From NASA Goddard via the OCO-2 Satellite
Carbon dioxide is the most important greenhouse gas released to the atmosphere through human activities. It is also influenced by natural exchange with the land and ocean. This visualization provides a high-resolution, three-dimensional view of global atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations from September 1, 2014 to August 31, 2015. The visualization was created using output from the GEOS modeling system, developed and maintained by scientists at NASA. The height of Earth’s atmosphere and topography have been vertically exaggerated and appear approximately 400 times higher than normal to show the complexity of the atmospheric flow. Measurements of carbon dioxide from NASA’s second Orbiting Carbon Observatory (OCO-2) spacecraft are incorporated into the model every 6 hours to update, or “correct,” the model results, called data assimilation.
As the visualization shows, carbon dioxide in the atmosphere can be mixed and transported by winds in the blink of an eye. For several decades, scientists have measured carbon dioxide at remote surface locations and occasionally from aircraft. The OCO-2 mission represents an important advance in the ability to observe atmospheric carbon dioxide. OCO-2 collects high-precision, total column measurements of carbon dioxide (from the sensor to Earth’s surface) during daylight conditions. While surface, aircraft, and satellite observations all provide valuable information about carbon dioxide, these measurements do not tell us the amount of carbon dioxide at specific heights throughout the atmosphere or how it is moving across countries and continents. Numerical modeling and data assimilation capabilities allow scientists to combine different types of measurements (e.g., carbon dioxide and wind measurements) from various sources (e.g., satellites, aircraft, and ground-based observation sites) to study how carbon dioxide behaves in the atmosphere and how mountains and weather patterns influence the flow of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Scientists can also use model results to understand and predict where carbon dioxide is being emitted and removed from the atmosphere and how much is from natural processes and human activities.
Carbon dioxide variations are largely controlled by fossil fuel emissions and seasonal fluxes of carbon between the atmosphere and land biosphere.
For example, dark red and orange shades represent regions where carbon dioxide concentrations are enhanced by carbon sources. During Northern Hemisphere fall and winter, when trees and plants begin to lose their leaves and decay, carbon dioxide is released in the atmosphere, mixing with emissions from human sources. This, combined with fewer trees and plants removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere, allows concentrations to climb all winter, reaching a peak by early spring. During Northern Hemisphere spring and summer months, plants absorb a substantial amount of carbon dioxide through photosynthesis, thus removing it from the atmosphere and change the color to blue (low carbon dioxide concentrations). This three-dimensional view also shows the impact of fires in South America and Africa, which occur with a regular seasonal cycle. Carbon dioxide from fires can be transported over large distances, but the path is strongly influenced by large mountain ranges like the Andes. Near the top of the atmosphere, the blue color indicates air that last touched the Earth more than a year before. In this part of the atmosphere, called the stratosphere, carbon dioxide concentrations are lower because they haven’t been influenced by recent increases in emissions.
Joseph Fournier writes on Facebook of the surprising thing he’s found:
I have quantified the average ‘lag’ between the seasonally detrended monthly rate of CO2 concentration change at both the South Pole and at Mauna Loa and there is virtually ZERO LAG as indicated by the symmetric function around the y-axis. The second curve is the ‘lag’ in the number of months between when the Pacific Trade Winds decelerate and when the seasonally detrended monthly rate of change in the tropospheric CO2 concentration as measured at the South Pole station reaches its maximum growth rate. This model ignores empirical data as it shows that all the CO2 emissions are in the North Hemisphere and yet monitoring stations in both hemispheres suggest a common area source in the tropics.
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Looking at the CO2 in the video, the average globally would not be 400ppm but lower.
The video narrator uses false logic. Because we know the earth is greening, the amount of CO2 released through decay will increase along with the extra greening. Thrown in differences in how different plants adapt to rising and all other influences on plant life in the NH, like land management, in total huge tracts of land change year on year, mainly in the direction of clearing greenery.. draining wetlands ect.. and add our emissions on top of that.. how much do we really effect the long term trend?
A warming greening world is going to see CO2 increase year on year. CO2 producing lifeforms explode exponentially in warming climates, things like Termites. Sadly, this abstract method of deducing natural CO2 emissions are utterly flawed due to the fact that not only plants advance and retreat in summer n winter but so do a vast number of CO2 producing organisms which increase in population in warming climates.
