Recent Comments

Prev  1436  1437  1438  1439  1440  1441  1442  1443  1444  1445  1446  1447  1448  1449  1450  1451  Next

Comments 72151 to 72200:

72151. Dikran Marsupial at 02:10 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       bugai You may prefer a differential equation, however as I will shortly be introducing annual observations into the discussion it makes far more sense to look at annual changes rather than instantaneous rates. So, do you agree with step 2 or not? I have solved the differential equations as well, so I am happy to discuss those later once we have agreed on the basics.
72152. bugai at 01:56 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       To Dirkan: I prefer the full differential equation: dC/dt = E_a + E_n - U_n Do you agree with that? It is better to have a true differential equation, because we have then something to solve.
72153. Dikran Marsupial at 01:52 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       bugai good, so step #2, do you agree that we can write this more formally as dC = E_a + E_n - U_n where: dC is the annual increase in atmospheric CO2 in GtC/year E_a is annual emissions from anthropogenic sources in GtC/year E_n is annual emissions from natural sources in GtC/year U_n is annual uptake by natural sinks in GtC/year Technically there ought to be U_a, which is annual uptake by anthropogenic sinks, but this is effectively zero as we are not yet achieving any significant carbon sequestration. Again, this should be fairly obviously true as it is just a restatement of step 1 with total emissions divided into anthropogenic and natural. Do you agree with this?
72154. bugai at 01:51 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       To Hyperactive Hydrologist: I am not an expert, but here is what Wiki writes: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_zone_(ecology) "Use of chemical fertilizers is considered the major human-related cause of dead zones around the world."
72155. Hyperactive Hydrologist at 01:45 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       Bugai, "It is known that due to pollution with fertilizers and pesticides large regions of ocean lose phytoplankton. According to some "studies", we have already lost up to 40% of phytoplankton since mid-1900. If true, this has certainly a big influence on the relaxation time "tau" and can easily explain the CO2 rise." I would be interested to see these studies. Could you provide a reference please?
72156. bugai at 01:33 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       To Dikran: Step #1: Do you agree that conservation of mass applies to the carbon cycle, in other words the annual increase in atmospheric CO2 is equal to total emissions minus total uptake? Answer: trivially true.
72157. bugai at 01:32 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       To muon calculon: 1. "the rate of increase in global atmospheric CO2 has dropped noticeably in years immediately following global recessions": please, provide a reference for this statement. 2. "CO2 concentrations mirror diurnal cycles (increase during higher traffic hours) as well as weekly cycles (drop on weekends)." Is off-topic, as diurnal changes are (i) local and (ii) too fast to equilibrate with anything.
72158. Dikran Marsupial at 01:28 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       bugai Sorry, refusing to answer a question and asking another one in its place is transparent evasion and not something I am going to encourage by indulging such behaviour. If you really want to get to the truth, I suggest we go through the arguemnt step by step and you can point out where the error lies when we get to it. Step #1: Do you agree that conservation of mass applies to the carbon cycle, in other words the annual increase in atmospheric CO2 is equal to total emissions minus total uptake?
72159. bugai at 01:21 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       Answer to Sphaerica: sorry, I am not a "believer". I want to understand. Your "argumentation" does not do it in any way." Answer to Dikran. Or, better, a question. You say: "natural emissions and natural uptake .. are quite closely balanced compared to the magnitude of the fluxes involved. " Who balanced that? Why you think they are still balanced? How to describe the balancing process? My equations (see first posting) do that. The small extra antropogenic source cannot possibly change the balance. We do change the system by different means: pollution.
72160. muoncounter at 01:17 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       bugai#131: "the antropogenic source is negligibly small" If that is true, you will need to explain why the rate of increase in global atmospheric CO2 has dropped noticeably in years immediately following global recessions - when emissions decrease. In addition, explain how locally measured atmospheric CO2 concentrations mirror diurnal cycles (increase during higher traffic hours) as well as weekly cycles (drop on weekends).
72161. Bob Lacatena at 01:03 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       131, bugai, Your position is untenable because the accounting has been done and is very straight forward. We know how much carbon we burn. This is carbon that has been sequestered under the ground for hundreds of millions of years. It can't get back there on it's own. We take it out, we burn it, it must go somewhere. There are three places that it can go; into the air, into the oceans, or into vegetation. We have been measuring the level in the atmosphere. We know it is increasing. We have been measuring the level in the ocean. We know that it is increasing. We know that the balance (amount burned - added to the atmosphere and ocean) is going into vegetation. This has all been studied, measured, worked out, and is incontrovertible. Hence your conclusion:

       antropogenic emissions cannot possibly account for observed CO2 rise. No way.

