March 12th, 2020 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
Once again I am being drawn into defending the common explanation of Earth’s so-called “greenhouse effect” as it is portrayed by the IPCC, textbooks, and virtually everyone who works in atmospheric radiation and thermodynamics.
To be clear, I am not defending the IPCC’s predictions of future climate change… just the general explanation of the Earth’s greenhouse effect, which has a profound influence on global temperatures as well as on weather.
As we will see, much confusion arises about the greenhouse effect due to its complexity, and the difficulty in expressing that complexity accurately with words alone. In fact, the IPCC’s greenhouse effect “definition” quoted by Dr. Ollila is incomplete and misleading, as anyone who understands the greenhouse effect should know.
As we will see, in the case of something as complicated as the greenhouse effect, a simplified worded definition should never be the basis for quantitative calculations; instead, complicated calculations are sometimes only poorly described with words.
What is the “Greenhouse Effect”?
Descriptions of the Earth’s natural greenhouse effect are unavoidably incomplete due to its complexity, and even misleading at times due to ambiguous phrasing when trying to express that complexity.
The complexity arises because the greenhouse effect involves every cubic meter of the atmosphere having the ability to both absorb and emit infrared (IR) energy. (And almost never are the rates of absorption and emission the same, contrary to the claims of many skeptics – IR emission is very temperature-dependent, while absorption is not).
While essentially all the energy for this ultimately comes from absorbed sunlight, the infrared absorption and re-radiation by air (and by clouds in the atmosphere) makes the net impact of the greenhouse effect on temperatures somewhat non-intuitive. The emission of this invisible radiation by everything around us is obviously more difficult to describe than the single-source Sun.
The ability of air and clouds to absorb and emit IR radiation has profound impacts on energy flows and temperatures throughout the atmosphere, leading to the multiple infrared energy flow arrows (red) in the energy budget diagram originally popularized by Kiehl & Trenberth (Fig. 1).
Fig. 1. Global- and time-averaged (day+night and through the seasons) primary energy flows between the surface, atmosphere, and space (NASA). If there was no atmosphere, there would be a single yellow arrow reaching the surface, and a single red arrow extending from the surface to outer space, representing equal magnitudes of absorbed solar and emitted infrared energy, respectively.
[As an aside, contrary to the claims of the 2010 book Slaying the Sky Dragon: Death of the Greenhouse Gas Theory, this simplified picture of the average energy flows between the Earth’s surface, atmosphere, and space is NOT what is assumed by climate models. Climate models use the relevant physical processes at every point on three-dimensional grid covering the Earth, with day-night and seasonal cycles of solar illumination. The simplified energy budget diagram is instead the best-estimate of the global average energy flows based upon a wide variety of observations, model diagnostics, and the assumption of no natural long-term climate change.]
If the Earth had no atmosphere (like the Moon), the surface temperature at any given location would be governed by the balance between the rate of absorbed solar energy and the loss of thermally-emitted infrared (IR) radiation. The sun would heat the surface to a temperature where the emitted IR radiation balanced the absorbed solar radiation, and then the temperature would stop increasing. This general concept of energy balance between energy gain and energy loss is involved in determining the temperature of virtually anything you can think of.
But the Earth does have an atmosphere, and the atmosphere both absorbs and emits IR radiation in all directions. “Greenhouse gases” (primarily water vapor, but also carbon dioxide) provide most of this function, and any gain or loss of an IR photon by a GHG molecule is almost immediately felt by the non-radiatively active gases (like nitrogen and oxygen) through molecular collisions.
If we were to represent these infrared energy flows in Fig. 1 more completely, there would be a nearly infinite number of red arrows, both upward and downward, connecting every vanishingly-thin layer of atmosphere with every other vanishingly thin layer. Those are the flows that are happening continuously in the atmosphere.
The most important net impact of the greenhouse effect on terrestrial temperatures is this:
The net effect of a greenhouse atmosphere is that it keeps the lower atmospheric layers (and surface) warmer, and the upper atmosphere colder, than if the greenhouse effect did not exist.
I have often called this a “radiative blanket” effect.
Interestingly, without the greenhouse effect, the upper layers of the troposphere would not be able to cool to outer space, and weather as we know it (which depends upon radiative destabilization of the vertical temperature profile) would not exist. This was demonstrated by Manabe & Strickler (1964) who calculated that, without convective overturning, the pure radiative equilibrium temperature profile of the troposphere is very hot at the surface, and very cold in the upper troposphere. Convective overturning in the atmosphere reduces this huge temperature ‘lapse rate’ by about two-thirds to three-quarters, resulting in what we observe in the real atmosphere.
Dr. Ollila’s Claims
The latest installment of what I consider to be bad skeptical science regarding the greenhouse effect comes from emeritus professor of environmental science, Dr. Antero Ollila, who claims that the energy budget diagram somehow violates the 1st Law of Thermodynamics, i.e., conservation of energy, at least in terms of how the greenhouse effect is quantified.
His article is entitled, How The IPCC’s Greenhouse Definition Violates the Physical Law of Conservation of Mass & Energy. He uses a modified version (Fig. 2) of the Kiehl-Trenberth diagram:
Fig. 2. Dr. Ollila’s version of the global energy budget diagram.
It should be noted that these global average energy budget diagrams do indeed conserve energy in their total energy fluxes at the top-of-atmosphere (the climate system as a whole), as well as for the surface and atmosphere, separately. If you add up these energy gain and loss terms you will see they are equal, which must be the case for any system with a stable temperature over time.
But what Dr. Ollila seems to be confused about is what you can physically and quantitatively deduce about the greenhouse effect when you start combining energy fluxes in that diagram. Much of the first part of Dr. Ollila’s article is just fine. His objection to the diagram is introduced with the following statement, which those who hold similar views to his will be triggered by:
“The obvious reason for the GH effect seems to be the downward infrared radiation from the atmosphere to the surface and its magnitude is 345 W/m2. Therefore, the surface absorbs totally 165 (solar) + 345 (downward infrared from the atmosphere) = 510 W/m2.“
At this point some of my readers (you know who you are) will object to that quote, and say something like, “But the only energy input at the surface is from the sun! How can the atmosphere add more energy to the system, when the sun is the only source of energy?” My reading of Dr. Ollila’s article indicates that that is where he is going as well.
But this is where the problem with ambiguous wording comes in. The atmosphere is not, strictly speaking, adding more energy to the surface. It is merely returning a portion of the atmosphere-absorbed solar, infrared, and convective transport energy back to the surface in the form of infrared energy.
As shown in Fig. 2, the surface is still emitting more IR energy than the atmosphere is returning to the surface, resulting in net surface loss of [395 – 345 =] 50 W/m2 of infrared energy. And, as previously mentioned, all energy fluxes at the surface balance.
And this is what our intuition tells us should be happening: the surface is warmed by sunlight, and cooled by the loss of IR energy (plus moist and dry convective cooling of the surface of 91 and 24 W/m2, respectively.) But the atmosphere’s radiative blanket reduces the rate of IR cooling from the warmer lower layers of the atmosphere to the upper cooler layers. This alteration of average energy flows by greenhouse gases and clouds alters the atmospheric temperature profile.
A related but common misunderstanding is the idea that the rate of energy input determines a system’s temperature. That’s wrong.
Given any rate of energy input into a system, the temperature will continue to increase until temperature-dependent energy loss mechanisms equal the rate of energy input. If you don’t believe it, let’s look at an extreme example.
Believe it or not, the human body generates energy through metabolism at a rate that is 8,000 time greater than what the sun generates, per kg of mass. But the human body has an interior temperature of only 98.6 deg. F, while the sun’s interior temperature is estimated to be around 27,000,000 deg. F. This is a dramatic example that the rate of energy *input* does not determine temperature: it’s the balance between the rates of energy gain and energy loss that determines temperature.
