Total solar irradiance, also called “TSI”, is the total amount of energy coming from the sun at all frequencies. It is measured in watts per square metre (W/m2). Lots of folks claim that the small ~ 11-year variations in TSI are amplified by some unspecified mechanism, and thus these small changes in TSI make an observable difference in some aspect of the temperature.
In that regard, here are the monthly variations in TSI (as a global 24/7 average) as shown by the CERES data:
Figure 1. Variations in TSI. The upper panel (red) shows the actual measured TSI. The middle panel shows the seasonal component of that variation. The bottom panel shows the ~ eleven-year variation in TSI once the seasonal data has been removed.
There are oddities in this record. Overall, the ~ eleven-year variation is a bit more than a quarter of a W/m2. However, from late 2000 to early 2001, the TSI dropped a bit more than a quarter of a W/m2. However, I digress …
My question is, if the tiny eleven-year changes in TSI of a quarter of a W/m2 cause an observable change in the temperature, then where is the effect of the ~ 22 W/m2 annual variation in the amount of sun hitting the earth? That annual change is a hundred times the size of the eleven-year TSI change. Where is the effect of that 22 W/m2 change?
To get an idea of the predicted effect of this variation in TSI, using IPCC figures this TSI change of 22 W/m2 is about the same change in forcing that we would get from six doublings of CO2 … that is to say, CO2 going from the current level (400 ppmv) to the extraordinary level of 25,600 ppmv.
In addition, again according to the IPCC, using their central value of 3°C warming per doubling of CO2 (3.7 W/m2 additional forcing), this change in forcing should be accompanied by a change in temperature of no less than 18°C (32°F).
Now, I can accept that this would be somewhat reduced because of the thermal lag of the climate system. But the transient (immediate) climate response to increased forcing is said to be on the order of 2°C per doubling of CO2. So this still should result in a warming of 12°C (22°F) … and we see nothing of the sort.
I say this lack of an effect of the TSI changes is because the climate system responds to the current conditions. The climate system is not some inanimate object that is simply pushed around by external forcings. Instead, it reacts, it responds, it evolves and varies based on the instantaneous local situations everywhere. In particular, when it is cold we get less tropical clouds, and that increases the energy entering the system. And similarly, when it is warm we get more tropical clouds, cutting out huge amounts of incoming energy by reflecting it back to space. In this way, the system reacts to maintain the same temperature despite the changes in forcing.
However, I’m happy to listen to alternate explanations and to consider opposing evidence … so if you think that the IPCC is right when it says that changes in temperature are driven by the changes in forcing, I ask you why the annual forcing change of 22 W/m2 doesn’t seem to show a corresponding 12°C change in global temperature.
Best to everyone,
w.
My Request—if you disagree with someone, please quote the exact words you disagree with. This allows us all to understand just what you think is incorrect.
“I ask you why the annual forcing change of 22 W/m2 doesn’t seem to show a corresponding 12°C change in global temperature.”
I didn’t read the comments so I don’t know if this has been mentioned already. It does. In fact, the change in temperature is greater than 12 C. In New York it’s around 30 C. Notice in your graph the TSI variation and seasonal component are almost the same. TSI variation is responsible for the seasons. But different parts of the world get different amounts of irradiance so the seasons are not global but regional.
Insolation changes due to obliquity are responsible for the seasons. Real TSI changes are too small. One must be careful to distinguish actual TSI changes from apparent TSI changes due to conditions of the Earth. As Leif once commented on changes in TSI: ” For the climate, TOA at the Earth is the proper measure. For study of the Sun, TSI at 1 AU is the proper measure. “
The Terra satellite is on the top of atmosphere. Its TSI measurements are TOA.
The Terra satellite has 98 degrees inclination. Its nearly in polar orbit. It doesn’t measure TSI at all latitudes and longitudes. It may not represent global average TSI.
