With the possibility of the coldest Super Bowl ever coming this week, this story about CO2 concentration seemed appropriate.
Ryan Scott Welch writes:
Anthony as you know, many people don’t know much about the earth’s atmosphere. For example, when questioned about how much CO2 is in our atmosphere most people give me a guess of somewhere between 30% and 70%. When I tell them that CO2 is only 0.04% or really about 395 ppm (parts per million) they generally look at me as if I was speaking some kind of foreign language. The layman simply cannot convert 0.04% of the atmosphere or 395 ppm into anything they can picture or relate to. In searching for some way to help the layman to understand the earth’s atmosphere, CO2, and the human contribution to atmospheric CO2, I came upon the idea of relating a sample of the atmosphere to something that nearly every person has seen, a football stadium.
So, instead of talking about ppm atmosphere, I talk about seats in a stadium. I put together a presentation using football stadium analogy and it goes something like this.
How much atmospheric CO2 is from human activity? If a football stadium represented a sample of our atmosphere, how many seats would be human caused CO2? The Dallas Cowboys Stadium seats 100,000 for special events.
Each seat represents one molecule of gas in our atmosphere.
Nitrogen is 78% of the atmosphere, Oxygen is 21%, and Argon is 0.9% giving you a total of 99.9% of the atmosphere.
So, where is the CO2? CO2 is a trace gas that is only 0.04% of the atmosphere which in this sample = 40 seats.
But of the 40 seats, or parts per 100,000 of CO2 in the atmosphere, 25 were already in the atmosphere before humans relied on hydrocarbon fuels (coal, gas and oil) leaving 15 seats.
And since humans only contribute 3% of all CO2 emitted into the atmosphere each year (97% is from nature), the human contribution is 3% of the 15 remaining seats in our sample. 3% of 15 is 0.45.
So in our stadium sample of 100,000 seats the human contribution of CO2 is less than half of one seat. That is less than one half of one seat from 100,000 seats in a Dallas Stadium sized sample of our atmosphere is human caused CO2.
[NOTE: per Dr. Robert Brown’s comment pointing out an oversight, this half-seat visualization analogy is on a PER YEAR basis, not a total basis – Anthony]
Here is my presentation uploaded on slideshare.net
http://www.slideshare.net/ryanswelch/how-much-atmospheric-co2-is-from-human-activity-23514995
REFERENCES:
Mauna Loa CO2 data: ftp://aftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/products/trends/co2/co2_mm_mlo.txt
Wigley, T.M.L., 1983 “The pre-industrial carbon dioxide level.” Climatic Change 5, 315-320 (lowest value of 250 ppm used)
Increasing Atmospheric CO2: Manmade…or Natural? January 21st, 2009 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D. http://www.drroyspencer.com/2009/01/increasing-atmospheric-co2-manmade%E2%80%A6or-natural/
Water Vapor Rules the Greenhouse System, Geocraft, http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/greenhouse_data.html
The Carbon Cycle, the Ocean, and the Iron Hypothesis, Figure based on Sabine et al 2004, Texas A&M University http://oceanworld.tamu.edu/resources/oceanography-book/carboncycle.htm
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Floyd Doughty says:
January 29, 2014 at 1:17 pm
Who cares how much there is of something? The question is, what can it do?
If the weight of your possessions is represented by $100, the weight of your gold ring is less than four pennies … but THAT DOESN’T MEAN IT IS WORTH FOUR PENNIES!
Here’s the thing, Floyd The amount of a substance doesn’t matter. The effect of the substance is what we are trying to figure out, and for that, the absolute amount doesn’t help us in the slightest, Small things can have big effects, and vice versa.
w.
The Pompous Git says:
January 29, 2014 at 10:25 am
Git, you should know better than to post something controversial like that without a citation. I take no position on the question. However, I do find this, which says absolutely no increase in life expectancy from very low doses of arsenic in rats, only a slight (non-significant) decrease … however, it did find a decrease in the lifespan of mice fed arsenic.
