Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach
For no particular reason, I got to thinking about the non-global nature of the incoming energy. And this led me to consider the sensitivity of the surface to changes in the radiation absorbed by the surface.
The sensitivity of the surface to changes in absorbed radiation is a central, critical question in climate science. The claim is that the change in global average temperature is equal to the change in absorbed radiation times the “equilibrium climate sensitivity”, abbreviated as ECS. The ECS is assumed to be a constant.
However, despite hundreds of thousands of dollars, work-hours, and computer-hours dedicated to determining the value of the ECS, the uncertainty about its value has only continued to increase.
Figure 1. This figure shows a variety of ways that the Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS) has been estimated. The dotted lines show the uncertainty of the earliest estimates of the ECS, which was said to be between 1.5 and 4.5 degrees C per doubling of CO2 (2xCO2).
Initially, back in the 1970s, the equilibrium climate sensitivity was claimed to be between 1.5 and 4.5 °C of warming from an increase of 3.7 W/m2 in downwelling radiation. This 3.7 W/m2 is the assumed value of the increase in downwelling radiation from a doubling of CO2 (2xCO2).
This can also be expressed as the change of temperature from a one watt per square meter increase in downwelling radiation. The original central estimate of 3 W/m2 per 2xCO2 is the same as 3/3.7 ≈ 0.8 °C for each radiation increase of 1 W/m2.
However, as you can see in the graphic above, over time, the estimates of the ECS have grown wider and wider. Now, they range from 0.37 degrees C warming resulting from a doubling of CO2 (2xCO2), up to 8.1 degrees C per 2xCO2. This is the same as a range of 0.1 to 2.2 W/m2 for each additional 1 W/m2 of radiation.
I know of no other field of science where this is true, where endless studies of a central constant in the field only show wider and wider uncertainty. To me, this can only mean that the underlying theory is incorrect … but I digress.
Now, the ECS is said to be the climate sensitivity after years of adjusting to the change in radiation. This is because the claim is that the warming is much larger and slower than direct calculations indicate. Mainstream scientists say that various feedbacks increase the warming due to increased radiation, with cloud feedbacks and water vapor feedbacks being the main culprits.
This is discussed in the IPCC AR6 Working Group 1 Chapter 7. They say that the central estimate for the net cloud feedback is 0.42 W/m2 for every 1°C of warming, and that the central estimate for water vapor feedback is another 1.8 W/m2.
In other words, the IPCC says that for every 1°C increase in temperature, the feedbacks increase increase the forcing by another 2.22 W/m2. This means that the warming should be far larger than you’d expect just from the underlying increase in radiation. Using the IPCC central estimate of 3°C/3.7 W/m2 of forcing from 2xCP2, the feedbacks would increase this by 6.66 W/m2 …
Keep this in mind—the standard theory says that the warming should be greater than no-feedback warming.
So to start with … if there were no feedbacks, what warming would we expect to occur?
To investigate this question, I started by taking a look at the total radiation being absorbed by the surface. This is the sum of the absorbed sunlight, which is the total sunlight hitting the surface less reflections from the surface, along with the downwelling thermal radiation from the atmosphere. Here’s a map of the global distribution of the total surface absorbed radiation.
Figure 2. Average Mar 2000 – Feb 2024 of the total absorbed surface radiation, which is the sum of longwave radiation (“LW”, thermal radiation from the atmosphere) and shortwave radiation (“SW”, solar radiation).
As a 24/7 average, the surface gets about half a kilowatt per square meter. In Figure 2, you can see the reflective nature of the desert and the poles, which lead to less radiation being absorbed.
Next, I looked at the total change in absorbed surface radiation over the 24-year period of the CERES dataset. Below you can compare the changes in absorbed radiation (top) with the changes in temperature.
Figure 3. Changes in total absorbed surface radiation (top) and changes in surface temperature (bottom) over the period March 2000 to February 2024.
Note that in a number of areas, the changes in absorbed radiation correlate with the surface temperature changes. Also note that, as expected, increasing radiation leads to increasing temperature.
How much would we expect this increase in radiation to increase the temperature? This can be determined from the Stefan-Boltzmann equation, which states that radiation is proportional to the fourth power of the temperature. Using the CERES data and the S-B equation allows us to calculate just what heating we’d expect to occur from that increase in absorbed radiation. Below is the result.
Figure 4. Theoretical change in temperatures from a uniform 1 W/m2 increase in absorbed surface radiation.
This shows that the expected warming is 0.19°C for each 1 W/m2 increase in absorbed radiation (or 0.7 W/m2 per 2xCO2). However, because a given increase in radiation warms cold areas more than warm areas, the warming ranges from 0.15°C per 1 W/m2 (0.6°C per 2xCO2) in the warmest ocean areas up to 0.44°C per 1 W/m2 (1.6 W/m2 per 2xCO2) in Antarctica.
So that’s our theoretical warming. And the prevailing theory says we should see much greater warming than the theoretical warming due to the feedbacks described above.
To gain further understanding, I looked at how much the observed temperature actually changed in response to the changes the absorbed radiation. Figure 5 below shows the change in temperature that corresponds to a one W/m2 increase in radiation.
Figure 5. Change in the surface temperature for each 1 W/m2 increase in absorbed surface radiation. CERES data from March 2000 – February 2024.
Now, this reveals a surprise. The climatastrophists keep saying that as the radiation absorbed by the surface increases, the temperature perforce must increase.
And for most of the world this is true, although at greatly different rates as we can see in Figure 5.
But in the area of the “Pacific Warm Pool” north of Australia, and the area of the Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) just above the Equator, the opposite is true—as the amount of radiation absorbed by the surface increases, the temperature goes down, not up.
I say this is a result of the combined effects of the temperature-threshold driven emergence of both tropical cumulus cloud fields and tropical thermally driven thunderstorms. These cool the surface in a host of ways, and exert a huge negative feedback on temperature increases.
But for the purposes of this post, the mixture of phenomena driving this important oddity are not the focus. I’m simply looking at the actual response of the surface temperature to changes in absorbed surface radiation. Most places it increases … but not everywhere.
Next, I looked at the trend data in a different way. I looked at a scatterplot of the trend shown in Figure 5 versus the average surface temperature. I also included the theoretically expected temperature change versus the average surface temperature.
Figure 6. Scatterplot, sensitivity of surface temperature to surface absorbed radiation. Actual average, actual land, and actual sea are calculated based on the CERES data. Theoretical results and average are based on the use of the Stefan-Boltzmann equation on the CERES data.
Now, this is quite interesting for a number of reasons.
First, in every case, the results are below the theoretical calculations. This is a clear indication that far from the globe having a strong positive net feedback to any warming, the net feedback is negative.
Next, this data covers 24 years, nearly a quarter century. So this is not the instantaneous sensitivity of the surface to absorbed radiation.
However, it’s likely that the longer-term warming would be greater than shown in Figure 4. In other words, if the amount of absorbed surface radiation were to suddenly stop increasing, the world would continue to warm for a bit.
So … how much will it warm? Well, in my post Lags and Leads, I showed that we can calculate the warming based on the length of time by which the surface warming lags the absorption of the radiation at the surface. As you might expect, this is greater for the ocean than for the land, due to the greater thermal mass of the ocean.
Per the CERES data, the lag in the land warming is about ten days, and the lag in the ocean warming is much larger, about four times that. Using the formula from “Lags and Leads” linked to above, this would increase the land warming by about 2%, and it would increase the ocean warming by about 30%.
So here is the data shown in Figure 4 above, but with the values adjusted as discussed above to account for delayed warming. I’ve also included the lowest four ECS values from Figure 1 at the head of the post. (The values in that figure have been divided by 3.7 to give them in units of °C per W/m2 rather than °C per 2xCO2.)
Figure 7. As in Figure 6, but with the values adjusted to give the eventual change in the temperature. Purple dots show the lowest four of the ECS estimates shown in Figure 1 at the head of the post (values converted from °C/2xCO2 to °C per W/m2).
Even with these adjustments, the sensitivity of the temperature to absorbed radiation is still well below the theoretical global average. In addition, the four lowest values from Figure 1 are also below the theoretical blackbody values.
And because it is based on observations, this graph includes all possible feedbacks, including cloud feedbacks, cloud aerosol feedbacks, water vapor feedbacks, and all the rest. It is based on how much the surface temperature actually has changed with an increase of 1 W/m2 in absorbed surface radiation.
So I’ll go out on a limb and say that this value of 0.11°C per W/m2 (0.4°C per doubling of CO2) is a reasonable estimate for the Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity. It includes all feedbacks known and unknown, is adjusted for the different thermal lags in the ocean and the land, it is in the range of the four smallest ECS estimates from mainstream climate studies, and it is quite close to three of those ECS estimates.
As Figure 5 shows, like the four smallest ECS estimates in Figure 1, the net feedback to the warming is negative. We know this because everywhere on the Earth, the warming is less than we’d experience with a blackbody planet.
This negative feedback is as we’d expect, given the remarkable stability of the global surface temperature, which only increased by about 0.2% over the entire 20th Century. Twenty-five years ago, that surprising stability was what first drew me to start studying the climate. If the feedback were positive, there would be much larger variations in the Earth’s temperature.
Finally, it could be argued that this is NOT the equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS), because I’ve used the change in radiation absorbed at the surface, while the ECS is based on the change in top-of-atmosphere (TOA) downwelling “greenhouse effect” radiation (GHE).
As Ramanathan first noted, the TOA GHE radiation can be calculated as the amount of surface upwelling thermal radiation minus the amount of TOA upwelling thermal radiation. And this GHE radiation is closely related to the downwelling radiation absorbed by the surface. Figure 7 shows that relationship.
Figure 7. Absorbed downwelling longwave radiation at the surface, and top of atmosphere (TOA) “greenhouse effect” downwelling longwave radiation
Because they are so similar, and because the downwelling longwave radiation at the surface is only part of the total absorbed radiation, this will make little difference to the ECS I calculated.
The CERES data shows that for every 1 W/m2 increase in TOA downwelling greenhouse radiation, as we’d expect, the surface downwelling radiation increases by on the order of one W/m2 (1.1 ± .14 W/m2 per W/m2). So any change in my calculated ECS will be small.
And with that, further affiant sayeth naught.
Fog this morning, which is good news because it’s been hot and I still have another acre to mow. Protip: When your age has two digits and starts with a 7 or above, if you slow down …
… you stop.
And wonder of wonders, a bobcat just walked into the back acreage, what a lovely being!
My very best to all,
w.
You’ve Heard It Before: Quote the exact words you are commenting on. I can defend my words. I can’t defend your interpretation of my words.
Not surprising. And the reason for the increasing in the official uncertainty is because every time an empirical calculation is done, the warming is too small to be concerned with which throws a wrench in the climate crisis gospel. By claiming high uncertainty they can claim they were right without admitting that its not a problem.
Always a treat when Willis reviews some CERES numbers.
Thanks, D, appreciated.
w.
Fig. 7 is ”Absorbed Surface Downward LW” on the left and “Downwelling GH” on the right. Since CERES sensors only measure TOA leaving as viewed from outer space…this means their data tables must back-calculate the numbers on which you are basing your analysis from “accepted science”. I’d be interested in your comments on the efficacy of those back calculations. Of course there are many phenomena they can identify, or think they can identify, by filtering for different IR wavelengths.
The testing I’ve done against surface-based data sources like the SOLRAD stations, the TAO buoy data, and the various temperature datasets show very good agreement.
I also found one place to calculate the one of the given datasets (total atmospheric absorption) in two different ways, and it was within a couple of watts.
The data sources underlying the calculated values are described at the product info page at the CERES website. There are a host of other descriptions, sources, and links elsewhere on their website.
w.
Well, that’s certainly completely pointless, isn’t it? What do these “watts” have to do with anything?
Sorry Willis, but you are sounding like someone who believes that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter! [SNIPPED—If you want to insult me, please do it on your own thread. w. ]
Maybe you really meant to write something else?
All my best
m.
A “treat”? Neither you, nor CERES, nor Willis has any clue what the word “radiation” means. But enjoy your pseudo-scientific bafflegab “treat”, by all means!
Please enlighten us about what YOU think “radiation” means.
Will Happer of Princeton seems to have a pretty good grasp of what it actually means in Earth’s atmosphere. He was good enough for me until you just came along asserting otherwise.
As a lawyer, you have no clue either. Why not leave physics to the physicists, and stay in your lane? You and DMac will both look smarter that way.
EM radiation is an electromagnetic field. Like any other field, it is a form of energy. Energy is measured in Joules. How many times did Willis write the word “Joules” in his article next to the word “radiation”?
Thanks for confirming that “climate scientists” aren’t physicists (or scientists) either.
Joule is energy, Watt is energy flux or Joules/second which is correct when quantifying the sun’s energy flux. As a matter of fact: science is data and arguments pertinent to that. It has absolutely nothing to do with the person (or his qualifications) at all ! If you want to argue, then do it with scientific arguments and not by questioning the person’s credentials. But that’s the usual mantra of climate alarmists: if you’re not a “climate scientist” then you’re not qualified to talk about it. Absolute nonsense.
“Joule is energy, Watt is energy flux or Joules/second which is correct when quantifying the sun’s energy flux.”
That’s only half the truth, and a half-truth is kissing cousin to a lie, isn’t it?
You can’t quantify “energy flux” (i.e. work, and thus power) from one object by itself. You need a source, and a receiver. And they have to be separated by an entropy gradient. Every physicist knows that. You apparently don’t.
“if you’re not a “climate scientist” then you’re not qualified to talk about it.”
I have yet to meet a “climate scientist” who knows his radiation physics from his basket-weaving. Do you know any? Who are they? Bear in mind that in the current political “climate” (rapidly changing now), any “climate scientist” who points out that the other climate “scientists” are all liars is simply not going to get published.
“Absolute nonsense.”
No, simply an observation of the truth, as painful as it may be to swallow.
Because the “physicists” in climate science are obviously incompetent and biased. They are physical social scientists.
w/m2 radiation= power/unit area.
Multiply by total area and time and you have Energy = total power x time = joules
I’m not sure what you’re trying to say here, it’s mostly true but largely irrelevant to my point.
Here is stevekj’s description of radiation
I, for one, am happy to stay out of Steve’s lane.
Also since a Watt is a Joule per second, I think Willis wrote “Joules per second” about 63 times.
[SNIPPED—Please stick to the science. w. ] I didn’t say “how many times did Willis write Joules per second”, did I? No I did not.
[SNIPPED—Please stick to the science and leave out the personal insults. You’re not doing your reputation any good. w. ]
Yes, Willis, you are not. Snipping things you don’t like makes you look as though you can’t handle dissent.
According to the International Atomic Energy Agency
Does that help you?
You also said
No, he doesn’t. He seems to believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter – but maybe I’m wrong. If he does, he’s dreaming.
When “climate scientists” with their climate models get anywhere near the nearly perfect overlap of calculated and observed spectra that Happer and Wijngaarden achieved (nota bene without “fudge factors”), then maybe … we’ll start to take “climate scientists” seriously. Of course when they say 3 +/- 20 they will always be right. Heads I win, tails you lose sort of thing.
Presumably, this is supposed to mean something. What is it? Are you trying to imply the nonsensical idea that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, or something you can’t quite put your finger on?
[SNIPPED—Stick to the science, thanks. w. ]
Maybe you could demonstrate your acceptance of reality by agreeing that adding CO2 to air does not make it hotter?
MF, if you add CO2 too the air between a candle flame and an IR camera, the image of the flame will get dimmer. Technical folks presume this means some of the IR emitted from the flame was absorbed by the CO2 and shortly after the air molecules near the CO2 molecules must vibrate faster (thus warmer temperature).
What is your explanation ? Please help the rest of us reduce our gullibility, ignorance , and irrelevance.
Don’t you know? Why are you asking me? I’m surprised you regard me as an authority on such matters.
You have essentially answered your own question. The CO2 has prevented some of the candle’s radiation from reaching the camera’s IR sensor (thermometer if you prefer).
The thermometer responds to a reduction in radiation by indicating a lower temperature. Professor John Tyndall wrote about this over 150 years ago, and his measurements of the reduction in the Sun’s radiation reaching the surface due to atmospheric blocking are very close to NASA’s.
Around 30%, resulting in maximum terrestrial surface temperature of less than 100 C, compared with the airless Moon’s maximum of 127 C after the same exposure time.
But you already knew all this, didn’t you?
There is definitely pseudo-science. Just not where you obviously think it is.
While I agree that Steve is lost in the weeds, it’s true that from the perspective of em radiation no time passes between it being emitted and absorb. So there must be a destination before the source can emit. This is true even though from our perspective there is a time lag from emittance to reception. So he is correct when he says that there is a lot of misunderstanding of what em radiation is.
A definite time is involved. Radiation in a vacuum travels at the speed of light. Hardly surprising, as all radiation is light. Maybe you meant to say something else?
I know! I know! *waves hand furiously*
The Hubble constant! The expansion rate of the universe! Hasn’t that been getting more and more uncertain, with two main measurements getting farther and farther apart and no consensus on which is correct?
Wikipedia says:
which, alas, doesn’t say they are getting farther apart.
*sits down, dejected*
There is a big difference between astrophysicists, who can’t first hand observe their proposed neutron stars or black holes, with the general public assuming they are geniuses….and CliSci’s who any STEM person can look at their work and say “ your work is just riddled with assumptions, inconsistent results, and stated accuracies that are less than your instrumentation error” also with the general public assuming they are geniuses.
… or both could be correct.
Measurement model is perhaps the the key. In essence, the Hubble constant uses a similar model, with different mechanism of measurement.
Incoming (SW) and emitted (LW) are separate wavelengths so shouldn’t suffer from that.
Man, why you all gotta be so serial?
It just comes naturally? One after the other?
Fun ‘sits down, dejected’ late additional comment. The ‘Hubble constant’ isn’t observationally constant over universe time . Whichever of the two present ‘observed’ values might be ‘true’, it is apparently accelerating due to ‘fully unexplained’ dark energy. Something Rumsfieldian about known unknowns versus unknown unknowns.
Einstein called his general relativity Hubble lambda ‘constant’ —which he removed altogether from his final general relativity theory in 1917 BEFORE Hubble’s 1920 red shift discovery— “his greatest mistake”.
1917, Rud.
[Thanks, Kevin. Fixed. w. ]
I think that the unstated assumption is that the expansion rate should be a single value, that is, be isotropic. Perhaps the assumption is invalid. If you were filling a balloon with a gas, would you expect the rate of increase of the radius of the balloon to be the same as the rate of increase of the circumference? Might pi play a role?
.4C per doubling? Utter heresy!
But you have reason to support that conclusion. It is in the range of “not bupkis”
as far as any plausible effects.
Yes, but this leaves out the magical heat which is hiding in the oceans. That’s where 93% of the energy is claimed to exist. Hence, you must multiply the value by ~14 to add this energy back in. That brings it up to a alarming 5.6 C which will jump out and get us at some unknown time in the future.
In reality, even the .4 C is too high. It includes the Hunga-Tonga warming effect which may even be the entire amount.
How did the heat hiding in the deep oceans, which presumably was acquired above the thermocline by absorption of sunlight in the mixed zone, sneak past the thermocline?
Like I said, it’s “magical”.
The key is how much was deposited into the ocean before anthropogenic warming?
I don’t know Nick Stokes in another post told everyone that ocean heat content at depth is stable. Since he is the arbiter of truth I’ll go with that.
Some ‘adjacent’ factoids.
Ergo, the ECS must be something greater than about 1.2C. The great unsettled question is by how much?
The several observational EBM estimates all range around 1.7C with fairly narrow uncertainty bands. (My preferred paper is Lewis and Curry 2, which responded in detail to 5 critiques of Lewis and Curry 1.)
The INM CM5 from CMIP6 has 1.8C—and INM CM5 is the ONLY CMIP6 model that does not produce a spurious tropical troposphere hot spot.
That tight range of very differently estimated ECS values mean, as WE also concludes here, that climate alarm can be cancelled.
That one fact, lack of a tropical troposphere hot spot, invalidates CliSciFi’s foundational assumption of significant water vapor feedback to minor CO2 warming. Skeptics need to keep harping on that singular scientific fact.
Dave Fair, the INM CM5 result was so important they published a longish paper on it. You are exactly correct. INM CM5 used a decade of global ARGO observations to parameterize CM5’s ocean rainfall—observationally about twice what had previously been thought. ‘Ocean fresh water storage’ was one of the three original ARGO design intents, done via salinity measurement above 700 meters deep. So their water vapor feedback was about half, and voila no modeled tropical troposphere hotspot.
And make sure Sherwood’s erroneous wind shear paper is pointed out.
This is such a good example of “science” trying to prove an expected and desired result. There is zero chance any result would have been published if it had unambiguously supported the radiosonde temperature measurements.
Indeed, compare the Russian model output with latest version of the Nobel prize winning Manabe model:
You realize this graph suggests massive negative feedbacks?
What happens if Ts increases by 0.19K, while the emission temperature (Te) is up by 0.3 to 0.33K (the average emission altitude is above 0.5bar in the tropics)? The GHE is defined as Ts – Te, or 288K – 255K = 33K in general.
In this instance the GHE would shrink by 0.3/0.19 – 1 = 0.58K to 0.33/0.19 – 1 = 0.74K per Kelvin warming, due to lapse rate feedback. I should add: the models have a somewhat smaller rotation of the lapse rate over a transitional period, as it is primarilly related to ocean temperature, which is warming slower.
