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Comments 59351 to 59400:

59351. John Mason at 14:52 PM on 2 May 2012
       Two Centuries of Climate Science: part two - Hulburt to Keeling, 1931- 1965
       Indeed, Barry. I'll see if we can place the same link at the end of each of the three parts. Weart's attention to detail is first-rate and if anyone wants to study this story in depth, I can't think of a better place to go. Cheers - John
59352. Dave123 at 13:12 PM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Tom, As I understand it, no one has implemented these methods. The problem continues to be that slag is produced on a semicontinuous basis, and you don't want any screwup in energy extraction to affect the production of the steel itself. From my own perspective, the chemical route is interesting, but the kinds of endothermic reactions that could use this degree of heat are best managed in a fully continuous operation. A carousel of tundish operations comes to mind...and it's conceptually not dissimilar to the use of ion-exchange columns in a continuous process. (One is exchanging, one on standby, the third regenerating). (Of course it's not the same, hence the tortured formulation of conceptually not dissimilar).
59353. barry1487 at 12:55 PM on 2 May 2012
       Two Centuries of Climate Science: part two - Hulburt to Keeling, 1931- 1965
       Jim @ 1 linked at the bottom of part 1 is the online version of "The Discovery of Global Warming," which is more detailed than the book, and I believe Weart updates it annually. I'm sure you're aware of it, but for anyone else, it's an excellent chronological primer on the subject. http://www.aip.org/history/climate/co2.htm
59354. muoncounter at 11:59 AM on 2 May 2012
       Two Centuries of Climate Science: part two - Hulburt to Keeling, 1931- 1965
       Jeff18: Venus' atmospheric pressure at the surface is 90x that of earth. Supak: What do you mean by 'adding .02 to the yearly temp anomaly'? Is that .02 degrees? That works as a decadal scale average, but annual variation can be much more.
59355. supak at 11:41 AM on 2 May 2012
       Two Centuries of Climate Science: part two - Hulburt to Keeling, 1931- 1965
       I have seen it noted on this site that CO2 is adding about .02 to the yearly temperature anomaly. I am counting on this effect to power my winnings in the Global Temperature Anomaly prediction markets at Intrade. They have monthly and yearly, plus some other climate bets. Intrade is notoriously good on predicting things. For example, the markets correctly predicted the Oscars, getting 93 out of 95 predictions correct. Intrade was correct 92% on Super Tuesday. I encourage everyone to join in as the more people mean better predictions, but be sure to get the deniers you argue with to put their money where their mouths are too, as there just aren't that many sellers. Seems many of them don't believe their own theories enough to bet on it. I thank Neil Degrasse Tyson for pointing out that you can bet on this, when he was on Bill Maher's show. After all, what's the sense in arguing with them if they don't really believe what they're saying.
59356. scaddenp at 10:55 AM on 2 May 2012
       Two Centuries of Climate Science: part two - Hulburt to Keeling, 1931- 1965
       Jeff, I don't know whether you were looking over those years, but you should try IPCC WG1 report for starters. How much temperature change for given much change in CO2, is known as climate sensitivity. Search here for that. Remember that radiative response is to log(CO2). Ie you get the same response as going from 200 to 400, as you get from 400 to 800 (or 100 to 200). Secondly, the instantaneous change in forcing directly from CO2 can be directly calculated from the Radiative Transfer Equations but tells only part of the story. The change in temperature from the CO2 induces feedbacks (particularly water vapour, albedo) which further increase temperature. The same physics works for Venus but its not a good analogue because the feedbacks are so different. The feedbacks work over different timescales up to hundreds of years for equilibrium. The IPCC report goes into the detail and links back to the relevant papers.