So … you feelin’ lucky?
w.
Mike Jonas:
Your post provides the same response as Ferdinand; i.e.
the rise in atmospheric CO2 is anthropogenic because I say so.
I accept the empirical data and there is no data – none, zilch, nada – which provides a clear indication that you are right or you are wrong.
But there is very clear evidence that the rise is NOT accumulation of part of the anthropogenic emission which is what your ‘mass balance’ argument assumes and I refuted. This is the dynamics of the seasonal cycle, and I explained this with a link in this thread here so you can see for yourself.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
January 29, 2014 at 3:01 pm
But there is very clear evidence that the rise is NOT accumulation of part of the anthropogenic emission which is what your ‘mass balance’ argument assumes and I refuted.
Come on Richard, the decline in 13C/12C ratio is 1/3rd of what can be expected if all human emissions remained in the atmosphere. As the main other source or sink of low 13C is the biosphere and that is a proven sink for preferably 12CO2, the only cause of the 13C/12C ratio decline are the human emissions.
Thus at least 1/3rd of all human emissions remain in the atmosphere. As the increase of CO2 is about halve the mass of the emissions, 66% of the increase is directly from human emissions, despite the dilution caused by the CO2 exchanges with other reservoirs.
Including the 40 GtC/year exchanges with the deep oceans, the real contribution by humans is over 90% and less than 10% is caused by the temperature increase over the past 160 years.
I really can’t be of that much help here but I do recall a presentation by Dr. Salby that seemed to address the carbon ratio and it seemed to refute the idea that the decline in the ratio was due to human activity.
I am just sincerely trying to help. I am still learning from all these posts but I do read much of this and I do recall it being addressed by Dr. Salby. I can only hope this will help.
@ur momisugly Willis Eschenbach, Jan. 29, 2014
That wasn’t my point, Willis. I would never argue that it is strictly the amount of a substance that causes an observed effect. That would be an insane argument, and I am not insane (though other geophysicists who know me might disagree). The effect of a substance is obviously a function of its physical and chemical nature AS WELL AS the quantity of the substance available to react. I thought the main point of the article was simply a suggestion regarding how to describe very low concentrations to laymen, to help improve understanding. I was merely suggesting two different analogies.
But, now that you bring it up, I wonder, indeed, if the total number of CO2 molecules in the earth’s atmosphere would be capable of absorbing and re-radiating enough energy in the CO2 infra-red absorption wavelengths to sufficiently raise the surface temperature to a level that water vapor in the atmosphere is actually increased through evaporation to cause, in turn, the global temperature increases that are predicted by the warmists. Sorry for the run-on sentence. Of course, we are talking only of the small amount of infra-red energy at the CO2 absorption wavelengths that remain after the original atmospheric water vapor – especially over the oceans – is finished having it’s way with the available radiation within the CO2 absorption bands. I suspect that the effect of an additional 400 ppm of CO2, or so, on the temperature of the troposphere might be analogous to one spreading a few tons of magnesium chloride on a glacier in order to melt it. One of these days when I have time, I should do the analysis to find out.
Well wishes to you,
Floyd
richardscourtney – The original question was “How could a human contribution of 3% of the yearly CO2 output become 54% of the increase?“. NB. “How could”, not “How does”. I answered that question. I happen to think that it is a likely answer to the “How does” question, and I have examined evidence and done calculations which led to that thinking, and am trying to get them published. In the meantime maybe we can just agree to disagree.
I looked at the link you provided, and if I’m reading it correctly, it addresses only the seasonal changes. The original question, while referring to the seasonal changes, was addressed at multi-annual changes. Here, Ferdinand and I come at it from different angles, but with similar conclusions. And no, I don’t assume “that the anthropogenic emission is the only – or by far the most significant – variation to the inputs and outputs“, I look at all the inputs and outputs that I can find or think of.