Yet we can project this on the global scale to outline the underlying problem:
We get a huge negative feedback, larger than all the positive feedbacks combined, so that overall feedbacks turn negative. That is inevitable.
So how would models avoid having negative feedbacks?
Feedback parameters in climate models are calculated assuming that they are independent of each other, except for a well-known co-dependency between the water vapour (WV) and lapse rate (LR) feedbacks
(AR6, p.978)
https://greenhousedefect.com/the-holy-grail-of-ecs/the-climate-kill-switch-why-feedbacks-are-actually-negative
Why would massive negative feedbacks be wrong?
I do not say they were..
Thanks, Rud, always great to hear from you. I’ll divide my response into different comments for clarity.
First, you say:
1.1°·C per 2xCO2 is 0.29°C per one W/m2 increase. I get 0.19 instead.
The way that I calculated the no-feedback response is as follows:
I took the gridded map of the average upwelling surface LW, and converted that to temperature T1 using the gridded average emissivity.
Then I added 1 W/m2 to the gridded map of the average upwelling surface LW, and converted that to temperature T2 using the gridded average emissivity.
The map in figure 4 shows T1-T2, showing a no-feedback change of 0.19 W/m2 per W/m2 (0.7 W/m2 per 2xCO2)
There is an alternate, cruder way to calculate it. This is to differentiate the S-B equation, which gives us
dTdW=function(w,epsilon=1) {16.2/(epsilon*(w*epsilon)^(3/4))}
where epsilon is the emissivity and w is the radiation in W/m2.
Current surface radiation is on the order of 398 W/m2. Using that in the above equation with emissivity = 1 gives us 0.18°C per W/m2, very close to my value in Figure 4 above.
What am I missing here? Sure seems to me like adding 1 W/m2 to the surface leads to ~0.18°C of warming.
Regarding Lindzen’s paper, it just says:
“It is generally accepted that in the absence of feedback, a doubling of CO2 will cause a forcing of ∆Q ≈ 3.7 Wm−2 and will increase the temperature by ∆T0 ≈ 1.1 K (Hartmann, 1994; Schwartz, 2007)
So I looked at Hartmann. He uses the same formula I used, but with a temperature of 255K, the theoretical temperature of a superconducting blackbody, and an emissivity of 0.9. This gives ~ 1.1°C per 2xCO2.
However, when we substitute the real temperature and emissivity of the Earth, we get the numbers that I show above.
What is the reasoning behind using the 255K (-18°C) temperature of a theoretical blackbody superconducting earth for the no-feedback calculation? Why would we not use actual conditions?
Regards,
w.
This is such an interesting topic that it sent me to thinking about it most of this morning.
I’m going to offer a quick explanation of the 0.29 to 0.18 discrepancy. A thin atmosphere containing IR active gasses works to make the Earth behave a bit like a solar collector engineered to increase its absorption temperature with a thin coating that improves its figure of merit. I explained this in an essay here about six years ago. That essay, by the way, is messy to read over formatting issues, I since learned to avoid, but I digress.
First, I went to Hartmann 1994 looking for that formula you described, and found it as 9.7 in the book, but it seems to me more clearly explained as just taking the derivative of S-B with respect to temperature including an effective emissivity.
Now, what about emissivity?
What the thin “coating” does is to make the IR emissivity of Earth as seen above the atmosphere, the current atmosphere with current values of CO2 and H2O, appear to be 0.62 or so, not anything near 1.0, in other words. Therefore, if one is going to look at how emitted power according to the Stefan-Boltzmann law is going to cool the Earth the effective emissivity is 0.62 and so your sensitivity coefficient of 0.18 should be adjusted for present conditions to
I suppose one might argue that a full atmosphere value of emissivity is not pertinent because we are looking here at a surface temperature. True enough. Yet, almost all of this Greenhouse effect of this thin coating is near surface because that is where the H2O resides.
By the way, I thought I’d written something original six years ago in that essay on effective emissivity, but lately, in working on my Energy Imbalance Part III I found the identical argument in an older research report By Rind, et al (JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH, VOL. 94, NO. D10, PAGES 12,851-12,871, SEPTEMBER 20, 1989 ). There often seems to be nothin’ new.
Best,
Kevin
Rud, next you say:
I’m not seeing that at all. See my posts “Observational and theoretical evidence that cloud feedback decreases global warming” and “Rainergy“. They show that there is a very large negative feedback due to the cooling effects of thermally-driven clouds and their associated rainfall.
If you can see faults in those posts, please quote them.
w.
Maybe your eyes are closed? Reality doesn’t care whether you see it or not. Adding CO2 to air does not make it hotter. W/m2 does not necessarily bear any relationship to the temperature of the emitter or the absorber.
That’s why ignorant and gullible pseudoscientists love it. Why do you use it?
Hi Rud,
I’m with Willis here. I realize that in the laboratory or using radiative models (for example van Wijngaarden and Happer) you should expect about one degree of warming for a doubling of CO2. Unfortunately or fortunately, we are not in a laboratory like in Matrix, nor do we live in a world where the surface cools radiatively. Heat is removed from the surface via conduction, evaporation, and radiation that is immediately captured by GHGs, mostly water vapor.
It is not radiation that carries the surface heat away, it is convection, the actual radiation to space (outside the atmospheric windows) is emitted from high in the atmosphere, higher than 2 km. Below 2 km weather uses up a lot of the energy moving air and water around and forming clouds (thermodynamic work).
In short, the radiative calculations miss the real story, the atmosphere is an enormous air conditioner. I’m not surprised that Willis computed an ECS <1, I’ve long suspected the true ECS was less than 1. It makes the most sense when you think about it. Look at the IndoPacific warm pool, what is going on there? Huge negative feedbacks due to deep convection.
Sorry Andy, reality doesn’t support you. Adding CO2 to air does not warm it. Tyndall’s meticulous experiments (reproducible and since verified) show that increased CO2 or H2O in the atmosphere results in lower maximum surface temperatures on the surface. No GHE.
If models show otherwise, they are wrong.
I have to disagree with you re the statement: “It is not radiation that carries the surface heat away, it is conduction…” Conductron from a surface into a gas (air) provides the lowest heat transfer rate possible. A huge step up is convection, which can dominate all of the heat transfer mechanisms.
However, radiation can be the dominant heat transfer mode, as anyone who lives in a desert climate can attest. I lived in Redlands, CA for 11 years; Redlands is in the Inland Empire, definitely a desert climate. In December 2000, we had a week of the most unusual weather we had ever seen in that area. Five of those seven nights, the sky was completely crystal clear, the air was dead calm, and the temperature dropped to a low of exactly 38 F. Those five nights, our swimming pool’s surface froze for the only times in 11 years.
Each night it froze to an ice thickness of 3/16 inch, minimum. I calculated the heat transfer rate required for that to happen, and it was completely consistent only with radiation from a water surface at 0 C to a sky at -51 C, the temperature at 12 km and up. I took into account the radiation view factor between our pool and the sky, given the trees we had surrounding the pool. It was a match.
If you ever go out desert camping, even in the summer, even in Death Valley, CA, you know to bring the warmest sleeping bag you have. If you don’t, and they sky is clear and the air calm, you’ll freeze to death at night, no matter how hot the day was.
Michael,
In the second paragraph I meant “convection” not “conduction.” The first use of conduction is correct.
“Heat is removed from the surface via conduction, evaporation, and radiation that is immediately captured by GHGs, mostly water vapor.”
And then? What happens to the energy? It just goes to space, never to be seen again. Vanished. Disappeared.
Don’t you agree?
the atmosphere is an enormous air conditioner.
=====$$
YES!! X 1000
the sun is the pump, the armosphere is the working fluid and gravity is the orifice. Night and day are the cold and warm coils.
This is not a perpetual motion machine as some propose or a pressure theory. It is the atmosphere as a heat pump and air conditioner
Finally, you say:
The water positive feedback is much smaller than the negative cloud radiative feedback. See the links in my previous comment.
In addition, as usual, the climate is very poorly described by things like the thermodynamic Clausius-Clapeyron equation.
For example, as the tropics warms, we get more thunderstorms. And while the water vapor underneath them goes up per C-C, the path to space is already blocked by the thunderstorm cloud above.
On the other hand, the area around the cloud becomes dryer because it is descending air from the top of the thunderstorm, and the water in that air has been stripped from it in the form of rain.
So the net result is lots of areas of drier air, rather than the increasing water vapor as predicted by C-C.
Next, the IPCC has ASSUMED that the net of the remainder of the feedbacks is zero. However, as I pointed out in the links below, the cloud radiative/rainfall effect that I calculated does not include the following effects of cumulus fields and thunderstorms:
• Increased surface albedo over the ocean due to the white surface foam, spume (foam driven aloft by the wind), and spray. Increased cloud albedo due to the vertical extent of thunderstorm towers.
• A thunderstorm operates on the same refrigeration cycle as a household refrigerator or air conditioner. It evaporates a working fluid (in this case water) in the area to be cooled. It moves the resulting vapor to a separate physical location (the thunderstorm cloud base) where the working fluid is condensed and then returned to the area to be cooled, in the form of cold rain. This natural refrigeration-cycle heat engine greatly cools the surface quite independently of any radiation considerations.
• There is increased evaporative cooling due to the thunderstorm-generated winds at the base, as well as from the provision of dry air to the surface.
• A large thunderstorm typically generates on the order of 20,000 tonnes of rainfall over its existence. This means it is moving on the order of 40 terajoules of energy from the surface to high up in the troposphere. There, because it is above most greenhouse gases, it is much freer to radiate to space.
• Increased evaporative cooling from the increase in surface area due to the creation of millions of spray droplets.
• Increased radiation to space due to the lack of water vapor in the dry descending air between the cumulus clouds and between the thunderstorms.
Tropical thermally driven cumulus fields and thunderstorms increase with increasing temperatures. And none of these factors are included in the IPCC’s universe.
Finally, you say:
Not true, for the reasons I stated above. You are hugely underestimating the effect of the clouds.
In addition, seven of the ECS estimates in Figure 1 above are below 1.2°C per 2xCO2 … so there are a lot of folks besides me who think it’s not true.
My best to you, my friend,
w.
I’ll help you out – climate is the statistics of weather observations.
All my best
m.
The decending air around a large tropical thunderstorm is cold, cold, cold and strong enough to knock a sailboat down.
I think that a lot of people misinterpret the C-C equation. It provides an upper-bound on the relationship between temperature and humidity. It is probably only fulfilled over the oceans, if even there, because of the frequent rains and the finite amount of time it takes to recharge the depleted water. However, in most terrestrial situations, the humidity is limited by availability of water from evapotranspiration. That explains why the interiors of most continents are arid or semi-arid, particularly in the rain shadows of transverse mountain ranges.
Therefore, I think that the C-C relationship is not universal, but depends on the location and topography. I think that the net effect is positive, but small.
Indeed. C-C is an equilibrium relationship and evaporation is non-equilibrium in addition to the complications you mention. Now I agree with Rud that it is some positive number as long as constraints don’t make it zero.
“The Clausius-Clapeyron relationship between specific humidity and temperature is sound in the laboratory, but observations show the relationship between humidity, temperature, and precipitation in the real world is more complex.”
From here:
https://andymaypetrophysicist.com/2023/03/21/atmospheric-water-vapor-tpw-and-climate-change/
Andy, I think your remark, “The various estimates of total atmosphere TPW and specific humidity available do not agree with one another very well. Even the two NCEP estimates, both global, vary by 3% over 1988-2022,” supports my assertion that the C-C relationship should be thought of as an upper-bound, rather than a functional relationship. It establishes conditions that have to be met to reach a particular specific humidity, but other things such as availability of water vapor and condensation and crystallization nuclei, and windiness create barriers to achieving the potential.
I agree, wind patterns are the real control, and these vary periodically with the various ocean oscillations. Thus, the C-C relationship is violated periodically globally, and works or doesn’t work basin by basin as time goes on.
You’re singling out the radiative impact of potentially increased water vapour without simultaneously considering the latent energy transfer increase to the upper atmosphere due to convection of a more humid atmosphere. What is your argument the radiative impact dominates?
More [SNIPPED—You want to call me names, do it elsewhere] nonsense from Willis:
“downwelling thermal radiation [power] from the atmosphere”
That sentence doesn’t pass the “laugh test”. So it is false, right? Right.
Troll. Stand under a tree during a clear night.
You’re not a physicist, are you, Dave? [SNIPPED—You want to insult me, do it on your own thread on your own time. w.]
What do you think you are demonstrating by standing under a tree during a clear night?
And the same to you, Willis. This is Anthony Watts’ blog isn’t it? is your ego a little fragile, perhaps? Are your feelings hurt?
Haven’t the guts to let anybody see what you SNIPPED?
You believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, and you can’t stand anybody who says that this is only believed by the gullible and ignorant, having no experimental support at all. Rather, the complete opposite, as Tyndall’s experiments showed.
Pity you cannot SNIP him, isn’t it?
Michael, I asked you to dial back on the ugly insults. Where you have continued to belittle me or anyone else, I’ve snipped it, as I said I would.
You ask if I “don’t have the guts” to let anyone see what I snipped? It seems you’ve missed the purpose of erasing your words … nothing to do with “guts”, and everything to do with this being a blog about science and not about your hatred.
Don’t like it?
Don’t care. If you want a place to call people childish names, start your own blog, because this ain’t the place for that nonsense.
With that bit of housecleaning out of the way, a link to the “Tyndall’s experiments” would be useful here. Because as near as I can tell, Tyndall showed that CO2 and other gases absorb thermal radiation, which is the basis of the poorly named “greenhouse effect”.
https://www.envchemgroup.com/john-tyndallrsquos-discovery-of-the-lsquogreenhouse-effectrsquo.html
And if you want experiments showing that the “greenhouse effect” is real, here are a few.
https://www.drroyspencer.com/2013/04/direct-evidence-of-earths-greenhouse-effect/
Here’s observational evidence:
https://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/08/observational-evidence-of-the-greenhouse-effect-at-desert-rock-nevada/
Here’s another experiment
https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rsos.192075
And another.
https://www.drroyspencer.com/2013/08/revisiting-woods-1909-greenhouse-box-experiment-part-ii-first-results/
Here’s Eunice Foote’s experiment
https://www.aps.org/apsnews/2023/07/carbon-dioxide-atmosphere-eunice-foote
And there are several experiments here:
https://www.fizziq.org/en/post/greenhouse-effect-practical-experiences-and-teaching-methods
Now, you may not like those experiments. And you may disagree with them … but your claim that the greenhouse effect has “no experimental support at all” is a joke.
The earth is tens of degrees C warmer than we’d expect it to be given its distance from the sun. It’s far warmer than the moon, for example, which is at the same distance from the sun.
The general explanation for extra warmth is the very poorly named “greenhouse effect”. However, since you don’t believe that there is any such effect … what is your explanation for why the Earth is so much warmer than expected … and do you have any experiments to back up whatever your theory is regarding that extra warmth?
I’ll wait …
w.
Here you go. You said yourself
Poorly named? Maybe you could give it a better name? There is no consistent and unambiguous description of the “greenhouse effect”.
Not one of your links describes the “greenhouse effect” in any sensible way. Roy Spencer can’t describe the GHE. From the “Eunice Foot” link –
No description of the GHE. and your reference is obviously misleading, irrelevant and pointless.
You and your ilk can “expect” it to be anything you like. But it isn’t, is it? Surface temperatures vary between about -90 C, and +90 C. The temperature range on the Moon is much greater, having no atmosphere.
You like others, have fallen into the trap of believing that you can “calculate” the temperature of an object by knowing how much radiation falls upon it. This is nonsense, of course.
Put a red hot (or freezing cold) lump of iron in direct sunlight. “Calculate” how hot it is. That would be stupid, wouldn’t it?
This sort of calculation will provide the same answer, regardless of reality. For example, when the Earth’s surface was completely molten, your calculation will provide exactly the same answer as when the surface was cool enough to let the first liquid water to form, the first ice to form, and the present time.
I know you don’t believe that the Earth losing 44 TW means it’s cooling, and I know you believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter.
Believe what you like – facts are what are left even if you don’t believe in them.
All my best – you look like you need a bit of support
m.
“what is your explanation for why the Earth[‘s surface] is so much warmer than expected [if it were a plain black body]”
There’s a lot to unpack there, and a lot of assumptions, but the short version is that the atmospheric temperature gradient has a lot to do with the temperature of the surface. And that gradient has a lot to do with gravity, and essentially nothing to do with EM radiation. Just so you don’t think we are (rightly) ridiculing your unsupported theory without providing a better one in its place.
Stevekj, I think I will fall on your side of coin here. Thermal radiation is radiation based on temperature and gases in the atmosphere don’t do that. Gases are not black bodies.
“Thermal radiation is radiation based on temperature and gases in the atmosphere don’t do that.” Add words to elaborate on “don’t do that”.
To quote my Heat Transfer book:”When they absorb and emit radiation, they usually do so only in certain narrow wavelength bands.”
Your heat transfer book is wrong, for non-excited gases.
All matter emits infrared radiation, with wavelengths dependent on temperature. For example, the air compressed in a Diesel engine to 500 C emits shorter wavelengths than air at 20 C. It’s hotter.
You can choose not to believe me if you like.
O2 and N2, for example, are not black body solids and emit IR very, very add another very, close to nothing, zero, zilch, nada in the temperature range of Earth’s surface temperatures. That means they are transparent. Show us a graph or table or research paper…one that has CO2 or methane on it too for comparison.
Choosing not to believe you would be a wise choice because you don’t know what you’re talking about!
“All matter emits infrared radiation, with wavelengths dependent on temperature.”
Not true gases do not!
From Plank’s Theory of Heat Radiation.
Although this chapter deals with monatomic gases, this reduces the case to translation only. Most of this also applies to diatomic molecules after apportioning energy appropriately.
Even these simple sounding statements become complicated when one considers all that may go in gasses. Indeed wavelengths are not temperature dependent, although some lines might appear out of the base when temperatures are raised high enough (electron transitions for example). Now, even diatomic molecules do absorb and emit radiation in the infrared region via rotation. The problem is often what do people mean by emit infrared? If they mean as a blackbody spectrum, then that is wrong unless the gasses are so dense that broadening begins to look like continuous bands. If they mean as simple radiation of some type, lines in the infrared, then that seems fine as Jim’s reference says below…
Kevin, I assume you are talking about spectroscopy or spectrometry, or possibly excited gases. Not relevant to radiation emitted by an unexcited gas as a result of being above absolute zero.
I’m referring to say, atmospheric air and its component gases. These are definitely matter. As an example, rapidly compressed air can reach a temperature of 500 C in a Diesel engine, hot enough to ignite cold fuel injected into the combustion chamber.
If people do not want to believe that hot air emits infrared radiation, so be it.
It puzzles me what people think “air temperature” refers to.
They don’t seem to accept the basics of quantum electrodynamic theory, which is probably the most extensively experimentally tested theory in the history of the universe. All matter above absolute zero emits photons continuously. Heat. Infrared. All matter. No exceptions at all.
How do people think that air temperature can be measured remotely by sensing the frequency of the emitted IR – which is dependent on temperature? I’m using infrared in its broad sense – longer wavelengths than visible light.
Next thing, people will be claiming that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter!
What I was responding to was: “All matter emits infrared radiation, with wavelengths dependent on temperature.”
Which is not true for gases, even allowing for the poster’s fake definition of infrared!
Of course, you can’t find an experiment to support you, can you?
Well, air has temperature. Somewhere between 0 K, where it emits no radiation at all, with an upper practical limit dependent on temperature and pressure (sorry if that’s a bit circular).
You don’t have to believe the experimental results of John Tyndall, who measured the ability of gases to both absorb and emit infrared radiation.
If you want to believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, you are free to do so.
‘All matter emits infrared radiation…’
The IR spectrum in microns:
Near 0.78 to 2.5
Middle 2.5 to 50
Far 50 – 1000
For either O2 or N2 at atmospheric pressures and temperatures, can you provide any links showing emission peaks in the above range of 0.78 to 1000 microns?
Infrared radiation is all radiation with a wavelength longer than visible red. That’s why it’s called infrared.
If you don’t believe that gases have temperatures above absolute zero, you don’t have to.
If you refuse to believe claims that companies and government organisations can measure atmospheric temperatures from space by measuring infrared (longer than visible red) emitted at wavelengths proportional to temperature, good for you!
Be independent. Believe whatever you like. I certainly won’t try to convince you otherwise. My belief is that ignoring facts won’t make them go away.
Adding CO2 to air won’t make it hotter.
I figured you’d punt on providing links to the O2 and N2 spectra.
Fyi, 1000 nanometers = 1 micron, and the line spectra for O2 and N2 have peaks in the ranges of 500 – 700 nm and 300 – 400 nm, respectively. In other words, they both emit at wavelengths that are shorter than those that are considered to lie in the infrared.
Please find attached a graphic of the EMR spectrum for your consideration.
You seem to routinely appear to attract a lot of ‘downvotes’ (NB: none of them mine) on some of your comments from fellow skeptics – you might want to consider why that happens.
Don’t be silly. You must be thinking about spectroscopy or spectrometry. Exciting a gas, or shining a light through it.
You obviously have no appreciation for the scientific method.
As Einstein said “No amount of experimentation can prove me right, a single experiment can prove me wrong.” So prove me wrong.
