause it
to rise slowly.
68 psi is 4.6 atm. 1 Atm would press water 33 feet below waterline. So at 68 psi water
in pipe is depressed 152.65 feet waterline inside the pipe. And a decrease in pressure in
the pipe will cause the water to rise. Having 68 psi keep water at that level. Increasing
pressure to 68 psi pushes it down to 152.65 feet. It’s isn’t the forcing of water out the
pipe which is the cause of acceleration- it’s not “jet powered” but it’s also not an
insignificant factor in beginning and ending of acceleration.
So at 10 second mark, the pipe is 400 feet under water and has 400 – 152.65 feet of water
inside the pipe: 247.35 feet coulumn of water.
Due to momentum and not considering forces slowing such momentum, the pipelauncher travel at
320 feet per second, it will at 11 second mark have pipe will only be 80 feet under the water.
And since was 152.65 feet fill with air, 152.65 – 80 feet. Or 72.65 foot column of air would
be pushed out the bottom of the pipe. It also mean that at air pressure at 80 feet below
water line is 36.3 psi. So at 10 second mark there was 68 psi, at the 11 second mark the
pressure inside pipe would drop to about 36 psi.
Now one could make a design modification. Simple or more complicated. Simple would be
having big holes in the pipe, starting at 250 feet from the bottom of the pipe. Which means
the 250 feet of pipe would used to slow down the pipelauncher. So at 10 second mark air would
start “venting” out sides of pipe, and as the holes became closer to surface [within the 1
second] more air would pushed out to holes. Or you have doors at near or at top pipe which
open at 10 second mark.
Now if you do no modifications, and do nothing at the 11 second mark, you will have about
about 36 psi air in pipe, and within a fraction of second, the 36 psi will go to zero- same
pressure as atmosphere.
Or with no modifications but the continuation dumping in liquid air one can rapid cool
the air, causing the pressure to drop.
One can do lots of stuff. This is the art of driving a pipelauncher.
For instance for first 8 to 9 seconds of acceleration you could keep the air temperature
around 100 C or cooler, and in last second or two rapidly increase air temperature-
burn more kerosense and/or stop adding liquid air. And a fraction of second before 10 second
mark stop all kerosene burning, and dump liquid air.
If you have 500 K air and lower temprature to 250 K, you get 1/2 the pressure, 68 psi
becomes 34 psi, which stops acceleration and causes water to rise in the pipe.
Aluminum: 2.72
Steel: 7.82
PVC 1.36
Small diameter and long:
20 feet in diameter 2000 feet long [or longer].
200 feet length Marine Aluminum- fire box and ice box.
1600 feet of PVC
200 feet of steel
In water PVC has little weight. Steel has higher density and will function as keel.
PVC has Yield tensile strength 6500 psi or about 1/6th of 40 K aluminium alloy or steel.
1 inch wall 20 feet [240″] diameter can withstand 54 psi. 1.5″: 81.25 psi
Will use 1 1/2″ wall thickness will PVC and 1/2″ wall thickness with aluminium. And 1/4″ pipe
wall thickness with steel.
200 feet 20 foot diameter 1/4″ steel pipe weighs:
circumference: 62.8 feet. Times 200 is 12560 square feet.
12560 divided by 48 is 261.6 cubic feet of steel.
cubic feet of steel: weighs 489 pounds. Times 261.6 is
127,955 lbs [69.9 tons]. In water it weighs less than 8/7th this weigh [56 tons].
But as accelerated mass it’s about 70 tons.
Distilled water is about 62 lb per cubic foot [62.428]
So, Aluminum: 2.72 is about 170 lb per cubic foot and PVC is about 85 lbs
So Aluminum 20 diameter and 200 feet long is 12560 divided by 24 which is:
523.3 cubic feet. Weighs: 88966.6 lbs [44.5 tons].
PVC 20 ft diameter and 1600 ft is 12560 times 8: 100,480 square feet.
100,480 divided by 8 is 25,120 cubic feet. Which weighs:
2,135,200 lbs [1067.6 tons]. But in water it weighs about 22 lb per cubic foot [276 tons].
20 diameter circle has 314 square feet. At 1 psi it’s 144 lb of force.
314 times 144 is 45,216 lbs of force per 1 psi.
To float 200 feet above waterline: it weighs: 56 + 44.5 + 276 tons: 376.5 tons. Or about:
753000 lb. Divide by 45,216, means it needs 16.6 psi of air pressure inside pipe.
If rocket plus everything else weighs 376.5 tons, then need 33.3 psi.
Which is 2.65 atm and depressing water, 74.77 feet below the waterline.
To determine the air pressure with 1 gee acceleration one has to use mass rather than
weight. And 791.6 and 14 tons- 805.6 tons- 1,611,200 lb. So: 1,611,200 + 753000 lb x 2 is:
3,117,200 lbs. Divide by 45,216 is 68.9 psi. So it’s 68.9 plus 33.3 psi and that is
102.2 psi. Which exceeds the 81.25 psi strenght of PVC. But 1/2″ wall Aluminum can withstand
166.6 psi.
So the 102.2 psi is 6.95 atm or depresses water 229.5 feet below waterline.
So roughly, if made the 200 feet of aluminium pipe be instead 250 feet, you start with 1 gee
acceleration.
Hmm. Let try 2 seconds at 1 gee. Make aluminium pipe 300 feet long. The aluminium is lighter
out of water and PVC is only a bit lighter than alumium in the water, but PVC would probably be
be cheaper. So half a gee is 68.9 / 2 = 34.45 psi. Plus 33.3 ps is 67.75 psi. So one more than
1/2 gee of acceleration.
Lets say part of launch tower is a tube, which is water resistent. Say this tube is 30 feet
tall, and allow pipelauncher to start it’s acceleration -20 feet below waterline.
In terms of pressure if PVC pipe is below 33 feet it would be overpressurize by 14.7 psi.
And 81.25 plus 14.7 is 95.95 psi and 66 feet is 110.5 psi. So with 1 gee acceleration
PVC must below 60 feet under water.
And PVC starts 320 feet under water. So within 4 seconds at 1 gee acceleration it moves up
256 feet. So at 4 second mark moving at 128 ft per second [39.2 m/s {87.5 mph}].
If 128 ft per second velocity were not to accelerate but kept constant speed, you run out pipe
lenght in 13 seconds- total being 13 plus the 4 seconds at 1 gee.
And roughly want the time to be about 10 seconds or more in total.
So try 8 seconds + 4 seconds. and 8 second at 24 ft per second per second, which distance of
768 feet. Plus 8 second at 128 ft per second which is 1024 feet. Which doesn’t work.
So 7 seconds: 24 ft per second per second, distance is 588 ft plus 896 ft plus the 256 ft.
Is 1740 feet. Minus 20 ft leaving 280 feet of pipe in water after 11 seconds of acceleration.
With velocity of 128 ft + 168 feet per second [296 ft/s [ 84.9 m/s or 189.5 mph].
All aluminum:
“Aluminum 20 diameter and 200 feet long is 12560 divided by 24 which is:
523.3 cubic feet. Weighs: 88966.6 lbs [44.5 tons].”
Times 10 to equal 2000 ft long: 88966.6 lbs [44.5 tons] * 10 = 889666 lbs [445 tons].
“20 diameter circle has 314 square feet. At 1 psi it’s 144 lb of force.
314 times 144 is 45,216 lbs of force per 1 psi.”
So, 19.6 psi to float.
Have rocket and tower plus everything else 445 tons times 2 = 890 tons
To float: 19.6 psi + 19.6 times 2 = 39.35. Total 58.95 to float.
1 gee is 117.9 psi. 20 feet diameter Aluminium 1/2″ wall can operate as high as 166.6 psi.
Could accelerate slightly faster than 1 gee or add more length.
Say add 22.1 psi of added pipe giving pressure of 140 psi.
Adding 1000 feet [3000″ in total] adds 9.83 to float and 19.6 psi with 1 gee.
So 10 second of 1 gee is 490 meters or about 1600 feet. 1600 feet out of water and 1400 feet
under water. And 117.9 + 19.6 psi is 137.5 psi [9.35 atm] so water pressed 308.67 feet under
water. So at 10 second aceleration one has 1091.33 feet of pipe with water in it and 1908.67
feet with air at 137.5 psi.
If pressure can rapidly halved to 68.75 psi, the this pressure floats payload and pipe.
Without added more pressure:
Pipelauncher and rocket with continue to accelerate but be decreasing in acceleration- ceasing to
accelerate once pressure reaches 68.75 psi.
So at 10 second mark, after accelerating 10 seconds 32 feet per sec/sec, it’s going at
320 feet per second. So at 11 second mark it will traveled additional 320 plus it’s decaying
acceleration rate [called it DAR]. So volume of air in pipe will increase by 1908.67 feet
plus 320 feet plus DAR. And ignoring DAR it’s 1908.67 + 320 = 2228.67 feet.
A 20% increase of 1908.67 is 2290.4 feet.
A 100% increase would half the pressure- lose 68.75 psi. So at 20% one loses a 1/5th of this
so 13.75 psi. And lose 1/5 acceleration: 6.4 ft per sec from 32 feet per second.
So in one second one goes from 32 ft per sec/sec to 25.6. And the acceleration average during
the second is 28.8 feet per second.
So going back and adding DAR is 1908.67 + 320 + 28.8 = 2257.47 feet.
But decrease of 13.75 of psi will causes the water inside pipe to rise about 30 feet- this is
not instantaneous [it accelerate from zero to 6.4 ft per sec/sec during the 1 sec.]
So at 12 second mark the pipe travels up 2 times 320′ [plus 2 seconds of DAR].
Again roughly, pressure reduces by another 1/5th.
So in two seconds, pressure at 137.5 drops by 13.75 + 13.75 psi- falls to about 110 psi.
And roughly, [320′ times 2] + [28.8 times 2] equals 697.6
One had 1091.33 feet of pipe with water minus 697.6 feet, leaves 393.73 water in pipe, but
water also increasing as water accelerate up pipe [a minor amount so far].
And with water still in pipe, one gets another second of acceleration- 1 second +.
So DAR has decreased from 32 ft per sec/sec to 25.6 and second two 25.6 to 19.2 feet per second
per second. Add to 320 feet per second 44.8 per second [248 mph]. And after second 3:
12.8 ft persec/sec [1/2 to 1/3 gee]. And pressure drop by about another 13.75 psi [end of 13
seconds pressure inside pipe will be about 96 psi [ 6.5 atm and pushes water 216 feet below sea
level. The 137.5 psi [9.35 atm] pushing it 308.67 feet under water. Accelerationg of
water was 6.4, 12.8, finally 19.2 feet per sec per sec. And water rising 3.2, 12.8, 22.4 =
38.4 feet. after 3 seconds [and “wants” to be about 60 feet higher- and sort of like water
falling from 60 feet up- it’s rushing like a waterfall upwards].
But we can add 38.4 feet to the 393.73 feet: 432 feet.
The distance traveled in 12 to 13 second is 320 + 28.8 + 22.4 + 16 = 387.2 feet.
So 48.8 feet of water left in pipe.
In terms pipe in water. [320 * 3] + 28.8 + 22.4 + 16. Had 1400 feet minus 1027.2 feet =
372.8 feet.
All kinds of excitement occurs in the 13 second to 14 second mark. Pipe will at around 14 second
mark, be leaving the water, water once in pipe will be chasing after it, and lacking water
pressure to prevent air pressure from leaving pipe. One not have a second of acceleration
after the 14 second mark.
“30 feet in diameter.
15 square is 225, times pi is 706.5 sq ft.
1 psi is 101736 lbs of force.
Circumference: 94.2 feet
1/4″ steel wall at 40000 is 69 psi
1000 foot lenght is 94200 square feet
94200 divided by 48 is 1962.6 cubic feet of steel
Weighs 959,662.5 lbs [480 tons]”
Aluminum: 2.72
Steel: 7.82
1/2″ 360″ diameter, Aluminum alloy with 40,000 psi strength burst pressure: 111 psi
Aluminum:
1/2″ rather than 1/4″
“Cubic foot of aluminum will weigh 171 pounds”
