But, why if that is true, why are we in a pause, when there’s been an increase in CO2 the last decade and no correlation with temperature?
From the Institute of Physics:
CO2 warming effects felt just a decade after being emitted
It takes just 10 years for a single emission of carbon dioxide (CO2) to have its maximum warming effects on the Earth.
This is according to researchers at the Carnegie Institute for Science who have dispelled a common misconception that the main warming effects from a CO2 emission will not be felt for several decades.
The results, which have been published today, 3 December, in IOP Publishing’s journal Environmental Research Letters, also confirm that warming can persist for more than a century and suggest that the benefits from emission reductions will be felt by those who have worked to curb the emissions and not just future generations.
Some of these benefits would be the avoidance of extreme weather events, such as droughts, heatwaves and flooding, which are expected to increase concurrently with the change in temperature.
However, some of the bigger climate impacts from warming, such as sea-level rise, melting ice sheets and long-lasting damage to ecosystems, will have a much bigger time lag and may not occur for hundreds or thousands of years later, according to the researchers.
Lead author of the study Dr Katharine Ricke said: “Amazingly, despite many decades of climate science, there has never been a study focused on how long it takes to feel the warming from a particular emission of carbon dioxide, taking carbon-climate uncertainties into consideration.
“A lot of climate scientists may have an intuition about how long it takes to feel the warming from a particular emission of CO2, but that intuition might be a little bit out of sync with our best estimates from today’s climate and carbon cycle models.”
To calculate this timeframe, Dr Ricke, alongside Professor Ken Caldeira, combined results from two climate modelling projects.
The researchers combined information about the Earth’s carbon cycle–specifically how quickly the ocean and biosphere took up a large pulse of CO2 into the atmosphere–with information about the Earth’s climate system taken from a group of climate models used in the latest IPCC assessment.
The results showed that the median time between a single CO2 emission and maximum warming was 10.1 years, and reaffirmed that most of the warming persists for more than a century.
The reason for this time lag is because the upper layers of the oceans take longer to heat up than the atmosphere. As the oceans take up more and more heat which causes the overall climate to warm up, the warming effects of CO2 emissions actually begin to diminish as CO2 is eventually removed from the atmosphere. It takes around 10 years for these two competing factors to cancel each other out and for warming to be at a maximum.
“Our results show that people alive today are very likely to benefit from emissions avoided today and that these will not accrue solely to impact future generations,” Dr Ricke continued.
“Our findings should dislodge previous misconceptions about this timeframe that have played a key part in the failure to reach policy consensus.”
From Tuesday 3 December, this paper can be downloaded from http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/9/12/124002/article
###
“Our findings should dislodge previous misconceptions about this timeframe that have played a key part in the failure to reach policy consensus.”
That is the money quote, in other words there is no time to lose ‘we must act now ‘
That is before the political will and cash has moved on because the whole thing is BS
Some of these benefits would be the avoidance of extreme weather events, such as droughts, heatwaves and flooding, which are expected to increase concurrently with the change in temperature.
The logic of climate science: if we do this, we san stop some things that were never going to happen anyway.
san = can
In a truly shameless attempt to discredit the above post and attached commentary and all the other posts/commentary appearing here at WUWT, Victor Venema–he whose surname will not be bandied about in ribald jest!!!–has cobbled together a post at his pathetic, loser blog, “Variable Variability” (Note: “V”ictor “V”enema and “V”ariable “V”ariability. “VV”=”VV”–Get it? Pretty snappy, huh? I mean, like, that’s just the sort of geek-ball, Mr. Smarty-Pants word play that really appeals to the the ivory-tower eco-flakes who flocculate, in risibly small numbers, at Vic’s sorry, nerd-pit excuse for a blog!) entitled “The quality assurance system of WUWT”.
SPOILER ALERT!!!: VV’s post consists entirely of a single page with the words “This page was intentionally left blank”. Get it?!!! Finished slapping your knee, yet? Jeez…look, VV desperately needs a “sense of humor” and so I’m basically sympathetic with his attempt at a little eco-creep joke, even if VV’s unwonted try for a giggle-booger is, in the final analysis, a big, fat, laughing-at-you-not-with-you, frankly-I’m-embarassed-for-the-guy, spastic-dork, showing-his-ass failure.
