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Comments 63451 to 63500:

63451. KR at 01:47 AM on 24 February 2012
       Breaking News…The Earth Is Warming…Still!
       Ken Lambert - I would agree with you that ice melt is only a few percent of climate energy changes. Which is why I found your invocation of it here, in an apparent claim (as I interpreted it) that "warming in the pipeline" won't happen due to ice melt energy absorption (contrary to the OP, an this post in particular), to be, well, quite puzzling.
63452. Ken Lambert at 01:45 AM on 24 February 2012
       The Year After McLean - A Review of 2011 Global Temperatures
       DM "If you cannot do this, they you have no good reason to invent some mysterious ocean circulation. The ball is in your court." An unsymmetrical ENSO over 10 years implies a larger cycle of ENSO. You say 30 years is not exactly neutral either. That implies a longer ENSO cycle (return to neutral) than 30 years. It is not mysterious just deductive. William of Ockham would no doubt agree.
63453. CBDunkerson at 01:41 AM on 24 February 2012
       DenialGate - Infographic Illustrating the Heartland Denial Funding Machine
       CraigR wrote: "The amounts of funding are simply disproportionate to those that support the AGW theory and those that do not" What reference set are you using here? All forms of funding to everyone who supports/opposes AGW theory? Including the paychecks your employer gives you? If so then the money received by people who accept AGW is likely somewhat larger... because there are more of them. Making the difference very much 'proportionate'. All funding to climate scientists? Again, I'd argue that funding here is proportionate... because there are vastly more climate scientists who support the AGW theory (i.e. virtually all of them) than do not. All funding to anyone to promote a specific pre-determined viewpoint on global warming? Here I'd agree that there is a clear case of "disproportionate" funding, to the 'skeptics'. Also keep in mind, scientists are constantly trying to prove and DISprove countless aspects of climate science. Indeed, every significant scientific talking point the 'skeptics' have comes originally from research done by actual climate scientists (which 'skeptics' then distort or continue to reference decades after it has been corrected). Thus, treating all the money going into climate science as 'pro AGW' is simply false. That money is 'pro science', it is just that over a century of scientific efforts to contradict AGW have failed to do so.
63454. Ken Lambert at 01:32 AM on 24 February 2012
       Breaking News…The Earth Is Warming…Still!
       KR & CBD All sea ice decline is small in absorbed energy terms. From memory, sea ice melt is 1-2E20 Joules/year in a Trenberth imbalance of 145E20 Joules/year (0.9W/sq.m). scaddenp #79 "Do we expect rapid decline in sea ice are in winter with rising GHG gases? No. Do we expect summer ice decline? yes." If sea ice largely recovers in winter - then the energy absorbed in a bigger summer ice melt is largely being lost to space. This indicates that more energy is being pumped through the Arctic in a larger amplitude summer/winter cycle. It is still small in energy terms - 2 or 3% of the claimed warming imbalance.
63455. DSL at 01:16 AM on 24 February 2012
       DenialGate - Infographic Illustrating the Heartland Denial Funding Machine
       CraigR, the ultimate point is that worthwhile initiatives get funded. You could make the same argument about science in general: "Geez, these new theories about chemistry, physics, biology, and agriculture sure do have a lot of supporters. But there are alternative theories (God, FSM, Gaia). I'll bet the alternative theorists get funded much less than the scientists! Conspiracy! Waste! Fraud!" Heartland funding leads to a less informed public. Funding to climate science leads to a more informed public. The former profits the few; the latter profits the many.
63456. Matthew L at 01:05 AM on 24 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       I have a question on this point about coming out of the ice ages: "If a long slow wobble (precession) was sufficient for Earth's feedbacks to raise the global temperature 8-12 degrees, we should be cautious, wary, risk-adverse of a global disturbance of 1 degree C, as this one degree disturbance occurs on top of an interglacial." Surely a disturbance of 1 degree C on top of an interglacial is a lot less dangerous than a disturbance of 1 degree C on top of an ice age? It seems to me that the conditions that prevailed on the Earth as it started to come out of the ice age were very different to those now (during an interglacial). The primary positive feedback driving the 8-12C of temperature rise was the melting of the summer ice and snow at low latitudes and consequent dramatic fall in albedo. The sunlight reflected from snow at 40-59N is much greater than that reflected from snow at the 60-90N. Hence melting at low latitudes causes a bigger reduction in the amount of light energy reflected back to space than the same area of melting at high latitudes. Once all but the polar ice caps remained the albedo stabilised, there was dramatically less summer ice and snow to melt and the positive feedbacks reduced - hence the warming came to an end. We cannot assume that the dramatic positive feedback affects that brought us out of an ice age still apply when there is no low latitude summer ice and snow to melt.