Instead of 94200 divided by 48 it’s divided by 24:
3925 cubic feet of Aluminum. Which weighs 671,175 lbs.
Cap: 706.5 sq ft 1/2 thick: 29.4 cubic feer: 5034 lbs
Total weight 676,209 lbs.
Rocket weight: 2 million lbs
Rough total weight is 2.8 million lbs
And 2.8 million divided by 101736 lbs per 1 psi is
27.522 psi or 1.87 atm.
In terms of total amount of air it’s 1 atm plus 1.87 atm.
Mass of air 1000 feet length and 30 foot diameter:
706.5 sq ft time 1000 is 706,500 cubic feet of air
“According to the CRC Handbook of Chemistry and Physics, the density of dry air at
20 degrees C at 760 mm of mercury (one atmosphere of pressure) is 1.204 milligrams per
cubic centimeter.
1 cubic foot = 28,316.8467 cubic centimeters.
So, dry air weighs 34,093.48 mg per cu.ft.
Which is about 1.2 ounces per cu.ft. ”
http://wiki.answers.com/Q/How_much_does_a_cubic_foot_of_air_weigh
So 1 atm at 20 C, 706,500 cubic feet of air is 847,870 oz.
And 2.87 atm at 20 C is 2,433,186 oz. Or 152,074 lbs
Or 76 tons.
Assume have this pipelauncher [gross weight: 400 tons] with 1000 ton rocket is floating with top
of pipelauncher 20 feet above the water. It has 27.522 psi of air in it. 14.7 psi of air will push
to water 33 feet below sea level- or about 2.25 feet per psi. So 27.522 psi of air will push water
61.78 feet under water. And with 20 feet above water, one has about 81 feet of air at
1.87 atm + 1 atm. One starting with about 1/12th of total 76 tons of air- about 6 tons.
So if one adds 70 tonnes of air, fills the entire pipe length of 1000 feet with 1.87 + 1 atm
quantity of air.
So if added 70 tons of liquid air and the liquid air was warmed to 20 C- [pouring it into warm
ocean water would more or less do this. Considering area of 30 diameter pipe is 706.5 sq ft and
one foot depth of water is 706.5 cubic ft. Is 22 tons of water. And dumping a ton or more
liquid air it will mix with the water several feet under the surface of the water.
Plus turning the water into ice requires a lot energy in terms of heat loss. Making it improbable
that liquid air dumped into warm sea water would be cooler than 0 C, and more mixed with water
the higher temperature of the air.
So roughly air should limited roughly between range of 0 and 20 C without adding additional
heat [which will be done]. The air in the pipe will be heated over 100 C, but first
starting with assumption of air heated to 20 C.]
So if put 70 tons of air at 20 C in pipe and it’s 1/2 full of air- 500 feet of length has air
in it, the air pressure will be 2 times 2.87 atm Or doubling the volume will 1/2 the pressure/density
if same temperature.
If add 70 tons of air at 20 C over long time period- anything over couple minutes is long period,
the pipelauncher and rocket payload will rise until bottom of pipe is 62 feet under water and top of
pipe is 938 feet. And it’s unstable in this position- it flip over it not balanced. But it floats
vertically if prevented from flopping over.
If instead of slowly adding 70 tons of air, one were to very rapidly add the 70 tons- say in less
than 1 second, one have too much pressure in the pipe. If make the pipe strong enough to
withstand such pressures, one gets the pipelauncher going up quickly and the water being pushed
down quickly.
Instead of slowly adding air and very quickly adding air, one want to do is increase the pressure
to certain amount and keep the pressure at this level.
So with gross weight of 2.8 million lb it requires 27.522 psi pushing up on top of pipe and
pushing down on water inside pipe. Top of pipe has area of 706.5 sq ft or 101,736 square inches.
If pressure is doubled [55.04 psi] then water pushed down twice as far and one gets 1 gee of
acceleration for long as there is 55.04 psi. And water stays at level of twice depth.
And at 55.04 psi and with 500 feet of air in pipe. And air is at 20 C that requires 70 tons of added
air.
And if double the temperature in K, it doubles pressure. 20 C is 293 K. So increase to 313 C it’s
twice pressure. And increase temperature by 50% [+146.5 C] or to 166.5 C it increase pressure by 50%.
It also means if decrease air temperature by 50% from 20 C that is -126.5 C, it halves pressure.
Liquid Nitrogen boils at -195.8°C in 1 atm. So spray liquid nitrogen in say 20 C air, it could cool the
air down to -126.5 [as -126.5 C air is still warm enough to boil nitrogen droplets of liquid].
So if you had 100 feet of air in pipe at 20 C, and misted liquid nitrogen into air and cooled air to
-126.5 C to column of air at same pressure would shrink by 50%. Go from 100′ to 50′. And if air warmed
back up to 20 C it expands back to 100′ and if heated to 166.5 C, expands to 150′.
So with 20 C air and 20 feet above water, we column of air being about 82. If instead it was 40 feet
above water, one have 102 feet column of air, and cooled air to -126.5 C, the top of pipe go below the
sea level [10 feet below]. If doubled the 82 feet so had 164 feet of air at the start, and cooled to
-126.5 C then it drops down to 20 feet above water. And instead starting with 6 tons of air in pipe,
we start with 12 tons.
So at start of launch sequence, the top of pipe is about 100 feet [10 stories] above to water, you cool
the air and pipelauncher drops and once stops falling, use kerosene or methane burners to heat the air
and dump liquid nitrogen [or liquid air] into the water- turning it into somewhat cool air.
So since increased the starting tonnage of air by 6 ton, the 70 tons is 64 tons.
So with 64 tonnes of air added and temperature of 20 C, and half pipe full this gives 1 gee of acceleration.
Or by the correct amount in, we get 1 gee acceleration up point where 500 feet of air at 20 C is
in the pipe. At 32 feet per sec per sec that is 5.59 seconds of 1 gee, and speed of 178.88 feet per second
[54.5 m/s- or about 128 mph].
Increasing air temperature from 20 C to 166.5 C increases the 500 feet to 750 feet.
And at 32 feet per sec per sec at 1 gee up to point of 750 feet is 6.84 seconds of acceleration, and
speed of 219 feet per sec [66.79 m/s- 132.5 mph].
So with 750 feet of pipe out of water, one is left with 250 feet under the water at the point of 6.84
seconds of acceleration. And the water is pushed under water 61.78 feet times 2 [123.56 feet under the
water] and one is traveling up at 219 feet per sec. So at this point the total column of air is 750
plus 123.56 feet. Which is 873.56 feet of air at 55.04 psi and air temperature of 166.5 C.
If stop adding any more air or heat, one still have +50 psi and air temperature of +160 C for the next
1/2 of second, so you have slightly less than 1 gee of acceleration for 1/2. And in 1/2 second you
travel 219 + 8 feet per second divided 2, or about 113.5 feet upwards. Or add 113.5 to 873.56 feet-
which is 987.06 feet- leaving only 12.94 feet of pipe still in the water. And within the 1/2 second
the air in pipe will be expelled out into the water.
A conclusion one could reach is if one going to heat air to 166.5 C, then one add less than 64 ton of
liquid air. So say less than 60 tons of air added.
And instead acceleration at 1 gee for 6.84 seconds, it could be for 6 second. And addition 1 second of
acceleration at slightly less than 1 gee.
So 6 seconds is 576 feet upward, rather than 750 feet. And 7 second at almost 1 gee 784 feet.
And less than velocity of 224 feet per sec [68 m/s- 152 mph].
In all cases once bottom of pipe leaves water, one gets no more acceleration.
And this last “refinement” at 7 second point, the pressure in pipe is dropping and water isn’t pushed
down as much and is rising. Both these factors are occuring after 6 seconds, but by 7 seconds they
are amounting to something. So at/after 7 second air pressure would be less than 50 psi and water
pushed down less than 113 feet. So 784 + less than 113 feet is less than 897 feet. So more than
100 feet of water in pipe. And more than 216 pipe in the water after 7 second of accleration.
Which means one have about in additional + 3/4 of second of acceleration and + 3/4 of gee.
So one further reduce acelleration of 6 second gee, to say 5 3/4 of second and get about 2 seconds
of about average of .8 gee. And need to use less tonnage of air. And get slightly more than 150 mph.
And one can do better than 150, if one uses more than 1 gee for say first 4-5 seconds of acceleration.
Such increase in acceleration doesn’t require more tonnage of air, just quicker use of air, and bit
more kerosene/methane use [and one using a small amount fuel- roughly one heating 76 ton of air by
+ 140 C.
To heat 1 kg of air by 1 C: 1.0 kJ/kg.K
So say 70,000 kg times 150 K equals 10.5 million kilojoules.
Kerosene 46,200k kJ/kg
http://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/fuels-higher-calorific-values-d_169.html
So 227 kg of kerosene.
Tiny pipelauncher:
5 to 30 ton gross mass rocket:
30 ton: 1 gee acceleration.
8 feet diameter
250 feet long
8 feet diameter. Area 50.24 square feet
50.24 sq ft is 7234.56 square inches
1 foot length is 50.24 cubic feet. 1 cubic foot water weighs about 62 lbs:
1 foot length displaces 50.24 time 62 is 3114.88 lbs.
100 foot lenght: 311,488 lb
To push water 100 ft requires about 1 atm per 33 ft depth. So about 3 atm [14.7 * 3 is 44.1 psi]
1/8″ thick wall pipe 96″ diameter can easily withstand 45 psi.
Circumference of 8′ diameter pipe 25.12 feet.
1 foot length of pipe is 25.12 feet by 1 foot. 25.12 square feet.
1/8th inch thickness of 1 foot square requires 96 square feet to equal one cubic foot.
Or 25.12 square feet at 1/8″ is .261666 cubic feet of material
Cubic foot of aluminum Weighs= 168.5 lbs
“1 cubic foot of aluminum weighs 169.344 Lbs”
“Aluminum is about 171 pounds per cubic foot.”
Assume it’s 171 lbs. Times by .261666 is 44.75 lbs
And 250 feet weighs 44.75 times 250: 11,185.25 lbs
Cap is 50.24 square feet so 1/8″ is 44.75 lbs. 1/4 is 89.5 lb
So 1/8 wall and 1/4″ cap and 8′ diameter and 250 lenght mass is
11,185.25 + 89.5 lb. 11,274.75 lbs. [5 1/2 tons]
Without any additional mass pipelauncher floats with 3.61 feet of air in pipe and
at air pressure of 1.558 psi.
{A human with pressure of breath raise the level it floats above the water. And
would not cause it to sink by much if stood on it.}
“The density of seawater varies between 1.02 and 1.03 SGU, so a cubic foot of seawater
weighs between 63.6 and 64.3 pounds at 40 degrees F.”
“1 cubic foot of water weighs approximately 62.46 pounds.”
“density of fresh water at 20C = 0.998 g/cm³ = 998 kg/m³ = 8.33 lb/gal = 62.1 lb/ft³
density of seawater = 1.025 g/cm³ = 1025 kg/m³ = 8.55 lb/gal = 63.8 lb/ft³
1 foot length: 50.24 cubic feet times salt water at 63.6 is 3195.2 lbs
30 ton payload: 60,000 lbs + pipelauncher 11,274.75 lbs is 71,274.75 lb
71,274.75 lbs. 1 foot length: 3195 lb. 71,274 lbs divided by 3195 is 22.3 feet
71,274 divided by 7234.5 square inches is 9.85 psi
1 gee acceleration:
9.85 psi times 2 is 19.7 psi. And water depressed 44.6 feet under sea level.
9.8 m/s/s 19.7
19.6 m/s/s is 29.5 psi. and water depth of 66.9 feet.