59357. Tom Curtis at 10:51 AM on 2 May 2012
       Two Centuries of Climate Science: part two - Hulburt to Keeling, 1931- 1965
       Jeff18: 1) The albedo of Venus is much higher than that of Earth, with the result that Venus absorbs less energy from sunlight than does the Earth; 2) Temperature does not increase linearly with CO2 concentration, but rather it increases linearly for each doubling of CO2 concentration. 100% atmospheric concentration represents 12 to 13 doublings of CO2. Therefore based on your simple method, one doubling of CO2 should result in 800/13 = 61.5 degrees C temperature increase. 3) The actual figure for doubling CO2 is the far less disastrous 3 degrees C. The figure is much lower because: a) The more even temperatures on Venus also contribute slightly to increased temperature; b) (more importantly), the much greater atmospheric density on Venus contributes significantly to increased temperatures; and c) The greenhouse effect contributes significantly more to the temperature of Venus than the simple formula for the radiative forcing of CO2 would indicate, that formula only being accurate for a few doublings or halvings of CO2 concentration relative to current levels on Earth. Despite the difficulties represented by (a), (b), and (c) above, models of the greenhouse effect have been shown to predict Venutian surface temperatures for Venutian atmospheric conditions since 1980.
59358. Realist at 10:16 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Dana1981 That may be purpose of a climate conference, but as Copenhagen was not a success we are back to the situation i described where nations are clearly making decisions to optimise their own position ie doing nothing, or lobbying for grants
59359. Jeff18 at 10:12 AM on 2 May 2012
       Two Centuries of Climate Science: part two - Hulburt to Keeling, 1931- 1965
       I have been looking for answer to this carbon dioxide question for a few years. Exactly how much CO2 change will cause how much temperature rise? The only real data I could find is the planet Venus. Let us assume the atmosphere is 100% CO2. (It is almost). For round numbers, the temperature is 800 degrees warmer than earth. Let us ignore for now the fact that Venus is closer to the sun and atmospheric pressure (thus CO2 content) is 15 time greater than earth. I will also assume the rate of change of temperature and CO2 is linear. If anyone has any data that differs, I would like to know about it. So, 100% is 800 degrees warmer, 1% would be 8 degrees warmer. And, .01% (100ppm) would be .08 degrees warmer. If you consider that Venus is closer to the sun and the pressure is higher, that further reduce the effect of CO2. It would seem by the above that the effect of CO2 is small. Comments Please. -Jeff
59360. Tom Curtis at 09:22 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       steve from virginia @45, in fact the system of dumping waste into the streets did involve an enterprise, and Alley clearly states. Specifically, "In the early 1800s, night-soil haulers in places such as London, Paris and Edinburgh removed the human output to the countryside, where it was used as fertilizer." (p216) He later goes on to discuss the potential implications this had on decision making to switch to modern sewage systems. It speaks ill for your case that you must continually misrepresent the contents of Alley's video and book in order to make it. More directly to your case, the loss of asset value following new inventions is never a consideration in the deployment of that invention, or at least it should not be. The invention of electronic calculators made the technology for mechanical adding machines largely obsolete. That was not a reason to forbid the manufacture and sale of electronic calculators, despite the loss of asset value for patent holders and makers of mechanical adding machines. Nor, in an earlier period, was the potential loss of employment to stable hands, and loss in asset value for horse breeders a reason for Henry Ford to not make the model T. In like manner, the loss of "asset value" of fossil fuels is no reason to not shift to renewables. This is particularly the case in that the supposed asset value of those fossil fuels consists largely in the fact that private enterprise gets to internalize the value of the benefits of the fossil fuels, while society at large is expected to pay the costs. Where the costs, including the costs of the full impact of global warming, where internalized to the producers of fossil fuels, the "asset value" of their reserves would be much smaller, and possibly even constitute a net debt, with each gallon of oil pumped impoverishing the oil producer, even before the costs of pumping it were included. People would be a lot wiser in economic decisions if they realized that "assets" and "debts" are mutually agreed upon fictions. They have no material existence, but rather consist solely of agreements made between people. Those fictions are often very useful fictions, but if you reify them you get Great Depressions, Global Financial Crises, and if we accept steve from virginia's analysis, the persistence in a ruinous policy because people with poor foresight, and a poorer conscious, decided to invest in fossil fuels rather than renewables. Well, the economic consequences of their unwise investment are their problems, not ours.
59361. dana1981 at 09:00 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Realist @52:

       "Surely you are not suggesting Copenhagen was a success?"

       No, if I was going to suggest it was a success, I would call it a success. I'm talking about the purpose of international climate conferences, not their success rate. Realist @53:

       "Tragedy of the commons is the same as what economists describe as a competitive marketplace."