63457. Eric (skeptic) at 00:47 AM on 24 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Albatross, thanks for breaking it all down. On (1), I agree with Meyer although CAGW should be qualified as CAGW by 2100 and I believe we will have adequate technological fixes for all potential consequences well before that. (2) The plant growth data is ambiguous, specifically we don't the proportion of natural uptake of our CO2 by extra plant growth versus oceans. But it is mostly oceans and we continue to eliminate forests net, so I do think Meyer has a valid point here. (3) My answer starts here (quick summary: water vapor distribution is what matters, not C-C) (4) If one assumes nothing within the models, then there is no consensus on sensitivity. For example "An intercomparison of 14 atmospheric general circulation models, for which sea surface temperature perturbations were used as a surrogate climate change, showed that there was a roughly threefold variation in global climate sensitivity." http://www.sciencemag.org/content/245/4917/513.short I would argue the IPCC researchers assumed nothing in their research but that the uncertainty was downplayed in the final summary reports. (5) I believe there is some short term negative feedback, probably by clouds and likely by increased convection. There are also plenty of short term positive feedbacks, water vapor, ice cover, etc. Long term the clouds are still unknown, but probably don't matter, feedbacks will be mostly positive. In short, no homeostatis. (6) You are correct. OHC rises have not stopped but I would point out that the deep ocean is a giant heat sink and since heat content appears to be rising there, that heat is not a warming factor for time intervals of interest. If that water does in fact return, it will cool the atmosphere. (7) You are correct. The rise in atmospheric temperature and OHC has slowed but there are two very good explanations for it: ENSO and a recent deep solar minimum. Same with (8), a sloppy statement by Meyer. He should have said: Before 1940, the increase in temperature is believed to have been caused mainly by two factors: 1. Increasing solar activity; and 2. Low volcanic activity (as eruptions can have a cooling effect by blocking out the sun). (9) Meyer is oversimplifying but we should have seen more system warming (OHC plus atmosphere). As I said in response to (7), the two major explanations of the lull in warming are ENSO and solar, but the solar minimum was very recent (2008) and ENSO would have transferred heat from the atmosphere to the ocean in greater quantities than we hav seen. So he is basically correct, but didn't explain it well. (10) Meyer is not correct IMO. The atmospheric rise is about 0.3C or a bit more since 1979 against a rise in CO2 from 335 to 390, for a sensitivity of 2C. Although the slowing of OHC rise makes a case for lower sensitivity, the observed temperature rise demonstrates some positive feedback. (11) Meyer's point is valid. The models are tuned to the atmospheric temperatures using anthropogenic aerosol parameters (not measurements) and crudely calculated natural aerosols. In addition, "...simulations with the GISS GCM for the first indirect effect (with sulfates, sea salt, and OC aerosols) with a minimum CDNC = 10 cm−3 was −2.1 W m−2, whereas that for CDNC = 40 cm−3 was −1.1 W m−2. This difference of 1 W m−2 is quite large and regionally can change the surface temperature response from a positive to a negative, as shown in Figure 3." (http://www.atmosp.physics.utoronto.ca/people/lev/ESSgc2/14892396.pdf) (12) I do not agree with you. My statements were about a specific issue which has now been addressed in the OP. I didn't give evidence for low sensitivity in this thread, I have addressed it in dribs and drabs here and there. Sensitivity also depends on exogenous factors, for example solar as I pointed out here
63458. dunc461 at 21:46 PM on 23 February 2012
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       Thanks! The number I used was 7,557,379 Million Short Tons from http://www.indexmundi.com/energy.aspx?product=coal&graph=consumption which is apparently incorrect.
63459. Lloyd Flack at 21:43 PM on 23 February 2012
       Denialgate - Internal Heartland Documents Expose Climate Denial Funding Network
       Looked at the prospectus. That is a lobbyist's prospectus, not that of a think tank. That by itself should get their charitable status questioned.
63460. Sapient Fridge at 21:10 PM on 23 February 2012
       Denialgate - Internal Heartland Documents Expose Climate Denial Funding Network
       GreenCooling The 2010 Heartland prospectus is still online. The diagram you referenced is on page 7. Best take a copy before it vanishes from there as well ;-)
63461. les at 21:01 PM on 23 February 2012
       2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
       1266 - DSL. Just be thankful there's no "Advanced" tab, given the law: (confusion of 'skeptics') = α(depth of physics)⁴
63462. Sapient Fridge at 20:40 PM on 23 February 2012
       It's the sun
       Link to /pub/data/irradiance/composite/DataPlots/composite_d41_62_1110.dat (PMOD) doesn't work.
63463. Sapient Fridge at 20:02 PM on 23 February 2012
       Scafetta's Widget Problems
       Estiben did you see the reply from the Met office to that article?
63464. GreenCooling at 19:40 PM on 23 February 2012
       Denialgate - Internal Heartland Documents Expose Climate Denial Funding Network
