Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
[SEE UPDATE AT THE END]
Due to the recent posts by Lord Monkton and Nick Stokes, I’ve been thinking about the relationship between radiation and temperature. So I turned to the CERES dataset. Here is a scatterplot of the monthly global average surface temperature versus the monthly global average downwelling total radiation absorbed by the surface. The total radiation is the sum of the net solar radiation at the surface and the downwelling longwave radiation at the surface. I’ve removed the seasonal variations from the data.
Note that 3.7 W/m2 is the increase in downwelling longwave radiation expected from a doubling of CO2 …
When I saw that, I thought well, maybe the increase is small because there’s a lag between the absorption of the radiation and the warming. To see if that was the case, I did a cross-correlation analysis of the relationship.
No lag visible.
Now, I get busted regularly for drawing what I’m told are the wrong conclusions from the data that I present. So I’m just gonna say …
Comments?
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Me, I’m writing this from banks of the Kenai River in Alaska, one of my favorite spots in the world. When I got off the airplane, the aroma of the air was absolutely intoxicating. Summertime is short here but the days are long, and the air is full of the heady perfume of every plant and every animal growing and going at triple speed, making the most of the brief Alaska summer. Here’s what the sun is doing today this far north …
[UPDATE] Someone asked what temperature I’m using. I used the conversion of the upwelling longwave radiation from the surface. However, the answer is only slightly different if I use, for example, the HadCRUT surface temperature. Here is that result:
As you can see, there is no significant difference when I use the other surface temperature dataset.
My very best regards to all, may your days be as full of sunshine as mine,
w.
PS—My usual request: when you comment, please quote the exact words you are responding to, so we can all be clear about who and what you are talking about.
PPS—Bonus question. What latitude on the planet gets the most hours of sunlight per year?
Due to orbital eccentricity, the North Pole (currently) receives the most hours of sunlight. The Earth’s eccentricity causes a slightly slower orbit during Northern Hemisphere Summer.
If Earth’s orbit was perfectly circular, all latitudes would average 12 hours sunlight per day.
Since the Earth’s axis processes, this relationship will change in the future.
“If Earth’s orbit was perfectly circular, all latitudes would average 12 hours sunlight per day.”
Dead wrong. The correct statement would be: if the polar axis were perpendicular to the earth’s orbital plane (around the sun) “all latitudes would average 12 hours sunlight per day.” The word ‘equinox’ was well defined by Chaucer: “This circle is also called the Equator, that is the measurer of the day, because when the Sun is at the start of Aries and Libra, the days are same length everyplace in the world. Therefore, these two signs are called the equinoxes.” –AGF
If the polar axis were perpendicular to the earth’s orbital plane, then all latitudes would receive 12 hours of sunlight per day, every day of the year.
With the axis not being perpendicular, the amount of sunlight varies throughout the year, but if the orbit was perfectly circular, the average amount over the year would work out to 12 hours a day.
Dead right.
And yet that’s what the OP wrote.
Methinks that if the polar axis were perpendicular to the earth’s orbital plane (about the sun) then the exact north and south poles would receive continuous sunlight, assuming no blockage from surrounding higher ground elevations. True, the sun would directly on the horizon, and perhaps half of the solar disk would be blocked by the horizon, but the poles would nevertheless being receiving continuous solar radiation in such a hypothetical situation.
Uhhh . . . “higher ground elevations” in my above post obviously includes ice.
And apologies for the typos (dropped “be” and “being” instead of “be” in last sentence). Sigh . . . too early in the morning, my time.
Final note: the solar disk subtends an apparent disk angle of 0.53 degrees in the sky at 1 AU, thus insuring that sunlight would actually fall on the top of an perfectly spherical or perfectly oblate-spheriodal Earth.
The Arctic Circle has the longest total annual daytime… 4,647 hours, while the North Pole receives 4,575. About 3 days more on the Arctic Circle than the North Pole. This is annual amount of daytime…the amount of time the Sun is above the horizon. Because of elliptic nature of the Earth’s orbit, the Southern Hemisphere is not symmetrical: the Antarctic Circle, with 4,530 hours of daylight, receives five days less of sunshine than its antipodes. The Equator has a total daytime of 4,422 hours per year. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunshine_duration
Hmm, the question was most hours of sunlight not daylight. Given the hours of daylight vary very little with latitude (4422 to 4647 according to Earthling2) the impact of cloudiness is likely to be far more significant and the least cloudy areas of earth are at the edges of the Hadley cell ie: latitudes 30 degrees north and south – which is where most of Earth’s deserts are. It is due to the already dry descending and thus warming air at the edges of the Hadley cell which results in a permanent band of high pressure at these latitudes.
Yup, looks like about 0.5 C for a CO2 doubling (3.7 w/m2).
But I forgot, it’s all about the magical-mystery water-vapor enhancement! /sarc
WV bands are saturated. CO2 (which is the same bands except for 15 um) does nothing.
This the correct answer.
http://us-climate.blogspot.com/2015/06/daylight-and-twilight.html
Remember to account for refraction — the atmosphere bends incoming light, so the average day anywhere is a bit more than 12 hours. The sun appears in the sky for a while both before sundown and after sunup when, by a true straight line, it would be below the horizon.
The effect is surely greatest where the sun’s apparent path is most oblique, as opposed to perpendicular, to the horizon — that is, at higher latitudes both north and south during their respective summers. I now live at about 58 degrees north, and I notice that at winter solstice there is about seven hours of daylight, but now at summer solstice there is about 6.5 hours without daylight — so the situation is not symmetric!
No one processes data as interestingly as Willis Eschenbach. If his first graph is correct – and, knowing him, it probably is – then the combined effect of forcing and feedback on global warming is negligible.
In that event, it is puzzling that official climatology assigns only a plus-or-minus-10% uncertainty to the directly-forced warming of 1.05 K per CO2 doubling (i.e., per 3.7 Watts per square meter of radiative forcing), a value thrice the 0.38 K equilibrium warming after feedback has acted that Willis has found.
This is an interesting result indeed, and it bears out the conclusion of the Connollys pere et fils – also no slouches at data handling – that there is no detectable influence of the water vapor feedback in the radiosonde data.
I hope that Willis will write this result up as a paper for peer review and publication.
The earth’s axis “precesses” in a wobbly circle with a cycle length of 22,000 yrs due to the effects of the sun and moon and the other planets tugging on the bulging equator. The earth’s orbit itself also slightly processes with the focal point being the sun though this orbital precession is not nearly as dramatic as that of Mercury. The earth’s axial precession causes a gradual 90 degree shift in the location of the equinoxes to a different point in the earth’s orbit as well as the axis pointing toward a different pole star approximately every 5500 years. So the appropriate pole star 6000 years ago to indicate north would have been the star at the end of the handle of the Big Dipper. Also 11,000-16,500 years ago, coinciding with the ending of the last Ice Age, the winter solstice would have occurred at a different location in the earth’s orbit, shifted 180 degrees slightly further distant from the sun due to the eccentricity of the orbit. The current location at the winter solstice is at a point closest to the sun. One presumes 11,000 yrs ago somewhat less solar radiation was received by the northern hemisphere by the the location of the earth at winter solstice. Though I’m not sure of the difference in actual received watts/m^2. The axial tilt would have been slightly different as well though I’m not sure of the change from the vertical compared the current tilt at that time. The book Ice Age (2001) by John and Mary Gribbin introduced me to the Milankovitch Cycles (beside precession of the equinoxes, the other two being orbital eccentricity with a cycle of 100,000-110,000 yrs and variation in axial tilt currently 23.5 degrees from vertical nodding up and down with a range of 3 degrees, referred to as nutation with a cycle of 41000 years) and the exciting history of the discovery of the ratios of atomic O16:O18 isotope chemistry developed as surrogate for T anomalies and magnetometer dating science in cores of ice cap and deep ocean floor that led to the acceptance of Ice Ages, their occurence every 110,000 yrs during the past 2.5 million years or so. It’s fascinating to us amateurs.
Conclusion: Minor variations in a minuscule atmospheric gas doesn’t have much impact on earth temperatures. There are too many other massive energy transfers for such a small perturbation to have a significantly discernible effect.
I remember crossing the Kenai river on the way to Homer one year, when there must have been a salmon (steelhead?) opening–the river was a forest of fishermen. I had two instant thoughts:
1. How many fights must have broken out that day due to tangled lines?–these were (probably armed) Alaskans! (I’d seen a LOT of Alaska’s highway signs by then.)
2. How on earth did any fish manage to get upstream through the forest of legs in hip waders–it was a close-spaced grate capable of diffraction!
(There was no thought of any issue of global warming though; the world was at that time still in a settled-science panic because it was going to freeze.)
Thanks, Len. On the Kenai, that’s called “Battle Fishing”. And if you want real fun, toss in a few grizzly bears …
w.
Len: Most likely was the Red Salmon run. There are millions that go through it. Fights are surprisingly few, most fishermen are decent people and capable.
Willis: As locals, we always called it ‘Combat Fishing. Now, mostly Grizzlies are fine to fish around. They prefer the shallows to the pools we want fish out of.
Oh wait–I think it was what they call a ‘King salmon’ (Chinook) up there–and I heard a short time later on the radio that a record fish had just been caught–such that from the timing someone must have been landing it just as we drove over the highway bridge. An interesting memory.
Actually, Willis, its called Combat Fishing by locals (I was a local). After Combat Fishing for awhile, most fisher-people learn how to avoid line-fouling.
Armed Alaskans that participate in Combat Fishing know most everyone else is armed; no altercations.
Since netting fish is unlawful, the vast majority of salmon get through the lines of fisher-people. After individual fish runs are determined to be sufficient to ensure salmon survival, State officials will allow limited netting.
The excitement of a 45 pound King Salmon on the line is indescribable. The group I got into with on the Kenai Peninsula used fly rods, 20 pound test lines, and treble-hooks with the barbs removed. It took a lot of skill and resulted in some epic battles. I was once dragged down a stretch of the Anchor River near Homer into the Cook Inlet where, as the waves washed over the top of my full-body waders, the line snapped when the reel ran out of line as I ran out of ground to move forward.