All matter above absolute zero emits infrared radiation. You don’t have to believe it.
Can you clarify what you mean by this? First, do you suggest that any and all gaseous components are going to emit radiation? If there is no permanent dipole moment, then there isn’t going to be IR radiation emitted. However, there may be some diffuse radiation from vibrational N2 lines excited by collisions.
But now more to the kernel of my question, do you suggest that for a gaseous component which does radiate IR, like CO2, it emits shorter wavelengths because the lines of each radiating component are shifted to higher frequency (shorter wavelength), or are you suggesting that this shorter wavelength radiation is due simply to the partition function becoming larger and higher energy levels are relatively more populated with temperature?
Kevin,
As I said to Frank, all matter above absolute zero emits infrared radiation.
You cannot produce any reproducible experimental support to disprove this basic physical fact.
As Einstein said “No amount of experimentation can prove me right, a single experiment can prove me wrong.” So prove me wrong.
[SNIPPED—No offence intended. w. ]
No offence intended.
There’s an interesting excerpt from a chemistry text on infrared spectroscopy here. It discusses the mechanics of the absorption/radiation of longwave IR by gases.
TL;DR version: their ability to absorb/radiate longwave IR depends entirely on the ability of the interatomic bonds to flex in such a way that it changes their dipole moment.
Protip: Argon and other monatomic gases have no interatomic bonds.
I’ll let you do the logic on that one.
As to experiments on argon in the longwave IR range, nobody does them because it’s well known from physical first principles that they don’t emit or absorb in that range because they lack interatomic bonds.
Argon’s lack of emission/absorption of thermal IR is so well known, in fact, that argon is used to purge spectroscopic instruments to avoid errors in the readings due to atmospheric gases disturbing the spectroscopic measurements. See below. So I suppose that you could say that every time a spectroscopic measurement is purged with argon, it’s an experiment showing that argon doesn’t absorb or emit in the thermal IR range.
I’d ask you to provide an experiment disproving that, but you won’t find one for the reasons given above. It’s like looking for experiments proving water is wet … won’t find those either.
Regards,
w.
===
The purge is an excellent example of an experiment done so frequently and universally that a person can easily overlook its meaning.
Willis, your comment is completely irrelevant.
I just stated that all matter above absolute zero emits infrared.
You can’t find an experiment to disprove this statement, so you talk about everything else.
You can choose to believe that some matter cannot either absorb or emit IR, but you can’t provide anything at all to back up your fantasy.
Sorry about that, but you are obviously ignorant, and refuse to accept reality. I could accuse you of talking hot air, but you might refuse to believe that air can be heated, and emits infrared radiation as a result of its temperature.
In designing furnaces, boilers and ovens, the radiant heat transfer from hot gasses to the structure requires calculations involving CO2 and H2O as these are products of combustion. If heat treatment is involved one might have to look at an ammonia atmosphere for certain metals. The calculation is done via curves that provide the equivalent emissivity of a (thicknessxpressure) of gas at various temperatures. There are no tables for nitrogen, oxygen, argon and so forth. Why is that?
Now, the book I first learned general engineering heat transport in graduate school from (Heat Transfer by Alan Chapman 3rd ed 1974) says this
The textbook I have taught from some five or six times is Fundamentals of Heat and Mass Transfer, Incropera and Dewitt, copyrights from 2002 to 2011, has this to say about there being only graphs for CO2 and H2O…
I did not work with heat transport on a day to day basis, but over 23 years of consulting I did my fair share of such work, including tracking down problems with thermal stresses on silicon wafers and the failures in making planar devices on silicon in ovens and other process vessels when I consulted for Shin Etsu.
Engineers have to make things work, so if N2 and O2 and similar gasses actually were involved with IR absorption and emission, there would have to be methods to calculate these effects — there are none. If you look for IR spectra for N2 in the thermal IR band, you will only find spectra for N in combination with other radicals. If one wishes to delve into the physics about why these gasses behave as they do, we can go there as well.
Best to you.
I’ll just point out that scientists like Dr Roy Spencer measure air temperature from space by sensing the temperature dependent wavelengths of infrared emitted by oxygen, for example.
All light with wavelengths longer than visible red are infrared. Sorry about that.
John Tyndall measured the IR properties of many gases and liquids, and compared the properties to the IR properties af air purged of CO2 and H2O, and cleaned of suspended particulate matter normally held aloft by Brownian motion. He assigned a value of 1, and compared other gases against it.
Until someone demonstrates otherwise, I’ll stick with Tyndall. Or Richard Feynman, if you want to understand why all matter above absolute zero emits infrared radiation. All the time. Can’t be stopped.
Feel free to prove me wrong- it will only take one experiment.
I am curious, what did Tyndall find for the IR properties of N2 and O2?
The ATMS uses magnetic dipole transitions in the 60Ghz complex of oxygen. This is the microwave region. I suppose you view microwaves as IR because wavelengths are longer than visible red. Yet, this is not thermal IR and no one would claim so.
Willis and I both gave you many examples of experiments to prove this point. Gas molecules are not condensed matter so do not produce SB type radiation. They have energy but not “temperature”. Some molecules do not absorb or emit in the thermal IR range.
If you want more information than I have provided, it might be best to read Tyndall’s publications.
Your comment is a bit strange. Are you disagreeing with the fact that all matter above absolute zero emits infrared radiation, but cannot provide any experiment showing matter that doesn’t?
Sorry, that’s not the scientific method. That’s pseudoscientific wishful thinking
“Yet, this is not thermal IR and no one would claim so.”
The term “thermal” IR is vague. It’s my understanding that IR typically induces vibrational energy increases in a molecule while microwave energy induces rotational energy increases. Both increase the energy level of the molecule. Both can increase “thermalization”, i.e. passing the increased energy to another molecule via collisional transfer of kinetic energy.
That is an unfortunate aspect of this sidetracking “debate”. What constitutes “thermal IR” has vague boundaries. No one would dispute that 10 micrometer wavelengths are thermal IR, but what about two waves per centimeter EM at 60GHz? There is almost no natural power at these wavelengths to accomplish anything of thermal significance — an exception being an engineered system design to produce high power.
Rotational energy provides a component of the degrees of freedom in the kinetic theory of gases, but unless there is an electric dipole in the rotating molecule there won’t be an interaction with an EM field of any significance.
No, it’s not “vague”.
w.
===
Direct, primary sources from NASA, the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP), and peer-reviewed literature define “thermal infrared” (thermal IR) as the portion of the infrared spectrum associated with the emission of heat by objects at Earth-like temperatures.
According to NASA and remote sensing literature, the thermal infrared region is typically defined as wavelengths from 3 micrometers (μm) to 14 micrometers (μm). Within this range, the 8–14 μmband is most commonly used for thermal imaging of Earth’s surface because it corresponds to the peak emission of objects at ambient temperatures and falls within the atmospheric window for terrestrial thermal radiation detection [2] [4].
ICNIRP and authoritative medical literature further subdivide infrared as follows:
• Near-Infrared (IR-A): 0.78–1.4 μm
• Mid-Infrared (IR-B): 1.4–3 μm
• Far-Infrared (IR-C): 3–1,000 μm [1] [3]
However, only the wavelengths longer than 3 μmare considered “thermal infrared” because they represent primarily emitted, not reflected, energy from objects at typical terrestrial temperatures [2].
No primary source defines “thermal infrared” to include wavelengths shorter than 3 μm. The upper boundary is consistently cited as either 14 μm or, for some applications, up to 15 μm [2] [4].
Summary:
The boundaries of “thermal infrared” are 3 μm to 14 μmin wavelength, with the most common operational range for terrestrial thermal sensing being 8 μm to 14 μm [2] [4]. These limits are supported by direct, empirical evidence from NASA and standard-setting organizations. No primary source exists for alternative boundaries.
Citations
[1] https://www.icnirp.org/en/frequencies/infrared/index.html
[2] https://up42.com/blog/introduction-to-thermal-infrared
[3] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3699878/
[4] https://science.nasa.gov/ems/07_infraredwaves/
You have squeezed an impressive amount of scientific knowledge into one concise comment!
If gas molecules do not produce SB type radiation, then labeling these types of graphs based on Planck temperature curves is a worthless endeavor.
In order to exert pressure, gases must have a temperature. Planck in sections 127 to 134 shows that the gas laws can be derived which show the relation to temperature.
‘If gas molecules do not produce SB type radiation, then labeling these types of graphs based on Planck temperature curves is a worthless endeavor.’
Thermal radiation is the emission of electromagnetic waves from all objects with a temperature above absolute zero. The word ‘objects’ is key here, as these consist of condensed (solids and liquids) matter, which exhibit ‘surfaces’ to / from which thermal radiation can be absorbed / emitted. Properties of thermal radiation include:
Atmospheric gases are not condensed matter, and therefore do not exhibit any of the above properties of thermal radiation, at least not under the non-plasma conditions that prevail here on Earth.
Re. ‘labelling’, the main issue with annotating the Earth’s Planck Curve with the names of GHG species is that in erroneously ‘conflates’ the properties of thermal radiation to these gases. This is a necessary and sufficient condition to justify the application of radiant transfer models (RTMs) to the lower troposphere, which is basically the genesis of all climate alarmism.
A brief, and better, description of how this ‘conflation’ came about, and it’s consequences, is provided in Part 2 (~page 11) of the attached PDF summary of a Shula-Ott presentation:
https://andymaypetrophysicist.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/01/Shula_Ott_Collaboration_Rev_5_Multipart_For_Wuwt_16jul2024.pdf
Frank from No Va says:
I must confess, I am always surprised when otherwise reasonable sounding people put forward such easily disproven claims.
Frank, buy an infrared “standoff” type thermometer. They read the amount of thermal infrared and convert it to temperature. Now go outside and point it at the sky. If the atmosphere is not radiating thermal infrared, the thermometer should read about 2K or so.
But it won’t read that, because there IS downwelling radiation from the atmosphere. It’s measured by both scientists and automated instruments all over the world, from the arctic to the tropics. In the SURFRAD stations around the US. On the TAO/TRITON buoys. At the US Climate Reference Network sites.
We also know that atmospheric gases absorb infrared radiation because we can measure it from satellites.
We also understand exactly which gases absorb and emit a lot of thermal IR, and which gases aborb and emit very little thermal IR. We understand the physical nature of the absorption emission (twisting/flexing/stretching of interatomic bonds) that we can predict the absorption/emission characteristics of molecules without actually testing them. And we do test them.
Below are references to back up what I said above. TL;DR version? Gas molecules absolutely absorb and emit thermal radiation.
Regards,
w.
[1] https://www.utdallas.edu/~scortes/ochem/OChem_Lab1/recit_notes/ir_presentation.pdf
[3] https://www.lehigh.edu/imi/teched/GlassCSC/Lecture_5_Petit.pdf
[4] https://projects.iq.harvard.edu/files/acmg/files/intro_atmo_chem_bookchap7.pdf
[5] https://chemistry.stackexchange.com/questions/25029/why-do-molecules-have-to-have-a-change-in-dipole-moment-in-order-for-them-to-be
[6] https://www.s-a-s.org/assets/docs/0470027320_Infrared_Spectroscopy_Theory.pdf>
Willis,
Thanks for the links, which I will review. In the meantime, I presume that the point of contention is my statement that gases, as ‘non-condensed matter’, don’t exhibit the major properties of thermal radiation. I have honestly ‘struggled’ with that idea, so it’s very possible that I’m wrong on this.
Ironically, my leanings on the above actually stem from some of your very fine work, namely your take down of Westerhold et al, which along with the Pleistocene ice core data, convinces me, and hopefully others, that the entire ‘CO2 is the control knob of climate’ theory is rubbish.
The issue with that conclusion, however, is that it infers that there are problem(s) in applying Schwarzschild’s radiative transfer model over the entire atmosphere, because doing so means that any change in radiative forcing must result in a temperature change, which from the data at hand, hasn’t happened.
One possible ‘solution’ to this quandary may be that IR-active gases near the Earth’s surface that absorb thermal radiation from the surface are predominantly thermalized in short order by collisions with non-IR active gases, thereby converting this radiation into sensible heat that is convected aloft, rather than re-radiated. If nothing else, this would explain why CO2 has not had any visible effect on the paleo record.
I’m sure you’ve seen other references to this line of reasoning, so won’t dwell on details except to say that it hinges on not conflating atmospheric gases with ‘objects’ with respect to their radiative properties, hence my position. However, I will attach a one-pager on the subject of the differences between the thermal radiation of gases and condensed matter for your consideration:
https://physics.stackexchange.com/questions/290528/difference-in-thermal-radiation-between-condensed-matter-and-gases
PS – I do have a FLIR One, which I occasionally use to avoid doing dumb things to my in-floor radiant system. My understanding is that it only senses IR in the atmospheric window, so I wouldn’t expect it to pick up on any direct IR emissions from CO2 and H20. However, it does register temperatures when I point it skyward, which I assume are emitted by dust, water droplets, clouds, etc.
All the best,
Frank
Follow-up to my previous comment:
Willis,
Just following up on your links for completeness:
As a lapsed ChE I have no issues with any of the information provided in links 1,3 and 5. Link 6 takes me to the landing page of the Society for Applied Spectroscopy, so I didn’t pursue it further.
I was disappointed, however, with link 4, because IMHO it’s just another version of Climate Science for Alarmists 101. In other words, the actual science presented therein, while accurate, is woefully (conveniently?) incomplete.
Specifically, there’s nothing there that allows any room whatsoever for, say, your emergent phenomena theory or for the idea that thermalization of excited GHGs within meters of the surface might mean that climate alarmism is way overblown.
Overall, I didn’t find anything in the links that would dispel the ideas I posted earlier, namely, that the properties of thermal radiation are generally applicable to condensed matter but not to gases.
All the best,
Frank
“But it won’t read that, because there IS downwelling radiation”
energy
“from the atmosphere. It’s measured by both scientists and automated instruments all over the world, from the arctic to the tropics.”
No it isn’t. They measure power, and it is negative.
No it isn’t. Individual molecules have no direct connection to temperature, but they do have a brightness — that is an amplitude of emitted power. This brightness is the result of a rate of transitions, which in turn is related to the probability of a molecule encountering an event with just the right energy to transfer. If a system is at local thermodynamic equilibrium this probability is related to the Boltzmann distribution and will lead to a brightness that is a point on the Planck function at some temperature.
So, while individual molecules know nothing about temperature, the ensembled of many line brightnesses will map out bits of the black body curve at whatever temperature provides the radiance. This might be different in different parts of a spectrum. Looking downward in a clear part of the spectrum (window) the ground provides this temperature.
This statement seems incongruous at best. Temperature is the measure of kinetic energy (sensible heat) held by atoms/molecules in a volume. The kinetic energy can become several types of motion, vibrational, rotational, translational, etc. That is a direct connection.
Kirchoff’s Law tells us that when a particle (atom/molecule) absorbs energy, it also emits energy. That brings up what happens in absorption/emission. An EM wave contains energy made up of electrical and magnetic fields. The instant an EM wave is absorbed, the energy it contained is no longer in the form of an EM wave. It is transitioned into kinetic energy in a particle. When the particle emits, that kinetic energy is again transitioned back into an EM wave. The “brightness” of that EM wave is determined by the energy in it.
As to a gas not being a material of sufficient density to meet the SB equation. Gases are not black bodies, their emissivity varies depending on all the variables contained in the ideal gas law. That does make it difficult to use simple equations. Consequently, a constant known as emissivity “σ” must be added to the SB equation. This can be used to convert the intensity, brightness as you call it, to a temperature.
Which brings me back to my original problem. H2O and CO2 have lots of overlap in their spectrums. Their emissivity’s are also different. How does one attribute each molecules emissivity to the final result and label the temperature as from one or the other.
‘I’ll just point out that scientists like Dr Roy Spencer measure air temperature from space by sensing the temperature dependent wavelengths of infrared emitted by oxygen, for example.’
I think that would be news to Dr Spencer. This is what is measured according to his website:
‘Microwave temperature sounders like AMSU measure the very low levels of thermal microwave radiation emitted by molecular oxygen in the 50 to 60 GHz oxygen absorption complex.’
Yes, infrared. Below visible red. Light. That’s what radiation is – light.
“Thermal microwave radiation” is infrared. Not visible, not ultraviolet.
Maybe you can find an experiment showing some matter above absolute zero which emits no radiation at all? That would shut me up, wouldn’t it?
I doubt anything will prevent you from persisting in this effort of yours because according to your definition, AM broadcasts are done with infrared radiation.
Before we lose sight of the goal here, whatever heat transport mechanisms we discuss have to have some practical impact on the greenhouse effect or more generally the climate.
In working on my part III of energy imbalance I have noticed, from oxygen isotope data, that there is a persistent energy imbalance on the Earth that is of the order one-half watt per meter squared, positive to negative, that causes the cooling or warming of our planet and accumulation or melting of ice on time scales from many millenia down to decades. Thus, energy transport of the order of one-half watt per squared meter is significant.
These oxygen magnetic dipole transitions you now bring up are 5 or 6 orders of magnitude smaller than one-half watt per squared meter. They have wavelengths of two per centimeter. You can see them tabulated in the calculations from Modtran. They are at the longest wavelengths calculated, but they are far below the lower limit of any typical infrared radiometers and are referred to as microwaves or millimeter waves. They are detected with technology more akin to radio than anything else. Other than enabling temperature measurement they have no climatic significance whatsoever.
In my physics undergraduate days I was introduced to the simplest model of interaction between an electromagnetic field and matter possible. The interaction of an EM field with an electric dipole is a powerful interaction and ubiquitous in nature. Fortunately for us O2 and N2 don’t exhibit permanent dipoles and so miss out on significant interactions with EM radiation — i.e. they don’t interact with IR fields.
O2 has a triplet state, an unpaired electron in its ground state, which allows it weak interaction with EM fields in the gigahertz region. N2 has no triplet ground state, but it does have a triplet in some excited states. So, collisions could give rise to similar magnetic dipole radiation in N2, but it’s going to be two orders of magnitude smaller still. Arguing these nits is a complete distraction from the stated goal of this website, which is climate.
Thanks, Kevin. You say regarding Michael Flynn:
“I doubt anything will prevent you from persisting in this effort of yours because according to your definition, AM broadcasts are done with infrared radiation.”
It’s true. Michael says “Yes, infrared. Below visible red. Light. That’s what radiation is – light.”
No, Michael, all radiation is not light. Light is only a small part of the electromagnetic spectrum.
As another example, despite my explaining over and over that the absorption and radiation of thermal IR only happens because of the flexing, twisting, and/or stretching of the bonds between the atoms of gas molecules, he still can’t grasp that argon being a monatomic gas has no such bonds and thus doesn’t emit or absorb thermal IR.
I suspect that, like me, he was told somewhere in his education that ALL things radiate thermal IR. And like me, he believed it 100%. And while it’s true for all solids, as I found out in my later life, it’s not true for monatomic gases like argon. And unlike Michael …
It is Michael’s unshakeable level of scientific misunderstanding, plus his unpleasant accusations directed at anyone who disagrees with him, that have led me to mostly ignore what he says.
Anyhow, kudos to you for still making the attempt, although as you say, it’s doubtful that anything will ever change his mind.
Best to you and yours,
w.
‘I suspect that, like me, he was told somewhere in his education that ALL things radiate thermal IR.’
I suspect that goes for all of us. I also suspect that it would be interesting to peruse some older texts to ascertain exactly when the blurring of radiative behaviors between ‘things’ (objects) and atmospheric gases began.
No, Michael, all radiation is not light.
Editing, hit the wrong button.
Light, thermal, infrared, microwave, radio, AC, are all imprecise descriptions of portions of the electromagnetic spectrum.
Infrared may be considered light by other life. Microwaves may be thermal. These descriptors are not scientific, they are what humans perceive.
EM waves have electric and magnetic fields and carry energy. Their properties are governed by Maxwell’s equations.
EM wave interaction with atoms/molecules are pretty well defined. The absorption of energy can be appotioned into different reactions of them.
Thanks, w. I always appreciate your efforts with data analysis. They always lead to thought stimulating posts. The example of purging to avoid spurious signals was great insight — an example that should have made the point utterly clear.
You’re just being silly and pig-headed now. Even NASA (and every other sane physicist in the world) agrees with me. Here’s NASA
Maybe you meant to say “visible light”?
Do you still believe that adding CO2 makes it hotter?
‘I doubt anything will prevent you from persisting in this effort of yours because according to your definition, AM broadcasts are done with infrared radiation.’
Michael’s definition of the ‘infrared’ also includes the ‘ultraviolet’.
Accepting that objective reality doesn’t exist (an ironic contradiction in itself) under the aegis of postmodernism allows us to free ourselves from the unjustly colonized and socially incorrect tenets of modern physics!
/sarc (in case it’s needed)
‘In working on my part III of energy imbalance…’
Good!
What “effort” is that? If you don’t agree with my definition of infrared radiation being all those wavelengths longer than (below) visible red, provide another.
The rest of your comment seems to imply that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, or something similar, involving some effect which cannot be described consistently and unambiguously.
The Earth currently loses energy at about 44 TW. That’s generally regarded as “cooling”, but ignorant and gullible people seem to think that “slow cooling” results in “heating”!
How silly is that?
By the AM is an abbreviation for “amplitude modulation”. Visible light modulation involves signal transmission by modulating visible light.
Infrared amplitude modulation is extensively used in IR remote controls, so yes, my definition seems OK.
Do you agree?