How the atmosphere processes heat is pretty simple.
There has never: not ever: been anything about the atmosphere that stopped mankind from filling lightweight airframes with human life – as in “we’ll sue you out of existence if there’s anything major you don’t know about this and it causes a problem,” – and landing those human beings anywhere they saw fit.
Just because the people alive today can’t remember doesn’t mean the entire applied research aerospace field didn’t have a very,
very good idea, of the fundamentals of atmospheric action.
It’s a pot of fluid compounds, one of them boils off at the bottom, rises until it emits that heat, condenses and falls again. The others move around in it’s wake, along with earth’s spin imparting it’s motion.
It’s just, not nearly as complicated conceptually, as the entire Magic Gas preaching world, tried to pretend.
Then again pretense is all they had to work with.
And when you make your living
pretending refrigerants and coolant compounds bearing them: water’s the refrigerant, the cold nitrogen and oxygen are the coolant compounds bearing it to the surface of the heated target object –
are all part of “a giant heater,” because you ‘did the math’ and “it shows you that immersing a hot rock into cold, refrigerated nitrogen, made the rock get hotter than when you heated it up in vacuum” – the claim made by warm atmosphere religionists –
it’s no wonder they can’t tell which way a thermometer will go.
And that everything looks impenetrably complicated.

Well this post went chest up.
“the maximum theoretical efficiency decreases with increasing temperatures”
Um. No. Not really. Sort of? Hmmm…. No. Not really. The “maximum theoretical efficiency” decreases as the cycle becomes less square on a T-s diagram. The solution to increasing differences between Th and Tc is to increase the range of Va to Vc thus making it more square in the, again, T-s space. These sorts of problems are better worked out in T-s space or at least P-T space since dP drives V.
I didn’t have the heart to read the rest of the argument but the increasing temperature difference leads to more storm energy is a basic NS energy balance argument. Lindzen gave the best rebuttal which was to show that GWT predicts increasing polar temperatures and even tropical temperatures thus lessening the temperature difference that drives storms.

