Reposted with permission from Bizpacreview
Proponents of the Green New Deal (GND) tell us that increasing human carbon dioxide emissions are fueling a dangerous rise in worldwide temperature. This temperature rise is then linked to a laundry list of climate-related catastrophes like droughts, floods and fires that are ongoing and only going to get worse unless drastic measures are taken.
Their solution? Force consumers and industries away from the consumption of the fossil fuels and toward carbon-free energy sources like wind, solar and geothermal. Glaringly missing from most of these green proposals is an embrace of the only non-fossil fuels that could provide abundant and reliable energy – nuclear and hydro-electric projects (but that is a story for a different day).
All the Democratic candidates, including the last man standing – Joe Biden, embraced some version of the GND, only differing in whose proposals would deindustrialize the United States the fastest. Make no mistake, a deindustrialization of America would be the result of moving our economy away from the affordable, abundant and reliable energy derived from the fossil fuels that power the country.
The overarching goal of the GND and the Paris climate accord is to lower atmospheric greenhouse gas by halting these emissions across all sectors of the global economy. With the economic collapse induced by COVID-19 stay-at home orders across much of the globe, we have been conducting a painful experiment that closely resembles the massive reductions envisioned by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the many aligned green advocacy groups.
No hard data is yet available on exact numbers of the recent emission reductions, but the reduction will likely be significant from decreased oil demand, air travel and industrial activity. Reductions in CO2 emissions from China have been estimated to be as much as 25% lower in the last month.
According to the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) the primary sources of greenhouse gas in the United States are transportation (29%), electricity generation (28%) and industry (22%). Of these three sectors, electricity generation is likely to be least affected by the shutdown, as more people are staying home and increasing the residential load by cooking, watching Net Flicks and the like, partially offsetting the decline in industrial demand. Demand is down across the New York Control Area only 2% to 18%, while some countries in the EU like Spain, Ireland and France are reporting slight increases in electric demand.
Meanwhile, both the transportation and industrial sectors will likely exhibit quite substantial reductions in CO2 emissions. Nearly all non-essential travel has been curtailed and many industrial activities have been reduced. The result has been an unprecedented worldwide lab experiment on how shutting down global CO2 emissions would impact atmospheric concentrations and how quickly.
One would surmise that the result from the self-imposed lockdown and consequent reduction in CO2 emissions would be a noticeable decline in atmospheric carbon dioxide, or at the very least a reduction in the rate of increase of the gas. On April 8th, the Mauna Loa Observatory released their report on the previous month’s (March 2020) concentration, and the data was shockingly contrary to what I and others had expected. Not only was there no decrease in the level of atmospheric CO2, the rate of increase continued unchanged. The most recent daily measurement as of the time of this post on April 9th set a new record high concentration (417.85 ppm).
The lack of an effect whatsoever on global CO2 levels after the huge decline in emissions should be a wakeup call to any of the politicians advancing economically crippling measures like the Green New Deal or the Paris climate accord. In particular, those Republicans that have recently embraced carbon taxation or Cap and Trade schemes in a misguided attempt to control the uncontrollable (global temperature) should seriously rethink this folly.
April data should be instructive, with a further whole month of economic and consequent emission slowdown.
There are lots of good experiments and observations to be made, but the extent of natural contributions and variability make finding any human signals out of the noise very difficult, especially globally. Local changes in particulates, audible noise, primary pollutants are easier to see.
It’s too bad that we have to eat. Doing this experiment for a year might tell us much.
I don’t agree.
a) AGW activists claim a huge proportion of the Keeling Slope is caused by human emissions;
b) As such, a ding — any sort of ding, even a tiny one — should show up.
c) if nothing whatsoever shows up over April-June, it falsifies AGW.
They will have to admit either AGW contribution is small or “gee, we will have to switch to another culprit than CO2”
Activists put all eggs in one basket. If there is no ding, the eggs are fried.
AGW activists claim a huge proportion of the Keeling Slope is caused by human emissions;
’til now, nothing to see in the weekly data
@ Krishna Gans
“ ’til now, nothing to see in the weekly data”
You did mean ….. “no decrease in the weekly CO2 ppm data”, …… right?
But don’t be looking too hard for any decrease from December 2019 until bout mid-May 2020 unless our global warminist friends at NOAA decide to apply their ‘fuzzy math’ calculations to the Mauna Loa data.
That is, excluding any effect from an El Nino, La Nina or volcanic eruption.
Add: if no ding shows up, at the very least it will falsify the Green New Deal: “We shut down 25% of world CO2 emissions, which is more than AOC ever dreamed of, and nothing happened.”
“…many aligned green advocacy groups” should be “malignant green advocacy groups”.
One should never believe anything that pathological liars say. China lied (and continues to lie) about coronavirus and their lick-spittle apologists in the West lie just as much.
“The overarching goal of the GND and the Paris climate accord is to lower atmospheric greenhouse gas…” Wrong. The overarching goal is to weaken Western economies so that China can take over as the world’s dominant superpower.
God help us all if that ever happens. It will make Japan’s “Greater Eastern Co-prosperity Sphere” look like child’s play in comparison.
You guys have it all wrong. The data must first be “adjusted”, and you will see the error in your ways.
Thanks for reminding me about that, Mark.
How could I have forgotten.
If no slight dip in the CO2 emissions shows up, expect to read about a faulty sensor or an error or “a version 2.0 upgrade” and then suddenly, there is a slight dip. Oh, and by the way, the old/faulty data will be destroyed.
That is why vigilance should be directed to many measuring stations.
CAGW (n/k/a Climate Change) is a religion, not a science.
Religions are not killed by counterfactuals.
Religions have predicted all sorts of apocalypses, none of which has yet occurred. But believers have not abandoned their religions because of that little glitch.
Sorry gentlemen,
One need to take in consideration that the total human emissions are only about 4.5 ppmv/year, of which about half (as mass, not the original molecules) remains in the atmosphere.
That means that the monthly human caused increase about 0.2 ppmv/month, or about the accuracy of the measurements at Mauna Loa… Thus looking at monthly measurements which change about +/- 4 ppmv over the seasons doesn’t say much about the influence of a 25% reduction in human emissions. Just wait until the end of the year to have a clear picture…
Further, nobody needs to guard the data, both the raw and “cleaned” data are available at the website of NOAA, without any manipulation of anybody, as that is practically impossible: there are 70+ stations which monitor CO2 at “background” places, 10 under supervision of NOAA, others by lots of people from lots of organizations in lots of countries.
If NOAA would like to interfere with the data, Scripps, still mad that NOAA did overtake their monopoly for delivering calibrations and -gases, take their own (flask) measurements at Mauna Loa and would be very eager to point to any errors from them…
Until now they don’t differ with more than 0.12 ppmv (1 sigma) from each other for a 90+ ppmv increase.
What is the difference between the raw data and the “cleaned” data? The raw data are screened on irregularities like high variability if the wind blows from the volcanic crater uphill or too low values in the afternoon from (photosynthesis) CO2 depleted upwind out of the valleys. These data are not deleted, but not used for daily to yearly averages. That is all.
That is based on stringent a priori criteria, not after the fact “adjustments”:
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/about/co2_measurements.html
Plotting both raw and cleaned data show the same general seasonal variability and the same trends to within 0.1 ppmv/year…
One can only hope that one day temperature station data are as rigorously monitored as the CO2 data are…
windlord-sun, the contribution of humans is about 4.5 ppmv/year of which half (as mass, not the original molecules) is absorbed by oceans and vegetation. That gives around 2.25 ppmv/year increase in the atmosphere.
If 25% less is emitted, that would give a change of around 0.55 ppmv/year or 0,05 ppmv/month,
The accuracy of the CO2 detection used at Mauna Loa and many other stations is better than 0.2 ppmv, thus nothing to see there within months.
You need 1-2 years before you can detect a significant change within the seasonal (+/- 4 ppmv) and year by year (+/- 1.5 ppmv) variability…
Small doesn’t mean that it doesn’t exist…
It takes at least 20 years to detect -statistically- a few mm/year of sea level rise within huge waves and tides which gives meters of change within minutes to weeks…
@ Ferdinand Engelbeen
Apparently you are here to prepare the pitches for HideTheDing. Good luck. Common sense is not on your side.
Since you’ve now “convinced” us that a Virus-driven reduction of human contribution of 25% won’t be visible at Mauna Loa, or at the other high-precision high-calibrated stations – not immediately, or not for a year, or years, or 20 years – you might find it uncomfortable to go up against a headline like this:
“COVID-19 Reduces CO2 Emissions Better Than Green New Deal, But Nothing Happened!”
Frankly, you’d think you’d be rooting for a ding in the slope. Then your headline could be
“COVID-19 Pause Results in Moderation of CO2 Increase, GND Will Do The Same.”
That headline would be infinitely easier to support than mine.
If no ding appears from this COVID activity pause (and it might pause for months and months), you will be facing the world with the claim that 8 Billion people who thrive on fossil fuel have to ditch it, with no evidence that doing so will reduce the amount of CO2 – or even moderate the increase – in the atmosphere for years/decades to come. Let alone evidence that a reduction in CO2 will prevent catastrophic warming.
In other words, blind faith.
Not to mention that direct measurement of temp, even in NOAA’s adjusted GHCN, shows declining TMAX since 2000, and probably will continue to do so for another 15 years.
windlord-sun,
You are barking the wrong tree…
If the human emissions are small but show a steady increase over the past 60 years and the same happens with the increase in the atmosphere at half the human emissions, we can be pretty sure that humans are the cause of the increase.
If there is a slowdown in these emissions, that will show up in the increase figures, but that takes time to be detected “statistically significant” above the natural noise. It will take 1-2 years of full data. That is all I said.
Nobody can hide or torture the CO2 data, as too many people of too many organizations in too many countries are involved. But nobody with a little knowledge of the figures would expect an immediate result of an important change in emissions, as the natural “noise” in the data is too large on short periods.
After 1-2 years of the same reduction, it will surely be measured in a slower increase in the atmosphere.
If humans could reduce (without too much costs) CO2 emissions to 50% of the pre-covid ones, there would not be any increase as emissions and sinks get equal.
Further, any result of that change in CO2 release on climate is simply futile and so are any “New Green Deals” as the supposed effect of that extra CO2 is mainly in the fantasy of overblown climate models…
Ferdinand Engelbeen
“windlord-sun, You are barking the wrong tree…”
No, I’ve got you treed.
Would you be so kind as to give a paragraph … just a key sentence or two … that you would present to the average person (surrogate for 8 billion prospering on fossil fuels) after there is no discernable change (ding) to all the ten NOAA stations and all the others, when this trope is used to end GND-type legislation/control of human fossil fuel burning (and you oppose ending it):
“COVID-19 Reduces CO2 Emissions Better Than Green New Deal, But Nothing Happened!”
windlord-sun,
Here in the newspapers a rare moment of truth:
“Human emissions are down, but CO2 is still rising”, already from a few weeks ago when China admitted that their emissions were 25% lower than before the corona crisis.
I am pretty sure that one will see the effect of a 25% reduction in emissions (if sustained) in 1-2 years from now. The exact figure would be an average 1.1 ppmv/year increase i.s.o. the current 2.2 ppmv/year. That is half the increase for a 25% reduction. With a 50% reduction there wouldn’t be any increase…
All the rest is politics and I am a-politic (not anti-politic).
Scissor, yeah but who is doing this research? It is an otherwise impossible experiment to do, and here with it in our hands it would be immoral not to do an honest multidisciplinary study.
We know that climateers don’t want to know how the climate really works. The National Guard should be deployed to guard data gathering like Mauna Loa, and all temperature sets, tide guages, etc. Stations should not even be visited by the climate establisment because you know they aren’t going to sit back and let things play out to their disadvantage. Aerial and ground surveillance to deter arsonists, block visits to reefs and other such types from operating with impunity. The raw data should then be supplied to a central depository for all who wish to study it.
There will be those who argue the ‘raw’ data is available to all. Not if at their sole discretion they can discontinue stations that they don’t like (GISS-Hansen- scrapped several thousand long standing stations between 1998 and 2007 after which H retired ), or move them so they can ‘recalculate’ a more abuser friendly adjusted raw data.