I do not agree. Your effort is that of trying to convince people that CO2 will not make an atmosphere warm, or warmer, or hot, of whatever adjective you use on any occasion. You seem intent on insisting that CO2 has no effect, or that there is no greenhouse effect, or maybe that cold gas cannot transfer energy to a warm surface. What you never do is answer any question put to you. Instead you refer to Feynman or Tyndall.
No one here insists that CO2 makes air hot. What we maintain is that adding co2 to air changes the manner in which it interacts with blackbody radiation passing through it, or with specific frequencies of EM radiation passing through it. It can certainly make air hot in some circumstances.
So adding CO2 to air does not make it hot, but can make it hot in some circumstances. An interesting concept – it doesn’t, except when it does.
“Climate scientists” like the self-proclaimed “climate scientist” Gavin Schmidt claim that CO2 is well mixed in the atmosphere.
Under what “circumstances” can adding CO2 to the atmosphere make it “hotter”? Surface temperatures vary between about +90 C, and -90 C. What circumstances will result in hotter air due to CO2 in the atmosphere above these surface extremes?
There is no consistent and unambiguous description of the GHE, so hopefully your “circumstances” don’t refer to something that doesn’t exist.
I’m not trying to convince anybody of anything. If you believe that adding CO2 to air sometimes makes it hotter, you are free to do so. I’m sure there are plenty of ignorant and gullible people who will believe you.
i don’t. Sorry about that.
I agree there’s vagueness on the subject of DLR. It is mostly modeled, using inputs for temperature and water content in the air column, although they do say that where it is actually measured, it agrees well with the modeled values.
One question I have, along the lines of the distinction you raised between thermal emissions from ‘bodies’, e.g., dust and ice particles, water droplets, clouds, etc., and emissions from IR-active gas species, is what is actually being measured / modeled?
I also have questions about the instruments themselves, e.g., are they limited to picking up IR radiation in the atmospheric window? Are they cooled to very low temperatures, hence giving a very misleading result on the ‘direction’ of energy flow? And lastly, what exactly is the contribution, if any, of IR-active gases to DLR given that thermalization by collisions with non-IR active gas species effectively prevents the former from spontaneously emitting photons in the lower troposphere.
Frank, read manuals on pyrgeometers and pyranometers. Kipp and Zonen are pretty standardly used and have downloadable manuals.
You will likely come to the conclusion that a tape measures accurate to thousandths of an inch are being used to measure the strike zone calls of a major league umpire in real time…necessitating much extrapolation and interpolation.
Thanks DM. I don’t have any questions about the solar instruments. My main concern is with DLR; I have no doubt that we can measure the downwelling thermal radiation in the aptly named atmospheric window that emanates from condensed matter in the atmosphere. But I am very suspicious of claims that the instruments are picking up spontaneous emissions from CO2, H2O and other IR-active gases given that these are preferentially thermalized via collisions with non-IR active gas species like N2 and O2.
It’s been a while, which means I probably won’t be able to find it, but I recall that Pat Frank resurrected a thread in which stevekj and others openly debated what the instruments were actually capable of measuring.
As I almost certainly described in that other thread you mention, pyrgeometers measure upwelling thermal radiation at the surface. That is what the 2nd Law predicts, and it is indeed what they measure. It’s not what they report, but that’s a different story, isn’t it? There’s a whole lot of nonsense going on in between the measurement and the final report.
Your belief means you have to deny so many results. If I were you I’d bring about a class action against pyrgeometer manufacturers for claiming they can measure downwelling radiation.
Tim, your attempt at sarcasm might be misplaced.
“Downwelling radiation” is just pseudoscientific jargon for radiation from the atmosphere.
Apparently to confuse the ignorant and gullible into believing that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, or that the Earth is getting hotter, or some other specious nonsense.
You wouldn’t be prepared to say you believe anything so fantastic, would you?
I thought not.
Yes. But not “pseudoscientific jargon”, its actual radiation from the atmosphere. So what’s the problem?
In science, the principle of parsimony should apply to descriptions.
“Radiation” is sufficient in itself. It it is coming from above, you could call it “downward” or “downwelling” radiation, but nothing is gained. You might as well start referring to “horizontal” radiation as “sidedwelling” radiation, and so on.
Or you could claim that the statistics of weather observations determines future weather! “Climate scientist” claim that weather events can be determined by “climate change”, which is due to a mythical “greenhouse effect”, which doesn’t even have a consistent and unambiguous description.
No problem at all to me. What about you?
“Your belief means you have to deny so many results.”
Let’s try writing that correctly:
“Real physics means you have to deny so many fake results.”
Yes, that is correct now.
“If I were you I’d bring about a class action against pyrgeometer manufacturers for claiming they can measure downwelling radiation.”
Sure, Tim, I’ll get right on that, because I’ve got nothing better to do and bags of money to spend on lawyers. No, it’s not my job to take the pyrgeometer manufacturers to court over fake physics, and the courts wouldn’t care anyway. Rather, as a supposedly intelligent and well-informed consumer of their work, it is your job to determine when they are shoveling the bovine excrement, and reject it. Preferably loudly and in public.
If you look closely, you can see where the real result is, so their work is not a total waste of time, but you need to dig a bit to get the correct answer, and they usually don’t make any of this easy for you to do for yourself after the fact, because they don’t publish the individual terms, or even the temperature, just the final sum:
LWi = k1Sd + k2σTd^4
^^^^^^ ^^^^^^
Actual Fake-physics
result adjustment (“self-irradiance”)
I haven’t read the doco but that looks ok to me. That looks like the body of the apparatus radiates towards the sensor and needs to be corrected for. What makes that “fake physics” ?
“That looks like the body of the apparatus radiates [energy, in Joules] towards the sensor”
The problem is that they hallucinated that radiant energy is the same as radiant power, and blithely substituted one for the other with no regard whatsoever for the Law of Conservation of Energy or indeed the Second Law of Thermodynamics. No bueno. A preposterous fraud has been perpetrated here.
In other words, disingenuously or ignorantly, they failed to take into account that while the body of the apparatus does indeed radiate energy to the sensor, the sensor (at the same temperature) radiates exactly the same energy back, resulting in a thermal equilibrium situation inside the apparatus. No work is done in such a situation, and no power can be developed. They left that entire half of the system out of their equation, though. Why?
Its a correction term. The problem with your statement is that you’re providing no information about what k1Sd is actually a measure of and yet you’re still claiming “fake physics”
“Its a correction term.”
In the sense that it is “correcting” a real result into a piece of propaganda, yes, it is.
“you’re providing no information about what k1Sd is actually a measure of”
That is the measurement of power developed from the sensor to its environment (or vice versa, depending on the temperatures involved). I apologize for not making that explicit earlier, but it’s in the manufacturer’s documents too, so it’s not difficult to find.
“you’re still claiming “fake physics””
Yes, the “adjustment factor” which involves converting a single object’s temperature directly into power is fake physics, as I’ve explained before. But since you don’t know what “energy” even means, this is going to be a tough concept for you.
What manufacturer? What product? You’re just as bad as Michael Flynn and almost never give references especially when they’re needed for your argument.
You don’t need “references”, Tim, you need a physics textbook. Why don’t you pick one up, open it, and work through all the exercises from start to finish? Like the rest of us have. Then you might be able to define “energy” correctly, among other basic physics skills.
Here’s your “reference”, though, not that it will do you any good:
“Apogee SL-510 and SL-610 pyrgeometers output two signals: a voltage from the thermopile radiation detector (proportional to the radiation balance between target and detector)”
from here: https://www.apogeeinstruments.com/content/SL-510-610-manual.pdf
I dont need references, you do. I generally give references where they’re needed and certainly when they’re asked for. You dont. You did the absolute bare minimum in this case. Here is the relevant section. What, specifically do you have a problem with?
Their first sentence is only half true, because objects cannot “emit power” all by themselves. (In other words, “radiation transfer [between what and what?] is proportional to the fourth power of absolute temperature [of which object]”?)
The second sentence describes actual power, based on the temperature gradient, which requires two objects, not just one, and describes the behaviour of the sensor (which is one of the two objects in this scenario) correctly. No issue there.
More junk. Objects radiate based only on their temperature and not what objects are near.
EM waves contain “power”. What do you think the amplitudes of the fields mean?
The power radiated in an EM wave remains until something changes the wave..
“Objects radiate [energy] based only on their temperature”
Fixed that for you.
“EM waves contain “power”.”
No they don’t. Who taught you that? And what do you think “power” means? Or “energy”, for that matter? (EM waves can be used to develop power, though, of course, like any other form of energy can)
“What do you think the amplitudes of the fields mean?”
What amplitudes? Photons don’t have “amplitudes” like ocean waves do. Not that we can measure, anyway. They have a wavelength, though, which is of course the inverse of frequency, and a characteristic energy (not power), given by E=hf, where h is the Planck constant, and f is the frequency. This unit is in Joules, of course, not Watts. Where did you say you studied your physics, again?
Note that the Poynting vector at any given location does have an amplitude (and direction), though, and this indicates the strength (and direction) of the resultant field’s energy and gradient at that location.
“The
power[energy] radiated in an EM wave remains until somethingchanges[interacts with] the wave[ and any other waves that may be present at the same time and location, and then if an entropy gradient is present, work will be done (i.e. energy will be transferred), and thus power will be developed, but only in the unique direction of increasing entropy.]”Much better now. This is what all our instruments show us, and is in accordance with all known laws of physics. Although, the description could still be improved to take into account that time itself (e.g. “until” as well as “and then”) does not pass the same way for EM waves that it does for everything else in the universe. But never mind that for now.
You have obviously never studied electrical engineering nor Maxwell’s equation.
I can take my transmitter and generate EM waves at various frequencies with varying power levels.
I can buy microwave ovens that have various power levels.
From:
https://pressbooks.online.ucf.edu/phy2054lt/chapter/energy-in-electromagnetic-waves/
From:
https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-007-electromagnetic-energy-from-motors-to-lasers-spring-2011/3c2144742cf51b5c60a28b2f23b9f157_MIT6_007S11_lec20.pdf
Photons have a unique and discreet energy value that is not dependent on the intensity of the EM that is carrying it. A photon is not an EM wave and an EM wave is not a photon. A single EM wave can carry numerous photons, or quanta (photons) the unique packets of energy.
Stop using things you have cherry picked with no knowledge of what you are reading. Your wordplay is the sign of a simple teenager and quite honestly, isn’t worth the time to respond to.
“You have obviously never studied electrical engineering nor Maxwell’s equation.”
False
“I can take my transmitter and generate EM waves at various frequencies with varying power levels.”
Only because you are transmitting across an entropy gradient to receivers with less energy than your transmitter. If the transmitter antenna were bathed in more EM field energy than your power supply is capable of generating, it would dissipate 0 watts, and instead would start to feed power back into your amplifier, according to the Second Law. (That might not be good for the amplifier, so I don’t recommend trying this, unless you can afford a new one)
“I can buy microwave ovens that have various power levels”
Only because the interior of the oven (and your food) contain less energy
than the magnetron emitter. As before, this forms an entropy gradient. And if you somehow separately fill the interior of the microwave cavity with more field energy than the magnetron is capable of producing, it will probably blow out the magnetron. (I take no responsibility for the state of your oven if you try this)
Do you have any more stupid and ignorant examples of misunderstanding how physics works?
“In electromagnetic waves, the amplitude is the maximum field strength of the electric and magnetic fields.”
i.e., energy
Yes, that’s why I described the Poynting vector the same way. It’s not because the E-M fields are oscillating wider, like an ocean wave, which is what you seem to think. Nor, and more importantly, is it because they contain inherent power. That is unphysical nonsense, as any physics student teenager knows. (But not the engineers, apparently)
“a simple teenager”
I am not the one who can’t define basic concepts like “energy”, “power”, and “entropy”. That would be you, wouldn’t it? Of course it would. Therefore, if I am operating at the level of a teenager, that would put you at about the level of a 6-year-old, at most.
You are so full of crap it isn’t funny. The fact that I can generate an EM wave with different power levels is the issue.
Again that has nothing to do with the issue.
Here is what you said.
Nothing you have responded with support your assertion that EM waves don’t have power.
More hand waving with nothing to support your assertion except your opinion.
I showed you the equation, and you ignored it and just repeated your opinion. Refute this with a reference of your own. If you can’t, you LOSE!
I’ll repeat my support.
From:
https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-007-electromagnetic-energy-from-motors-to-lasers-spring-2011/3c2144742cf51b5c60a28b2f23b9f157_MIT6_007S11_lec20.pdf
In case you aren’t a math whiz.
|E̅| is the symbol for the scalar magnitude of the vector E. That is “wider” in your language!
|H̅| is the symbol for the scalar magnitude of the vector H. That is “wider” in your language!
You are like a joker saying watch my hands while they move and don’t listen to what I am saying.
“You are so full of crap it isn’t funny.”
I’m not the one who can’t define “energy”, or “radiation”, correctly.
“The fact that I can generate an EM wave with different power levels is the issue.”
No you can’t. What you can generate is EM waves with different energy levels. Because that’s what they are. Even Willis knows that. Well, as of last Sunday he does, anyway. It’s a brand-new piece of knowledge for him, and still far off in the distance for you, apparently.
“EM waves don’t have power.”
Not intrinsically, no, because they are an energy phenomenon. Everyone from James Clerk Maxwell to Willis the fisherman knows that. (Naturally, any form of energy can be used to develop power, including EM energy.)
What do you think “power” means, anyway? Can you define the terms “energy” and “power” for me? Obviously you can’t define “radiation” correctly, that’s a more advanced topic, so let’s stick to the basics and see how badly you do.
I gave you a reference from MIT and you have the chutzpa to spout off your ignorant interpretation of what you think! Grow up sonny.
https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-007-electromagnetic-energy-from-motors-to-lasers-spring-2011/3c2144742cf51b5c60a28b2f23b9f157_MIT6_007S11_lec20.pdf
Notice the text that says:
Intensity = Power/Area = |E̅| • |H̅|
We are done till you can provide support for your outlandish fountains of craziness.
“I gave you a reference from MIT”
Without, apparently, understanding even a single word in it. (They didn’t define “power” for you, sadly, so you’re going to have to look elsewhere for that.)
“1000 W/m^2”
You don’t know what a Watt is, and I wouldn’t put long odds on “meter” either, so let me explain to you that this only occurs because the Earth is much colder than the sun. Otherwise it wouldn’t.
“Power”
You have literally no idea what that word means. Please define it correctly before we proceed, as I have asked you to do many times. Thanks!
If you can’t show a reference explaining what you assert, then you lose the argument. Ad hominem don’t explain anything.
I asked you to define your words, and you couldn’t. You have not made an “argument”, you have simply spouted nonsense. You aren’t using any of those words the way physicists use them.
Instead of reading treatises on electromagnetism from MIT that you have no hope of understanding, because they are written for physicists, you should probably start here with this link. Let us know when you have completed the chapters on “energy”, “work”, “force”, and “power”, and can define those words correctly along with their relationships to each other, and then we can think about talking about electromagnetism. It’s a very advanced topic and not for feeble-minded half-witted engineers. This is required reading.
https://phys.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/University_Physics/Physics_(Boundless)/1%3A_The_Basics_of_Physics
I gave you the definition shown by MIT and it is what I learned when being taught how to deal with Maxwell’s four partial differential equations dealing with electromagnetism. Fundamentally, this definition applies:
Intensity = Power/Area = |E̅| • |H̅|
This is the dot product of the scalar magnitudes of the electric and magnetic fields of an EM wave. Why don’t you show us your mathematical definition of the power contained in an EM wave.
You spend lot’s energy of dancing around any definitive answer dude. Yet nothing that shows you have any understanding.
Why don’t you show us how YOU DEFINE the power contained in an ElectroMagnetic Wave. and/or show us a reference that does so in the detail given by the MIT reference here.
https://ocw.mit.edu/courses/6-007-electromagnetic-energy-from-motors-to-lasers-spring-2011/3c2144742cf51b5c60a28b2f23b9f157_MIT6_007S11_lec20.pdf
Your deflection into base definitions does nothing to show that you have any clue about how they are combined in an EM wave.
In other words, walk the talk or give it up!
“Power”
You still can’t define that word. Have you completed that basic physics course I assigned you yet?
“dancing around any definitive answer”
I’m not the one who can’t define “power”, so I’m obviously not the one who is doing the “dancing”.
“the power contained in an ElectroMagnetic Wave”
Power is not “contained in” anything. Not that you would have any clue about that. How much speed is “contained in” your car?
Out here in the real world, the power developed from one object to another via electromagnetic radiant energy fields depends entirely on the temperature of both objects, of course. More generally, on the energy (“capacity to do work”) gradient involved, or even more precisely, the entropy gradient. That is what we can measure. Nothing else. Therefore that is how the universe works. As best we can tell, anyway.
“Your deflection into”
insistence on
“base definitions”
Yes, because that’s how science works. Not that you would know. Science means knowledge, and knowledge depends on definitions. Without definitions, you are just babbling nonsense. And you can’t measure any of it, either, putting you squarely into the realm of fantasy and fiction. I’m sorry that your engineering professors misled you so badly, but then, it makes no difference to them, in the end, does it? Nor to you, obviously.
Have you ever managed to sell any of this baloney to any actual professional physicists? If so, which ones? I would like to have a chat with them. (And no, Roy Spencer is not a physicist. He can’t define “power” correctly either.)
You are obviously THE ONE who can’t define power. You have yet to show a mathematical definition of power.
I’ve shown you the mathematical definition of the power contained in an EM wave as illustrated in an MIT online course.
Intensity = Power/Area = |E̅| • |H̅|
Here is another derivation from:
Elements of Physics, Dr. Shortley and Dr. Williams, Volume Two Third Edition, 1960
This is somewhat different than the MIT derivation, but it still shows the power in an EM wave is a function of the amplitudes of the field values.
Be a good boy and show your math to the world that refutes what I have shown.
Perhaps this page will help elucidate to you, that the power contained in an EM wave is directly related to the amplitude of the E field and the B field.
It takes *power* to generate an EM wave. That power is inherent to the EM wave. The EM wave generated by a 1KW AM radio station is not as strong (i.e. has less power) than the EM wave generated by a 10KW AM radio station. The *watt* is a measure of power. The watt-hour is the measure of the amount of work done. A travelling EM wave does no work so there are no watt-hours involved. There is still power in the EM wave.
steve is confusing work with power.
This equivalent question shows an equivalent level of usefulness.
Sure it does, Tim, sure it does. Keep telling yourself that.
Well, sort of, mkelly, but it’s not quite true that the atmosphere doesn’t radiate any energy at all. Parts of it do, and some of it more efficiently than others, depending on the temperatures and emissivities of the various gases (and liquids) involved. The main thing is that none of it is warmer than the surface, therefore none of it can transfer energy to the surface.
On a net basis you are correct. On a component level you are not.
Heat a metal rod to 1200F. Put it in a vacuum and time how long it takes to cool to 70F.
Heat a second rod to 1000F. Put it near the first rod at 1200F, both in vacuum. Time how long it takes both to col to 70F.
Bet you the two time intervals won’t be equal. dQ/dt will be different for the 1200F rod in each case.
“On a component level you are not.”
Those “components” are hallucinations. You can’t measure them. They don’t exist, except in your head.
Your example does not contradict anything I said. Energy flow between two objects depends on the temperatures of both.
It does contradict you. You believe there is no energy flow from the cooler rod to the warmer rod. You’ve been very explicit about that.
If you actually believe it doesn’t contradict, please describe what you think is happening for everyone here.
It seems to me is that what many are missing is the difference between the detail of what is happening and the net result.
“It does contradict you.”
No it doesn’t.
“You believe there is no energy flow from the cooler rod to the warmer rod.”
Correct. (It’s not a matter of “believe”, that’s just how the physics works, and how the relevant terms are defined, of course at all times being in accordance with all available experimental evidence as is required for any science)
“please describe what you think is happening”
I’ve given some more detailed descriptions below, as I have for you before, but none of it sank in, even when I wrote a description that a three-year-old could understand. (Even the fact that that one was an analogy apparently went miles over your head, since you seem to enjoy childishly gloating over your own misapprehension that my analogy somehow constituted my entire understanding of the subject, despite the fact that I explicitly told you why I was writing it that way, and that that description was not the one that physicists use.) So I strongly doubt that rewriting all of that will help this time either. However, I can try writing it for an eight-year-old audience instead of a three-year-old one, using a water analogy, or even a twenty-year-old audience, with electromagnetic field strengths and counteracting potentials. Which level do you think I should try for you next?
Full physics level, thanks. No simplified analogies, explain as explicitly as you can. You’re not just writing for me, you’re writing for everyone here including actual physicists.
Either that or a simple reference from a mainstream paper would be better and save you the trouble.