You should have seen the one that got away.
It was called Al Gore.
Willis – your assignment is to report back on the effect of increasing atmospheric CO2 on the number and size of the salmon. (Mepps Flying C per chance?)
Farmer
That’s easy. It’s a very large and obviously catastrophic effect that will shrink their size by half and their numbers by 97%
Tonyb
Or it will increase their size by 14%
He’s a trout, an old one, not a salmon.
I’ve always heard it called Combat Fishing. I’ll be there next week but not to fish.
Yeah, commenters are right, it’s “combat fishing”. Gol-dang memory …
w
Easy fix to “Combat Fishing”. Hook up with a local.
https://imgur.com/gallery/T3zuY4B
Thanks, Renee, nice shots. For those interested in my history on the Kenai, see Fishing The Mighty Kenai …
w.
I feel so lucky to enjoy and study the Kenai River during this Holocene interglacial period. It’s been a glacier for 70% of the time over the past the 100,000 years.
http://dggs.alaska.gov/webpubs/dggs/gb/text/gb008.pdf
Does the FAA still send out inspectors to paint tail numbers on the mosquitoes?
Mosquitoes up there are now required to have ‘black boxes’ and collision avoidance systems.
When we took a rental RV down the Alaska Highway a couple of years ago, we were told to be careful otherwise the mosquitoes, given the chance, would carry us off and come back later for the RV.
In Alaska, you can even see the no-see-ums (Culicoides).
I remember being in Fairbanks in early-April in 1967. Water was running in the creek beds, but the ground was still covered with snow — and the mosquitoes were already out and flying around!
Out on the Aleutians it was too windy for mosquitos, one of not very many benefits to being there.
Len says:
How on earth did any fish manage to get upstream through the forest of legs in hip waders–it was a close-spaced grate capable of diffraction!
Quantum effects. Some fish magically appear past the fishermen if they’re not observed. 😉
12 degrees South gets the most DWSR, so I assume that that is proportional to the amount of sunlight received.
Just get yourself a bucket of cold water and a heat gun and try putting heat through the surface of the water, You can’t, that tells the story
Get yourself a handful of air with a dewpoint higher than that of the water. That will add heat to the water as the water vapor condenses (and forms dew?) on the water. The inverse of evaporation, wet bulb temperatures, all that good stuff.
I have said it before, and I will say it again: The Sky cannot heat the Surface of the Earth, and the Sky cannot heat itself. The Sun heats both. CO2 absorbs 15 micron IR, thermalizes it low in the Atmosphere, absorbs and reradiates it high in the Atmosphere.
The IR absorbing sky does not (generally) heat the Earth, but it does radiate some energy to the Earth in a process that is effectively radiation partial insulation, which does result in a higher temperature. An analogy (not the same process but similar in effect) would be to put a clear blanket with some vent holes over the surface.
Leonard Weinstein,
Do you know what Thermalization is? It seems that you do not. CO2 radiates at 15 microns, corresponding to a temperature of -80 C. When this radiation encounters an object which is warmer than -80 C, it is simply reflected, not absorbed, no heat is transferred from the colder gas to the warmer surface. Yes, photons do that. This is the nature of the Second Law, and if humans know anything about physics it is the First and Second Laws of Thermodynamics.
Next time it’s cold outside – do not don a jacket. After all, jacket cannot heat your skin.
If you wrap a coat around a steel ball at 98.6 degrees F, its temperature does not increase. Why not?
Your body is a heat source. Efficiency of a human body is roughly 22%, and most of the expended energy is released as heat. When you are not physically active – your produce 40-45W per m² of your skin. Therefore you are in radiative equilibrium with your environment if it’s ~10K colder than your body. Human skin is on average 33°C, that’s why temperatures around 23°C are so pleasant to us. Your body radiates 450W, and is receiving ca. 400W.
Now, what happens if it’s 0°C outside? Your body still radiates 450W, but from the environment you’ll receive just 287W. You’ll lose over hundred Joule per second, and will soon be cold and dead. Now you don your jacket. Heat transfer is slowed down and after an equilibrium is established, your jacket will be on the outside the same 10K warmer than the environment. The heat flux is the same 40W, but the jacket emit just 330W, and receives 287W. The jacket will also have temperature gradient, which will be defined by the thermal conductivity of the jacket material. In our case heat flow is known – it’s 40W/m², temperature difference is 23K, and thermal conductivity for thinsulate is 0.023W/m*K. Therefore your jacket has to be 13mm thick – then you are perfectly warm.
What happens here is that the equilibrium surface is pushed outwards, away from your skin. For that you need a medium that can slow down heat transfer. It’s the rate of the slowdown, which defines the temperature gradient. No slowdown – no gradient – no jacket effect.
Exactly the same thing happens in the atmosphere. The equilibrium surface is 5500m away and CO₂ is one of the factors that define the slowdown. The slowdown happens because absorption and re-emission take time. The time is minuscule, but not instantaneous. And exactly that makes CO₂ a “jacket-gas”.
Anyway, I think the back-radiation approach is physically not correct. My approach would be to calculate thermal conductivity of the radiative transfer and how CO₂ influences it. BTW, the lapse rate of the atmosphere is the equivalent of the temperature gradient in the jacket. If CO₂ significantly influences the thermal conductivity of the atmosphere, then the lapse rate should change. Since we don’t see it – I’d suspect that CO₂ influence is rather smallish.
Well put.
It is not a matter of conductivity (which is extremely low for gases), nor of absorption and re-emission since the absorbed energy is almost always thermalized before it has time to be re-emitted. The absorbed energy is instead transported by convection. Convection moves considerably more heat away from the surface than radiation.
@tty I’ve never meant to reduce my argument to radiation only.
Because the room temperature is 75 degrees. (Assumed steady temperature.)
Your steel ball will cool to eventually approximate 75 degrees.
If the room temperature were kept at 150 degrees F, then the steel ball also would eventually approximate 150 degrees F. (Some thermal lag in both cases. Greater or more efficient insulation = greater thermal lag. Greater steel bearing mass = greater thermal lag. Too much insulation = faster cooldown in most cases. )
Stupid question…what software do you use for your charts?
Michael, I do almost all my work in the computer language “R”. It’s the best language I’ve used in my 50+ years of programming computers.
w.
Yes I’ve seen you mention R many times over the years, ditto with Steve McIntyre.
I just wonder why I don’t see more of it in the world…so many charts are clearly done in Excel.
Excel is much easier to use than writing R code. Especially if you are only looking for quick trends and simple statistics.
Renee June 8, 2019 at 9:47 pm
I love Excel, and I can make it sit up and spit pickle juice. I’ve written hundreds of macros, and even wrote hooks into it to make it run C code … but it is slow and lousy for big datasets.
For example, each of the CERES individual datasets, such as say the surface downwelling longwave, is 180 rows by 360 columns by 216 layers. That’s a total of 153,964,800 data points for each dataset … and often I’m comparing four of them. Try that in Excel.
Now, suppose I want to add an offset to every one of those individual data points, say plus 5. The surface longwave dataset mentioned above is called surf_lw_down_all.
In Excel, I’d have to create a new dataset of the same size by writing a formula like
=A1 + 5
in each of the 153,964,800 cells.
And it would take hours to run …
In most other computer languages, to add 5 to each cell of the array you’d have to write something like:
for myrow = 1 to 180
….for mycolumn = 1 to 360
……..for mylayer = 1 to 216
…………surf_lw_down_all[ myrow, mycol, mylabel] =
surf_lw_down_all[ myrow, mycolumn, mylabel] + 5
……..next mylayer
….next mycolumn
next myrow
(ignore the dots, they’re just for formatting, WordPress won’t let you indent lines)
In R, on the other hand, I just say
surf_lw_down_all = surf_lw_down_all +5
That’s it. No need to write nexted loops to address each of the hundred and fifty million individual data points.
It takes R maybe a second to run that.
Anyhow, that’s why I use R instead of Excel. To be clear, I’ll use Excel for certain quick-and-easy calculations, but R is industrial strength.
Finally, R is free, cross-platform, has free packages for everything from obscure statistics to 3D graphics, and it has a killer user interface called RStudio. RStudio has features like, click on the name of a function to jump to wherever you defined the function, even in another file. And it has function completion, spreadsheet-style inspection of data, and lots of other great features.
Steve McIntyre talked me into learning R. I’ve been programming computers since 1963, over half a century now, and it was a real eye-opener … I’ve blessed Steve many times since then for his persistence in telling me I needed to move up to the big leagues.
Anyhow, that’s why I use R …
w.
You don’t see much of R in the world because you’re in the wrong industry. In Data Science and predictive modeling, everyone uses R or a handful of other tools (and almost everyone was lol at least use R occasionally).
It’s actually a good litmus test for the competence of anyone’s Analytics or Business Intelligence department – do they ever use R? If not, it’s a very immature group.
So can we just say an increase of 1 Watt/m² causes ~0.1K warming?
Bonus Answer – All latitudes get the same total hours each year.
The shame of it is that there are places in this world where the extra daylight is wasted as you have to sleep, and you pay for it in the winter with months of miserable cold darkness – too many years living in Scotland!
We have a winner! Every spot on the earth receives the same amount of direct sunshine … curious but true.
Thanks, Alec.
w.
I believe VaughnBeethoven is correct. The North Pole currently has (very)slightly more hours of direct sunshine.
Willis, I assume you mean the same duration of sunlight, not the same “amount” (total Joules/m2 or W/m2)
Another way of expressing this surprising truth:
For every point on the earth, on average the sun is above the horizon exactly half the time.
Chris
With Earth being inclined to its orbital plane by 23.5 degrees and having a slightly elliptical orbit about the Sun (e=.0167), Kepler’s second law would say this cannot be true. Reference the second OP to this article by Earthling2.
>>
For every point on the earth, on average the sun is above the horizon exactly half the time.