Everytime you raise a question about a long standing station raw record that is showing the opposite to the alarum narrative, they say oh, that was adjusted because of a station move. The Capetown, S. Af. record is a case in point. It is virtually indistinguishable from the unadjusted US record, matching major temperature swings in the same years and it is on another continent and in the Southern Hem! The same goes for Canada, Greenland, Iceland, Scandinavia, Paraguay, Bolivia, etc. Here is Capetown Raw:
From:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/01/28/homogenization-of-temperature-data-makes-capetown-south-africa-have-a-warmer-climate-record/
Gary, all strong points.
“The National Guard should be deployed to guard data ”
I live relatively close to La Jolla, CA and would be glad to take up arms at Scripps.
https://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu/data/atmospheric_co2/sampling_stations.html
Would I have to wear a mask?
Start looking at the CRN network at NOAA. Ignore everything else. These are special stations started out in the boonies that are NOT supposed to need adjusting. Since 2004 they have shown NO significant warming trend.
It is not good advice to trust CRN and “forget everything else.” It is a disaster.
CRN can NOT tell you if there is abnormal warming in the world. It is only 12 years old. At best, it can say if there has been warming for the “past few minutes” at the station you examine.
So what? Any 12-year warming signal could be just a minute wiggle in the organic natural sine wave on the upslope.
Here’s your test: if a CRN station shows a .1 degree C warming for its life, perhaps 12 years, is that enough to scream “Catastrophic Armageddon?” or even abnormal warming?
If so, if you are claiming abnormal warming on a 12-year signal, you will have to face reality when some or all of the stations show a descent. You’ll have to claim the coming of the next glaciation.
Meanwhile, 860 stations that have reported for 120 years to USHCN are still sending in their numbers, and looking at their curves — there is no abnormal warming.
Added information:
1) CRN stations do not measure CO2, only temp, percip., soil moisture
2) there are 114 stations in CRN, 1215 in USHCN, with ~400 temporarily unreported by NOAA, so 114 vs 815
There is no human signal detected in the recent direct or proxy records. All we see are cycles, which account for all the observed change, so natural. And now declining. No monotonic signal in the frequency spectrum of the climate temperature data. The theory has been disproven by a basic analysis anyone can repeat. Case closed. But nobody wants to do real science. Consensual belief is preferred to the science facts you can now prove.
Paper here: DOI: 10.2174/1874282301711010044
Explained a couple of years earlier here:
This flick, well worth watching, demonstrates that man’s emissions are very small indeed:
John
jpm,
Too many errors by Dr. Salby. I have followed his speech at London and read his speeches in other locations and have been actively discussing his errors here at WUWT. The problem is that he never reacts. Not here not elsewhere.
Even if man’s emissions are small, they are one-way additions and the huge natural cycle is two way and natural sinks are larger than natural sources, but the net sink is only half human emissions. So nature can’t cope with human emissions the same year as emitted…
I believe that Salby made his claim extremely well. Do you dispute that the anthropogenic emissions in the first decade of the 21st century were 3 times as great as the previous decade and the increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration continued in a linear fashion. That demonstrates the mans CO2 emissions are an extremely small portion of total increase in CO2 concentration. Less than 2.73% as claimed seems about right.
When you also consider that the warming effect of atmospheric CO2 is decreasing logarithmic, you will see that man’s CO2 will have no noticeable effect on the globes temperature.
Way back around 2000 it was agreed that man’s contribution to the increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration was around 3%, I believe it was acknowledged by the EPA. In fact those advocating the CAGW nonsense were coming up with arguments like it takes only a very small amount of poisons to kill you. A silly argument really but it demonstrates that they acknowledged the fact that man’s emissions were a very small portion of the yearly increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration.
I don’t know why you are getting into discussing sinks as what is being discussed is net emissions and the sinks are catered for in that.
John
jpm,
You are mixing the turnover of huge natural quantities of CO2 with the result of adding a small quantity of CO2 one-way. The human part of the CO2 inflows indeed is around 4%, but the contribution to the increase in the atmosphere is near 100%…
If you have a factory with a huge turnover, that is a huge throughput of goods (thus capital) from raw materials to finished products, that says next to nothing about he gain (or loss) of the same factory. That factory can have a gain or loss or break-even.
Human CO2 is only 4% of the natural input, but it is only 0.2% of the natural output (at 10% human in the current atmosphere) and about 50% (as mass, not the original molecules) remain in the atmosphere. Thus that small extra amount in the input adds to the total CO2 in the atmosphere, while the huge natural cycle is a net sink for CO2.
Thus (near) all increase in the atmosphere is from that tiny small human contribution.
The net uptake by the natural cycle doesn’t depend of the human input of one year or even a decade, it depends of the total extra CO2 pressure (pCO2) above the equilibrium, which is currently about 290 ppmv for the current average sea surface temperature. It is the extra 110 μatm (~120 ppmv) pressure that pushes more CO2 in the oceans and vegetation. There doesn’t need to be a correlation between human input of one or several years and the increase in the atmosphere:
– If you keep the current human input constant, the increase in the atmosphere will drop to zero at the moment that input and removal are equal (would be over 500 ppmv for current emissions).
– If we would halve our emissions today, there wouldn’t be any increase anymore in the atmosphere.
– If we would reduce our emissions to zero, there would be a drop of CO2 in the atmosphere until the equilibrium of around 290 ppmv would be reached again.
So Dr. Salby is completely wrong about the correlation between emissions and increase in the atmosphere. Not the only point of discussion in his speeches…
FE
Waffle on as much as you like. The anthropogenic emissions increased three fold without any noticeable change in the rate of increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration, 2000 – 2010 compared to 1990 – 2000. Also the anthropogenic emissions increased at an exponential rate from the early 1940s and the atmospheric concentration continued to increase at about 0.5% per annum. Somehow that doesn’t equate with man causing most of the increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration.
John
That’s why I never call it the Keeling Curve. It is not a curve. It is a slope with very tiny acceleration, especially in this century, during the sharp up-curve in human emission.
Since me have no direct measurement prior to 1960, it is completely feasible this is just one segment of an organic sine wave, with a human-induced kicker.
jpm,
Please, there is little reason that the increase in the atmosphere must correlate with human emissions. That is simply a matter of inputs and outputs and how the outputs react on an increased level in the atmosphere.
In this case the response is quite linear, surprisingly linear. Over the past 60 years, there is a linear response of about 2%/year of the extra CO2 pressure in the atmosphere above equilibrium (a tau of 51 years). If you plot the net increase in the atmosphere as the difference between human emissions and calculated sink rate on that base, you are in the middle of the (temperature caused) variability:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em2B.jpg
Look at the last years of that plot (need some update with the latest figures!): the emissions did get flat, but the increase in the atmosphere slightly drops. Why? Because CO2 in the atmosphere still increases, thus the extra pressure in the atmosphere increases the sinks in oceans and vegetation…
The increase of CO2 in the atmosphere only partly depends of human emissions, the other part only depends of the extra CO2 pressure in the atmosphere, independent of human emissions of one or several years…
You are missing the forest for the trees.
The Green New Deal is Here.
Flights have ended
People are staying at home
Oil production is ceasing
And the list goes on…
Plus bonuses like busting up churches and criminalizing the fellowship of the Saints.
In fact, everything the Green New Deal wanted has been accomplished.
So why on Earth would any politician want to lift the National House Arrest
Too many people at home farting.
In related news, wind turbines cause osprey populations to rebound after they had dropped coincident with the introductions of wind turbines.
I think you meant “defunct” wind turbine towers cause raptor populations to rebound. Oh, they’re great for vines too.
I still don’t see osprey nesting on active turbine hubs.
You can find the actual updated charts on my blog version here: https://inconvenientfacts.xyz/blog/f/green-new-deal-goes-viral-and-fails
Crush the peasants. Elevate the do-gooder elites. Any excuse will do. Our allegedly “globalist,” but in reality neo-royalist betters are only getting warmed up. Neither AOC, Gavin Newsom nor the Secretary General of the U.N. are more inclined to travel in ox carts or rowboats than anyone else, despite protestations to the contrary.
But we are in an age of politicians who have no understanding of the real world, they been in politics all their life and rely on second and third hand information from people who have suspect abilities in the first place, or worse, personal agendas. Right now the governor of Michigan is relying on an MD that clearly has no clue about the rate of new infections, the fact that deaths are a trailing outcome of rates of infection, or even know what “exponential growth” means. We are in a day-over-day decline in new cases of Covid-19, yet they still talk about reaching the peak “sometime soon” … based on increasing cases and the 8-10 day lag between infection, testing and reporting we reached the peak infection rate some 16 to 17 days ago in Michigan. That’s what we’re dealing with, and it’s time to call the so called “experts” out for what they are, incompetent careerists.
This point is so important, someone should turn it huge:
1) microscopic attention to many other stations, not just Mauna Loa
2) rigorous attempt to estimate the CO2 Pause Reduction (CPR?);
3) comparison of the CPR to the amount the GND holds as a goal.
Link: Scripps Program, 14 stations measuring CO2 with downloadable files:
https://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu/data/atmospheric_co2/sampling_stations.html
Any data mavens interested?
Undauntedly we will see competent analyses in the near future.
Some scientists have estimated that about 3 to 5% of atmospheric CO₂ contribution is from fossil fuels. If we get accurate reports on consumed fossil fuel deviation during the lock-down period, I imagine it should be possible to calculate our actual contribution of plant-food.
Carl Friis-Hansen,
Human emissions are about 4% of the (mainly seasonal) natural input, but there is 0% human output.
That means that about 90% of the CO2 increase in the atmosphere is from human input and 10% from the temperature increase of the ocean’s surface in the past 170 years.
Thanks Ferdinand, I had a read of your:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/co2_origin.html
@ Ferdinand
“Human emissions are about 4% of the (mainly seasonal) natural input, but there is 0% human output.”
Still talking that AGW trash, ….. are you Ferdie?
Ferdinand, ….. GETTA CLUE, ….. human conducted agriculture around the world is one hell of a “human output” for sucking CO2 out of the atmosphere each and every year.
GEEEZUS, ….. how many millions of tons of “CO2-dependent” corn, rice, wheat, oats, barley, soy bean, cotton, etc., is grown each and every year?
Iffen humans are responsible for about 4% of the CO2 emissions into the atmosphere…… then they are also surely responsible for about 4% of the CO2 absorptions from out of the atmosphere.
Give it up, Ferdinand, ………. your science claims should be relegated to the “round file” that sits on the floor.
Samuel,
If you have a pocket calculator at hand, the net figures are:
9 GtC/year CO2 from human use of fossil fuels
4,5 GtC/year measured increase in the atmosphere
4.5 GtC/year is absorbed by oceans and vegetation
The sinks are about 50/50 between oceans and vegetation, thus all what humans have planted plus natural forest growth is good for 1/4 of human emissions…
Right now these stations need to be protected by the National guard, aerial monitoring for ‘Wild’ fire arsonists, …tide guages etc… The stakes are huge and this has cost us trillions. The stakes are no less hugh for the Adjustocene folk and we know they are ruthless. They don’t want this kind of experiment that takes control out of there hands.
Gary,
The GND AOCs must be holding their breath in fear. All the Democratic candidates were wildly enthusiastic signatories to GND. Now Mother Nature dropped a controlled scientific experiment right on top of their agenda. It is falsifiable.
I just think it is so ironic. Grimly watching it play out.
I can’t wait to see the math comparing the amount of CO2 Reduction the GND targets vs the amount of CO2 reduction the virus created. I think the virus is going to over-deliver.
Gary Pearse,
As there are some 70+ stations measuring CO2 in “background” air, (of which 10 under supervision of NOAA), it simply is impossible to manipulate the data.
Stations are exploited by different people from different organizations in different countries, they all show the same increase with slightly different seasonal amplitudes and a N-S lag (which points to human emissions, 90% in the NH).
The calibration procedures at all stations are very rigorous:
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/about/co2_measurements.html
There are no afterward “corrections” with one exception: if there was a problem with one of the calibration mixtures after use, but that is always for one station data, not other stations.