       No, it's not. You could argue that it's an unfortunate aspect of a competitive marketplace, but the two are not equivalent.
59362. Tom Curtis at 08:54 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Dave123, thanks for the reference. Here is the abstract of Barati et al:

       "Molten slags represent one of the largest untapped energy sources in metal manufacturing operations. The waste heat of slags amounting to ∼220 TWh/year at temperatures in the range of 1200–1600 °C, presents an opportunity to lower the energy intensity of metal production. Currently, three types of technologies are under development for utilizing the thermal energy of slags; recovery as hot air or steam, conversion to chemical energy as fuel, and thermoelectric power generation. The former route is most developed with its large scale trials demonstrating recovery efficiencies up to 65%. The latter two are emerging as the next generation methods of waste heat recovery. An evaluation of these methods shows that for both thermal and chemical energy recovery routes, a two-step process would yield a high efficiency with minimal technical risk. For thermoelectric power generation, the use of phase change materials appears to solve some of the current challenges including the mismatch between the slag temperature and operating range of thermoelectric materials."

       The current ability to recover of 65% of waste heat as energy, I think, effectively rebuts realist @36.
59363. Realist at 08:19 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Tragedy of the commons is the same as what economists describe as a competitive marketplace.
59364. Realist at 08:10 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Dana1981 Surely you are not suggesting Copenhagen was a success? If so by what measure?
59365. Dave123 at 08:06 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Steve- Please put some numbers to paper.... you're as amorphous as any climate change denier. At 132000 TWhr/yr 2008 Energy Utilization, I can invest with present $ and technology in wind power, and let's say we did 500Billion/year...vs my calculation above that gets us over 1 terrawatt per year....and in 50 years we're around 1/2 way there from wind alone. It's just resource allocation. If we were faced with a 4th of July style alien invasion is there any doubt we could rassle up as much money as we wanted to? War powers do odd things to financial systems. Now if we only had a room temperature super conductor.
59366. Realist at 08:02 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Dana1981 If so, by what measure?
59367. Dave123 at 07:58 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       oops those are page numbers 5540-5499. don't know where the e came from.
59368. Dave123 at 07:56 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Thanks to Phil, I've found I misquoted the review article...it's 200 TWh/year energy in steel slag. Based on some other numbers, those 6 Megawatt wind turbines would generate about 18 gigawatthrs/year. (Scaled from a 1.5 Meg machine at 35% operating capacity) Thus we only need about 11,111 of them. I'm seeing costs of about $1.30 per watt installed [link] for an expenditure of about $87 billion we can use wind power to cover the energy in slag....assuming I haven't messed up again. So for a little more than 10% of the current US military budget, we could do quite a bit with state of the art machines. For everyone playing around with slag....getting the energy out of it is harder...nice review article here: Barati et. al. Energy 36 (2011) 5440e5449 Unfortunately behind a paywall. You can probably see the abstract. Bear in mind anything you do has to be fool proof, steel companies don't like taking their mills up and down. And as for what you do with the cool slag...the problem has mainly to do with location and transportation costs vs other materials that you can put into concrete and other applications.
       Moderator Response: [RH] Embedded link that was breaking page format.
59369. Realist at 07:56 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Dana1981 Surely you are not suggesting Copenhagen was a success?
59370. dana1981 at 07:09 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Realist @44 - what you're describing is a form of the Tragedy of the Commons, and is why we have international climate conferences, to get all nations on board with emissions reductions.