For global TSI, the perihelion is around January 3 and the aphelion around July 4. The difference in TSI between perihelion and aphelion is around 22.7 W/m^2
Yes, and the question Willis asked applied to the GAT, which despite an increase in insolation during the SH summer of immense proportions, (at least relative to any CO2 forcing) the atmosphere cools about 4C, the opposite of the quick glance intuitive assumption.
The questions are many…
“Does the earth gain or lose energy during this period on most intense insolation?”
Does the increased albedo and potentially increased cloud cover more then make up for the increased energy striking the oceans?
How much of the atmospheric cooling is due to said increased insolation entering the oceans, and thus lost to the atmosphere for a time?
Is there a greatly increased cloud cover during this time of increased insolation?
Does much of the energy simply go into an accelerated hydraulic cycle?
Does some relevant quantity of this energy go into algae and diatomic life growth spurts?
etc.
I am not certain any of my questions were answered, alas.
“despite an increase in insolation during the SH summer of immense proportions, (at least relative to any CO2 forcing) the atmosphere cools about 4C”
Nope. January 3 is summer in SH. It warms by 30 C in South Pole.
“Does the earth gain or lose energy during this period on most intense insolation?”
It probably gains but negative feedbacks can offset it or thermal inertia can delay the effect by months.
“Does the increased albedo and potentially increased cloud cover more then make up for the increased energy striking the oceans?”
These are possible negative feedbacks.
“How much of the atmospheric cooling is due to said increased insolation entering the oceans, and thus lost to the atmosphere for a time?”
Increased insolation theoretically should cause warming not cooling.
“Is there a greatly increased cloud cover during this time of increased insolation?”
Yes, cloud cover is positively correlated to surface temperature in January and negatively correlated in July. These coincide with the perihelion and aphelion.
“Does much of the energy simply go into an accelerated hydraulic cycle?”
Theoretically possible. Must be checked with observations of humidity and precipitation.
“Does some relevant quantity of this energy go into algae and diatomic life growth spurts?”
Certainly. This is happening since time immemorial and part of natural climate change.
Dr Strangeglove, thank you for your reply, but I think you confirmed my questions as valid and unanswered. Here they are in full, with my comments in ( )
Dr. Strangelove
October 28, 2014 at 11:33 pm
“despite an increase in insolation during the SH summer of immense proportions, (at least relative to any CO2 forcing) the atmosphere cools about 4C”
Nope. January 3 is summer in SH. It warms by 30 C in South Pole.
(What does this have to do with GAT? Global average Temperature. Note; this is global average atmospheric temperature, which is lower during this time of increased insolation.)
“Does the earth gain or lose energy during this period on most intense insolation?”
It probably gains but negative feedbacks can offset it or thermal inertia can delay the effect by months.
(yes, and probably is my guess as well, but not an answer.)
“Does the increased albedo and potentially increased cloud cover more then make up for the increased energy striking the oceans?”
These are possible negative feedbacks. (Yes,as my question implied, but again, no answer to the question)
“How much of the atmospheric cooling is due to said increased insolation entering the oceans, and thus lost to the atmosphere for a time?”
Increased insolation theoretically should cause warming not cooling. (Not if the insolation enters below
the ocean surface, where “for a time” it is lost to the atmosphere.)
“Is there a greatly increased cloud cover during this time of increased insolation?”
Yes, cloud cover is positively correlated to surface temperature in January and negatively correlated in July. These coincide with the perihelion and aphelion. (Yet global surface T drops Do you have access to NH and SH cloud cover changes during these two seasonal extremes? )
“Does much of the energy simply go into an accelerated hydraulic cycle?”
Theoretically possible. Must be checked with observations of humidity and precipitation. (would love to see the comparison)
“Does some relevant quantity of this energy go into algae and diatomic life growth spurts?”
Certainly. This is happening since time immemorial and part of natural climate change. (yes, but does it correlate seasonal with insolations changes, and is the amount quantifiable?)
(In summary these basic questions associated with seasonal changes should be quantified and understood well, even by laymen, but instead we spend billions pursuing CAGW assumptions. This is sad in my view.)
