Paper finds a decrease of IR radiation from greenhouse gases over past 14 years, contradicts expected increase – cloudiness blamed for difference.
A paper published in the Journal of Climate finds from 800,000 observations a significant decrease in longwave infrared radiation from increasing greenhouse gases over the 14 year period 1996-2010 in the US Great Plains. CO2 levels increased ~7% over this period and according to AGW theory, downwelling IR should have instead increased over this period.
According to the authors,
“The AERI data record demonstrates that the downwelling infrared radiance is decreasing over this 14-yr period in the winter, summer, and autumn seasons but it is increasing in the spring; these trends are statistically significant and are primarily due to long-term change in the cloudiness above the site.”
The findings contradict the main tenet of AGW theory which states increasing greenhouse gases including the primary greenhouse gas water vapor and clouds will cause an increase of downwelling longwave infrared “back-radiation.”
The paper also finds a negative trend in precipitable water vapor, as do other global datasets, again the opposite of predictions of AGW theory that warming allegedly from CO2 will increase precipitable water vapor in the atmosphere to allegedly amplify warming by 3-5 times. Is the unexpected decrease in water vapor the cause of the decrease in downwelling IR?
Global datasets also show an increase of outgoing longwave IR radiation to space from greenhouse gases over the past 62 years, again in contradiction to the predictions of AGW theory.
Gero, P. Jonathan, David D. Turner, 2011: Long-Term Trends in Downwelling Spectral Infrared Radiance over the U.S. Southern Great Plains. J. Climate, 24, 4831–4843.
doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/2011JCLI4210.1
Long-Term Trends in Downwelling Spectral Infrared Radiance over the U.S. Southern Great Plains
P. Jonathan Gero
Space Science and Engineering Center, University of Wisconsin—Madison, Madison, Wisconsin
David D. Turner
NOAA/National Severe Storms Laboratory, Norman, Oklahoma, and Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences, University of Wisconsin—Madison, Madison, Wisconsin
Abstract
A trend analysis was applied to a 14-yr time series of downwelling spectral infrared radiance observations from the Atmospheric Emitted Radiance Interferometer (AERI) located at the Atmospheric Radiation Measurement Program (ARM) site in the U.S. Southern Great Plains. The highly accurate calibration of the AERI instrument, performed every 10 min, ensures that any statistically significant trend in the observed data over this time can be attributed to changes in the atmospheric properties and composition, and not to changes in the sensitivity or responsivity of the instrument. The measured infrared spectra, numbering more than 800 000, were classified as clear-sky, thin cloud, and thick cloud scenes using a neural network method. The AERI data record demonstrates that the downwelling infrared radiance is decreasing over this 14-yr period in the winter, summer, and autumn seasons but it is increasing in the spring; these trends are statistically significant and are primarily due to long-term change in the cloudiness above the site. The AERI data also show many statistically significant trends on annual, seasonal, and diurnal time scales, with different trend signatures identified in the separate scene classifications. Given the decadal time span of the dataset, effects from natural variability should be considered in drawing broader conclusions. Nevertheless, this dataset has high value owing to the ability to infer possible mechanisms for any trends from the observations themselves and to test the performance of climate models.
via the Hockeyschtick with thanks
This study was over 14 years, and a 100 km by 100 km box. Hardly a “bombshell” with global ramifications. For more information, please see references here:
http://agwobserver.wordpress.com/2009/08/02/papers-on-changes-in-olr-due-to-ghgs/
Nick Stokes says:
August 6, 2014 at 3:07 am
Joe says: August 6, 2014 at 1:35 am
“So that would strongly suggest that clouds are a negative feedback, no?”
No. The effect of AGW at this site is to reduce cloudiness, but the global average may well increase. But most people who think of clouds and feedback think first of the competing effect of albedo.
————————————————————————————————————————
Sorry, let me be more specific. That would suggest that the alteration of cloud cover caused by warming may be (ok, I’ll allow “maybe” instead of “is”) a net negative feedback.
I’d also be interested to know who these “most people” are?