Well, you can read any physics textbook about radiation physics. They’ll all tell you the same thing. Maybe this one:
https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/classical-electromagnetic-radiation_jerry-b-marion/908511/item/13068062/?utm_source=google&utm_medium=cpc&utm_campaign=pmax_canada_low_17770472293&utm_adgroup=&utm_term=&utm_content=&gad_source=1&gad_campaignid=17414391828&gclid=Cj0KCQjw9O_BBhCUARIsAHQMjS6FPLOpnFucaR5LdAWEwxfmn36Kh47cg9s-cbm_tVgs0G4DVptc0SAaAvIIEALw_wcB#idiq=13068062&edition=2750932
Although I haven’t read it myself. But I’ll eat my hat if it doesn’t say some version of this, part of which Willis also wrote below, and all of which you can also find in the various relevant Wikipedia articles:
Electromagnetic radiation is a form of energy transmitted without a medium, in the form of alternating electric and magnetic fields. The strength of these fields is of course measured in Joules. And these fields, like any other form of energy, comprise the “potential to do work”. Every object in the universe above absolute 0 emits electromagnetic fields, and these fields all combine together into a universal EM field. At any point in space, varying by both time and frequency, this field has a single three-dimensional gradient vector. This is called the Poynting vector, and denotes the direction and magnitude in which the field applies force, and therefore the direction in which work (transfer of energy) will be performed. And thus also the direction in which power will be developed, as power is defined as the rate of doing work. Work done and power developed by this universal electromagnetic field depends on the matter with which it interacts, characterized by quantities such as emissivity and absorptivity of different materials at different frequencies and temperatures.
Any objections?
Applied to Tim G’s two-rod example, the hotter rod emits a higher strength (energy) of EM field than the colder one, thus the Poynting vector at all points between the two rods points from the hotter one to the colder one, and that is the direction in which energy will be transferred, work will be done, and power will be developed. Until equilibrium is achieved, of course, at which time the Poynting vector at all points between the two rods will have a magnitude of 0, indicating that no energy can be transferred and no work can be done.
“Applied to Tim G’s two-rod example, the hotter rod emits a higher strength (energy) of EM field than the colder one”
ROFL! What do you think we’ve all been saying?
There are TWO EM fields! Their Net value determines the Poynting vector.
“There are TWO EM fields! Their Net value determines the Poynting vector.”
Correct. I never said anything different. The other Tim did, though.
You are denying reality. Prove mathematically that my example is wrong. The cooling times *will* be different. The slower cooling allows the first object to dump *more* heat, in essence acting as a sort of reflector of heat received from the second object – thus preventing the second object from cooling. The second object warms from the heat received from the first object. It’s a *net* flow.
“Can’t measure them” doesn’t mean they don’t exist. You can’t measure volume either using any instrument that I know of. You have to calculate the volume from other measurements – just like measuring the difference in cooling times for two heated rods.
“You are denying reality.”
No I’m not. Saying it doesn’t make it so. Nothing I’ve written contradicts any experimental result.
“The slower cooling allows the first object to dump *more* heat, in essence acting as a sort of reflector of heat received from the second object – thus preventing the second object from cooling.”
This is so confused it isn’t even wrong. Where did you say you studied your physics?
“It’s a *net* flow”
Where did you get the word “net” from? It does not appear in the definitions of either “energy”, “work”, or “power”. You hallucinated it.
““Can’t measure them” doesn’t mean they don’t exist.”
What do you think the word “exists” means? What do you think the word “hallucinated” means?
“You can’t measure volume either using any instrument that I know of.”
You certainly can. Even Archimedes could. What do you think a graduated beaker measures, for example?
“just like measuring the difference in cooling times for two heated rods.”
I never said that didn’t exist – i.e. the difference. What doesn’t exist is “gross flows” which you mathematically add up to get “net flow”. You can’t measure “gross flow”. It is a hallucination. A fiction. An irreproducible result. Not science.
You didn’t understand Tim’s claim.
Here it is again
You’ve just said knowing a volume, you can measure the volume of something else that conveniently fills the known volume. Tim was getting at a different problem…What measuring device measures the volume of the beaker?
stevekj has no clue about beakers. His knowledge of measurement is seriously lacking. Here is a link about calibration of beakers, pipettes, and burettes.
https://chem.libretexts.org/Courses/University_of_California_Davis/Chem_4A_Lab%3A_General_Chemistry_for_Majors_I/Chem_4A%3A_Laboratory_Manual/04_1%3A_Calibration_of_Volumetric_Glassware_(Experiment)
The determination of the graduations is not done by a device that directly measures volume.
“The determination of the graduations is not done by a device that directly measures volume.”
What difference do you think that makes? When did I ever say it had to be? Every step is based on an objective measurement of something else, and everyone who does that measurement will get the same answer. That’s not true for “gross heat”, though, since there is no such thing, and no one has even attempted to measure it – even in multiple stages of other direct and objectively repeatable measurements. It can’t be done. Because you can’t measure hallucinations.
“a different problem”
It’s an irrelevant one. There are several ways to mark up a volumetric measuring device accurately, involving weights and densities of known fluids, etc., just as Archimedes knew how to do. Volume is not a fictional concept. You can tell because when different people do these calibrations and measurements, they all get the same answer. That’s science. How do you propose to ensure that important scientific characteristic for the fictional and purely imaginary “gross heat”? Not even one person has ever measured such a thing, never mind several to confirm it. That’s how you can tell it’s fictional.
Its relevant because the claim was that
It was immediately before the claim on inability to measure volume and the point is you cant measure it. You can measure something else and then use a formula to derive the volume.
And the important context for you is the claim that energy can flow in two directions but only be measured as the net result in the one direction.
So for example the Poynting vector is a way to understand net EM fields, its not a “real thing”, the thing that is real is the idea behind it, and that is conservation of energy.
It is valid to consider multiple vectors from multiple fields that sum to a single net value and in fact your description here
Doesn’t even attempt to directly address the fact the hot rod cools more slowly but implies the Poynting vector is smaller on account of the way the fields interact…but that’s just a mathematical way of calculating the net effect.
Except you dont like the idea of a net effect and as far as I can tell, the Poynting vector is real to you.
So what is the crucial part of your description… and its here
In a single field there can only be one direction of energy flow. But that doesn’t change anything. The single direction is still just the net contribution of all the flows combined.
And that
So the fact the matter (eg warmer surface of the earth) interacts with the EM from the cooler atmosphere means the surface molecules can absorb that EM radiation as long as the net energy flow is upward and you’ve not contradicted this at all.
And
You’ve not provided anything yet to backup your claim that the warmer rod cant absorb energy from the cooler rod. You’ve restated the fact that the net effect is the cooler rod absorbs energy from the warmer rod [as a result of a net effect in universal EM field using the poynting vector calculation] and that mathematically the warmer rod radiates less towards the cooler rod.
To back up your claim, you’re going to need to very carefully describe EM absorptivity and emissivity in such a way as to exclude the possibility that a molecule can absorb EM radiation in the circumstance where the bulk substance is emitting more than it’s receiving (mathematically if you prefer)
Try to stay away from pressure, boards and springs.
Nice explanation.
“It was immediately before the claim on inability to measure volume and the point is you cant measure it”
Sure you can.
“In a single field there can only be one direction of energy flow.”
Correct.
“The single direction is still just the net contribution of all the flows combined.”
No it isn’t. There are no “all the flows combined”. That’s a hallucination. No one has ever measured any of them. They don’t exist.
“the warmer rod cant absorb energy from the cooler rod. ”
What do you think “absorb energy” means, in terms of the basic physics concepts of “energy”, “work”, and “power”? Do you mean “perform work”? Because no, the cooler rod cannot perform work on the warmer one. No one has ever seen that happen.
“Try to stay away from pressure, boards and springs.”
As I said, that analogy was designed for your intelligence and education level. I fear it was still too complex for you.
This is what you need to carefully define in such a way as to support your argument. Do it with full physics. Make the argument in such a way as to exclude the atmospheric EM field from interacting with the surface.
You didn’t answer my question.
It’s your claim that the surface doesn’t receive energy from the cooler atmosphere. You need to justify it as per my original statement
Of course you can simply ignore it and move on but this is your chance to clear up the physics behind your claim for all to see.
“It’s your claim that the surface doesn’t receive energy from the cooler atmosphere.”
What do you think “receive” means? Please use the standard physics terms of “energy”, “work”, and “power” in your answer.
Oh, and also:
“It’s your claim that the surface doesn’t receive energy from the cooler atmosphere.”
No, that wasn’t my claim. Now you are simply lying. Why don’t you write out what I actually said, for all to see? Because what I wrote was based on well-defined physics terms, but what you claimed I wrote wasn’t.
Regarding
From here we have your statement
So who’s lying now?
Regarding measurement of volume and
Using a ruler, measure width, depth and height and apply the formula Volume = Width x Depth x Height. You never measured volume. You cant measure volume with a ruler.
At this point, yet again, I feel that this has become a complete waste of time because you simply deny everything, never provide references and never take ownership.
If you are defining “receive” as one half of “transfer”, which I can’t assume when dealing with you, then yes, you are correct. A warmer object will not “receive” energy (thereby increasing its own total energy) from a colder one. Energy transfer only occurs the other way.
If you have a different meaning for “receive” than this one, then please do specify it, so everyone knows what you are talking about.
“You never measured volume”
Sure you have. What do you think “measure” means?
“complete waste of time”
Only if you refuse to learn basic physics concepts, such as what “energy” means. Why don’t you start with that?
“You didn’t understand Tim’s claim.”
No, I understood it very well. It’s just that it was a retarded claim.
“You can’t measure volume either using any instrument that I know of.”
Certainly you can. Even Archimedes could. Start with a ruler, and let me know how you progress.
Heat loss has a functional relationship to temperature. For an object in a vacuum where the heat loss is totally radiative the heat loss is the integral of the temperature curve. The slower the decay the greater the area under the curve. Basic physics. What do you think determines the decay constant.
This has been explained to you at least twice. Each object will emit an EM wave. They will meet each other. They will either partially cancel or completely cancel. How much cancellation occurs determines the net flow.
(gotta go, more later)
“Heat loss has a functional relationship to [an object’s] temperature.”
That’s only half the truth, and it’s a misleading half. What else is heat (energy) loss (or gain) related to?
“net flow.”
You still haven’t explained where you got the word “net” from. The other Tim gave us his definitions of “energy”, “work”, and “power” in a different thread, and there is no “net” in any of them, but maybe you should give us your definitions here too, in case they are different.
“Net” can also describe a final amount or quantity after all costs, expenses, or deductions have been subtracted.”
It’s not a difficult definition to understand. If you had ever run a business it’s pretty obvious.
It’s all well and good to add up fictional costs and expenses and subtract them from fictional income, if that’s your thing.
You asked what “net” means. You speak as if you are an expert in physics. Part of physics is the analysis of forces on an object. Did you not learn an alternative name for the vector sum of forces? Several of *my* physics books refer to “net force”. Go here for an online book from Georgia Tech.
If you want a thermodynamics textbook go here: “https://openstax.org/books/college-physics-2e/pages/15-1-the-first-law-of-thermodynamics”
In order to have a “net” anything there must first be components from which the “net” value can be determined.
““net force””
This is a valid term. “Net work” is not. What do you think is the difference between “force” and “work”?
The issue is the net radiation (i.e. heat loss), not “net work”. You are trying to change what is being discussed – a red herring argument. You failed.
“You are trying to change what is being discussed”
No, that is a lie.
“net radiation [energy]”
is what I referred to as the Poynting vector. It results in work being done in one direction.
“net work”
What do you think “work” means, and how does it differ from “heat” in this context? But if it makes you feel better, read “net heat” where I wrote “net work”. (Lots of other people have tried to sell the concept of “net work”, but if you personally haven’t, then we’ll stick to the phrasing “net heat”)
“That’s only half the truth, and it’s a misleading half. What else is heat (energy) loss (or gain) related to?”
No, it’s the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
You forget to quote the very next sentence. Selective quoting really means you can’t refute what I said. Not unexpected.
“No, it’s the whole truth and nothing but the truth.”
It isn’t. Who taught you that?
“You forget to quote the very next sentence.”
Not a matter of forgetting. Your first sentence was misleading and only half-true, which is what I pointed out. You should try to avoid writing sentences like that.
“Not a matter of forgetting. Your first sentence was misleading and only half-true, which is what I pointed out. You should try to avoid writing sentences like that.”
No, my first sentence was part of the context taken as a whole. You indulged in selective quoting in order to avoid addressing the entire context. You still haven’t done so. Not unexpected.
“context taken as a whole.”
Your context is an object in a vacuum presumably surrounded by an environment with a temperature of 0 K. (the real “vacuum” of outer space is 3 K, but never mind) In this context, the radiant heat loss of the object is determined solely by its own temperature, yes. But that’s not what the rest of us are talking about. In the real world, such as on Earth’s surface, what else affects the heat loss of an object?
So what?
Again, so what?
“But that’s not what the rest of us are talking about. In the real world, such as on Earth’s surface, what else affects the heat loss of an object?”
Again, so what?
You keep missing what the term “net” means. In a vacuum there is only a limited number of components and only radiation that needs to be considered. However, what holds in a vacuum for radiation also holds on the surface of the earth. There *will* be a net radiative heat flow between two objects. The other factors are conduction and convection but that doesn’t invalidate the fact that there will be a *net radiation* factor in the heat loss between the two.
“So what?”
What do you mean, “so what?” You complained that I didn’t include your entire context. So I included it. That’s “so what”.
“You keep missing what the term “net” means.”
No, I am not the one who doesn’t know what that word means.
“net radiative heat flow”
Who told you that? It wasn’t a physicist. Can you define “gross flow” for me, please? And show me how to measure it?
“What do you mean, “so what?” You complained that I didn’t include your entire context. So I included it. That’s “so what”.”
What you said is *not* a refutation that radiation is emitted by both the warmer object and the cooler object. Two component EM waves.
So I say again, so what?
“Who told you that? It wasn’t a physicist. Can you define “gross flow” for me, please? And show me how to measure it?”
Malarky. You have absolutely *NO* idea how a Yagi directional antenna works, do you? How does it produce a directional EM wave from three different elements, one driven and two passive elements (a director and reflector). How can two driven elements with a 90deg phase shift between them produce a directional EM wave?
EM waves interact. The gross flows are vectors. In a frame of reference with two objects radiating one can be the forward component of the gross flow (call it the positive direction) and the other one can be the backward component of the gross flow (call it the negative direction). The NET flow is Vector1 – Vector2. Vector1 is the forward EM wave and Vector2 is the backward EM wave. They interact to form a NET EM wave.
go google: “antenna design method of moments”
Radiation is radiation. Doesn’t matter if it is at HF, microwave, or infrared.
Stop trying to say people don’t understand physics when it is obvious it is you that doesn’t.
“What you said is *not* a refutation that radiation [energy] is emitted by both the warmer object and the cooler object. Two component EM waves.”
I never said it was a refutation of that statement, nor would I want to.
“EM waves interact.”
Correct.
“The gross flows are vectors.”
What “gross flows”? Can you define “gross flow” (i.e. “gross heat”, i.e. “gross power”) for me, please? And while you’re at it, preferably also “energy” and “work”, in as many “net” and “gross” variants as are necessary to support your definition of “gross flow”, whatever that is. Then I can try to acquire some sort of understanding of what you’re hallucinating, because none of that is in any of my physics textbooks. Thanks.
You obviously don’t understand vectors and EM waves let alone simple English. Gross components combine into a net result. E.g. all revenue streams combine into a gross revenue. Gross revenue minus expense equals net revenue. E.g. gross gravity forces combine to form a net force which determines orbital mechanics.
You are a troll using an AI to feed you words with no understanding of basics.
You aren’t worth answering any longer.
“You obviously don’t understand vectors and EM waves let alone simple English.”
Sure, keep telling yourself that.
“Gross components combine into a net result.”
If they are real components, then yes. Dollars in and out are real, and can be measured. Forces are real components, and can also be measured. “Gross flows” are not. Across any given entropy gradient, there is only one “flow”, and the net force is what tells you what direction it will be in. (Always in the direction of increasing entropy, naturally.)
What you are actually doing with your dollar analogy is something like this: Bob paid me $10 to mow his lawn, so he is $10 poorer, and I am $10 richer. Our respective auditors will confirm these numbers. But what I’m going to report, for some reason, is that I actually made $1000 somehow, and then spent $990 of it in a way that I decline to explain. I’m still $10 richer, which no one can argue, but where did I get that extra $990 from, and where is it now? None can say, because of course it never existed… so what I would say is, it was a hallucination, from start to finish.
(The pyrgeometer scientists are even worse than that. They claim they actually made the full $1000, but, when asked, can’t show it to anyone. All they can show is the $10 they actually received. The rest is the Emperor’s New $990. Just trust us!)
Rather than dollars, the usual analogy we use in physics class is water. It represents energy, and, like energy, is a quantity. So when you have water flowing downhill in a river, which it often does, what is the “gross flow” downhill (!?), and the “gross flow” uphill (!?), that you can subtract in order to get the actual measurable (and always downhill) “net” (!?!?) flow?
“You aren’t worth answering any longer.”
Says the guy who can’t define the word “energy” to save his life, and can’t even define “radiation” as accurately as Willis the fisherman. (Wow, I never ever thought I would type those words in that order and actually mean them, but it’s true! As of last Sunday, no less. I still can’t get over it. That was a Red Letter Day, and no mistake.) Well anyway, it’s your loss. I can teach this stuff to you, but I can’t understand it for you.
I bet you can’t calculate how long for both rods to achieve equilibrium.
Sorry, but it’s a completely pointless bet either way. Insufficient information.
I don’t actually have to calculate it. I can measure it.
No you can’t. The contents of your imagination are not “measurements”.
No weaseling out allowed.
You don’t own a stopwatch? There should be one on your smart phone. That and a thermometer are all you need to measure the decay time.
Stop it. You’re creating some clenched butt cheeks with those who have no actual experience in designing and evaluating real down to earth measurements.
What you describe is exactly what we did in the old mechanical switching telephone offices and switchboards. A stopwatch and every 100 seconds you would count the busy switches on each shelf.
Go ahead and do it.
Let everyone know your results.
stevekj, add detail. It looks like you threw a rock at everyone who disagrees then ran away.
I’ve added lots of detail before, and none of this audience (specifically Willis, DMac, and Rud, among others, none of them physicists) are smart enough to understand any of it. But I’ll add it again.
The atmosphere, like any object above absolute 0, emits EM radiant energy. That is measured in Joules. Not Watts. Do you want more detail? Bear in mind that radiation physics is a whole textbook, it’s quite complex.
The other half of the relevant fundamental thermodynamics principle that you need to know is that no object can develop power onto a hotter one. Energy only flows from hot to cold. The atmosphere is colder than the surface, therefore it cannot develop power onto the surface. No one has ever measured such a thing, and it’s just as well, because they would have to violate the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics to do it.
One of your “know-nothing” physics ignoramuses (ignoramii?) commenting here –
I understood that heat flows from hot to cold, but “heat” is a product of energy doing work.
How confused am I. hey? 🙁
That’s pretty good, actually. [SNIPPED—Focus on the science, leave the personalities out.] Yes, the formal definition of “heat” is “flow (or transfer) of energy”, i.e. “work”.
Yes, Willis, sterling advice. You should follow it.
What is this “science” to which you refer? Political science? Domestic science? Social science?
Maybe you were using Feynman’s definition – “Science is belief in the ignorance of experts”?
I believe you are just trying to suppress dissent a la William Connolley. Feel free to demonstrate otherwise. You certainly don’t seem to share my support for free speech.
In case you missed my earlier post in this thread, Here is stevekj’s description of radiation from a previous thread.
[SNIPPED—STOP WITH THE ENDLESS INSULTS! w. ]
Not a big fan of free speech, Willis? Are your feelings easily hurt?
You believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter – no wonder your ego is easily bruised.
Steve, you say:
OK, let’s go forward from there. The Stefan-Boltzmann equation shows how much radiation “Q” is emitted by an object at a temperature “T” in kelvin. For simplicity, let’s assume the object is a blackbody. The S-B equation says:
q = σ T^4
So … what are the units of q?
Well, the Stefan-Boltzmann constant sigma (σ) has SI units of watts per square meter per kelvin to the fourth power (W m−2 K−4).
And when you multiply σ by T^4 in the equation you get the units of q as being … wait for it …
W/m2
Watts per square meter.
NOT joules.
Watts per square meter.
Bear in mind that this is a flow. And since one watt is one joule per second, we can also express q, the radiative flux, as
joules per second per square meter.
Joules per second. NOT joules as you claim.
Regards,
w.
Willis wrote:
“The Stefan-Boltzmann equation shows how much radiation “Q” is emitted by an object at a temperature “T” in kelvin”
To an environment at a temperature of 0 K, yes, that is correct.
But that’s not what you described in the head post, is it? The Earth’s surface is not at 0 K. What exactly do you think the word “radiation” means?
Steve, first, please point to the part of the S-B equation or quote some scientific reference that says that the S-B equation doesn’t work anywhere in the universe.
Because even in outer space we have the cosmic microwave background (CMB), which is the residual thermal radiation from the Big Bang. This has a blackbody temperature of ~ 3K, so the background is NOT at 0 K.
So where in the universe are you claiming that the S-B equation works?
Second, I note that I’ve demonstrated that your claim that
The atmosphere, like any object above absolute 0, emits EM radiant energy. That is measured in Joules. Not Watts.
is incorrect. The result of the S-B equation is in WATTS, not joules.
You gonna admit you were 100% wrong, or keep ignoring that?
w.
“So where in the universe are you claiming that the S-B equation works?”
The way you wrote it, with a cold temperature of 0 K, nowhere.
“The result of the S-B equation is in WATTS, not joules.”
Yes, and it requires TWO input temperatures. TWO objects. If one of them is at 0 K, then it looks like just one. But that’s an illusion. The other one is still there, you just can’t see it in the equation because it’s 0.