<<
Dr. Spencer is right–it’s not the same amount in W/m^2. Also, due to refraction by the atmosphere, it’s not exactly half either.
Jim
Except when there has been a solar eclipse.
My guess on the latitude with most sunlight is 90N and 90S. The sunlight actually precedes the Sun poking above and below the horizon due to refraction. At 90N/S it will “hang” on the horizon as the Sun slowly drops down or rises at the Equinoxes, giving more sunlight over the total year.
I suppose you also have to take into account the speed of the Earth around the Sun but without looking it up, I’m guessing it is about the halfway point at each Equinox, so it won’t matter between 90N and 90S.
Close?
90N, since the orbit is elliptical, perihelion during the summer, and the Sun shines also a bit below the horizon. Just a guess might be more complicated though.
Perihelion is in early January, hence northern hemisphere winter, southern hemisphere summer.
mcswell
Perihelion is in early January, hence northern hemisphere winter (Nov-Dec-Jan-Feb) has a higher solar radiation level at TOA than does northern hemisphere summer, southern hemisphere summer has a higher solar radiation level at TOA (top of atmosphere) than does southern hemisphere winter (June-July-August).
However, the tilt of the earth matters more to radiation at ground level than does the radiation at top of atmosphere.
My guess is latitude 19° 28′ 46N, where it intersects with Mauna Loa volcano.
With a clear 360-degree view to the surrounding ocean, that particular location more than 4 km above sea level is exposed to a few moments of extra sunlight every day.
And if you wanna talk about the impact of feedbacks… there is some evidence that the extra insolation at Mauna Loa is enough to melt rock!
Give this man a cigar! With earth surface rotation speed (at the equator) being 40,000 km/day or 1667 km per hour, it can be calculated that the peak of Mauna Loa (if located on the equator) would receive the first rays of sunlight at the same time as a point on the ocean surface 226 km to the east. 226/1667 x 60 is about 8 minutes. Multiply that by two for the same effect in the evening. Ok, Mauna Loa is not on the equator, and the extra light is at that very low angle but your insight wins the prize IMHO.
Kilimanjaro elevation 19341 feet, -3 S latitude.
Yes, in private communication Nick said he realized the Kilimanjaro is higher and closer to the equator but the image of lava wasn’t present, so he used Mauna Loa to demonstrate the principal.
Thanks, Greg. But it’s Willis’ question and he’s the arbiter and he says sunlight’s the same everywhere.
So, sigh…, apparently there’s no bonus for “thinking outside the oblate spheroid”.
Then again, I really didn’t deserve to win, because Kilimanjaro’s summit is supposedly FIVE kilometers above its surroundings. If that can be believed, because the feedbacks at Kilimanjaro should be the same and yet it has gone dormant. Of course most WUWT readers are aware that conjecture about the sign and strength of feedbacks on a handful of watts per square meter is a bit dodgy despite having been settled for several years.
Thanks, Nick, but I’m not the arbiter of anything. I’ve been wrong far too many times for that.
I was considering a smooth surface. I would imagine that Mt. Everest gets the most hours if we count mountains.
w.
PS—I did like “thinking outside the oblate spheroid” …
Cloud cover at 90N and 90S might affect the hours of sunlight.
Similarly cloud cover at Mauna Loa.
Yuma, Arizona , apparently takes the crown as the sunniest [directly measured] place on earth rather than those locations that are potentially the sunniest.
NASA had a go at answering the question and found that the sunniest patch of ocean was somewhere south of Hawaii and the sunniest land location was in the Sahara Desert in Niger
http://www.bbc.com/earth/story/20160127-which-spot-on-earth-gets-the-most-sunlight
Ah, the Kenai. That’s where I was born and raised. Your description was spot on. Enjoy the sun and fish.
Thanks, Josh, it’s a wonderful place.
w.
I suggest that the feedback model is not the one that should be used in assessing the reduction in in the radiation of energy to space. A parallel resistance model (with clouds and clear sky as the two variable resistances) is more likely applicable. The surface temperature of water and ice is being controlled by water cycle. Evaporation is an endothermic process so the surface temperature will tend to be at the dew point (air is saturated). Condensation in clouds occurs as water vapor transfers energy to air (at the dew point). There is not much difference between the dew point at the surface and the dew point at the bottom of a thunder cloud so there will not be much net radiation. However, when there are no clouds and the humidity is low the net long wave radiation to to the top of the atmosphere is relatively high. The electrical analogy would be the difference between the dewpoint at the surface and the frost point at TOA as the driving force or voltage and clouds as the big resistance with sum of the effects of water vapor and CO2 in clear sky as the low parallel resistance. Both vary on a daily basis with both time and space, allways seeking equilibrium at any one spot on earth.
–PPS—Bonus question. What latitude on the planet gets the most hours of sunlight per year?–
I would guess the middle of the Earth’s bulge, 0 Latitude, the equator.
Interesting answer. If you go S on the Texas coast day length increases in the winter, if you go N it does in summer so the solar panel on my trailer worked longer in New York. Since there was not as much night and it was cooler, the batteries and occupants appreciated it. Saw a picture somewhere with use of panels at high latitudes in snow, but didn’t see batteries.
In Texas summer it is too hot to measure until well after the sun sets.
What atmospheric “surface” is used for the downwelling? How far out? Radiation is emitted from a surface. No surface then it must be the voices in someone’s head.
Is the upwelling “surface” per WMS at 1.5 m above the ground or the actual ground?
The Instruments & Measurements
But wait, you say, upwelling LWIR power flux is actually measured.
Well, no it’s not.
IR instruments, e.g. pyrheliometers, radiometers, etc. don’t directly measure power flux. They measure a relative temperature compared to heated/chilled/calibration/reference thermistors or thermopiles and INFER a power flux using that comparative temperature and ASSUMING an emissivity of 1.0. The Apogee instrument instruction book actually warns the owner/operator about this potential error noting that ground/surface emissivity can be less than 1.0.
That this warning went unheeded explains why SURFRAD upwelling LWIR with an assumed and uncorrected emissivity of 1.0 measures TWICE as much upwelling LWIR as incoming ISR, a rather egregious breach of energy conservation.
This also explains why USCRN data shows that the IR (SUR_TEMP) parallels the 1.5 m air temperature, (T_HR_AVG) and not the actual ground (SOIL_TEMP_5). The actual ground is warmer than the air temperature with few exceptions, contradicting the RGHE notion that the air warms the ground.
Conclusion
So, the 396 W/m^2 upwelling LWIR and net 333 W/m^2 GHG energy loop of RGHE and the K-T diagram and RGHE claim that the air warms the ground are all illusions due to misunderstood & misapplies instruments.
Nick, you ask:
“Is the upwelling “surface” per WMS at 1.5 m above the ground or the actual ground?”
————–
I’ve been waiting on an answer to that question for some time. Last summer my IR thermometer read various surface temperatures ranging from 99 F (grass) to over 160 F (roof of car) while the ambient air was about 90 F.
I would guess that the difference could be even greater if the air temp was cooler and less humidity. LWIR is coming up from the surface. I have no idea if the ‘budget accounting’ simply uses 1.5 m air temps rather than actual but I’m watching for it. A 50 – 60 F emission temp difference is significant.
““Is the upwelling “surface” per WMS at 1.5 m above the ground or the actual ground?””
Solar SW is absorbed by the Earth’s surface (not at 1.5m) – so that is the ultimate emitting surface.
However LWIR photons are intercepted and absorbed by GHGs on their exit to space. Being re-emitted in all directions.
So it is an infinitely complex process of exchange – with the biased emitted direction for some distance that of the surface and as the photon gets higher in the atmosphere the direction of re-emission gradually gets biased to space. There is a region where this transition takes place, and it is where the atmosphere is at a temp of ~ -18C. The temp which matches the S-B relation to Earth’s absorbed solar energy. That point is where satellites see’s Earth’s temperature. And it is 255k and not 288k (average surface temp). That is the GHE at work.
The question remains unanswered. I agree with you that the emitting surface temp is actual reality. To refine the question just a bit, do the cartoons showing the radiation budget use the true surface temperature or do they use the so called surface temps that were measured at 1.5 – 2.0 meters?
The question remains the same, just a little more refined.
If the monthly radiation were to oscillate back and forth between (say) 506 and 512 W/m2 I would expect the temperature to oscillate back and forth a bit relative to what you’d get from the average of 506 and 512, but that (small?) temperature oscillation would not reflect what you’d get from a sustained 506, relative to a sustained 512.
If a small oscillation didn’t give what we’d get from a longer sustained value, we’d see a lag between the two.
w.
Which way would it lag?
The response (temperature) would lag the forcing (downwelling radiation).
w.
In my hypothetical example that would surely not happen, there would be only 2 temperature values, and it would be crazy if the higher temperature came along with the lower radiation.
A complication for interpreting the correlation is that the SW part of the radiation is probably largely the EFFECT of the temperature heating the atmosphere, rather than the CAUSE of the temperature variations.
“My guess on the latitude with most sunlight is 90N and 90S. The sunlight actually precedes the Sun poking above and below the horizon due to refraction. At 90N/S it will “hang” on the horizon as the Sun slowly drops down or rises at the Equinoxes, giving more sunlight over the total year.”
Well if 10 km elevation or higher.
Otherwise the sunlight has go thru many thickness of atmospheres, before getting to 90N and 90S.
And to get any sunlight, to reach a surface, the surface must be pointed at the Sun. So if the plane was vertical to the ground and pointed at sun.
With tropics, surface if level [and most is] that angle to have the plane at.
How about another theory. Due to the characteristics of the measuring instruments, an increase in surface temperature makes it look like the surface is absorbing more energy.
On the other hand, daytime clouds can reduce the amount of energy reaching the surface. In a desert climate, the sun dramatically warms the surface rather quickly. ie. the surface warms and cools appreciably between daytime and night.
It could be all about clouds and even the alarmists admit we don’t know as much about clouds as we should. link
Does removing Seasonal Variation reduce or hide lag?