But the one thing I can’t forgive VV for is how he so managed to “blow” his idiot zinger-stunt. I mean, like, if you write “This page intentionally left blank” on an otherwise blank page, then that page cannot be factually described as “intentionally left blank”–indeed, IT’S NOT BLANK, AT ALL!!! I mean, like, can’t VV see that for himself, even?–what a doofus, f#ckstick screw-up!!!
If you go to VV’s “Variable Variability” blog, you might be astonished to find that VV has re-produced my above comment as the 7th comment in the thread attached to his post “The quality assurance plan of WUWT”.
Curious, it seems to me, that my above comment, embedded in a matrix of indifference–possibly studied indifference–here at WUWT, and seemingly lost amidst the snicker-snack of yet another of this blog’s typical, work-a-day, comment-thread de-capitations of yet another of the hive’s endless, ever-morphing, hydra-head scare-boogers, should be plucked from obscurity by a big-gun hive-worthy–Victor Venema, no less!–and treated to huzzahs (“beautifully written and funny comment”) of the sort normally only reserved for the gas-bag, ex cathedra utterances of brazen-hypocrite, carbon-piggie hive-biggies, like Al Gore, who, in addition to their mouth-piece duties, serve Gaia as inexhaustible sources of that brown material (the “fresh-stuff” forming the top-most stratum, of course) that perpetually hangs off the calloused nose-tips of the hive-bozo flunky-elite.
And even more “mind-blowing” (hippy-freak talk, for you young’uns), VV appears to extend an invitation to me (and others like me) to “jerk his chain”, with further comments, on his very own blog. Superficially, it doesn’t get any better than that–really! I mean, like, I’d love to mix it up with VV on his own blog–brings back memories of BBD et moi goin’ at it in the threads of “Climate, etc.” (before I got banned) and Deltoid (again, before I got banned). But sorry, VV, I must decline your kind invitation (if that’s what it is) since I caught that “transgressions” business, in an earlier WUWT comment of yours, that precipitated a “cull” of one of my better zingers. I mean, like, I don’t know just how the laws work, in terms of “transgressions”, beyond the good ol’ USA’s free-speech lovin’ borders, and so, out of an abundance of caution, I am currently resolved to limit my comment activity to American blogs, only (pardon my paranoia).
And of further interest, immediately following my above comment, as reproduced at VV’s blog, there appears a trenchant, dazzling, technicolor take-down of the same by an improbable dude sporting the “handle” Steve Bloom, who, in his dismissive critique, brilliantly explores the heretofore unsuspected and endless possibilities of the word “dull” (Steve uses the word twice, within his four-sentence review (“How very dull” and “Double plus dull.”) and as his only adjective, referring to my above comment–not through a lack of imagination on Steve’s part, mind you, but rather, we can be sure, in order to give a minimalist, emphatic edge to his expression of disgust and contempt). All this putting Steve’s evaluation bravely at odds with the expressed and obviously uncouth pleasure VV derives from my “well-written and very funny”, failed attempt at eco-drollery. But then that’s why we need literal-minded, humorless, mind-numbingly tedious, goofus-gadfly, that-creep-out-pest-again!, judgmental, privileged-white-dork contrarians, like Steve.
P. S. Interesting the zeal with which Steve, in particular, but even VV to a degree, defend as legitimate and acceptable the use of the phrase “This page was intentionally left blank” to indicate a page is left blank when the “de-blanking” phrase, itself, on its face, impeaches its own words. And their rationale? Well, it appears that if you Google this or that hive-approved authority, then you’ll find that the use of this “BIG LIE” (see Tim Ball’s post on this subject elsewhere at this blog), party-line-compliant, “blank-page” convention is O. K. for use, despite what your “lyin’ eyes” and common-sense might counsel to the contrary. Sorta like how rational empiricism in the real world has been rejected by the hive-toadies in favor of a climate-model-based, self-serving, gravy-train, parasite-friendly alternative-reality, right? I mean, like, no wonder you lefty, lickspittle sell-outs are so partial to and comfortable with “pretend” blank pages that are NOT, as a matter of fact, blank pages, at all. Comrade Lysenko would be so proud!