All what is done is that unreliable data are flagged and not used in daily to yearly averages, but including or excluding the flagged data only gives a difference in “noise” level, no change in trend (less than 0.1 ppmv/year)…
We only can hope that one day that the temperature measurements were done with the same rigor…
The pandemic has brought a successful end to the global warming scare. We’re 25 degrees below normal here. Now if we can just get the population to go along with the present lock down forever.
Dr. Tim Ball, climatologist, has been saying this for years.
Water, H2O is 95%+ of the greenhouse effect.
Carbon Dioxide, CO2 is less than 4%.
Of the CO2 in our atmosphere 95%+ is produced by nature.
Less than 4% is produced by humans.
All his books are worth reading. Especially his 2016 handbook for the layman:
Human Caused Global Warming The Biggest Deception In History.
Names the multi-billlionaires as the chief pushers of the warming/climate fraud.
Chief among them the Rockefellers & George Soros.
Only 121 pages, an easy weekend must-read.
His latest book, with others, shows that CO2 serves as a net coolant, via convection.
Unrefuted thus far.
The Sky Dragon Slayers Victory Lap.
John Doran.
Sorry, but Dr. Ball is wrong on that point:
If you have a fountain with a huge pump which pumps 1000 l/min over the fountain and that drops back in the basement, nothing happens with its level (except some evaporation).
If the maintenance person opens the supply valve which delivers 1 l/min input in the main line, then the water level will rise, despite that it is only 0.1% of the supply…
He is equally wrong about CO2 as “coolant” too…
You are on a “roll”, aren’t you, Engelbeen?
Still batting 10,000, aren’t you?
And that was sure a great analogy, ……. comparing the functioning of earth’s natural world to pumping beer out of a barrel ….. without spilling any on the bar top.
and its still unrefuted. !
fred250, unrefuted?
The earth’s mainly seasonal CO2 fluxes are around 200 GtC in and out within the same year.
Human contribution is around 9 GtC/year one way addition.
Net increase in the atmosphere is around 4.5 GtC/year.
Net sink in nature after a full seasonal cycle thus is about 4.5 GtC/year.
Any bookkeeper in this world worth that name will tell you that all the gain of the game is by that human contribution…
Ferdinand, why do you say that ‘Human contribution is… ‘one way” ? Why isn’t Henry’s Law working for this fraction?
Tonyn,
Human contribution is one-way addition, there are hardly any human-made sinks. Some reforestration in the Western world, but more forest is destroyed by humans in other parts of the world…
Nature has enormous sources and sinks, mainly seasonal and caused by temperature changes/differences. The seasonal cycle is hardly influenced by some extra CO2 in the atmosphere (whatever the cause). No more leaves grow on trees when there is more CO2 in the atmosphere or no more CO2 is captured by the oceans with the same temperature differences.
The net sink capacity is only increased by the extra CO2 pressure: more pushed into the ocean surface and more growth of plant/tree mass with more CO2 in the atmosphere.
Thus while the huge seasonal CO2 in/out fluxes are temperature dependent, the removal of any extra CO2 in the atmosphere is pressure dependent. The latter is independent of the composition or the yearly human CO2 emissions, only depends of the total extra CO2 pressure above equilibrium. The latter is governed by temperature and Henry’s law.
If 10% of the CO2 in the atmosphere is from human origin, then 10% of the sinks will be of human origin, thus also of the net sinks, be it with a slight difference between the isotopes…
Ferdinand, getta clue and cease with your “smoke blowing”.
All the numbers (figures) you are using in your calculations …… are numbers you have pulled out of a hat.
HA, some science, ….. estimate this, estimate that, multiply by a guess, then divide it by a maybe ….. and then announce a new “scientific fact” to the world.
Samuel,
We have been there many times, so here again what science knows and what science best guesses are:
– Human emissions are based on sales (taxes!) thus relative accurate, probably somewhat underestimated by under-the-counter sales.
– The increase of CO2 in the atmosphere is accurately measured in “background” atmosphere, that is 95% of the atmospheric mass.
– The difference between these two is what nature after a full seasonal cycle net has supplied or absorbed.
– In the past 60 years nature was always a net sink for CO2.
That is what is scientifically known: humans are the cause of the bulk of the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere.
What are best guesses?
The amount of CO2 that passes the atmosphere within a year and mainly caused by temperature changes over the seasons.
These are based on the measurements of changes in 13C/12C ratio and changes in O2 level in the atmosphere and the solubility of CO2 in seawater with temperature.
If vegetation starts to grow in spring, a lot of CO2 is absorbed and preferably 12CO2, thus enriching the 13C/12C ratio in the atmosphere and at the same time O2 is produced in stoichiometric quantities. Thus measurable, but the O2 measurements are quite difficult and can give substantial errors.
Thus while the net result of the whole natural cycle is known with more that sufficient accuracy, the natural fluxes themselves have error factors of +/- 50%, but that is not important at all for the cause of the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere…
Ferdinand,
you should have stopped keying after you entered the following, to wit:
“We have been there many times, so here again what science knows and what science best guesses are:”
Ferdie, ….. the “root” of your anthropogenic CO2 argument is based solely on “best guesses”, so it matters not how much or how little actual science you cite to justify your “best guesses”.
“best guesses” supporting “best guesses” = “junk science” claims of fact
@ John Doran
“Water, H2O is 95%+ of the greenhouse effect.
Carbon Dioxide, CO2 is less than 4%.”
“YUP”, ….. way, way less than 4%.
Like ….. “the little end of nothing” ….. percent.
“The lack of an effect whatsoever on global CO2 levels after the huge decline in emissions should be a wakeup call to any of the politicians advancing economically crippling measures like the Green New Deal or the Paris climate accord”
https://tambonthongchai.com/2019/11/16/agw-issues/
Green New Deal now law in Virginia:
Northam also signed climate legislation on Easter Sunday.
He signed the Virginia Clean Economic Act, which “incorporates environmental justice concepts related to the Green New Deal,” the socialist takeover of the economy that would impose tremendous costs on Americans.
Among other things, the law establishes high renewable energy and energy efficiency standards for local energy companies, advances ineffective wind energy while requiring Dominion Energy Virginia to “prioritize hiring local workers from historically disadvantaged communities,” and encourages solar energy.
The governor also signed the Clean Energy and Community Flood Preparedness Act, which establishes a carbon dioxide cap-and-trade program and a Flood Preparedness Fund.
“These new clean energy laws propel Virginia to leadership among the states in fighting climate change,” Northam said. “They advance environmental justice and help create clean energy jobs.”
The laws also represent a massive government intrusion in the energy sector at a time when U.S. emissions are already decreasing.
“prioritize hiring local workers from historically disadvantaged communities,”
Their undergarments are showing.
“prioritize hiring local workers from historically disadvantaged communities,”
So, they are racists giving preferential treatment to people because of their skin color? Typical leftists.
Green New Deal now the law in Virginia:
Northam also signed climate legislation on Easter Sunday.
He signed the Virginia Clean Economic Act, which “incorporates environmental justice concepts related to the Green New Deal,” the socialist takeover of the economy that would impose tremendous costs on Americans.
Among other things, the law establishes high renewable energy and energy efficiency standards for local energy companies, advances ineffective wind energy while requiring Dominion Energy Virginia to “prioritize hiring local workers from historically disadvantaged communities,” and encourages solar energy.
The governor also signed the Clean Energy and Community Flood Preparedness Act, which establishes a carbon dioxide cap-and-trade program and a Flood Preparedness Fund.
“These new clean energy laws propel Virginia to leadership among the states in fighting climate change,” Northam said. “They advance environmental justice and help create clean energy jobs.”
The laws also represent a massive government intrusion in the energy sector at a time when U.S. emissions are already decreasing.
The only solution for the people of Virginia is to vote those Democrat fools out of office as soon as possible.
CB: West Virginia may be the crash test dummy for the GND in America. Couldn’t happen to a better state. It should be interesting to see how far down the rabbit hole they go.
Said it elsewhere but appropriate here again:
CO2 levels will start decreasing as the Northern hemisphere enters Spring – happens every year:
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/weekly.html
This link shows levels dropping from a peak of 416ppm in the middle of May 2019 to a low of around 408ppm by October. In 2016 the peak was in May but April was close behind.
It may only be April still, but I’m not sure any drop now really proves a lot.
Amos E. Stone …
I submit there is a difference between a “drop” and a “ding.” Yes, granted, there is always a drop as you describe, with the turn of the seasons. Then back up. That is the baseline. No one challenges the accuracy and reality of that.
However, with a huge pause in emissions, we should ALSO see a “ding.” Just a wobble in the ususal saw-tooth graph, a change in the pattern of the baseline. An honest-to-god discernable ding.
@ Amos E. Stone – April 14, 2020 at 9:26 am
YUP, the bi-yearly cycling of atmospheric CO2 has been “steady& consistent” for the past 63 years.
Amos, you might find the following compiled info useful.
Cheers, Sam C
Maximum to Minimum yearly CO2 ppm data – 1979 to May 2019
Source: NOAA’s Mauna Loa Monthly Mean CO2 data base
@ ftp://aftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/products/trends/co2/co2_mm_mlo.txt
1979 – 2019 YTD CO2 — “Max” ppm @ mid-May (5) … “Min” ppm @ end of Sept (9)
year mth “Max” _ yearly increase ____ mth “Min” ppm
1979 _ 6 _ 339.20 …. + ….. El Niño ___ 9 … 333.93
1980 _ 5 _ 341.47 …. +2.27 _________ 10 … 336.05
1981 _ 5 _ 343.01 …. +1.54 __________ 9 … 336.92
1982 _ 5 _ 344.67 …. +1.66 El Niño __ 9 … 338.32 El Chichón
1983 _ 5 _ 345.96 …. +1.29 _________ 9 … 340.17
1984 _ 5 _ 347.55 …. +1.59 __________ 9 … 341.35
1985 _ 5 _ 348.92 …. +1.37 _________ 10 … 343.08
1986 _ 5 _ 350.53 …. +1.61 _________ 10 … 344.47
1987 _ 5 _ 352.14 …. +1.61 __________ 9 … 346.52
1988 _ 5 _ 354.18 …. +2.04 __________ 9 … 349.03
1989 _ 5 _ 355.89 …. +1.71 La Nina __ 9 … 350.02
1990 _ 5 _ 357.29 …. +1.40 __________ 9 … 351.28
1991 _ 5 _ 359.09 …. +1.80 __________ 9 … 352.30
1992 _ 5 _ 359.55 …. +0.46 El Niño __ 9 … 352.93 Pinatubo
1993 _ 5 _ 360.19 …. +0.64 __________ 9 … 354.10
1994 _ 5 _ 361.68 …. +1.49 __________ 9 … 355.63
1995 _ 5 _ 363.77 …. +2.09 _________ 10 … 357.97
1996 _ 5 _ 365.16 …. +1.39 _________ 10 … 359.54
1997 _ 5 _ 366.69 …. +1.53 __________ 9 … 360.31
1998 _ 5 _ 369.49 …. +2.80 El Niño __ 9 … 364.01
1999 _ 4 _ 370.96 …. +1.47 La Nina ___ 9 … 364.94
2000 _ 4 _ 371.82 …. +0.86 La Nina ___ 9 … 366.91
2001 _ 5 _ 373.82 …. +2.00 __________ 9 … 368.16
2002 _ 5 _ 375.65 …. +1.83 _________ 10 … 370.51
2003 _ 5 _ 378.50 …. +2.85 _________ 10 … 373.10
2004 _ 5 _ 380.63 …. +2.13 __________ 9 … 374.11
2005 _ 5 _ 382.47 …. +1.84 __________ 9 … 376.66
2006 _ 5 _ 384.98 …. +2.51 __________ 9 … 378.92
2007 _ 5 _ 386.58 …. +1.60 __________ 9 … 380.90
2008 _ 5 _ 388.50 …. +1.92 La Nina _ 10 … 382.99
2009 _ 5 _ 390.19 …. +1.65 _________ 10 … 384.39
2010 _ 5 _ 393.04 …. +2.85 El Niño __ 9 … 386.83
2011 _ 5 _ 394.21 …. +1.17 La Nina _ 10 … 388.96
2012 _ 5 _ 396.78 …. +2.58 _________ 10 … 391.01
2013 _ 5 _ 399.76 …. +2.98 __________ 9 … 393.51
2014 _ 5 _ 401.88 …. +2.12 __________ 9 … 395.35
2015 _ 5 _ 403.94 …. +2.06 __________ 9 … 397.63
2016 _ 5 _ 407.70 …. +3.76 El Niño __ 9 … 401.03
2017 _ 5 _ 409.65 …. +1.95 __________ 9 … 403.38
2018 _ 5 _ 411.24 …. +1.59 __________9 … 405.51
2019 _ 5 _ 414.66 …. +3.42 __________9 … 408.50
La Nina – El Nino index: https://ggweather.com/enso/oni.htm
The above data is proof-positive of an average 5 to 6 ppm decrease in CO2 that occurs between mid-May (5) and the end of September (9) of each calendar year …… and that there is an average 7 to 8 ppm increase in CO2 that occurs between the end of September (9) and mid-May (5) of the next calendar year.