       is untenable. Beyond this, you have two problems to solve: First, if anthropogenic CO₂ is not going into the oceans and atmosphere, then where is it going? Second, what is the source of the CO₂ that is causing the increase in the atmosphere? It's not the oceans, because CO₂ is increasing there. Where is this added CO₂ coming from?
72162. Dikran Marsupial at 01:01 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       Bugai wrote: "Your claim is that the mankind influences the natural CO2-sinks via CO2 emission. This is very shaky as the antropogenic source is negligibly small." The error in this line of reasoning has already been pointed out, anthropogenic emissions are not negligibly small. Whether CO2 rises or falls depends on the difference between total emissions and total uptake, the volume of the flux is irrelevant. Anthropogenic emissions are large compared to the difference between natural emissions and natural uptake, which are quite closely balanced compared to the magnitude of the fluxes involved. Around 1850 the difference between natural emissions and natural uptake was also much smaller than it is now. If you look at the annual increase in atmospheric CO2 you will find it has been roughly 45% of anthropogenic emissions, going back as far as 1850. So as anthropogenic emissions have increased, the difference between natural emissions and natural uptake has increased with it and the natural carbon sink has been strengthening. "For this, there is no more balance between NATURAL CO2-sources and CO2-sinks." I have already pointed out that there is no balance between natural sources and sinks. You would make more progress if you paid better attention to the replies to your posts. Regarding residence time and adjustment time, I suggest you read the glossary of the IPCC report, which explains the distinction very clearly. Carbon cycle models do not neglect photosynthesis by phytoplankton, however they also do not neglect respiration by oceanic biota. Here is a challenge for you, if you think that anthropogenic emissions are not the cause of the observed rise then explain (i) how the annual rise in atmospheric CO2 can be less than anthropogenic emissions unless the natural environment is a net sink or (ii) how the natural environment can be the cause of the observed rise if it is a net sink. Nobody has risen to the challenge so far.
72163. Tristan at 00:58 AM on 22 October 2011
       Climate sensitivity is low
       I'm trying to understand the relationship between climate sensitivity and C02:temp feedback. Assuming that CS is 3C for the radiative forcing resulting from doubling atmospheric C02: 1)Over what time period is this realized? 2)Is this the limit of the temp:C02 feedback or is this just the first order effect? 3)Wouldn't the C02:temp feedback limit be dependent on the amount of C02 already in the atmosphere? 4)If the radiative forcing came from a non-C02 source, wouldn't the temperature rise be larger, as there'd be more 'room' for the feedback to occur?
72164. Bob Lacatena at 00:53 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       111, Briago1, No one seems to have replied to you (because you packed too many off topic arguments into a single post), but your misconceptions are pretty easy to address, so I took the time to help point you in the right directions. Response to your first point is on the runaway warming thread. In response to your second and third points (which are relevant on this thread):

       2) On the whole 29GT does not sound like much

       The carbon cycle involves a constant flow in and out (refer to this diagram here). What matters is not how much flows in and out, but the net difference. In this context, the system has been pretty much in near perfect balance for thousands of years. We are now shifting it out of balance by 29GT per year, which slowly but surely increases the concentrations both in the atmosphere and the ocean.

       3) ...a measly 4% increase in plant/algae life would more than make up for the difference

       But it doesn't. Scientists have actually measured where the carbon is going, and how much is going into increased vegetation, the ocean and the atmosphere. We don't need to argue about what should or might happen here, because we've pretty much measured it and we actually know exactly how much is going where. Response to your fourth point is on the CO2 lags Temperature thread. Response to your fifth point is on the Has Arctic Sea Ice Recovered thread.
72165. Bob Lacatena at 00:52 AM on 22 October 2011
       Arctic sea ice has recovered
       Briago1, This is in response to your point 5 here.

       5) ...the north pole all but completly melts EVERY YEAR

       This is not true. In the 70s the north pole melted back only fractionally, while today it is almost completely melting every summer and will probably totally melt some summer in the near future. Here is the ice extent at the end of the melt season in 1980: And here it is again at the end of the melt season in 2009:
72166. Bob Lacatena at 00:48 AM on 22 October 2011
       CO2 lags temperature
       Briago1, This is in response to your point 4 here.