P. P. S. Oops!!!–almost forgot the obligatory I DARE YOU, VV, TO RE-PRODUCE THIS COMMENT AT YOUR BLOG EVEN THOUGH IT MAKES STEVE BLOOM LOOK LIKE A BIGGER DUMB-ASS THAN DAVID APPELL, EVEN!!! I DOUBLE DARE YOU!!!
If it’s true what is the CO² doing during the intervening 10 years ? dancing around and missing the incoming radiation and the sideways kinectic forces.
The CO2 limbo?
JK Islander
December 3, 2014 at 10:29 am
Yes. CO² has no demonstrable affect on climate temp. Therefore, as temps rise co² follows .
Thank you.
Even very large volcanoes — VEI 6 eruptions like Pinatubo — have almost no effect on surface temperature averages even as they have a substantial effect on top-of-troposphere insolation as measured on Mauna Loa!
RGB
Willis Ech found no signal from volcanos as well. Interesting n’est pas ?
Willis claimed that the response to a late 18th century Icelandic eruption wasn’t “unusual”. That’s not the same as no signal. The years after it were however the coldest but one for the 75 year period between the end of the Maunder Minimum and start of the Dalton, ie 1715 to 1790. The only colder year was the famous 1740 event, apparently caused by a super-blocking high.
To me, that’s unusual. There were colder winters during the Maunder and Dalton Minima, no surprise.
Big volcanic eruptions (VEI 6 & 7) do affect weather, but not climate. Pinatubo shows up in weather records. So did Tambora, Krakatoa, et al. The effect depends upon the amount of sulfur dioxide and sulfate aerosol released, where the volcanoes are located and other factors.
http://www.wunderground.com/climate/volcanoes.asp
Essay Blowing Smoke in Ebook of same name delves into transitory volcanic temperature influences in some depth. Built around the dissection of a pretty good paper that received much media attention for things it did not say, resulting from a grossly misleading university press release about the paper. In the end, debunks a lot of the aerosol ‘adjustment’ used to cool GCMs that run too hot because they have the water vapor and cloud feedbacks wrong. Explained in other essays in the book.
Thanks!
‘The researchers combined information about the Earth’s carbon cycle–specifically how quickly the ocean and biosphere took up a large pulse of CO2 into the atmosphere–with information about the Earth’s climate system taken from a group of climate models used in the latest IPCC assessment.’
I have Googled it, I have Yahoo’d it, I have Binged it. But I have yet to figure out how much a ‘pulse’ is. Is this some newly invented scientific term for ‘a whole bunch’? If so, is CO2 emitted in bunches? I rather thought that it was a continuous process, the man-made stuff, anyway. (I am sure that women do their part, too)
Of course CO2 from fossil fuel burning is emitted in a continuous process. But if you want to know how quickly CO2 takes effect, and how long that effect lasts, you need to feed your model with a “pulse” of CO2, in other words, a significant quantity that is instantaneously injected into the atmosphere. Then you can track the impact that it has.
As with most issues in climate science, it would be nice if we had a spare world that we could do such an experiment on physically, but we don’t. So scientists construct models that follow the physics of the real world as closely as possible and see what happens when they are subjected to this sort of abuse.
There is, of course, a massive real physical experiment under way right now to see what happens to an earth-like planet if a large quantity of CO2 is added into the atmosphere in a very short period of time. Unfortunately, though, this involves a gradually increasing quantity of CO2 over a period of several decades, not a single instantaneous pulse. So that makes it difficult to see exactly how large the impact of an individual emission is.
If the response to a sudden change of CO2 (a step function) is known, than the response to a slowly increasing amount (a ramp function) is simply the sum or integral of many small step functions each slighly delayed from the previous one. This assumes a linear response of final temperature change to CO2 change which is already assumed by the concept of climate sensitvity (given temp change for 2x CO2).
My goodness. So observations can’t tell us what is happening, but if we look to our models we can see the things that reality can’t. Holy cow!