Who told you that converting an object’s temperature directly into power constitutes valid physics? It certainly wasn’t a physicist.
No, you didn’t “demonstrate” anything. Why don’t you (a) tell us what you think “radiation” means, and then (b) tell us why you earlier, in a different thread, wrote the phrase “the energy associated with radiation”? Where does that come into the picture, do you think?
“[SKJ’s claim that] The atmosphere, like any object above absolute 0, emits EM radiant energy. That is measured in Joules. Not Watts.
[WE] is incorrect. The result of the S-B equation is in WATTS, not joules.
You gonna admit you were 100% wrong, or keep ignoring that?”
Speaking of “ignoring” things, Willis, since you explained to us helpfully that radiation is indeed energy, and of course energy is measured in Joules (as everyone surely knows by now, I hope), then clearly my statement is obviously much closer to 0% wrong than “100% wrong”. Because, of course, I never said, as you implied I did, that the result of the S-B equation is in Joules. That would be a stupid thing to say, and obviously false, so naturally I didn’t say it. Instead, your claim that I was “100% wrong” about something I never said would simply be another of your damned lies, wouldn’t it? You gonna just keep ignoring that?
I think your Q should be Eb (total energy from a black body). As far as I can find Q is joules. Little q is something else, qdot something else, qnu something else but Q is joules.
Seems nitpicking, but I changed it to little q. Happy now? My point remains. No matter what symbol is used, it’s measured in W/m2.
And it’s not “total energy from a black body”. It’s the energy FLUX from a black body.
w.
Here is the Wiki detailed description
And
M is Willis’ Q
stevekj – looks like you’ve missed some tricks apart from the obvious one that watts are joules per second as several people have told you. The main one is that radiation transfers heat bidirectionally – it’s very hard to get any heat flows in one direction only, and in practice they are always bidirectional for both conduction and radiation, and we normally use the net flows for convenience. It doesn’t just go from the hotter thing to the colder thing, as you will find if you’re in a room at +20°C as opposed to -20°C. Since your body is warmer than 20°C, clearly by your theory the +20°C cannot warm you, but you will clearly cool down faster in the room at -20°C. If you only radiated energy to objects colder than yourself, that would violate causality, since you’d need to know the temperature of that body before you radiated energy towards it. If that body is a significant distance away, you’d need to know where it will be at the time your radiated photon reaches it in order to radiate in the correct direction. Clearly that is absurd.
Thus you might want to re-think what you understand of theory here, as well as understand what the units mean.
Probably why the people who do know what they are talking about ignore your explanations.
“radiation transfers heat bidirectionally”
No it doesn’t. Who told you that? Physics doesn’t work like that. There is no such thing as “bidirectional work”. It’s right there in the definitions.
“net flows”
There is no “net”. Nor is there a “gross”. There is either a flow of energy (down an entropy gradient), or there isn’t.
“that would violate causality, since you’d need to know the temperature of that body before you radiated energy towards it”
No, that’s not how physics works either. Does the water in a river need to know that the far end of the river is 100 metres lower in order to flow downhill? Of course not.
Where did you study your physics, if I may ask?
“you’ve missed some tricks”
I’m not the one who is hallucinating and making up fairy tales.
Oh, please, not this again. See page 15 in this pdf entitled “Radiative Heat Transfer“. Radiant energy flows in both directions. Heat is the net of the two flows, and it flows in one direction, from warmer to colder.
w.
“Radiant energy flows in both directions.”
[SNIPPED—Stick to the science.] Can you measure this “bidirectional flow”? Of course not. It’s a hallucination.
What “science” is that? Can’t say? Won’t say?
Tut tut. Not a good look, Willis.
Then explain why two identical metal rods near to each other in a vacuum at say 200C will cool down more slowly than a single metal rod in the vacuum at 200C
In this example the two metal rods are the same temperature.
Standard physics tells us each rod radiates towards the other, supplying energy so that energy loss is overall reduced compared to the one rod radiating.
How does your explanation differ?
We’ll see.
“Then explain why two identical metal rods near to each other in a vacuum at say 200C will cool down more slowly than a single metal rod in the vacuum at 200C”
Yes. You know of course that the rate of energy gained or lost by an object (i.e. work done, and thus power developed) depends on the temperature of its surroundings. I’ve never said otherwise (although plenty of others including Willis have), and every experiment you can do will confirm this.
But in this case you didn’t specify what the surroundings were, either with or without the second metal rod, so your experimental description as it stands is incomplete and ambiguous. Would you like to tell us what else is in the environment other than a vacuum? Perhaps the surrounding box that contains the vacuum and the rods? And what temperature is it at?
“Standard physics tells us each rod radiates [energy] towards the other,”
Yes, it does, and I have never written anything different. There is nothing wrong with your description. (As long as you don’t write any nonsense like “radiation transfers heat bidirectionally” or “net flows”, as Simon did!)
Your description does differ wildly from what Willis wrote, though, which is why I complained about his false ideas.
Lets say in space. Between galaxies. You could have made some assumptions and answered but it looks like you’re dodging the question.
So you’d be happy if I assume that somebody who believes that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter is ignorant and gullible, or would you prefer that I assume they are wise and skeptical?
You could assume that I’m always right. That would suit me.
I’m not dodging any questions, Tim, but not making any assumptions either. You know what they say about assumptions, especially in science.
In space is fine, and certainly realistic, and we are between galaxies to boot, which means the environment is going to be pretty much exactly at the background temperature of space, around 3 K. Perfect. So your description is fine in this case, as the rods will not gain any energy from the environment, only lose energy to it, and the rate at which this happens certainly depends on whether there is a second high-temperature rod in the vicinity of the first, as you said. No argument there! I’ll move onward and upward through the comments to your previous questions upthread next. (I find it somewhat easier and more logical to go through all the replies backward through the thread)
The problem with assumptions is that they’re often left unstated. Stating assumptions isn’t just ok, it’s what gives an explanation validity. Combine assumption statement with giving references and you have a real argument.
[SNIPPED—Insults go nowhere. Stick to the science. w. ]
What do you think?
What “science” is that? Maybe you should stick to being a petty dictator on your own blog, if your ego is so easily bruised. You’ll probably wind up with a group of ignorant and gullible sycophants, but that’s what you want, isn’t it?
Not going to respond to my logic, Willis? [SNIPPED—Leave out the insults and stick to the science. w.]
Steve, some uninvited advice from an old geezer who has fought many “spirited” board-room fights with $millions of personal financial investment at stake –
you don’t get engagement from adversaries by presenting with your hair on fire.
Read and comprehend “The Art Of War” and (god forbid) “The Art Of The Deal”.
(the take-aways from both are – leave your emotions at the door)
[SNIPPED—Stick to the science. w. ]
What “science” would that be? Social science? Political science?
Show what you snipped, unless you are claiming to be the arbiter of what is “science” and what is not. Or do you prefer absolute authority without any accountability?
Sorry, but you’re appearing a bit dictatorial.
Willis can’t.
Steve, some of us have lives. You wrote your logic, timestamped May 29, 2025 3:53 pm.
Then you got on my case for not answering, timestamped May 29, 2025 3:59 pm.
Six minutes? I didn’t answer you in six minutes and you wrote a whole insulting post claiming I’m “not going to respond”?
Six minutes?
In any case, when I got back from town, I “responded to your logic” above before reading your latest charming epistle.
I await your answer to my response.
w.
Sorry if I misinterpreted your snip of my (accurate) description of your ignorant nonsense as your “reply”. Apparently it wasn’t, it was just an early edit of my comment, and your actual reply came later. I have replied to that posting in turn. Thanks!
You still haven’t replied to my logic question, Willis. Are you going to answer that, or not?
Steve, I fear after all the back and forth I have no idea what “logic question” you are referring to. Please quote it, and I can see if I’ve answered it or not. If not, I’m happy to answer.
w.
Sure thing, it is this one:
You wrote: “downwelling thermal radiation [power] from the atmosphere”
I wrote: That sentence doesn’t pass the “laugh test”. So it is false, right?
My new addendum, so it is clear what the “logic question” part is: In other words, by your own logic, your claim is false. Right?
Maybe that one? Not too hard to find – you wrote it yourself.
“… tropical cumulus cloud fields and tropical thermally driven thunderstorms…exert a huge negative feedback…”
Hooraay! Let’s hear it for the Water Cycle, the most effective mechanism of energy transport in the Earth’s atmosphere, no matter the source of temperature change!
The confusion is strong here:
First, CO2 is not about an increase in “downwelling” or “back-” radiation. I recommend Myrrhe, Stordal 1997 to learn about the basic concept of CO2 forcing. Could you name me any paper, not totally outdated or scientifically irrelevant, that claims “back radiation” was the forcing mechanism?
The next paragraph evidently confuses W/m2 with temperature.
The third paragraph then consequently applies this confusion, descending into total chaos.
I also noticed W/m2 and temperature used as awkward synonyms.
Kevin, you say:
I’m sorry, Kevin, but that’s meaningless.Could people PLEASE FOLLOW THE SIMPLE INSTRUCTIONS I PUT IN DIFFERENT WORDS AT THE END OF EVERY POST?
In this post, they were
Come back when you’re willing to do that.
w.
Willis, why are W/m2 and temperature not awkward synonyms? What has W/m2 to do with temperature?
You don’t know, and neither does anybody else.
Willis writes:
“I can defend my words.”
That part is simply a damned lie, of course, isn’t it, Willis?
I defend my words constantly here at WUWT, so it’s the absolute truth, steve.
w.
“I defend my words constantly here at WUWT”
No, Willis, that is a lie. I have asked you dozens of times, over the years, to define the word “radiation”, and every time, you either ignored the question, insulted me, yelled “Pass!”, or just flat-out refused and said “no”. If you have defined it, ever, please point me to where. Thanks!
Steve, I don’t do a number of things that you ask, because interacting with you is inevitably so damn unpleasant.
However, since you insist, radiation is energy that travels and spreads out as it moves away from its source. In other words, it “radiates”.
This energy can be carried by electromagnetic waves (such as light, radio waves, infrared, ultraviolet, X-rays, and gamma rays) or by particles (such as alpha particles, beta particles, or neutrons). Generally in climate science we’re discussing electromagnetic radiation.
It’s distinguished by, among other things, the fact that it doesn’t require a medium to propagate it. This differentiates it from something like sound.
And no, I won’t argue about or discuss this definition with you, for the reason stated above.
w.
“so damn unpleasant.”
Please stop the insults, and stick to the science, Willis.
“radiation is energy”
Correct! Phew, that only took about 4 years and 27 requests, but we finally got it. Champagne, everyone!
Now, for the $64,000 question: what units do we measure energy in, Willis?
Yes, but trying to defend the indefensible might make you look ignorant and gullible. For example, you could not “defend” the GHE, because there is nothing to “defend” – not even a consistent and unambiguous description of this nonsensical myth.
Likewise, if you never put your belief that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter into words, then no defence is necessary. Very clever of you. Some might say “too clever by half”.
Sorry Willis, but the Earth is cooler now than it was four and a half billion years ago, in spite of four and a half billion years of continuous sunlight. There is no “ECS”, no ” CO2 forcings”, no “H2O feedback” or any of that pseudoscientific jargon. All illusion, smoke and mirrors, foisted on an ignorant and gullible public
The fact that you accept the existence of of a mythical “ECS” (climate is the statistics of weather – it has no “equilibrium” or “sensitivity to CO2”) shows that you are not especially knowledgeable, nor particularly skeptical. in short, ignorant and gullible.
With any luck, Government funding of the bumbling and incompetent “climate” scammers will come to an end, probably to the consternation of ignorant and gullible politicians who will quickly deny any fault, and quickly throw their weight behind the next piece of popular idiocy to emerge.
Maybe you could try and divert attention from inconvenient facts to your hurt feelings? Make people sorry for you?
Worth a try.
LOL!
I rigthfully criticize when Willis gets the science wrong, and encourage him to level up.
But hey, there obviously is another side to it, I could not even imagine: he is too “sciency” and should level down.. 😉
Never underestimate the nihilism!
Holy guacamole, I did not mean to incite incivility.
No worries, the incivility was there before you came along, and it was all started by Willis of course. Many years ago.
Gosh, I started all the incivility “many years ago”? Who knew I was so powerful that I could force stevekj and Michael Kelly to be unpleasant many years later? Seems I’ve been underestimating my awesome abilities …
w.
What “awesome abilities” are they, Willis? Do you really consider being uncivil to be demonstrating “awesome ability”?
I am assuming your comment is intended to be sarcastic, and gratuitously offensive, but that’s hardly a good example of an “awesome ability”, is it?
You definitely have an awesome ability to believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, that the Earth is getting hotter as a result, and a mythical GHE is the cause.
THAT’S awesome!
All my best, of course
m.
Willis has no idea how not to be gratuitously offensive. It’s a lot easier than actually learning science. But he’s making progress! Against all odds, we’ve now established conclusively, after many years of trying, and in the face of an enormous amount of incivility, that EM radiation is indeed a form of energy, and not somehow bizarrely and intrinsically power. This is a huge leap forward in his education. I think we should celebrate!
For anyone who gets the reference:
This was a triumph
I’m making a note here – Huge Success
It’s hard to overstate my satisfaction
I’m not even angry
I’m being so sincere right now
🙂
I concur.
Sorry I did not mean to attack – I just returned to read now. The paragraph that bothered me was”
“Initially, back in the 1970s, the equilibrium climate sensitivity was claimed to be between 1.5 and 4.5 °C of warming from an increase of 3.7 W/m2 in downwelling radiation. This 3.7 W/m2 is the assumed value of the increase in downwelling radiation from a doubling of CO2 (2xCO2).”
I was bothered by the argument that more CO2 leads to more radiation leading to more warmth, all true if you assume nothing else.
Input: CO2
Output: Temperature
Mechanism: Radiation
I don’t know what the models say but I’m guessing (wrong? maybe) that the modelers make easy math with assumptions like 50% radiation goes up and 50% goes down and reradiation only happens once per photon.
Whatever the correct math I’d want to check it versus data (maybe other people have). I doubt the result is a linear (okay 2nd order whatever) relationship between doubling CO2 and average surface temperature.
Then there’s the whole concept of average surface temperature. People here have beaten that horse to death. I personally think we could swap average air temperature for average below-ground-rural-bedrock temperature which would greatly simplify the process. Heat transfer isn’t _that_ slow.
Don’t you have your own blog where your commands are law?
You’re sounding a bit full of yourself – telling others what to do. I suppose the ignorant and gullible lap up the suppression of dissenting views.
Typical for pseudoscientists who don’t understand that one may bear no relationship at all to the other.
It comes as no surprise that the ignorant and gullible support adding and subtracting W/m2 as valid operations, when even they would laugh at someone who thought that adding the temperature of two objects would make them twice as hot!
250 W/m2 of sunlight will melt ice emitting 300 W/m2. If you add both together, what is the temperature required to emit 550 W/m2?
Pardon me for my jeering laughter.
Pretty much what I was going to post. Here Willis, start by watching this. It may be educational. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqu5DjzOBF8
twofeathers, in response to Kevin saying “I also noticed W/m2 and temperature used as awkward synonyms”, you say “Pretty much what I was going to post.”
See my response to Kevin above.
w.
PS—Sorry, I don’t do “science” videos. No way to skim them or summarize them, no citiations or references, and they move far too sloooooow …
E., you say:
For back-radiation, how about:
CO₂ Back-Radiation Sensitivity Studies under Laboratory and Field Conditions
*Authors: Ernst Hammel, Martin Steiner, Christoph Marvan, Matthias Marvan, Klaus Retzlaff, Werner Bergholz, Axel Jacquine*
*Journal: Atmospheric and Climate Sciences, 2024*
However, “back-radiation” has fallen out of favor and generally been replaced by “downwelling radiation” or “downwelling longwave radiation”. Here’s a few of those:
“Clouds reduce downwelling longwave radiation over land in a warming climate” (Nature, 2025, DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-08323-x)
“Hygroscopic aerosols amplify longwave downward radiation in the Arctic” (Atmospheric Chemistry and Physics, 2025, DOI: 10.5194/acp-25-3889-2025)
“Understanding variations in downwelling longwave radiation using Brutsaert’s equation” (Earth System Dynamics, 2023, DOI: 10.5194/esd-14-1363-2023)
“Trends in Downwelling Longwave Radiance over the Southern Great Plains” (Journal of Geophysical Research: Atmospheres, accepted 2024, DOI: 10.1029/2021JD035949)
There are heaps more. I’ll let you do the searching.
Next, you say:
This is exactly why I said above, as I always do in different forms in every post:
Come back when you’re willing to follow simple instructions and I’ll be happy to discuss your objections.
Regards,
w.
The first source is a group of Austrian compatriots, and activists. I know them. Their level of knowledge is.. not so great, to say at least, and probably even below yours.
All the other sources name the term “downwelling radiation” in one way or another, but none of these claim it was a) a forcing mechanism and b) it was the forcing mechanism of CO2.
Sorry Willis, DWIR is not considered the cause of warming any longer. Yes, it does exist, but it doesn’t warm the Earth. Check out this video:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqu5DjzOBF8
Climate science has replaced the cause of warming twice now. You are right that downwelling IR was initially viewed as the cause. However, the downwelling IR doesn’t travel very far before it’s reabsorbed. This leads to the realization that the only flux of radiation in the atmosphere is upward. The vast majority of DWIR which hits the Earth comes from such a low altitude it cannot have a warming effect.
This led to the claim that raising the emissions height was the cause of warming. But, this doesn’t work out either since it violates Kirchhoff’s Law of Radiation.
The current view is all the warming is caused by widening of the emissions window as greenhouse gases increase. This is also demonstrated in Dr Happer’s work.
While this latest claim is falsified by the work of Dr. Miskolczi, climate science is still denial. The increase in absorption by well mixed greenhouse gases get countered by a decrease in absorption by water vapor. The net effect is no warming at all. That’s why your greenhouse efficiency calculation shows no trend.
I still contend that much of the problem is the tendency of climate science to use mid-point temperatures (mis-named as averages) instead of actually analyzing the curves. Heat loss by radiation results in an exponential decay of temperature. The actual heat lost is related to the area under the temperature curve and not just to the “average”, i.e. mid-point of the start and end value. The longer a body stays warm the more heat it dissipates over an interval of time.
So all DWIR would do is cause the earth to dissipate *more* heat over a time interval than without the GHE. It makes some intuitive sense if you consider that the GHE can only return what has already been sent. But what gets returned also gets resent! And since DWIR can never return everything it gets (some gets lost to up radiation and some to convection/conduction) everything the earth sends eventually gets lost over the send/return/resend decaying oscillation.
So what climate science started out with was “GHE’s *trap* heat” to GHE’s slow the loss of heat. The first just isn’t true at all. The second doesn’t account for the rate of heat loss being greater at higher temperatures.
At night the temperature drop is most significant right after sunset. It get slower near sunrise. You lose most of the heat when the temperature is warmest. You can’t judge how much heat is actually lost by taking the mid-point temperature. But that is what climate science does.
Total chaos is of course exactly what one would expect of a fisherman (or anyone else) trying to wade through radiation physics without any training. Somehow, when I pointed out exactly the same thing above, possibly slightly less diplomatically *cough*, I got a rating of -36 compared to your +4. Good job! 🙂
tbh.. diplomacy is not my strength.
Nor mine 🙂 I suspect the mental skills that make good physicists are entirely distinct from, if not incompatible with, the ones that make good diplomats!
Willis, methinks that’s a few orders of magnitude low for the amount of money spent (wasted?) on trying to come up with a figure for ECS.
I’m glad the modelers spend extra for supercomputer hardware to arrive at ridiculous conclusions much faster than thay could dream of if they used old Dell laptops slowed by archaic amtivirus software.
Yeah, sadly true.
w.
I’ve always puzzled how the earth energy transport system could have positive feedback.
In systems engineering, to have positive feedback there is an amplifier powered by an independent power source.
In the case of the planet, the incoming or outgoing EM radiation is the signal.
So where is the amplifier and what is its independent power source?
In order to have positive feedback, there also has to be a closed loop (circuit).
Assuming the incoming EM radiation and outgoing EM radiation constitutes a closed loop and clouds are a positive feedback, then one would expect an ever increasing runaway egress of energy from the planet and we would be freezing.
If the climate modelers can have simplistic models, then mine can not be criticized for its simplicity.
Temperature does not create energy. Temperature is energy. The black body equations only provide the means for converting thermal energy into electromagnetic energy. Kirchhoff must be obeyed.
The energy at the surface of the earth starts with solar EM radiation. The surface warms and the BB calculation determines the spectrum and intensities of the EM emissions. However, Kirchhoff must be obeyed. Before the BB becomes EM, one must subtract the convection, conduction, and latent heat. But also, as the surface warms, more thermal energy flows into the ground where it is sequestered for later transfer. Heat is the flow of thermal energy across a temperature gradient (hot to cold). As the surface warms, heat flows into the depths. Based on heat capacity and thermal resistance of the materials involved one can calculate an equilibrium except the solar energy is constantly changing due to the planet rotating. The point is one cannot look at the incident solar energy and the bond albedo and get an ahah moment. Adding spice to the mix is the small amount of thermal energy being transferred from the core to the surface.
Another amusing complication is photons are not real particles. A photon is a mathematical construct being defined as a quantum of energy required for a valence electron to change state. Too many view them as some sort of bullets. The fun part is taking into account the oblate spheroid shape of the planet. Make it simple – a sphere. More in a minute.