       4) I keep reading that ice cores show in increase in temperature after an increase in CO2 (this is debatable, but I'll skip that). This tid bit is then being used to say that since CO2 has risen x amount in 30 years, that now we are going to have a temperature rise in the next decade

       No, this information is not being used in that way. Our understanding of physics and myriad other observations tell us what increases in CO₂ will do. The ice cores (and other proxies, and other periods of time besides the ice ages) simply confirm this understanding by demonstrating that increasing CO₂ levels did affect global temperatures (as would be expected) in the past. But the ice core inference is not the source of the conclusion, but rather simply one of many sources of confirmation.
72167. bugai at 00:45 AM on 22 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       Antwort an Bibliovermis. The Suess effect does not show that the CO2 increase is due to emissions. It only shows that we do emit CO2. This we perfectly know without Suess. Antwort an Dikran Marsupial. Your claim is that the mankind influences the natural CO2-sinks via CO2 emission. This is very shaky as the antropogenic source is negligibly small. Why should it so drastically change the natural sink? Especially around 1850 when the antropogenic source was even some 10 times smaller. It is much more reasonable to assume the change in the CO2 sink is due to a different, more powerful influence, like pollution with fertilizers. For this, there is no more balance between NATURAL CO2-sources and CO2-sinks. And - the 5 years IS the relaxation time for extra CO2 (experimentally proven). Concerning the 74 years or 1000 years for thermocline - this is only if you neglect photosynthesis by phytoplankton.
72168. Bob Lacatena at 00:41 AM on 22 October 2011
       Positive feedback means runaway warming
       Briago1, A response to the first part of your question here.

       1) ...as the atmosphere warms that will release more carbon dioxide from the oceans making the atmosphere even warmer. This can not be the case otherwise if the atmosphere ever got a little warm, it would be doomed to continue to heat up.