Does the maximum Solar Radiation occur in June when the Highest Temps appear to be in August?
I drew the same conclusion, but then I started to think about the spatial resolution. You get a lot of incoming somewhere, or less incoming everywhere, and the average is the same, but the average temperature apparently is not. Interesting graph though, and takes a bit more of explaining given the ‘conservative’ let alone ‘worst case’ climate sensitivity estimates. Thanks for sharing, because the incredible stability of temperature does cast some healthy doubt on high end sensitivity speculations.
We have about the same sunshine as you there, and the max today was around +28C. The thunderstorm predicted missed us by ‘that much.
For the bonus question, how are we accounting for clouds?
If clouds reduce sunlight, I’ll go with 30 degrees north.
No clouds, Duncan. Just a count of hours of sunlight.
w.
In that case I’ll go with Santa. 90 degrees north.
Climate science doesn’t understand basic math. They are unaware of Holder’s inequality. You cannot take an ave flux for a sphere and convert it to temp via the Stefan Boltzmann equation. If you do you get a 1K increase for 3.7W.m^2. You have to calculate the flux for a billion points around the globe and then integrate that and then apply the Stefan Boltzmann equation for each one of these billion fluxpoints for a spherical surface.The correct answer is closer to 0.38 K as Willis has found out.
“No lag visible” – that’s because it’s leading.
That suggests that temperature leads radiation. That in turns suggests that cloud cover is being modulated by temperature – which explains why you’re getting 0.37C per doubling than 1.05C as is commonly quoted.
Why has this simple calculation never been done before? It undoubtedly has …. but it never got published because it did not fit the doctrine of the climate cult.
You’ve just put a stake in the heart of a >$1trillion scam.
Um…$10 to $100 Trillion.
The gross world product (GWP) is the combined gross national product of all the countries in the world equals to the total global GDP.
World economy, comprising 193 economies, in 2019 is projected around of US$88.08 trillion in nominal terms against US$84.84 trillion in 2018, according to IMF. Global GDP in terms of PPP (purchasing power parity, used by the CIA) is forecasted around of Int$143.09 trillion against Int$135.24 trillion in 2018. This number is 162% of nominal. PPP to Nominal ratio was 1.28 in 1990, all time lowest of 1.20 in 1995. But due to higher growth rate of developing economies, which have generally higher GDP in ppp terms, this ratio has increased.
In constant 2010 prices, which gives better idea about expansion over years, World economy has expanded from $11.33 tn in 1960 to $80.10 in 2017, or 7.07 times on the basis of market exchange rate as estimated by world bank comprising more than 200 economies. In purchasing power parity terms, world gdp has expanded by 2.46 since 1990, data for ppp terms available since.
http://statisticstimes.com/economy/gross-world-product.php
This century…not annually duh.
Another one. See Nickolov and Zeller and Noonworld.
WE, your second cross correlation chart is IMO a key to understanding your first. It does not say there is no lag. Take, for example, correlation 0.5. It says there can be a lag of ~ minus 0.5 to plus 1.0 years. Especially since ‘no lag’ is only 0.8. Since you removed seasonality, that surprising 1.5 year negative to positive range suggests something else is driving the Ceres system—and therefore also your first chart. If so, then the first chart shows a ‘spurious correlation’. One plausible ‘something else’ hypothesis is ENSO.
Fitting a simple multivariate multiple regression with surface T =radiation flux plus ENSO (you could just simply use pos, neg, neutral as the ENSO values: plus one, zero, minus one) tests that hypothesis by looking at the resulting significance of the Enso term coefficient.
I go with the South Pole
‘Scientists estimate that the pilot whale population in the eastern North Atlantic is above 700,000 whales, with approximately 100,000 around the Faroe Islands.’
Read more: https://metro.co.uk/2019/05/30/faroe-islands-defend-slaughter-whales-sea-turns-red-blood-9743755/?ito=cbshare
It is interesting that the spread of temperatures is so markedly smaller at higher absorbed energies. This is probably near perhelion, i. e. during southern summer/northern winter.
A couple of decades ago, I was working on a MoS2 prospect just south of the Taku River, which is east of Juneau.
Arctic Char – fishing with a lure thing with a short casting rod, from a gravel bar.
Made four casts and caught four fish.
But one was a sideways snag with the hook.
As we used to say when out in remote streams.
“The fishing was so good, you had to go behind a tree to bait the hook.”
The barramundi fish in north Australian inland waters, billabongs, can go crazy like that. Four year old son caught an 8 pounder while standing in water up to his knees, rod over shoulder, lure dangling 6 inches above the water. It jumped up and hooked itself, so keen was it for food.
Then an hour later it all went quiet and no amount of casting would excite any interest at all.
But then, this was in 1976, before CO2 and its inexorable march altered every natural system ever studied by humans.
Willis, you continue to display one fascinating picture after another, of a type that raises two important questions. 1. How do the observations fit current hypotheses and 2. Why have they not received discussion by the current crop of climate science experts ( if indeed one of your many pictures has been under-discussed. I feel this is the case, but I have not had the means to check in detail).
Again, shall we see the harm being done by the standoff between Establishment scientists and other researchers with their”ignore them” policy? Geoff
The barramundi fish in north Australian inland waters, billabongs, can go crazy like that. Four year old son caught an 8 pounder while standing in water up to his knees, rod over shoulder, lure dangling 6 inches above the water. It jumped up and hooked itself, so keen was it for food.
Then an hour later it all went quiet and no amount of casting would excite any interest at all.
But then, this was in 1976, before CO2 and its inexorable march altered every natural system ever studied by humans.
Willis, you continue to display one fascinating picture after another, of a type that raises two important questions. 1. How do the observations fit current hypotheses and 2. Why have they not received discussion by the current crop of climate science experts ( if indeed one of your many pictures has been under-discussed. I feel this is the case, but I have not had the means to check in detail).
Again, shall we see the harm being done by the standoff between Establishment scientists and other researchers with their”ignore them” policy? Geoff
Must have been doubly good.
How can there be seasonal variations in a global plot? Does not the northern summer balance the southern winter?
I’m actually impressed that there is such a large increase in surface temperature on such a small increase in radiation, 1 degree C for a 7 watt per square meter irradiation increase.
Frankly, this document is very scary as reported. It suggests that truly small changes in irradiation will have major impact on overall surface temperatures.
I think you mean 9.7W/m2 for 1C.
So 9.7/340 = 2.9% increase.
As Mr Eschenbach hints at doubling of CO2 won’t get anywhere near it.
That’s one reason thinking people question UN IPCC climate models; cloud representation. Cloud variations have far more impact than minor GHG concentration changes.
etudiant
Using Q= 1/R A (Surf T – ToA T) my back of the envelope says a 1% change in albedo changes the surface temp 1 C.
Not something to mess with casually.
“1% change in albedo changes the surface temp 1 C.”
That doesn’t seem to be true in reality. A couple of times over the last several years, much of the northern hemisphere was covered in snow. It was certainly more than a 1% change in albedo, yet there was no corresponding major drop in temperature.
For Graph 1: Total Radiation Absorbed vs. Temperature what is the actual value for the correlation coefficient?
Willis,
This is a tough test of the data, but what happens to the scatter plot if you force the best fit through zero w/m2? Does it produce a meaningful temperature?
Fitting through the small range of 506-512 w/m2 and getting correlations better than 0.8 is remarkable and means that either the instruments are very high performance. – or that the preceding data treatment has induced circularity that finally shows up as (spurious, mathematically created) high correlation. These are mere impressions about numbers, I have no specific examples. We place a great deal of faith in these satellite numbers like TOA radiation and not much examination of errors, given their pivotal importance. Geoff
Could this be due to the T^4 nature of energy? We know it takes more energy to warm equatorial areas than it does polar areas.
At what temperature is the 3.7 w/m2 per degree calculated at? Could that be at the -18 C basic S-B temperature of our planet?
Assuming this is right then at the current temperature of Earth the warming should be only about 1/3 of what is claimed.
Willis. I’m not 100%sure the two radiation terms should be summed. But it would be interesting to see the same graph for just the down welling fraction vs temp as it is at the heart of the warming theories.
Totally agree, Terry.
Some quantities can’t be added. Eg. Two 20C objects don’t make an object in middle 40C.
SW 168W/m2 is ~ -40C. Emission ~240W/m2 is ~ -18C. So is Ghg effect really 33 or 55C.
I get burnt by UV in minutes…never by moonbeam IR.
As Willis said before, “The CERES surface datasets include a dataset of the upwelling longwave from the surface. But that’s not much use to me. I wanted surface temperatures rather than surface upwelling longwave emissions. However, the Stefan-Boltzmann equation lets us convert from longwave emission to temperature if we know the emissivity. The good news is that for natural substances, in almost all cases the emissivity is quite close to 1.0.”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2018/12/06/man-i-hate-being-wrong/
So I guess that is where “CERES Surface Temperature” is coming from.
Why not compare CERES OLR with UAH TLT to see if there is warming? That looks like this:
?w=1000&h=569
The whole post at Okulaer is informative: https://okulaer.wordpress.com/2018/11/11/how-the-ceres-ebaf-ed4-data-disconfirms-agw-in-3-different-ways/
My synopsis is https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2018/12/12/no-ghg-warming-fingerprints-in-the-sky/
Thank you. Excellent summary.
Ronan and Michael Connolly studied radiosonde data and concluded in 2014:
“It can be seen from the infra-red cooling model of Figure 19 that the greenhouse effect theory predicts a strong influence from the greenhouse gases on the barometric temperature profile. Moreover, the modeled net effect of the greenhouse gases on infra-red cooling varies substantially over the entire atmospheric profile.
However, when we analysed the barometric temperature profiles of the radiosondes in this paper, we were unable to detect any influence from greenhouse gases. Instead, the profiles were very well described by the thermodynamic properties of the main atmospheric gases, i.e., N 2 and O 2 , in a gravitational field.”