Bill from Nevada says:
December 29, 2013 at 12:31 pm
The problem is you self owned.
The whole reason for convective overturn being what it is,
is the radiative gas water: which magnifies the atmosphere’s activity.
So while telling someone ‘pwnd’ is ALWAYS elegant and sufficient,
self-pwnd is even better: and you did because he tried to tell you: the radiative gas class drives the entire thing much harder than if there were no water, being fundamentally responsible for each, individuall Hadley circulation. Each Hadley circulation’s nothing more than a “heat pipe” which is a phase change refrigerator.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
No he didn’t actually. He (Konrad) claims a HC is driven by radiative cooling aloft causing descent. It is not. Full stop. The reasons are as I state, and are incorporated in the equations that go into NWP models. By his reasoning they’d go berserk.
I also said the prime driver is convection and LH release. You have just said the same thing in another way.
“Which means the atmosphere’s nothing but a series of refrigerating Hadley cells, or in other words a series of
radiative gas driven
phase change
refrigeration cells.”
It’s far, far more than that my friend.
Get a text book on Meteorology and start at page 1.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
“This isn’t complicated it’s been known for years, a group of unethical people called ‘Green House Gas Effect” believers hijacked atmospheric science and destroyed an entire current generation’s understanding of gas energy science.”
I’m afraid it is complicate my friend, and efforts to simplify it defy belief.
Known for years? Well my professional meteorological knowledge goes back to 1974. You?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
“So I’ll call “pwnt””
If it makes you happy
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
“and consider that I helped by reminding everyone that it’s been known for years,
the Hadley cells are mini refrigeration cycles
the refrigerant being water.”
Correct in a simplistic way – but that’s not what Konrad was arguing.
I suggest after page 1 you skip to Coriolis and divergence/convergence zone entrance/exits in jet streams (vital understanding regarding the upper branch of a HC) and also the vast majority of mid/upper latitude meteorology.

I see I wrote “Hadley cells” when I shoulda written “Hadley-like cells” or “refrigeration circulation cells” but I don’t typically place a lot of importance on an occasional grammatical slip.
Those who want to get the point always do, those who desperately wish it wasn’t there, never do.

Cont
“This isn’t complicated it’s been known for years, a group of unethical people called ‘Green House Gas Effect” believers hijacked atmospheric science and destroyed an entire current generation’s understanding of gas energy science.”
I’m afraid it is complicate my friend, and efforts to simplify it defy belief.
Known for years? Well my professional meteorological knowledge goes back to 1974. You?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
“So I’ll call “pwnt””
If it makes you happy
Cont

Such as TB here with his flailing.
You can’t help willful disbelief of what’s in front of someone’s eyes. Everyone who’s ever seen a heat pipe in action knows it’s a form of phase change refrigeration,
and everyone who’s ever overviewed atmospheric circulation knows it’s a series of refrigeration cells,
and every that the Hadley, Ferrel, and Polar cells, are driven primarily by the phase change effect of water making possible circulation otherwise impossible.