       I think it is important to understand how outfits like Heartland work, and how sophisticated and organised they are in approaching their mission of undermining climate scientists and gaining "greater attention to free-market ideas". It is the use of methods like those described in the following diagram that enable them to punch well above their weight. This is from their 2010 "Prospectus", which they regrettably no longer make available, but would be interesting to see if anyone has a copy? The important thing to bear in mind is that, as others have observed, Al Capone was not put away for theft or muder, but they did get him for tax evasion.
63465. Glenn Tamblyn at 18:52 PM on 23 February 2012
       Global Extinction: Gradual Doom as Bad as Abrupt
       Owl905 "Quite the opposite, it's your Malthusian 'No Blade of Grass' hyberbole chalked with examples that have proven to be hollow. There's less famine now, less violence now, higher standards of living with a population explosion, and the pulse of famine has slowed to a stop in China. It's scare-mongering when the outcomes are diametrically opposed to the forecast. And the big reason for that is technology; hint- read the 1972 Club of Rome report. - they also missed the technology factor. " Fundamental logical fallacy here Owl. The club of Rome report as about resources and their depletion, wastes and their accumulation. It is not about technology. For the simple reason that technology is about the efficiency with which we do something. So if we are consuming resources, technology may reduce the rate at which we consume those resources. But it cannot reduce the rate to zero. So technology can contribute to possibly changing when we hit various limits. But it cannnot change the fact that we will hit them. So lets consider your statement "There's less famine now, less violence now, higher standards of living with a population explosion, and the pulse of famine has slowed to a stop in China." Yes it has. And depletion of limited groundwater has accelerated, soil loss due to erosion has increased, agricultural yields are more dependent on fertilisers derived from Natural Gas, Nitrogenous fertilisers are causing steadily increasing problems of run-off into the oceans. When fisheries collapse, most don't recover. And so on... So far our technology has allowed us to continue to grow because the technology has become ever more capable at harvesting resources. And for decades the technology became so good and ever better at harvesting resources that we seemed to be getting ahead. And we were. For a time. But the very technologies that let us harvest resources better for our benefit today hasten the arrival of the time when we can't find enough resources to harvest, no matter what the technology. A simple case study in this is India, the Punjab, Rice and Water. The Punjab is now the rice bowl of India. It is probably the main reason real famine doesn't occur in India today. And this revolution is partly about crop strains, fertilizers, machinery etc. But more than anything else it is about water. Water fuels the Punjab. And while the water is there, times are good. And the Indian Government has fueled this by providing subsidies for pumps and the electricity to run them. There are farmers in the Punjab who don't bother growing a crop. They earn a living from just selling the water pumped from under their plot of land. And water tables are dropping. It is not uncommon for people to pump water from a kilometer underground. So technology has made us far more efficient at extracting resources which have produced a short term benefit of reduced famines etc. But still only by accelerating our draw-down of resources. Technology doesn't invalidate the Club Of Rome's findings. It simply changes it's timing of when they occur. Rather than the CoR's projections, technology may defer the moderate level impacts for a while, but accelerate the later more severe impacts. Technology is capable of providing paradigm shifts. Rather than just temporarily delaying resource limits, it has the potential to break out of the limits. But only if we accept the social and economic changes that technology might enable to produce a truely sustainable economic system. The technology is neutral. It can help us build a sustainable economic system. Or it can turbo-charge an unsustainable system. So rather than highlighting what technology might have delivered so far, rather, ask what it has cost to do so, and what has this to say about what can be delivered in the future. Basic rule in life. Never try to judge the future by looking at the past. By just looking at what happened. If we are to make judgements about the future, we need to look at WHY past events occurred and what this tells us about the future.
63466. IanC at 18:14 PM on 23 February 2012
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       dunc461, muoncounter, The World Coal Association puts the 2009 production to be 6823Mt, which agrees with 7.5 billion short tons figure. This translates to 1.5E13 pounds, so dunc461's figure is probably off by a factor of 1000. This puts the heat released to be 0.0099W/m²
63467. Estiben at 18:04 PM on 23 February 2012
       Scafetta's Widget Problems
       I was going to ask why you would even bother to cover this nonsense. Surely no one would take this guy seriously. Then I found this: Forget global warming - it's Cycle 25 we need to worry about Although the Daily Mail isn't exactly a scientific journal. *Rolls eyes*
63468. IanC at 17:54 PM on 23 February 2012
       Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
       7 Rosco:

       What if increased levels of CO2 actually provide another mechanism for the Earth's surface to cool.

       How exactly? Again, no ones says that convection doesn't play a role. Convection is included in all weather and climate models. Yet to explain the vertical structure of the atmosphere you need BOTH convective and radiative processes. While taking CO2 out of the atmosphere will not alter the convective process, it will definitely affect the radiative balance.
63469. IanC at 17:44 PM on 23 February 2012
       Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
       6 Rosco: Response to your individual points 1) That's only one factor. The heat capacity and the length of day will play a big role. 2) Not sure what your point is, but as I have re-iterated, you can't apply the simple model to the moon. The fact that the simple model fails spectacularly for the moon does not mean that it is automatically meaningless for earth. Earth and the moon differ very significantly. 3-5) No one says that the instantaneous solar radiation is 170W/m^2. It obviously varies according to the time of day, latitude, cloud cover and so on. You can probably get close to 1368w/m^2 if you are on the equator at noon on a sunny day. If you want a decent weather/climate model that realistically models the earth you will have to take these factors into account. However, no matter what the level of sophistication is, a model with an atmosphere will always be warmer than the same without, because it is dictated by physics.
63470. actually thoughtful at 17:07 PM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       How is Myers point, as quoted in #51 a denier point? It would seem to be true (as refined by Glenn Tamblyn). What am I missing?
63471. CraigR at 16:15 PM on 23 February 2012
       DenialGate - Infographic Illustrating the Heartland Denial Funding Machine
       Apologies to the Authors... my mistake The amounts of funding are simply disproportionate to those that support the AGW theory and those that do not, it's just not comparable, to think otherwise is not being realistic. Decisions are made and financial benefits are provided particularly from convinced governments to enterprises, groups & business that have a vested interest in proposed solutions and ongoing research, it simply gains momentum of it;s own which in fact could be described as the "climate change industry", as someone has already described.
63472. IanC at 16:14 PM on 23 February 2012
       Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
       Rosco, As Riccardo said, this is a simple model, and when you consider a simple model. The advantage of a simple model it gives you a crude, easily to calculate estimation. Whether this estimation is any good depends on the assumptions. In this case, this simple, zero dimension radiative balance model will be good for a planet that is rotating quickly and have a high heat capacity (such as the earth), and poor for a slowly rotating, low heat capacity object such as the moon. This model can give poor estimations for two reason: 1) The physics is wrong (your assertion, which is incorrect). 2) The assumptions that enables us to calculate a numerical value is not satisfied (this is the correct explanation). To explain the temperature on the moon, you'll need to use a more sophisticated model, where rotation is fully taken into account, while the physics is exactly the same as the simple model. Indeed the model reproduces the diurnal temperature on the moon very well, with the maximum temperature exactly what you would expect with 1368 Wm^-2 of solar radiation with 0.11 albedo.
63473. muoncounter at 15:44 PM on 23 February 2012
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       dunc461: "we burned 7,557,37 Million Short Tons of Coal" It would be helpful if you cite where you found your figures. According to the EIA, 2010 world coal consumption was approx 7.5 billion short tons, vastly less from your figure (which seems to be missing a digit or has an extra 2 digits).
63474. Glenn Tamblyn at 15:12 PM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Taking one of Meyers points "Rising temperatures may increase evaporation and therefore the amount of water vapor in the air, thus adding powerful greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere and accelerating warming." This seems to be a common misunderstanding about what drives the water vapour feedback. Increased temperatures most certainly are likely to increase evaporation but that isn't necesarily the driver of increased water vapour in the atmosphere. Evaporation is happening all the time, so water vapour levels in the atmosphere would just keep rising unless something counter-balances them. That something is precipitation. So if evaporation increases precipitation needs to increase. However, if there were increased atmospheric temperatures alone, without any increase in evaporation we would still get increased water vapour in the atmosphere. The reason is driven by cloud formation. Clouds need the air to be nearly saturated before they can form. The water vapour content of the atmosphere where the clouds might form needs to be around the maximum possible content for that temperature - its saturation point. Clouds don't form unless the air essentially is saturated. So if the air is warmer then its saturation water level is higher - it can hold more water before it reaches its limit. So just the act of increasing the air temperature means the air has to hold more water before cloud formation becomes possible. And since evaporation keeps adding water to the atmosphere until precipitation is high enough to balance it, in warmer air this drives water vapour levels up. And this doesn't require increased evaporation to occur. Just that current evaporation levels be continued. Imagine a tank with water being pumped into it. The pump is evaporation. And the tank fills with water until it reaches its capacity. The tank is like the atmosphere and its volume is the saturation limit. Once full, the tank starts to overflow and balnce is struck. The overflow is precipitation. So we increase the height of the tank, increasing what it can hold. This is the equivalent of increasing the air temperature so it can hold more water. The same flow rate from the pump will still eventually fill this larger tank and overflow it. If the pump runs faster the tank fills faster and then the overflow is greater. But the amount of water in the tank doesn't change because it isn't the flow rate that matters (evaporation) it is the height of the tank (air temperature)
63475. dunc461 at 15:11 PM on 23 February 2012
       Waste heat vs greenhouse warming