RE: ” I came upon the idea of relating a sample of the atmosphere to something that nearly every person has seen, a football stadium”
BS.
That idea has been propounded by others in this and other blogs & elsewhere–though usually using Michigan’s “Big House” stadium. And usually by those presenting it “tongue-in-cheek” or ou of woeful ignorance.
Further, the analogy is fundamentally flawed in any practical application:
Implicit, and wrongly implicit, in the analogy is that all of the 100,000 molecules represented by game attendees are the same size — they are not! The differences are huge and their effect on the energy (e.g. Infrared) passing thru is dramatic.
The Stadium analogy presents a grossly fictitious impression: a human-eye-view of the attendees yields the impression that any handful of CO2, as represented by 40-some attendees, has imperceptible effect on anything. However, in a real-world sample space defined by 100,000 molecules of ‘air’ those 40-some carbon-dioxide molecules have a distinct and significant effect on the transit, or blockage, of infrared energy; especially thru an air mass as thick as it is in reality (i.e. thru a series of thousands of attendees representing thousands of stadiums).
To present this stadium analogy as an original thought is hard to believe (though it is possible the author had this as an independent, but parallel & not “original,” idea).
To present the stadium analogy as if it had any real relevance to any real-world process is ignorant or deceptive. Clearly, there is no “critical thinking” moderating the postings on this website, otherwise this would have been presented with the proper caveats. This was an almost childish posting…presumably because the conclusion was appealing it was mindlessly accepted?
One can search for Burt Rutan’s analysis and learn the same thing — that human-generated CO2 is a fraction of the total — and much more information — and in proper context (such as here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/01/03/aviation-pioneer-and-master-engineer-burt-rutan-on-global-warming/).
Floyd Doughty says:
January 29, 2014 at 3:31 pm
Thanks, Floyd, that’s interesting.
I had a whole different take. I thought he was describing how low the human annual contribution is to show that humans couldn’t be making more than a trivial difference … which is why I objected to the simile.
w.
Willis Eschenbach is wrong about the point of this presentation and/or my possible motive, which is unfortunate because I am a huge fan of his writings and his shine has been tarnished in my mind. My point, as I have repeatedly stated was to demonstrate the ratio of CO2 in the atmopshere compared to the rest of the other atmospheric gasses, and then to show what I believed to be the human contribution.
When I posted this article I did have questions as to the amount of human contribution, but in spite of Ferdinand Engelbeen’s best efforts I feel better about this presentation now than I did when I posted it, being that he has not convincingly proved that the earth’s increse in CO2 is primarity human and not other natural processes like oceanic outgassing from a warming world.
Thank you all who have defended me and my motives! Adios!!
Ryan Scott Welch says:
January 29, 2014 at 5:05 pm
Thanks for that, Ryan, but that doesn’t answer the question. You say that your point was to show “what show what I believed to be the human contribution.” And I agree with that.
But WHY did you want to show how tiny the human contribution was? I said that it appears that you went through the whole exercise to show why you think humans make little difference to the climate … if I’m wrong (and I certainly may be), then why did you go through the whole exercise?
That seems … well, kinda rash, given all of the evidence. Ferdinand did his best and has my thanks, but there is a lot of evidence that the rise in CO2 is from humans. You might start with my post on the subject here where I discuss some of the issues and questions …
Ryan, the fact that your motives were brought into play at all is a measure of how poorly the piece was written. Since you didn’t make your point clear about WHY we should follow your metaphor, or what it might show us, people were left to speculate about your motives for telling the story. Me, I hate doing that, motive is not something I like discussing … but when you tell an allegorical story with no motive we’re left with “why did he tell us that?
As to whether people are defending your motives, or defending you … that’s not the point, that’s not the issue, and that’s not what happens here. Either your science is worth defending or it isn’t, regardless of you and your motives. In this case, since you entirely left out any analysis of the cumulative effect of the human contribution in a quasi-equilibrium situation, your science isn’t worth defending …
My best to you,
w.