Thank goodness for the constancy. It will make any wobble quite visible. And since AGW says human contribution is not trivial, there should be a non-trivial wobble, or “ding” varying from the baseline. If they are right!
The seasonal amplitude did not change much over time, here compared in the early period and later period of Mauna Loa:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/seasonal_CO2_MLO_trend.jpg
Only the trend doubled from 1 ppmv/year (with human emissions around 2 ppmv/year) to 2 ppmv/year (with human emissions around 4 ppmv/year).
WOW! 339ppm/v to 414ppm/v from 1979 to 2019 and the weather hasn’t changed a bit.
“ any drop ”
Q?: Say from 418 to 380;
what then?
John – then I’d say the warmists have a point, the CO2 level increases are mainly caused by us humans. And we’d better get back to putting some extra CO2 up there for the plants to eat. If CO2 levels keep going up through May then I think we need to look elsewhere!
Windlord – can’t argue with that at all, but how will you know? There always seems to be a hiccup around February where the rate slows down – (so not quite a ding 🙂 ). Is that just because Feb is shorter than the other months? By eyeball the difference between March and April this year certainly looks less than last year, but I’d suggest we”l just be looking at a slightly fatter peak and then seasonal descent as normal from mid-May.
I’m not suggesting this global lockdown will have no effect, just not sure that the inevitable headlines crowing about the reduction in CO2 levels being due to WuFlu will have any basis in fact. I’ve not seen anyone else point out that CO2 levels do come down around now naturally anyway.
Amos,
If, according to AGW theory, man’s contribution to the increase in CO2 is huge/important/catastrophic, then an enforced reduction this drastic ought to show up in the direct measurement. That’s all. And everything.
windlord-sun
There is a difference between important and huge. You don’t need huge quantities of cyanide in air to get poisoned…
The point is that the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere is mostly from human emissions, no matter if that is measurable within months or only clear after a full seasonal cycle or only after a few years.
That is simply a lost battle, as on that point the warmists are right, as they have all observations on their side.
Where skeptics need to fuel the debate is the impact of that increase on climate and there is it where the warmists and alarmists are an very shaky grounds…
@ Ferdinand Engelbeen – April 15, 2020 at 1:07 am
Sorry bout that, Ferdie, ……but the following statistics proves you are wrong, to wit:
year — world popul. – % incr. — May CO2 ppm – % incr. — avg ppm increase/year
1940 – 2,300,000,000 est. ___ ____ 300 ppm est.
1950 – 2,556,000,053 – 11.1% ____ 310 ppm – 3.3% —— 1.0 ppm/year
[March 03, 1958 …… Mauna Loa — 315.71 ppm]
1960 – 3,039,451,023 – 18.9% ____ 320.03 ppm – 3.2% —— 1.0 ppm/year
1970 – 3,706,618,163 – 21.9% ____ 328.07 ppm – 2.5% —— 0.8 ppm/year
1980 – 4,453,831,714 – 20.1% ____ 341.48 ppm – 4.0% —– 1.3 ppm/year
1990 – 5,278,639,789 – 18.5% ____ 357.32 ppm – 4.6% —– 1.5 ppm/year
2000 – 6,082,966,429 – 15.2% ____ 371.58 ppm – 3.9% —– 1.4 ppm/year
2010 – 6,809,972,000 – 11.9% ____ 393.00 ppm – 5.7% —— 2.1 ppm/year
2019 – 7,714,576,923 – 11.7% ____ 414.66 ppm – 5.5% —— 2.1 ppm/year
Source CO2 ppm: ftp://aftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/products/trends/co2/co2_mm_mlo.txt
“DUH”, the world’s population increase from 3 billion humans in 1960 ….. to 7.7 billion humans in 2019, ……. is not reflected in either the yearly or decadal increase in CO2.
Samuel,
The increased level of CO2 must be calculated above the temperature controlled equilibrium (about 290 ppmv), not above zero CO2…
Further, you have to look at human emissions, not the increase in the atmosphere and these increased a 4-fold since 1960:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em8.jpg
That while population only increased a 2.5 fold.
Thus energy use increased with the population and the increase in comfort of the same population worldwide…
“The increased level of CO2 must be calculated above the temperature controlled equilibrium (about 290 ppmv), …. ”
Ferdinand, …… how about 265 ppmv, …. or how about 282 ppmv, …. or how about 297 ppmv, …. or how about 313 ppmv, ……… cause since you are “how abouting” it shouldn’t make any difference right, …. because whatever answer you get it will be the correct one, right?
Samuel,
I know, you are a lost case, but for others who are interested in real science, here the graph of the relation between temperature and CO2 levels over the past 420,000 years from the Vostok ice core:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/Vostok_trends.gif
The relationship between Antarctic temperatures and global CO2 is about 8 ppmv/K
Translated to global temperatures, that is about 16 ppmv/K
The latter is the change in solubility of CO2 in seawater with temperatures around 15 degC, confirmed with over 3 million seawater samples…
Thus in real science one must consider the (dynamic) equilibrium between seawater and atmosphere per Henry’s law…
CO2 is naturally outgassed after and because of ocean temperature changes, driving lagged atmospheric CO2 accumulation after times of sun-warmed ocean heat accumulation, seasonally, over the last century, and ancient past.
The net CO2 partial pressure flux has been positive, outward from the surface since the ocean started warming up after the Little Ice Age; ie the ocean isn’t a sink now, it’s a source, the main source of CO2, until ocean temps fall sufficiently for net CO2 sinking, just like it has historically, repetitively.
Bib Weber,
Sorry, but you are wrong:
The influence of temperature on the solubility of CO2 in seawater changes with about 16 ppmv/K around the 15 degC, which is the current average sea surface temperature.
Over glacial – interglacial periods it was 8 ppmv/K for Antarctic temperatures, as seen in the 420,000 years Vostok ice core with four such cycles. Because of the “polar enhancement” that also translates to about 16 ppmv/K for global temperatures.
Thus the 0.8 K warming of the sea surface since the LIA is good for maximum 13 ppmv increase in the atmosphere. That is all. The rest of the 120 ppmv increase since the LIA is from humans. And the extra pressure in the atmosphere pushes about 1/4 of human emissions (as mass, not the same molecules) mainly into the deep oceans.
That is also measured with meanwhile over 3 million seawater samples and at a few permanent monitoring stations:
https://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/feel2331/maps.shtml
and the next section shows the yearly average:
“This map yields an annual oceanic uptake flux for CO2 of 2.2 ± 0.4 Pg C/yr”
That was for the reference year 1995. Since then the CO2 pressure (pCO2) in the atmosphere only increased, so only more CO2 would be absorbed by the oceans…
Sorry Bob, not Bib…
Your first graph showing that the sun and oceans cause the seasonal cycle is wrong too:
It is vegetation in the NH that is dominant, not the oceans, as the opposite CO2 and δ13C trend show:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/seasonal_CO2_d13C_MLO_BRW.jpg
BTW, the temperature at Barrow and Mauna Loa go up in summer, not down, but CO2 goes reverse…
The second graph has it right: for fast variations the CO2 sensitivity for temperature is 2-4 ppmv/K. Thus the 120 ppmv CO2 increase can never be caused by temperature…
The third graph is right too: over the past 800,000 years some 8 ppmv/K for Antarctic temperatures.
Thus you have proven yourself that less than 1 K sea surface temperature increase never can cause a 120 ppmv CO2 increase and that this extra pressure pushes more CO2 into the oceans…
Ferdinand, …… I dun told you to “cease & desist” from citing the junk science of others as proof of your junk science.
Now proxy studies of fossilized leaf stomata provides a fairly accurate of number for atmospheric CO2 ppm because they are equivalent to a “dated picture”, ……. whereas with glacial ice, it will tell you anything you want it to tell you.
“DUH”, …… if Keeling had not established a stable “benchmark” for atmospheric CO2 ppm in 1958 …. then the Vostok ice core researchers wouldn’t have a frigging clue of how much CO2 their “testing & sampling” of glacier ice should result in. They just knew it had to be high enough for plants to evolve and survive. And then for the herbivores and carnivores to follow suite.
Ferdinand, …… if those ice core researchers were so frigging smart …… why did Keeling have to tell them how much CO2 was in the atmosphere?
I pulled this Plant Stomata graph off a paper about 2 years ago, showing elevation of CO2 in Early Holocene at 250- 310 ppm, with a spike and drop around the Younger Dryas, then a beginning of a rise back to 300 PPM.
Ice cores cannot see spikes. They are slushy. Fine for very long term inspection, but useless when duct-taped to high precision measurement.
Ferdinand, I’m not wrong as the data clearly show the lagged relationships. Since you mentioned pCO2 in 1995 I’ll start there.
The air-sea CO2 flux hindcast for Jan 1995, first image, shows high flux in the southern ocean that other estimates don’t show, ie as in the second image:
The estimated pCO2 in 1995 as seen among other years in the next image indicate significant variability in the magnitude and location of the highest pCO2.
These are averages based on dissolved inorganic carbon, DIC. If you’ll notice the last image left-hand side west of the dateline (180 degrees), it indicates almost zero DIC flux.
What does this mean physically? Or does it mean lack of data coverage for those areas? Does it mean there are little to no DIC in the western Pacific? How is that possible when most of the coral reef bases are there?
The other problem with sea-air fluxes is the generalization of a single point Mauna Loa CO2 atmospheric concentration to specific gridded locations over the ocean surface that are then used to estimate the air pCO2 that is then compared to the estimated ocean pCO2 in order to find the net flux from each grid space. We’re now talking about two different estimates each with issues, being used together that generate poor conclusions.
Also, your cumulative emissions vs ML CO2 connection fails higher-order analyses.
BTW, the temperature at Barrow and Mauna Loa go up in summer, not down, but CO2 goes reverse…
Ferdinand Engelbeen – April 16, 2020 at 11:41 am
Ferdinand, what is it about the word “impossibility” that you don’t understand?
It is too bad that it screws up and negates all of your highly important scientific work that you have spent a lifetime on but the literal fact is that it is “a biological impossibility” for the Northern Hemisphere’s vegetation, …. be it the decomposing or the growing of said, …. to have any measurable effect on the bi-yearly (seasonal) cycle in atmospheric CO2 ppm quantities, ……. with the unquestionable and primary reason being that 98% of all decomposing and growing of NH biomass occurs during the Spring and Summer (April-Sept) months when there is sufficient moisture (liquid H2O) and warm temperatures.
Ferdinand Engelbeen – April 16, 2020 at 11:41 am
Ferdinand, ….. educate yourself on the finer points of Henry’s Law.
“ In physical chemistry, Henry’s law is a gas law that states that the amount of dissolved gas in a liquid is proportional to its partial pressure above the liquid. The proportionality factor is called Henry’s law constant.”
It matters not a twit if it is the temperature of the air or the temperature of the ocean water that increases or decreases, or the actual number of degrees involved, it will cause a change in the “partial pressure” between the water and the air.
Samuel,
Stomata data are proxy for CO2 levels, ice core CO2 data re direct measurements of CO2 done with the same equipment as direct in the atmosphere.