       Can someone please point out where I am making a mistake? In 2009 we burned 7,557,37 Million Short Tons of Coal which equals 1.51148E+16 pounds of coal. Coal has heat value of between 10,000 and 15,000 BTUs/pound depending on type. So at 10,000 BTU/pound the burning of this coal released 1.51148E+20 BTUs/year or 1.72543E+16 BTUs/hr. Since 1 Btu/hr. = 0.293 watts this equals 5.05551E+15 Watts. Dividing the Watts by the area of the earth 5.112E+14 meters squared you get 9.9 Watts/meter squared for just coal. This 35000% higher than the 0.028 Watts/meter squared sited on this site and else where for coal, oil, natural gas and nuclear power
63476. muoncounter at 15:06 PM on 23 February 2012
       2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
       YOGI#1270: What makes you think that greenhouse gas 'power' (actually 'global warming potential') is proportional to atmospheric concentration? Where I live, a lot of that water vapor winds up on my car every morning. That might give you a clue about what these numbers mean.
63477. Tom Dayton at 14:48 PM on 23 February 2012
       2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
       Yogi, please read the paper that you were pointed to. A less technical account is at realclimate.
63478. scaddenp at 13:18 PM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       william, studies on YD would indicate no. eg Schaefer 2006 You might also want to look for more recent work by Petrenko but I dont have a reference to hand.
63479. Bern at 13:16 PM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Gillian @ 47: it may just be that all of the studies are accurately reflecting the real proportions. william @ 48: Probably more from decaying organic matter in melting permafrost than clathrates, although outgassing from warming oceans would make a contribution too.
63480. william5331 at 13:09 PM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       The sudden jump in CO2 at the end of glacials may be due to Methane Clatrate (geologically speaking, instantly oxidized to Carbon dioxide) trapped under the ice sheets and released to start a run away green house effect as the ice started to melt from a Milankovitch nudge. http://mtkass.blogspot.com/2011/08/end-of-ice-ages.html Incidentally, New Scientist Feb4, 2012 p17 reports on some new work on the effect on wheat crops of climate warming. Not a pretty picture.
63481. DrTsk at 12:17 PM on 23 February 2012
       Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
       Rosco, Go get a course on basic physics first. Earth cools by radiating to space!! Nothing else cools the Earth from a system perspective. Radiators heat with both radiation and convection. I mean c'mon. Do we have to uber analyze everything??? G'd'mn broken education system. Oi!!!
63482. Lloyd Flack at 12:11 PM on 23 February 2012
       Monckton Misrepresents Specific Situations (Part 2)
       If you are going to debate him don't do it live. Have it pre-recorded over several days with say a day or two between replies to give people time to check others claims. That way you can expose the half-truths and fabrications. Given the sloppy way that he reads things his replies could well put him into ever deeper holes.
63483. YOGI at 11:59 AM on 23 February 2012
       2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
       more like 2% and 0.039% so that would make CO2 50 times more powerful as a green house gas ?
63484. YOGI at 11:34 AM on 23 February 2012
       2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
       So if water vapour is 50% of the greenhouse effect at 0.4% of the atmosphere content, and CO2 is 20% of the greenhouse effect at 0.00039% of the atmosphere content, CO2 would have to have 410 times the greenhouse effect of water vapour. Is that correct ??
63485. GillianB at 11:34 AM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Yes, I know...not quite 'exactly' the same. 97-98% in one study 95% among the meteorologists (taking the 5% who disagree that human activity is a significan cause) But still... this is an unusual level of uniformity.
       Moderator Response: [muoncounter] A more appropriate thread for this discussion is here.
63486. GillianB at 11:31 AM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Why is the 'oft-cited 97%' always 97%? This figure comes up in a number of surveys of climate scientists. 1) You link to a 2004 study showing 97% (link is broken btw). 2) Doran and Zimmerman 2009 is quoted as showing 97% (this is the study famous for have a sample of only 79 climate scientists) 3)William R. L. Anderegg, James W. Prall, Jacob Harold, and Stephen H. Schneider (April 9, 2010). "Expert credibility in climate change". Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America. This found that 97–98% of the climate researchers most actively publishing in the field support the tenets of ACC (Anthropogenic Climate Change) outlined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and (ii) the relative climate expertise and scientific prominence of the researchers unconvinced of ACC are substantially below that of the convinced researchers. 4) Stephen J. Farnsworth, S. Robert Lichter (October 27, 2011). "The Structure of Scientific Opinion on Climate Change". International Journal of Public Opinion Research. Retrieved December 2, 2011. This study of members of the American Geophysical Union or the American Meteorological Society found that 97% agreed that that global temperatures have risen over the past century. Moreover, 84% agreed that "human-induced greenhouse warming" is now occurring. Only 5% disagreed with the idea that human activity is a significant cause of global warming. The 97% figure is widely quoted and somewhat confusing because it is so closely linked with the Doran and Zimmerman study with the small sample. I'm curious that the number seems to have been reproduced so consistently. It's unusual in social research that a percentage across four studies using different methods and different samples would be exactly the same.
63487. scaddenp at 11:28 AM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Albatross, this is one excellent dissection. Should be sent to Forbes.
63488. Riccardo at 10:58 AM on 23 February 2012
       Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
       The simple model does not prove anything, it's just a way to explain the basics of energy balance applied to a planet with an atmosphere. Arrhenius already did a bit better dividing the Earth in latitudinal bands and doing the calculations for each season but retaining the uniformity over the 24 hours. Anyway, the simple model aproximates the planet as a uniform sphere with a uniform temperature. The Earth has an atmosphere and oceans which help smoothing the temperature out and this aproximation may apply to a certain extent. The moon is different and you can not use the same aproximations. What you're a demonstrating is that the simple model does not apply to slowly rotating bodies with no atmosphere, which we all know. If you want a better model for the moon, calculate the energy balance locally. You'll get fairly reasonable values except for the night side where the temperature drops too fast and too low.