If energy has no efficient way to escape, then even a weak rate of energy input can lead to exceedingly high temperatures, such as occurs in the sun. I have read that it takes thousands of years for energy created in the core of the sun from nuclear fusion to make its way to the sun’s surface.
Since this is meant to be a critique of Dr. Ollila’s specific arguments let’s return to them. I just wanted to first address his central concern by explaining the greenhouse effect in the best terms I can, before I confuse you with his arguments. Here I list the main points of his reasoning, in which I reproduce the first quote from above for completeness:
[begin quote]
The obvious reason for the GH effect seems to be the downward infrared radiation from the atmosphere to the surface and its magnitude is 345 Wm-2. Therefore, the surface absorbs totally 165 + 345 = 510 Wm-2….
The difference between the radiation to the surface and the net solar radiation is 510 – 240 = 270 Wm-2...
The real GH warming effect is right here: it is 270 Wm-2 because it is the extra energy warming the Earth’s surface in addition to the net solar energy.
The final step is that we must find out what is the mechanism creating this infrared radiation from the atmosphere. According to the IPCC’s definition, the GH effect is caused by the GH gases and clouds which absorb infrared radiation of 155 Wm-2 emitted by the surface and which they further radiate to the surface.
As we can see there is a problem – and a very big problem – in the IPCC’s GH effect definition: the absorbed energy of 155 Wm-2 cannot radiate to the surface 345 Wm-2 or even 270 Wm-2. According to the energy conversation law, energy cannot be created from the void. According to the same law, energy does not disappear, but it can change its form.
From Figure (2) it is easy to name the two other energy sources which are needed for causing the GH effect namely latent heating 91 Wm-2 and sensible heating 24 Wm-2, which make 270 Wm-2 with the longwave absorption of 155 Wm-2.
When the solar radiation absorption of 75 Wm-2 by the atmosphere will be added to these three GH effect sources, the sum is 345 Wm2. Everything matches without the violation of physics. No energy disappears or appears from the void. Coincidence? Not so.
Here is the point: the IPCC’s definition means that the LW absorption of 155 Wm-2 could create radiation of 270 Wm-2 which is impossible.“
[end quote]
Now, I have spent at least a couple of hours trying to follow his line of reasoning, and I cannot. If Dr. Ollila wanted to claim that the energy budget numbers violate energy conservation, he could have made all of this much simpler by asking the question, How can 240 W/m2 of solar input to the climate system cause 395 W/m2 of IR emission by the surface? Or 345 W/m2 of downward IR emission from the sky to the surface? ALL of these numbers are larger than the available solar flux being absorbed by the climate system, are they not? But, as I have tried to explain from the above, a 1-way flow of IR energy is not very informative, and only makes quantitative sense when it is combined with the IR flow in the opposite direction.
If we don’t do that, we can fool ourselves into thinking there is some mysterious and magical “extra” source of energy, which is not the case at all. All energy flows in these energy budget diagram have solar input as the energy source, and as energy courses through the climate system, they all end up balancing. There is no violation of the laws of thermodynamics.
Is There an Energy Flux Measure of the Greenhouse Effect?
One of the problems with Dr. Ollila’s reasoning is that there really isn’t any of these unidirectional energy fluxes (or combinations of energy fluxes, such as 155, or 270, or 345 W/m2) that can be called a measure of the greenhouse effect. The average unidirectional energy fluxes are what exist after the surface and atmosphere have readjusted their temperature and humidity structures (as well as after the sensible and latent convective heat transports get established).
Even the oft-quoted 33 deg. C of warming isn’t a measure of the greenhouse effect… it’s the resulting surface warming after convective heat transports have cooled the surface. As I recall, the true, pure radiative equilibrium greenhouse effect on surface temperature (without convective heat transports) would double or triple that number.
If the atmospheric radiative energy flows are too abstract for you, let’s use the case of a house heated in the winter. On an average cold winter day, I compute from standard sources that the heating unit in the average house leads to a loss of energy through the walls, ceiling, and floor of about 10 W/m2 (just take the heater input in Watts [around 5,000 Joules/sec] and divide by the surface area of all house exterior surfaces [ around 500 sq. meters]).
But compare that 10 W/m2 of energy flow though the walls, ceiling, and floor to the inward IR emission by the exterior walls, which (it is easy to show) emit an IR flux toward the center of the house that is about 100 W/m2 greater than the outward emission by the outside of the walls. That ~100 W/m2 difference in outward versus inward IR flux is still energetically consistent with the 10 W/m2 of heat flow outward through the walls.
This seeming contradiction is resolved (just as in the case of Earth’s surface energy budget) when we realize that the NET (2-way) infrared flux at the inside surface of the exterior walls is still outward, because that wall surface will be slightly colder than the interior of the house, which is also emitting IR energy toward the outside walls. Talking about the IR flux in only one direction is not very quantitatively useful by itself. There is no magical and law-violating creation of extra energy.
Concluding Comments
If you have managed to wade through the arguments above and understand most of them, congratulations. You now see how complicated the greenhouse effect is compared to, say, just sunlight warming the Earth’s surface. That complexity leads to imprecise, incomplete, and ambiguous descriptions of the greenhouse effect, even in the scientific literature (and the IPCC’s description).
The most accurate representation of the greenhouse effect is made through the relevant equations that describe the radiative (and convective) energy flows between the surface and the atmosphere. To express all of that in words would be nearly impossible, and the more accurate the wording, the more the reader’s eyes would glaze over.
So, we are left with people like me trying to inform the public on issues which I sometimes consider to be a waste of time arguing about. I only waste that time because I would like for my fellow skeptics to be armed with good science, not bad science.
[I still maintain that the simplest backyard demonstration of the greenhouse effect in action is with a handheld IR thermometer pointed at a clear sky at different angles, and seeing the warming of the thermometer’s detector as you scan from the zenith down to an oblique angle. That is the greenhouse effect in action.]
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In my mind a thermal works as a pump, the hot air rises until it looses heat energy. The loss is by more than one process, water condensing and forming a cloud, radiation. Once cooled the air falls and warms in a Process similar to a chinook warming. This warming is a conversion of Potential Energy into heat energy. Again my mental picture has a build up of Potential Energy during the day and it being converted to heat at night. With the caveat that both processes are operating virtually continuously.
Then I have to add UHI creating columns of rising air for longer than rural land. The energy of each photon is inversely proportional to the wavelength so each Conversion produces less, not necessarily fewer, energetic photons.
I’m left wondering who and how all the other inputs to the system are assigned “values”. So add in all the phases of warm and cold in this inter glacial, are we discussing angels on a pin head
The first problem with “greenhouse effect” is the morons who still insist on calling it that in any form.
Atmospheric Thermodynamic Insolation Gain is the correct term.
ATIG makes a nice acronym too.
Exactly, pls. refuse to use wrong language dictated by alarmists.
We need reeducating camps for wormunists where they do hard labor in greenhouses.
The megaphones should loudly repeat: all the heat you feel is because of lack of convection.
It suits me but it is too difficult to start using your own terms, no matter how bad the old terms or names are.
Extra energy and the GH effect on the surface
Dr. Spencer writes like this: “The latest installment of what I consider to be bad skeptical science regarding the greenhouse effect comes from an emeritus professor of environmental science, Dr. Antero Ollila, who claims that the energy budget diagram somehow violates the 1st Law of Thermodynamics, i.e., conservation of energy, at least in terms of how the greenhouse effect is quantified.”
I have been reading two, three times this comment and the comments following further in the blog story and I think that Dr. Spencer mixes up two matters. I do not write anywhere that the diagram violates the 1st law of thermodynamics. On the contrary, I write that everything in this figure is in place and according to physical laws.