Bill from Nevada says:
December 29, 2013 at 4:18 pm
Such as TB here with his flailing.
You can’t help willful disbelief of what’s in front of someone’s eyes. Everyone who’s ever seen a heat pipe in action knows it’s a form of phase change refrigeration,
and everyone who’s ever overviewed atmospheric circulation knows it’s a series of refrigeration cells,
and every that the Hadley, Ferrel, and Polar cells, are driven primarily by the phase change effect of water making possible circulation otherwise impossible.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
As I said Bill, whatever makes you happy then believe it, why not. Some people believe in fairies. It’s generally harmless.
Can I ask you what you do/did for a living?
Was it a profession. A scientific one perhaps? I have the same profession as Anthony – our host here.
Would you like to contact him directly and tell him you know more about it than him … because that’s what you have just done by inference.
Anyway whatever you do/did do. Well I know more than you. So there. Start flailing.
Like I said Meteorology is far more complicated than that. Just as a start you overlook a basic. The Earth spins my friend. And that adds a vital dynamic to things.
This will be instructive for you….
http://www.iup.uni-bremen.de/~bms/lecture_atmphys/AtmosphericPhysics_04_05_dyn.pdf

The Ferrel cells are included as part of that. Their motion’s responsible for picking up moisture that later falls out as polar and ferrel cells encounter each other and mixing causes that moisture to fall out in the snow bands around the world, where polar cell circulation and ferrel cell circulations collide.
It doesn’t take an entire book to know how the atmosphere works. It’s fluid compound of nitrogen and oxygen that are quite cold. Mixed with them is some water vapor gas which acts as phase change refrigerant.
The motion and action isn’t difficult to perceive in fact you have to be willfully trying not to. It’s a freezing cold fluid bath for a rock whose surface temperature’s a lot warmer than it is.
It’s always cooling the planet even when the sun goes down just like when you close your refrigerator, and the light that was warming it because they were close, goes off, the heat the light put into your soda is being washed off by the same cold, atmospheric mix, that washes the entire rest of the world cooler.
You don’t have the sun go down and tell yourself “Thank goodness it got dark, the dropping temperature of the nighttime air can help me stay warmer, longer.”
No matter how many Green House Gassers told you when the light goes off in your refrigerator the cold air washing over it is “helping it stay warm until the light comes back on.”
That’s not real science.
That’s Greenhouse Gas Effect believer pseudo-science.

My posts and other peoples’ aren’t appearing in sequence that’s why the conversation’s not fluid just so you, those reading, know.

A real heat engine does work external to the engine. The so called “heat engine” that is the earth climate system does not. I think therefore it is a miscalculation to call the earth’s climate system a heat engine. All the solar energy that makes it work has to leave the system so the system doesn’t heat up. Any earthly heat engine scenario is, ultimately, latency in that heat removal process meaning the earth heats up. That is the alarmist position. The earth’s climate system is certainly dynamic and moves energy around but I think it falls well short of a classic heat engine/Carnot cycle model.

If you assure me and everyone reading you don’t believe in magically, algebraically reversed cooling/heating functions then I’ll believe you.
But understanding the shape the fields of climate and meteorology, it’s incumbent on anyone coming into contact with any one of you who says you’re part of the field,
to do an assessment of just how likely you are, to be able to determine which way a thermometer would go if someone epoxies it to a sphere, illuminates it in vacuum,
the plunges into cold nitrogen/oxygen compound, bath.
If your answers are ‘No that’s impossible’ three times, you’re cleared as not having been overcome by magical wishing instead of factual thinking.

One of the early criticisms/premises originally brought up was reduced Carnot efficiency and the general murmur among the Magic Gas/Light crowd was the slowing of the conveyor, would allow heat to build up all along the way, as well as creating “super storms” in warm areas.

My link above came out like an adverisement for this book with “buy it” button, that was not my intention.
/Jan

TB says:
December 28, 2013 at 9:35 am

The Earth’s climate is an open system – with a constant input of energy from the Sun and a constant emission of that energy to space after conversion into terrestrial IR. Therefore the efficiency of the conversion does not matter.

Yes it does TB, and I think your argument is beside the point.
My point is to show that the potential for converting thermal energy to mechanical energy is reduced when both the cold element and the warm element heat equally much.
If there were no temperature differences on the Earth’s surface, and no heating, there would not be much wind either. But when temperature differences and solar heating exist, the atmosphere will start to move. A fundamental cause is that heating of a gas makes the volume to increase and therefore start a fluctuation.
But for a given temperature increase, say 10 C, the volume will increase more if you start with a low temperature than a high one.
An increase from 0 C to 10 C make the volume increase by 3.66%,
an increase from 10C to 20C make the volume increase by 3.53%
The higher the temperature is, the lower the increase in volume will be.
This reduces the potential for wind when all temperatures increase equally much. When the lowest temperatures increase more than the higher, as will be the case for the Earth’s surface, the potential will be further reduced.
/ Jan

Jan Kjetil Andersen says:
December 30, 2013 at 8:21 am
You are getting very close.
For a planet with no atmosphere both the height at which the S-B equation is satisfied and the effective radiating height are together at the surface.
Consider that conduction raises off the surface the height at which the S-B equation is satisfied.
In contrast, the radiative capability of the atmosphere raises off the surface the so-called effective radiating height.
Note that the two heights are then different.
Wind is then required to ensure that the energy at the S-B height is moved to the effective radiating height so as to maintain radiative equilibrium for the system as a whole.
You may be regarding winds as horizontal movements but in fact those horizontal movements actually enable vertical movements of energy so that gravitational potential energy (PE) at the S-B height can be shifted down to the effective radiating height and converted to kinetic energy (KE) at the effective radiating height for radiation to space.
That is what s going on.
Neat or not ?

Jan Kjetil Andersen says:
December 30, 2013 at 8:21 am
TB says:
December 28, 2013 at 9:35 am
The Earth’s climate is an open system – with a constant input of energy from the Sun and a constant emission of that energy to space after conversion into terrestrial IR. Therefore the efficiency of the conversion does not matter.
Yes it does TB, and I think your argument is beside the point.
It’s all the point Jan.
When comparing the Earth’s climate to anything – we recognise, say, that it is an orange. That being the case, we compare it to another orange, or at least a tangerine. Certainly not a banana.
What matters is that that is what comes as energy in must go out.
If it doesn’t we heat up.
The efficiency of the climate system matters not a jot (in how it uses that energy to cause weather).
As it is merely the mediator in the exchange of Solar absorbed > LWIR emitted to space.
All the inefficiencies/vagaries/cycles within weather (~30 years) do not alter the basics of Energy in must equal energy out…. Or we’re in trouble.
Weather, or your “Carnot engine” is just the internal chaos of the system, when measured at the fill up/exhaust bit of Earth (TOA) the chaos disappears. Like water boiling in a pan on a stove. Put a known amount of heat into it and it will reach boiling in a known amount of time (with known starting conditions). That is, it does not matter how the water churns around in the pan (weather) as that’s internal chaos and the end result, say 100C in 99 sec, is predictable.