Thus ice core CO2 data are by far preferable above stomata data.
Stomata (index) data depend on the average CO2 level of the previous growing season (and several other items).
Stomata data have one big problem: leaves grow on land where CO2 can change with hundreds of ppmv between day and night and with monthly averages 40-100 ppmv above “background” CO2. The average local/regional CO2 level can change with changes in the main wind direction (growth of other crops, land use changes), even the main wind direction can change in specific periods (MWP – LIA).
Therefore they are calibrated over the past century against… ice core data, firn and direct measurements. But nobody can be sure how the local bias changed in specific periods.
CO2 measurements in ice cores are accurate to +/- 1,2 ppmv (1 sigma), but have huge drawback: that are averages of 10 to 600 years, depending of the local snow accumulation rate.
One point is sure: if the average CO2 level of stomata data differs from the measured CO2 level in ice cores over the same period as the resolution of the ice cores, then the stomata data must be re-calibrated, not reverse…
windlord-sun,
Stomata data are a local/regional proxy of CO2 over land. They reflect local/regional CO2 levels, not global.
Further, over the period 13,000 = 10,000 ago, there are ice cores with a resolution of around 40 years (Taylor Dome), by far enough to see the result of the Younger Dryas on CO2 levels (but not on temperature).
Here for the West Antarctic Divide, with a resolution of less than a century:
https://www.clim-past.net/15/913/2019/ Fig. 3
Much more accurate, global and detailed than the stomata data,
The accuracy of ice core measurements are better than 1.2 (1 sigma) for one ice core measured in different labs and better than +/- 5 ppmv for ice cores with extreme differences in temperature, accumulation rate and resolution for the same average gas age.
Bob Weber,
Sorry for the late reply…
As far as I know, Mauna LOA and Barrow are in the NH above sea level, thus their insolation gets stronger in the NH spring until the end of june, while CO2 goes fast down (!) in specific Barrow, when all tundra starts to grow in the few summer months above freezing they have… Your explanation is for what happens in seawater and of course that is mainly up with temperature, except in the far North East Atlantic where the THC sinks winter and summer with a lot of CO2.
Thus CO2 goes down while temperature goes up. That is a reverse relationship…
Then indeed there is a lag between temperature and CO2 levels on short (ENSO) to very long periods and in between (MWP-LIA).
Despite that lag, there is a definitive maximum of CO2 in the atmosphere for a fixed temperature jump: 16 ppmv/K, measured in all oceans with over 3 million seawater samples. That is what Henry’s law says: for a given temperature, there is a fixed ratio between CO2 in solution and in the atmosphere.
That brings us to the current CO2 increase: the warming ocean surface since the LIA is good for about 13 ppmv extra in the atmosphere and nothing more. That is all. All the rest is from human contributions, which are about twice as high as the observed increase.
The increased CO2 level in the atmosphere pushes more CO2 in the oceans than reverse from the increased temperature.
Feely e.a. have made an inventory of over 900,000 measurements of ocean pCO2 and compared them with the pCO2 of the atmosphere (BTW, the differences in the atmosphere are small, less than 8 ppmv globally over the oceans): the average difference is 7 μatm higher in the atmosphere than in the ocean surface. Thus again the average flux of CO2 is into the oceans, not reverse:
https://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/feel2331/exchange.shtml
Then about DIC: if the oceans were responsible for the increase in the atmosphere, then DIC should decrease over time, but all six fixed marine stations show an increase of DIC over time, see Fig. 3 in:
https://tos.org/oceanography/assets/docs/27-1_bates.pdf
Again, the average CO2 flux is from the atmosphere into the ocean surface, not reverse…
You made the same mistake as Bart/Bartemis:
he CO2 sensitivity to temperature is per unit time
Of course not, the CO2 sensitivity to temperature is a fixed ratio per Henry’s law (*). As the mixing speed of CO2 in water is very low, one need a lot of wind to mix it into the “mixed” upper ocean surface (100-200 meter), and that speed is indirect ratio to the pCO2 difference between atmosphere and water, but when in equilibrium (if ever), then it stops. The pCO2 of the oceans changes with about 16 μatm/K around 15 degC. If the pCO2 of the atmosphere increases with 16 μatm, both are again in (dynamic) equilibrium…
(*) See the engineering solubility for 1 atm for different gases at different temperatures at:
https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/gases-solubility-water-d_1148.html
The graphs are for fresh water, but that is the same for pure CO2 gas in seawater, but as that reacts with the buffer salts to (bi)carbonates, the real solubility in seawater is about 10 times higher than in fresh water.
Amos,
Thanks! This is exactly what I was thinking as I scanned down the comments. If the ‘lock downs’ are still in place come May, I speculate the Alarmists will claim the decline in atmospheric CO2 that starts in May is the ‘clear signal of gross man made CO2 polluting the atmosphere’ falling off as the lock downs continue. They will not honestly disclose the drop in May is a cyclical annual event.
Amos,
A quick calculation: if human CO2 emissions worldwide would drop with 25% this year, means that the emissions decrease from 4.5 ppmv/year to about 3.3 ppmv/year or a difference of 1.2 ppmv/year or a monthly less increase of 0.1 ppmv/month. Not even measurable with the accuracy of the current instruments. Surely not in the +/- 4 ppmv seasonal ups and downs.
To be sure, you need a full year of data and even then , the year-by-year variability (Pintubo, El Niño) is also good for some +/- 1.5 ppmv variability around the 90+ ppmv trend over the past 60 years.
So, I don’t think we will see much in the data. Only if all emissions were halved, the trend would get around zero and measurable within 1-2 years even within the noise…
We are saying the same thing, I think. The natural variation in CO2 levels, especially at this time of year when levels fall anyway, will mask any effect from the WuFlu lockdown.
I fear it won’t stop some people claiming that ‘ooh look – the levels are falling, so increases in CO2 must be all be due to bad humans’.
[begin sarcasm]
Dear Ferdinand,
Thanks for the math. It appears that you just proved that homo sapiens contribution to the total volume of CO2 in the atmosphere isn’t even measurable at PreCovis levels, or DuringCovis, or AfterCovis.
Whew. Thank goodness. It thought my SUV was going to kill a polar bear.
Dear Amos, I see you are trying to help HideTheDing. Thank you. Let’s have a charcoal grill-out to celebrate.
[end sarcasm]
If there is no ding, my SUV can sing.
WUWT has been pointing out for years that human CO2 emissions are a tiny portion of the total atmospheric CO2. The only way the CAGW arithmetic works is to assume that none of the other items in the CO2 budget change in the slightest and, as well, that human CO2 emissions stay in the atmosphere forever.
It looks like the data doesn’t support the CAGW dreams.
With today’s story, we have yet another example that demonstrates that atmospheric CO2 does not track human emissions.
“It looks like the data doesn’t support the CAGW dreams.”
Perhaps, but I suspect that after a few adjustments or one good homogenization the “data” will not only support CAGW but also prove that it is worse than we thought.
commieBob,
Some people at WUWT are pointing that out, but they are wrong. Measured (on base of the 13C/12C ratio), the current atmosphere contains already 10% fossil fuel CO2, way larger than the “only 4% contribution” in the CO2 supply…
The trends are tracking human emissions anyway, the variability around the trends are tracking temperature variability, that is all (+/- 1.5 ppmv around 90+ ppmv trend)…
We’ve had this conversation before. Somehow the people who believe as you do reject the evidence of atomic bomb produced isotopes with regard to residence time.
It’s a world where estimates by alleged desktop experts overrule reality.
commieBob,
I only follow facts, not theories and the facts tell us that 10% of CO2 in the current atmosphere is caused by human emissions from the use of fossil fuels.
How do w know?
– Any increase of emissions from the oceans would increase the 13C/12C ratio.
– Any increase in net uptake by vegetation would increase the 13C/12C ratio.
– The latter is proven by the increased oxygen production and satellites: the earth is greening.
– There are no other known huge sources of low-13C on earth into the atmosphere.
The only known huge source of current low-13C CO2 is from fossil fuel use.
What about the fast decay of the bomb-test 14C peak of 1960?
Quite simple: what did go into the deep oceans was the isotopic mix of 1960 and some extra 12CO2. What did come out of the oceans in the same year was the isotopic mix of ~1000 years before, long before the atomic bomb tests.
That makes that in 1960 some 97.5% of all 12CO2 returned from the deep in the same year but only 45% of the 14CO2.
That makes that the decay rate of any excess 14CO2 is many times faster than of an excess 12CO2:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/14co2_distri_1960.jpg
Hi Ferdinand. You say:
“I only follow facts, not theories and the facts tell us that 10% of CO2 in the current atmosphere is caused by human emissions from the use of fossil fuels.” Up above you also refer to “the current atmosphere contains already 10% fossil fuel CO2”.
Could you please share the numerical details on how this percentage figure is determined (i.e. the actual calculation using the 13C/12C measurements to which you refer). Thank you.
Jim Ross,
I have somewhere the calculations of over a decade ago…
The formula for the δ13C calculation is:
(13C/12C)sampled – (13C/12C)standard
—————————————————————— x 1.000
(13C/12C)standard
If you make a mixture of CO2 from different sources with different 13C/12C ratio you can calculate the resulting δ13C of the mixture.
How much human CO2 remains in the atmosphere can be deduced from the calculations of the δ13C ratio if all human CO2 remained in the atmosphere: That would have dropped the δ13C level to -11 per mil, compared to the about -6.4 per mil in the pre-industrial atmosphere. If I remember well, that was with average -24 per mil in the average fossil fuel use mix.
The real drop is to less than -8 per mil or about 1/3 of the drop if all human CO2 remained in the atmosphere. The rest was exchanged with mainly the deep oceans.
Humans increased the atmospheric CO2 content with about 35%, thus 1/3 would be around 10%, which fits the δ13C calculation.
The δ13C drop is seen in both atmosphere: ice cores, firn, direct measurements and ocean surface (coralline sponges):
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/sponges.jpg
The difference in δ13C between sea surface (+1 to +5 per mil), deep oceans (0 per mil) and atmosphere (-6.2 to -8 per mil) is a matter of shift in ratio between the isotopes at the water-air border (-10 per mil) and air-water border (+2 per mil), average -8 per mil compared to the sea surface level (which is higher than the deep oceans due to bio-life and drop out of organics with low δ13C level).
The -6.4 +/- 0.2 per mil seems the equilibrium between ocean surface an atmosphere all over the Holocene and even the transition between glacial and interglacial periods doesn’t show more than a few tenths of a per mil change…
I made once the full calculation for the period since 1850 and here it is:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/fract_level_emiss.jpg
up to 2010 it was about 9% anthro fraction (FA%) in the atmosphere and 5% in the ocean’s surface (FL%). The calculations of the total carbon in the atmosphere (TCA), including the remainder of human emissions did fit the observations.
If you need the original calculations (Excel), I will look them up and make them available…
Ferdinand,
Thank you for your response. It does not answer my question. I do not “need” your original calculations, but if you are going to claim your 10% as a “fact”, I do consider that you are obliged to justify that value with data and relevant computations. Otherwise, some people might wonder if it is just made up. As you should know, I have a lot of respect for your analysis techniques, but I have never been entirely comfortable that you can fully explain the historic δ13C data, as indeed Keeling et al (2017) cannot. What we do know as a fact is that the incremental atmospheric CO2 has an average δ13C of -13 per mil (including the Law Dome ice core data).
All I am asking for is the calculation that demonstrates (proves as a fact) that 10% of atmospheric CO2 is from fossil fuels.
Jim Ross,
Sorry, my memory is not what it was once, I suppose that we have been discussing that some time ago…
I thought that the calculation was quite straight forward:
Fossil fuels: -24 per mil δ13C
Atmosphere, pre-industrial: -6.4 per mil δ13C
Atmosphere, 2010: -8.1 per mil δ13C (MLO)
% fossil fuels CO2 in the atmosphere:
(8.1 – 6.4) / (24 – 6.4) = 9.7%
I am not sure what you mean by the -13 per mil δ13C of the incremental CO2, as the emitted quantities quadrupled since 1960 and there is a flux of ~40 GtC/year deep ocean CO2 between upwelling near the equator and sinks near the poles. That flux has an average of -6.4 per mil δ13C, thus “thinning the “human fingerprint” much harder in the past than in current times…
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/deep_ocean_air_zero.jpg
Ferdinand, your whole argument is around CO2 increased by our use of fossil fuels. Is there a way for you to determine how much of that CO2 was created in the mining, manufacture, transport and recycling of wind and solar renewables including batteries. You would need to include the additional CO2 created for the manufacture of the trucks used to transport of wind turbines as they are built for purpose, and of course any other equipment that was built for purpose too. The number of ships to transport this infrastructure globally would need to be taken into account to as China produces most of this industry.