But what I write about the GH effect definition of the IPCC, is like this (a quote): As we can see there is a problem – and a very big problem – in the IPCC’s GH effect definition: the absorbed energy of 155 Wm-2 cannot radiate to the surface 345 Wm-2 or even 270 Wm-2. According to the energy conversation law, energy cannot be created from the void. According to the same law, energy does not disappear, but it can change its form.”
I write it clearly that I talk about the GH effect of the IPCC – not about my own definition. Dr. Spencer does not express the main point of my study that the GH effect definition of the IPCC means that the only reason for the GH effect is the LW radiation absorption by GH gases and clouds and its numerical values according to Figure is 155 W/m2. Exactly the same value as used by Schmidt et al. as I already have shown in the comment above.
As simply as possible: the GH effect of the IPCC means energy flux of 155 W/m2 and I have shown that it is 270 W/m2, which does not violate physical laws.
Another quote from Dr. Spencer: “But this is where the problem with ambiguous wording comes in. The atmosphere is not, strictly speaking, adding more energy to the surface. It is merely returning a portion of the atmosphere-absorbed solar, infrared, and convective transport energy back to the surface in the form of infrared energy.”
I agree with “the extra energy due to the GH effect” originates from the sun. It is not created from the void, but it is a result of the GH effect and the diagram in the figure shows it in an illustrative way. This energy comes originally from the sun. Totally four energy fluxes maintain the temperature profile of the atmosphere and one of them is just a portion of direct SW radiation 75 W/m2 absorbed by the atmosphere and then reradiated back to the surface not being a part of the GH effect.
The total energy of the atmosphere is like in a trap in the atmosphere: huge energy fluxes are coming in all the time and there must be a way for outgoing fluxes. The only way for the atmosphere to get rid of these energy fluxes for maintaining the balance is to radiate them downwards 345 W/m2 and into space 212 W/m2 which makes the total energy balance of the atmosphere to be 557 W/m2. The incoming energy fluxes into the atmosphere are 367 from the surface 75 from the insolation, 155 from LW absorption, sensible heating 24 and latent heating 91, a totally of 557 W/m2. It should be noticed that 28 W/m2 transmits through the atmosphere and that is why the total LW radiation flux into space is 212+28 = 240 W/m2.
The GH effect is a real thing. Although the physical phenomena creating the GH effect are complicated, the results are pretty simple. The GH effect works like the insulation of the house, but its physical basis is different. I make an example of a house with 100 m2 in a cold climate having a constant outside temperature of -20 C. We could put a heating source having a heating capacity of 5 kW without a thermostat into this house having the temperature of -20 C and (it may happen in many cottages in Finland in the wintertime). After a day when we go into this house, its inside temperature would be something like +20 C. It means that the incoming and outgoing energy fluxes have come into balance. The same has happened with the Earth. The incoming energy fluxes at the top of the atmosphere, in the atmosphere and on the surface have come into the balances, which are amazingly stable. The energy balance depends on both the incoming and the outgoing energy fluxes, and they finally determine the temperature.
(try with my ‘spare/main’ email addy – The Money Grubbing Powers that be stopped my old one)
We have GOT to get this thing clear.
Firstly – go to the wiki and run their temp formula with REALISTIC values
Especially for Earth Albedo – use a value of 0.1 (value 0.3 comes AFTER a climate has been created)
Next, use a realistic value for the emissivity of the atmosphere, that is =0.02 (or even less)
THEN you get an Earth Temp close to that of Venus
Does this not make sense, water does everything it can to raise Earth albedo – from creating clouds/ice to growing plants (green plants have albedo= 0.4 and even higher when fed lots of nitrogen fertiliser)
Water Cools The Planet.
Read what Stefan said…
An object radiates according to its temperature and emissivity – it matter not what other objects are in the vicinity
Read what he said about Radiation Pressure – try to grasp what that might be
(It is not easy – firstly we need to know why a vacuum has ‘properties’ how DOES a place of Completely Nothing manage to have electric/magnetic ‘properties’
I suspect a Nobel awaits anyone who figures it out
Thus, A Warm Object can NOT absorb the radiant energy coming from a Cold Object.
Never mind where it goes – it is in all probability reflected – confusing the unthinking observer that the cold object has in fact warmed up.
Remember, the wavelength (indicative temperature) is ONLY connected to the radiated power via the emissivity
First exercise, work out how much energy the atmosphere, at emissivity 0.02 and Temp= 288 Kelvin actually radiates.
Notta lot is it?
Doc Spencer says the returning energy ‘replaces’ previously lost energy
It can not do that because it is coming from the atmosphere and ANY POINT in the atmosphere is ALWAYS COLDER than anywhere below it.
No It Does Not
Radiant energy CAN NOT flow downwards in the atmosphere – Stefan said that by using the term “Radiation Pressure”
The analogy with the Sun is nice.
The troposphere has water (vapour) in it. That pretty well defines it.
This water vapour makes it, to all intents and first approximation, utterly opaque to the radiations coming off objects at 288K plus/minus 100K
Yes OK, CO2 does in fact make it slightly blacker but we’re talking specks of pepper on a velvet jacket. Immeasurable – as it actually is – HAS ANYONE recorded yet this downwelling radiation?
Of course, water by having high absorption must also be a good emitter.
But it is all happening inside something with the transparency of a lump of coal.
Similar to inside the sun. As soon as any radiation sets off, it is intercepted and turned back into sensible/actual heat
THUS, the only way that heat can escape Earth’s surface (the dirt you’re standing on) is via conduction or convection
A double whammy thus occurs, oxygen/nitrogen has VERY low thermal conductivity
Right, using radiation to account for heat flow in the troposphere is a fools errand -shine a torch into a brick then use a radiation model to see the light coming out the other side.
Now, convection get the heat energy to the Tropopause.
Above it is the Stratosphere – by definition of a wet troposphere, the stratosphere is Bone Dry
Thus, the water building at the top of the Troposphere can now use it high emissivity to radiate away the Earth’s energy.
Of course, being warmer than the stratosphere, this radiant energy will be intercepted by cold molecules in the stratosphere – they will then radiate at their temp and emissivity – which is VERY low.
But the stratosphere is transparent, thus it appears to a distant observer to have layers like an onion.
Each layer emits at it temp but is energy can get through the layers above it – UNLIKE what happens in the troposphere.
Bingo!!
We now have no need for convection any more and so it is – hence how the stratosphere got its name
Now think about it.
The Strat will act like a Perfect Gas – its size will depend upon temperature and the amount of radiation it emits will depend upon its size.
Thus, if Earth tries to cool, the strat will shrink and reduce its energy output
DO remember again, the radiant flow in the Strat can ONLY be upwards – as per what Stefan said
So not only de emergent phenomena and the ‘iris effect’ maintain temps – so does the stratosphere
Now then, because the Strat is the Earth’s radiator and depends upon its low emissity – what would happen if some high emissivity ‘stuff’ got in there?
Would it not cool?
Is THAT not exactly what’s happening – the Stratosphere is cooling exactly because CO23 is getting into there
What about volcanoes and sulphur?
Would SOx not also have high emissivity and cool the Stratosphere/Earth – EXACTLY what happens.
Maybe the Aerosols are a Red Herring?
And the Strat IS REPORTED as cooling
Yet brain dead energy conservationists say this is because the heat is trapped in the (warmer) Troposphere
Have you EVER heard such garbage – they’re saying that CO2 is making the Thermal Gradient (Trop vs Strat) steeper and LESS energy is flowing down that steeper gradient.
Complete Insanity4
Once you’ve got the hang of emissivity you can then explain the temperature inversion as you first rise into the Strat.
