Guest Commentary by Kip Hansen
The New York Times has set a new standard of scientific misrepresentation in this front page title to the latest climate change consensus salvo from Justin Gillis. On the front page of the online edition of the NY Times for 26 June 2017, the title is given: “Sharp Rise in Levels of Earth-Scorching Carbon Dioxide”
The actual title of the article, once one clicks through to it, is “Carbon in Atmosphere Is Rising, Even as Emissions Stabilize”.
Who knows who at the NY Times thinks that characterizing CO2 as “Earth-scorching” is a valid scientific description of one of the absolutely necessary-for-life trace gases in the Earth’s atmosphere. It certainly is not a proper journalistic description.
My objection is that it is a serious violation of Society of Professional Journalists’ Code of Ethics specifically:
What do you think the phrase “Take special care not to misrepresent or oversimplify in promoting, previewing or summarizing a story” might mean in this context?
It is simply scientifically false to label CO2 as “Earth-scorching” in so many ways that it is difficult to begin to write about it. Journalistically, even if it were anywhere near true, it would be an oversimplification.
Is Mr. Gillis blameless? He doesn’t write the front-page headlines. I wish I could say that but I can’t. Gillis writes: “The excess carbon dioxide scorching the planet rose at the highest rate on record in 2015 and 2016. A slightly slower but still unusual rate of increase has continued into 2017.” — this is Gillis’ misrepresentation.
Are CO2 concentrations particularly high? Looking at the NY Times graphic, we see that they are at mountainous heights:
Looking at NOAA’s graphic, not so mountainous:
The NY Times art department (or whomever is making the graphics) has taken data from the NOAA graphic and stretched it vertically to increase the appearance of a large increase.
Re-scaling the NY Times graphic helps some:
Better this:
I must say I can’t see that incredible dangerous increase in rate of rise in the second NOAA graphic — because it is in reality an increase in fractional parts per million. Note that the current spike in the two bar graphs matches a spike from the last El Niño in 1998 and the recent 2015-2016 El Niño .
Is the planet scorching?
No, it is not. For the year so far, we are running about 0.4 °C or 0.72°F above the 1981-2010 thirty-year average, down considerably from the 2015-2016 El Niño peak.
How about the US?
Oddly flat from the 1920s thru the 1980s — [adjusted?] up to flat again in the new century, centering on 53.5 °F or 12 °C — is that “scorching”? It is a bit chilly for me. Note that Global Average Temperatures are in the same absolute temperature range…still not scorching.
But, but, but they say, what about those summertime high temperatures?
For the United States, reader Steve Case “compiled [the data] from NOAA Climate at a Glance data”…then saved a text file of all the states June through September Max temperatures Alabama to Wyoming. Trends in high temps produce this map:
So, maybe not scorching in the US either.
Actual observational stats on extreme weather are not on rising trends – at least droughts (US), hurricanes, tornadoes (US), flooding, etc. Reference Pielke Jr.’s evidence presented to the Senate Committee.
Gillis at least asks the right question:
“If the amount of the gas that people are putting out has stopped rising, how can the amount that stays in the air be going up faster than ever? Does it mean the natural sponges that have been absorbing carbon dioxide are now changing?”
Good question, Mr. Gillis.
Let’s see if the readers here can answer it for you —
Here’s the question:
“If the amount of the gas [CO2] that people are putting out has stopped rising, how can the amount that stays in the air be going up faster than ever?”
Readers: Your answers in comments please.
# # # # #
Author’s Comment Policy:
I am not a climate scientist — I am an essayist, a writer. I have some ideas, but not an answer.
I think that the question is apt and extremely important — it may be, or contain, the key to the current climate dilemma.
I’ll be interested in reading the answers you share in comments, but probably won’t be responding much. [ I may moderate a bit if the discussion devolves into name-calling.]
# # # # #
Kip Hansen:
You ask
I refer you to one of our 2005 papers; viz.