In am quite serious about this question, you are trying to identify the amount of CO2 that humans are responsible for in the atmosphere. I want to know how much CO2 we could eliminate by not having this ‘clean’ energy. Every step of the increase in CO2 must be included in an audit for wind and solar renewables including batteries. This whole industry was unnecessary, but by creating it, there is additional CO2 in the atmosphere. The recycling of green renewables isn’t fully operational yet but when it is, transport, the manufacture of specialised equipment and the process itself all create CO2 and this needs to be taken into account.
The trillions we have spent so far on renewable technology could have been spent on improving the existing technology and if people really believe that manmade CO2 is a problem then nuclear is the most logical source of power. The big bonus with that is that it actually works and going down that road wouldn’t be as hard on the environment or as visually invasive as green renewables.
Megs,
I have not all details of all forms of energy, but the IPCC (2014) themselves (yes…) has a list of CO2 emissions for different forms of generating electricity, from the extraction of ores or oil/gas, refining, concrete for buildings, use and decommissioning.
That can be found at:
https://www.electricitymap.org/?page=map
choose any country with a mix of generation types and hoover the cursor over any of the energy supplies and you will see the “carbon intensity” of that type of energy generation.
There are several interesting things: wind energy and nuclear have the lowest direct impact (11 and 12 g CO2/kWh), but one may not forget that wind (and solar at 45 g CO2/kWh) need 100% backup for when there is no wind and/or sun. Nuclear only needs a general backup for maintenance and unexpected shutdowns, but in general that is around 10% reserve of the total capacity of all generation together.
The problem with wind and sun thus is in the kind of backup: If that is hydro (24 g CO2/kWh) the emissions still are low, but in my country there is hardly any hydro, so the backup is by gas turbines and these give you 490 g CO2/kWh.
The general yield of wind (land + sea) is around 33%, thus here one needs gas energy for about 2/3 of the time and the average CO2 emissions of wind/solar + gas then gets 330 g CP2/kWh…
No wonder that proponents of wind energy never mention the necessary backup and closing nuclear facilities (as Germany has done for half their reactors, the rest will follow in a few years) only increases the CO2 emissions…
Ferdinand,
Yes, memory is a problem these days!
I do not understand your equation. Changes in δ13C are not linearly related to changes in CO2. This is demonstrated very clearly by the plot you showed previously (http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/sponges.jpg). Look at the δ13C and CO2 scales; in order to align the two parameters, the δ13C scale is linear, but the CO2 scale is the reciprocal of CO2. This is precisely as indicated by the Keeling plot analysis discussed below.
A good summary of the basis for the Keeling plot can be found here:
https://www.biogeosciences.net/3/539/2006/bg-3-539-2006.pdf
Basically, if you add CO2 with a constant δ13C to a reservoir (e.g. the atmosphere) you can plot atmospheric measurements of 1/CO2 against its δ13C content and you will get a straight line with an intercept equal to the δ13C of the additional CO2. If you have multiple time-variant sources with different δ13C values or a single CO2 source with varying δ13C content, you will not get a straight line.
Figure 1 in the above reference shows the Law Dome data giving an intercept of -13.1 per mil with r2 of 0.96. They also show some direct atmospheric measurements for Point Barrow. I am not sure why did not use the South Pole observations both because of location and because the seasonal CO2 cycle is minimal and hence can be removed without undue distortion. I have plotted the Scripps data which has had the seasonal cycle removed and I get -13.0 with r2 of 0.99. If I do the same thing at Mauna Loa, I get -13.4 per mil, r2 of 0.98.
In Figure 1, they show the Point Barrow data detrended and get a reasonable estimate of the δ13C for the seasonal cycle (-25.3 per mil, r2 of 0.96) since this has removed the longer term trend (the interesting bit!). They then show the “original” data which of course shows a lot of scatter since it contains both the seasonal cycle and the long term trend. You cannot use the Keeling plot where you have more than one source with different δ13C content. If you use the Scripps data with the seasonal cycle removed, you get -13.2 per mil with r2 of 0.96.
You can use the Keeling plot or you can model the decline over time by simply taking the monthly CO2 values (with seasonal cycle removed) and assuming different (but constant) δ13C values for the incremental CO2. The data will not allow you to deviate far from -13 per mil over the longer term (short term fluctuations linked to ENSO and Pinatubo are apparent).
So, we either have a single source of the incremental CO2 with a δ13C of close to -13 per mil or we have multiple sources that together are behaving as single source.
Of course, it is a combination of sources and sinks, not just sources.
Jim,
You need to make a differentiation between the δ13C of CO2 mixtures from different origin and what happens with the total amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
To calculate the δ13C of a mixture, the calculation is simply linear with quantities and δ13C levels of the ingredients as in the case of how much human CO2 is currently in the atmosphere. See formula (4) in the Keeling plot discussion.
To calculate the history of CO2 and δ13C over time is a different story as:
1. Human emissions increased from near zero in 1850 to 9 GtC/year in current times.
2. Human emissions increased a fourfold between 1960 and 2020.
3. There is a continuous natural flux of ~40 GtC CO2 with -6.4 per mil δ13C passing the atmosphere.
4. The seasonal exchanges between ocean surface and ocean surface and vegetation redistribute part of the isotopic and quantity changes.
5. The total amount of CO2 in the atmosphere increased from 605 GtC in 1850 to 885 GtC (GtC = ppmv * 2.13) in 2020.
That all makes that the relation between change in δ13C and quantity of CO2 is more complicated…
Therefore I have calculated that plot with the year by year change in composition in the atmosphere since 1850, based on the emissions and a constant 40 GtC CO2 passing by at -6.4 per mil, including the increase in the atmosphere:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/fract_level_emiss.jpg
I suppose that there will be a linear correlation between the δ13C changes and the 1/CO2 if you have a one-way addition to a closed system, but here are too many other variables interfering…
The human addition is slightly quadratic increasing over time (but less in the past 20 years), so the extra pressure in the atmosphere increased slightly quadratic and so did the sinks.
That makes that there is a rather constant ratio between increase in the atmosphere and emissions of around 50%. But that is pure coincidence, not a given. If CO2 emissions are curbed for whatever covid, that relationship will be lost and with e.g. a 50% reduction, no further increase in mass, but still a decrease in δ13C, thus the δ13C – 1/CO2 relationship will get lost too.
Then we have:
“”There are two basic assumptions underlying the Keeling plot method:
(1) The system consists of only two reservoirs.”
Which is not the case, as in this case the deep oceans are the third huge reservoir with a huge impact on δ13C levels.
Further:
“The y-axis intercept y0 increases from the seasonal effects (−25‰) to the anthropogenic impact (−13‰) with the mixed signal of the undetrended data at Point Barrow in-between (−17‰) (Fig. 1b). This increase is explained by a larger oceanic carbon uptake and a smaller airborne fraction of any atmospheric disturbance in CO2 in the longer time series from the Law Dome ice core (Fischer et al., 2003).”
Which also shows the relative larger impact of the deep ocean circulation in the earlier periods with no/low human emissions…
Ferdinand, here a couple of graphs to back-up my analysis. The first is a Keeling plot of the South Pole observations (data downloaded from https://scrippsco2.ucsd.edu/data/atmospheric_co2/spo.html). The CO2 and δ13C values are monthly with the seasonal cycle removed (by Scripps). There is a clear linear relationship over time with an intercept of -13 per mil. For perspective, I have added the lines that would reflect intercepts of -12 and -14 per mil.
For the second plot, I show the monthly δ13C data against time, against after removal of the seasonal cycle. I have then added three lines that reflect a common δ13C starting point, after which the δ13C values are all calculated from the CO2 data alone, assuming a constant δ13C for the additional CO2 of -12, -13 and -14 per mil.
Jim,
A quick calculation:
The current human input is 9 GtC/year at -24 per mil.
The main flux of importance from/to the deep oceans is 40 GtCyear at -6.4 per mil.
Average per mil of the mix: -9.6 per mil
Seems too high for the Keeling plot, but that is the real measurement in the atmosphere, where only 1/3 of human emissions remain.
I have the impression that the Keeling plot may work with clean cases where one new ingredient is mixed into a closed reservoir, not so much in the real world…
Jim,
The quick calculation was too quick: that can only be applied if both human emissions and deep oceans are one way supplies…
In the case of the deep oceans, the supply in mass is more then compensated with a larger sink capacity (~2 GtC/year) which adds an additional +2 per mil to the atmosphere from that extra sink. The same for the ~2 GtC extra sink in vegetation at +24 per mil
Thus the mass transfer from/to the deep oceans doesn’t add to the total mass, but does dilute the -24 per mil δ13C level of the human contribution. That probably gives the apparent -13 per mil of the Keeling curve.
Ferdinand,
Sadly, you are completely misunderstanding my position here. You keep trying to argue against the observations by referring to your hypothesis about the interaction between CO2 sources and sinks. I have made no comment on your or anyone else’s hypothesis, because they are not relevant to my analysis. I am merely trying to establish the factual basis that must underpin any hypothesis.
First though, since you mentioned equation 4 in the ice core paper (https://www.biogeosciences.net/3/539/2006/bg-3-539-2006.pdf), the relationship allows us to determine the average δ13C content of additional CO2 in a reservoir (the atmosphere) without needing to consider sources of that extra CO2. So let’s see what we get:
Pre-industrial emissions CO2 = 280 ppm, δ13C = -6.4 per mil
Latest Scripps data (SPO) CO2 = 406 ppm, δ13C = -8.49 per mil
Average δ13C of extra atmospheric CO2 = ((406 x -8.49) – (280 x -6.4)) / (406 – 280)
And the answer is … drum roll … -13.1 per mil! This value only gives us the overall average, not how it may have changed over time, but it is without any recourse to hypotheses about the number or behaviour of sources and sinks. It is an important “fact”.
So, moving on to the Keeling plots, these demonstrate (prove) that this average/net effect/apparent δ13C of the incremental CO2 has been pretty well constant since the start of growth of atmospheric CO2, other than short term variations due to ENSO/Pinatubo. You quote from the above-linked paper that a basic assumption underlying the Keeling plot method is that “the system consists of only two reservoirs” and then add “which is not the case, as in this case the deep oceans are the third huge reservoir with a huge impact on δ13C levels”.
This is a classic example of poor climate science (should that be in bold!). The second statement is trying to undermine the data analysis by telling us that the hypothesis precludes using the plot at all (so we don’t even need to bother looking at it). The first statement is even worse, because it is both wrong and very seriously misleading. Of course, the basic model is based on a two-reservoir system. However, the data show a linear relationship. You cannot simply ignore that fact. Either it means that you do in fact have a two-reservoir system (time to re-think the hypothesis) or it means that you have a multi-reservoir system where all sources (and sinks) are behaving in such a way as to provide a merged response in δ13C terms that is not changing with time. Not very likely, perhaps, but certainly that is not a valid reason to completely ignore the consistency of the δ13C data (time to re-visit the hypothesis and ensure that it matches this requirement).
You state that your hypothesis “probably gives the apparent -13 per mil of the Keeling curve”. It doesn’t, according to work published by R.F Keeling et al in 2017. Their model which is clearly much more sophisticated (or should I say more complicated) than yours reflects the same basic principles of yours, including the ocean-atmosphere exchange. The paper is available at: http://www.pnas.org/content/114/39/10361. There are many astounding quotes in the paper, but here is just one from the abstract: “Using updated records, we show that no plausible combination of sources and sinks of CO2 from fossil fuel, land, and oceans can explain the observed 13C-Suess effect unless an increase has occurred in the 13C/12C isotopic discrimination of land photosynthesis”. They are admitting that with all their vast expertise, their model/hypothesis could not match the δ13C observations. Wow. They then admit that “a further difficulty is that the global δ13C budget does not balance convincingly”. Remember that this was only three years ago.