(Use the fact that in (say) water, that the high energy/temp, molecules escape first. If high energy molecules escape the Trop and get into the Strat, they are In Heaven. No convection, little conduction & very low emissivity – so they maintain their ‘above average temps’
Also perfectly explains the Chromosphere around the sun – a very high temp layer of very low emissivity molecules – oxygen, nitrogen, aluminium, silver etc etc
There you go – why DOES a vacuum have properties.
Light travels at a certain defined speed – NOT just because it has to go at one speed or the other.
Fat fingers & not paying attention – I could be a really good Climate Scientist at this rate.
Suspect not tho
Quote:….. the unthinking observer that the cold object has……
I did intend that to say the HOT object.
Yes?
The impartial distant observer sees the radiation from the hot object, but ALSO sees/measures the REFLECTED radiation that started off from the cold object
He thus sees more energy coming from the hot object and if he doesn’t account for its wavelength=temperature (Wien’s Law) he will wrongly conclude that the presence of the cold object has warmed the warm one.
No No NO
The Take-Away from this rave?
Do NOT assume emissivity of Unity (=1) for ALL your Earth objects
That is The Main Fail in everyone’s thinking.
Because an oxygen/nitrogen atmosphere has an emissivity that is so low as to be impossible to measure accurately generally taken to be 0.02
Your calcs will be out by a factor of at least 500
We all know that objects change colour depending on The Light
Thus, Take 3 objects – hot, cold & middling (just right)
The hot object will see the warm and cold objects as being =black (absorbing)
The cold object will see the warm and the hot as both being= white (reflecting)
But the warm (middling) object will see the cold one as black and the hot one as white.
Worse than a Hall Of Mirrors innit
That ‘Radiation’ for ya!
Then we record temps down to (how many) decimal places without being able to get a good handle on emissivity
sigh
Makes the counting of Dancing Angels look like a worthwhile pursuit
Yes non radiative heat transfers of latent and sensible heat contribute to downwelling Radiation. But an equal amount of surface absorbed downward radiation is used up to generate the non-radiative transfers and thus does not add anything to surface upward radiative flux, ie surface temperature. So latent and sensible heat should therefore not be counted as part of the greenhouse effect.
Quote: “But an equal amount of surface absorbed downward radiation is used up to generate the non-radiative transfers and thus does not add anything to surface upward radiative flux, ie surface temperature.”
This is very confusing. In which way non-radiative transfer happens from the atmosphere to the surface?? No energy balance diagram shows these kinds of energy fluxes.
Thanks for replying. It is not confusing, it’s just energy transfer. When latent heat is released in the atmosphere, the gases must heat up – including the greenhouse gases, resulting in the increased long wave radiation that we see KT97 add to back radiation. That’s why it is referred to as an energy budget, not a radiative budget. Best regards.
This is nonsense. You could say as well that the solar insolation does not add any energy to the surface because the surface emits the same amount.
Moving air leads to speed gradients and obviously friction. Which results in heat no matter the sign and direction of speed sheer.
Then, somewhere deep down, Earth has another source of heat. Neutrons from radioactive decay of naturally present radioactive elements pushing their way through matter. Yes, in a way, our planet doubles as a gigantic radioactive elements “cooling pool”.
Now, all mixed together, including the “initial heat” contained in the core, various turbulence and sheer air frictions, gas law P.V temperature variations, all, then, OK,I wish the best to anyone who claims accurate modelling.
Fully agree with this statement.
I have three points to support it:
1. Energy balance
The only source of energy we have on Earth is Sun, it radiation in visible and UV emission, and solar energetic particles. The solar UV radiations is absorbed by all the molecules of terrestrial atmosphere and redistributed between different sources. Some of it goes to the Earth producing heating as described. However, from the energy conservation law, the total energy involved in all this process cannot exceed that obtained from the Sun. If they generate some energy in the lower layers as IPCC scientists claim, they make somewhere an error violating the conservation of the energy. Basically they found the ‘eternal engine’, which the alchemists of the medieval ages failed to do.
2. Radiative transfer
If we assume that this infra-red (IR) radiation reflected from the Earth is so strong as the AGW models suggest, than this radiation will not be simply absorbed by the overlying molecules. The reflected photons of this IR radiations will undergo radiative transfer (RT) process when IT photons are absorbed and emitted many-many times and not necessarily in the same frequencies as absorbed.
What the difference this RT will make to the radiation emitted back tot he Earth?
It will lock the IR photons within the media of radiative transfer, they cannot drop all these photons back to the Earth. Instead, the RT layer will be emitting only a small bit from the level in the lower atmosphere where optical thickness (number of absorbing atoms multiplied by the absorption coefficient) is equal to unity.
Hence, the IR emission will be constant and much smaller that the IPCC predicts (who drop all the photons back to the surface.
3. Furthermore, the solar forcing is not constant as the IPCC models assume.
I wish to point out that the current models of solar forcing does not include the extra solar radiation coming from the fact that currently the Sun moves closer to the Earth orbit in its solar inertial motion.
This motion from 1700 to 2010 made the Sun to emit extra solar irradiance of 2-3 W/m^2 (that is close to that measured by the current instruments), than will be 4 W/m^2 by 2100 and 7-10 W/m^2 by 2700 when the Sun will be closest to the Earth. This motion, consequently, increases the terrestrial temperature by >1.2C (1700-2000), >1.5C (1700-2100) and about 3.0-4.0 C in 2700 (like it was during Roman’s empire when grapes grew in Scotland).
The AGW people were so scared by this missing solar forcing mechanism we reported in our paper that they made the Editor to retract our paper from Nature Scientific Reports on some made up reason not stating that they object the fact that the S-E distance changes with a period of 2100 years https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-019-45584-3.
We placed the author’s protest below the Editor’s note. We also provided the archive paper showing the updated paper with the correction of the S-E distance which do not change the paper figures, text, conclusions or abstract.
Then my university site was brought down on the basis of ‘revision’ (of what?) so people could not see our reply and the papers with calculations demonstrating our points.
We created a new web site and moving the stuff there. But the protest note with the links is working on this site https://solargsm.com
This extra solar forcing mechanism is an additional blow to the IPCC idea of greenhouse heating of the atmosphere.
To support the solar forcing in our planet heating may I suggest to have a look at other planets.
Planet Mars had it polar ice caps melting in 1999-2001 at the same time when the Arctic and Antarctic ices were melting
https://www.jpl.nasa.gov/spaceimages/details.php?id=PIA03179
https://www.google.com/search?q=martian+ice+images+in+1999+and+2001&sxsrf=ALeKk01Y2WvpSp75W3l4dpd0P9RX6Gb6Pw:1584022280940&tbm=isch&source=iu&ictx=1&fir=RM1LWYNuikMHuM%253A%252Cg8_XxUn-cgFu9M%252C_&vet=1&usg=AI4_-kRot820iBWgw4X5Y6lno_R_5025aA&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjjn_zqjpXoAhWGFMAKHb4jD40Q9QEwAXoECAcQBw#imgrc=RM1LWYNuikMHuM:
The same was applicable to the Jupiter typhoons and expansion fo red spot a decade ago (google for images from the previous decades, because google hides the previous research in favour of AGW). Currently, the area of red spot (typhoon?) is reducing https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/25/science/jupiter-great-red-spot.html
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Jupiter
We believe this reduction or the red-spot area is because the Sun goes into the grand solar minimum 2020-2053
https://nam2015.org/press-releases/64-irregular-heartbeat-of-the-sun-driven-by-double-dynamo.
The same is expected to happen on the Earth, the temperature has shown the signs of reducing and will continue doing so for the next 2 decades as the Sun is going into a hibernation https://www.nature.com/articles/srep15689.
I believe, the AGW will be squeezed to the back seat because of the growing needs for heating and food can be the main issues in these few decades.