While water vapour is a greenhouse gas, the effects of water vapour on the temperature profile did not appear to be related to its radiative properties, but rather its different molecular structure and the latent heat released/gained by water in its gas/liquid/solid phase changes.
For this reason, our results suggest that the magnitude of the greenhouse effect is very small, perhaps negligible. At any rate, its magnitude appears to be too small to be detected from the archived radiosonde data.”
Just wondering what is the value of the correlation coefficient between surface absorption and surface temperatures as plotted in a graph 1.
Richard, correlation is show in the second figure. Between 0.8 and 0.9.
w.
According to Willis’s data a change of 3.7 watts/sqM in surface radiation absorbed leads to 0.38C rise in temperature. The claim is that doubling CO2 will increase surface temperatures by 3C or more(actually the claim is 3C by 2050 which is well before CO2 would have doubled to 560 ppm). That would require an increase of about 30 watts/sqM. Truly remarkable, 3.7 watt/sqM from CO2 leads to 30 watts/sqM in total. Since most of the claimed feedback is through water vapour that means around 26 watts/sqM increase due to water vapour. Wow, the impact of GHG’s is logarithmic, the total impact of water vapour is supposedly around 80-100 watts/sqM and even if we assume constant humidity 3C would not double the water vapour content of Earth’s atmosphere. Then again, if we assume constant residence time for water vapour in the atmosphere, doubling water vapour content would double rainfall. Wow one would think that even at 400 ppm CO2 the change would stand out like – you know what!
But, you know what is even more remarkable, the claimed residence time of water vapour in the atmosphere is around 10 days (derived from the ratio of total water vapour content of the atmosphere to the annual global rainfall). So the water vapour feedback time constant should be of the order of days to at most a couple of weeks. But that means it should already be incorporated in Willis’s data and that means the impact of doubling CO2 INCLUDING FEEDBACK EFFECTS will be about 0.38C. Sounds plausible to me!!!
The striking discrepancy between the CERES-inferred surface temperature and the much higher values given by Stefan-Boltzmann for the indicated “total surface absorption” points to an ill-posed physical problem. What’s physically pertinent here is the NET heat flow, not the conjectured radiative absorption in the face of neglected non-radiative mechanisms. I doubt if the cross-correlation would suffer much if the DLWIR were simply ignored; it would be quite interesting to see a comparison.
If you can do that, could you also control for it in a plot of global average temperature vs. measured CO2 changes. That should be interesting, to say the least.
Just my eyeball estimates suggests that the uncertainty in measurements alone easily swamps any effect that could even potentially be attributed to CO2.
Willis,
What happens if you plot surface absorption vs. temperature? It might well give a very different result. Least squares routines are derived on the assumption of no errors in the independent (x) variable. Noise in that variable results in a slope that is too small. If you switch variables, you again get a slope that is too small, so then the inverse is too large; therefore, much larger than with the original arrangement.
What happens if you plot surface absorption vs. temperature? It might well give a very different result. Least squares routines are derived on the assumption of no errors in the independent (x) variable. Noise in that variable results in a slope that is too small. If you switch variables, you again get a slope that is too small, so then the inverse is too large; therefore, much larger than with the original arrangement.
Willis
Would you also have the total radiation vs time graphed and the total radiation vs net CO2 graphed?
The dashed line looks a little high at the extreme left and a little low at the extreme right. I’m not saying that the straight line fit is incorrect, just that it looks like something else is happening at the ends of the scatter plot.
You know that feeling, when the Doberman Pinscher finally breaks the chain and is closing the distance between you at 3 yards per stride.
Time to try to diffuse the situation.
Assume a nonaggressive position and entice it to engage.
Worked for me once…..
A request for some clarifications
1. Where did you get your “monthly global average surface temperature” and is it reliable?
2. Over what period was the data collected?
3. How did you remove the seasonal variation given that NH and SH have different seasons?
4. The temperature is a consequence of a large number of forcings spread over a large number of timescales and yet you imply that surface temperature is purely a consequence of “monthly global average downwelling total radiation absorbed by the surface”. Are you ignoring the other forcings or assuming them to be constant?
5. Some of the downwelling total radiation won’t contribute to heating the Earth’s surface but will instead be used in photosynthesis and evaporation.
6. How do you account for the difference between your finding and the more commonly used “conversion” from watts per sq m to temperature (2.4? 2.7?)?
7. How do you relate this to MODTRAN output regards CO2 and temperature, the link being the downwelling radiation from CO2?
8. And D. Cohen above raises a good question about the linear fit perhaps failing at the extremes. Maybe an exponential fit is more appropriate, which begs the question – why?
Please forgive me if I seem abrupt. I can assure you that I’m interested in these details. I’m just trying to keep this comment brief.
John McLean June 8, 2019 at 5:34 pm
From Ron Clutz’s comment below:
See the graph header
Yes, and they add together to give seasonal variations in the global average. That’s the variation that I removed.
I’m ignoring them to focus on the actual surface absorption of radiation.
True. I’m looking at the net effects.
The commonly used conversion is 3°C per doubling of CO2 (3.7 additional watts). Mine is observation-based. Theirs is generally model based. Finally, there’s not really an agreed upon value. Claims have been made that it is anywhere from about a degree C per 2X CO2 to about 6 degrees per 2X CO2.
MODTRAN doesn’t include any of the feedback.
Hard to tell if that is a real phenomenon or not … part of the problem with short datasets.
On my planet the only foolish questions are the ones I don’t ask …
Regards,
w.
@ Willis E
Are you not adding up the same radiation twice (2X) to derive the “total” received at the surface?
I mean like can you add in the “echo” and then claim a louder noise was heard?
No, that’s the nature of the poorly named “greenhouse effect”. Some of the outgoing LW radiation is absorbed by the atmosphere, with ~ half going upwards and half going back to leave the earth warmer than it would be if all the radiation went straight to space.
See my post The Steel Greenhouse for a complete explanation.
w.
Willis, thanks anyway but I really don’t need a “complete explanation” of the, per se, “greenhouse effect”.
What I would like is an explanation of what I consider “questionable claims/assertions” in your posted commentary.
Such as your above response to me, …… excluding the 1st sentence with which I agree.
The “greenhouse effect” does not exist in nature ….. and it was a misnomer when it was first coined, and it is still a misnomer …….. and thus its only use it to scare the bejesus out of the gullible and/or miseducated.
Quoting Willis:
Now Willis, you should know very well that the radiation of the outgoing LW radiation from the surface it is not a “50-50” up and down re-radiation from the, per se, GHG molecules in the atmosphere.
And secondly, …… how is it possible for PART OF the re-radiated LWIR from an atmospheric GHG molecule make the earth’s surface “warmer” …… when it was the “warmth” from the earth’s surface that “warmed up” the atmospheric GHG molecule in the first place.
You can’t give away part of your money to someone, ….. and that someone gives you a wee part of it back, …. then you can’t possibly have more money than what you started with.
Samuel C Cogar June 9, 2019 at 4:57 am Edit
You don’t need an explanation of it … but you are certain it doesn’t exist. Yeah, that’s legit …
Samuel, if you truly believe that all the atmospheric scientists and the physicists are all participants in some giant scheme to pretend that a poorly-named “greenhouse effect” actually exists when it doesn’t, you are far beyond my poor power to add or detract.
Oh great picker of nits, you see the “~” symbol before my statement about half up and half down? It means “approximately”, and I put it in there specifically because I’ve dealt with folks like you before.
So let’s work with that … I give you a hundred dollars, you give me nothing. I’m broke.
OR, I give you a hundred, you give me ten, and I end up RICHER THAN I WOULD BE OTHERWISE.
Which is exactly what happens to the earth … because of the greenhouse effect, we end up WARMER THAN WE WOULD BE WITHOUT THE DOWNWELLING RADIATION.
Please, go bother someone else. I can deal with ignorance, and I can deal with arrogance, but your combination of the two is both frustrating and unpleasant.
w.
I’ve coined the term “pressure cowboy” for these types.
Willis Eschenbach – June 9, 2019 at 1:54 pm
Shur nuff, ……just post condescending “claptrap” and then …… “run n’ hide”, …… and everyone will just assume you are still the “never-wrong” expert.
And Willis, to appease your ego, I decided to read your cited The Steel Greenhouse ….. and quickly decided that it was just “more-of-the-same” tripe n’ piffle and of no intellectual value to me.
Also Willis, it is asinine, silly and idiotic to be measuring …. via use of an electronic frequency detector, ….. specific frequencies of LWIR that are radiating through the earth’s near-surface atmosphere, ….. then algebraically adding those “incoming” and “outgoing” totals, ….. and then converting the resulting “total” LWIR radiation to degrees F, C or K, …… simply because all radiation possesses kinetic energy but do not possess any temperature measurable thermal “heat” energy. So, you will have more luck at trying to “pee up a rope” than you will at correctly converting LWIR totals to degrees F, C or K.
“DUH”, the actual thermal or “heat” energy temperature of earth’s near surface atmosphere is actually determined by the two (2) most abundant gases therein, namely Nitrogen (78%) and Oxygen (21%). And that is a non-debatable scientific fact.
And Willis, I almost forgetted, …. iffen just a few years ago you had asked 2 or 3 million “expert” Medical Research professionals, Doctors and/or health care providers …..if stomach ulcers were caused by a bacterial infection, …. they would have all laughed at you and replied with an emphatic “NO”.
Samuel C Cogar June 10, 2019 at 10:20 am
Run and hide? What are you on about? I’m still here. It’s just not productive dealing with you.
And that quote perfectly exemplifies why I’d said:
You started by telling us that even though you hadn’t read my post, The Steel Greenhouse, it was wrong …
So I invited you to read it before criticizing it.
Your response? You read it “to appease my ego” … yeah, that’s totally legit. It’s so egotistical to ask that a man actually read your words before discussing them …
And then you apparently didn’t even finish it. Instead you’ve returned to tell us that you had “quickly decided that it was just “more-of-the-same” tripe n’ piffle and of no intellectual value” to you.