Rorsch A, Courtney RS & Thoenes D, ‘The Interaction of Climate Change and the Carbon Dioxide Cycle’ E&E v16no2 (2005)
It provides six models of the carbon cycle system. There are three basic models and they each assume a single mechanism dominates the carbon cycle system. In each basic model it is assumed that
1. the rise is purely natural
and
2. there is a significant anthropogenic (i.e. from humans) contribution to the rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration.
Thus we provided six models.
Each of the models in that paper matches the available empirical data without use of any ‘fiddle-factor’ such as the ‘5-year smoothing’ the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) uses to get its model (i.e. the Bern Model) to agree with the empirical data.
The superior performance of each of our models over the IPCC’s Bern Model results from our modelling assumption. The Bern Model uses the assumption of anthropogenic CO2 emissions being in excess of what nature can sequester (which is now refuted by the OCO-2 data). Our models assume something has altered the equilibrium state of the carbon cycle system.
The carbon cycle is always moving towards its equilibrium state but never reaches that state because the equilibrium state is constantly changing.
Some processes of the carbon cycle system are very slow with rate constants of years and decades. Hence, the system takes decades to fully adjust to a new equilibrium. The observed rise in atmospheric CO2 is easily modeled as being continuing slow adjustment towards an altered equilibrium.
This raises the question as to what may have altered the equilibrium of the carbon cycle.
One possibility is the anthropogenic CO2 emission. In our models the short term sequestration processes can easily adapt to sequester the anthropogenic emission in a year (which is now confirmed by the OCO-2 data). But, according to our models, the total emission of that year affects the equilibrium state of the entire system with resulting rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration as is observed. This possibility is real but unlikely.
Natural factors are more likely to have caused the alteration to the equilibrium of the carbon cycle system. Of these, the most likely cause is the centuries-long rise in global temperature which is recovery from the Little Ice Age.
Almost all the CO2 moving in the carbon cycle is in the deep oceans and the limiting rate of change of atmospheric CO2 concentration is the rate(s) of exchange of CO2 between deep ocean and the ocean surface layer. Indeed, the drop in decadal atmospheric CO2 growth rate for the 1990s (see the horizontal bars in your plot of annual growth rates) is to be expected because global temperature did not rise between ~1940 and ~1970
Richard
Interesting. Two questions:
1. Do your models account for changes in the carbon isotope ratio?
2. The ice core records seem to max out at about 280 ppm CO2, even during periods that were warmer than the present. How do you account for that?
Thanks, M.
Michael Palmer:
You ask me two questions pertaining to the models in one of our 2005 papers. I answer each question in turn.
Q1.
“Do your models account for changes in the carbon isotope ratio?”
A1.
The models (e.g. as used by the IPCC) which assume the sinks for CO2 are overloaded provide atmospheric carbon isotope ratio changes that disagree with observations by a factor of 3. This is overcome by assuming “dilution”. Our models provide similar discrepancy but require less assumed “dilution” to obtain agreement with observed reality.
Q2.
“The ice core records seem to max out at about 280 ppm CO2, even during periods that were warmer than the present. How do you account for that?”
A2.
Stomata data indicate the ice core Indications (n.b. NOT “records”) of paleo atmospheric CO2 concentration are wrong. There are several reasons why the ice core data of CO2 are misleading. For example, it takes many years for the firn to solidify to sealed ice and atmospheric pressure variations ensure mixing of the gases in the firn during that time which the IPCC says is 83 years. If the sealing time is 83 years then rise of atmospheric CO2 observed at Mauna Loa since 1958 could not be observed because data points would be average CO2 concentrations from two adjacent 83-year periods which as yet do not exist. If you are not familiar with the stomata data then this is a good introduction: As David Middleton there says
Richard
Michael Palmer:
My link did not work for some reason. It is
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/26/co2-ice-cores-vs-plant-stomata/
Richard
Thanks, Richard. I wasn’t aware that the IPCC models don’t fit the changes in isotope ratios.