“So I take it that the total solar energy reaching the round earth in one second (average for a year) is 25% of TSI x PI.r^2 or 1362 x (PI.r^2)/4 joule approximately”.
————
“No, it is TSI x PI x r^2 [if you want to be complicated]. But the important quantity is how much reaches the real surface integrated over the whole globe, and that is the 25%”.
============
OK, so the average yearly total solar energy reaching the round earth in one second is 1362 W/m^2.
And, 25% of the aforesaid 1362 W/m^2 average yearly total solar energy reaching the earth’s real surface in one second integrated over the whole globe is an average 360 W/m^2.
So, it’s an average 360 W/m^2, ….. so what?
Does that 360 W/m^2 “signature” show up in the Surface Temperature Record from 1880 to present? I don’t think so.
Does that 360 W/m^2 “signature” show up in any of the various “calculated” Surface Temperature proxy data or proxy graphs associated with the past 2,000 or 4,000 years? I don’t think so.
So, just what is the “value” of said “360 W/m^2” figure to resolving actual, factual “questions” associated with earth’s climate and/or Climate Science?
A nit-picking curious mind would like to know.
Does that 360 W/m^2 “signature” show up in the Surface Temperature Record from 1880 to present? I don’t think so.
Well, you may not think so, but Mother Nature has her own mind about this. If the input were much lower than the 342 W/m2, the temperature would be much lower. If the input were much higher, the temperature would be much higher.
“If the input were much lower than the 342 W/m2, the temperature would be much lower.”
——————
Don’t be talking silly to me. Your afore misstated number of “the 342 W/m2” is an abstract numerical figure which has no actual physical “quantity” associated with it …. and thus it should have been defined as being ….“the average 342 W/m2” ….. because “average” numerical values are the calculated median of a specific number set. Averages are like boats, …. they rise and fall with the “numerical” tide. And said “one (1) time” calculated average can not be employed or cited for “ever n’ ever” as being an actual, factual quantity to prove or justify another claim of “fact”.
Citing an “average” as a numerical fact of a physical quantity is “junk science”. So, …. “If …. a toad had wings” ….. was not a legitimate response to my nit-picking questions.
Anyway, here following is a “temperature proxy graph” containing seven (7) different “average temperature” proxies …. plus the calculated “average” (heavy black line) for said 7 proxy averages (an average of the 7 averages) ….. and thus I am curious as to how you are going to correlate and/or apply your above quoted comment to said graph …. or to the 2nd pictured temperature proxy graph, to wit:
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/c/ca/Holocene_Temperature_Variations.png
http://www.paulmacrae.com/wp-content/uploads/2008/06/warming-in-cycles-carter1.jpg
Are those “higher” and “lower” temperatures the result of …. big changes in your specified “average solar irradiance” of 342 W/m2?
Probably so, …. but said “big changes” would be ….. “location specific” and therefore immeasurable. And much ado about nothing.
I think people should read “The Neglected Sun” by Professor Dr Fritz Vahrenholt and Dr Sebastion Luning.
Readers will be stunned by the contents of this book!
Willis asked: “why the annual forcing change of 22 W/m2 doesn’t seem to show a corresponding 12°C change in global temperature.
You could also ask why ocean doesn’t freeze every night when almost 1000 W/m2 of solar radiation stops.
It takes several centuries for a change radiative forcing to produce an EQUILIBRIUM change in temperature. Even TCR is calculated after a 70-year period of gradually increasing forcing. The earth has too much thermal inertia (the heat capacity of the atmosphere and mixed layer) to respond in a few months to a modest change in solar input. (22 W/m2 / 1463 W/m2 = 1.5% change).
You can find detailed calculations in my earlier comment. The linked paper uses the same CERES data you do.
The ocean doesn’t freeze overnight but air temperature cools by 5 C or more. That’s quite a lot. If global temperature cools that much, we will be in an ice age.