EM waves are spherical. The power density of the wavefront is subject to the 1/r^2 law. So, have a valence electron decay and emit a couple of eVs of energy (aka a photon). This is a single point energy and the EM field it generates is subject to spherical 1/r^2.
Put it at 10 miles up. Directly below the power density of the field is eV x 1/(10 mi)^2. So far so good, but what about at the poles? The power density there is eV x 1/(4000 + 10 mi)^2. In addition due to the slope of the planet more is reflected. This is clear when doing radar (EM again) calculations. But, given the spherical geometries, none of the photonic energy makes it to the pole. Curve of the earth blocks it. The general position is half of the EM radiated by molecules comes back down. Relative to the cross section of the planet, that is true, but relative to the surface of the planet it is not. Based on the spherical wave front and the spherical surface one can calculate for a given altitude how much of the EM wave hits the surface and it is significantly less than half. This is a flaw in the climate models.
Likewise EM energy emitted by the surface is not a vector. It is a spherical wave front. Reading deep into the theory reveals how this is dealt with. The point being 1 m^2 on the surface is larger than 1 m^2 at altitude and the power density is less due to 1/r^2.
The CERES has an non-zero error budget. It also has a limited acquisition angle. It also has a minimum sensitivity. It also has fixed bandwidth. What this means is CERES as good as it is, does not capture all ground emitted IR.
Why post this? Because Willis is right and some of this plays into the answer of why things “climate scientists” calculate and publish are simply wrong.
Sparta, you say:
The point being 1 m^2 on the surface is larger than 1 m^2 at altitude and the power density is less due to 1/r^2.
True, but generally ignored. Why?
Because it’s so small. The phenomena in question are almost entirely in the troposphere. The area-weighted average height of the tropopause is on the order of 11 km.
This means that the area of the tropopause is only 0.0003% larger than the area of the surface of the earth. Since this is far smaller than the uncertainty in the various variables, it is ignored.
Next, you say:
Here’s an example. A tropical oceanic thunderstorm is powered by warm moist air from the sun heating the sea surface. The low density of the warm air causes it to rise, and if the surface exceeds some threshold temperature, that rising column of warm air becomes strong enough to initiate the process that turns a cumulus cloud into a thunderstorm. So that power is coming from the sun.
Once the thunderstorm is in existence, however, it creates strong winds at the base of the thunderstorm … and because evaporation is a function of wind speed, this increases the evaporation of water under the base of the thunderstorm.
And since water vapor is lighter than the atmospheric, this further decreases the density of the warm air and increases the amount of moisture in the air, both of which act as positive feedbacks supporting the existence of the thunderstorm. This positive feedback keeps the thunderstorm in existence when the surface has cooled to below the required initiation temperature to create the thunderstorm in the first place.
Best regards,
w.
You can ignore anything you like, if it doesn’t suit your purposes.
For example, you might say that a piece of ice is only 0.0003° C colder than the water surrounding it, but the ice will still not heat the water.
You say
which is quite meaningless, considering the “positive feedback” seems to turn into “negative feedback” and the cloud ceases to be. Thunderstorms have been observed at Vostok station in Antarctica, so your “required initial temperature” is just more pseudoscientific jargon – being whatever suits you at the time.
“Climate science” is as relevant to physics as is “political science” or “social science”.
Accept reality – as the IPCC stated, the atmosphere is chaotic, and it is not possible to predict future states of the atmosphere.
Sorry about that, but facts are what remains, even if you don’t believe in them.
Adding CO2 or H2O to air does not make it hotter. There is no GHE or ECS. Radiation is just radiation – terms such as “thermal”, “upwelling”, “downwelling” are just pseudoscientific jargon, and meaningless.
Why is it ignored? If they are claiming an energy imbalance of 0.7%, then it is significant.
\
Remember, the devil’s in the details.
If they are calculating temperatures to micro degrees, 0.0003% becomes significant.
Your description of hurricanes and thunderstorms do not define positive feedback. Those are functions that are well understood but none meets the definition of positive feedback. If they were, the storms would continue to grow You are describing a transfer function.
So, when I step on the gas pedal in my car and more fuel is injected to burn in the engine making the car go faster, is the, by your definition, positive feedback?
Just a refresher… Thunderstorms and hurricanes and a lot of other weather phenomena are thermal engines.
Sparta, you say:
It’s ignored because it is nowhere near 0.7%. As I pointed out above, it is 0.0003%.
And in general, temperatures are given to one or two decimal places. I object to this practice because it ignores the issue of significant figures.
But in any case, the global temperature is on the order of 288K. A difference of 0.0003% of that is 0.000003 times 288K = .0009°K, and nobody is calculating anything near that small a difference.
Next, you say:
Again, you mistake positive feedback with runaway feedback. In general, the eventual steady-state of a system with a constant positive feedback factor “f” is given by 1/(1-f).
So if say half the signal is fed back, the system will achieve steady-state at twice the no-feedback condition. It will not continue to grow forever as you claim. It’s only with a feedback factor greater than 1 that you get a runaway condition.
And the positive or negative feedback is regulated by the temperature-determined time of the daily emergence of the cumulus cloud field and the thunderstorms. If they emerge earlier in the day, it cools the day—negative feedback. If they emerge later in the day, it warms the day—positive feedback.
Regards,
w.
In control theory, positive feedback is runaway.
Sorry, Sparta, but that’s not true. Only positive feedback with a feedback factor “f” greater than one leads to runaway. A positive feedback factor “f” between 0 and 1 will stabilize at a value of 1/(1-f).
Regards,
w.
As an item of note: Remember the “runaway greenhouse effect?” Then “runaway global warming?”
They have thrown in positive feedback as a replacement for those.
If there were any positive feedbacks in the earth energy system, we would not be here chatting. The planet would be an very, very cold ice ball or in thermal runaway, neither of which can support life.
Thanks, Sparta.
The existence of positive feedback does NOT mean “runaway” anything. That only occurs with a positive feedback greater than 1, which would be a very unusual situation.
w.
Not true. Positive feedback adds to the input causing an increase in output which in turn increases the positive feedback.
A loop gain less than one implies a controlling mechanism in the feedback branch. The positive feedback is modified by “something” that lowers the feedback from the output to the input as a limit is approached, either by changing amplitude or by changing phase. Sooner or later the “positive” feedback is limited to an equilibrium value.
This is supposedly the logarithmic response CO2 offers to increases in the atmosphere. Each doubling provides less and less amplification of temperature.
Instead of actually trying to identify where this “limiting” will leave the biosphere the CAGW advocates would rather imply a “runaway” temperature turning the earth into a molten rock. And then when challenged trot out the “positive feedback is less than one” argument – while declining to say what the equilibrium point will actually be.
Some of the periods of highest diversity of life on the planet existed when CO2 was much higher than today. That is why the term “greenhouse effect” has always had positive connotations to me. I once lived near a large greenhouse – a huge diversity of plant life was cultivated there along with a continual battle against the vermin and insects that loved living in that atmosphere.
The CAGW crowd always reminds me of Tevye in Fiddler on the Roof. “Changing CO2 is bad”. “Changing CO2 will bring bad things”. it’s a sad joke of monstrous proportion.
Most of what you say I can buy. Just a couple of observations
While the EM wave may be spherical it doesn’t have to have the same intensity in all directions. A dipole antenna will emit more energy broadside to the dipole than off the ends. So a single molecule will emit more in some directions than another. When you are considering a volume of molecules, however, their positions are all random and their sum will tend to having the same power in all directions.
Freeman Dyson always criticized the climate models for not being holistic. A holistic factor that the climate models always ignore is the fact that the earth, i.e. below the surface, is not in thermal equilibrium. BB’s are assumed to be in internal thermal equilibrium. If the earth is not internally at thermal equilibrium then what it emits for radiation gets very complicated. Climate science just ignores this. It may be insignificant but it isn’t sufficient to just assume that is so. That isn’t science. It’s magic thinking.
Hear, hear!
It is true we can construct antennae that have very interesting emission fields. That is aside from the description of a single point emitter, which is the basis of my post.
That aside, the rest of your post is spot on.
CO2is a vibrating dipole. Not much different than a microwave dipole.
The quantum emission from a valence state decay? That is a dipole?
Even so, the scale is molecular. No two molecules are connected. It is going to emit with spherical geometry.
CO2 has 2 opposing dipoles that cancel.
Sparta Nova 4: That’s a good and thoughtful post. But I think you’ve likely missed a key point. The climate scientists probably aren’t thinking in terms of an amplifier. Rather, think in terms of a really complex set of plumbing with numerous cross connections and odd shaped cavities. There are a bunch of valves and flow gauges scattered around the system.
As with climate, input and output can be assumed to be fixed and equal. If a valve is opened or closed a bit, the flow in it’s branch will (probably) change. And the flows in other branches will change as well. The “feedbacks” climate scientists are trying to analyze are the changes to flows elsewhere in the system to changes in flow at one particular valve.
Is that a reasonable thing to look at? Probably. Is it easy to do correctly? Maybe. But if your mess of plumbing is supposed to model the behavior of some real world phenomenon, you have to design it properly, and that can be, and apparently is, really hard.
Having a flow means there is an outlet somewhere or a change in pressure somewhere. A change in pressure would indicate work being done such as by a compressor. As a passive (mostly) element the earth itself can’t do work, it can only direct energy input that is applied externally.
A pipe that leads from downstream back to the input, which does not have an element capable of adding energy, doesn’t change things . The fluid in the pipe that reaches the input via backflow won’t have enough pressure to add back to the input. In fact, the direction of flow in that looped pipe will be from the input toward the output just like in the main pipe. More water being added to the flow past the junction, assuming the pipe is “full” with no turbulence, will be a slight increase in pressure in the pipe downstream of the junction. That increase in pressure will increase the flow at the output.
Voila! Output equal input.
Remember, CO2 is a passive element, it doesn’t *add* energy. If it is at a lower temperature (similar to a lower pressure in the pipes) than the earth then it can’t transfer “heat” to the earth.
Adding CO2 to the atmosphere is like increasing the diameter of the pipe or in opening the output valve wider. The pressure seen at the output may drop but the total output will go up because of the larger area involved.
Tim: I thought Sparta had put a lot of effort into his post, and deserved some … well … ehrrr … feedback. The point I was trying to make was that there’s no amplifier and no feedback in the electrical circuit sense. Instead the climate scientist’s “feedback” is (I’m sort of sure) the changes of other system parameters when one is tinkered with. The point being that since output and input are defined to be equal, altering a flow anywhere in the system must alter at least one and quite possibly many flows elsewhere.
I used a complex water system as an example because the corresponding electrical circuit would seem to be a resistor network and the output power wouldn’t be equal to the input — some or all of the input energy having been converted to heat. Maybe water was a poor choice.
—–
About CO2. It’s passive in the sense that it’s still CO2 after absorbing a photon then eventually dumping the energy, If it loses the energy by reradiating a similar photon, then presumably its kinetic energy is unchanged. However, CO2 molecules are continually bumping into other atmospheric molecules and exchanging kinetic energy with them. Some sources claim that excited CO2 molecules can return to their normal (ground?) state by converting their excess energy to kinetic energy during a collision instead of reradiating it. If that’s true then CO2 really can warm the atmosphere directly rather than just bouncing radiant energy around.
“The point being that since output and input are defined to be equal, altering a flow anywhere in the system must alter at least one and quite possibly many flows elsewhere.”
Yep. That’s why climate models need to be holistic.
Absent a compressor or pump, where in a plumbing system do you get energy increases?
Yes, you can constrict the flow increasing pressure that increases speed of flow, but that is not an energy increase but rather a transformation and it not positive feedback.
Switching on and off, again is not positive feedback. Controls are not feedback.
By the way, the notation “Climate Scientist” is a self appointed title. Most if not all involved do not have the composite skill sets of physics, em fields and waves, thermodynamics, chemistry, etc., etc. to have a degree in “climate science.”
The point? If we, the pragmatics and skeptics continue to accept and use the climate apocalypse language, re-definitions, etc., we are increasing the credibility of those that wish to end civilization.
Pseudoscientists love analogies – particularly when they lack the ability to ex0lain their “science” to a 12 year old.
Why not think about the atmosphere? Reality?
SN4, let me add a couple of things.
One thing you mention is warming of land. Here is a graph of surface temperatures at various levels.
If down welling IR were a factor in warming the surface, the sine would increase at a faster rate, have a broader top, and decrease at a slower rate. IOW, a sine with two components.
Lastly, I am very, very leery of “averaging” a function that has a power of 4 in it over 24 hours. That diminishes the effect that a high temperature has on the intensity of radiation. In essence, it chops off the top of the sine to a value of about ~2/3 of the peak.
Jim, what is the basis for your claim that
“If down welling IR were a factor in warming the surface, the sine would increase at a faster rate, have a broader top, and decrease at a slower rate. IOW, a sine with two components.”
To make that claim it would seem you’d need a graph showing the contrary condition or some other evidence.
It seems that you are assuming that the downwelling IR is constant over a 24-hour period. However, downwelling IR is a function of the atmospheric temperature. So it varies just like the surface temperature varies.
In addition, during the day the surface is warming the atmosphere, but during the night the atmosphere is warming the surface. This changes the shape of the cooling.
So it’s not clear why you think that the curve means that the downwelling IR doesn’t leave the surface warmer than it would be in the absence of the IR.
w.
Let’s make some assumptions to start.
As the sun circles the earth, at sunrise insolation increases from 0 to π/2. As the sun continues on, the insolation drops to zero at sunset, i.e., 0 to π/2.
Now if we make the assumption that down welling insolation from GHG’swarm the surface, we would have an equation of (you pick the fraction, I picked 1/3);
sin(θ) + (!/3)(sin θ)
Over similar times, this means the peak is increased and the rise and fall are steeper.
Both Planck and Stefan-Boltzmann tell us that energy absorbed from a colder body can not warm the hot body. So the assumption that the earth warms is false.
Now for averaging. That peak insolation moves across the earth as the sun moves in this example. That means every point at a 90° beneath the sun receives the peak value and radiates at whatever temperature that insolation causes. Averaging across 24 hours with half the time in darkness simply reduces the peak insolation and therefore the radiation that the insolation causes.
If you want to deal in averages, you need to determine the average of the peak value under the sun. The average for a sine is 0.637. Therefore, for 0 to π/2 you have an average of +0.637 and for 0 to π/2 you have a -0.637. That average won’t allow calculating the maximum temperature at zenith, but one can calculate and average insolation.
This graph does not show the surface being warmed. There is a constant cooling until sunrise the following day. I will admit that the dew point can be reached and that flattens the cooling curve, but that isn’t exactly GHG warming. That has occurred long before humans came around and is attributed to H2O, not increasing CO2.
Let me add, this is an ideal look at a complex problem. But from simple foundations large things can be built.
A book I downloaded was helpful. It is Practical Meteorology, by Roland Stull.
Jim, you say:
While it cannot warm the hot body, radiation from a colder body slows the heat loss from the hot body. This leaves the hot body warmer than it would be without the presence of the colder body.
See my post Can A Cold Object Warm A Warm Object, or Dr. Roy Spencer’s posts on the same subject here and here.
w.
Willis,
I agree the heat loss is slowed. Too many people try to deduce from that fact that the body must increase in temperature because it isn’t “getting rid of heat”.
Planck addresses this succently.
Entropy is a b*tch.
Planck again:
Nice concise explanation. Most people get too long winded which leads to continual argument. Yours is short and to the point. Nice.
I’ve never heard of one of those before. You can fit a polynomial to anything, if you like, but to say polynomial decay , implies you have some theoretical basis for that decay actually being a polynomial. What is that about?
Did you mean exponential decay?
The phase shift with depth is interesting. You get something like that by convolution of a sinewave with an exponential decay, though diffusion would probably need something a little different from an exponential, it’s good first approximation.
I agree with you about questionable averaging of temperature (a non extensive quantity), it is the energy which an extensive quantity which should be averaged.
This is fundamentally unscientific thing to do, which is why I also reject the idea of averaging sea and air temperatures. Climatology IS PSEUDO-SCIENCE all the way down.
https://judithcurry.com/2016/02/10/are-land-sea-temperature-averages-meaningful/
Do polynomials have exponents? I was trying to not limit the equation to one variable.
If you want to try convolution with an exponential decay, here is a simple script:
https://climategrog.wordpress.com/2013/03/03/scripts/
I don’t claim to have THE answer to what or how the decay rate is determined. Multiple factors from soil type, ground cover, diffusion from below, dew point, etc. It isn’t as simple as discharging a capacitor across a load.
No it’s not as simple as a capacitor but it’s a better starting point that a “polynomial” which really does not say anything at all.
That is your opinion. Maybe you have a better mathematical equation to show us?
Willis,
The Radiative-Convective-Equilibrium (RCE) description of of our atmosphere has been presented as the most challenging of computational problems. Indeed it has so proved, for the troposphere is not an equilbrium, but a dissipative system. Last June I suggested in WUWT a linear dissipative description for climate sensitivity based wholly on boundary values for flux and temperature which you might find of interest (4.53 W/m2/K). Without internal specifics for radiation and convection, probably good to 5%.RCE is an oxymoron. RCD works for steady-states. How long it takes to get from steady-state A to B awaits a 2nd JCM.
https://pdquondam.net/Linear_Dissipation_Models.pdf
“However, as you can see in the graphic above, over time, the estimates of the ECS have grown wider and wider.”
That’s not what I see on the chart. The yellow dots after covid seem higher and tighter.
Kevin, that’s just a subset of the CMIP6 climate models. The fact that they are near each other is hardly surprising.
However, they are still wider than the original estimates, and they have a two-humped distribution, so we’re still far from narrowing the uncertainty …
w.
Great post Willis, thanks!
I concur.
“How much would we expect this increase in radiation to increase the temperature? This can be determined from the Stefan-Boltzmann equation, which states that radiation is proportional to the fourth power of the temperature. Using the CERES data and the S-B equation allows us to calculate just what heating we’d expect to occur from that increase in absorbed radiation.”
Well, S-B says how much you expect the increase in temperature to increase the outgoing radiation. Using it backwards means you have to identify the outgoing radiation. You have equated it to the incoming. But heat is transferred by other means, eg evaporation and winds and currents. The up radiation is less than the down in many regions, and that looks in your formulation like lower sensitivity.
This is particularly so in the Pacific warm pool. It loses a lot by evaporation, which is subsequently advected away (Hadley cell). But also, because it is the warmest sea, it loses much heat by ocean current transport. This is independent of any feedback arguments. It is just accounting.
Thanks, Nick. For the theoretical warming, I wanted the maximum value. So I assumed that all energy left the surface via radiation. You are correct that the value would be smaller if sensible and latent heat loss were included.
w.
Willis, you are correct. All energy is lost by radiation.Photons being emitted by electrons, at base (apart from nuclear processes, of course).
What is a photon. It is a mathematical definition of the energy transferred in or out of a valence electron when it changes energy states.
The only place a photon is identified as a particle is in quantum mechanics and it is done so to make the math easier. QM defines a photon as a single point energy with zero (rest) mass and zero volume.
Too many people think photons are some kind of projectile. Alpha, beta, and gamma particles are projectiles. Photons are not.
If you mean gamma rays, they are photons – which act like both waves and particles, depending on what you expect of them.
No, I’m not being humorous. This is exactly what happens in the double slit experiment, and Feynman said about it “. . . has in it the heart of quantum mechanics. In reality, it contains the only mystery”.
Can I explain it? No. Can anybody else? Not as far as I am aware.
Maybe you know more than me.
Whilst true, that energy still ultimately radiates away even if it does it from a different location. You’ve used the argument many times yourself.
Latent heat does not “radiate.”
While the gist of your post is reasonably correct, the deficiency is in transfer latency. EM travels at c. Thermal travels at much less than the speed of sound. Conduction is even slower. These elements of energy transfer latencies (speeds) is notably missing in the climate models.
Also true but that doesn’t describe why it matters in the context of the conversation.
Harold The Organic Chemist Says:
CO2 Does Not Cause Warming Of The Atmosphere!
Shown in the chart (See below) are plots of temperatures at the Furnace Creek weather station in Death Valley from 1922 to 2001. In 1922, the concentration of CO2 in dry air
was ca. 303 ppmv (0.59 g of CO2/cu. m.), and by 2001, it had increased to 371 ppmv
(0.73 g of CO2/cu. m.), but there was no corresponding significant increase in the air temperature at this remote desert. The reasons there was no increase in air temperature
at this arid desert is quite simple: There is too little CO2 in the air to absorb out-going long wave IR radiation from the desert surface to cause heating of the air and there is very low constant humidity.
The above limited empirical data suggests that there is no reason to propose the ECS which is probably zero.
The above empirical data falsifies the claims by the IPCC that CO2 causes “global warming” and is the “control knob of climate” The purpose of these claims is to provide the justifications for the continued maintenance and generous funding of not only the IPCC but also the UNFCCC and the UN COP and for the distribution of funds donated by the rich countries to these UN organizations to a poor countries to help the cope with global warming and climate change.
PS: If you click on the chart, it will expand and become clear. Click on the “X” to return to text.
NB: The chart of plot of temperatures in Death Valley was obtained from the late John Daly’s website: “Still Waiting For Greenhouse” available at: http://www.john.daly.com. From the home page, scroll down and click on “Station Temperature Data”. On the “World Map”, click on region or country (e.g., Australia) to access temperature data from over 200 weather stations located around the world which showed no global warming up to 2002.