What that tells me is that no, you could NOT find one single scientific error in my work. If you had, you’d be rusing to point it out. So instead of observations about the science, you’ve blessed us with adjectives about your opinion. Great. Another fool who thinks that adjectives are a substitute for math, logic, and observations.
Please, go away until you have decided to discuss the science rather than make vague hand-waving attacks completely devoid of anything but an ugly view into your emotional state.
Don’t go ‘way mad.
Just go away … this is not the spot for personal attacks and adjective-loaded rants. I’m happy to discuss science with you, but I won’t be your punching bag.
w.
Willis Eschenbach – June 10, 2019 at 11:53 am
Now iffen I remember correctly I started out by explicitly telling you all, to wit: “Willis, thanks anyway but I really don’t need a “complete explanation” of the, per se, “greenhouse effect”.”
I made no mention that it was right, wrong, indifferent or otherwise.
And I also don’t remember you inviting me to read it “before criticizing it”, as you stated above.
On the contrary, it was you who attempted to personally defame my good name and reputation by sarcastically stating, to wit: ”You don’t need an explanation of it … but you are certain it doesn’t exist. Yeah, that’s legit …”
It appears that some people, selectively, …. don’t practice what they preach, to wit:
Thus, I see no point in any further discussion on this subject matter.
San C
The most sunlight is received at the latitude with the least ‘government’ and fewest “Journalists”.
Oh, very good …
w.
+42
Willis,
In the CERES data set, what does “surface temperature” represent? Is it the surface “skin temperature”, surface air temperature at 2 meters above the ground, or air temperature in the lower troposphere near the surface? And how is it derived? The answers could influence the interpretation of your first graph.
Likewise for the LW and SW absorbed at the surface. I presume these data are derived rather than measured directly and must have some associated uncertainty. How would this uncertainty affect the interpretation of your first graph? Are you confident that the uncertainties are low enough to yield a meaningful result from your first graph?
Maybe others here have thoughts on these questions as well.
Two other people have asked about the surface temperature. See above.
Regading the uncertainties, I’d have to look. However, while the accuracy of the CERES data is on the order of ± 5 W/m2, the precision is much better, and that’s what relevant for this type of analysis.
Do a google search on CERES EBAF, which is the dataset used. Sorry, running fast, life calls …
w.
Can you please explain what your X axis is showing?
The total surface absorption should be in a range around 240 W/m^2) yet this scale shows a center around 509 W/m^2.
During the period from 2000-2018, solar TSI changed by about 2 W/m^2 (1360.25-1362.25). Yet the chart shows a wider range of 6 W/m^2 in your X axis. And of course, most of the incoming solar radiation never even reaches the surface, so even showing a range of 2 W/m^2 would be overly generous.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/pmod/from:2000.16/to:2018.16/scale:0.175
Bart, X axis is downwelling longwave + net shortwave (incident minus reflected) at the surface.
w.
How do you get a number that is larger than the standard ~240 W/m^2?
TSI includes all of longwave + shortwave.
OLR = ASR = TSI * (1-albedo) /4 = 1360 * (1-0.3) / 4 = 238 W/m^2
TSI is only downwelling solar at the top of the atmosphere. I’m using net solar at the surface plus downwelling LW at the surface.
HTH,
w.
Okay, I think I understand now. But I don’t think you can draw conclusions from that chart, since there is another variable (surface radiation) that is probably not just a constant that can be ignored. It could have been changing during this period as well, and very likely was.
Consider this chart:
https://scied.ucar.edu/radiation-budget-diagram-earth-atmosphere
If you used all three variables (absorbed by surface from sun + absorbed by surface from downwelling – surface radiation), then we could the net changes to the surface radiation correctly.
If you assume that 3.7W/M^2 increase is a result of a doubling of CO2 according to the 5.35 Ln (CO2b/CO2a) formula, then by using the Stefan Boltzmann equation you end up with a 1K change. However this is not correct because it ignores Holders inequality for integrating over a spherical body. As Willis found out,the answer is near to 0.38K for a doubling of CO2, hardly scary at all.
Interesting plot, I would interpret in the following way. Upward surface flux equals total downward flux (lw+ sw) minus total non-radiative surface to atmosphere heat transfers ( i.e. latent and sensible heat transfers) minus the radiative imbalance. So if you plot total down flux against surface up flux on y-axis, you can just plot a straight line with slope 1, then subtract the above quantities for each point. Doesn’t tell you anything about the cause of the changes in total down radiation. Your plot is the same, except you extract temperature from the upward flux on the y axis.
Willis, you wrote:
Yes. You still appear to believe, Willis, that radiation itself is all that’s needed to make the temperature of something go up (or down). You still seem utterly ignorant on even the most basic thermodynamic concepts and principles.
Simply put: “Atmospheric back radiation” (DWLWIR) does not constitute heat [Q] to or from the surface, and so can and does not in itself affect the internal energy [U] and thus the temperature [T] of same surface. The SOLAR flux (net SW, ASR) to the surface, on the other hand, does constitute heat to the surface, and so can and does, all by itself, affect its internal energy and temperature.
Radiation does not affect temperature, Willis. Heat does. Net thermal transfers of energy.
The DWLWIR simply goes up when the (lower) tropospheric temperature (T_tropo) goes up, and the (lower) tropospheric temperature in turn goes up when the surface temperature (T_s) goes up.
We can safely say that there is no evidence whatsoever of any gradual, systematic rise in DWLWIR over the TLT (T_tropo), going from 2000 to 2018:
If we plot the difference between the two curves in this graph to obtain the “DWLWIR residual”, this fact becomes all the more evident:
And here’s the important point:
The idea of “an enhanced GHE causing global warming” requires the DWLWIR to rise significantly and systematically more than T_tropo (TLT) over time, and its “null hypothesis” therefore postulates that such a rise should NOT be seen. Well, do we see such a systematic rise in the DWLWIR residual above? Nope. Not at all.
How the CERES EBAF Ed4 data disconfirms “AGW” in 3 different ways …..
https://okulaer.wordpress.com/2018/11/11/how-the-ceres-ebaf-ed4-data-disconfirms-agw-in-3-different-ways/#more-6562
“Radiation does not affect temperature, Willis. Heat does.”
My microwave oven thinks you might be wrong.
Is your microwave 750 W or 1000 W?
You do know how a microwave oven works, do you?
Microwaves effect rotation of water molecules. It is the rotation that causes the temperature change.
You will not see a temperature change in the air in your microwave only in solid or liquids.
Kristan, climate science ignores the well established specific heat of air and CO2, the idea that molecular energy states determine if absorption can take place, and my thermo profs admonition that something can only get as hot as the hottest supplier.
Joule’s conclusion of his experiment that internal energy is at most a function of temperature and Anthony Watt’s experiment with CO2 in a jar that failed to show a temperature increase with increased CO2 concentration should have put a nail in all this.
“experiment with CO2 in a jar that failed to show a temperature increase with increased CO2 concentration should have put a nail in all this.”
Really.
How about this one ..
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ge0jhYDcazY
And this one….
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pPRd5GT0v0I
And this
https://mrcc.illinois.edu/resources/edu_howto_greenhouse.jsp
This
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kwtt51gvaJQ
There are many more.
Then there are Roy Spencer’s experiments ….
Such as the following…
(Quote)
“In my continuing battle to keep people from being led astray by bad science, I sometimes try to think of new ways to demonstrate the existence of the Earth’s so-called greenhouse effect (GHE).”
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/08/suggested-backyard-experiment-to-measure-the-greenhouse-effect-of-more-carbon-dioxide/
That BBC experiment does not represent what is theoretically going on in Earth’s atmosphere, where tropospheric warming is reflected back to the surface. [Yes, an oversimplification. So sue me.]
And the chemical processes in creating the CO2 gas must affect the temperature in the CO2 bottle. A 6C differential is incredible; I know of no process by which that could happen in a closed bottle with a fixed heat source. Maybe the CO2 concentration is so astronomically high it affects the thermal properties of the system? I don’t know.
Any chemists out there with an opinion?
Exothermic reaction for generation of CO2 through tablets in water* = extra heat in the system for CO2 measurements. If bottle is sealed additional heating through increasing pressure. Dismiss these experiments.
Only mythbuster experiment tells one something but would have to be done in atmospheres purely of nitrogen and oxygen as control and then start adding low amount of CO2 until equilibrium is reached and then double again and again to show anticipated logarithmic function is real and at which concentration an effect would be measurable. Pressure has to be kept equal between chambers.
Though still no proof for “greenhouse heat trapping by CO2” as in the atmosphere there would be convection.
*depending on tablets it could be solvation energy so not a real reaction in chemistry terms but still probably exothermic given the kinetic of the process.
The bottle CO2 experimenters are concocting scientific lies to support CAGW. GHGs work, but not the way presented and certifiably not as strongly as implied.
Correct the GHE in the Earth’s atmospher works by way of emitting LWIR ultimately to space from colder molecules. They have a temperature of ~255K – the temp that the S-B law tells us is what the Earth’s temp should be due what energy it absorbs from the Sun.
The GSMT is ~288K.
255K is measured by satellite.
Go figure.
Oh, and a classic proponant of the “d” variety has to come up with “concocting scientific lies”.
Keep it up please… there is nothing that destroys that species credibility and that of it’s invented world than that denial of empirical science.
You could try it for yourself of course
It’s not difficult.
But that might shatter the need to bend the world to fit your ideological bias.
And no, I dont have a bias – other than to not think that scientists are either incompetent or frauds.
And certainly not that you know better than them.
Temperature differences between two bottles in no way reflects the physical reality of the temperature differences between the surface and the emission height. Prove me wrong.
That BBC video (the first linked YouTube video provided by Anthony Banton above) is a joke all around:
— obviously, no consideration for the variation in radiation levels on, and likely convection heating of, the two experimental bottles (note that the lamp on the right, illuminating the CO2-containing bottle, is visually closer to its bottle than is the lamp on the left, illuminating the air-containing bottle)
— no control on the how the thermocouple probes themselves were affected by direct illumination from the lamps
— no control (or even mention) on how the CO2-containing bottle was affected by the added water vapor carried over from the vinegar-baking soda that generated CO2 to fill the experimental CO2
— no control (or even recognition) of possible differences in convective cooling/heating of each of the two experimental bottles
— I could go on and on, but need I?