My experience is that most people who actually think about it, rather than trotting out dogma (on either side of the debate) think of cloud changes as a very complex mix of effects involving albedo, radiative properties, convective heat transport, physical movement of latent heat and a myriad other effects depending on location, time of day, season of year and so on.
Perhaps I just hang with smarter people than you?
This is consistent with the theory of CO2AGW. Because some model runs predicted it.
(Others didn’t. The theory of CO2AGW has many tentacles. No real world measurement can be as mighty as the manifold of possibilities that exist in the supercomputer.)
Kristian says:
August 6, 2014 at 4:10 am
davidmhoffer says, August 5, 2014 at 10:14 pm:
“Matthew R Marler (quoting Kristian)
Why aren’t we seeing ‘back radiation’ power plants all over the world?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Because photo voltaics have an efficiency approaching zero in that frequency range.”
Hehe. Yeah. That’s the reason.
/////////////////////////////////
The issue is: why is there no research into photo voltaic marterial that responds to the required frequency range?
Theoretically, according to K & T, DWLWIR is a far superior energy source to that of solar, so, surely, it is only a question of finding material that responds to the frequency bandwidth of DWLWIR.
Pyrometers are used to measure IR, and yet, is it not strange that the material in these cannot be scaled up to harvest the IR into real energy?
I find it strange that if DWLWIR is capable of perfoming sensible work in the environ in which it finds itself on planet Earth, that research in to tapping this energy source is not a mainstay of steps taken to combat climate change. It seems to me that 25 to 50% of the total budget spent on AGW/climate change should have gone into that, since it is a win win scenario.
If we can find suitable photo voltaic material then we solve the clean energy issue, and if we do not find suitable material, it is probably because we are proving that DWLWIR is nothing more than a signal incapable of performing sensible work in the environ of planet Earth, and is therefore not a problem.
Since convection is what moves heat in the lower troposphere and the surface temperature is determined well above the surface, at the equivalent emissions height (and not by some fictitious radiation balance at the surface), the current study is interesting, but largely irrelevant.
Whatever happens regarding the asssessed fate of DWLWIR or UWLWIR balances and the climate temp response, rest assured, higher atmospheric CO2 will be blamed by the cognoscenti and the congregation of the Church of Global Warming.
The entrenched political powers pushing the “settled science” ditty are too reputationally and economically invested in acquiring carbon taxes for redistribtive ideologies and more control over capitalist economies, while they abet the ecoterrorists bent on de-industrialization policies.
For substantiation look no further than California, where carbon offset taxes are now being tagged by the governor for high speed rail construction. It’s a construction project where the political left’s main supporter are unions who will be contractually guaranteed the work. Meanwhile the govenor continues to curry favor with ecoterrorists by supporting large fresh water discharges from reservoirs into the San Joaquin delta during an extreme drought in California.
Wow, why is it that reading the comments takes an order of magnitude greater amount of time than merely reading the article… 🙂
To summarize this thread, we have the following discussions occurring (abbreviated for conciseness and my own personal amusement):
1.0 Discourse on the Subject of the Article in Question
Skeptics: DWLWIR was measured as less than expected at specific locations, so “suck it trebec!”
Believers: Nah man, it’s the clouds, see, they turn it up to 11, besides, this study is so, like, yesterday, “hey, the 2011’s called and they want their study back.” Oh, and lest we forget, this was only one location, and the physics there are clearly not applicable to the rest of the globe.
Skeptics: Wait, “it’s the clouds” is our argument, and you can’t have it back. But maybe we should see about measuring DWLWIR other places.
2.0 Discourse on the Subject of the Greenhouse Effect
Engineer 1: As my calculations clearly show, concentrations of CO2 above 200ppm cease to have any meaningful additional effect on atmospheric temperature.
Engineer 2: Uh, stupid, there is no greenhouse effect. Our atmosphere ain’t no glass tube in a lab. So, you can take your “greenhouse effect” and shove it up your…
Engineer 1: You’re not an engineer
Engineer 2: No, you’re not.
…and etc…
3.0 Discourse on the Subject of Solar-Driven Climate vs ENSO-Driven Climate
Classroom Lecturer 1: You are all wrong. It’s been the sun this whole time. I switched arguments while your back was turned. That’s what makes this so funny!