You are of course right that the ice core CO2 levels are smoothed in time. I’d go further and say that nobody really knows for certain exactly what the smoothing interval would be. As an aside, I also don’t buy the oft-repeated point that in the ice cores changes in CO2 lag those in temperature – too many assumptions go into this determination to be certain.
Still, whatever the smoothing interval, one would expect sustained periods of high temperatures – the Holocene optimum, or most of the Eemian – to show higher CO2 levels than those following the little ice age.
Thanks for the link to David Middleton’s piece on plant stomata, very interesting.
Michael Palmer,
I have had years of discussion with Richard about their models, but have not seen much progress since then…
About the human isotope “dilution”, that is quite simple: about 20% of all CO2 each year is replaced by CO2 from the oceans and vegetation with for the (deep) oceans a much higher 13C/12C ratio than what human emit. One can use that difference to calculate the total deep ocean – atmosphere exchanges, which gives following curves:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/deep_ocean_air_zero.jpg
Thus at ~40 GtC/year deep ocean CO2 throughput, the current drop in 13C/12C ratio with human emissions is completely explained.
The same ~40 GtC/year deep ocean – atmosphere exchange was independently calculated from the decay of the 14C spike of the atomic bomb tests in the 1950’s.
Ice core data are far more reliable than stomata data and Richard is completely wrong on his remarks: there is even a 20 year overlap (1960-1980) between high resolution (less than 10 years) ice core CO2 data from Law Dome and direct measurements at the South Pole:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/law_dome_sp_co2.jpg
Richard refers to the article by Dave Middleton about stomata data, but I have commented there too:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/26/co2-ice-cores-vs-plant-stomata/#comment-559340
Ferdinannd:
NO! You are “completely wrong” in your trust of the misleading ice core data and dismissal of all the information that refutes its misleading indications. But you always ignore anything that refutes your mistaken narrative which pretends to know the cause of the recent rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration.
I again refer readers to the excellent comparison of GEOCARB, stomata and ice core data of paleo atmospheric CO2 concentrations provided by David Middleton that can be read at
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/26/co2-ice-cores-vs-plant-stomata/
and concludes
I agree ( indeed, I said) that assumed “dilution” can explain the gross disagreement between the expected and observed isotope changes. But so what? The discrepancy is a factor of 3 and the “dilution” explanation is merely a possibility that cannot be known to be true,
Richard
Richard,
Geocarb has a “resolution” of thousands of years, thus can’t show any short term variability and completely based on proxies of which absolute level one can have a discussion. Stomata data too are proxies, which need to be calibrated to… ice core data, still the gold standard, even for stomata people. Stomata data show the CO2 variability over land where the plants grow, not the global CO2 variability.
Simply said, if the stomata data have an average that differs from the CO2 measurements over the period of the ice core resolution, then the stomata data need recalibration, not reverse…
Ice core CO2 are direct measurements of CO2 in the ancient atmosphere, not a proxy, be it from a mix of years, not of one moment or one year (neither do proxies, but stomata have a better resolution). Ice core CO2 measurements are done with the same measurement equipment (NDIR, GC, mass spectrometer) as direct CO2 measurements in air.
BTW, the difference in CO2 levels, averaged over a year between Barrow, Alaska and the South Pole is less than 5 ppmv, with an increase of ~2 ppmv/year, starting in the industrial NH. During deglaciations the “speed” of CO2 increase was 0.02 ppmv/year, thus ice cores show global CO2 levels, be it mixed over one to several decades.
I know, your “knowledge” of ice core data is highly influenced by the late Prof. Jaworowski, but his main objections from 1992 against ice core data were completely refuted by the work of Etheridge e.a. from 1996 on three ice cores at Law Dome with extreme high resolution.