Bottom line, if this was a high school science fair project that I was judging, i would give it a grade of D (not an F only because a science experiment was PERFORMED and people can learn from mistakes).
About: Graphic nr. 1: Scatterplot Total Radiation and Surface Temperatures
WR: I suppose the high ranked months in the right half of the graphic are El Nino months. The higher moisture degree over larger areas of the Pacific creates both the higher downwelling radiation and the higher surface temperatures.
If the above is correct, I suppose that we are looking at water vapor’s down welling radiation, caused by natural variations (like El Nino, La Nina) that influenced the total surface area with a high water content in the lower troposphere. The larger the warm ocean surface area, the larger the area with high water vapor in the lower atmosphere that is absorbing surface radiation (near the surface) and the larger the area that enhances downwelling radiation.
The combination of El Nino effects with the effects of a temporary warmer Arctic (less sea ice, more water vapor in the air) brings us our present relatively warm era.
Water vapor is by far the most important greenhouse gas in the lower atmosphere. Something that will diminish the content of water vapor just above the surface will bring down surface temperatures. For example: colder ocean surfaces, more ice in the Arctic, more wind over the oceans that enhances ocean mixing and oceanic upwelling etc..
Wim, always good to hear from you. I, like you, think we’re looking mostly at water, both as vapor and as clouds.
Regards,
w.
Is your microwave 750 W or 1000 W?
It’s good to see yet another refreshing approach from Willis to the boring old subject of Global warming. Fresh approaches wake you up again after weeks of repetitive and meaningless ad hominems. Yes, I think that 0.5 C looks like a fair answer for a doubling of CO2 (3.7 w/m2).
Neat. That suggests negative feedbacks at play.
Al Gore once predicted a sea rise of twenty feet by the end of this century.When n I saw this I decided to make my own prediction,. At the time 80 kilometers sea surface were available. It predicted clrear sea rise of just under ten inches by the end if the century, This is ridiculousI said and I wanted to inform the journals Nature Science of this fact Both journals tgrew out my result and Al hgot a Nobel Prize for his lie. Checking today chows that all predictions are too high. My original prediction is likely to be closest to truth in the end. Arno Arrak
Willis,
“Note that 3.7 W/m2 is the increase in downwelling longwave radiation expected from a doubling of CO2 …”
No, it’s not. The 3.7 W/m^2 for 2xCO2 is the instantaneous increase in (straight) upward IR optical thickness from the surface through to the TOA. Or it’s simply an increase in upward IR absorption by the atmosphere from the surface.
RW, thanks for that detail. I was also confused on exactly what the 3.7 w/m2 applied to. When I used a conversion tool I found the warming from that amount of energy was on .68 C. To get 1 C of warming I needed ~5.45 w/m2 at the Earth’s average temperature (~15 C). In the chart above this amount of forcing would lead to around .55 C of warming.
sorry, I’ll fix my earlier post where I messed up the blockquote tags.
Could you explain what you mean by “downwelling” ( an awful term to describe radiative transfer ) ?
Since this is CERES I assume you have incoming SW and incoming LW minus backscattered SW and TOA LW emissions. ie total energy input. Am I correct in recalling there are still outstanding calibration issues in the total energy input this gives which is far in excess of a credible value and would be heating us up at a rate we know is not happening?
That is between the atmosphere and the surface. Since figure you cite is that after reaching a supposed new equilibrium state, the TOA budget should not change.
I’m not sure that what you plot has any bearing on the 3.7 W/m2 figure.
You don’t say what the temperature is , so I assume it is also a CERES measurement. That probably means it is “clear sky” surface temp. That obviously introduces a geographic bias and probably you need to consider what that implies about the graph.
On the face of it, I don’t think that graph tells us anything. At least what it represents has not been explained.
I find the zero lag very surprising but that may be accounted for by the above geographic bias, also is this surface ( ie water ) or near surface (5km) air “temperature brightness?
IIRC Spencer & Braswell published something a bit like this based on CESES about 5y back.
Greg June 9, 2019 at 12:46 pm
Sure. “Downwelling” means headed towards the earth, and “upwelling” means headed towards space. Why are those clear names somehow “awful”?
There are calibration issues, but they affect the accuracy, not the precision … and for e.g trends all we need is precision.
Read the damn thread. I’ve explained it once, and another commenter explained it once. I’m not gonna hold your hand, do your homework before uncapping your electronic pen.
I think you’re trying to say “I don’t know what the graph means despite explanations” …
Yeah, that’s lots of help …
Sadly,
w.
Thanks Willis. [Pruned] as usual in the face of even mild criticism.
Radiation does not “well” up and down it radiates: the clue is in the name.
Wells are full of fluid not radiation and the modes and reasons of movement are totally different. That is why it is an awful term.
You really think I’m going to read through a hundred or so mostly irrelevant comments to find out if maybe someone commented of where you got temperature from. Nothing like your usual, humble self to say :”heck I did forget to put that in my article, I’ll add note at the end. Good catch.”
… or the “where did you get the data for you graph in the article” questions.
So do they measure “downwelling longwave” from a satellite. If you were half as smart as you think you are you’d have a better reply to discussions about what the graph and its slope indicate, instead of avoiding the questions I raised by snarky remarks.
” IIRC Spencer & Braswell published something a bit like this based on CERES about 5y back.”
Well I don’t have the ref. to hand and you are as good as anyone at using google. So instead of expecting me to do your homework for you , go find it if you are interested. You may have 2 or 3 papers from those two authors, I’ll sure you’ll manage.
Greg June 14, 2019 at 12:42 pm
Greg, the sciences are full of “terms of art”. These are words which are used in a specialized sense. Often, they don’t make exact sense. “Upwelling” and “downwelling” are good examples. So is the “greenhouse effect”.
Now, you are free to whine all week about how the greenhouse effect doesn’t really work like a real greenhouse, or how downwelling has nothing to do with a well. But those are the terms that are used, whether you like them or not.
You really think I care whether you are willing to read the thread? Do your homework or not, I couldn’t care less. It’s not my homework.
w.
Greg, upon further thought I wanted to add that if you’d said, “Willis, could you add an explanation of where you got your temperature data it would make the post much clearer”, I’d most likely have said “Sure, I’d be glad to.” I’ve answered dozens of requests in that manner.
As to you saying you didn’t read the thread, oftentimes the real nuggets are in the thread. I can’t tell you how much I’ve learned from the commenters on my work. So you are throwing away valuable information. You can skip the junk withough reading more than a line or two of each comment.
Just sayin’ … that’s how I learn things.
Regards,
w.
I seriously doubt its legit physics to add SW + LW and convert the total as a surface temperature.
So do I, Macha … who do you think is doing that?
w.
Well, in terms of using a delta-Ts versus delta total surface-energy (LW+SW)-flux-absorbed in order to obtain an correlation coefficient (i.e., the first graph presented in the above article), I think the answer is obvious.
I think it is significant that the derived least-squares (presumed) linear fit of the data produces an equation that has a “b” term, in the linear equation form y = mx +b, that is significantly offset from zero (by my calculation by -38 C). I cannot yet determine the significance of this, but is of concern. It may be related to the fact that radiation should be governed by a T^4 scaling relationship (i.e., not linear) and for small delta-T changes this reduces to basically a 4* dT influence factor (binomial expansion) instead of a linear scaling.
Deeper thinking is required.
Gordon, and Macha, I added LW + SW. However, I didn’t “convert the total to surface temperature”.
Best regards.
w.
Why? IF – big “IF” there! – you assume all inbound radiation must equal all outbound radiation, and a single albedo and emmissivity and a single coef of heat capacity and coef of heat transfer exists for a solid, uniformly radiated object in a vacuum, then the equilibrium temperature will be proportional to the total of the inbound radiations.
If in a barren desert with typical sand, a forest of artificial dark green plants were placed on the surface, will the surface temperature be higher or lower?
Replace the artificial plants with real ones and add water. Now what happens?
There’s a reason why deserts are hotter at the same latitude and altitude than a tropical environment.
Convection rules the day, not radiation.
Don’t forget effective albedo over any given area of Earth. Effective albedo is a combination of both cloud coverage and ground surface coverage (e.g., sand versus vegetation versus open ocean water).
Unlike convection, albedo directly controls the amount of solar energy absorbed by the atmosphere and ground over any area of Earth during daylight hours.
To all the greenhouse gas faithful. I reckon there’s a Nobel prize for the person who, uses traditional science – such as controlled experiment and rigorous, repeatable observation – to conclusively prove the greenhouse gas effect and refute the Laws of Thermodynamics. Why are none of you interested in collecting your Nobel?
All this proof by statistics, lampooning ones opponents, argument from authority, telling us scientific and social parables, goes only so far. There will also be a core of scientifically-minded people who laugh at you.
What does 3.7W/m² physically mean? Does it mean an extra 3.7W/m² of energy is trapped? How much of it warms the surface? How much is due to CO2, water vapour, clouds? Give us precise numbers here (or at least clear error bounds). You can’t expect us to pay $200 trillion, world-wide to rewire our energy systems, based on your faith.
NB: prove: write it out in a form which can be falsified by some experiment or observation but such falsification fails.
Mark, please purchase a modern college textbook on thermodynamics. Also consult the writings of “skeptical” physicists. You are beclowning yourself.
I have to wonder about your scientific background, Mark. Please enlighten us as to you qualifications to question the conclusions of different branches of science.
I’ve looked at modern college textbooks on climatology. One told me computer model runs are experiments. No thanks, I don’t need your post-normal science. I’ll be a little circumspect on mere college textbooks in future. I doubt you’ve read any books on thermodynamics; textbook or otherwise.
UN IPCC climate models based on unproven assumptions are bunk. The assumption of 3X water vapor magnification of an unmeasurable amount of CO2-driven warming is bunk.