Half baked science makes half baked claims, the CO2 origin question has one eyed biased assumptions, it’s hardly scientific to claim to know what amounts of Co2 come from where, given we don’t even measure human emissions let alone natural!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
How much CO2 per year does all animals and humans combined exhale in total? 😀
Average human metabolism is about 1 kilogram of CO2 per day or .001 tonnes. For every 12 grams of carbon you eat, about 44 grams of CO2 is released. So you are eating about 270 grams of carbon per day.
So, 7E9 people release 7E6 tonnes of CO2 per day, which is .007 gigatonnes. 365 times .007 is 2.55 gigatonnes annual CO2 added to the atmosphere, which has a mass of about 3090 gigatonnes of CO2.
http://globecarboncycle.unh.edu/CarbonPoolsFluxes.shtml
The page uses atmospheric carbon value of 750 gigatonnes, which is an old number. Current atmospheric CO2 is 3090 gigatonnes, or 12/44 times 3090 tonnes for “carbon”, about 842.
Mark and bw,
What bacteria, fungi, insects and animals destroy or digest is converted into CO2, but that is CO2 which was captured by plants some months to decades before out of the same atmosphere. That is part of the biological carbon cycle, which is currently more sink (~1 GtC/year) than source. The latter is based on the oxygen balance, which shows that the biosphere as a whole produces more oxygen than it uses, thus more CO2 is absorbed than released by the biosphere… See:
http://www.bowdoin.edu/~mbattle/papers_posters_and_talks/BenderGBC2005.pdf
While interesting to know, it is not important in the total biological cycle, as not more recent carbon derivatives can be converted back to CO2 than were captured first by plants. At least not over long periods…
The main exception being fossil fuels, the result of millions of years of accumulation that we are bringing back into the atmosphere to the joy of most plants on earth…
Cheers bw, I had no idea.
According to a good piece written on here, the oil comes from algae that does not have a chance to fossilize. So fossil fuel it’s not 😀
Ferdinand, you have cited Bender 2005 before and I’ve read it before. Note the last sentence in the abstract. “…these fluxes are not understood.”
As a methods paper it deserves respect but they extrapolate a few measurements into a global assumption that happens to support the canonical Keeling hypothesis.
I can also cite a more recent peer reviewed paper that finds that the global oceans are a net source of atmospheric CO2.
http://reef01.marine.usf.edu/sites/default/files/project/cariaco/publications/Astor_et_al_2013.pdf
You can let me know why it is wrong after your read it. I can also cite papers that explain why the biological CO2 gradients in the uppermost ocean layer are underestimated. That means the biological component of biogeochemical fluxes of the oceans are actually underestimated. That means the actual guesses about the biological pump is underestimated and the upwelling CO2 is underestimated. Geological ocean bottom sources are underestimated, and CHANGES in global natural CO2 fluxes over century time scales are completely unknown. This is confirmed by the direct view of global CO2 fluxes by the OCO-2.
Since the anthropogenic CO2 estimates are known to be about 4 percent of global CO2 fluxes, at most, it is obvious that the remaining unknown addition of CO2 to the atmosphere is plausibly explained by the global ocean due to the recovery from the little ice age. It can’t be proved, but the simplest explanation is that the change in atmospheric CO2 is about 4/5 natural and about 1/5 anthropogenic.
bw,
If you cite someone’s work. please quote it literally with the relevant background.
“…these fluxes are not understood.” where the authors have measured these fluxes, which give the year by year variability, not the trend and they don’t know the origin of that variability…
The work of Bender looks at global changes in the oxygen balance, which shows that the earth is greening, the work of Feely e.a. looks at global ocean-atmosphere CO2 changes, which shows that the oceans are net sinks.
What you refer to is the measurements of one bassin just above the equator, which of course shows CO2 emissions. That is not global and can’t be extrapolated to global.
The biological pump is in fact included in the oxygen balance, as all plants, including sea plants, produce oxygen when performing photosynthesis. Once the oceans are saturated, any excess O2 production will reach the atmosphere and counted for…
CHANGES in global natural CO2 fluxes over century time scales are completely unknown.