Classroom Lecturer 2: This is where you’re mistaken. I’ve built up an immunity to solar arguments. It’s ENSO.
Classroom Lecturer 1: Strong! But I have a confession to make, I have a paper.
Classroom Lecturer 2: ENSO
Classroom Lecturer 1: Stop saying that…look at all these other papers.
Classroom Lecturer 2: Oh my sweet ENSO! What have I done?
Please let me know if I’ve missed any sub-topics, and I’ll be glad to revise the above.
rip
Pamela Gray says:
August 6, 2014 at 8:08 am
You began the unscientific as hominem tone, showing totally unjustified sense of certainty and were unwarrantedly condescending. You were out of line. I responded in kind. Where do you get off lecturing me on writing like a scientist? Besides which, how should I react when you dodge the very request you made of me and reply so lamely to my first example, after coming off as so superior, imagining that you could school me in climatology, when all you had was “your gut”?
You have yet to produce a single paper supporting your baseless assertion that the sun plays no role in climate, as you required of me and which request I answered four times over. You present nothing but more unfounded assertions. If you imagine that even one of the supposed hundreds of papers on intrinsic weather patterns supports your view, then let’s see it and your argument for how it offers this support.
Climate is the long term average of weather. If you imagine that climatic patterns just happen without any underlying causes, please show why you think so, based upon peer reviewed papers.
I presented evidence that the ENSO is solar influenced. You have shown nothing to support your claim that the PDO is driven by ENSO. In fact, both oscillations are part of the same system, as you’d know if you had ever actually studied either phenomenon. Nor have you demonstrated that these oceanic oscillations are not under solar influence, among other lesser causes.
What makes you think that the Gleissberg Cycle is not valid? It might or might not be, but you yet again present no evidence for your baseless claim. Show your evidence and reasoning. Some of the papers from the past few years I presented demonstrate that real experts consider it genuine. They’re experts and you obviously are not. The burden of proof is on you.
Here’s another one from the past decade:
Braun, H; Christl, M; Rahmstorf, S; Ganopolski, A; Mangini, A; Kubatzki, C; Roth, K; Kromer, B (10 November 2005). “Possible solar origin of the 1,470-year glacial climate cycle demonstrated in a coupled model”. Nature 438 (7065): 208–11. Bibcode:2005Natur.438..208B. doi:10.1038/nature04121. PMID 16281042
I’m positive I know a lot more about Milankovitch Cycles than you do. Precession could be considered a wobble, and maybe even tilt. I wouldn’t apply that term to eccentricity or inclination, but OK, if you want to. To answer your question, experts disagree over the most important parameter, but IMO it’s eccentricity, which is why the Holocene might be another super (multi-precessional cycle) interglacial. IMO eccentricity controls the 100K glacial cycle, but might not rule interglacials. The parameters must be considered in conjunction.
But once more I respond to your question without your answering mine. So yet again, how can you categorically deny solar influence on climate at the 1000 and 100 years orders of magnitude, when Milankovitch Cycles, which rule climate on the scale of 100K and 10K years, are based upon insolation?
Pamela,
Should you wish to educate yourself about the relationship between the PDO and ENSO beyond the misinformation and misconceptions you seem to have acquired on this blog, here’s a good place to start, from U Dub, 2009:
http://cses.washington.edu/cig/pnwc/compensopdo.shtml
It provides data without much in the way of hypothesis as to causes of and relationships between the two oscillations. Note however that El Niños are more common during the warm or positive phase of the PDO (when the west Pacific cools and part of the eastern ocean warms) and La Niñas during its cool or negative phase.
This is not even really a teleconnection, since the temperate North Pacific and tropical Pacific are obviously in direct contact. Hence, I would have thought it equally obvious that the two oscillations are related, such that they can’t be regarded as entirely separate phenomena, with ENSO somehow in control. ENSO was observed in the 16th century and the PDO not until the 20th, but historical priority doesn’t bestow on the tropical oscillation any physical primacy. But if you imagine that it rules, please, as above, provide some evidence in support of this assertion.
Thanks.