Reply to Valentina Zharkova’s comments
1. Energy balance.
The downward LW radiation of the atmosphere is a scientific fact because it has been measured by the ground-based network. It is an undeniable fact.
2. Radiative transfer
I have calculated tens of times what happens to the radiation flux emitted by the surface (not reflected as Dr. Zarhova writes) according to its temperature per Planck’s law. Miskolczi has shown in his papers in which way the upward and downward fluxes behave in the atmosphere. I have used as validation two absorbed flux value in comparison to the model calculated fluxes of my spectral analysis with the global average atmosphere. Stephens et al. have calculated the average value of 13 different energy balance models which is 314.2 W/m2 for the downward flux from the atmosphere. My calculations give 310.9 W/m2, a difference being of 1.0 %. NASA CERES values for the outgoing LW flux into space for 2000-2019 is 266.4 W/m2. My calculations show 266.4 W/m2. It should be noticed that I have carried out calculations using the global average atmospheric temperature, pressure and GH gas concentration profiles up to 70 km (absorption is ready 98 % after the troposphere) and the calculations are based on the interactions between photons and GH gas molecules taking into account absorptions and emissions between the GH gases. The calculation equations have been tested in laboratory conditions and the absorption of CO2 even in nature, and the accuracy is below 1 %.
2. Solar forcing
Now we talk about the different subject and it is what has possibly caused the warming of the Earth since 1750. I agree that the role of the Sun may have a much bigger effect than calculated by the IPCC. When I consider the “climate optimum” periods of the Roman empire 2000 years ago and the Viking period 1000 years ago, the best and imminent explanation is the Sun and probably it is the main cause also in the present warming period. According to my studies, the warming effect of CO2 is only 30 % of the official figure of the IPCC, which means that the TCS is only 0.6 C and not 1.8 C. I have shown in my original research paper that the TCS value of 1.8 C cannot be fitted into the correct GH effect definition of my (270 W/m2) but my warming effect of CO2 fits perfectly. I have sent this story to WUWT but they have not published
“The only source of energy we have on Earth is Sun”
That’s not true. The earth itself is relatively warm–it has energy.
While true, the amount of heat being emitted by the earth is less than the rounding error of the other numbers.
How much energy you think would come through the oceans which cover 70 % of the Earth’s surface and which temperature in the bottom of the ocean is about +4 C degrees and the surface temperature (mainly the mixing layer of the ocean) is +15 C degrees. Think it over.
[I still maintain that the simplest backyard demonstration of the greenhouse effect in action is with a handheld IR thermometer pointed at a clear sky at different angles, and seeing the warming of the thermometer’s detector as you scan from the zenith down to an oblique angle. That is the greenhouse effect in action.]
Increasing the angle from zenith you are just measuring atmospheric temps at lower mean altitudes.
Little to do with a “GHE in action”.
“Increasing the angle from zenith you are just measuring atmospheric temps at lower mean altitudes.
Little to do with a “GHE in action”.”
No, that is everything to do the “GHE in action”.
If it wasn’t then the IR thermometer would read the temperature of outer space (3K).
The atmosphere is ~99% transparent to outgoing terrestrial LWIR.
IF the 1% of it that is opaque (H20, O3, CH4, N2O) were not present there would be no GHE.
It is measuring back radiated LWIR from that “1%”.
The GHE.
No, if a target is colder than IR thermometer,
you are measuring radiation leaving the IR thermometer.
This comment comes from a known person with her very own ideas that the LW radiation cannot be even measured. NASA is just cheating everybody by measuring these fluxes by satellite observations.
So, your answer is she is wrong because she disagrees with NASA.
Ms. Phin shows quite clearly that the mathematical model of the GHE as written online in a Harvard Book ( http://acmg.seas.harvard.edu/people/faculty/djj/book/bookchap7.html ) has a gross error that does not represent the physical world.
For those interested you can find Ms. Phin’s analysis of the GHE here:
https://phzoe.com/2019/11/01/why-the-greenhouse-effect-is-a-fraud-p1/
https://phzoe.com/2019/11/01/why-the-greenhouse-effect-is-a-fraud-p1/
https://phzoe.com/2020/03/04/dumbest-math-theory-ever/
I, too, grew up hearing about the GHE and assumed it to be logical and correct. GHGs are a blanket on the planet and a thicker blanket traps more heat. Finally though after years of reading I now see the unbelievably foolish lie, and complete lack of physical reality. A) you can not heat something with something cooler B) physics tells us if you add more GHG to an atmosphere you INCREASE the LWR emissions thereby INCREASING COOLING. This is basic physics. The utter lunacy of CO2 driving atmospheric temperature change is truly breath taking in it’s blind stupidity.
Show me a valid mathematical explanation for the GHE.
Antero,
It’s a known fact that satellites can’t measure IR moving away from it!
I don’t know why you can’t understand that labelling something “downwelling” doesn’t make it so.
Thanks, JP66
Where did you get the notion that satellites were being used to measure downwelling radiation?
That how it goes. If I write that the downward LW radiation has been measured by the ground-based network, some people write that I wrote that satellites are doing it. That is why it does not make sense to argue with these gues.
Ground based stations measure upwelling-from-the-instrument IR. That’s why they don’t report it, otherwise you’d see it’s the same as “downwelling” IR.
As for satellites, how else does NCEP/NCAR have a ~18,000 grid cells for “downwelling” IR covering every place on Earth?
How does NASA’s ISCCP project have ~6,600 grid cells covering every place on Earth?
There are no ground based stations ALL over the Earth. Many places, sure, but not all over.
Do you not think the measurement device has a temperature and will emit?
Why isn’t that emission reported?
Because that upward emission is already called “downward”.
Try to think beyond the labels.
Zoe Phin,
It seems that there are more reports of downwelling IR radiation than you expect:
https://scienceofdoom.com/2010/07/17/the-amazing-case-of-back-radiation/
A comment for measuring downward LW flux emitted by the atmosphere. I know that CERES satellite system has been used to measure this flux but the results have been checked and calibrated by the ground-based measurement stations- a totally 81 stations. That is how we know that it is a real thing and not just an image that this flux really exits and we know its magnitude.
Anterro,
How many times can you be fooled by a label?
Roy,
It is simple to set up a physical experiment to show a blanket initially makes it seem warmer below it, but colder above.
You can put your apparatus in a bigger box and wait. Over time, the blanket imbalance evens itself out because the bigger box does not add or subtract heat and within it, all objects tend to a common temperature.
What aspect of the atmosphere is different? I suspect it is Earth rotation, that prevents the big box stability. However, I have never liked the blanket analogy for this reason. It has an often-neglected time element, in theory. Geoff S
“What aspect of the atmosphere is different?”
Unless I’m misreading you ….
The fact that the Earth is continually receiving solar energy.
The “box” isn’t.
The sun doesn’t shine 24/7.
Actually it does, just not on all parts of the Earth at the same time.
That’s what I meant to say. Sheesh, coffee first, then type.
“ The sun doesn’t shine 24/7.“
Yes, I say that to my Australian cousin every time I ring her at 3am (sarc).
At any one time half of the Earth is sunlit.
Solar TSI is absorbed by the Earth’s climate system 24/7.
This one of those comments that people do not understand at all, what is the energy balance presentation. They mix it continuously to the events with timescales of minutes, hours, day-time, night-time, days, weeks.
In a way, I am not surprised about the comments what I have seen so far on this webpage and on the other webpages. It has been a common experience that people do not comment on the issue under discussion but more or less they show their own thoughts. THERE IS NOT A SINGLE COMMENT ABOUT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN MY DEFINITION AND THE IPCC’S DEFINITION AND THE OUTCOMES OF THESE DEFINITIONS.