Indeed, but so what? The net result is known: 800,000 years of a nice correlation between temperature (proxy) and CO2 levels mid the range of Henry’s law are more than enough proof that natural CO2 levels simply follow the temperature of the ocean surface. 290 ppmv for the current average ocean surface temperature. Not 400 ppmv.
Since the anthropogenic CO2 estimates are known to be about 4 percent of global CO2 fluxes
False reasoning from Bart, repeated by you: human emissions are up to 50% of maximum natural increase in the atmosphere over the seasons, not 4%. That is because ocean and vegetation fluxes are opposite to each other, largely cancelling each other out. Only human emissions are extra, each year again.
As only ~50% of all human emissions as mass is removed, the other half remains in the atmosphere and accumulates with the next half in the next year,…
“Carbon dioxide is the most important greenhouse gas released to the atmosphere through human activities.”
“Saliva via expectoration by baseball players is the most important fluid deposited on the playing field. We did not consider perspiration because it is not significant.”*
* We also did not consider precipitation. You know, like rain falling from the sky.
http://s1.postimg.org/ldp9fb6r3/climate_change_spitting.png
“Saliva via expectoration by baseball players is the most important fluid deposited on the playing field. … ”
One hopes .
Thank you Janice Moore for your kind words above.
For clarity, I do not necessarily suggest all or even most the observed increase in atmospheric CO2 is natural – like my friend Richard Courtney I am more of an agnostic on this subject. While this question is scientifically interesting, it is not critical to the assessment of the risks of catastrophic humanmade global warming (“CAGW”). One can make conclusions regarding the risks of CAGW with a high degree of confidence, without fully resolving the primary source of increasing atmospheric CO2.
It is incontrovertible that annual atmospheric CO2 flux (the Keeling curve) is dominated by natural seasonal temperatures – the cause of this seasonal flux is overwhelmingly natural and temperature-driven. It is also incontrovertible that atmospheric CO2 lags (in time) atmospheric temperature at all measured time scales (MacRae 2008, Humlum et al 2013 and others).
Since I wrote that conclusion in 2008, few climate scientists have wanted to even acknowledge this incontrovertible fact. To this day, the mainstream debate between climate skeptics and global warming activists continues to concern the sensitivity of climate to temperature (“ECS”) – or by how much the future can cause the past. 🙂
The following post attempted to focus the debate on what really matters – that based on the evidence, ECS is so small as to be insignificant, and the risks of CAGW are also similarly so.
Regards, Allan
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/04/12/perspective-needed-time-to-identify-variations-in-natural-climate-data-that-exceed-the-claimed-human-co2-warming-effect/comment-page-1/#comment-2477211
Excerpts from the following post:
All that really matters [in this analysis] is that CO2 lags temperature at ALL measured times scales and does not lead it, which is what I understand the modern data records indicate on the multi-decadal time scale and the ice core records indicate on a much longer time scale.
…
It also does not mean that increasing atmospheric CO2 has no impact on global temperature; rather it means that this impact is quite small.
…
What we see in the modern data record is the Net Effect = (ECO2S minus ECS). I suspect that we have enough information to make a rational estimate to bound these numbers, and ECS will be very low. My guess is that ECS is so small as to be practically insignificant.
Regards, Allan
Please excuse the pedantic nature of the following treatise – I am so often misquoted on this subject that I tried to make it very clear where I stand.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/01/24/apocalypse-cancelled-sorry-no-ticket-refunds/comment-page-1/#comment-2406538
[excerpts]
I have stated since January 2008 that:
“Atmospheric CO2 lags temperature by ~9 months in the modern data record and also by ~~800 years in the ice core record, on a longer time scale.”
{In my shorthand, ~ means approximately and ~~ means very approximately, or ~squared).
It is possible that the causative mechanisms for this “TemperatureLead-CO2Lag” relationship are largely similar or largely different, although I suspect that both physical processes (ocean solution/exsolution) and biological processes (photosynthesis/decay and other biological processes) play a greater or lesser role at different time scales.