Alan Robertson The Lorentz paper does indeed show that numerical modelling is impossible.
The modelling approach is inherently of no value for predicting future temperature with any calculable certainty because of the difficulty of specifying the initial conditions of a sufficiently fine grained spatio-temporal grid of a large number of variables with sufficient precision prior to multiple iterations. For a complete discussion of this see Essex:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hvhipLNeda4
Models are often tuned by running them backwards against several decades of observation, this is
much too short a period to correlate outputs with observation when the controlling natural quasi-periodicities of most interest are in the centennial and especially in the key millennial range. Tuning to these longer periodicities is beyond any computing capacity when using reductionist models with a large number of variables unless these long wave natural periodicities are somehow built into the model structure ab initio
Interestingly ,however Lorentz does admit the possibility of skillful lomg term forecasting based on quasi-periodicities in analogous states. Since everything only happens once in the real world I would amend that to read quasi-analogous states. For discussion of all this see.
http://climatesense-norpag.blogspot.com/2014/07/climate-forecasting-methods-and-cooling.html
davidmhoffer says, August 6, 2014 at 7:42 am:
“There’s enough kinetic energy stored in ocean currents to drives the world;s economy. Why don’t we use that? Because it isn’t practical to harvest the energy, that’s why. There’s enough energy in lightning strikes all over the world to provide energy for many major cities. Why don’t we use that? Because it isn’t practical to harvest the energy. There’s enough kinetic energy stored in the moon as it orbits the earth to run the world’s economy for centuries. Why don’t we use that? Because it isn’t practical to harvest the energy.
All of which you would know if you had the first clue about physics, but you would prefer to continue commenting in this forum and proving beyond a shadow of a doubt that you not only don’t understand the physics, you don’t WANT to understand the physics. You just want to rant on as if you do.”
You simply don’t have a clue what we’re talking about here, do you David? Why I said “Yeah. That’s the reason.” It’s not because it’s impractical to harvest the atmospheric ‘back radiation’ energy. It’s because it’s impossible. Physically impossible.
You only need to know the laws of thermodynamics to understand this.
What does the First Law say? ΔU = Q – W. The change in internal energy of a system equals the heat transferred to it minus the work done by it.
The surface cannot itself perform any work on its surroundings. So more heat in in this case directly gives an increase in internal energy (and thus a rising temperature).
You seem to argue that the DWLWIR is a separate energy flux down to the surface from the atmosphere essentially equal in general properties (an equivalent flux) to the solar flux, only within a different frequency range. You would ADD the two together to get a total INPUT of radiative energy to the surface, wouldn’t you? And thus raise its internal energy more.
Accordingly, following the K&T09 energy diagram, your surface budget would look like this:
INPUT: 161 W/m^2 (solar flux) + 333 W/m^2 (DWLWIR flux, ‘atm back radiation’) = 494 W/m^2
OUTPUT: 97 W/m^2 (convective fluxes) + 396 W/m^2 (UWLWIR flux) = 493 W/m^2
Completely conflating HEAT (energy transferred from hot to cold as a result of the temperature difference) with thermal radiant emittance by a ‘surface’.
For a photovoltaic cell at ambient temperature, how do you suggest we harvest the DWLWIR energy from the atmospere above when there is always more UWLWIR moving out? How do you suggest the DWLWIR in this way will manage to increase the internal energy (U) of the photovoltaic cell? If we don’t first (artificially) cool the cell to become colder than the air above?
DWLWIR isn’t ‘heat’, David. It isn’t ‘work’ either. Hence, it cannot effectuate a detectable increase in the internal energy of anything.
Why isn’t it heat? Because it is simply ONE PART of an integrated, continuous energy exchange between surface and air, the other (opposing) part being the larger UWLWIR. The net of the two is the heat. You cannot just choose to leave the one out to make the other one work as if it were alone in the exchange. They’re inseparable. They make up the same radiation field. You can’t just pick one and pretend it works by itself as if it were a real heat flux. Like the solar flux. Heat ONLY and ALWAYS spontaneously (in nature) move from higher to lower temperature. This is the Second Law.