22 W/m^2 averaged over 6 months is 11 W/m^2 or 1.7 x 10^8 J/m^2 heat energy. The radiative forcing of doubling CO2 is 3.7 W/m^2 over a period of 75 years for TCR. That’s 8.7 x 10^9 J/m^2 or 50 times greater than the energy from solar insolation. Without feedbacks we expect around 1 C global warming due to CO2. Hence, the expected warming due to solar insolation is 1/50 or 0.02 C. This is within the range of observed monthly global temperature variability.
While the air 2 m above the land surface may cool 5 degC (or more) and the land surface may cool even more, I’ve read that the surface of the ocean (SST) cools about 0.5 degC at night in most places. This is because cold water sinks. As soon as the sun sets and evaporation and thermal emission continue, the top surface of the ocean cools and begins to sink, bringing warmer water to the surface. If I did my math correctly, a 500 W/m2 average difference between day and night is enough energy to change the temperature of 10 m of ocean by 0.5 degC in 12 hour.
It is too bad Willis (and so many others) embarrassingly forget that temperature is a form of energy while a radiative forcing is a power/unit area. The proper way to convert power/unit into a change temperature is to know the depth of the material being heated (giving power/unit volume), multiply by the time it is being heated (energy/unit volume) and divide by heat capacity (energy/unit volume/degK). ECS (degK/W/m2 or degK/doubling) is a shortcut for calculating how much warming will have taken place at EQUILIBRIUM when the material has warmed up (or cooled) enough so that the change in its thermal emission (Planck feedback) has balanced a radiative forcing. Willis’s question assumes that the planet can respond to a 22 W/m2 forcing with a 12 degC warming in several months. That is as idiotic as asking why the ocean doesn’t freeze every night: 1000 W/m2 change for a half day is about as much energy as 22 W/m2 for one month. However, even when one does the calculations correctly, all one gets is an initial rate of temperature change. As the material warms, its increased emission negates some of the forcing.
Frank, I’m quite certain that Willis knows a whole lot more about Temperature and energy than most people, and I’m sure he knows that Temperature is NOT a form of energy. But it IS a macro characteristic of a particular form of energy namely “heat” energy (noun)
Sorry George. When applying the law of conservation of energy, temperature IS internal energy. Heat capacity tells us how much energy a particular material has stored inside it at a particular temperature. A Watt (the W in W/m2) is energy per unit time (power).
If you put some water in your microwave oven, does its rated power (often 1000 W) determine how much warmer the water will get? Of course not. The amount of warming varies with the amount of water and the amount of time the microwave is heating – and its power!
Whatever Willis knows (Is he too embarrassed to respond?), he exposed at least temporary ignorance of physics when he asked at the end of this post: “why the annual forcing change of 22 W/m2 doesn’t seem to show a corresponding 12°C change in global temperature”. To convert a forcing into a temperature change, one needs to know how long the forcing is being applied (months), how much material is being warmed and what its heat capacity is. To convert power to energy (and eventually a change in temperature) you need to multiply by time! A 22 W/m2 forcing applied for only one month delivers less ENERGY (and therefore temperature change) than a 3.7 W/m2 forcing by 2XCO2 in one year!
Willis can’t use ECS or TCR to predict how much warming to expect from a forcing. The former assumes that warming has reached equilibrium, which takes centuries for our planet. TCR is the warming after 70 years from a gradual doubling of CO2.
This comment is written in hopes that Willis’s future posts (which are sometimes excellent) won’t confuse power, energy and temperature.
David: You raise a good point about my incorrect figure of 1.5%. Willis’s graph was labeled TSI, so I divided by 1463 W/m2 (instead of the correct value, about 1367 W/m2). The earth is about 3.5% closer to the sun in January than in July(152.10*10^6 km/147.09*10^6 km according to NASA’s planetary fact sheets). That should produce a peak to trough range of 7%. The same percentage can be applied to: a TSI of about 1367 W/m2 (to get 102 W/m2) or the global average solar irradiance of about 341 W/m2 (23.7 W/m2, similar to Willis’s estimate of 22 W/m2) or the post-albedo average of about 240 W/m2 (17 W/m2). Due to snow cover in the northern hemisphere, the earth’s albedo happens to be higher when the sun is closer and the range of the post-albedo cycle is about 5 W/m2 smaller than 17 W/m2 . To calculate a temperature change, Willis should be using difference between incoming and reflected SWR, both of which are available from CERES.