PS—I do love folks like you who say that they’re a big fan of mine … until I disagree with their scientific claims.
Then, instead of entertaining the possibility that their claims might be wrong, far too often their conclusion is that somehow I’ve lost my shine, that I’m not as smart as they thought I was …
I assure you, Ryan, I’m no dumber now than when you thought I was smart.
Willis Eschenbach says:
January 29, 2014 at 2:46 pm
“….
Here’s the thing, Floyd The amount of a substance doesn’t matter. The effect of the substance is what we are trying to figure out, and for that, the absolute amount doesn’t help us in the slightest, Small things can have big effects, and vice versa.
….”
No Willis you are wrong.
The amount of substance does matter.
You can’;t get 100 pounds of sh*t out of a 10 pound sack.
Though a lot of people try to get 100 pounds of sh*t into a 10 pound sack.
A CO2 or methane molecule can only re-emitt so much energy.
Ken Jan 29 3:56pm – When you say “a human-eye-view of the attendees yields the impression that any handful of CO2, as represented by 40-some attendees, has imperceptible effect on anything“, that idea is yours and yours alone. The writer never touched on that idea. As he has confirmed in a more recent comment Jan 29 5:05pm.
Willis, the only reason that it seems to you that the human concentration of atmospheric CO2 in my presentation is tiny is because I used a sample of 100,000 instead of the normative 1,000,000 and as I said repeatedly before I used a football stadium as an example because it is something people who I live around and talk to here in Texas (where American football is king) are all very familiar with. Nearly everyone I know can easily picture a football stadium, and can picture a 40 seat section, thus the example choice.
Now you can disagree with my number for the human contribution and as I am obviously not a climate scientist, nor an expert on atmospheric gas, and there is every possibility of me being wrong. But I do read, and generally can comprehend what I read, and have since 2008 read wattsupwiththat.com nearly daily, so I am not completely ignorant, and this presentation was based on my understanding.
Now you accuse me of purposefully misrepresenting our atmosphere and nothing could be further from the truth. I gave, in my mind, a very generous amount of human contribution to CO2. I could have, for example, said that the starting atmospheric CO2 amount was 290 ppm as many scientists believe instead of the 250 I used in my presentation. I could have also figured that the human contribution of atmospheric CO2 started out as 0.001% in 1850 and rose to the 3% we see today, which in my mind is more likely that a straight 3-4% human contribution of CO2 every year since 1850, but I did not.
Thus I never knowingly attempted to deceive or mislead anyone as you allude that I have, and so Willis, you are wrong.
Ryan Scott Welch – Your analogy is excellent, and as far as I can tell you have correctly interpreted the figures you are working from in order to work them into the analogy. I think it is an excellent analogy, and one that nearly everyone will understand. I happen to think that one of the figures you are working from is not in fact correct, but that is a separate matter which has been debated at some length in the comments, and anyway you are completely open about the figures so everyone can see for themselves where they come from. I am very disappointed in the commenters who unjustifiably accuse you of their own interpretation of your analysis (that the number is so small that we can ignore it). I suppose it’s a case of ‘welcome to the insane world of climate science’. Hopefully it won’t put you off contributing again one day.
Willis Eschenbach said @ur momisugly January 29, 2014 at 2:59 pm
Found this:
From that, I might have had it arse-about. From the above, a deficiency of arsenic reduces lifespan in rats. OTOH I may have recalled a study in which the rats were deficient in arsenic and so responded positively.
Paper here: http://toxsci.oxfordjournals.org/content/123/2/305.full
Also worthy quoting:
Unfortunately the eBook is $69.99 so I’m not springing for that. You can find it here: http://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1007/978-4-431-68120-5_48
My interest in this area stems from being invited to present a poster on cadmium contamination of sheep offal to a nutritionists’ conference in Hobart back in the 1990s. The papers from that conference are long gone.