TB says:
December 30, 2013 at 10:22 am

Weather, or your “Carnot engine” is just the internal chaos of the system, when measured at the fill up/exhaust bit of Earth (TOA) the chaos disappears. Like water boiling in a pan on a stove. Put a known amount of heat into it and it will reach boiling in a known amount of time (with known starting conditions). That is, it does not matter how the water churns around in the pan (weather) as that’s internal chaos and the end result, say 100C in 99 sec, is predictable

TB, when we discuss whether the Carnot theorem matters or not, it is crucial that we agree on what it may matter for. I was discussing the weather, or more specifically the wind, in this article, but you say here that the weather doesn’t matter.
As in your example above, I’m not interested in the “end result” as you call it above. It is, to use your example again, how the water churns around in the pan (weather), that I am discussing.
/ Jan

TB says:
December 30, 2013 at 12:30 pm

Fair enough Jan – but the title to this thread is “Climate as a heat engine”.
I take climate to mean, as in long term (>~30 years). Such that we eliminate weather cycles and reveal long term heating/cooling trends.

Yes, of course climate is the theme, but I am discussing the consequences for the weather in the long run when some underlying factors are changed.
A storm is a weather phenomenon, and what I am discussing is that the forces which create the storm will weaken when the temperatures increase and the differences are getting smaller. The eventual temperature increase is of cause a long time climate phenomenon.
/ Jan

Stephen Wilde says:
December 30, 2013 at 10:34 am
TB said:
“Like water boiling in a pan on a stove. Put a known amount of heat into it and it will reach boiling in a known amount of time (with known starting conditions). That is, it does not matter how the water churns around in the pan (weather) as that’s internal chaos and the end result, say 100C in 99 sec, is predictable.”
And that 100C is set by atmospheric pressure on the surface.
I contend that, similarly, atmospheric pressure determines the energy cost of evaporation and so in turn determines the energy that the oceans can hold in the long term subject to shorter term internal ocean variations.
The ultimate factor that determines the amount of energy that the earth system can hold on to from any given level of solar input is set by the density of the mass of the atmosphere.
http://www.newclimatemodel.com/the-setting-and-maintaining-of-earths-equilibrium-temperature/
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Stephen, I’ve had a scan through your paper. I don’t think you’ll be surprised that I don’t agree with it.
Quotes from same…
“That is the point at which the oceans reach an equilibrium temperature and it is that ocean
temperature which then controls the temperature of the air above and NOT the Greenhouse
Effect. The real arbiter of the Earth’s equilibrium temperature is instead what I have termed
The Hot Water Bottle Effect.”
SST’s and heat stored in the oceans certainly do affect atmospheric temperature. That is largely why we have the current “pause” – 8 years BTW – as there has been a preponderance of La Ninas.
Don’t agree with the (lack of) GHE – that is adding heat to the oceans (see below).
“Water boils away at 100 degrees C so in other words the process of evaporation removes
from the local environment (in the form of latent heat) over five times the amount of energy
required to induce that evaporation.”
No, the LH of evaporation comes from the local environment – has too. It isn’t magicked from the ether. Evaporation will extract the LH requirement from the water or air below/above, most from the warmer. So it takes away the LH from the surface and deposits it via condensation aloft. Result zero net gain/loss from the climate system.
“However over the Earth as a whole the water is
nearly always warmer than the air (due to solar input) so inevitably the average global energy
flow is from oceans to air via that latent heat of evaporation into the air and the energy
needed is taken from the water. This leads to a thin (1mm deep) layer of cooler water over the
oceans worldwide and below the evaporative region that is some 0.3C cooler than the ocean
bulk below. The evaporative process extracts energy faster from the oceans than it can be
drawn up from below and added from above otherwise that cool layer could not be present.
That 1mm deep 0.3 cooler layer is a critical diagnostic indicator but as far as I can tell it has
never been recognised as such. It is disturbed by diurnal and seasonal variations and by
changes in wind speed but on average over time it is a permanent fixed feature of our ocean
surfaces.”
You are thinking entirely radiatively here Stephen. You mention conduction (not quoted) in passing, but it plays a much larger part than you give it credit for. Yes, there is surface evaporation but as the surface skin is cooled via LH evap then so the temp differential between ocean skin and air is reduced. (as you say by ~0.3C). Ergo the conductive part of the equation is reduced. So letting less heat through from the more turbulent mixed layers below to heat the atmosphere in contact with the ocean. In effect a small warming blanket is created by the evaporating skin to the water below
http://www.realclimate.org/images/Minnett_2.gif
Stephen, across the 71% of the Earth’s surface that is ocean/water the surface pressure will average the same at any given moment or at least over the course of a short period of time. Therefore any atmospheric effect on evaporation will cancel out, and anyway an insulation effect will take over.
Also ARGO float data show ocean temps rising at many (even abyssal) levels – so where is the rise coming from if you theory is correct?
“Many are pointing out that the feedback from more energy in the air seems to be negative
(more convection, rainfall and clouds in particular) rather than positive and the observed
climate shifts over the past ten years (more atmospheric ‘blocking’ events causing the surface
pressure systems to shift around more and producing more meridional/equatorward jet
streams) seem to be confirming that view since the temperature trend is increasingly
diverging from that expected from more CO2 emissions.”
I’m sorry, I don’t agree that –ve feedbacks dominate over +ve.
Lets look at it logically…
Earth varies between nice and comfortable temps inter-glacially to ice age conditions (via changes in orbital characteristics).
If feed-backs where largely –ve how would we ever get out of an IA?
You are saying that rising temps lead to falling temps or at least a regulation of them.
So in an IA what will amplify ocean then air temps if the feed-backs weren’t mainly +ve. We know they have flipped quickly and CO2 has tracked them mirror-like. You do accept CO2 is a GHG? Therefore amplifying temp rise. Descent into an IA is explainable even with -ve feed-backs – just via increased albedo, but how do we get out of an IA with –ve ones? At least as quickly as evidence shows?
Yes, I agree that we are seeing more meridional flow, but why should that alter temperature trends since if cold air flows away from the Arctic (say) then the Arctic must warm relative to when it kept that cold air. Similarly a meridional flow induces warm air north to balance the equation in a hemispheric sense.
Also why would it give more cloud? Colder air is drier, so as that moves south over warmer temps in winter its convective cloud infill will be minimal/zero over land giving a net cooling anomaly. Over sea broken convective infill, therefore net warming anomaly. Warm air moving N in winter will produce low cloud via cooling/condensing, hence net warming anomaly over both land/ocean. In summer cold air moving S will be highly convective over sea (net cooling anomaly) but dry with limited convective infill still over land giving a net warming anomaly. Warm air moving north in summer tending to cool/condense over ocean giving net surface cooling, balanced by net warming over land. So I see no net feedback either way. (NB in all of the above I speak as of radiative balance NOT temp levels).

TB,
I am grateful to you for the time you spent reading my article and I note your comments.
I could deal with each point in detail but do not wish to derail this thread.
I think you would have an uphill struggle convincing anyone that the system response to a change in internal forcing elements is not negative.