None of this changes the fact that it takes decades to approach and centuries to reach the equilibrium warming expected from a forcing. This forcing that changes seasonally. Seasonal changes are eliminated when temperature anomalies are calculated.
“22 W/m2 / 1463 W/m2 = 1.5% change). No 1463 W/m2 is the actual Insolation, not cut to 1/4 by global surface average and day night. The actual insolation increase is about 7 percent. Also the thermal inertia of the earth is not in the atmosphere, but in the oceans.
Willis asks, “I ask you why the annual forcing change of 22 W/m2 doesn’t seem to show a corresponding 12°C change in global temperature.”
+++++++
Because there is not a simple linear relationship. Huge lags and interactions have inertias. It’s not like a DC electrical circuit with a resistor. And it’s more complex than an RLC circuit with alternating current.
@ur momisuglyfrank October 31, 2014 at 12:54 pm:
++++++
Frank has is right, in the explanation he uses. The Lags, that I mentioned @ur momisugly[Mario Lento October 29, 2014 at 9:20 am], refer to the same thing – power over time and resulting temperature –“Rate” of power over time is energy.
Temperature change is far more complex than assuming constant pressure, volume and heat capacity! You know, PV=nRT. We really need to know what the energy in the system is. Is it accumulating? And where does it go and what can it do? In summary, heat in dry air has a lot less energy than heat in water or moist air (which has latent heat energy). So expecting a specific temperature of the planet based on power change depends on the where the energy goes, for how long and in what state the energy exists.
When Frank wrote, “A Watt (the W in W/m2) is energy per unit time (power).” I knew what he meant, though it is not correctly written. And no, I do not think Frank is confused. The Watt, is a measurement of Power. Energy is Power accumulated or integrated over time, often measured in kWhrs. But Frank’s explanation is in the text is correct.
VikingExplorer October 29, 2014 at 2:28 pm
Viking, you may not have been around a couple years ago when we went through all of this “gravity makes it warmer” nonsense with Hans Jelbring.
I wrote about it in a post back then called Perpetuum Mobile. More to the point, Dr. Robert Brown of Duke University provided a lovely proof that gravity couldn’t do what you think it can, called Refutation of Stable Thermal Equilibrium Lapse Rates.
Please read those posts, and in particular, think about the implications of Dr. Brown’s proof as regards your claims. At present you are way off of the rails, and it’s not doing your reputation any good.
w.
>> when we went through all of this “gravity makes it warmer” nonsense with Hans Jelbring. … Dr. Robert Brown of Duke University provided a lovely proof that gravity couldn’t do what you think it can
Willis, thank you for the link to this previous discussion, which I was not aware of. It was quite interesting and educational. To clarify my position, and my previous comments, I’m definitely not saying that the 2nd Law is ever violated, or that a gravity field is sufficient to maintain a DALR.
However, even Dr. Brown eventually said: “Personally, I think the DALR is caused by the greenhouse effect and gravity, working together to maintain the heat differentials that drive the troposphere”.
Why did he make this concession? It’s probably because the prevailing scientific theory is that stars and planets are formed by a gradual gravitational collapse of a cloud of matter. The compression caused by the collapse raises the temperature of that material. This explains why stars get hot enough to trigger a fusion reaction, and why the cores of planets like Earth and Jupiter are hot. Jupiter receives only 50 W/m2, but just a little way in, at 10 bars, it’s a toasty 152F. To be clear, I’m certainly not saying that gravity will maintain that temperature. As Dr. Brown said, when the compression has stabilized, energy starts radiating away into space. However, that process is very slow. Earth and Jupiter are exothermic, bleeding off energy for eons.