The surface temperature of the Earth is much higher than it should be without the atmosphere and the GH effect. The GH effect provides more radiative energy to the surface and the surface reacts to this energy. Not energy found at the top of the atmosphere or in the atmosphere itself. They are prerequisites for the LW radiation emitted by the atmosphere and its magnitude is well-known inside some W/m2 in all published energy balance presentations.
What has not been observed in the comments, is the GH effect definition of the IPCC and what it means as the calculation basis for calculation, for example, the contribution of CO2. That is the hot spot of my study. Somehow you seem not to notice it and somehow also, Dr. Spencer mixes up my definition and the IPCC’s definition.
So in other words what you are saying is that back radiation is higher than what IPCC assumes and if so the contribution from CO2 must logically also be lower than assumed? In fact, you don’t have to be many % right before CO2 effect is minuscule.
Yes, that would have been a much more interesting discussion.
To MrZ
Quote: “So in other words, what you are saying is that back radiation is higher than what IPCC assumes and if so the contribution from CO2 must logically also be lower than assumed?”
Well, well. This is almost hopeless. I have drawn a diagram of the story showing all the essential energy fluxes connected to the GH effect. I show in the figure and by the means of the text in which way I conclude that the basis of the GH effect is 270 W/m2 and not the 155 W/m2 of the IPCC. I use the same downward LW radiation flux 345 W/m2 as the IPCC. Why I have written that the GH effect definition of the IPCC violates the physical laws. Once more: the IPCC definition says it a univocal way that 155 W/m2 can emit 345 W/m2 radiation to the Erth’s surface. It is against physical laws. I show which elements are needed to sum up this 345 W/m2 and one of these four fluxes (75 SW radiation absorption) is not part of the GH effect.
“Why I have written that the GH effect definition of the IPCC violates the physical laws. Once more: the IPCC definition says it a univocal way that 155 W/m2 can emit 345 W/m2 radiation to the Earth’s surface. It is against physical laws.”
It does not violate any physical laws. Assume as a thought experiment that the atmosphere and the ground were separated by a thin region of vacuum preventing any exchange of heat from the surface to the atmosphere, other than by radiation. Also assume that the GHG concentration were high enough and wide enough in spectra that all the radiation from the Earth’s surface was captured by the atmosphere. Finally, assume that the atmosphere is transparent to solar radiation so that all radiation from the sun hits the Earth’s surface.
Then I draw a boundary around the top of the atmosphere and equilibrium physics tells me that energy in equals energy out, meaning that the radiation escaping outwards from the atmosphere has to equal the radiation crossing inward through the boundary from the sun. But the radiation from the atmosphere can’t be exclusively directed outwards; one half of what goes out must also be directed down to the Earth’s surface, adding to what the surface receives from the sun.
Now, it’s true that because each of the assumptions regarding the vacuum layer separation, the transparency of the atmosphere to solar radiation, and its complete opacity to outgoing long wave radiation is not true, that the added heat flux at the surface is not as much as what it would be in the hypothetical. But you cannot say that physical laws prevent the atmosphere from providing additional radiation to the surface beyond that already provided by the sun.
Kurt.
Two comments.
1) Quote: “the transparency of the atmosphere to solar radiation”. Look at figure 1. The atmosphere is not transparent to solar radiation, because about 30 % will be absorbed.
2) No matter how long an explanation, the absorption energy of 155 W/m2 cannot create the downward flux of 345 W/m2 or 270 W/m2. I think that you are the only one who thinks so.
3) The downward LW flux from the atmosphere has been measured all the time. It is an observation based fact.
“The atmosphere is not transparent to solar radiation, because about 30 % will be absorbed.”
Like I said above, even though some of the solar radiation is absorbed by the atmosphere, that doesn’t refute the fact that the atmosphere radiates energy towards the surface, and this gets added to the portion from the sun that hits the Earth. The physical laws you refer to are ones that have to be simultaneously satisfied at the atmosphere/space boundary the atmosphere/surface boundary. The temperature of both the surface of the Earth and the atmosphere will keep changing until these equilibrium boundary conditions are satisfied, and there is no upper limit the flux across either of those two boundaries that is a function of only the flux across it coming from one of two sources crossing it.
Focusing only on the portion coming from the sun in the final equilibrium state (155 W/m2) and treating that as some kind of variable that sets a limit on the total amount that can be “caused” from it is a fallacy.
And I think that there are many people on this post who agree with me.
Antero, I did get your point and agree that others seem to be missing it. I play with thermohydraulics and related at work on projects involving $B. I also have to deal with mgmt of not just the process energy balances but also the $ budget. Successful projects (success being defined as profitable) have one very common attribute: semantics are clear and consistent across all phases and all aspects of a project. This allows for effective communication and effective critical problem solving when reality diverges from the Project Model (aka The Budget & Schedule). Other projects tend to resemble the Tower of Babble and those never make money in a competitive market place and can even result in fatalities in the extreme cases. So, until there is a clear, standard, universal definition of a concept and range of concepts then babble ensues. This can be very entertaining to the casual observer but is counterproductive if one is wants, has, or needs to get something done. I think most of us recognize that an energy balance is just that, a balance to characterize a complex system as a starting point or a paradigm for critical thinking. A balance is (by definition?) a not a transient! Communication between humans is much more complex than understanding the GHE in my world. Keep up the good work!
Thanks. I am basically an Engineer myself and it seems to be so that the have their feet on the ground.
On the one hand, I think such arguments that Spencer is addressing get too much play here in the comments. The GHE slows the transport of energy outwards to the TOA. Then the equilibrium is reached.
Spencer uses the example of heating of your house. If you can’t understand that, give up. You haven’t discovered anything and there is no conspiracy, stop making Watts and the rest of us look bad.
On the other hand, Watts doesn’t ban such arguments or comments as far as I know. There is no conspiracy here to silence your great discovery. None is needed.
Focus on winning. Be a winner.
You back radiationists don’t seem to have much rebuttal to this other than arguing that the researchers didn’t build more planet sized models to make their theory more robust.
https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Robert_Holmes24/publication/324599511_Thermal_Enhancement_on_Planetary_Bodies_and_the_Relevance_of_the_Molar_Mass_Version_of_the_Ideal_Gas_Law_to_the_Null_Hypothesis_of_Climate_Change/links/5ca6a09b92851c64bd50b2e6/Thermal-Enhancement-on-Planetary-Bodies-and-the-Relevance-of-the-Molar-Mass-Version-of-the-Ideal-Gas-Law-to-the-Null-Hypothesis-of-Climate-Change.pdf
Robert, all what Robert Holmes has dons is curve fitting of the temperature of 6.5 planets with three variables, not that difficult. The underlying non-greenhouse warm(er) surface is physically impossible, as Willis Eschenbach has proven:
So let us assume that we have the airless perfectly evenly heated blackbody planet that I spoke of above, evenly surrounded by a sphere of mini-suns. The temperature of this theoretical planet is, of course, the theoretical S-B temperature.
Now suppose we add an atmosphere to the planet, a transparent GHG-free atmosphere. If the theories of N&K and Jelbring are correct, the temperature of the planet will rise.
But when the temperature of a perfect blackbody planet rises … the surface radiation of that planet must rise as well.
And because the atmosphere is transparent, this means that the planet is radiating to space more energy than it receives. This is an obvious violation of conservation of energy, so any theories proposing such a warming must be incorrect.
Willis has proven nothing with a hypothetical using special physics.
Robert W Turner,
If a theory violates the conservation of energy in a thought experiment, using straight forward physics, then the theory simply can’t be true, whatever real life experiment you want to do.
Boiled down to a few words it would see that the greenhouse effect is from the re-radiation of IR from the water vapor and CO2 in the atmosphere which warms the surface of the earth, be it ocean or land.
Yet that warming *should* increase the radiation from the surface of the earth by the fourth power of the temperature. This would tend to keep daytime temperatures from soaring to destructive levels.