59371. steve from virginia at 07:03 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Alley's supposition is incorrect because it does not include the economic effect of a successful conversion on competitors. There is no factor in the calculation that represents the dumping of waste into Edinburgh streets, it was never an enterprise and could never compete against sewers: the fuel wasting enterprise on the other hand is the world's largest and represents the greatest part of world GDP. How can removing the fuel waste be cost free? Removing the waste is the object of the exercise, right? :) After all, if the renewables cannot eliminate fuel waste and its associated enterprises there is no point to the renewables. This is a competition between regimes. The implication is that all of the waste dependencies can remain as they are now but with different 'green' prime movers. This is false because all the dependencies are wasteful and polluting in their own right. What Prof Alley might suggest is that the replacement cost of new renewables versus new conventional prime movers is similar in $$$/kjoule. What happens is prime movers are aggregated according to operational characteristics within the wasting regime: intermittancy, base-load, etc. Wind farms do not replace reactors, they are added to them. For the purpose of removing atmospheric gases the entire waste enterprise must be eliminated. All the related costs including that of sunk capital must be calculated in addition to the cost of prime movers. Far from being easy or inexpensive, reconfiguration energy regime will be the hardest thing the human race has ever attempted in its entire existence. It is vital that we look at our endeavor this way so as to prepare ourselves for the crushing struggle to come. The future does not have any cars in it. There will be no conveniences, only shared struggle, hunger, perhaps much violence and deprivation. We lack the basic social infrastructures needed to cope with difficulties: our leadership and institutions are formed from mechanical and financial leverage. We are used to pushing buttons on the remote, for hiring others to solve our problems while we relax. The future has no relax in it. We cannot get a grip on our climate, fuel, food, water and other resource problems without acknowledging there will be large trade-offs and sacrifices. We cannot 'have it all'. We give up something or industrialization kills us (and itself in the process). Since industrialization is already unraveling (it doesn't pay for itself) we may as well go with the flow. What this means is the centralized, industrial forms of renewables are not likely to be deployed at a meaningful level. We cannot afford large-scale renewables already: the entire world has bankrupted itself the 'old- fashioned way' leaving nothing in the account books but debts. True enough, some is better than none, but when the credit is gone and the ginormous windmill breaks who will pay to repair it? The model here: Detroit.
59372. scaddenp at 07:01 AM on 2 May 2012
       Murry Salby - Confused About The Carbon Cycle
       desertphile - a nitpick but evidence to date would say that LIA was indeed a global event, though less marked in SH than in NH.
59373. Realist at 06:59 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       @43 The problem with the argument that it's cheaper to act now is that all nations know its even cheaper to let everyone else act first. The longer an individual nation delays acting the cheaper it is for that nation. Of course the absolute cheapest is to get others to pay or subsidies your renewable energy (Copenhagen?).
59374. muoncounter at 06:29 AM on 2 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       TOP: "For the most part the atmosphere is transparent to microwaves." Indeed. That should make the concept of atmospheric heating by microwave emission vanish into the ether.
59375. KR at 05:59 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       steve from virginia - What Alley is pointing out is that conversion to a fossil fuel free economy would cost about the same proportion of GDP as converting open sewer ditches into our current waste handling systems. With respect to the auto industry, my personal view is that one of the better approaches is solar->methanol style fuel production, such as described here. Methanol or ethanol can easily be burned in current vehicles with minor conversions, and if the fuel is generated from electrolyzed hydrogen and CO2 using renewable power it's carbon neutral. The same goes for renewable-created methane or other gaseous fuels, although those require more expensive conversions. Conversions that would not, I'll note, trash the auto industry. As to your "costs too much" argument, I would refer you to the discussions on the economic impacts of carbon pricing and Renewable energy is too expensive threads. Acting now is far less expensive than waiting.
59376. steve from virginia at 05:02 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Hmmm ... This is easy: Professor Alley supposes that renewable energy generators can replace conventional, fossil fuel waste at a negligible cost. Either renewables replace fossil fuel waste or they don't. - If they don't there is no point to renewables as the fuel waste enterprises will carry on as before, wasting fuel and loading carbon into the atmosphere. Fossil fuel waste will take place alongside the renewables (and their own embedded fossil fuel waste). See 'Jevon's Paradox': the demand for more energy to waste is insatiable. - If renewables DO replace fossil fuel waste the losses to the wasting enterprises will far exceed the cost of the renewables themselves. The auto industry and its dependencies: the fuel supply- real estate- finance- construction- defense- retail and the rest represent 60% + of GDP. As has been seen across the US economy, reducing funds to- or cutting one dependency has effects that ripple across the whole. - Meanwhile, the current level of economic 'cash flow' (which is what GDP represents) is what both enables and services the economy's debts. Renewables therefor cannot replace fossil fuel waste, instead they require fuel waste as a (credit) subsidy. The same way the sales of electric- and hybrid cars is internally subsidized within the auto industry by the sales of mega-SUVs and massive pickup trucks. No truck sales, no electric cars b/c they are too expensive. Speak of: the only pollution solutions must include getting rid of the cars, all of them along with car-related dependencies. Believe it or not, the market is already solving the 'car problem'. Europe is right now in the process of becoming car-free ... the hard way. GDP cost? Massive. Look to Greece ... then Somalia ... for the future of Europe, then Japan, China and the US. Cutthroat fuel competition using credit as a weapon is happening now under everyone's noses and few are paying attention. There is nothing anyone can do to halt or unwind the process, either.