Etheridge used three different drilling techniques (dry and wet), measured CO2 in atmosphere and firn down to closing depth and in the ice. No differences found between air in still open pores and already fully enclosed bubbles at closing depth. The difference between average air age in the first fully closed ice and the atmosphere was only 7 years, while the ice surrounding it was already 40 years old. The 40 years closing time and the less than 10 years resolution have nothing to do with each other, only that both are influenced by the local snow precipitation rate.
Even the 560 years resolution of the 800,000 years Dome C ice core are sufficient to show the current increase in CO2 over the past 165 years, be it with a smaller amplitude.
And the 13C/12C ratio “dilution” is as good a proof for the human contribution as adding an acid to a solution and expecting a lower pH…
Richard Courtney ==> Thanks for the thorough reply — interesting.
Kip Hansen:
My pleasure.
In 2008 at the First Heartland Conference I gave presentation of the work, and a video of me doing that can be seen at
https://l.facebook.com/l.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.youtube.com%2Fwatch%3Fv%3DeQtRB60kU60&h=ATObYgy_MOvn8v_bXywxJvXiDXI72PNMaVhk3Kjjk0yNrZGTFxx6gqZibKQ2XmB7Willoh_p9HTzOLg-U4y2x_Wqtg-hgU3jGcOP0Y4FVSRKVofIyHDGAtJHHqDKUrSVNDI4
The video fails to show the visual illustrations I presented but it is comprehensible despite that, and it commences with my providing a parody of a ‘fire ad brimstone’ sermon which may amuse you.
Richard
Richard,
I have looked at that presentation (and the following about the ice cores). Indeed it is mathematically possible to have human emissions as main cause of the CO2 increase as good as mainly natural causes or any mix in between.
What decides is in how far the different solutions match with all the observations. That is only the case for human emissions, which fits all observations. Natural causes as main drivers all fail one or more observations…
Ferdinand:
The ‘overloading’ hypothesis is no better fit to observations than any of the many other possible causes of the recent rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration. Assumptions must be made to obtain a fit of any of them to e.g. the isotope data.
The ‘overloading’ hypothesis (which you promote) is the only one of the suggested causes which is directly refuted by observations; i.e. the satellite data indicates that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are completely sequestered near to their emission sources.
Richard
Richard:
the satellite data indicates that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are completely sequestered near to their emission sources.
Sorry Richard, the OCO-2 satellite has a resolution of about 0.1 ppmv. Human emissions are 0.01 ppmv/day. Even if most emissions are in 10% of the earth surface and the satellite can focus on specific areas for a longer period, enhancing the resolution, it will be a hell of a job to detect any human emissions.
Thus using that as an argumentmakes no sense, the more that in every year in the past 60 years nature was not able to sequester all human emissions, or the increase would be not more that 10 ppmv, as that is the change in solubility of CO2 in seawater with increased temperatures in the past 60 years…
What happened to that O-C-O illustration?
I have since looked for it but it seems to have been removed from the,NASA website
“The New York Times” is an anagram of “The Monkeys Write.” The monkeys make stuff up, too.
Climate4you is brilliant at presenting climate data with great clarity IMO.
The annual changes in CO2 concentration appear to trail the temperature changes by maybe 4m – 6 months in this presentation:
http://www.climate4you.com/images/DIFF12%20GlobalCO2%20HadCRUT4%20HadSST3%20Since1958.gif
How can anyone look at that graphic and not conclude that a (very) temperature sensitive ‘thing’ is creating the CO2, I Do Not Know.
Maybe those with their eyes closed, fingers in ears and going lalalalalala – those afflicted by magical thinking.
Those who cannot be bothered to think, cannot be bothered to do and/or those who pass their thinking buck to others and go with the prevailing crowd.
The temperature sensitive ‘thing’ being soil bacteria.
Is it not a rather wierd coincidence that the temp inside your fridge – below 5 degC (when bugs stop working) is also the temperture that farmers, gardeners and growers know to be the same temp where seeds don’t germinate and plants stop growing.