What it *would* seem to cause to happen is that nighttime cooling would be interfered with thus raising the nighttime minimum temperatures. This is exactly what my 24/7/365 data since 2002 shows is happening in the central part of the US.
My conundrum is why the AGW alarmists think this is a bad thing. Higher nighttime temps mean longer growing seasons, increased nighttime growth of plants, and more food availability for the world. Continued record global grain harvests every year for the past twenty years would seem to confirm this (there are a few outlier years but the trend is record harvests every year). Coupled with this is the huge increase of green areas on the earth since 1980 (estimated to be anywhere from 10% to 15%).
The Earth seems to be far from turning into a cinder from the greenhouse effect. And average temps going up only serves to hide this fact allowing the AGW alarmists to extort money from the common man. I still maintain that climate studies should be based on regional heating and cooling degree-days and not on global average temperatures. This would provide far more useful information as to what is happening with the climate and it would be far more understandable to the common man.
For another point of view:
http://phzoe.com/2020/03/04/dumbest-math-theory-ever/
Downwelling IR is not measured, but derived. It is actually Upwelling-from-the-measuring-instrument IR.
Zoe Phin,
I don’t see the problem: if the instrument only measures its own outgoing IR and not the incoming IR, why would there any change at all if the instrument temperature doesn’t change no matter for skies with/without clouds, different humidity, etc.?
Why is is that on a dry, cool day, when I am working outside, if a small cloud passes in front of the sun, blocking this 160 W/m2, I suddenly feel MUCH colder? When I close my eyes, I don’t feel this 340 W/m2 baking me from every direction. Yet, when the sun is out, same conditions except I am in a box surrounded by walls with no roof, I suddenly feel very hot? When I close my eyes, I can feel an intense 160 W/m2 blasting me from above? Where is this evidence that these energy flows are correct (the internal flows are much larger than the total input from the sun)? My experience working outside tells me different.
This is easy – 160W/m2 is an average over day&night, it includes cloud fraction and losses in air, if you measure the flux under clear sky, you will probably have something around 1000 W/m2.
This small cloud in your example makes sensible difference, to have similar situation with this 340 W/m2, you just have to remove the atmosphere for a moment and expose yourself to the 3K cosmic environment.
The thread here and at Dr. Spencer’s blog show the various notions concerning the energy transfers within the climate system. And the IPCC has contributed to the confusion (intentionally?) by putting out a variety of explanations. The main point is that the earth surface temperature is warmer because its atmosphere, and less variable because of its ocean. So the pertinent discussion is around the theory that this atmospheric thermal effect is enhanced by rising CO2. The claim is that the Effective Radiating Level at top of atmosphere is elevated to a colder altititude, thus requiring the surface to warm to emit more to dissipate the incoming solar energy. This diagram from the literature shows the theory:
?w=730&h=465
However, so far the enhanced effect from CO2 does not appear in the relevant datasets.
https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2019/09/14/global-warming-theory-and-the-tests-it-fails/
The earth is an infrared star.
Some want to deny this status.
The core of the earth is fusing hydrogen?
If not, then it isn’t a star.
Does this star fuse hydrogen?
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/WISE_0855%E2%88%920714
“It is also the coldest object of its type found in interstellar space, having a temperature in the range 225 to 260 K”
Because all of the arrows in Figs. 1 & 2 are in fact spectral irradiances, I maintain that making simplistic arithmetic calculations of totals is invalid.
Fact 1: By reflecting away 30% of the ISR the albedo & atmosphere that creates it together make earth cooler not warmer. RGHE has it wrong.
Fact 2: Because of the significant non-radiative heat transfer participation of the contiguous atmospheric molecules, BB LWIR upwelling “extra” energy from the surface for GHGs to “trap” is not possible. RGHE has it wrong.
Fact 3: No “extra” energy for GHGs means they cannot create any terrestrial warming. This hypothetical GHG warming loop also violates conservation of energy, perpetual motion and cold to hot without work. RGHE has it wrong.
Fact 4: Zero RGHE = Zero GHG terrestrial warming = Zero man caused global warming or climate change.
I don’t explain acronyms. If you have done the homework you know what they mean. If you haven’t done the homework – sit quietly during class participation.
The K-T diagram is junk. The numbers don’t even add up. Anybody who can balance a check book can trash this graphic.
Why you write any comments if you do not explain your acronyms. No more comments.
Because the albedo/atmosphere reflect 30% of the incoming solar energy the earth is cooler with that albedo/atmosphere than without. Without an atmosphere the earth would receive 30% more kJ/h becoming a barren rock much like the moon, hot^3 on the lit side, cold^3 on the dark.
This observation is easily confirmed by comparisons with the moon as Nikolov, Kramm suggest and UCLA Diviner mission observes. This refutes the RGHE theory which postulates just the opposite, that the earth sans atmosphere would be a -430 F ball of ice or 288 K w/ – 255 K w/o = 33 C cooler. (Rubbish!)
Because of the non-radiative heat transfer processes of the contiguous participating atmospheric molecules, 396 W/m^2 of BB LWIR upwelling from the surface is not possible.
As I demonstrate in the grand science tradition of performing experiments: https://principia-scientific.org/debunking-the-greenhouse-gas-theory-with-a-boiling-water-pot/
Without the 396 W/m^2 upwelling LWIR there is no net 333 W/m^2 for the GHGs to “trap”, “back” radiate or warm anything anywhere.
There is no radiative greenhouse effect and the so-called GHGs do not “warm” the terrestrial surface.
Nick,
“Without the 396 W/m^2 upwelling LWIR there is no net 333 W/m^2 for the GHGs to “trap”, “back” radiate or warm anything anywhere.”
You forgot that using ideological mathematics, it all makes sense:
http://phzoe.com/2020/03/04/dumbest-math-theory-ever/
You can’t use experiments to debunk mathematicians.
“Because the albedo/atmosphere reflect 30% of the incoming solar energy the earth is cooler with that albedo/atmosphere than without.”
That statement is not self-evident. Since a large amount of Earth’s rotational period (50% on a yearly average for any latitude) is spent facing deep space with NO incoming solar radiation, on has to factor in how effective the atmosphere (including clouds) is in reducing Earth’s radiation losses over this time period.
Since you also state ” . . . 396 W/m^2 of BB LWIR upwelling from the surface is not possible”, I’m curious as what temperature and equivalent BB radiation flux you think the average surface temperature of Earth has during nighttime.
I cover diurnal changes here:
http://phzoe.com/2020/02/25/deducing-geothermal/
Gordon,
Energy moves from the terrestrial surface to ToA using ALL heat transfer processes: 1.0, i.e. ALL of it = conduction + convection + advection + latent + radiation. Until the molecules run out at 32 km.
BTW this is clearly demonstrated by my experiment.
Surface emissivity = radiation / (conduction + convection + advection + latent + radiation)
This, too, was demonstrated.
The ONLY way a surface radiates BB is into a vacuum, i.e. no contiguous participating media.
This, too, was demonstrated when 1.5 “Hga was produced in the box.
The “extra” 396 W/m^2 upwelling in the K-T and assorted clones is a theoretical “what if” calculation with no reality.
Zero “extra” 396 & Zero “extra” 333 = Zero RGHE
Thermodynamics does not allow for any “extra” energy.
BTW^2: per Q =U A dT earth’s hot dT lit side loses energy to ToA much faster than the cold dT dark side.
The atmosphere is a second year HVAC engineering class.
I have several clarifying posts on my LinkedIn page with PPT graphics.
It appears that you
— didn’t read, or
— didn’t understand, or
— didn’t want to address
the issues I raised in my reply above.
Oh well.