As is obvious from figure 1A in the paper, their model reflected too low an average δ13C content for the incremental atmospheric CO2, both prior to and during the period of observations. Their focus was on trying to match the trend (gradient) of δ13C decline during the period of observations. Now, bearing in mind that the data are telling us that the average (apparent, if you prefer) δ13C content is constant and the gradient of δ13C decline is not linearly related to CO2 or to time (it may be close enough now to think that it can be approximated as linear, though this could be part of the problem), their “fix” was to introduce a time-variant characteristic to a key parameter starting in 1955 in order to offset the invalid gradient of the model. If they had acknowledged the evidence from the Keeling plots, perhaps they would have recognized the problem with their model earlier (as well as dealing with it in a different way).
They are supposed to be the experts, but this sure makes me feel uneasy. Definitely not settled science.
Ferdinand, the re-growth of the forests are sequestering the C13 in the soils and their respiration is emitting the C12 back into the atmosphere ….. and that is potentially where your declining δ13C level is coming from.
Jim Ross,
Sorry for the late reply…
I have read the work of Keeling now and in my opinion you are misinterpreting his work.
In Keeling’s work, he takes into account all reservoirs, thus including oceans and vegetation which shows that the apparent source of low 13C must be around -13 per mil.
That “source” is not human CO2 alone, it is a mix of one way human CO2, modulated by two-way ocean and vegetation CO2 and one-way uptake by oceans and vegetation, the latter also an important factor in δ13C discrimination.
Keeling doesn’t have a problem with the discrepancy between the observed and modeled change in δ13C, as he shows in Fig 1.c. that a small change in /land CO2 uptake or the effect of temperature on land uptake δ13C is sufficient to put the curves together.
As only the total uptake of CO2 is reasonably accurately known, but the partitioning between oceans and vegetation is only known within wide margins, that can be used as one of the controls to adjust the δ13C decline level height, but not the slope.
What he finds unexpected is that the curves are diverging, while the supply of human CO2 has a constant δ13C level. His theory is that the increased CO2 level in the atmosphere also alters the δ13C discrimination of (C3) land plants and therefore the δ13C level sinks less fast over time than expected.
He may be right, as I remember to have read that at higher CO2 levels, C3 plants indeed do have less discrimination in δ13C levels.
But that has nothing to do with the real δ13C level of the human contribution, it only affects the result in the atmosphere and the apparent δ13C level of the supply…
Samuel,
If there is more uptake and storage of CO2 in roots ans soils, that is slightly higher in 12C, then the remaining δ13C level in the atmosphere goes up.
If there is more release from CO2 from soils, that will increase 12CO2 in the atmosphere more than 13CO2, thus the δ13C level in the atmosphere will go down.
As the earth is greening, more CO2 is taken away by vegetation than released by soils, decay, food and feed. Thus the δ13C level in the atmosphere should go up, but we see the reverse: it is going fast down in ratio with human emissions…
No, you are wrong and prof Salby showed why.
rg,
If you mean the 13C/12C ratio, Dr. Salby is wrong.
He is right to mention that low-13C CO2 may come from the decay (and digestion) of plants, but all depends of how much is absorbed by plants via photosynthesis and released by decaying plant material. The balance is positive for photosynthesis: the oxygen balance is positive: more oxygen is produced by plants than is used for oxidation of decaying plant material:
http://www.bowdoin.edu/~mbattle/papers_posters_and_talks/BenderGBC2005.pdf
Satellites show that the earth is greening:
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/2016/carbon-dioxide-fertilization-greening-earth
When plants incorporate CO2, they slightly prefer 12CO2 above 13CO2, which makes that organic material has a lower 13CO2 content than the atmosphere. On the other side, if there is more CO2 uptake by plants than decay, relative more 13CO2 remains in the atmosphere and the 13C/12C level would go up, but we see a fast decline of the 13C/12C ratio in the atmosphere.
There is only one conclusion possible: the whole decline in 13C/12C ratio is caused by human emissions…
https://tse3.mm.bing.net/th?id=OIP.xu8x8-U9PzxMc-WMkCqaswHaE7&pid=Api&P=0&w=233&h=156
Renewable Energy in Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria
The lack of an effect whatsoever on global CO2 levels after the huge decline in emissions should be a wakeup call to any of the politicians advancing economically crippling measures like the Green New Deal or the Paris climate accord. In particular, those Republicans that have recently embraced carbon taxation or Cap and Trade schemes in a misguided attempt to control the uncontrollable (global temperature) should seriously rethink this folly.
Yes!
And let the idiot Green elite squirm in their ivory towers.
Don’t underestimate the deviousness of alarmists. The unusually cold spring in much of North America will probably be cited as proof that he economic paralysis was the cause of global cooling.
The pix is a Jacobs wind turbine. I served them years ago. Changing the oil in the gear head was a b****. You always got covered with gear oil as did the steps on the tower below you.
Glad those days are long behind me.
Serviced…
John,
That’s what engineers skilled in Design for Manufacturing, Assembly and Maintenance call ‘Designed For Disaster’! Glad you survived! The eagle/osprey nest is an ironically better use of the tower than the crappy bird chopper ever was.
CO2 concentration increase DOES NOT cause global temperature increase :
– cross-correlation diagram of 40 years of data measurements shows that the AWG assumption is pure non-sense :
https://youtu.be/2ROw_cDKwc0?t=559
The only plausible assumption is that CO2 may act as a (weak) negative feedback with respect to a global temperature variation.
The annual mean Earth energy budget analysis confirms this result :
– active gas in the infrared spectrum contribute to cool the atmosphere and hence, the Earth because they emit into space almost ten times more energy than they absorb from the Earth’s surface.
Is that because carbon dioxide is “looking” at 0K in outer space and 287K towards Earth?
Oh my God… Not that again…
I have followed Dr. Salby’s lecture in the London Parliament some years ago and the other lectures too. Simply too many errors in reasoning…
The point is that Dr. Salby never reacts to any critical questions, not here at WUWT nor elsewhere, so there is no way to discuss his errors…
People have followed your comments, Englebert…
Too many simple errors in reasoning and logic to be worth even a cent.
fred250 ,
Any scientist worth that title should publish his work even if that is on the Internet for open debate. If he doesn’t that, it is not science…
Not a scientist Ferdinand, but by your logic why wouldn’t Michael Mann openly discuss his ‘Science’ and publish it for open debate?
Megs,
Mann has published and his work was “peer/pal reviewed”. After scrutiny by Steve McIntyre and others, his work was found to have substantial errors, which he always refuted and doesn’t want to discuss. That puts him on the same list of non-scientific “scientists” as Dr. Salby…
Respect for responding Ferdinand.
The GND was according to its fans not legislation but aspirational. That explains away the idiocy. We want to do things that are obviously stupid but that’s just a goal. Nice. Where are these green jobs we keep hearing about. The statics put forward have been trashed on detailed review again and again. They are full of fluff which doesn’t pay the bills. Creepy Sleepy Joe here in the US has given voters in the industrial economy lots to think about by supporting GND. We’ll make sure they have all the info they need on that.
troe, at least you make solar panels in the US, Australia imports just about all of its panels from China. The developers are from overseas, the installers are mostly backpackers, the completed solar infrastructure is sold on too, again to overseas concerns. We don’t have full recycling happening at this stage so no jobs there either.
So guess where our tax payer funded subsidies are going, you guessed it, overseas!
If the data doesn’t support the narrative, they will torture it until it does.
Don’t be surprised when you hear that there is a “very valid reason” to adjust the readings to show what they want them to show.
Make no mistake, a deindustrialization of America would be the result of moving our economy away from the affordable, abundant and reliable energy derived from the fossil fuels that power the country.
It’s a long standing plan
“A massive campaign must be launched to de-develop the United States. De-development means bringing our economic system into line with the realities of ecology and the world resource situation.” —Dr. Paul Ehrlich, Anne Ehrlich, and Dr. John Holdren, Ecoscience: Population, Resources, Environment, 1970, p. 323
Patience would appear to be a virtue.
I don’t understand the arguments being made here as much as I would like to somehow prove that fossil fuel burning doesn’t affect CO2 in the atmosphere how is that possible?
We must have a fairly accurate estimate of how many tons of coal, oil, and natural gas are burned annually. My understanding is that it comes to an amount corresponding to 4ppm of the atmosphere. I haven’t attempted to validate that so maybe someone can show a much lower number?
It’s true that our emissions are a small fraction of natural fluxes, but those natural flows are both sources and sinks with high seasonality. It’s all well and good to say that there’s a 2ppm/yr imbalance between the natural sources and the natural sinks accounting for the long term trend. But if there really is 4ppm/yr going in from our emissions how can it only rise 2ppm/yr? It has to be that our emissions are offset by a 2ppm/yr net natural sink.
You can only make this case by showing that our emissions are a couple orders of magnitude lower than have been estimated.
Now to say that CO2 isn’t a significant factor in warming, because the equilibrium climate sensitivity is low (<1.5) is reasonable and I think true. But to claim that we aren’t increasing CO2 concentration doesn’t add up.
Rich
RE: “It has to be that our emissions are offset by a 2ppm/yr net natural sink. ”
Assuming the 4 ppm increase is all due to human interactions, they are partially offset by natural sinks. CO2 is the essential nutrient for plant growth on planet Earth. Our current atmospheric 415 ppm is less than optimal for plant growth. Repeated studies have demonstrated enhanced plant growth at 1500 ppm and cessation of plant growth at 150 ppm. Commercial green house operations add CO2 to the green house atmospheres up to 1500 ppm and gain accelerated and hardier plant growth as a result because plants are naturally optimized for higher CO2 concentrations.
You can see this effect in the annual variations in atmospheric CO2.
https://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/weekly.html
As the winter dormancy in the northern hemisphere (where most of the above water planetary land mass is located) yields to new and accelerating plant growth in the spring, atmospheric CO2 levels start declining in May and continue to drop until October. Why? Hungry growing plants. As the atmosphere gets more CO2, the growing plants aggressively use it! CO2 is the rate limiting nutrient for plant growth. If they could get even more, they will use it and sequester some more of it. This real data demonstrates some of the CO2 sinks are not static… and the plants are hungry for more!
J Mac
I don’t have any argument with anything you mentioned about plants loving CO2 but you missed my point.
I’m not saying that there’s a measured increase of 4ppm/yr and we have to figure out how much is us and how much is nature.
The measured increase is 2ppm/yr. But the fairly closely estimated amount of emissions should raise concentration by about 4ppm if there were no net natural sink or emission. (If natural fluxes were in balance)
I’m doing a mass balance over the atmosphere:
Input -output = accumulation
We can estimate pretty closely how many tons of emission we put in. We can measure directly the accumulation based on the change in concentration. So we can calculate the net sink from natural causes. Just rearrange the formula:
Input – accumulation = output
Or emissions – accumulation = sink
Unless emissions are overestimated by more than a factor of 2, there’s no way that there isn’t a net natural sink.
Unless emissions are overestimated by a factor of four, there’s no way that natural sources are bigger than human sources.
Let me hasten to add that natural sources dwarf human sources, but I’m referring to net numbers. The difference between huge natural emissions and huge natural sinks is a small net sink due to nature, that is about half the size of human emissions.
Rich,
The enhanced plant growth causes an additional increment of 2 ppm CO2 sequestration each year, in the form of accumulating dead plant matter and decay that does not release all of the plant carbon as CO2 back into the atmosphere. That is your annual increase into the net natural sink.
delta 4 ppm CO2 annual emissions – delta 2 ppm CO2 annual plant sequestered = delta 2 ppm CO2 net annual accumulation to the atmosphere.
J Mac,
The point is that the growth of the greening earth is slower than the growth of human emissions. Given time, the plants (and deep oceans) will absorb all extra CO2 above the pre-industrial equilibrium, but for the moment they are not growing fast enough to remove as much CO2 as humans emit. That is the reason that CO2 in the atmosphere still is rising.