Coincidence. Not.
Does anybody think about that. Does nobody wonder about stuff anymore? Can nobody put 2 and 2 together and have the guts to speak out the answer?
Its obvious that they are gutless, that they don’t think or don’t want to know, yet the rate doubling thing is something that they should have learned in school, pretty elementary school at that.
Is is that *all* chemical reactions and hence bacterial activity double their rate/speed every time the temp rises by 10 deg C.
The whole mess surrounding CFCs and ozone would never have got the legs it did if someone had just insisted on a rigourous response to that question?
And no-one has insisted on a rigourous response to how the GHGE works and it has resulted in tower blocks of houses being doused with gasoline and, under Government Mandate, almost every building in the UK and Europe being stuffed full of, and clad with, ‘non-flammable oil’
Do you laugh or cry?
Dimicandum.
I am sure that many plants, especially food crops, stop germinating or growing below about 40 F; however, from personal experience in the plant fields (mainly daylilies, in my case), I can say that certain ones grow slowly but perfectly well right down to freezing, while others stop pretty much all activity at 50 F or even higher. With no experimental apparatus, I can’t say that higher CO2 levels could affect those temperatures; but it seems possible, perhaps likely. If I leave my more “tropical” houseplants outside (they stay out from mid-April or early May to early November here in central Virginia), a 35-degree night can stop most of them from growing, and even seemingly freeze some of them (i.e., they die). I have learned to take them in if the forecast goes below 45 F. As for germination: I try to get my seeds planted outdoors by March 15. Some seeds germinate in a couple of weeks, with still some freezing weather ahead of them; they don’t seem to care. Others wait 5 or 6 weeks, thus escaping late freezes. How do they know to do this? All I can say for sure is that they didn’t hear it from me . . .
Peta from Cumbria, now Newark June 27, 2017 at 1:40 am
Its obvious that they are gutless, that they don’t think or don’t want to know, yet the rate doubling thing is something that they should have learned in school, pretty elementary school at that.
Is is that *all* chemical reactions and hence bacterial activity double their rate/speed every time the temp rises by 10 deg C.
Unfortunately your elementary school misled you: all chemical reactions do not double for an increase in temperature of 10ºC. If that were true all reactions would have the same activation energy!
The whole mess surrounding CFCs and ozone would never have got the legs it did if someone had just insisted on a rigourous response to that question?
Since the detailed reaction kinetics for that process has been determined your question based on an elementary school misunderstanding of chemical kinetics is easily refuted.
Peta from Cumbria,
Indeed the CO2 rate of change (in this case diff12) follows the temperature rate of change with a few months, but that is all about variability. Have a good look at the trends in that graph: diff12 of temperature has no trend, while diff12 of CO2 has a firm trend.
That shows that temperature is responsible for all year by year variability, but not for the bulk of the trend…
Most of the CO2 increase thus is not by temperature…
“I think that the question is apt and extremely important — it may be, or contain, the key to the current climate dilemma.”
Kip, as a writer surely you know the definition of trivial.
As a parent, as a navy officer, as an engineer it is extremely important to know what is extremely important to differentiate between what is trivial and important.
A dilemma is letting 16 year old children learn to drive. So far this year this will not be an important for the parents of 14 US babies let to die in a hot car.
My theory is that writers are interested in ppm CO2 as a mechanism to avoid real tragedies. In a PC world we can not be insensitive to parents suffering a tragedy.
Kit ==> Well, important for Climate Science — how important climate science is is another matter altogether.
For 45 years, I never heard of climate science. It used to be that California regulated how many windows you could have to prevent building more nukes. Now climate change is the excuse for such regulations.
It is a clear pattern. Idiots with the moral values of pond scum want to tell me how to live.
Kip please be offended. The ability to craft a coherent sentence does not imply any skills related to understanding science or making good moral choices.