All that really matters is that CO2 lags temperature at ALL measured times scales and does not lead it, which is what I understand the modern data records indicate on the multi-decadal time scale and the ice core records indicate on a much longer time scale.
This does NOT mean that temperature is the only (or even the primary) driver of increasing atmospheric CO2. Other drivers of CO2 could include deforestation, fossil fuel combustion, etc. but that does not matter for this analysis, because the ONLY signal that is apparent in the data is the LAG of CO2 after temperature.
It also does not mean that increasing atmospheric CO2 has no impact on global temperature; rather it means that this impact is quite small.
I conclude that temperature, at ALL measured time scales, drives CO2 much more than CO2 drives temperature.
Precedence studies are commonly employed in other fields, including science, technology and economics.
Does climate sensitivity to increasing atmospheric CO2 (“ECS” and similar parameters) actually exist in reality, and if so, how can we estimate it? The problem as I see it is that precedence analyses prove that CO2 LAGS temperature at all measured time scales*. Therefore, the impact of CO2 changes on Earth temperature (ECS) is LESS THAN the impact of temperature change on CO2 (ECO2S).
What we see in the modern data record is the Net Effect = (ECO2S minus ECS). I suspect that we have enough information to make a rational estimate to bound these numbers, and ECS will be very low. My guess is that ECS is so small as to be practically insignificant.
Regards, Allan
*References:
1. MacRae, 2008
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/CO2vsTMacRae.pdf
Fig. 1
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1200189820058578&set=a.1012901982120697.1073741826.100002027142240&type=3&theater
Fig. 3
https://www.facebook.com/photo.php?fbid=1200190153391878&set=a.1012901982120697.1073741826.100002027142240&type=3&theater
2. http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/from:1979/mean:12/derivative/plot/uah5/from:1979/scale:0.22/offset:0.14
3. Humlum et al, January 2013
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921818112001658
Allan,
CO2 lags temperature on all time scales (including current seasonal to 1-3 years) except for the period (1850-) 1958-current where CO2 leads temperature by 110 ppmv for the current average ocean surface temperature.
There is no ocean temperature on earth that can increase CO2 levels in the atmosphere beyond Henry’s law as seen in ice cores for over 800,000 years and over 3 million seawater samples in recent decades…
You are misapplying Henry’s Law. It only establishes the equilibrium point between oceans and atmosphere. It does not dictate the absolute level, only the ratio.
If the oceanic concentration increases, then the atmospheric concentration will increase in lock step, in accordance with the Law. And, a temperature rise throttles the transport of CO2 within the THC, which increases concentration within the surface layer of the ocean.
Ferdinand – you keep repeating this mantra and it is simply false.
CO2 lags temperature at all measured time scales – there are no proven exceptions.
Bart,
There is zero indication of any initial increase in the ocean’s CO2. The oceans follow the CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere, not reverse.
And a temperature rise at the sink area’s is good for 16 ppmv/K extra, while we are at 110 ppmv above steady state and locally 250 μatm more CO2 pressure in the atmosphere than in the ocean surface at the sink area’s.
And no temperature in this world can change the transport of CO2 within the THC or any other water (the “throttling” is only in your imagination), temperature only influences the exchanges between the ocean surface and the atmosphere in both directions, according to Henry’s law as above.
Allan,
From Etheridge e.a. CO2 at Law Dome ice core (~20 years resolution):
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/law_dome_1000yr.jpg
Temperature drop 1200-1600 ~0.8 K (Moberg, Esper,…); CO2 drop ~6 ppmv
Temperature increase 1600-2000 maximum as much as the drop 1200-1600; CO2 increase ~100 ppmv
Which is leading and lagging here?
You too Ferdinand – please read what I wrote!
Allan,
I have carefully read your texts since 2008 and commented several times…
Where my objections are is in the following sentence:
Atmospheric CO2 lags temperature by ~9 months in the modern data record
That statement is not right, what you see is: variability in the atmospheric rate of change of CO2 lags the variability in rate of change of temperature by ~9 months in the modern data record. Thus the noise around the CO2 increase lags the noise in temperature with ~9 months. That noise is not more than +/- 1.5 ppmv around a trend of +80 ppmv in recent decades and zeroes out in 1-3 years.