       You are confusing a runaway scenario with a simple positive feedback. If the CO2 released by the ocean warms the atmosphere less than the amount that caused the CO2 release, then as things warm, the ocean will release less CO2 in response. In math it is a simple convergent series, like 1 + 1/2 + 1/4 + 1/8 ... → 2.
72169. Tristan at 00:35 AM on 22 October 2011
       A Scientific Guide to the 'Skeptics Handbook'
       Has there been a rebuttal to JoNova's response? Her claim: "Indeed when I have bothered to debunk Cook, Cook had no reply, and didn’t apologize for all his errors, or his use of a flagrantly deceptive graph either."
72170. Rob Painting at 00:20 AM on 22 October 2011
       How Increasing Carbon Dioxide Heats The Ocean
       Sphaerica - fair comment. I'll go over it in the next day or two and tweak a few things to make it clearer. I did produce a graphic but wasn't happy with it - I'll reassess that too, but I'm in the middle of writing a few other posts which rate higher on my agenda.
72171. Hyperactive Hydrologist at 00:16 AM on 22 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       I still feel catastrophic collapse of the Greenland ice sheet is unlikely. If you look at a topographic bedrock map of Greenland the central region is lower than the surrounding perimeter especially on the eastern side where there is a mountain range. I think once the glaciers retreat from the sea we could see a slow down in ice loss. The central region, which contains the majority of the ice, should be relatively stable. However, Antarctica shows a very different picture,especially for the Western Antarctic Ice sheet. Much of this region is actually below sea level and a large increase in ocean warming could potentially destabilise the ice sheet.
72172. Bob Lacatena at 00:03 AM on 22 October 2011
       How Increasing Carbon Dioxide Heats The Ocean
       30, Rob, I have to admit, as a result of guinganbresil's comments, I went back to the post and started to try to work things out, and realized there's some ambiguity that led me to a state of mild confusion. I think my problem lies primarily in that there are two gradients involved (ocean/air and deep-ocean/cool-skin) and it's not always clear which is being discussed. I think at most points that when you talk about the gradient being decreased, you are referring to the latter (ocean/cool-skin), not the former (ocean/air), but it's not always clear in the text. For example, when you talk about GHGs warming the cool-skin layer, this will increase the ocean/atmosphere gradient (the ocean being warmer) which implies the ocean will cool faster, but it decreases the deep-ocean/cool-skin gradient, which I think is the real issue, because it blocks heat loss from the bulk of the ocean through the cool-skin layer. But that's not always clear. In addition to this, there are obviously different states in different time frames (e.g. during the day, temperatures are X, Y, and Z, and the system is dominated by solar radiation, while that changes at other times and under other conditions). Is it possible to clarify all of this? Perhaps a diagram showing the relative temperatures and net flows in different situations? [In my mind the system has 5 possible components, the deep ocean, the cool-skin layer, the atmosphere, and then one of two sources of radiation, either the sun or clouds/atmosphere/GHGs.] I think that guingabresil's problems come from focusing on the ocean/atmosphere interface rather than the more important (in this situation) deep-ocean/cool-skin interface... or so I think. Again, I haven't completely wrapped my head around it enough to say this with authority (it's Friday, and it's been a very long week!).
72173. Rob Painting at 23:24 PM on 21 October 2011
       How Increasing Carbon Dioxide Heats The Ocean
       guinganbresil -..... but the paper you link to in the text above the figure was published in 2001 The paper linked to is a description of MAERI, the measuring instrument, and it details how measurements are carried out. "Unfortunately Minnett does not source his graph" I believe the data were obtained during a survey with a different purpose in mind. I don't think this has ended up in the peer-reviewed literature, but Professor Minnett informed me he has a postdoc taking up work on it. "Looking more closely at the orders of magnitude..........." I can see you're not really following this, sorry but its a very complex subject and not easy to put into layman terms (at least not for me) but I hope this helps: - The ocean cool skin is a surface layer where molecular processes dominate, i.e conduction is the form of heat transfer. Therefore a temperature gradient needs to exist (confirmed by Khundzhua [1977]) . - Greenhouse gases, such as CO2, warm the cool skin and lower its gradient. The lowered gradient slows the heat flow of heat out of the ocean into the atmosphere. This mechanism allows the oceans to build up heat. - This mechanism is pervasive because the increased greenhouse effect is a global phenomenon. In other words, all parts of the ocean surface are subjected to its influence. - Changes in heat associated with changing winds, humidity, evaporation etc, can indeed be much larger on short timescales, but are local effects, causing the ocean to either store more or less heat over these shorter intervals. However, the greenhouse gas effect on the skin layer gradient is still toiling away in the background, it's ever-present 24 hours a day (except for those rare occasions when it breaks down momentarily), and is global in scale. So any heat headed for the atmosphere has to run the gauntlet of this greenhouse gas-warmed ocean cool skin layer, and in the process a little bit of heat is stolen away and stored in the ocean. - Because of the very long-lived nature of carbon dioxide, it can affect the cool skin layer temperature gradient for hundreds to thousands of years. Of course in Earth's deep past, higher levels of carbon dioxide corresponded with higher ocean temperatures. So the whole conceptual framework shows coherency - elevate carbon dioxide, and the oceans warm - just like they did in the past, and just like they are now. - Now what you, and a couple of earlier commenters, seem to be inferring doesn't make any sense whatsoever. If wind speed, humidity etc (there's a bunch of other factors) were the long-term controls on the cool skin layer, wouldn't the ocean temperature just fluctuate within a set boundary determined only by those factors? (windspeed etc). - In your hypothesis (?) how could you account for the 20,000 year ocean warming that took place in the Paleocene-Eocene termal Maximum (PETM)? Windspeed? How are the oceans warming now?