59377. TOP at 03:38 AM on 2 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       @jmorpuss Regarding amateur radio you are picking at gnats. Amateur radio stations do not often operate at 1.5kw PEP and when they do it is at lower frequencies that would not likely cause response to the species in the atmosphere. The PEP requirement means that the actual power used is dependent on the modulation and represents any where from 41% to 100% of the PEP power. The higher amateur bands (VHF, UHF, microwave) where a measurable atmospheric response might happen near the antenna, the power levels are kept low simply because propagation is usually line of site except in rare instances (tropo ducting, Sporadic E, meteor scatter and EME). High gain antennas are usually used to get results. And of course in the amateur service, the rule is to use the least amount of power necessary to carry on communication. You simply can't use ERP additively since ERP is simply accounting for the gain in the antenna. Gain is simply the ability of the antenna to take the power presented to it and compress it into a smaller volume so that less transmitter power is needed. On UHF frequencies where the ERP might be 10MW for TV the antenna also might have 20Db gain which means that only 10kw is being radiated. The big difference between amateur service and broadcast is that broadcast is typically in operation 24/7 while amateur stations may be operated a few hours a night a few nights a month. And that fluctuates according to the sunspot cycle. The cell phone service operates at frequencies that will cause heating of water vapor in the atmosphere (3G, 4G, GSM), but they are supposedly low power and are not expected to cover an area much larger than 20 miles, usually much smaller. @21 muoncounter ATT still uses microwave transmission for local service within states. There is an ATT microwave tower in operation within site if this laptop. Longhaul may have been killed by fiber and satellite, but many of the towers are still active. In addtion to ATT there are now numerous microwave links privately operated in lieu of purchasing T1 and T3 connectivity over short hauls (20 miles or so). L band is in the 3.5 micron range which has a high transmittance in the atmosphere. For the most part the atmosphere is transparent to microwaves.
59378. Jim Eager at 03:07 AM on 2 May 2012
       Two Centuries of Climate Science: part two - Hulburt to Keeling, 1931- 1965
       John, thanks so much for compiling this history of the science in one easy to access place, or ultimately three places. No longer will I have to thumb back and forth through my dog-eared copy of Spencer Weart's The Discovery of Global Warming.
59379. dana1981 at 02:41 AM on 2 May 2012
       Climate Scientists take on Richard Lindzen
       We'll be doing a post on this NY Times cloud/Lindzen article in the near future. It is a good article and really lays out the problem with listening to "skeptics" like Lindzen. As Stephen @49 notes, it also highlights that Lindzen is unable to consider the true consequences if (when) we learn that he's wrong, if we heed his advice and fail to act in the meantime.