In parting, I will just note that any ongoing processes of convection, conduction, advection, and phase change happening at the surface (land or sea) of the Earth at any given temperature DO NOT increase or decrease the instantaneous thermal radiation flux emitted by that surface at its given temperature, assuming a constant surface emissivity.
I have a basic question for those of you more knowledgeable on this subject than me. It seems to me that the entire equation using energy in TOA and energy out TOA can never be in equilibrium at the levels of energy being discussed. Consider this. The ocean according to these models is constantly receiving 240W/m2. Yet, the emission of LW from the ocean is dependent on the ocean sea surface temperature. From what I hear and read from you guys, is that LW as emitted by GHG cannot penetrate the ocean, thus its effect on SST is purely at the ocean/atmosphere interface. GHG itself also emits based on its own temperature. Thus, the SST is determined by two sources, heat coming from below, and heat coming from above. As it is said by many, all of the increase in LW from the increase in CO2 is used up in the evaporation process, and converted to latent heat.
Given that the SST is NOT a reflection of the constant 240 W/m2, but rather a function of internal handling of the scarce energy it receives, then, … why do all these atmospheric models use this 240W/m2 solar input as an input to the atmosphere? It would seem to me that an atmospheric model should be limited to input sources to the atmosphere, with those being, LW emission from the ocean + direct input from solar + LW emission from land. ….. OR ….. we need to include the ocean itself with its massive heat capacity as part of the atmosphere.
It would be much simpler to understand if we started from the concept of greenhouse gases slow the rate at which the earth cools. We have two simple paradigms, day time heating by the sun followed by nighttime cooling slowed by greenhouse gases. Averaging the two sows confusion.
….the atmosphere’s radiative blanket reduces the rate of IR cooling from the warmer lower layers of the atmosphere to the upper cooler layers.
Fig. 1. Global- and time-averaged (day+night and through the seasons) primary energy flows between the surface, atmosphere, and space (NASA).
” Much of the first part of Dr. Ollila’s article is just fine. His objection to the diagram is introduced with the following statement, which those who hold similar views to his will be triggered by:
“The obvious reason for the GH effect seems to be the downward infrared radiation from the atmosphere to the surface and its magnitude is 345 W/m2. Therefore, the surface absorbs totally 165 (solar) + 345 (downward infrared from the atmosphere) = 510 W/m2.“
But this is where the problem with ambiguous wording comes in. The atmosphere is not, strictly speaking, adding more [“New”] energy to the surface. It is merely returning a portion of the atmosphere-absorbed solar, infrared, and convective transport energy back to the surface in the form of infrared energy.
As shown in Fig. 2, the surface is still emitting more IR energy than the atmosphere is returning to the surface, resulting in net surface loss of [395 – 345 =] 50 W/m2 of infrared energy. And, as previously mentioned, all energy fluxes at the surface balance.
And this is what our intuition tells us should be happening: the surface is warmed by sunlight, and cooled by the loss of IR energy (plus moist and dry convective cooling of the surface of 91 and 24 W/m2, respectively.)”
–
Therefore, the surface absorbs totally 165 (solar) + 345 (downward infrared from the atmosphere) = 510 W/m2.“ Yes
the surface is still emitting more IR energy than the atmosphere is returning to the surface, resulting in net surface loss of [395 – 345 =] 50 W/m2 of infrared energy. Yes
Plus (plus moist and dry convective cooling of the surface of 91 and 24 W/m2, respectively.)” = 165 W/M-2 The surface absorbed solar radiation] Yes
–
So far I agree with both of you?
But Ollila” The difference between the radiation to the surface and the net solar radiation is 510 – 240 = 270 Wm-2. The real GH warming effect is right here: it is 270 Wm-2 because it is the extra energy warming the Earth’s surface in addition to the net solar energy.”
This is the magical energy from nowhere step you are referring to? Because , as you say, The atmosphere is not, strictly speaking, adding more [“New”] energy to the surface.
Ollila actually acknowledges this in his article ” According to the energy conversation law, energy cannot be created from the void. According to the same law, energy does not disappear, but it can change its form.” but ploughs ahead.
“The final step is that we must find out what is the mechanism creating this infrared radiation from the atmosphere. According to the IPCC’s definition, the GH effect is caused by the GH gases and clouds which absorb infrared radiation of 155 Wm-2 emitted by the surface and which they further radiate to the surface. This same figure has been applied by the research group of Gavin Schmidt calculating the contributions of GH gases and clouds. As we can see there is a problem – and a very big problem – in the IPCC’s GH effect definition: the absorbed energy of 155 Wm-2 cannot radiate to the surface 345 Wm-2 or even 270 Wm-2.”
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Here I go off the rails.
“If we were to represent these infrared energy flows in Fig. 1 more completely, there would be a nearly infinite number of red arrows, both upward and downward, connecting every vanishingly-thin layer of atmosphere with every other vanishingly thin layer. Those are the flows that are happening continuously in the atmosphere.”
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I presume that the ” net surface loss of [395 – 345 =] 50 W/m2 of infrared energy.” which is all that is left over when “moist and dry convective cooling of the surface of 91 and 24 W/m2, respectively.” is removed from the “initial surface absorbs totally 165 (solar)” is actually doing far more than rebounding just once and going off into space. There would be a limiting factor at 345 W/M-2 which is how much energy bounces back repeatedly until it can escape?
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Dr Ollila’s summary of heat sources
” it is easy to name the two other energy sources which are needed for causing the GH effect namely latent heating 91 Wm-2 and sensible heating 24 Wm-2, which make 270 Wm-2 with the longwave absorption of 155 Wm-2. When the solar radiation absorption of 75 Wm-2 by the atmosphere will be added to these three GH effect sources, the sum is 345 Wm2.”
explains why it is a little more complicated than that in that some of the IR comes from the effects of the IR radiation from other parts of the atmosphere but I am not sure where he gets the longwave absorption of 155 Wm-2.
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Ah.
It is the fact that the surface emission is higher than the TOA radiation to space so energy [quite a lot] must somehow be be being trapped in the atmosphere.
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“Now, I have spent at least a couple of hours trying to follow his line of reasoning, and I cannot.”
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Dr Ollila’s reasoning “Here is the point: the IPCC’s definition means that the LW absorption of 155 Wm-2 could create radiation of 270 Wm-2 which is impossible.”
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“The Role of Earth Radiation Budget Studies in Climate and General Circulation Research“ Ramanathan
The greenhouse effect. The estimates of the outgoing longwave radiation also lead to quantitative inferences about the atmospheric greenhouse effect. At a globally averaged temperature of 15°C the surface emits about 390 W m -2, while according to satellites, the long-wave radiation escaping to space is only 237 W m -2. Thus the absorption and emission of long-wave radiation by the intervening atmospheric gases and clouds cause a net reduction of about 150 W m -2 in the radiation emitted to space. This trapping effect of radiation, referred to as the greenhouse effect, plays a dominant role in governing the temperature of the planet.”‘
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Dr Ollila has a point. the surface emits about 390 W m -2, the long-wave radiation escaping to space is said to be only 237 W m -2. [where ??TOA or earth’s surface vitally important]
How can anybody say this ” a net reduction of about 150 W m -2 in the radiation emitted to space.”
The earth has had Greenhouses gases for over 2 billion years, possibly 4 billion.
How hot should we be if our planet can keep trapping 150W/M-2 for 2 billion years?
To Angech.
A quote: “How hot should we be if our planet can keep trapping 150W/M-2 for 2 billion years?”
It is even “worse”, The Earth has received 240 W/m2energy from the sun for billions of years. It looks like that you did not understand the basic feature and the message of the energy balance: What comes in, must go out; otherwise the Earth heats up or cools down. There is a balance also in the atmosphere even though it receives the energy of 345 W/m2 from four different sources according to the 1st Figure. But it releases it to the surface and thanks to this we have a habitable planet.