63489. Rosco at 10:56 AM on 23 February 2012
       Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
       What if increased levels of CO2 actually provide another mechanism for the Earth's surface to cool. Obviously convection of air heated by contact is the major mechanism for the Earth's surface to cool - if radiation were the main method of cooling then reality does not exist - radiators do not heat or cool by radiation they convect.
63490. Albatross at 10:46 AM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Eric @43, "I believe I answered that in #35 and raised my specific concerns with the critique of Meyer." No you most certainly did not. I was very specific, I asked "Could you please let us know specifically which of his claims you agree with or support and which ones that you do not agree with or support and Meyer makes several statements in his opinion piece". Let me help. 1) Meyer says: "We are discussing the hypothesis of “catastrophic man-made global warming theory.” " Nice strawman and misrepresentation of the body of evidence. Or do you disagree? 2) Meyer also claims: "On the opposite end of the scale, many plants grow faster with warmer air and more airborne CO2, and such growth could in turn reduce atmospheric carbon and slow expected warming." Good luck defending that one. 3) Meyer claims: "Rising temperatures may increase evaporation and therefore the amount of water vapor in the air, thus adding powerful greenhouse gasses to the atmosphere and accelerating warming." May increase evaporation and the amount of WV?! He is behind on the observational data and the Clausius-Claperyon equation. 4) Meyer also says: "The IPCC assumed that strong positive feedbacks dominated, and thus arrived at numbers that implied that feedbacks added an additional 2-4 degrees to the 1 degree from CO2 directly." They assumed nothing or do you disagree? If yes, please provide supporting evidence. 5) Meyer claims: "Not only may the feedback number not be high, but it might be negative, as implied by some recent research, which would actually reduce the warming we would see from a doubling of CO2 to less than one degree Celsius. After all, most long-term stable natural systems (and that would certainly describe climate) are dominated by negative rather than positive feedbacks." Are you a advocate of the notion of homeostasis Eric and do you believe that there is evidence of a net negative feedback in the system as he suggests? If yes, please provide supporting evidence. 6) Meyer claims: "Even more important for scientists (since the oceans are a much larger heat reservoir than the atmosphere) is the fact that the new ARGO floating temperature stations have measured little or no increase in ocean heat content since they were put in service in 2003." That is demonstrably false, or do you disagree? If you do, please provide supporting evidence. 7) Meyer claims: " There is no reason why warming should take a break, and we are starting to hear more frequently, even among catastrophic global warming supporters, discussion of “the missing heat.” Again, demonstrably false or do you, unlike the climate scientists, believe that the warming should be monotonic? If you think so, please provide supporting evidence. 8) Meyer claims: "They took computer models, which by their own admission left out a lot of the complexity in the climate, and ran them with and without manmade CO2 in the 20th century. Their conclusion: only man’s CO2 could have caused the measured warming." Another demonstrably false statement and misrepresentation of the body of scientific understanding, or do you disagree? If you disagree, please provide supporting evidence. 9) Meyer claims: "If the IPCC is correct that based on their high-feedback models we should expect to see 3C of warming per doubling of CO2, looking backwards this means we should already have seen about 1.5C of CO2-driven warming based on past CO2 increases." More misinformation and oversimplification, see here. Or do you agree? If yes, please provide supporting evidence. 10) Meyer claims: "Past warming has in fact been more consistent with low or even negative feedback assumptions." Really? Do you agree with that assertion? If yes, please provide supporting evidence. 11) Meyer claims: "Skeptics point out that no one really has any idea of the magnitude of the cooling from these aerosols, and that, ironically, every global warming model just happens to assume exactly the amount of cooling from these aerosols that is needed to make their models match history" This is a gross exaggeration and misrepresentation of facts. Or do you agree with his claims? If yes, please provide supporting evidence. 12) Meyer claims: "What they deny is the catastrophe — they argue that the theory of strong climate positive feedback is flawed, and is greatly exaggerating the amount of warming we will see from man-made CO2. " It seems from your comments above that you agree with this misguided and uninformed statement. No? IMHO, the premise of Meyer's argument is not based in reality and is certainly not a compelling case to delay or prevent taking action on reducing our GHG emissions. In short, he is a merchant of doubt. He (or anyone who supports his claims) is also betting against physics...and to do so is pure folly.
63491. scaddenp at 10:21 AM on 23 February 2012
       2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
       Yogi - you do it like this
63492. Rosco at 10:21 AM on 23 February 2012
       Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
       I need to add:- 1. The maximum temperature is determined by the power of the radiation. 2. The Moon heats so quickly from ~ minus 210 degrees to about 90 degrees C that graphs of the increase are almost vertical. 3. If the solar radiation hitting the Earth's surface is ~170 W/sq m how do experiments such as the one performed by Wood and others achieve such high temperatures inside a glass covered box where no IR backradiation can enter ? 4. How do solar panels produce electricity at ~170 W/sq m - 100% efficiency ?? 5. "Turning our attention to the example of Langley's greenhouse experiment on Pike's Peak in Colorado (mentioned by Arrhenius, 1906b), we may be tempted to ask how it is that a greenhouse can reach such high temperatures. Qualitatively, we may attribute the difference between the 15ºC mean surface temperature and the 113ºC observed in Langley's greenhouse to the fact that noon-time radiation at the surface is three to four times as intense as the mean radiation over the whole of the earth's surface." Given that a glass greenhouse prevents IR radiation from leaving it also prevents it entering - show how did that temperature arise in the few hours it did ? It certainly did not accumulate fro a mere 170 W/sq m input.
63493. Doug Hutcheson at 10:12 AM on 23 February 2012
       DenialGate - Infographic Illustrating the Heartland Denial Funding Machine
       DSL @ 45