TB has apparently failed to see what I asked him so I’m re-posting it so everyone can be sure TB has had the opportunity to defend his religion. I knew as soon as I saw him trying to deny the effect of water on shaping global circulation he was going to be saying crazy things so I went over to another thread that’s current now and sure enough, he’s denying science: denying it hasn’t warmed for 17 years, when everybody else on earth but apparently him, Trenberth and Mike Mann don’t know that.
Here’s the re-post:
TB my post from some time back got lost and I see you’re very concerned about being viewed as competent to understand a hot rock,
in a stream of cold nitrogen and oxygen.
You’ve already expressed surprise anyone else knows the atmosphere’s a cold nitrogen/oxygen bath refrigerated by sets of global convection cells exploiting phase change refrigerating action of water.
How in the world you can claim you’ve been around atmospheric energy since 1974 and not have heard that I find that not unusual: I find it just plain bizarre.
I’m not in the field of meteorology.
The reputation of my field is fully intact and unruined by scandalous revelation even the top professionals can’t read a thermometer.
I’m an Electronic Engineer. Specifically the area called Radiation Communications and Controls.
Whenever someone identifies themselves me as part of the field
whose foundations have been rocked by revelations many so called professionals and ‘scientists’
believe in glaringly unreal impossibilities,
I think you should know the fact you admit you’re a meteorologist and yet seem to be so perplexed leads me to think I should just ask you straight out, if you believe in the tenets of Green House Gas Effect ‘warm atmosphere’ pseudo-science.
If you don’t fine but if you do, then you’re going to have to tell others your stories about the magic heater because I’m not going to listen to it.
(1)As a professional claiming understanding of the science of atmospheric energy do you believe possible the illumination of a sphere, spinning in vacuum until it’s temp is stable, being immersed into a cold nitrogen/oxygen bath, causing every heat sensor on the sphere surface showing temperature increase?
Because in the real world: in real science like I practice – that’s impossible and no other field even claims it to be anything but prepostrous. Nevertheless many in climatology/meteorology have been seen saying,
they believe in a magical frigid nitrogen oxygen bath, which makes objects hotter than if they weren’t placed into a frigid bath at all, and hotter even than if they were kept heated, in vacuum.
If you answer yes to this critical question you need to know, your answers had better sound good because you’re immediately in the perpetuum mobim realm.
(2)Do you believe it possible to heat a sphere in vacuum then suspend reflective media (H2O/CO2) between sphere and illumination source, reflecting away 20% energy in, causing sensors on the sphere surface to show more energy to them,
than when there was more energy to them?
Again: an answer of yes immediately marks you as one whose conversation will not make sense if you try to refer to such magical glitterings.
(3)Do you believe it possible to heat a sphere in vacuum then suspend more reflective media
(H2O/CO2) than before such that 25% energy in is reflected away,
raising outputs of energy sensors yet again, so they show more energy in at 75%
than when there was more energy in at 80%?
This one’s an extension of the second but if you believe possible one you believe the other.
=======
In real scientific fields like mine no one believes in this junk; in fact just one “Yes I do!” answer immediately marks you as unable to fully comprehend the chain of events that occur when someone places a rock heated in vacuum, into a stream of cold nitrogen/oxygen compound.
I’ve got a sneaking suspicion you believe in all the above. If that’s not true then by all means let me know but I’ve got a feeling you’re going to be just changing the subject to anything but what I want to talk about.
Whether or not you really grasp what the atmosphere operates as.

Stephen Wilde says:
December 30, 2013 at 3:14 pm

I’d be interested to hear Jan’s take on my posts at 8.56 am and 9.36 am which appear to support his thesis but place it in a broader context.

I have read through both your postings and your paper Stephen. You take up big questions here, and many of your explanations are good and logical, but I am sorry to say that I have many objections to it.
But since it is such a big discussion to go into, I think I will leave here. Perhaps we can take it up in another thread.
Regards
/ Jan

Bill from Nevada says:
December 30, 2013 at 3:25 pm
You feel free to go get whoever you think you have to have near you so you feel safe TB.
Then answer the questions.
Excuse me??

TB says: “What is you don’t/can’t understand about Coriolis/convergence aloft INEVITABLY causing divergence below. That all the world’s Met organisations incorporate into NWP models?”
Changing the subject from me catching you claiming the geometries, velocities, volumes of air handling in the lower troposphere aren’t associated with the energy handling and release of water isn’t going to make time go back and you be right.

Claiming putting insulation between the heat of an illumination source and a rock, makes more heat come out of the rock, is what you’ve been seen trying to do, and it’s absurdity on it’s face.
The fact is you’re here to declare to the world you know of an insulation that reduces energy in, yet makes the object it sits blocking energy to, act as if more energy arrived on it.
That’s just impossible no matter how many climatologists said they did it, and it’s why the pseudo science called warm atmosphere doesn’t stand up to even the most cursory inspection.
“Incorrect appreciation of the GHE. GHG’s absorb IR from the Earth’s surface then re-emit it, some of it making it back to the surface again – thus SLOWING the rate of cooling and NOT heating it.”

Konrad said:
“So what’s so special about the tropopause? That’s where the atmosphere runs out of the most important radiative gas on our planet, H2O.”
It runs out of H2O because at that height the vapour has all condensed out but that isn’t why there is a reversal of the lapse rate.
The warming from tropopause upwards is due to the presence of ozone interacting directly with incoming solar radiation.
One could argue that the ozone layer is the most important radiative gas on our planet.
The observed lapse rate is a distortion of the ideal lapse rate set by mass and gravity but if an atmosphere is to be retained then all the varied observed lapse rates have to net out to the ideal lapse rate between surface and space.
I find it strange to be arguing with fellow sceptics that radiative gases are not needed for a fully convective atmosphere.
The advantage of such a position is that if one can involve the entire atmospheric mass in the warming of the surface above the S-B prediction then radiative considerations become too small to matter.
Radiative characteristics do not create the lapse rate. They simply distort the lapse rate away from the ideal lapse rate set by mass and gravity. Then that effect has to be negated elsewhere in the system and that is achieved by circulation changes.
Radiative gases simply raise the effective radiating height off the ground. In their absence the ground is the effective radiating height.
The more radiative the atmosphere the higher the effective radiating height goes and if the atmosphere were 100% radiative then the effective radiating level would simply be at the top of the atmosphere but if that could happen the atmosphere would just collapse back to the ground again because no energy would be left over for conduction.
Conduction raises the S-B height.
Radiative characteristics raise the effective radiating height.
When the two are at different levels then stability is maintained by convection shifting energy from the S-B level to the effective radiating level.to maintain overall radiative balance.