In short, I stand by my statement: Planets have a temperature because they have gravity
When Earth was being formed, material collapsed into a growing gravity well, resulting in higher temperatures. In fact, I’ve seen a simulation of one theory where a large planetoid crashes into earth, causing the entire planet to liquefy, and then eventually to stabilize to include a large moon. IOW, planets have a temperature because they have gravity.
>> I don’t think anyone has said that the TEMPERATURE of the earth is equal to incoming radiation.
Actually, AGW proponents make the incorrect assumption that the earth is in radiative balance. The reality is that earth is exothermic (out of balance) and energy generally flows from sun -> land/sea -> atmosphere -> space. If by some complex series of thermodynamic and/or physical transport interactions, warmer air ends up at the top of the troposphere, it will radiate more energy out. Otherwise, extra incoming energy could end up doing extra Work or heating an internal component.
>> IF, as you say, “planets have temperature because they have gravity”, what would be the temperature of the earth if there were no Sun?
The internal energy of the planet would slowly bleed off into space. The temperature of land & sea would slowly drop. People who incorrectly assume radiative balance think the temperature would be 0 K. This is clearly incorrect. The energy in the ocean alone is 290x the energy received from the sun per year. Assuming the same rate of bleed (which would actually drop), It would take 290 years for that energy to bleed off, but that is a tiny fraction of the energy in the crust and core.
Mostly good points by Viking Explorer.
One does need continuing insolation to allow mass and gravity to create a greenhouse effect indefinitely which is independent of GHGs.
The fact is that a parcel of gas which moves up or down within a gravitational field changes its temperature, pressure and volume without any thermodynamic interaction with surrounding molecules. That is what is meant by the term ‘adiabatic’.
You don’t even need a thermodynamic interaction between the gases and insolation because even a transparent atmosphere gains enough energy by conduction from below to cause adiabatic convective overturning to begin. All one needs is uneven heating below causing density differentials in the horizontal plane and that causes spontaneous overturning to begin.
That is the nub of the issue and it is the warming on descent that causes the mass induced greenhouse effect for any irradiated ball of gas affected by a gravitational field whether there is a solid surface beneath it or not.
That is what does not appear to have been taught or learned.
Everyone seems to assume that there ‘must’ be a thermodynamic relationship with surrounding molecules or insolation when a gas parcel moves up or down within a gravitational field but there isn’t any such thermodynamic relationship with surrounding molecules or insolation for an adiabatic process.
It is accepted that no process is completely adiabatic so in reality there will always be SOME thermodynamic interaction between the moving parcel and surrounding molecules or with insolation but that interaction is diabatic and not adiabatic.
The thing is that the nature of the adiabatic process is fundamental to atmospheric temperature (KE), energy content (KE+PE), circulation (climate zones and jet streams) and structure (lapse rates) but it is entirely missing from the radiative theory of gaseous atmospheres.
I have put the adiabatic process back into its proper place in my New Climate Model and, having done that, simple logic and observation causes the real scenario to fall into place in the manner that I have unsuccessfully attempted to describe here and elsewhere.
george e. smith October 29, 2014 at 7:41 pm
Suppose I look at my watch when I start driving my car. Exactly one measured hour later, I find that I have traveled exactly a measured sixty miles.
In other words, I have just MEASURED my AVERAGE speed as being sixty miles per hour.
w.
No Willis, you calculated it, by dividing the total distance MEASURED by the total time MEASURED.
I have no problem with you wanting to know such a result. But the cop will give you a ticket if his radar found you were doing 70 MPH at any time during that hour is the speed limit was 65 MPH. He is not impressed by your calculation that you averaged 60 MPH.
My car CALCULATES near instantaneous MPH, MPG, average MPH, average MPG, and distance to next required gas fill up. It is not capable of sensing any of those things. My average (moving) speed is 18.6 MPH. I never drive at 18.6 MPH, but I do drop below that number, when the traffic bunches up on the 65 MPH highway.
But Willis, as I said, those thoughts are just my opinion. I wouldn’t advise using them in a PhD oral presentation or thesis. My alma mater physics department still teaches in the electronics course that Ohm’s law says: E= I.R What Ohm really said was : R=Constant. E=I.R simply defines R.