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
I note your post at January 29, 2014 at 3:26 pm and others will note that you made it earlier and I refuted it upthread here
Richard
I Like to use this analogy take a stack of 100 pennies now take 1 penny and slice it into 10 slices through the edge, now take 1 slice and slice that one in 1/2 and the amount % of co2 is still a little less than that tiny slice
Mike Jonas:
Your post at January 29, 2014 at 3:39 pm begins saying
No. My disagreement is of no value. The data says you are wrong, and that is important.
As you say, the question was “How could?” Well, of course, fairies “could” have done it, but if the answer is bounded by reality as indicated by empirical data then your answer cannot be right.
As I explained, the dynamics of the sequestration demonstrate that your answer is WRONG. It does not apply to only the seasonal variation: it is an indication of the seasonal cycle.
The sinks for CO2 are not saturating and, therefore, the rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration is NOT CO2 accumulating in the atmosphere because the sinks cannot sequester it (they can).
Sorry if your paper fails to consider this data, but I do.
Richard
charplum says:
January 29, 2014 at 4:39 pm
I really can’t be of that much help here but I do recall a presentation by Dr. Salby that seemed to address the carbon ratio and it seemed to refute the idea that the decline in the ratio was due to human activity.
Dr. Salby did look at the possibility that the biosphere may be the cause of the decline in 13C/12C ratio. That may be, as when CO2 is captured by plants, the biological preference is for 12CO2 over 13CO2. That makes that in plants and all their users (microbes, insects, animals), there is less 13CO2 than 12CO2 than in the atmosphere. When plants are decaying (a lot of leaves in fall, more from stems and wood over the years) or eaten, CO2 is formed and released that contains less 13CO2 than what is found in the atmosphere.
The 13C/12C ratio is expressed in per mil, based on a standard (in earlier days Pee Dee Belmnite, a carbonate mineral, now a theoretical standard, agreed in Vienna – VPDB). The formula is:
(13C/12C)sampled – (13C/12C)standard
——————————––––––––––––––– x 1.000
(13C/12C)standard
The atmosphere was pre-industrial at -6.4 per mil over the Holocene, rapidely declining since ~1850 and is now below – 8 per mil.
Different biological processes give different discrimination levels for 13C vs. 12C
C3 plants (most trees and lots of small vegetation) are around -24 per mil
C4 plants (some grasses, corn,…) are around -15 per mil
Fossil fuels like coal were once C3 plants thus are also around -24 per mil
Others like oil and especially natural gas can go down to -40 per mil and even (much) lower…
The problem, as Dr. Salby said, is that it is impossible to distinguish between releases from fossil fuels and CO2 releases from decaying or eaten plant food.
But there is a solution: fossil fuel use is quite accurately known, because of taxes on sales, even maybe underestimated (because of the human nature to avoid taxes…). The oxygen use by burning fossil fuels can be calculated and the oxygen decline in the atmosphere is measured since ~1990. That revealed that slightly less oxygen was used than calculated from fossil fuel use.
Thus the whole biosphere is a net producer of oxygen since at least 1990, that shows that more CO2 is absorbed by plants that is used to destroy the plants, no matter in what way. The earth is greening…
But as more CO2 is taken by the biosphere than released, that is preferentially more 12CO2 than 13CO2, thus leaving relative more 13CO2 behind in the atmosphere.
That excludes the biosphere as the source of the 13CO2 decline in the atmosphere…
Thus Dr. Salby is wrong on this point. See for details:
http://www.bowdoin.edu/~mbattle/papers_posters_and_talks/BenderGBC2005.pdf
Almost all other sources of CO2 (oceans, volcanoes, rock weathering,…) are too high in 13C/12C ratio, thus any huge release of these sources would INcrease the 13C/12C ratio, not the firm DEcrease we see in the atmosphere… Thus forget the oceans as the main source of the increase…
richardscourtney says:
January 30, 2014 at 12:29 am
The sinks for CO2 are not saturating and, therefore, the rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration is NOT CO2 accumulating in the atmosphere because the sinks cannot sequester it (they can).