New headline “New York Times Makes Mountain Out of Molehill” 🙂
Looks like the data shows that eruptions like mount Pinatubo don’t spew out much CO2 even though it caused a lot of cooling. Or Gaia is so in sync with her body that she just sucked up that 3% extra but natural CO2.
Robert,
Volcanoes don’t spew that much CO2, but the case of the Pinatubo is quite interesting: not only there was a slight reduction in temperature by the extra dust in the stratosphere, but also a huge extra CO2 uptake by vegetation due to the scattering of sunlight by the dust, which made that leaves normally part of the day in the shadow of other leaves, received enough light to go on with their photosynthesis…
If the amount of the gas [CO2] that people are putting out has stopped rising
The first question I would ask is, has it? Data on fossil fuel usage on a global basis can hardly be exact. Plus there’s a massive black market due to terrorist organizations like ISIS selling oil. Then there’s the OPEC countries, many of whom claim to be cutting back production to support the price of oil, yet the price of oil continues to fall. These are not countries known for altruistic honesty. Plus you have governments virtue signaling themselves to death, insisting that they are taking action and getting results while doing little or nothing. Do you take coal consumption stats from China at face value for example? I don’t.
If it actually IS falling, then that’s a different matter, I’d recommend richardscourtney above.
Isn’t there a fairly recent satellite that can measure CO2 emissions all over the world? Why isn’t it being used instead of ground-based, corruptible estimates?
Roger,
Hardly accurate enough: as human emissions are about 0.01 ppmv/day and the OCO-2 satellite has an accuracy of ~0.1 ppmv, it will be a hell of a job to find any human CO2. Even if concentrated within some 10% of the earth surface and a possibility of the satellite to focus on hot spots for longer periods…
surely this is the fault of an over keen headline writer who got a bit carried away? I do know know this NYT author but many get embarrassed by the over sensationalised headline their piece is given.
tonyb
tonyb:
You suggest
Sorry, but your suggestion is flatly refuted in the above article where Kip Hansen writes
Richard
Mr Hansen, you asked:
“If the amount of the gas [CO2] that people are putting out has stopped rising, how can the amount that stays in the air be going up faster than ever?”
What people? According to published data, currently China and India are ‘putting out’ ever-increasing amounts of CO2, whilst the developed countries are putting out less. But the net result is that airborne CO2 is increasing (a bit). The REALLY important question is: does atmospheric CO2 drive global climate / temperature? I doubt it, as do many truthful scientists, partly because the oceans contain much greater amounts of CO2, and they outgas large amounts of CO2 if global temperatures rise, and vice versa. So rising temperatures CAUSE a rise in CO2, not the other way around. End of CAGW!
Hmm , up in the Arctic-
http://notrickszone.com/2017/06/26/since-2005-arctic-sea-ice-has-pivoted-to-a-slightly-increasing-trend-with-no-detectable-arctic-warming/#sthash.KADsi4DF.dpbs
Nytimes? Ethics? Haha!
If the NYT can’t misrepresent and decontextualize the climate issue they would have nothing to offer in support of the climate consensus.
Annual emissions have stabilized. At a value greater than zero. Thus total emissions are increasing.
Brain scorching stupidity at the NYT. How much more of this nonsense does the world have to suffer?
I’m surprised it wasn’t ” … Earth Scorching Russian CO2″
Like saying that I sleep under a bed scorching blanket.
There is big hole in this Climate Debate, namely volcanic and tectonic activity.
I am no expert here but gather, rightly or wrongly, that:
The total energy generated by this is in order of 40 to 45 TWatts per year which works out at some 0.078 W/sq.m and this renders it as insignificant. Hence the hole.
However this energy is random, localised and intermittent; but nonetheless continuous, being due mainly to the shifting tectonic plates which have defined our continents and climate for millions of years.
I gather that there are some 75,000 volcanoes and up to 1,000,000 subsea vents (aka: Black Smokers?) With 17? So called “Hotspots” dotted around. Iceland being one of them.