And as for Leif’s RMS power, the incremental conversion of electricity into heat (noun) energy, gives dE = i^2.R.dt joule. If you sum that over a complete cycle and divide by the period (cycle time) that gives you the Mean Square (average power) quantity, and if you take the square Root of that result divided by R, is I (rms). But the average power is exactly what is calculated by this RMS process. The RMS label, only makes sense relative to the voltage or current.
Willis, I’m quite happy to have people compute averages, or running averages or any other statistical mathematical concepts or any other thing that amuses them.
That doesn’t change the simple fact that real physical systems have already responded in real time to whatever system variable changes have occurred. They don’t wait around for something interesting, like the average value, to suddenly come along. They aren’t even capable of recognizing it when it happens. There’s a classic argument by Galileo Galilei, that says the average value (or any other between the extremes) WILL come along; but the system will not know when.
And as an aside to the above. despite Dr. Svalgaard’s assertion above, I’ve never made any claims of expertise, about anything. I have referred anecdotally to experiences from my past. Call me a liar if you like; that ball is in your court.
Most of what I have posted at WUWT, has been simply my opinion about this or that. At times when I can point to some text reference, that readers can access, I have done so. I almost never refer to peer reviewed papers, since I don’t have free access to most of them, and I read almost none of them (mostly of no interest to me).
Readers are free to regard my posts as worth exactly what they paid for them. If they aren’t useful; so be it.
As for applying for a job with Dr. Svalgaard; why on earth would I? I’ve never applied for a job with anybody else, so why would I start now.
Frank October 30, 2014 at 7:56 am
While the air 2 m above the land surface may cool 5 degC (or more) and the land surface may cool even more, I’ve read that the surface of the ocean (SST) cools about 0.5 degC at night in most places. This is because cold water sinks. As soon as the sun sets and evaporation and thermal emission continue, the top surface of the ocean cools and begins to sink, bringing warmer water to the surface. If I did my math correctly, a 500 W/m2 average difference between day and night is enough energy to change the temperature of 10 m of ocean by 0.5 degC in 12 hour.
This seems to be an underestimate.
http://ghrsst-pp.metoffice.com/pages/sst_definitions/
To what extent do you think deviations from a laminar one dimensional model (of the sinking) would change your estimate ? Also, does evaporation shut down at some point during the night ?
Phil: See top paragraph of page 722 of http://www.terrapub.co.jp/journals/JO/pdf/6305/63050721.pdf
12 hours of 500 W/m2 sunlight delivers 21,600 kJ/m2 of energy. Assuming my calculations are correct, that is enough to heat the top 1 m of water about 5 degK, the top 10 m about 0.5 degK, etc. The depth the heat mixes into is the critical factor. Your reference does appear to make more sense than mine.
David A October 27, 2014 at 11:35 pm
The earth gains energy over that time, peaking in January
No, but it reduces it somewhat, on average by about 4 W/m2
Unknown, we don’t have sufficient data to figure that one.
Mmmm … dunno. I don’t have a global cloud dataset to hand.
Yes.
Presumably, but the amount is unknown.
w.
1sky1 October 30, 2014 at 3:59 pm
Thanks, 1sky1. If you’d used the “proper scientific usage” to start with, that is to say if you had used “heat transfer”, I would have agreed, and we could have avoided this misunderstanding.
But you didn’t say “heat transfer”, you didn’t say “NET” anything. Instead, your claim was:
Since you were talking about a transfer of energy and NOT a transfer of heat, and since the transfer was specified as the energy transferred from the surface to the troposphere, I naturally took that to mean the ~400 W/m2 of energy transferred from the surface to the troposphere.
However, now it is clear that you thought you were writing about the net radiative heat transfer … given that, next time you might focus on proper scientific usage, and you’ll stay out of this kind of misunderstanding.