The main problem with this reasoning is that this is only valid if all the CO2 sequestering and release was caused by one and the same process. It is not.
Let us start with what happens within a year:
Some 120 GtC goes in and out in vegetation. that is a 24-hour process for 60 GtC respiration and photosynthesis, which largely cancels out within 24 hour or more days/weeks during the growing season.
Some 60 GtC goes extra out by photosynthesis during the growing season and some 60 GtC is released over the full year (some more in summer, but still a lot in winter) by vegetation decay and feed/food.
The net result of the second one can be seen in the seasonal variation in CO2 levels as well as in the 13C/12C variations and oxygen variations.
The overall effect at the end of the year is ~1 GtC/year more sink than source, based on the oxygen balance.
As the main effect is the rapid growth and decay of leaves, most of this process is fast, but limited in capacity. The long term effect of the 30% increase in CO2 level is only 1 GtC/year extra uptake. Probably because CO2 is not the only limiting factor in nature compared to greenhouse tests where all other factors are sufficiently provided.
The ocean surface simply follows temperature which gives some 50 GtC release with warmer waters and 50 GtC uptake in colder waters.
The long term effect of any CO2 change in the atmosphere gives a similar but limited (10%) change in the surface: the 30% increase in the atmosphere only shows up as a 3% increase (30 GtC) in the ocean surface, due to the buffer/Revelle factor. An increase of 5 GtC (2.5 ppmv) per year thus only gives an increase of 0.5 GtC/year in the ocean surface.
The deep oceans circulate a near continuous stream of ~40 GtC CO2 between the equatorial upwelling places and the polar sink places. As other possible sinks are either too small or too slow, that gives that the deep oceans do get the remainder of the ~5 GtC sink capacity necessary to remove halve the quantity of the human emissions per year. That is about 3.5 GtC/year, even if we have a 30% increase of the CO2 pressure in the atmosphere.
Thus despite the huge quantities involved over a seasonal cycle, the quantities that are really sequestered after a full cycle are very limited. Nature simply can’t cope with the human releases, because the removal of any extra shot out of the atmosphere is a (partial) pressure dependent process, while the seasonal cycle is a temperature dependent process. And the long term effect of temperature is very limited (8 ppmv/°C).
About saturation: the ocean surface is easely saturated within 2-3 years while neither the deep oceans nor vegetation show any sign of saturation, but both are limited in yearly uptake capacity.
richardscourtney – you say “The sinks for CO2 are not saturating and, therefore, the rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration is NOT CO2 accumulating in the atmosphere because the sinks cannot sequester it (they can).“. I agree that they are not saturating, the data does indicate that. But your “therefore” is incorrect because you haven’t allowed for the time that the process takes. There are actually a number of separate processes. The main ones, on timescales up to decades at least, are:
1. Land biosphere take-up and release.
The land biosphere is fast-acting, giving the high seasonal variation, though there is a modest net take-up over time (the planet is growing more plants than the de-foresters are removing).
2. Ocean-atmosphere interface.
At the ocean-atmosphere interface, a CO2 partial pressure imbalance has a half-life of about 13 years, but the movement towards equilibrium takes place on both sides – with excess atmospheric CO2 the atmospheric CO2 partial pressure decreases while the sea surface CO2 partial pressure increases. NB. It isn’t simple, because of chemical changes in the ocean.
3. Ocean surface layer / deeper ocean. Over time, excess C in the sea surface layer moves to the deeper ocean.
However, while all of this is going on, there is a bit more man-made CO2 being added to the atmosphere. The overall rate of net absorption is currently running at around half of the man-made additions. There’s nothing magical about the “around half”, that just happens to be where it is. As other things change, the proportion may change. The IPCC claim that the rate of net absorption is slowing down (panic! panic!) but it isn’t.