59380. citizenschallenge at 02:40 AM on 2 May 2012
       Lessons from Past Predictions: Vinnikov on Arctic Sea Ice
       Great article Dana! FYI ~ It's another one I couldn't resist bootlegging {with attribution ;-)} over at my WhatsUpWithThatWatts blog. SkS: “Poor Pielke Analysis”. . . Dear Dr. Pielke can you explain? ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ an excerpt from my introduction to your post: "{...} Contrarian-skeptics {as opposed to Informed-skeptics} are slippery fish to catch, but if you don’t mind my saying so, I think I caught a floppy one yesterday. {...} Additionally, rather than examine long-term Arctic sea ice "death spiral," Dr. Pielke chose to instead focus on short-term noise. "However, since 2006, the reduction has stopped and even reversed. Perhaps this is a short term event and the reduction of sea ice extent will resume. Nonetheless, the reason for the turn around, even if short term...needs an explanation." The explanation is that Dr. Pielke's Eyecrometer has failed him. An actual statistical analysis of the NSIDC data tells a different story (Figure 4). . . {...}" =============== Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. says "Nonetheless, the reason for the turn around, even if short term...needs an explanation." WHY? Why does the short term fluctuation need an explanation beyond the very reasonable explanations already supplied by mainstream climatologists? Can anyone help Pielke explain “Exactly what is wrong with the climatologist’s explanation?” WHAT DEGREE OF RESOLUTION IS Dr. Pielke EXPECTING ? WHY? What justifies demanding a bridge builder’s “engineering level resolution” as opposed to a reasonable "Earth science’s level of resolution"? What point is he trying to make? I ask because to me it seems like just more of the crazy-making contrarians love to inject into what should be a learning process. Isn’t the issue that NEEDS attention GHG’s salting of our planet’s atmosphere, with it’s resulting insulating effect? It is that simple! That atmospheric insulting effect isn't going to change itself over the short term. Why won't Dr. Pielke acknowledge that our grand experiment is producing results coming in faster and with more fury than any experts anticipated ! ? {...} Cheers, CC
59381. Stephen Baines at 02:05 AM on 2 May 2012
       Climate Scientists take on Richard Lindzen
       CBD Yes, its ironic that an real live example of accurate reporting of the news has me suddenly wondering if maybe there are such things as unicorns and Santa Claus! Gillis has been doing yoeman's work reestablishing what true journalistic balance should be about (as opposed to lazy he said-she said balance). It has become so rare in the mainstream media that seeing it now is just plain disorienting. If I were to quibble (and it is indeed a quibble) it's that he provides a lot more specifics about Lindzen's arguments than he does for the arguments against reduced climate sensitivity via the Iris effect. The arguments against are cast in a more general light. That can leave the impression that Lindzen's ideas are somehow more coherent and that mainstream scientists are being sourpusses. Nothing could be further from the case. I love Lindzen's quote near the end. “If I’m right, we’ll have saved money...If I’m wrong, we’ll know it in 50 years and can do something.” Of course, if Lindzen was wrong, we wouldn't be able to do anything about because climate sensitivity will be high and the effects will substantial and long lasting. What I think he meant was ... “If I’m right, we’ll have saved money, but if I’m right , we’ll know it in 50 years and can do something.” To state it simply, to me its clear that he simply can't imagine a scenario where he is wrong. And people claim mainstream climate scientists are arrogant! As Kerry Emmanuel states at the end, "...it just seems deeply unprofessional and irresponsible to look at this and say, ‘We’re sure it’s not a problem.'"
59382. Bernard J. at 02:02 AM on 2 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Via a comment on Stoat I ran into this post by Tom Murphy: http://physics.ucsd.edu/do-the-math/2011/07/galactic-scale-energy/ He doesn't really touch on the ideas that I was poking at further up on this thread, until near the end of the third post in the series, but all are very much worth reading. I'm sure that ol' Albert would approve... For those who venture to Tom's posts, there's one point worth dwelling on. Consider the last figure in third post, that is, the figure titled "Western lifestyle for all may require a vastly larger renewable footprint still". Note how Murphy depicts global energy consumption to date as the area under the grey peak to the left of the asterix. Compare that to the green area of the figure, which basically represents an energy business-as-usual into the future, but based on renewables. Then consider that that iddy-biddy grey area of energy consumption to the left of that asterix is responsible for bringing the planet to its current state of resource/ environment/biodiversity depletion. And then consider what the green area means for future resource 'sustainability', taking into account Tom's explanation about efficiency limits. And if we are going to bring the 'Other 80%' onboard to share equitably in the party (the blue area of the figure) - well... This is why simply converting to renewables is only a part of an answer that has to come very quickly, if there is to be any dignified future for our children and grandchildren, and for their decendants.
59383. dana1981 at 01:57 AM on 2 May 2012
       John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
       Old mole @20 - there are ENSO predictions which go about 9 months into the future, so we do have some idea how it will change in the near term. This is discussed in my post linked in comment 13.