Stephen Wilde says:
December 31, 2013 at 8:12 am
———————————————
The most important thing I should say here is –
Never apply SB equations in isolation to a moving gas atmosphere over a liquid ocean. Never.
For fluid columns in a gravity field the height of energy entry and exit is critical to determining the average temperature of the fluid. This is the science of conduction and fluid dynamics. This is what is missing from the “basic physics” of the “settled science”. This is what SB equations can’t deliver.
Both the atmosphere and oceans are fluid columns in a gravity field. If any of your modelling is based on trying to simplify the land/ocean/atmosphere system to a single SB radiating level, then it will fail because you have not modelled non-radiative transports correctly.
The planet can be in radiative equilibrium, yet can have very different atmospheric temperatures depending on both the radiative and non-radiative transports within the land/ocean/atmosphere system.
And now onto the to lapse rate below the tropopause.
The observed lapse rate below the tropopause is not the product of mass and gravity alone. Atmospheric mass and gravity simply generate the atmospheric pressure gradient. It requires continued vertical circulation across this pressure gradient to generate the observed tropospheric lapse rate. And this vertical circulation must be strong enough to overcome the speed of gas conduction.
Without this vertical circulation, gas conduction would send the bulk of the atmosphere isothermal. That alone would mean that the bulk of the atmosphere would be far hotter than present.
For an atmosphere maintaining a reasonably stable temperature, yet exhibiting strong vertical convective circulation, energy must be exiting the atmosphere at a higher altitude than it is entering the atmosphere. Energy enters our atmosphere at low altitude via surface conduction, release of latent heat and intercepted radiation. There is only one way it exits at high altitude, radiative gases emitting IR to space.
Claiming that surface conduction could match the cooling power of radiative gases simply won’t work. Empirical experiment shows that the surface is virtually powerless at conductively cooling the atmosphere. The whole pole-wise energy flow being the sole driver of circulation thing won’t work. It is resisted by surface friction and gas conduction. The currently observed pole-wise energy flow is only made possible by the Hadley, Ferrel and Polar cells being maintained by radiative cooling at altitude.
You state –
“I find it strange to be arguing with fellow sceptics that radiative gases are not needed for a fully convective atmosphere.”
And I find it most strange that you would be insisting that radiative energy loss and buoyancy loss at altitude does not have a critical role in Rayleigh Bernard circulation below the tropopause.
You can ignore the evidence that strong vertical circulation is only exhibited in the strongly radiative region of our atmosphere.
You cannot ignore the evidence that after 1990, climate pseudo scientists suddenly swapped from radiative only two shell models to radiative-convective models and attempted to write radiative cooling and subsidence out of atmospheric circulation.
They had to do this. Any critical role for radiative gases in governing the speed of tropospheric vertical circulation utterly invalidates not just AGW, but its very foundation, the radiative greenhouse effect hypothesis itself.
The good news is that the Internet remembers all. The climate “scientists” can never erase their crimes against science, reason, freedom and democracy. They have left a trail of “climate science” behind them that would fertilise the Simpson Desert.
Stephen, examine that trail. (Don’t attempt anything without the gloves). Sceptics now know that any attempt to generate a “hockey stick” from proxy data will be BS. Karoly and Gergis lasted only a few hours on the Net before implosion, withdrawal of the paper and a lifetime of burning shame (three years and $300,000 of taxpayer dollars vaporised in an instant). After McIntyre vs. Mann you know where to look. The same is true of radiative-convective modelling. If you know they are lying, you know where to look. You will find as I have done, it wasn’t a “mistake”, they knew they were lying.

Konrad says:
January 1, 2014 at 2:07 am
TB says:
December 31, 2013 at 9:26 am
——————————————–
“Konrad: the lab experiments, empirical mathematics and direct radiative/spectroscopic observation of the atmosphere via both ground based and orbital instruments over the course of the last ~150 yrs, trumps “the Internet” I’m afraid”
No, nothing you try will trump the Internet. I have used the Internet to demonstrate through repeatable experiment that incident LWIR cannot heat nor slow the cooling rate of liquid water that is free to evaporatively cool.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Look I realise of course that you are not for moving – no matter.
So, we have a history of study/experiment/mathematical modelling – restudy – remodelling. Then into the satellite era we have more observation from space. We have spectroscopic analysis from ground based instruments etc etc. That show CO2’s effect as a GHG.
BUT the internet trumps it. I suggest it depends on which bit of the internet you are reading. Do you use Google Scholar?
“CAGW depends on DWLWIR slowing the cooling of the oceans. I have proved that to be physically impossible.”
Did you not understand the concept of the ocean being a body of water? That is merely covered with a cooler skin that is evaporating. So then, at what point is it not possible to heat water via IR radiation – given that it is heat energy? Would you not think that this evaporation cooling effect would reach an optimum? That no more skin cooling could occur? Surely you are not suggesting that any amount of IR impinging on the surface will only result in cooling of the entire body. Are you saying that only SW heats water?
Sorry that is scientifically not so.
Also, are you not aware that the transport of heat from ocean and air passes through that skin via conduction/convection too? Do you not know that this is optimum when the hot surface is hottest? And that this skin cooling will go against that? Thereby REDUCING thermal contrast and keeping the turbulent waters below the skin WARMER than otherwise.
No it is entirely possible. In fact it happens, has to.
“I challenged you to produce just one simple lab experiment, that other readers could replicate, that shows incident LWIR heating or slowing the cooling rate of liquid water that is free to evaporatively cool.”
Your lab experiment does model the Earth and nor does it trump thousands of other experiments done over the last 150 yrs.
“Just one experiment.”
This is the same misconceived concept some have of the GHE. Ie some think you can’t warm an object with a colder one. Of course that’s NOT how the GHE works. It’s like a storage tank whereby there is an outflow and an inflow. The inflow (back-IR) is small and the outflow is large (given radiative cooling dominating). Now the outflow will still occur, but the pressure built in the tank will build and the outflow pressure increase. Ie there is a flux of heat stored in the tank (ground) that always wants to get out – sometimes it’s mostly in (inflow exceeds outflow) sometimes it’s out (outflow more than inflow). But the outflow can be slowed, by a small inflow. On land this in/out point manifests this reduced outflow by a temp rise.
Same with evaporative cooling – only in reverse. At some point the evaporation is at a maximum, yes? Must be, otherwise it would keep cooling forever (given the vast source of water available). So, obviously not. Then what happens to the energy in excess of that needed to evaporate that water?
We cannot have a steady state, something must happen. Logically the surface skin would cool so far and then, if it cannot maintain that cooling via LH uptake – it will warm, and eventually boil. Before it boils it will warm the water beneath by conduction.
Now of course this DOES NOT happen (in the oceans). But do you see the logic? It’s the same illogic that is applied by some who say there can be no GHE because you can’t warm an object by a colder one. That is not what happens. At what point does this drip, drip of back-radiated IR photons go over that optimum point and the cooling tips to warming. IR energy must heat water. It cannot always cool it. It’s a matter of the evaporative process balancing against the radiative sensible heating effect via conduction from below. The IR back radiating occurs during the day as well, when evaporation will be at a max.
The primary way that evaporation WARMS a body of water (when the air is colder than the water) is by the reduction of the thermal gradient at the ocean/air interface. Cooler skin means less conducted, and hence the body of water below the skin has a “warming blanket” over it, analogous to the GHE “blanket”. It’s about relative flows of energy.
“Current and future readers can see you can’t do it.”
I know you’re right in that in the main, I realise I’m in the minority on this forum – however it is fundamentally about debate. And some may take what I say on-board and go off and investigate “whatever” more deeply. That’s all I try to do. I have professional knowledge gained via man’s sum total of Meteorological investigation (not good on the curly d’s and Dels though) and further, I’ve spent many a long, lonely shift (day & night) observing weather and passing on information/forecasts to, eg, aircrew and operations for road ice management. I know as well as anyone can how it works. Sorry it’s just the way things work. Now, Anthony may have had a different career path than me, I don’t know, but I’m sure the physical processes at play in the atmosphere are well known to him. He disagrees on the degree of warming attributable to the GHE, which is fine. But he does not disagree with the fundamental processes and laws of thermodynamics.
“You fail. Now and forever.”
If you want to think that – it is of no matter.
“That’s how the Internet works.”
The Internet is a fantastic resource of knowledge – the greatest in the history of mankind. But one has to use it correctly. There is always 2 sides to the argument. Look for the other-side occasionally – that’s what I’m doing here in fact (It may surprise you to know that I’ve learned some stuff by doing so). This by arguments raising questions in my mind and me (being who I am) going off and investigating/learning from that question. You see it all depends how you use it.
Regards anyway Konrad and a Happy new year.