Ferdinand Engelbeen:
I said I would give you the ‘last word’ in our conversation.
Subsequently, I replied to a post to me from Mike Jonas, and you have responded to that in your post at January 30, 2014 at 2:56 am.
OK, I will stick to having given you the ‘last word’ by citing – indeed copying – an explanation I provided to you upthread.
In my post to Mike Jonas at January 30, 2014 at 12:29 am I wrote
And you have responded beginning by saying
Bollocks! I am citing an empirical fact and I am NOT providing “reasoning”. You are trying to pretend the empirical fact does not exist by using “reasoning” which does not mention the empirical fact.
I cited, linked to and explained the empirical fact in my post upthread which was addressed to you at January 29, 2014 at 2:39 am. Simply, it explains that the sinks do NOT fill up so they are NOT saturated. I copy the pertinent part of it to here to save you needing to find it.
“Each year the oceans alone pump more than an order of magnitude more CO2 in and out of the air than the anthropogenic CO2 emission. A changing equilibrium of the carbon cycle would alter the equilibrium between atmospheric CO2 and the ocean. This would not involve saturation of CO2 sinks with resulting accumulation of CO2 in the air. And the dynamics of the seasonal variation in atmospheric CO2 refutes that such saturation occurs.
This is the Mauna Loa data
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/weekly.html
The annual CO2 rise is the residual of the seasonal fluctuation of the CO2 variation throughout a year.
The seasonal fluctuation is a saw-tooth. The CO2 rises rapidly at near constant rate then reverses and falls rapidly at near constant rate, then reverses … This is NOT consistent with the sinks saturating. The rate of change should reduce as the sinks ‘fill up’ while approaching saturation. It does not.
It is consistent with altering equilibrium. The seasonal rise is a response to temperature through the year while the minimum (before reversal) of a year is the minimum set by the quasi equilibrium of that year as the carbon cycle system adjusts to an altered equilibrium state.
So, Ferdinand, your assertion of CO2 accumulation in the air is falsified by these observations of system dynamics.”
Richard
Mike Jonas:
I apologise to you, Ferdinand and the mods for having posted the mess at January 30, 2014 at 3:42 am which I have asked the mods to delete. Sorry for that error.
Thankyou for your reply to me at January 30, 2014 at 3:22 am. It begins saying
Thankyou for your agreement of the lack of sink saturation.
But your point about the time for the process is NOT pertinent.
Firstly, you (and Ferdinand) are claiming the ‘mass balance argument’. Simply, you say the anthropogenic emission is filling the sinks and the excess then accumulates. But, as you agree, the sinks are NOT filling.
Secondly, the natural fluctuation of the excess sequestration is at least 6 ppmv (which corresponds to 12 GtC) in 4 months. This is more than 100 times the yearly increase of anthropogenic CO2 emission, which strongly that the dynamics of the carbon cycle system can cope easily with the human production of CO2. A serious disruption of the system may be expected when the rate of increase of the anthropogenic emissions becomes larger than the natural variations of CO2. But our analysis indicated this is not possible.
The observations are completely explicable as being effect of the carbon cycle system slowly adjusting to a new equilibrium. Some processes of the system are very slow with rate constants of years and decades. Hence, the system takes decades to fully adjust to the new equilibrium. The issue is WHY the equilibrium has changed. The anthropogenic emission may be the cause but other causes are possible and the temperature rise from the LIA seems most likely.
Richard
PS If you want me to then I could copy the list of processes which we considered and it is much longer than yours but I see no relevance.
“Who cares how much there is of something? The question is, what can it do?”
We don’t know what it can do outside of a jar. If we had “thousands of line by line measurements” between the surface and various altitudes controlled for GHG’s, we would not need any model. What we have are measurements from the surface and from space.
Scale is important. A molecule that must energize 2500 of its closest friends to raise the temperature of the whole has a lot of work to do. To turn Willis’ argument on its head, just because it could, does not mean that it does.