The assumptions that one may calculate global warming based on minuscule alterations in earth energy flows is bunk. We are unable to measure the theoretically-calculated minuscule changes in those massive energy flows.
There are too many other continuously changing climate metrics to tease out the impact of a minor change in CO2 forcing.
Now, focus on those facts and leave the physicists alone.
BTW, my college coursework included a year of thermodynamics.
Willis, did you do a similar analysis a couple of years ago? Title: Temperature and Forcing, July 13, 2017. Does this new analysis supersede that?
Willis,
“Note that 3.7 W/m2 is the increase in downwelling longwave radiation expected from a doubling of CO2 …”
Where is this value coming from? Can you elaborate? In my physic books and its spectral calculations you are looking at about 10 Kelvin temperature increase in the CO2 core radiation band to get this increase of down welling radiation.
It’s not an increase in downwelling radiation. It is the areally averaged decrease in outgoing radiation at TOA obtained by flooding a model with double the concentration of atmospheric CO2 and applying the RTE across all gridded points.
Outgoing Radiation is INCREASED by increasing CO2.
The satellite measurements have already proved it.
see
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gIhBEF94YlM
about 15 minutes in.
Yes it will.
It is radiation emitted from the Thermosphere (100-200Km up).
Not the Troposphere.
The Thermosphere receives energy from UV and particles in the solar wind (not from Earth).
The presence of CO2 absorbs, then emits some of that energy in the form of LWIR.
The more CO2 there, then the more LWIR emitted to space and greater cooling of the Thermosphere.
I wrote TOA to try to keep things simple. I was focused on explaining the tools used for computing the forcing attributable to CO2. The true picture is as always more complicated. Normally “adjusted forcings” are calculated at top of troposphere after allowing the stratosphere to stabilise, but keeping all other atmospheric variables static. The stratosphere instantaneously cools in atmospheric models when CO2 is doubled. It emits more LW outwards because of the increased CO2 and takes less flux from below – so it cools. The outgoing net flux at top of troposphere is decreased. It is the decrease in this latter that is averaged after stabilisation of the stratosphere and called the adjusted forcing (Fa). This is subsequently modified into what is called the Effective Radiative Forcing (ERF) in a step which I am not going to attempt to explain and which I do not support. Typically, the instantaneous change in net TOA flux (pre-stabilisation of the stratosphere) is larger than the Fa which is larger than the ERF. Yes, the thermosphere which is almost 100kms above the elevation of interest should cool if you add CO2 and keep everything else constant.
JB, you ask where the 3.7 W/m2 per doubling comes from. I’ve never seen a proper engineering style well-buttressed derivation of that number. I can only say that it is the number that is always used.
I’ve also never seen any uncertainty estimate for the value … but like I said, everyone uses it.
w.
Smacks of an evaluation is on order to find out.
This is very unlike you to take this number at face value and not question it.
JB, I didn’t say I didn’t question it.
I said I’ve never gotten a full answer.
Thanks,
w.
Thanks for the lag chart!
Is it all from the Ceres dataset?
I wonder how a satellite can measure downwelling infrared?
An other point is how the ground temperature is measured. Is that by radiation, then you could have some conflicts.
There seems to be some missing w/m2, because 0.38K means only 1.8w/m2 ekstra radiation from earth. The rest must be evaporation i think.
Svend, see here for the answers to your excellent questions.
w.
Willis wrote: “Note that 3.7 W/m2 is the increase in downwelling longwave radiation expected from a doubling of CO2 …”
3.7 W/m2 is the average decrease in OLR predicted for an instantaneous doubling of CO2 by radiation transfer calculations. The increase in DLR is only about 1 W/m2.
The difference would be going into warming the atmosphere the atmosphere until the 3.7 W/m2 imbalance had been negated by increased emission of thermal IR by the warmer atmosphere.
Enjoy those long days.
Frank,
There is no increase in DLR from an instantaneous doubling of CO2.
I clarified what it was here in this post:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/06/08/radiation-versus-temperature/#comment-2719828
But Willis never replied. He’s not using the 3.7 W/m^2 figure correctly here and doesn’t seem to know what it is.
RW: Those doubled CO2 molecules must be pretty smart to be able to effect OLR, but not DLR.
You can go to the online MODTRAN website and see for yourself that doubled CO2 increases DLR and decreases OLR. The increase in DLR from clear skies is bigger than the “about 1 W/m2” I cited. However, if you add low clouds, doubling CO2 produces almost no change since most of the DLR photons are emitted from cloud bottoms.
I believe an early Ramanathan paper calculated an increase of 0.9 W/m2.
If you want a rational, doubled CO2 means that the average DLR photon after doubling arriving at the surface has been emitted from a lower altitude where it is warmer. This is analogous to the average OLR photon escaping to space being emitted from higher after doubling.
Frank,
There is no increase in DLR applied to the system for the instantaneous 2xCO2 case. The increase in DLR is (has to be) subtracted from the OLR decrease to conserve energy for the instantaneous case or calculation. So what is applied to the system (and the system is responding to) is simply an OLR decrease of 3.7 W/m^2
Frank,
Increased DLR and decreased OLR from 2xCO2 is a violation of COE.
Willis, is the CERES data sufficiently detailed to allow us to see the CO2 spectroscopic footprint? It would be interesting to see the amount of long wavelength radiation that is getting through in a real-world environment with water vapour in the atmosphere.
OK . . . to all WUWT readers that may wonder if they have the correct mental image of how the Earth radiates in the infrared band (particularly, radiation from global CO2 atmospheric content) and if this is accurately modeled over Earth’s surface area by a few linear (or even non-linear equations) run on a supercomputer . . .just check out this linked video. It’s been around for a while, but is still very informative and should be humbling to anyone attempting to calculate SWIR/LWIR from Earth’s surface directly to space and, moreover, from various atmospheric layers that are sending “downwelling” radiation to Earth’s surface.
Remember bright white area represents high IR emission to space while dark black areas indicate ~100% blockage/absorbtion of IR by water vapor and condensed water (i.e., clouds); peak IR imaging sensitivity is at 6.5 microns wavelength versus CO2 having a significant absorption/emission window at ~4-5 microns that is NOT blocked by atmospheric water vapor. The spatial and temporal variabilities are just wicked!
Enjoy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f7QttjGu628
Dear Willis
You have better skills and tools than i have, so i would like to draw your attention to the surfrad data.
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/grad/surfrad/
It is real radiation ( and other) data from the ground where humans live. Not up in the sky TOA.
They have only operated from 1995 and only a few places, but there must be some interresting connections to look at.
I wonder myself how the downwelling infrared depends on the upwelling. It looks that there are some connection, like constant difference og constant relation.
Best regards Svend Ferdinandsen
There is the Global Energy Balance Archive (GEBA). See article Martin Wild – The Global Energy Balance Archive (GEBA) version 2017: a database for worldwide measured surface energy fluxes https://www.earth-syst-sci-data.net/9/601/2017/essd-9-601-2017.pdf
Website GEBA and data acces: http://www.geba.ethz.ch/
“Data Availability and Exchange
The GEBA data are available at no cost for bona fide research.New users register by filling in the registration form”
Unsurprisingly, the uncertainty ranges are fairly large. It is instructive that UN IPCC CMIP5 do not do well in comparison.
There was some armwaving about the reasons for multi-decadal cyclical nature of brightening and dimming (increases and decreases in SW at the surface). They did not explain why the discussion was limited to the period beginning in the 1980’s.
It is interesting information.
Dave Fair: “Unsurprisingly, the uncertainty ranges are fairly large”
WR: Indeed, in 2017 the uncertainty ranges are still very large . The often wide uncertainty range is hardly known by anyone and hardly ever mentioned. For that an excerpt of the numbers and uncertainty ranges in the next table.
Some numbers of fluxes in the Global Mean Energy Balance diagram of GEBA, figure 4:
Best Estimate W/m2 Uncertainty Ranges W/m2
Solar absorbed surface 160 (154, 166)
Evaporation 82 (70, 85)
Sensible heat 21 (15, 25)
Thermal up surface 398 (384, 400)
Thermal down surface 342 (338, 348)
Thermal outgoing TOA 239 (236, 242)
Figure 4. Schematic diagram of the global mean energy balance of the Earth. Numbers indicate best estimates for the magnitudes of the globally averaged energy balance components (W m−2 ) together with their uncertainty ranges in parentheses, representing present-day climate conditions at the beginning of the 21st century.
Top-of-atmosphere fluxes are determined from the CERES satellite observations. Surface radiative flux estimates are derived from the CMIP5 model bias structure with respect to GEBA and BSRN observations as outlined in Wild et al. (2013, 2015). Adapted from Wild et al. (2015).
The diagram of the GEBA 2017 Global Mean Energy Balance:
Article: https://www.earth-syst-sci-data.net/9/601/2017/essd-9-601-2017.pdf
I’ve added an update to the head post showing the same results but using the HadCRUT surface temperature datase. Net result? No significant difference.
w.
Willis, this was very thought provoking and caused me to dig deeper and learn something new. So thanks!
What I’ve learned is that an increased greenhouse effect can be measured by looking at outgoing shortwave, which decreases with an increasing greenhouse effect.
See the following article from 2014:
The Missing Piece of the Climate Puzzle
http://oceans.mit.edu/news/featured-stories/missing-peice-climate-puzzle.html
“While one would expect the longwave radiation that escapes into space to decline with increasing CO2, the amount actually begins to rise. At the same time, the atmosphere absorbs more and more incoming solar radiation; it’s this enhanced shortwave absorption that ultimately sustains global warming.”
I recommend you try the same thing only looking at surface SW up this time vs. a surface temperature data set.
I tried this myself and for each 3.7 W/m^2 decrease in surface SW up, I found a 1.2°C increase in HadCRUT4.
For Berkeley Earth and GISTEMP, I found about a 1.5°C increase.
To be very specific, I used CERES “Surface Shortwave Flux Up – All-Sky”.