Or maybe they’re right and the heat is hiding. I read a headline this morning that said the Earth has broiled in 2014, BROILED! I’m not sure what you can broil at 14.5 degrees — maybe tofu? — but everyone be careful not to overcook yourselves when you step outside today.
“But, why if that is true, why are we in a pause, when there’s been an increase in CO2 the last decade and no correlation with temperature?”
The final temperature of the earth is due to the SUM of ALL forcings.
so, if C02 goes up, and other forcings go down, you get a pause.
Pretty simple.
If I have a bank account my balance is the sum of all deposits and withdraws, additions and substractions.
My deposits went UP this month, but my balance stayed flat.
Can one conclude that deposits dont make my account go up? nope they do… all other things being equal.
So my deposits went up and my balance stayed flat.. That must mean my withdrawls went up.
So, I check. Yup the increase in deposits was offset by the increase in withdrawls.
C02 went up. all other things being equal that means it should get warmer.. but it didnt?
What’s the explanation?
1. Check the bank records, did the balance really stay flat. The bank record in this case is the temperature
series.. Checking that record, we see that Cowtan and Way might have a point about missed warming
in the arctic.
2. Check the withdrawls. In the climate there are NEGATIVE forcings that can offset the C02
a) Aerosols
b) heat sequester in the deep ocean.
Are these explanations valid. For example, 2a. there is evidence of more volcanic impact than we though.
2b) yup it could be hiding in the ocean.
Are these explanations the final answer? Nope.
There is nothing suprising about a pause. If c02 goes up and everything else is held equal, then it will warm. However, we have evidence that everything was not held equal. And just like you look at your bank statement to find where the money went you have to look at the forcings to see which one went down.
Also, maybe you over estimated the impact from c02.. instead of 3C sensitivity, maybe its only 2.
Just as we cant be certain that how much warming c02 causes, we cant be certain when increases in c02 are followed by no warming.. because the theory is… when you hold everything else constant and increase c02 it will warm..
When you increase c02 and other stuff changes.. well you have more science to do
Steven Mosher says:
C02 went up. all other things being equal that means it should get warmer…
I agree that when CO2 goes up, so does global T.
But at current CO2 concentrations of ≈400 ppm, any rise in T is so very minuscule that it is unmeasurable. Even an additional 25% rise in that trace gas from here would not cause any measurable rise in global T. Almost all the effect has already happened, at around 20 – 100 ppm.
As Willis points out, CO2 is only a small, 3rd-order forcing — which is swamped by 2nd-order forcings. Both of those are swamped by 1st-order forcings. First-order forcings are all that really matter.
Current CO2 levels are inconsequential. They simply don’t matter, except to rent seeking scientists who benefit from the carbon scare. If CO2 mattered, then we would have seen a measurable rise in global T due to the addition of ≈40% more to the atmosphere. Instead, global T has stagnated at around 2001 – 2002 levels.
Yes, global T has risen as a result of more of that trace gas. But the amount of warming is just too small to measure with current instruments, and higher order forcings obscure any ∆T from more CO2, which is also beneficial to the biosphere.
If things were different I would not argue with what the real world was telling us. If global T was rising along with CO2, I would re-assess, and change my mind. Since it’s not, your side should re-assess. Why don’t you change your mind?
Except that the models didn’t predict a plateau, let alone one lasting so far almost as long as the late 20th century warming cycle.
Therefore, the models are wrong, & their assumption that CO2 is the control knob on climate is also thereby yet again falsified.
Love your bank account record example.
So when you increase CO2 other stuff changes so the temperature no longer increases. Why do you want to cancel CO2 increase NOW? Have you ignored the great beneficial effects of CO2 and that the temperature increase maybe, just maybe, due to it has been so low? Yes, go and do more science for as long as you want.
It is like your boss giving you a salary increase, but yet your monthly bank account does not increase as predicted by the modeler. The modeler calls your boss and tell her she did not make you a favor and she should cancel this increase NOW. The modeler will get back to her once finding out why your bank account did not increase as predicted, this will take a while. Never mind that this salary increase may have had some beneficial effects!
In the bank records analogy, the effect of CO2 on temperature is similar to the effect the amount of interest one might earn on savings accounts is nowadays. For all the good our CO2 does warming things, we might as well stick it under the mattress.