       "In other words, no matter what you believe about climate science, supporting the social construction of knowledge through the scientific method is inconsistent with supporting Heartland."

       Beautifully put. The scientific method is inconsistent with the populist politcal method, whether Heartland, Tea Party, Chris Monckton, Andrew Bolt, Tony Abbott (Australian), or any other protagonist seeking victory through rhetoric.
63494. Eric (skeptic) at 10:02 AM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       KR, does the consideration of dust and albedo require a model? Although ice sheets should have pretty good proxy measurements, I'm not sure how they would input the dust data. The model would have be calibrated with relatively imprecise temperature proxy data. Albatross, I believe I answered that in #35 and raised my specific concerns with the critique of Meyer.
63495. Rosco at 10:02 AM on 23 February 2012
       Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
       IanC We’ll agree on how the 255 K “effective temperature and the IR output to space of ~240 W/sq m is calculated – and it is supported by observation. But this does not justify reducing the solar radiation by four for any calculation OTHER than this. This balance calculation is erroneously offered as proof that the “effective temperature” relates to the Earth’s surface temperature caused by the solar radiation - which it does not. Wikipedia says - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect - “If an ideal thermally conductive blackbody was the same distance from the Sun as the Earth is, it would have a temperature of about 5.3 °C.” This is again based on reducing the solar radiation by the factor of four. My whole point about the Moon is to plainly demonstrate this is absurd logic. The Moon, not a perfect blackbody, reaches much higher temperatures that this method says is possible. The reality is there are such things as day and night and during the day the Earth is NOT subject to 170 W/sq m but most likely 4 times that on average over the illuminated disk – this flux would result in much higher temperatures than are observed and this in turn demonstrates the Earth’s atmosphere does NOT add heat during the day – rather it shields us from the solar radiation. This reality demonstrates a problem for the radiation trap “greenhouse effect” – if the Sun has the capability heat the Earth’s surface above observations then something is reducing the effect NOT increasing it. The only differences are the oceans and the atmosphere on Earth. I do not believe the “greenhouse effect” as postulated exists – I do not believe Fourier postulated it at all – if fact his words state it is impossible :- "In short, if all the strata of air of which the atmosphere is formed, preserved their density with their transparency, and lost only the mobility which is peculiar to them, this mass of air, thus become solid, on being exposed to the rays of the sun, would produce an effect the same in kind with that we have just described. The heat, coming in the state of light to the solid earth, would lose all at once, and almost entirely, its power of passing through transparent solids: it would accumulate in the lower strata of the atmosphere, which would thus acquire very high temperatures. We should observe at the same time a diminution of the degree of acquired heat, as we go from the surface of the earth." I see no support for a radiation trap greenhouse effect in this language – rather an acknowledgement that greenhouses work by preventing convection.
       Moderator Response: [Sph] Readers should note that Rosco's initial statement statement concerning observations is either incorrect or at best so vague as to imply an untruth.
       