59384. desertphile at 01:44 AM on 2 May 2012
       Murry Salby - Confused About The Carbon Cycle
       Salby mentioned the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice age, neither of which were global events, and then claimed that CO2 followed temperature; these assertions have been refuted and debunked by scores of scientists. Murry Salby needs to update himself in the current literature. Note that our New Galileo here also ignored the fact that humans are currently putting 30,000,000,000 tons of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere EVERY YEAR, yet the non-human sources put in AND THEN REMOVE the same, or very similar, amounts of CO2 that they do every year. Just where does Mr. Salby believe our release of CO2 is going?
59385. muoncounter at 23:37 PM on 1 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       jmorpuss#13: "Radio waves exite the oxygen molecule to propagate" Doesn't that mean molecular oxygen absorbs radio waves? So I guess microwave and radio are very poor means of long distance communication. Is that why ATT gave up on microwave telecomm links (4-8 Ghz) after a mere 40 years of commercial use? And is that why Iridium (~1620 Mhz) went bankrupt? And it's certainly ironic that all those long distance radars (1-4 Ghz) at airports and weather stations around the world are broadcasting energy that is absorbed by the atmosphere. Waste energy, indeed.
59386. DSL at 23:27 PM on 1 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       All clear now, scaddenp? :) You see, if you concentrate that .000005 W/m2, then it turns into 1.5 W/m2 over the same area. That's just the way it is, and denying it will just make you a denialist, and clearly you don't want to be one of those. And the tropospheric hotspot and clouds are the result of the dust moving from one place in the atmosphere (where the particles did not create clouds) to another place in the atmosphere (where they did create clouds), attracted by the magnetic flux created by the criss-crossing satellite microwave power beams that get amplified by the . . . the . . . ionosphere or something. The resulting friction from this forced travel also creates global warming. And these clouds that form never formed before microwaves were invented (by Al Gore), and now there are lots of these clouds (all different shapes, too -- lions, dragons, etc.) that create both a warming and cooling effect. Meanwhile, the ionosphere, which is full of water, is forming a plastic bag which serves as a parabola which heats up the Earth's core (the focal point of the parabola) and creates even more global warming. By the way, the CO2-warming connection (boy, what a CRAZY theory that is!) and any science-based criticisms of my theories are hoaxes perpetrated by greedy scientists and the Masters of the Universe, who live in a cave in the Himalayas and stand on their heads all day, saying "doh!"
59387. CBDunkerson at 23:23 PM on 1 May 2012
       Climate Scientists take on Richard Lindzen
       The New York Times has inexplicably published a cogent and thorough look at the state of AGW 'skepticism' with particular emphasis on Lindzen's 'cloud iris' hypothesis and clouds in general as being the 'last bastion' of uncertainty for 'skeptics' to hang their hat on. Oddly, I didn't see any egregious errors of fact or ludicrous convolutions in the name of providing 'balance'. It was almost as if they were reporting... news. Accurately. I've heard stories of such things from the olden days, but it is quite a surprise to see it in the here and now. Are unicorns also real?
59388. Realist at 22:57 PM on 1 May 2012
       Richard Alley - We Can Afford Clean Energy
       Bernard j While we use the metric of CO2 per person, there is no disadvantage for a country to increase its population. Which masks the fact as you point out, how will we all fit. I would like to think we has the intelligence to control our population instead of waiting for nature to step in and control it for us, but the only creature with such sense is a lemming, and unfortunately that lemming behavior is a myth.
59389. Daniel Bailey at 22:48 PM on 1 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       Fascinating, the way this thread has come to resemble the waste energy thread.
59390. Ari Jokimäki at 22:39 PM on 1 May 2012
       New research from last week 17/2012
       Fixed, thanks.
59391. jmorpuss at 20:06 PM on 1 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       skywatcher Do you see that the tropopause could be used as a parabola for reflection And also the way to increase the output of radio frequencies is as simple as building a bigger antenna aray and there's not much bigger then HAARP's ionispheric heater To create fire using water all you need is a clear plastic bag put in a cup of water manipulate the bag to form the water into a ball or freeze slowly so no bubbles form and you get the same effect magnification I see you didn't post anything about lower atmospheric electron discharge and cloud formation is it your belief that this is not taking place ?