The planet is doing our measurements for us, clearly showing what it cannot do over the last 17 years.
The analogy of this post was carried a bit beyond where it can stand in its own merits. The last bit requires technical issues discussed above likely lost on most football fans. Yet the final conclusion is, IMO, not far from the truth.
richardscourtney says:
January 30, 2014 at 3:24 am
Let us try it in another way:
– The seasonal changes show a global change of about 5 ppmv for a global change of about 1°C, where the hemispheres are opposite to each other and the NH vegetation is dominant.
Oceans and extra-tropical vegetation are the main players, working in opposite direction with temperature: higher temperature: more release from the oceans, more uptake by the biosphere.
Total in/out flows 90 GtC ocean-atmosphere-ocean, 60 GtC biosphere-atmosphere-biosphere.
Net effect: near zero in the pre-industrial past, but currently ~1 GtC extra uptake in the biosphere, ~0.5 GtC extra uptake in the ocean surface layer and ~3.5 GtC extra uptake in the deep oceans.
– The intra annual variability (over 2-3 years) also is caused by temperature changes, mainly ENSO and volcanic related and the tropical vegetation is dominant.
Oceans and tropical vegetation are the main players, working in parallel, where an increased temperature gives more releases of CO2 from the oceans but also from the tropical forests by changed rain patterns.
Total in/outflows: a few GtC extra release from oceans and tropical vegetation.
Net effect: ~10 GtC/°C (~5 ppmv/°C) in the first year after a temperature change, dying out within 2-3 years.
– The (very) long term changes in CO2 were also caused by temperature changes, where the deep oceans are dominant.
Oceans and vegetation again are the main players, working in opposite direction with temperature: higher temperature: more release from the oceans, more uptake by the biosphere, mainly a matter of ocean currents and changed land ice / vegetation area.
Net effect: ~16 GtC/°C (~8 ppmv/°C) spread over decades to many millennia.
So where does the human emissions fit?
Human CO2 is a direct injection of extra CO2 in the atmosphere. That increases the partial pressure of CO2 (pCO2) in the atmosphere. The first two processes (seasonal and intra annual) are temperature dependent and hardly influenced by pCO2: even with a 30% increase in pCO2, there is only 1 GtC/year extra uptake of CO2 in vegetation. Neither are the short term tropical forest releases/uptake influenced. The ocean surface is in equilibrium with the atmosphere within a few years and currently has a ~3% more CO2 in the mixed layer.
The main direct influence of an increased pCO2 is on the deep ocean uptake/release.
A temperature increase of 1°C only gives an increase of 17 ppmv in the atmosphere, per Henry’s law, without taking into account the extra uptake by the biosphere for the same increase in temperature. Taking the latter into account, the maximum increase is 8 ppmv/°C or some 5 ppmv since the Mauna Loa measurements started in 1959.
Human emissions today are near 10 GtC/year (5 ppmv/year). Only 2 years of the current human emissions equals the effect of an increase of 1°C in global temperature. Thus approximately the whole increase of CO2 is caused by human emissions.
The observations are completely explicable as being effect of the carbon cycle system slowly adjusting to a new equilibrium.
There is no natural reason for a change in equilibrium, except a temperature change. That is hardly of effect in the past decades or millennium (the MWP-LIA difference is only 6 ppmv). The equilibrium level of CO2 at the current temperature still is around 290 ppmv. That we are far above that equilibrium is caused by the human emissions.
This is NOT consistent with the sinks saturating. The rate of change should reduce as the sinks ‘fill up’ while approaching saturation. It does not.
As the seasonal exchanges are not pressure dependent, they don’t help to remove any buildup of CO2 in the atmosphere. Only the much slower processes of sequestering extra CO2 in more permanent vegetation and the deep oceans are of interest. Both still are not limited in current or future capacity, only limited in speed.