72174. Jeffrey Davis at 23:22 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       re: 10 and Muller's past Luke 15:3-7
72175. Hyperactive Hydrologist at 23:18 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       Surely now this issue can be put to bed. It would be nice to see Watts admit this and move on. I won't be holding my breath. Kudos to Muller and hopefully he has learned to keep his mouth shut until he has published papers to back up his claims. Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence one of the basic principals.
72176. John Russell at 23:07 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       [I just posted the following elsewhere and thought it worth posting here as it might trigger ideas.] Given that the BEST study uses the data gathered by other studies -- the results of which generally agree with one another -- to produce the 'graph of graphs', I'm at a loss to understand how the result could have turned out to be be anything other than a general confirmation of the previous studies. It could only have been different if all the original scientists had carried out their work fraudulently, or the BEST team had been fraudulent. Of course, neither had. I for one have enough trust in scientists to believe that whenever you put a large group of them together, they can't do anything other than arrive at an honest answer. Only the occasional individual scientist has ever been exposed as a charlatan. So, as sure as eggs is eggs, the denial argument will now turn to, "OK it's getting warmer -- but it's not caused by humans". As a response perhaps the sceptics should be asked to recommend/approve a large team of qualified climate scientists to answer that question. Then we can put that one to bed and move on to the next. A.s.a.p, please. Tempus fugit and climate change just ain't going away.
72177. Dikran Marsupial at 22:51 PM on 21 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       bugai wrote: "1. It is assumed, the "natural" sources/sinks of CO2 are still in a perfect equilibrium. Who has proven that? No, the natural sources and sinks were in approximate equilibrium prior to the industrial revolution. Anthropogenic emissions have disturbed this equilibrium and hence the natural carbon cycle is in a state of imbalance in an attepmt to restore the equilibrium. This is demonstrated by the fact that atmospheric CO2 is rising at a rate of about half anthropogenic emissions, which implies that the natural environment is a net sink, taking in more CO2 than it emits. 2. The humans emit just 5% of the total CO2 influx. This is nothing and could increase the CO2 percentage in the air by the same 5%, no more. The flaw in this argument is that while humans emit only 5% of the total CO2 influx, the natural environment is responsible for 100% of the outflux, which we know to be in excess of natural emissions. The annual growth in atmospheric CO2 depends on the difference between total emissions and total uptake. Anthropogenic emissions are large comparted to the natural net flux, and hence are what currently governs the increase or decrease of atmospheric concentrations. where tau is the relaxation time. We know that tau is somewhere between 5 and 10 Years." This is incorrect, the residence time is about 5 years, but for CO2 the residence time and relaxation time (known as "adjustment time" in climatology) are not the same. For the initial response (governed by uptake into the thermocline) the adjustment time is of the order of 74 years, the full response takes much longer. See the articles on residence time for discussion (an advanced version is in preparation).
72178. CBDunkerson at 22:44 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       Muller is, no doubt, speaking of himself (and possibly others) when he describes those who were "properly sceptical". The problem is that there was nothing 'proper' about it. As MA Rodger notes, the idea that surface temperature anomalies were significantly off had been overwhelmingly disproven long before the BEST study even began. Multiple different organizations using different data and methodologies had found consistent results. Surface and satellite records were in close agreement. Numerous studies had conclusively shown that UHI effects were negligible. Yet Muller mouthed off that Anthony Watts was a 'hero' for showing the 'serious doubts' about these values. He went around spreading one obviously false claim after another (e.g. 'not a single polar bear has died due to global warming'). He was not 'properly sceptical'. He accepted pure nonsense at face value and promoted it as 'established truth' despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary. Muller deserves credit for not allowing his bias to infect his work and accepting reality once he had himself done the research to confirm it. This places him a step above many other 'skeptics' (e.g. Roy Spencer). However, the fact remains that Muller assumed things which were untrue and promoted them as 'fact'. The UHI and 'inaccurate surface temperature record' myths were not the only false claims Muller promoted. Maybe this experience will cause him to re-examine those biased assumptions and/or avoid making unsubstantiated claims in the future, but for him to now say that he was 'properly sceptical', rather than owning up to his false statements even after his own research has (again) disproven them suggests that the denial continues. Muller has shown that he still does actual science, and thus I'll look at his work in the future. However, his failure to accept responsibility for the misinformation he promoted will prevent me from considering anything he says on the subject of climate change until he has published research to support it.