59392. skywatcher at 19:00 PM on 1 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       jmorpuss, you've a lot to learn about conservation of energy, among many other things. To take your last statement - yes, you can use a lens of water to concentrate energy (e.g. from the Sun) to incinerate objects, but this process concentrates the energy formerly spread over a larger area onto a very small spot, leading to intense heating at that point. Locations next to the spot of intense heating are heated less than they would otherwise be without the lens in place, as the lens diverts the incident rays towards the spot of intense heating - thus this is not the long-sought-after perpetual motion machine, and there is no creation of energy going on. Otherwise the humble lens could provide all the energy we ever needed! Similarly, 0.000005W/m2 cannot provide the same input of energy as the 1.6W/m2 anthropogenic forcing, however you concentrate it. Why would you want to invent some impossible physics in order to explain the effects of already well-understood physics?
59393. adelady at 17:51 PM on 1 May 2012
       John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
       Old Mole. See sout@1. "....the latest (24 April 12) ENSO wrap up from the Australian Bureau of Meteorology states: "Some, but not all, climate models note an increased risk of El Niño conditions evolving during winter or spring. Historically, about 70% of two-year La Niña events are followed by neutral or El Niño phases." So the likelihood according to BOM is 70% that this year will be neutral or El Nino if it follows the historical patterns.
59394. Old Mole at 17:08 PM on 1 May 2012
       John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
       dana @ 15 Question for you ... it appears that we cannot predict with any certainty whether there will be an El Nino, La Nina, or a an ENSO neutral year. I realize that uncertainty is not the same thing as true randomness, but what leads you to believe that a third La Nina after two previous ones is less likely than otherwise, any more than the odds of flipping a true coin heads for the tenth time after nine previous heads would be any less than 50%? Do you believe that there is a pattern, and we simply haven't figured it out yet, and what leads you to that conclusion? Best wishes, Mole
59395. 70rn at 16:57 PM on 1 May 2012
       New research from last week 17/2012
       The anders (1882) full text link appears to direct me to the Castebrubet et al (2012) paper. Unless I'm doing it wrong or summmin.
59396. jmorpuss at 16:34 PM on 1 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       Scaddenp How many free electrons do you think would be released from the hot spots that are created by this process http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/stp/IONO/Dynasonde/images/HeatPrecip.pdf And if you overlay this info onto transequateral communications and the hot spots that are created there would be the same result Now these lower atmospheric electron clouds that form have a high negative charge and would through magnetic atraction collect dust particls and moisture to form clouds And to clear things up a bit about radio waves are capable of temperature effects out of all proportions to the energy input Two words amplification and magnification man puts them to great use Do you know that you can use water as a magnifier to create fire
59397. KR at 15:06 PM on 1 May 2012
       John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
       dagold - The 'hiatus' periods are the ENSO events (heat going more/less into the oceans rather than the atmosphere), so this analysis speaks directly to that variation. With respect to aerosols, declines in insolation and the like, keep in mind that CO2 forcing is increasing faster than exponential right now, meaning GHG forcing is greater than linear in rise. I suspect that forcing balances out dimming and insolation to such an extent that it's going to be difficult to isolate anything more complex than linear temperature increases - given the noise level in the surface temperature signal. At least, not without a longer period...
59398. scaddenp at 14:50 PM on 1 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       jmorpuss, just to be clear. It seems to me, (and please correct me if I am wrong), that you are claiming that radio waves are capable of temperature effects out of all proportion to the energy input. To have the effect you claim would violate energy conservation. You put up links to perfectly well known science which I think you believe backs your claim, but I cannot see how this is so. I believe you have some serious misconceptions but since I cant even follow you line of argument.
59399. dagold at 14:39 PM on 1 May 2012
       John Nielsen-Gammon Comments on Continued Global Warming
       I am wondering how this study of ENSO effect 'speaks to' the impact of aerosal dampening and/or 700-2000 deep 'hiatus' periods vis-a-vis surface temps? Do the findings somehow account for the 'missing' heat of the last 10-13 or so years or is it simply that all 3 plots (La Nina, ENSO neutral, and El Nino) would be 'shifted higher' without the aerosal and/or ocean hiatus effects?
59400. scaddenp at 14:37 PM on 1 May 2012
       It's satellite microwave transmissions
       I'm still lost. What has that link got to do with anything on climate? You do accept that conservation of energy applied in that experiment?

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