If we should halve our emissions, no further increase in the atmosphere
If we should kill all emissions, the CO2 levels would drop to 290 ppmv (for the current ocean surface temperature) with a decay rate of ~51 years or a half life time of ~35 years.
Not necessary, as the effect of that extra CO2 is not worth much effort, but I suppose that halving CO2 emissions would be much less expensive than curbing to zero…
Rich, the number is this:
The measure of CO2 in the atmosphere is not 2ppm, it is 417 Parts Per Million. At the moment.
It comes to .04176% of the total gases above Earth. It’s a trace gas.
Yes, but how is that relevant?
It might argue that the effect of adding 0.0002% per year is unlikely to raise temperatures. Or that humans can’t change much. But it doesn’t say that we didn’t cause that tiny change.
Also if you recognize how little we can change things over a whole year, how could you then turn around and expect a noticeable change after a month of reduced (not eliminated) emissions?
Here’s what’s relevant:
If there is no new shape to the baseline pattern of the Keeling Slope, it means that man-made emissions are not contributing to the increase in any significant way.
This destroys AGW theory.
windlord-sun
I fear that wishful thinking doesn’t change the facts that a tiny change from 2.5 ppmv/year increase to 1.5 ppmv/year increase is hardly measurable in the noisy year by year data of Mauna Loa…
One can plot the theoretical increase in the atmosphere based on emissions and the observed removal of CO2 out of the atmosphere as a linear function of the extra CO2 pressure (pCO2) above the equilibrium for the current average ocean surface temperature (tau = 51 years).
That gives following plot:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/dco2_em2B.jpg
Where the calculated increase is midst of the natural variability.
@FOR EXAMPLE:
“I fear that wishful thinking doesn’t change the facts that a tiny change from 2.5 ppmv/year increase to 1.5 ppmv/year increase is hardly measurable in the noisy year by year data of Mauna Loa…”
But most greenies (e.g., 350.org) and those who have been convinced by them expect that a GND will have an immediate and important effect on CO2 levels. When it becomes known that Doing Something will scarcely move the needle, their zeal ought to be tempered.
(Especially if it is brought to their attention that human emissions will continue rising regardless of GNDs in the West.)
@Ferdinand Engelbeen:
“I fear that wishful thinking doesn’t change the facts that a tiny change from 2.5 ppmv/year increase to 1.5 ppmv/year increase is hardly measurable in the noisy year by year data of Mauna Loa…”
But most greenies (e.g., 350.org) and those who have been convinced by them expect that a GND will have an immediate and important effect on CO2 levels. When it becomes known that Doing Something will scarcely move the needle, their zeal ought to be tempered.
(Especially if it is brought to their attention that human emissions will continue rising regardless of GNDs in the West.)
Roger Knights,
You are right, but much depends of how far the world-wide reduction would be.
The moment that you have zero CO2 emissions, the current CO2 level would drop with around 2.3 ppmv/year, as that only depends of the extra CO2 pressure (pCO2) above the equilibrium level. I don’t see that happen in the near future, now that all countries will need a lot of money to recover from covid, but you never know how stupid some governments (like the EU) will be…
2ppm natural sink… Clive best looked at this a while back:
http://clivebest.com/blog/?p=7393&
Sounds right to me. Thanks
2ppm natural sink… Clive best looked at this a while back:
http://clivebest.com/blog/?p=7393&
(apologies if this appears twice – beer made me spell my name wrong!)
Rich Davis,
You are completely right, that skeptics fight the cause of the CO2 increase in the atmosphere is shooting in their own foot: the increase is from human use of fossil fuels and not natural, as human emissions are about twice the measured increase in the atmosphere. The mass balance is already sufficient proof, but all other observations show that humans are the cause:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/co2_origin.html
That makes that other far more important discussions about the impact of that increase where the IPCC is on shaky grounds is hardly done…
Well then, Ferdinand, since “the increase is from human use of fossil fuels and not natural,” now that virus control has suppressed emissions tremendously (as much as Paris and AOC/GND dream of, perhaps, already) you will happily have proof of your claim for all the world to see.
Because there will be a ding in the increase.
You will be famous, sort of like Einstein in 1921.
windlord-sun,
No need to be an Einstein, a simple calculator on your smartphone can do the job:
Human emissions before covid-19: 4.5 ppmv/year
During covid-19: 3.8 ppmv/year
Difference in yearly emissions: 0.7 ppmv/year
Difference in residual increase in the atmosphere: 0.35 ppmv/year
Difference in monthly increase: 0.03 ppmv/month
Accuracy of Mauna Loa measurements: better than 0.2 ppmv/year.
The difference in emissions is simply not measurable at Mauna Loa or anywhere on the world in the monthly data. You need at least a year to see any difference and even then , the natural variability (El Niño) also plays a role (+/- 1.5 ppmv around the trend).
Despite the author’s claim, Biden’s campaign supports nuclear and CO2 capture and sequestration.
Sanders’ campaign called these “false” or “fake”
Nuclear energy in a rational regulatory environment can be a “no regrets” option. Most of the excessive cost in rich countries is from pathological regulations. In countries with sensible regulations it is still the safest option, while also being cost effective and zero emission.
Emerging technologies like the Allam Cycle being pioneered by Net Power can make the same thing true of CO2 capture.
Whether GHGs are a problem or not, they can be eliminated from the power system for very near zero cost. Or – could be – if environmentalists didn’t make CO2 sequestration and nuclear power plants so hard to build.
One question: Who built the nest on the broken wind-thingy – the stork?
The shelter in place is doing more than decreasing CO2 – I wonder if we count all the lives saved both from a lack of car accidents and murders and then add to it the number of people dying from seasonal flu, would they combined be more than killed due to COVID19 in US?
That number will pale compared to the number of people who are currently having cancer Undiagnosed and therefore untreated. Add to that the number of people who are unable to have important, but theoretically elective surgery unperformed. And finally add to this the number of medical practices which have permanently gone out of business, and how that will affect public health. All this for a virus that in the end will be shown to have the mortality rate of the common flu. Madness
They wont abandon CO2, to much invested. Instead you’ll get someone like Mann to wave his hands, go on about man made atmospheric carbon momentum and how it will take a couple decades to see it turn around once we killed man made emissions. Mere months of shutdown is meaningless so we best get to shutting everything down now or we’re all doomed!
It is the trend in the atmospheric CO2 concentration, irrespective of what percentage is due to human activity, sinks etc., that is attributed mostly to humans:
http://www.climate4you.com/images/CO2%20MaunaLoa%20MonthlySince1958.gif
It will be interesting to see if there is a significant change in that trend.
It’s good to see a useless and defunct wind-turbine being put to a practical and biological use as a nesting site by an observant bird. This is much better than when the wind-turbine was rotating and killing other birds.
It has been revealed that Blackrock financial, a “shadow bank”, was used by Canada Pension Fund (CPP) to purchase Industrial Wind Turbines in Ontario, Canada.
https://blackrocktransparencyproject.org/2018/08/27/how-canadas-infrastructure-bank-was-created-by-and-set-up-to-benefit-blackrock/
It seems likely that “shadow banks” are a new way to steal pension fund money. The question is can we get it back.
Blackrock is also purchasing US debt. Is it possible that Blackrock is using carbon credits as collateral/security for these purchases?
I have been listening to X22Report.com. The host there suggests that the debts of the Fed may come under scrutiny in the Trump administration.
Perhaps the “bad debts’, due to climate change and other schemes, can be written off. Let us hope so.
“climate-related catastrophes like droughts, floods and fires”
None of those are climate-related, they are weather and weather-related.
New phrase for the PC culture — Avian justice.
@ Ferdinand, in response to your upthread comment to me:
BTW, the temperature at Barrow and Mauna Loa go up in summer, not down, but CO2 goes reverse…
The next image link left panel of annual zonal pCO2 flux means shows year-round positive pCO2 flux across the tropics, favoring the southern ocean, where the January insolation spike happens, followed by the subsequent insolation-driven warm-water wave from my first comment first image that either is travelling north in the NH summer or south in their summer, warming the respective polar waters every year. The subpolar oceans respond annually to the lag(s) from the tropics, ultimately driving the phase between ML and BRW pCO2 fluxes.
The annual warm pulse is also evident in the effect of Nino34 on sea ice extent at both poles:
Which means my first image and point was right. You also said
The second graph has it right: for fast variations the CO2 sensitivity for temperature is 2-4 ppmv/K. Thus the 120 ppmv CO2 increase can never be caused by temperature…
The third graph is right too: over the past 800,000 years some 8 ppmv/K for Antarctic temperatures.
Thus you have proven yourself that less than 1 K sea surface temperature increase never can cause a 120 ppmv CO2 increase and that this extra pressure pushes more CO2 into the oceans…
Ferdinand, you didn’t properly apply the CO2 sensitivity factors I derived that you said you agreed with, so you came to the wrong conclusion.
The CO2 sensitivity to temperature is over time, which means atm CO2 is largely an accumulation function integrating outgassing responses over long time periods from up and down temperature changes that can cancel out at times, faking equilibrium. There is no meaningful ‘CO2 equilibrium’ to talk about.
Repeated from above:
Bob Weber,
Sorry for the late reply…
As far as I know, Mauna LOA and Barrow are in the NH above sea level, thus their insolation gets stronger in the NH spring until the end of June, while CO2 goes fast down (!) in specific Barrow, when all tundra starts to grow in the few summer months above freezing they have… Your explanation is for what happens in seawater and of course that is mainly up with temperature, except in the far North East Atlantic where the THC sinks winter and summer with a lot of CO2.
Thus CO2 in the atmosphere goes down while temperature goes up. That is a reverse relationship…
Then indeed there is a lag between temperature and CO2 levels on short (ENSO) to very long periods and in between (MWP-LIA).
Despite that lag, there is a definitive maximum of CO2 in the atmosphere for a fixed temperature jump: 16 ppmv/K, measured in all oceans with over 3 million seawater samples. That is what Henry’s law says: for a given temperature, there is a fixed ratio between CO2 in solution and CO2 in the atmosphere.
That brings us to the current CO2 increase: the warming ocean surface since the LIA is good for about 13 ppmv extra in the atmosphere and nothing more. That is all. All the rest is from human contributions, which are about twice as high as the observed increase.
The increased CO2 level in the atmosphere pushes more CO2 in the oceans than reverse from the increased temperature.
Feely e.a. have made an inventory of over 900,000 measurements of ocean pCO2 and compared them with the pCO2 of the atmosphere (BTW, the differences in the atmosphere are small, less than 8 ppmv globally over the oceans, except for seasonal changes). The average difference is 7 μatm higher in the atmosphere than in the ocean surface. Thus again the average flux of CO2 is into the oceans, not reverse:
https://www.pmel.noaa.gov/pubs/outstand/feel2331/exchange.shtml
Then about DIC: if the oceans were responsible for the increase in the atmosphere, then DIC should decrease over time, but all six fixed marine stations show an increase of DIC over time, see Fig. 3 in:
https://tos.org/oceanography/assets/docs/27-1_bates.pdf
Again, the average CO2 flux is from the atmosphere into the ocean surface, not reverse…
You made the same mistake as Bart/Bartemis:
The CO2 sensitivity to temperature is per unit time.
Of course not, the CO2 sensitivity to temperature is a fixed ratio per Henry’s law (*). As the mixing speed of CO2 in water is very low, one need a lot of wind to mix it into the “mixed” upper ocean surface (100-200 meter), but the speed of uptake or release is in direct ratio to the pCO2 difference between atmosphere and water and when in equilibrium (if ever), then any flux stops. The pCO2 of the oceans changes with about 16 μatm/K around 15 degC. If the pCO2 of the atmosphere increases with 16 μatm, both are again in (dynamic) equilibrium…
(*) See the engineering solubility for 1 atm for different gases at different temperatures at:
https://www.engineeringtoolbox.com/gases-solubility-water-d_1148.html
The graphs are for fresh water, that is the same for pure CO2 gas in seawater, but as that reacts with the buffer salts to (bi)carbonates, the real solubility in seawater is about 10 times higher than in fresh water.