72179. Bibliovermis at 22:31 PM on 21 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       Bugai, Look up Suess effect, in reference to the work of Hans Suess, for independent, empirical confirmation that the CO2 is from fossil fuel combustion. I apologize for not providing a direct link, as this is being tapped out on the phone.
72180. John Russell at 21:56 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       @Lassesson writes: "What happened around 1865-1870 in figure 3 and where did the huge peak around 1880 come from?" The 'huge peak around 1880' was probably a legacy of Krakatoa or the sun's activity or some some other natural event at the time. Human-caused warming sits on top of any natural variation in temperature. @TScanlon. I don't believe this news is going to put the nail in the coffin of denial; it will just move denial on to the next -- and more difficult to prove to non-scientists -- argument. Namely, that "OK, the warming is real; but it's caused by natural processes". The argument is certainly far from over.
72181. MA Rodger at 21:14 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       Watts did say on his site when the BEST project was announced "It (BEST) may very well turn out to agree with the NOAA surface temperature record, or it may diverge positive or negative. We just don’t know yet." This was after giving a pretty strong approval of the project and its methodology. So if Watts doesn't accept the findings, he will have a hard time presenting a rational reason for doing so. Of course, the key word here is "rational". Watts' Urban Heat Island complaints, even the BEST project, is plain irrational. Do we not have 30 years of satellite records that already give independent confirmation of the surface temperature records?
72182. panzerboy at 20:39 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       I'm always ready to counter the "Its the Urban Heat Island effect" with the following. The Urban area of the Earth's surface is 1%. Average global temperature has increased by 0.8 degrees celsius. Do the math, urban areas need to have increased by 80 degrees celsius in order that 1% area to be responsible for the global temperature increase. Now, I'm sure that's an over-simplification please let me know if/how I've got things wrong.
72183. newcrusader at 20:03 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       Dr.Muller set Anthony Watts and the Koch empire up like a 'Science'. They where expecting a data conclusion far different then this. Perhaps now some of the skeptics can be marginalized even further.
72184. bugai at 19:30 PM on 21 October 2011
       Human CO2 is a tiny % of CO2 emissions
       Well, the story sounds inconvincing for me. 1. It is assumed, the "natural" sources/sinks of CO2 are still in a perfect equilibrium. Who has proven that? 2. The humans emit just 5% of the total CO2 influx. This is nothing and could increase the CO2 percentage in the air by the same 5%, no more. The CO2 concentration not far from equilibrium behaves as d(CO2)/dt = Source - (CO2)/tau where tau is the relaxation time. We know that tau is somewhere between 5 and 10 Years. The equilibrium concentration CO2 = Source*tau. If you add extra (antropogenic) source Sa, the equilibrium concentration changes to CO2_new = (Source + Sa)*tau Because Sa = Source*0.05, we have new equilibrium CO2_new = 1.05*CO2 (natural). That is a negligible change. Result: antropogenic emissions cannot possibly account for observed CO2 rise. No way. However, if there is a significant change in the relaxation time "tau", the CO2 concentration can change dramatically. The relaxation time is defined by the CO2 absorption by the ocean surface and its consumption in there by the phytoplankton. The biological consumption is very fast, comparable with the abiotic purely ionic exchange with the atmosphere! It is known that due to pollution with fertilizers and pesticides large regions of ocean lose phytoplankton. According to some "studies", we have already lost up to 40% of phytoplankton since mid-1900. If true, this has certainly a big influence on the relaxation time "tau" and can easily explain the CO2 rise. Another certain reason for CO2 rise is the observed warming of the last century, because the water temperature explicitely influences the relaxation time tau. These are the two main reasons for CO2 rise, not the tiny emission by the fuel combustion. When you bathtube is overflowing, you should either check whether you opened the tap too far, or you check the sink. And very often it is the case that you must call a plumber to clean the sink.
72185. jyyh at 19:26 PM on 21 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       Is this the new lowest bound? anyway nice to see sigmoidal curves on a projection for they may be found also on the ice core record.
72186. JMurphy at 18:34 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       "...purveyor..."