I agree with you first sentence. Nicely said.
Your second sentence I also agree as long as you stick to “CO2 does warming things”. I am OK with this.
But I don’t want to stick CO2 under the mattress when it comes to favorable increases in food production and reforestation. I want CO2.
As for the bank analogy, as long as the modeler calls to stop the salary increase to the one person suggesting the analogy I am fine with it. However, if the modeler wants to stop the salary increase to everybody, forget it, I want mine.
I can’t make sense of this;
“…specifically how quickly the ocean and biosphere took up a large pulse of CO2 into the atmosphere–…”
How does the ocean “take up” CO2 to the atmosphere?
Shouldn’t it read;
“…specifically how quickly the ocean and biosphere compensate for a large pulse of CO2 emitted into the atmosphere–…”
…Can anyone help me out on this? The whole article seems like doublespeak.
And as the oceans warm, evaporation will increase and its latent heat will be transferred to the atmosphere when clouds form, increasing the heat radiated to space. This is a larger negative feedback than that of positive water vapor feedback and will substantially reduce the now expected warming. http://climateclash.com/improved-simple-climate-sensitivity-model/
This is the type of “science” that just makes me angry! Using two failed models to predict a new model. These people should be prosecuted for fraud and have the wages they received for doing this study taken back in fines for the crime!
As the half-life of CO2 in the atmosphere is about 5 years. There is not much left 10 years out. And, as our emissions are such a small part of the annual global budget of CO2, our emissions will have no detectable effect, no matter how you cobble the GH ability of GHGs.
You can cite evidence that the half-life of CO2 in the atmosphere is about 5 years?
Interesting article on CO2 half-life here:
http://euanmearns.com/the-half-life-of-co2-in-earths-atmosphere-part-1/
Short term variances of CO2 are purely a delayed reaction to surface warming of the Southern ocean (best match) — For us colour blind people; upper line is temperature.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3sh/from:1996/mean:12/offset:60/scale:6/offset:1.8/plot/esrl-co2/from:1996.5/mean:12/detrend:33
Professor Lindzen has shown that a high climate sensitivity implies a long response time, while a low climate sensitivity implies a short response time. If a pulse of CO2 reaches its maximum effect in just 10 years, that is a case for a low CO2 sensitivity.
Nothing in this article provides you with such a response.
This article states that a 100 Gt-C emission pulse added to a constant 389 ppm CO2 will create havoc.
Where does this article gives you the CO2 concentration expected over and above the 389 ppm now recorded from this pulse injection?. Nowhere. And for how long? Nowhere.
At a minimum, this article should give a graphical presentation of the CO2 concentration vs time after the pulse injection. None is given.
The authors are not willing to tell us what will be the atmospheric concentration of CO2 as a function of time of their pulse added CO2.
I think it is time to start calling it what it is: This is a halt in warming (if you think the prior reported ‘data’ is accurate). Or it is the early stage of a longer term decline if you use the more nearly ‘raw’ data that didn’t show any real warming prior to ‘adjustment’…
This looks and smells like the PoS it undoubtedly is.
Fix the page title
[done -mod]
Anthony,
No correlation with temperature huh? Well, I can pick cherries too:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B1C2T0pQeiaSbE1Rb2xobGlVdkU/view?usp=sharing
In addition to the last 20 years of temperatures lagging CO2, there are two 20 year periods of declining temps going the opposite direction of CO2 concentration. As we go back in time, each curve is lower than the previous one. It’s almost as if every 50-70 years or so temperatures decline or flatten out a bit. The really curious part is that after each slowdown cycle, the next one occurs at a higher temperature.
Well I guess 2.4 °C/doubling CO2 shown at the top of the graph could be a positive correlation. Turns out there is even a basic 1st year physics explanation for why that’s happening. But I don’t know, maybe it’s pixies wot diddit. What’s your hypothesis?
Found you
Tell more about this idiotic “two-way latent heat”. I need the amusement please and thank you.
mpainter, I replied in context here: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/12/04/whither-the-weather/#comment-1807430
And yes for cripes sake, latent heat goes both ways.