The heat, the ‘net energy’, is the actual, detectable transfer of energy between the two bodies. Decreasing the U of the warmer one, increasing the U of the cooler one.
The kinetic energy of the oceans that you’re talking about can easily do work. The currents move things. There are wave and tide power plants around. Not many, and they’re not incredibly cost-effective. But it is at least being tested and shown to work in principle. This energy is possible to harness. Because we’re talking about real transfers of energy. In this case it’s ALL about the practicality and economics. When it comes to ‘atmospheric back radiation’ it’s all down to pure physical principles. It’s just not physically possible.
Engineers know the difference. You seemingly don’t …
RoHa says:
August 6, 2014 at 3:31 am
What makes you think I don’t know what a petard is? While Shakespeare uses “with”, “on” is perfectly acceptable, if you know what a petard looks like and how it was used. So is “by”. “On” is most appropriate if the petardier were leaning over the device when it detonated prematurely. “With” or “by” works if he happened to be close to but not over the charge when it went off.
sturgishooper says, August 6, 2014 at 10:44 am:
“I presented evidence that the ENSO is solar influenced. You have shown nothing to support your claim that the PDO is driven by ENSO. In fact, both oscillations are part of the same system, as you’d know if you had ever actually studied either phenomenon. Nor have you demonstrated that these oceanic oscillations are not under solar influence, among other lesser causes.”
Indeed.
Actually, I think people should drop the whole PDO hangup thing and widen their scope to include the entire spectrum of Pacific variability. PDO hasn’t even been the main SSTa pattern in the North Pacific since 1988/89.
The 25 years of modern global warming started abruptly in 1976/77 with the Great Pacific Climate Shift. This shift is definitely best expressed by the marked PDO phase flip occurring at just this time. And the following global warming step of 1979 directly resulted from it. But what caused this Pacific Climate Shift in the first place was the sudden drop in SOI (the pressure gradient from east to west across the tropical/subtropical Pacific basin), flattening the thermocline.
What, then, caused the drop in SOI? Who knows? But it wasn’t ENSO. And it wasn’t PDO.
Kristian
Ask Bob Tisdale.
The ENSO process does not cause the ocean cycle. But the ENSO process is surely what produces the multidecadal cooling and warming observed during the various up (‘positive’) and down (‘negative’) stages of it. ENSO is the executor. It is a caused cause of global warming (and cooling).
Dr Norman Page says, August 6, 2014 at 12:00 pm:
“Ask Bob Tisdale.”
About what?
Kristian says:
August 6, 2014 at 11:50 am
“The 25 years of modern global warming started abruptly in 1976/77 with the Great Pacific Climate Shift. This shift is definitely best expressed by the marked PDO phase flip occurring at just this time. And the following global warming step of 1979 directly resulted from it. But what caused this Pacific Climate Shift in the first place was the sudden drop in SOI (the pressure gradient from east to west across the tropical/subtropical Pacific basin), flattening the thermocline.
What, then, caused the drop in SOI? Who knows? But it wasn’t ENSO. And it wasn’t PDO.”
Might it be solar/lunar tidal effects?
“Possible forcing of global temperature by the oceanic tides”
CHARLES D. KEELING AND TIMOTHY P. WHORF
http://www.pnas.org/content/94/16/8321.full.pdf
Great science news, but I don’t think it will move the needle in the massive donations-for-climate distortion biz.
Nick Stokes says:
August 5, 2014 at 5:01 pm
“This is hardly a bombshell. The paper was published in 2011.”
A paper like this takes a long time to come to the fore in the holyland. Most were stopped by gatekeepers. I expect the playing field will be tipping the other way now with the pause
Kristian;
DWLWIR isn’t ‘heat’, David. It isn’t ‘work’ either. Hence, it cannot effectuate a detectable increase in the internal energy of anything.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Right, right, and wrong. It isn’t heat or work, it is an energy flux. We can measure it, we can measure the heat it creates and we can measure the work it does. That doesn’t make it practical as a way to generate electricity. Your entire argument is based on a complete lack of understanding of the physics, and as for what engineers know, I know a rather large number of them, and they are in general agreement that you are, as Einstein would put it, “not right, not even wrong”.