72187. JMurphy at 18:32 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       Watts is not happy and is now trying to weasel out of his previous support for the study. This is final proof that (alongside his site's constant references to cold records and general lack of credible scepticism) he is indeed one of those whose doubt about global warming this project's results should silence - if he were truly sceptical. Reading him and his followers over on WUWT is to see the sort of hurt incomprehension evident from similar supporters of creationism. If Watts can't now accept reality, he deserves to be side-lined as an irrelevant anti-science pervayer. Pielke Sr isn't happy either, surpisingly enough...not. And Judith Curry is still trying to work out how to spin the results so she can still argue one way while trying to appear neutral, i.e. friendly to the so-called skeptics. "My hope is that this will win over those people who are properly sceptical," Richard Muller, a physicist and head of the project, said. "Some people lump the properly sceptical in with the deniers and that makes it easy to dismiss them, because the deniers pay no attention to science. But there have been people out there who have raised legitimate issues." Are any of those I have named "properly sceptical" ?
72188. Lassesson at 18:25 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       What happened around 1865-1870 in figure 3 and where did the huge peak around 1880 come from?
72189. TScanlon at 16:31 PM on 21 October 2011
       Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature Study: “The effect of urban heating on the global trends is nearly negligible”
       When a skeptic like Muller does a 180 and starts publishing data like this and the confirmation of long term trends you know that the argument about climate change is over. Saw some fantastic new technologies are available for energy production. And the windfarm near our town has been running non-stop for a few months now.
72190. guinganbresil at 15:12 PM on 21 October 2011
       How Increasing Carbon Dioxide Heats The Ocean
       Rob - I noticed that the graph you show from RealClimate (Figure 2 above) is from R/V Tangaroa in 2004, but the paper you link to in the text above the figure was published in 2001. Unfortunately Minnett does not source his graph (was it published and peer reviewed?) - I am curious if the researcher controlled for wind speed or humidity - given that both are factors in the forced heat transfer case. Looking more closely at the orders of magnitude, I see that the effect of clouds shown in figure 2 above is ~100 W/m2 with a slope of ~0.002 K/(W/m2), so a 4 W/m2 change due to a doubling in CO2 would provide a 0.008K change in the skin layer temperature difference. Sun, wind, humidity and clouds jerk the value from -0.6 to +1 K - that is two orders of magnitude larger...
72191. Riduna at 14:30 PM on 21 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       One should question the utility and verity of a model which ignores “what is happening with the climate, but … focuses exclusively on sea levels. Others have noted the obvious, that one can not purport to model future trends in SLR, be they in respect of 100 or 500 years without taking into account those factors most responsible for it, namely the rate at which land based ice is expected to melt and the causes for that melting. It is overly simplistic to assume that anthropogenic emission of greenhouse gases will be either the sole or even the major cause of ice melting over the next 100 years. Nor can one ignore the unprecedented warming of the Arctic and Southern Oceans and the effects this is having. It is a strange model which apparently ignores the potential for rapid increase in and massive loss of polar ice. Hansen and Sato 2011 hold the view that loss of this ice will double each decade this century, that in consequence SLR this century will be non-linear and, starting from a low base, will continue rising relatively slowly in the first half of this century but much more rapidly and with disastrous consequences in the second half – particularly during the last decades of the century. Their conclusions are consistent with those of Shakhova et al 2010 who draw attention to the dangers posed by the melting of permafrost, particularly on the seabed of the Siberian Central Continental Shelf, producing massive release of methane. They note that this is now occurring and warn that emission of 3.5 gigatonnes of methane, about 0.1% of Siberian methane deposits, would be sufficient to cause abrupt climate change. Antarctica is already being affected by warm ocean currents causing near collapse of the PIG and Thwaites glaciers, draining almost 30% of the WAIS, with capacity to cause SLR of ~1.5 metres. These currents have the potential to cause break-up of WAIS and EAIS shelves, causing major increase in the rate of glacier discharge. These events are now occurring and will continue for the rest of this century. Loss of mass from the Greenland ice sheet is, as predicted by Hansen, more than decadaly doubling, accelerating and shows no signs of slowing. Nor could it, since the Arctic Ocean is warming so rapidly that it is predicted to be seasonally ice free within 20 years with consequential loss of albedo and increase in the rate of future warming. Given these considerations, I find it extraordinary that the model used by Aslak Grinsted should be regarded as of any reliability in predicting SLR over the next 50 years, let alone the next 500. In this regard it should be treated, as is the IPCC 4AR, as very conservative because it largely ignores the causes and reality of polar ice loss – in other words, what is already happening.
72192. guinganbresil at 14:27 PM on 21 October 2011
       How Increasing Carbon Dioxide Heats The Ocean
       Sphaerica - "The rate of flow of heat out of the ocean is determined by the temperature gradient in the 'cool skin layer'" [ - semantics/word-gaming snipped -] "Under cloudy conditions, the cloud cover radiates more heat back down toward the ocean surface than happens under clear sky conditions." Yes, so the heat loss from the surface goes down, and the temperature difference of the 'cool layer' goes down per Eq. (5) I notice that data from Minnett et al 2001, Figure 12 shows that under low wind conditions (during the day), the cool layer vanishes and becomes warm due to solar heating. So I should amend my previous statement - the long wave emission supports the cool skin layer at a dead calm, with clear skies, at night.