First, your link to John Daly’s website is broken.
Second, you can’t disprove a theory about how the climate works by looking at a single location, or even a single area. Large areas of the Earth have cooled over the last 24 years … does that mean the Earth is not warming?
w.
No, the fact that the Earth loses 44 TW or so means the Earth is not warming. It’s called cooling – net energy loss.
All the best
m.
Minor correction: The earth’s core loses about 44TW, which is a fraction of a W/m^2 power density but also it does not determine the NET energy into or out of the earth’s systems. When the surface warms, the temperature gradient flips and energy flows into the earth in the direction of the core until a thermal equilibrium is achieved. When the surface cools, the equilibrium point shifts towards the surface. If/when the equilibrium point shifts above the surface then heat from the core enters the atmosphere. Whether that core generated heat escapes the atmosphere is another discussion and a very involved one in fact.
Your core energy, in and of itself, does not define a net energy loss.
No, the Earth as a whole loses 44TW. That is, the energy contained within the atmosphere, aquasphere and lithosphere is currently reducing by 44 TW (or whichever figure you prefer).
Hence, the Earth being cooler now than four and a half billion years ago, in spite of four and a half billion years of continuous sunlight.
It doesn’t really matter, if you are somehow trying to imply that adding CO2 to air is making the Earth hotter, because that’s ridiculous.
Even you would agree, I hope.
The link to John-Daly’s website is not broken. I just went there. I use Bing and search: “Still Waiting For Greenhouse”. You should try again using this phrase.
Shown below is chart of temperatures for Adelaide which shows a slight cooling since 1857. I can only post one image in comment.
Once you get to John Daly’s site go to Oz. There are 21 charts there.
At the MLO in Hawaii the concentration of CO2 is currently 429 ppmv by volume. One cubic meter of this air has a mere 0.843 g of CO2 and has a mass of 1.29 kg.
There is still too little CO2 to cause warming of such a large mass of air.
I said your link to the website is broken. It is. The correct URL is
http://www.john-daly.com/
w.
I tried that link and it works. Why does adding the / make the web URL address work? How did you know to add the / ?
I thank you very much for your help.
PS: I will be 81 on Aug. 1 and I struggle to operate my fancy new Lenovo computer.
Your link is john.daly but the working link is john-daly
The link in your OP included the “slash slash” part already.
The reason it is “broken” is that it also contained “john DOT daly” instead of the correct “john DASH daly”.
Thanks for the info. A simple typo caused much confusion. I will now be more careful.
BTW: Did you go to John Daly’s site? The number of charts he made is amazing. What state do you live in? Does it have one of these crazy climate action plans like California?
I live in Burnaby, BC and we finally got rid of the carbon tax which was $CDN80 per tonne of CO2 equivalent.
John Daly’s website is a nonsecure site. Is that the reason why
http://www.john-daly.com does not work?
I tried http:john-daly.com and it works for me. Please try this and let me know if it works for you. My OS is MS11 and copilot is quite helpful for doing searches.
I thank you for alerting me to this problem. I was about to go the Occidental Petroleum website and post a message about John Daly’s website and that
CO2 does not cause warming of air because the company about to spend a very large amount of money to go to a low CO2 emission operation.
Look what this CO2 greenhouse warming fraud has done to the economies of the UK, Germany, Australia and California for example. Gov. Gavin N. wants phase out cars and light trucks with ice engines by 1935. This is crazy.
Correction: “copilot” should be “Bing”.
Ramanathan can calculate anything he likes, and you can believe it if you want. It is impossible to measure “surface upwelling thermal radiation” or “TOA upwelling thermal radiation”. Anybody who uses the term “TOA upwelling thermal radiation” is obviously clueless about radiation, and physics in general.
The term “TOA GHE radiation” is a meaningless phrase. There is not even a consistent and unambiguous description of the TOA!
Here’s some word salad from NASA on the subject
There s no ECS, no matter how much you believe otherwise, so spouting nonsense like
just shows your gullibility.
Sorry about that Willis, but you simply refuse to accept that adding CO2 to air does not make it hotter.
There is no GHE whatsoever, nor any ECS. The Earth has cooled in spite of four and a half billion years of continuous sunlight – atmosphere and all.
Claiming that you can heat a steel shell at -273 C, surrounding a -18 C sphere, to the same temperature with radiation from the sphere, is risible. About as silly as the dimwitted Eli Rabbett, who says that merely dividing a block of material in two, and separating the pieces, will result in a temperature rise!
Dream on, Willis. If observation differs from speculation, your speculation is wrong.
Post says:”…adding CO2 to air does not make it hotter.”
Fully agree. As you add CO2 you increase mass. More mass requires more energy to cause increase in temperature.
Willis, you said, with respect to Figure 4,
It appears that you have assumed that the water, vegetation, and regolith/soil have identical Specific Heat Capacity and reflectance, or at least absorptivity. Did I miss something?
I asked a simple question and have not received the courtesy of a reply. I even quoted what you said. Am I on your schist list or don’t I warrant a reply?
Clyde, you say:
Fallacy of the omitted middle. Neither is true. With all the comments (206 to date), yours got lost in the flood. My apologies.
I took the average CERES upwelling surface radiation. Using a gridded emissivity dataset, I converted that to temperature T1.
Then I took that same average CERES dataset and added one W/m2 to it, used the emissivity dataset to convert it to temperature T2.
Figure 4 shows T2 minus T1.
Best to you.
w.
Thank you for responding; however, you didn’t directly answer my question. The point of my question is that with different reflectivities (particularly extinction coefficients) and Specific Heat Capacities, I wouldn’t expect water and terrestrial materials to have the same temperature changes as shown in figure 4, particularly for the Australian Outback and southern Africa. Personal experience tells me that walking across light-colored beach sands at Waikiki that are borderline tolerable, it is a relief to wade into the cooler water. Obviously, reality doesn’t reflect your theoretical construction that shows temperature changes varying principally by latitude, not by material. Do you have any thoughts on why your construction appears nonphysical? It is more than a ‘typo,’ which you regularly applaud being made aware of.
Clyde, I’m not showing the underlying instantaneous temperatures. I’m showing the long-term change in temperatures if the amount of energy being continuously absorbed by the surface increases by 1 W/m2 everywhere, with no feedback from atmosphere, clouds, aerosols, etc.
If the absorption increases, over time the various items with various specific heats will warm until they are each emitting an additional W/m2, regardless of their specific heats. All the different specific heat does is to determine how long it takes to get to where it’s emitting an additional W/m2.
Your examples have to do with the relative speed at which the various materials change temperature. My calculations show two steady-state conditions, where the amount emitted is equal to the amount absorbed.
Regards,
w.
Willis,
The use of time with specific heat capacity provides no answer.
Q = mcₛ(ΔT)
Q is Joules
m is mass in grams
cₛ is specific heat in J/(gram×°C)
ΔT is a change in temperature °C
This heat equation determines the amount of Joules needed to raise the temperature of the mass a given amount regardless of the time. (Under strict assumptions like perfect insulation.)
You can use the Stefan-Boltzmann equation
I = σT⁴
one can determine the temperature rise for 1 W/m² and then determine the heat that was transferred.
Aha! The Eschenbach Intertropical Convergence Theory of Climate again. Really, Willis, if you only had a few of the right connections, you’d have got a Nobel Prize for that by now.
I still remember, as if it were yesterday, the evening in November 2015 that the intertropical convergence zone descended on me down the road from Darwin.
Willis, my age has 2 digits and starts with an 8, and I’ve HAD to slow down a bit. But far, far from stopping, I’m still active (that’s the key, I believe) but a bit less.
Cheers.
Willis, have you checked this against the number of papers published each year over the same time period? Obviously if more are published each time the greater the range of estimates you would expect (given that no one has a clue about determining the ”ECS”)
Thanks for this interesting post, Willis. And I appreciate your instruction to *quote the words.* I have indicated here what I think you surely meant – degrees C instead of W/m^2 in at least these instances.
“Figure 1. This figure shows a variety of ways that the Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS) has been estimated. The dotted lines show the uncertainty of the earliest estimates of the ECS, which was said to be between 1.5 and 4.5
watts per square meter (W/m2)C per doubling of CO2 (2xCO2).”And
“This can also be expressed as the change of temperature from a one watt per square meter increase in downwelling radiation. The original central estimate of 3
W/m2C per 2xCO2 is the same as 3/3.7 ≈ 0.8W/m2C for each radiation increase of 1 W/m2.”All the best to you.
Thanks, David, much appreciated. Fixed. I love writing for the web, my mistakes don’t last long.
Best to you and yours,
w.
Until ECS is resolved- the science ain’t settled.
True. And the big question is whether there will ever be a way to isolate the influence of incremental CO2 from the influence of cloud variation, of solar variation, and of dynamic variations from ocean and atmosphere circulations, for positive attribution. I think not. The valid null hypothesis of “no effect” (i.e. ECS of 2XCO2 =~ 0) is not likely to ever be reliably falsified by any means we have available to us.
[Edit – this is not to suggest there would be no effect from changing values of energy absorption – the sensitivity of the surface temperature to more or less absorbed energy is not in dispute.]
ECS is only one of a very long list of unsettled elements in the earth energy systems.
One of the unstated assumptions is that ECS is a constant with a single value. It may well be a variable whose value changes over time and with temperature and maybe even CO2 concentration. We don’t know.
Really, really interesting results! Many thanks for all of these insights Willis Eschenbach. Figure 4 only needs a small correction in the table; dgC per W/m2
Thanks, Arjan. Fixed.
Best to you and yours,
w.
Is there an error there somewhere, Willis. The first sentence says per deg C, the second seems to substitute this with “for every 1 W/m2 increase”.
Thanks, Greg. Fixed.
Much appreciated.
w.
In principal I would like to agree but that is contrary to what you are finding.
A large neg. f/b can never make something change in the opposite direction. The larger the neg. f/b the more closely the controlled quantity will hug the original unperturbed state. A really, really strong neg. f/b will ensure the temp never moves, no matter how the “radiative forcing” changes.
Willis may have found something interesting but it is not a simple neg. f/b.
That’s why I say what’s going on is not a feedback. It’s a governor.
w.
A (steam-engine) governor is a mechanical negative f/b. , if that is your analogy in using that term.
I’m not aware of how a governor mechanism does anything more than correct an error signal and apply an opposing adjustment. If it over adjusts it will end up having to correct itself by apply an opposite adjustment. If the mechanics, or inertia, make that too slow it could oscillate.
I fundamentally agree with your hypothesis that tropical rainstorms apply a neg. f/b and are a major factor stabilising climate, though I think some of your understanding of control theory and f/b is a little off.
A distinction without a difference. A non-linear feedback loop can act not only as a governor, but as a hard clamp.
I think this is an excellent point however I also think the exitance of tipping points in a chaotic system can lead to greater (negative) change than from the effect itself.
I do in principle agree with you for most change most of the time.
“Tipping points” is a reference to positive feedbacks.
Emergent phenomena like tropical storm emerge rapidly due to both non-linear and positive f/b processes. However they are always bounded by a negative f/b otherwise there would be a catastrophic conclusion to the entire system.
I was pointing out the fundamental inaccuracy of Willis’ claim that a “strong negative f/b” could cause net cooling.
You need a more complex description of a system to produce such a negative swing from a positive radiative “forcing”.
Thanks, Greg. The part that you are missing is that a positive feedback can power a negative feedback.
Consider a tropical thunderstorm over the ocean. Sun heats the surface. Surface heats the air. Because warm air is less dense than cold air, air starts to circulate in a Rayleigh-Benard emergent pattern, rising in columns and descending in the area around the columns.
When a given temperature threshold is exceeded, a cumulus field quickly emerges, with each cloud marking a rising column of warm moist low-density air.
When a further given initiation temperature threshold is exceeded and the amount of rising warm moist low-density air becomes great enough, some of the cumulus clouds become thunderstorms. This only happens when the surface is above that initiation temperature. Below that initiation temperature, no thunderstorms form. Above it, they form quickly and widely.
Now, a thunderstorm is a natural refrigeration system operating on exactly the same principles as your household refrigerator. Like your refrigerator, a thunderstorm has a working fluid, in this case water. See my post here for further discussion of thunderstorms as refrigerators.
And just like in your refrigerator, the working fluid is evaporated in one location and condensed in another. This cools the first location and warms the second. So the thunderstorm cools the surface and warms the “LCL”, the lifting condensation layer a few thousand feet up where the rising water vapor condenses.
In addition to the evaporative cooling, the thunderstorm drops millions of gallons of cold fresh water from aloft onto the surface, further cooling the surface.
And this leaves the surface COOLER THAN WHEN IT STARTED.
It doesn’t just slow the heating. It actively cools the surface below the initiation temperature of the thunderstorm. You can see this effect in the trail of cold water left behind a cyclone as it moves.
Curiously, a thunderstorm cools the surface so far below its initiation temperature that if it stays it one place it will die out. It has to continually move to new warm spots to keep a supply of its fuel, which is low-density warm moist air.
So there, we have a negative feedback system opposing surface warming (clouds and thunderstorms) which, contrary to your claim, is strong enough to cause not just reduced heating, but also to cause net cooling of the surface.
And I haven’t even gotten to the good part where increased positive feedback causes increased negative feedback.
One of the things that a thunderstorm does is whip up winds at the base of the thunderstorm. And evaporation varies roughly linearly with wind speed. The hidden part of this process is that water vapor is lighter than air. So the wind generated by the thunderstorm increases the power of the thunderstorm by providing more of the low-density moist air that fuels the thunderstorm. Obviously, this is positive feedback.
But because the positive feedback makes the thunderstorm stronger, it also increases the cooling power of the thunderstorm in two ways. First, it increases evaporation and rainfall, further cooling the surface. Second, it means that a thunderstorm is a dual-fuel heat engine, running off of a combination of surface-warmed air plus the low-density moist air created by the thunderstorm-driven winds.
And this means that the thunderstorm can survive and continue to cool the surface despite the surface being below the temperature required to initiate the thunderstorm.
So … the positive storm-wind-driven feedback provides additional fuel to strengthen the thunderstorm. This leads to additional cooling power and a longer lifespan for the natural thunderstorm refrigerator … and this in turn increases the negative feedback to increasing temperatures, and allows the entire cloud and thunderstorm negative feedback system to drive the surface temperature far below the initiation temperature it was at when the whole process started.
Best regards,
w.
You are aware that thunderstorms have been observed at Vostok station, I presume. Just wondering about the surface initiation temperature, and cooling the surface.
Vostok has recorded surface temperatures below -85 C. Can’t see a thunderstorm making things much colder, so maybe you can explain.
Thanks
m.
Perhaps you’re mistaken. What reference are you using?
This thunderstorm at the North pole initiated well above the ground. The world is full of exceptions.
I forgot to mention that I was referring to Vostok base in Antarctica.
Sorry. Does that clear things up?
You said
If there are exceptions, the rule (or theory) is wrong.
No. I asked for a reference not a location. You must have a paper or at least an article that made that claim.
A perfectly reasonable supposition on your part, but probably incorrect.
I have yet to see MF provide a reference or citation … or, perish the thought, a link … when a request for “supporting evidence” is made.
His responses that I personally have witnessed, both to myself and other WUWT posters, appear to be limited to either
1) No further response at all (as here, so far …)
or
2) The deflecting claim that “So you think adding CO2 to air makes it hotter” (or some variant thereof).
If anyone persists in their “(please) provide a citation” requests MF has the unfortunate habit of descending to the level of “debate” that is limited to making aspersions about their mental state / acuity.
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PS : I would be genuinely curious to see if any poster here can point to a contribution by MF where he did provide an actual reference / citation / link in the end.
In this comments thread I have just checked the 72 occurrences of the string “Flynn”, which includes both his comments and replies, and if there is a reference / citation / link in his posts I missed it.
As they say in (some) scientific domains, though :
“Absence of evidence” is not the same as “Evidence of absence”
I suppose you could have used your valuable time to produce some experimental data to support your belief that I have been factually wrong about something, but you didn’t.
That’s your choice of course. If you want to believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter, or that thermometers prove that the Earth is getting hotter, you are free to do so. Ignorant and people believe all sorts of strange things. You aren’t one of those, are you?
If you were, you might even believe that a “scientific” paper titled “Atmospheric CO2: Principal Control Knob Governing Earth’s Temperature”, (which included Gavin Schmidt as an author) was based on anything other than speculation and wishful thinking!
If you believe there is benefit in counting my comments (or even recording them), I support your efforts. I feel flattered.
Why should I provide anything to you just because you want it?
You don’t have to believe me, and I won’t dissolve into tears if you don’t. I don’t really care.
If you believe I’m wrong (and I’m not), just do a bit of research and show some facts to support your belief. Or not, as you wish.
Common courtesy, maybe ?
Not to mention the concept of “Nullius in verba“, the original motto of the Royal Society, which roughly translates as “Take nobody’s word for it”.
A more recent variant is the motto of the Apollo team at NASA in the 1960s :
“In God we trust. Everybody else has to bring data.”
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My Irony Meter just exploded …
You don’t have to take my word for anything at all. I don’t care.
To support your argument. Without it, you’re just making noise and over time people will listen to you less and less.
What “argument” are you talking about?
Is this your considered prediction, or just wishful thinking? Do you really think I care?
I can only speak for myself as far as reading your posts goes but I doubt I’m alone. I think you do care otherwise you wouldn’t post so much.
Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I don’t agree, of course. Do you care what I think?
Furthermore from my referenced article
and your claim
Willis isn’t claiming all thunderstorms initiate at the surface, that’s not his theory or rule. Nor is it the point of his post.
And that is supposed to have some relevance to me saying that if there is an exception to a rule, the rule is obviously not a rule?
Maybe you are confused.
Yes, Willis, we agree about the mechanics of the storm.
Not really, I already mentioned +ve f/b are present in a storm but a limited by greater -ve f/b. That is consistent with what you say about a storm would die out if it did not move. So there we agree.
You can have a local +ve f/b power a -ve f/b etc but you have to pay attention to scope and use of these terms. If you want to draw a boundary around the tropics or the ITCZ and look at the net effect of storms and say there is a negative feedback to an increase incoming radiation, that -f/b can never get you cooler than before the radiation started to heat the water. Negative feedbacks only apply a correction towards initial state. If it goes below the unperturbed state the same neg. f/b will correct upwards.
Even a “very strong” -ve f/b only clamps it harder to the unperturbed state.
If data shows it is getting cooler than the initial state, either you are misidentifying at what time can be considered the unperturbed state, or you need a more complex description than simply talking of simple feedbacks.
There is displacement of mass, inertia , thermal inertia , both +ve and -ve f/b , in short a complex chaotic system. There can be overshoots and oscillations in such a system.
That is why I said :
We don’t fundamentally disagree about storms or their effects, it’s just a case of being careful with language and not over simplifying what happens.
Your start and end points are essentially arbitrary, determined by the length of the data available. Although a decent length for an average start and end is still basically arbitrary, so sit at any point in system oscillations.
Your fig 5 shows a net cooling in western tropical pacific but a larger magnitude, smaller area warming to the east of that. It seems the negative is part of net ENSO changes over that period.
It’s all interesting stuff and I appreciate the discussion.
BTW caption of fig 5 says it’s temp per W/m2 but the legend is in flux not degrees. Which is correct? I was reading it as temp.
Grrrr … the endless details. Thanks, Greg. I’ve corrected the graphic.
w.
Glad to help, those sort of quacks are annoying.
Both are possible. A simple example would be how the earth ends up in ice ages.
I hope you are not implying something physically impossible like an ice-covered Earth.
That would both silly and impossible.
Are you denying ice ages?
I’m not sure what you mean.
I hope you are not implying something physically impossible like an ice-covered Earth.
TTTM wasn’t implying anything.
You are the person who is inferring things.
You appear to be conflating the two separate concepts of “an ice age” and “a completely ice-covered Earth”.
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“If you would debate me, first define your terms.” — (attributed to) Voltaire
For “dry facts” a good place to start looking is Wikipedia.
On their “Ice age” webpage their contributors ended up agreeing that :
OK, in “an ice age” there are “extensive ice sheets” around both poles.
If you are using a different definition of “an ice age”, please provide a copy of it along with a reference or citation (or, ideally, a link).
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On Wikipedia’s “Snowball Earth” webpage they admit that :
From the “Slushball Earth hypothesis” section of that webpage :
Yes there is serious scientific pushback against the hypothesis of “an ice-covered Earth”, but for some semi-anonymous poster on the Internet to loftily declare … without references or citations to “supporting evidence” to back them up … that it is “physically impossible” is unjustified.
Gee whiz – I said “I hope you are not implying something physically impossible like an ice-covered Earth.”
Do you believe my hopes were dashed?
If you believe an ice-covered Earth is physically possible, that’s your choice. You can also believe that adding CO2 to air makes it hotter.
Your beliefs are nothing to do with me.
The discussion here is about tropical thunderstorms, that is a specific meteorological phenomenon, not just thunder.
Willis started off
Maybe your eyesight is different to mine.
I did not say “the article” I said the discussion: in comments where I was replying to you.
If you think you are being smart you are way off the mark. Being disingenuous to wriggle out of being wrong does not help you.
What do you believe I am “wrong” about? Maybe you could improve my knowledge by telling me what I am “wrong” about, and providing some facts to support your opinion.
I trust you won’t be too upset if I place a value of zero on any opinions you might express.