Looking at the noise in the derivatives can tell you that the noise in the CO2 rate of change is caused by temperature variability, but doesn’t tell you anything about the cause of the trend itself, as by taking the derivatives you have largely detrended the CO2 increase…
In this case, the CO2 trend leads the temperature trend beyond anything seen in the past 800,000 years and far beyond what Henry’s law says about the solubility of CO2 in seawater.
The Japanese, with GOSAT, deciphered the data in such a way that you could see the basic, large scale, CO2 sources and sinks. Inconveniently, they did not conform to the CO2 temperature control knob meme.
Later the initial OCO2 product did the very same. However, NASA has entirely obscured the basic, large scale, CO2 sources and sinks in their recent very elegant 3D visual.
How about it NASA…can we return to a much simpler, less elegant presentation of the data; one that reveals the basic, large scale, CO2 sources and sinks?
Sorry, bad for funding.
Why does NASA depict CO2 in orange and deep reds? Why not greens and deep blues? It is plant food after all. On the other hand, the roiling hot colors do lend excitement to the video. Reminds me of the “HELL IS REAL!!!” videos on YouTube; all the NASA mock-up needs to add is the wails of the damned.
go get the data. do your own color scheme.
Typically folks just pull a pre built color ramp or color theme from the package they are using
No.
I don’t think that video supports the notion of a thousand year residence time for CO2 in the atmosphere.
There’s another David Crisp video that’s well worth watching :
Note that Crisp spends only a sentence mentioning the issue of “climate” , but then gets quantitative .
This article by Erik Swenson back in 2015 gives the picture in detail.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/10/04/finally-visualized-oco2-satellite-data-showing-global-carbon-dioxide-concentrations/
Compare the graphic for Apr 1 – May 15, 2015 with that for Jul 1 – Aug 15, 2015. Note that as soon as plant life in the northern hemisphere becomes active, the entire winter’s accumulation of CO2 is gone in 3 months. After reading this I am under no illusions about how long anthropogenic CO2 remains in the atmosphere.
Let’s be clear about OCO-2 it was launched to considerable fanfare and claims (largely borne out by some published results) that it had unprecedented accuracy and spatial resolution.
It would identify individual sources of CO2 as well as provide global coverage.
What have we seen ?
– in a single word obfuscation – driven in no small part by the instrument’s observations colliding with the prevailing hypothesis about how it all works.
So what would the earth be like without an atmosphere?
The average solar constant is 1,368 W/m^2 with an S-B BB temperature of 390 K or 17 C higher than the boiling point of water under sea level atmospheric pressure, which would no longer exist. The oceans would boil away removing the tons of pressure that keep the molten core in place. The molten core would rupture flooding the surface with dark magma changing both emissivity and albedo. With no atmosphere a steady rain of meteorites would pulverize the surface to dust same as the moon. The earth would be much like the moon with a similar albedo (0.12) and large swings in surface temperature from lit to dark sides. No clouds, no vegetation, no snow, no ice a completely different albedo, certainly not the current 30%. No molecules means no convection, conduction, latent energy and surface absorption/radiation would be anybody’s guess.
Whatever the conditions of the earth would be without an atmosphere, it is most certainly NOT 240 W/m^2 and 255K.
Model:
https://youtu.be/EGQsBmzFM_g
Reality:
If just falling leaves in SH autumn can overwhelm all the world’s cars, factories and power stations in CO2 emissions, even for only one month of the year, it puts anthro CO2 in perspective as of minor significance.
I find it amazing the NASA can turn the spot results from a satellite that orbits the earth completely every 16 days, into a data set that shows eddies etc of CO2 in 3D across the globe.
These eddies shown in the data to be fluctuating at a sub 24 hour timescale!!
Doesn’t the earth rotate as the satellite orbits, causing a 16 day lag before you get back to the same position above the earths surface?
Who knew they are this good!! /s
The Orbiting CO2 Observatory attempts to use a passive measurement of O2 opacity, and combines it with the active measurement of the tops of CO2 (ordinary air) columns, to arrive at a concentration ppv: http://www.atmos-meas-tech.net/10/59/2017/amt-10-59-2017.pdf
In other words, they are painting a picture by comparing apples with oranges