72193. scaddenp at 13:56 PM on 21 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       Careful with those maps. Something above the sealevel might look okay but if it is on soft sediment, then it can still succumb to coastal erosion. Deltas, dunes, and dune barriers over former estuaries would be examples. Sealevel rise that effect longshore sediment transport can cause a switch in coastal processes from prograding to aggrading. If you already have issues with coastal erosion, then expect it to get a lot worse in next 100 years.
72194. Stevo at 13:49 PM on 21 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       adelady, sorry, I was wearing my ironic/sarcastic hat when I wrote about ending up on the beachfront. In the case of Brisbane we are already at the stage where we are running out of land into which to accommodate our expanding population. I cannot see any action saving the homelands of many Pacific atoll dwellers and delivery of practical aid to these people is happenning way too slowly. Inevitably this will lead to displacement of these populations. How effectively do we expect we will prepare for and cope with SLR changes to our major cities, let alone the myriad other challenges posed by a changing climate when so far we have failed to supply enough sand bags to Kirrabati, and the "it isn't happenning" strain of denialism is still flourishing in this country?
72195. adelady at 13:37 PM on 21 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       Stevo "... ending up on the beachfront.." The really disastrous Oz lifestyle consequence is that all that lovely sandy beach will disappear under the waters. It won't re-form on any historical time-scale. And, let's be honest, the geological time-scales needed to reestablish such landscape features are not terribly relevant to us or our several generations of descendants.
72196. Stevo at 13:26 PM on 21 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       After looking at the map of Brisbane which DB provided I take no joy in the prospect of my home eventually ending up on the beachfront, while the airport, seaport and the business/industrial area in which I work becomming seabed in moreton Bay. I'm sure those displaced by such SLR will be consoled by the fact that they are only a minority. Before we even think of our own home towns I'm more concerned for the people in Tuvalu and Kirrabati. They are feeling the effects of SLR now.
72197. muoncounter at 13:19 PM on 21 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       DB: "savvy investors should avoid Edam cheese futures..." Actually, the Dutch are probably better off than most. Due to climate change and relative sea-level rise, the dikes will eventually have to be made higher and wider. ... Currently, reinforcement of the dike revetments ... is underway. The revetments have proven to be insufficient and need to be replaced. This work started in 1996 and should be finished in 2015. In that period the Ministry of Public Works and Water Management in cooperation with the waterboards will have reinforced over 400 km of dikes. Imagine that ... a government that can do something -- with popular support. Guess it really does take a crisis to solve a problem.
72198. guinganbresil at 13:17 PM on 21 October 2011
       How Increasing Carbon Dioxide Heats The Ocean
       Sphaerica - "Our discussion is based on a recognition that except for very light winds (perhaps less than 2 m/s) the Richardson number for the upper meter of the ocean is very small. As in the atmosphere immediately above the surface, heat transfer is forced or passive rather than free." The discussion that follows for the next two pages discusses the interaction of wind with the surface... forced heat transfer. On the bottom of page 271, Saunders discusses free convective loss case: "In a dead calm, when the Richardson number is very large..." At the top of page 272, he states: "If we suppose that the long-wave radiation to clear skies is the major agency for heat exchange between the ocean and the atmosphere... then the temperature difference derived from Eq.(4) is about 0.5C" So, free heat transfer vs. forced heat transfer. In one case, wind and humidity - the other dead calm and clear skies.
72199. Daniel Bailey at 12:55 PM on 21 October 2011
       Sea levels will continue to rise for 500 years
       @ Michael Hauber above: "For instance I live in Brisbane, and I've looked at google maps of sea level rise to see what will be lost. At say 2 metres it is only a minority of the city that is lost." Tell that to those who live in the "minority" of Brisbane who get to experience that 2 meter SLR up close and personal: "A look at Sydney shows that the city will cope significantly better" Looking at the same effects of 2 meters SLR one surmises the denizens of Sydney to be descendents of Prince Namor, the Sub-Mariner: But then, Australia is but a small place compared with the world as a whole. Expanding our viewpoint beyond the parochial pale (and ignoring the easy, low-hanging fruit of the Maldives or Bangladesh [and since Miami is so "been-there, done-that"]), a quick trip to the other side of the orb brings us to the Old Country, Europe: Meseems like savvy investors should avoid Edam cheese futures... [Maps courtesy of the visualization tools from the Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona]
72200. Dave123 at 12:49 PM on 21 October 2011
       Arctic Ice Volume is diminishing even more rapidly than Area
       Sphaerica, I know it recovers. I was simply making a point about possibly needing better phrasing here.

Prev  1436  1437  1438  1439  1440  1441  1442  1443  1444  1445  1446  1447  1448  1449  1450  1451  Next