Additionally there are thousands of miles of both convergent and divergent Ridge/Rift structures all with various degrees of activity pumping energy into the oceans at different locations. These being the mid Atlantic and Pacific Rifts and the notorious Ring of Fire encircling the Pacific.
All this, being random in nature prevents inclusion in any computer models as chaos is anathema in simulation processes.
Meanwhile, where CO2 is concerned the temperature of the oceans respond to all this locally in conjunction with the atmospheric and radiative influences from above and this could well explain the dilemma posed here in this post.
And perhaps this also goes some way to explain many of the statistical events which cause such heat in our debates.
For instance: Beneath the Arctic there is the Gakkel Ridge which was active around the time of ice reduction in the area, I believe. Also the recent melt in the Antarctic Ross ice shelf, which again has an active Rift lying beneath, with Mount Erebus nearby. And then there is the problem of El Nino. Could this energy be due to subsea magma movement in or around the Pacific?
I certainly don’t know and neither do I have any means to validate any of the information I have listed above.
All I can say is that this obsession with CO2 is currently addling our minds.
The general Cli-Sci approach is to assume that things that are simply too difficult to properly quantify are therefore to be treated as insignificant. Ignored. To be fair, other disciplines also sometimes take the same approach, but not to the same degree, because they know they will get rumbled in less than a decade or two. Cli-Sciists know they can be safely retired and dead before most of their conjectures are proved wrong.
When the idea that an unquantified variable is insignificant becomes obviously untenable, it is often assigned an ‘estimated average value’. Of course, as you point out, there is often no justification for making these assumptions either, but they press on with an “It’s the best we can do” attitude. That the best they can do is still clearly not good enough, matters not one jot when continued funding depends on getting a result, be it a good, bad, or awful result.
“…we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have.”
“Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest.”
Climate Guru, Stephen Schneider.
Although he was addressing climate “scientists”, journalists and indeed all those in the pay of, or somehow beholden to Big Climate took Schneider’s words to heart as being given carte blanche to lie to their heart’s content. The ends (“saving the planet”) justify the means.
The CO2 growth rate will fall below 2.0 ppm in 2017 (after being at 3.0 ppm in the last two years).
Mauna Loa is already recording year-over-year increase below 2.0 ppm in the last several months.
————–
Humans are emitting more CO2 than the natural absorption rates of Oceans and Vegetation/Soils.
–> Human emissions +10.0 billion tons Carbon (flat for three years);
–> Oceans net -2.0 billion tons (but varies from -0.5 to -3.5 depending on ocean warming or cooling in the year) (-2.0 billion is composed of -94 billion tons in and +92 billion tons out each year)
–> Vegetation/Soils -2.5 billion tons (probably doesn’t change much from year to year) (-2.5 billion is composed of -150 billion tons in and +147 billion tons out each year.
Net CO2 change 2017 = Human emissions around +10.0, Oceans -3.5, Vegetation/Soils -2.5 = +4.0 billion tons Carbon growth = 4.0 / 2.13 Carbon to CO2 ppm = 2017 less than 2.0 ppm
————
The Ocean and Vegetation/Soils uptake has also been increasing over time as the CO2 concentration in the atmosphere has gone up or more accurately as the CO2 has increased above 280 ppm.
Ocean/Vegetation/Soils Uptake = [Carbon atm Current 405 ppm – Carbon 280ppm) * 1.8% = Uptake.
Ocean/Vegetation/Soils Uptake = [845 – 596] * 1.8% = Uptake = 4.5 billion tons (2.0 Oceans, 2.5 Vegetation/Soils) =
As CO2 rises further in the future, the net Uptake will also rise along with it potentially catching up to human emissions at some point in the far future, many decades out.
Justin & the Scorchers? 😉
http://cps-static.rovicorp.com/3/JPG_400/MI0001/805/MI0001805866.jpg
Plant food scorches Earth?
Proofs, please?
Natural sources of CO2 emissions must be increasing lately.