But I’ve discovered that explaining facts to you, simple things like pointing out that the earth is warmer than the moon despite getting the exact same amount of insolation, it fruitless. You have a belief system, and you cling to it in a fashion that makes warmists look almost logical. Pretty sad. Goodbye.
Set/Kristian=Ignore
Kristian You say What, then, caused the drop in SOI? Who knows? But it wasn’t ENSO. And it wasn’t PDO. I said ask Bob Tisdale – he has written at great length on this topic.
Kristian says:
August 6, 2014 at 11:50 am
Agree. It might be OK to claim that “weather patterns” just happen, but regular changes in climate, the 30 year and longer average of weather, have causes which require explanation.
IMO the ultimate cause for changes in SOI (Southern Oscillation Index) and comparable phenomena in other ocean basins is solar activity, but not the sole cause. Only Marxist-minded enemies of humanity like the Climate Change Team believe in the One Great Cause (CO2 and destroying the West). But in as much as there is a primary cause of climate change, the preponderance of evidence in the presently admittedly limited, infantile state of our understanding, it appears to be solar activity.
Confidence is high that this is so on the scale of tens and hundreds of thousands of years, but less so for tens, hundreds and thousands of years, for which orders of magnitude the evidence is nonetheless still convincing, IMO, and growing. Climatology has been set back one or two generations by the CO2 mafia and inadequate at best computer modeling.
Here for instance is just one paper (2008) finding an association between these oscillations and solar activity, to include the SOI.
http://www.google.com/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=&esrc=s&source=web&cd=4&ved=0CDkQFjAD&url=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.researchgate.net%2Fpublication%2F225146810_On_Mid-Term_Periodicities_in_Sunspot_Groups_and_Flare_Index%2Ffile%2Fd912f503cb3c51625e.pdf&ei=coDiU8XYAor3oATTgoHYDQ&usg=AFQjCNFgRe4HQM_2Va_koe5eeolqF98XUg&sig2=oZD3XXzsmVIfTzYMfcdMUQ&bvm=bv.72676100,d.cGU
If anything, as I noted, the PDO controls the frequency of El Niños and La Niñas in the ENSO, not the other way around, which I should have thought would be obvious, since there are a number of ENSO swings in any one PDO phase.
Dr Norman Page says, August 6, 2014 at 12:24 pm:
“Kristian You say What, then, caused the drop in SOI? Who knows? But it wasn’t ENSO. And it wasn’t PDO. I said ask Bob Tisdale – he has written at great length on this topic.”
Not on this particular topic, no.
Dr Norman Page says:
August 6, 2014 at 12:24 pm
Bob has been asked what he thinks causes the ENSO, but in the only responses I’ve seen he talks about proximate “causes”, such as wind shifts, rather than ultimate causes. If I’ve missed that discussion, I’d be happy for him to present his view on what might cause observed atmospheric and oceanic oscillations on the scale not just of years, as with ENSO, but decades (as with the PDO and AMO), centuries (as with the Little Ice Age and Medieval Warm Period, etc) and millennia (as with the Holocene Climatic Optimum), possibly such as solar or seismic activity, or maybe even GHG concentrations.
A recent paper found at high confidence that the AMO was driven by some external forcings, but couldn’t distinguish solar from volcanic on the time scale of the study.
ferdberple says:
August 6, 2014 at 7:01 am
Is the unexpected decrease in water vapor the cause of the decrease in downwelling IR?
=================
only unexpected if you ignore partial pressure of gas law. add CO2 to the atmosphere and H2O will be reduced. basic chemistry. adding CO2 increases mass of atmosphere, increasing pressure, reducing the ability of water to evaporate, reducing water vapor until mass and pressure of atmosphere returns to equilibrium.
========================
Off the mark somewhat. Add CO2 to the atmosphere and H2O OR Air (O2, N2, Ar, etc) will be displaced. Adding CO2 increases mass of atmosphere, so what? As already pointed out, this molecule of CO2 replaced something else so therefore, has no effect on pressure. Why would this have an effect on the ability of water to evaporate? The pressure hasn’t changed. Mass of atmosphere does not need to reach any kind of equilibrium.