       The surface of the earth is clearly not 255K, as supported by observation, but the observed temperature of the earth as viewed from space is 255K.
       
       More correctly, as well, the IR output of the surface of the earth is about 396 W/m² (as supported by observations), and the output of the earth to space is in fact ~240 W/m² as supported by observation.
       
       All of these numbers are well established, supported by observation, and also supported by theoretical models and calculations. They all match.
       
       It falls to the Galileos among us not only to disprove the theory, but also to provide an alternative theory that so well fits the actual observations.
       
       Claims that the observations don't exist, or even worse misrepresentations of the actual observations, should be a warming sign to any reader as to the intent and veracity of further claims by the commenter.
63496. Pete Dunkelberg at 10:01 AM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Meanwhile getting back to Warren Meyer, he's a standard issue denier. Review: http://scienceblogs.com/denialism/deck.php Denialism is how businesses and their supporters put off, or delay, making changes for the benefit of the community. Delay is the bottom line. Often some environmental harm is being done, and basic denial takes the form: A It isn't happening B It isn't our fault C It's harmless or may even be good for people anyway. D The proposed remedy is either impossible or much too costly Meyer starts off with this gambit:

       Likely you have heard the sound bite that “97% of climate scientists” accept the global warming “consensus”. Which is what gives global warming advocates the confidence to call climate skeptics “deniers,” hoping to evoke a parallel with “Holocaust Deniers,” a case where most of us would agree that a small group are denying a well-accepted reality.

       As the denialism blog shows, denialism is mostly about business avoiding doing something. In a more recent article, Meyer says

       What really matters are issues like quantifying the climate feedback effect. Who the hell cares who funds the breakthrough work?

       In other words, we must wait for some breakthrough that finally convinces him to stop betting the planet on his hope that science is wrong. That's major delay, which is the bottom line of denial. Since there is only one planet we can use, the rest of humanity is held hostage until the blind rich relent. Don't bet the planet
63497. Albatross at 10:00 AM on 23 February 2012
       Uncertainty Is Not the Basis for Investment
       Eric, Could you please answer my question posed to you at #24 about your position on Meyer's claims (the subject of this thread) before moving on. Thanks. And I concur with KR's comments at #30 and #40.
63498. Andrew Xnn at 09:59 AM on 23 February 2012
       New research from last week 7/2012
       I see there are recent papers on heat waves and heat stress, but they are not free to read. Very curious about that subject as I recently read "An adaptability limit to climate change due to heat stress" by Steven C. Sherwooda, and Matthew Huber: http://www.pnas.org/content/107/21/9552.full.pdf+html If I understand it correctly, globally more land will be lost to heat waves than to rising sea levels. This will happen in south eastern US. With business as usual, not sure when this is expected to happen.
63499. JMurphy at 09:54 AM on 23 February 2012
       DenialGate - Infographic Illustrating the Heartland Denial Funding Machine
       CraigR, I believe you have read that wrong. As far as I can see, dana1981 and jg (the joint authors of this Post) state that "[m]ost of the programs and individuals in the lower half are potentially climate-related", i.e. potentially $1.75million will be spent on their attempt to create confusion in this matter. So, that is just on Climate Change in America. The figures for Greenpeace and WWF are spread throughout the world, so it is very possible that Heartland's money is comparable in scale within America - and they are just one group.
63500. YOGI at 09:19 AM on 23 February 2012
       2nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
       600-750 cm-1 does overlap with a water vapour band too. how does one decide the relative effects of each within that band ?

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