A complaint should be filed with the NYT Public Editor.
Oh wait …
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/06/02/public-editor/liz-spayd-final-public-editor-column.html
They were eliminated earlier this month.
#fakenews is now unfettered.
If you’re talking about “scorching” then it’s Maximum temperatures you’re talking about, not the Average. Besides, averages lose much of the information – it is useful to point out that the average of 51 and 49 is 50 and the average of 1 and 99 is also 50. Identical results very different inputs. When Johnny Carson prodded his audience with “It was really hot today” he didn’t have his jokes lined up to make fun of the average temperature.
Kip Hansen posted a graph from WUWT I did a while back, as it turns out it can be expanded to cover more than just the summer months. Climate at a Glance Maximum temperature trends for the United States May – October are flat back to 1921:
http://oi68.tinypic.com/2yu11eg.jpg
That’s 96 years!
Here’s an update of that map of the United States to illustrate what that looks like:
http://oi67.tinypic.com/10er3ps.jpg
My opinion is that folks on the skeptical side of the Climate Change debate way to often accept the language and terms from the other side. “Whoever controls the language controls the debate.” is a well-known quote and ought to be taken to heart. If they talk about scorching temperatures and show a blazing sun and dry cracked river beds then they’re talking about MAX temps not the average.
I should have pointed out that most of those states with a decline of over 80 years actually have declined since the 19th century.
Steve ==> For the record, I do not really approve of this type of “trend mining” — it is neither scientifically nor statistically proper. What your US graph shows is what the eye sees — rising Max Temps from 1900 to the highs in the 1930s, falling to the mid-1960s, flat thru the mid-1980-s, rising to 2000, flattish since. All in all with a RANGE of variability of about 3°F or 1.6°C.
It is interesting historically that on the scale of the last century, nothing much has changed.
Kip Hansen … at 7:40 am
…For the record, I do not really approve of this type of “trend mining”
“Trend Mining” as you call it is pretty much what the so-called “Pause” is all about. How far back in a particular time series can you find find the trend you are looking for. When it extends back just a few years, I am reminded of Skeptical Science escalator animated GIF:
They have a point.
But when you find trends that encompass the entire data set like the 19 states east of the Rockies do, they don’t have a point, at least I don’t think they do.
By the way I did toss out one value, Washington had an outlier negative trend since 1922, and would been assigned “Declined for over 80 years” Linear trend lines are like averages, they lose some of the information. Of means, medians and modes, modes can be multiples which linear trends more or less ignore.
Thanks for the comment.
Steve ==> What the Enforcers at SKS try to override with the longer term trend is that the whole Earth average temp seems to be step-changing to the tune of some combination of factors not understood or even really investigated today. It is unlikely that CO2 is causing that clear pattern that they point out, which is the topoic of the NY Times piece and this essay as well. The scientific thing to do is to investigate why the graph — if it means anything — behaves that way. Instead of being scientific, they take a political stance — Climate Consensus Enforcement.
If it were some other subject, like a medical study, this would be the hot topic of the year until the cause was found.
The point of my comment about trends is that any searched for trend can be found in any data that is irregular enough — even chaotic output, if mined for in that manner. Finding the trend does not MEAN anything other than you were able to find it over some period of time. It DOES NOT MEAN that the physical system producing the data is behaving in the way you might mean by finding a flat (declining or rising) trend over that period. It MIGHT mean what you are hoping to illustrate, and it might not. The finding of the trend is not evidence of anything.
If (note I said IF) car emissions are a major source of CO2, and the reason we have CO2 emissions at all from cars is due to catalytic converters, and the reason we have catalytic converters is due to government requirements, then the simple answer is to do away with catalytic converters.
That’s right those very expensive catalytic converter take the incomplete combustion that occurs in the internal combustion engine which produces carbon monoxide and completes the reaction to produce carbon dioxide Hilarious – Ha ha ha ha ha ha ha!