In any case, the numbers for NET radiative heat heat transfer to/from the surface are:
Solar radiation into surface ≈ 170 W/m2
Longwave radiation into surface ≈ 330 W/m3
TOTAL INCOMING ≈ half a kilowatt per square metre
TOTAL OUTGOING ≈ 400 W/m2 upwelling longwave radiation
NET ≈ 100 W/m2 GAIN
All the best,
w.
Inasmuch as heat is thermal energy in the process of transfer, I would think
that, in the context of climate, the equivalence of the terms “transferring
energy” and “heat transfer” would be evident. The operative word in energy
budget sudies is transfer, which is always applied to EXTENSIVE measures of
energy.
It is K&T who sow much confusion by showing an INTENSIVE radiative exchange,
based on model-derived estimates of GAT, amidst a host of EXTENSIVE heat transfers. Furthermore, unlike insolation–which supplies a stream of energy to the climate system from OUTSIDE–backradiation is merely a manifestation of thermal storage WITHIN the system. There is no physical power source to sustain the indicated radiative fluxes, which constitute a recirculation of terrestrial radiation, scaled to correspond to estimated GAT. At altitude, the intensity of those directional fluxes would be quite different. System wide, backradiation is simply not on the same thermodynamic footing as insolation.
The upshot of this that the wattage of backradiation cannot be legitimately added to that of insolation to obtain bona fide heat flux balances on a planetary basis. Had Earth been truly gaining 100W/m^2 through radiative means, we all would have been fried billions of years ago. The actual “greenhouse effect” is far more complex than propagandistic cartoons portray.
VikingExplorer October 30, 2014 at 9:30 am Edit
Actually, what you said was:
When you were questioned on that, we got this:
Really? That’s your explanation?
I don’t think anyone has said that the TEMPERATURE of the earth is equal to incoming radiation. However, incoming radiation is in general quite close to outgoing radiation. Here’s the situation of the earth:
Note that once we remove the seasonal variation, the earth has not gone more than ± 0.5 W/m2 out of balance at any time during the record.
Yes, and I provided the proof by Dr. Robert Brown that your claim is nonsense. In addition, Leif asked you for your calculation of the temperature of the earth without the sun, viz:
In response, you ran away from the question so fast that your shoes were smoking … so I’ll ask it again.
IF, as you say, “planets have temperature because they have gravity”, what would be the temperature of the earth if there were no Sun?
w.
“IF, as you say, “planets have temperature because they have gravity”, what would be the temperature of the earth if there were no Sun?”
It would be better to state it thus:
Atmospheres around a planet have an energy content determined by mass, gravity and insolation and those three parameters determine the surface temperature.
One has to have insolation to lift the atmosphere off the surface in the first place and one has to have an enhanced surface temperature (above S-B) in order to continue to hold the mass of that atmosphere off the surface against the constant pull of gravity.
Conduction from surface to atmosphere is what causes atmospheric mass to lift off the surface and convection both up and down then ensues as a result of uneven surface heating placing air parcels of different densities next to one another in the horizontal plane.
That convection then varies as necessary to cancel out any radiative imbalances that may arise between the system as a whole and space.
Convection holds stable the balance between radiation and conduction for the system as a whole.
If one adds GHGs then energy leaks out to space from those GHGs and the energy returned to the surface in the descent phase of convection is reduced to below that taken up in the ascent phase.
That reduction is then offset by DWIR from the same GHGs for a zero net thermal effect on the surface.
Dr Brown’s ‘proof’ doesn’t work because he fails to factor in the conversion of KE to PE as one moves away from the surface and the reconversion of PE to KE as one moves back down again.
Molecules of a gas vibrate faster and become warmer (more KE at the expense of PE) when pressure is increased but vibrate slower and become cooler (more PE at the expense of KE) when pressure is reduced.
In space where pressure is lowest molecules vibrate hardly at all and reach a temperature of only 3K. In a star where pressure is highest molecules vibrate very fast and reach huge temperatures.
The result is that the decline in pressure with height around a planet always results in a lapse rate gradient and the conversion of KE to PE with height prevents the isothermal outcome.