Arguments
Recent Comments
Prev 1876 1877 1878 1879 1880 1881 1882 1883 1884 1885 1886 1887 1888 1889 1890 1891 Next
Comments 94151 to 94200:
-
SuzieDsouza at 22:37 PM on 1 March 2011Measuring CO2 levels from the volcano at Mauna Loa
Wow – One of the reasons famous volcanoes Mauna Loa was selected as a CO2 monitoring spot was because it was so far from, well, everything and atmospheric gases would be well mixed by the time they reached Mauna Loa. If it winds up that Mauna Loa is well placed to measure ocean absorption of CO2, that would be off the irony scale! -
damorbel at 22:22 PM on 1 March 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
Re #428 RickG you wrote:- "You are obfuscating the same point I was trying to make to RW1. In one post he calls it "energy", in another, "power", in another "radiation"" 'energy' is measured in Joules 'power' is measured in Watts (Joules per sec.) 'Radiation' is hvwhich is a form of energy dependent on the source frequency 'v'. If you don't get these right then you will become hopelessly confused. Perhaps RW1 didn't get it right, one has to be careful. -
Jonas at 22:10 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
This is a non scientific argument, but it's important nevertheless (the Monckton argument is not scientific either, it's the same category): Every human has full responsibility for his/her small 1 / 7 billion share, and so have the Australians, who in average have a very high CO2 impact, and beyond personal responsibility, there is also the social example impact. A balance full of rice will shift with one single rice grain, and each one grain is equally important as the shifting one. -
RickG at 21:56 PM on 1 March 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
423 damorbel, You are obfuscating the same point I was trying to make to RW1. In one post he calls it "energy", in another, "power", in another "radiation". The point is a that an object of higher temperature can receive "energy, power or radiation", or what the hell ever you and RW1 want to call it when it is convenient for you, from a lesser temperature object because that higher temperature object cannot discriminate the source of the "energy, power, or radiation" it absorbs. -
Dikran Marsupial at 21:21 PM on 1 March 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
damorbel wrote: "But the atmosphere is also between the Sun and the Earth, just like a blanket with a corpse underneath it is between the (ambient or Sun) heat source." However: (a) The atmosphere absorbs LW IR radiation but is essentially transparent to SW radiation (visible light and ultraviolet) (b) Most of the radiation given off by the Sun is SW radiation not IR. (c) Most of the radiation from the sun is not absorbed by the atmosphere [see (a)], so the Sun does not significantly heat the atmosphere directly. The atmosphere does not significantly insulate the surface from suns radiation. (d) When the surface absorbs most of the suns SW radiation, it heats up and re-radiates LW IR radiation upwards. (e) The atmosphere does absorb some of this outbound IR radiation, and hence it heats up. The atmosphere is not warmed directly by the sun, but indirectly by the IR radiated from the surface. (f) The atmosphere being warmer than space thus insulates the surface from space, causing it to be warmer than it would otherwise be. (g) This does not violate the second law of thermodynamics as the net transfer of heat is from the warmer surface to the cooler atmosphere. (h) The greenhouse effect thus does not violate the second law of thermodynamics, and Roy Spencer (amongst others is perfectly correct on this point and G&T are flat wrong). O.K., I've spelled it out for you. Which of these points do you disagree with? For the sake of clarity, it would be best if you could make a list (a)-(h), saying whether you agree with the point or not, and if not explaining why. -
Berényi Péter at 21:01 PM on 1 March 2011Australia's departing Chief Scientist on climate change
#18 Rob Honeycutt at 14:58 PM on 1 March, 2011 BP... Please show me the research that backs up what you're saying. I can't because it gets deleted. Do your own research. You can start here or here then look around.Moderator Response: The original post was deleted as it was off topic for this thread. It should be reposted on one of the pages linked to in your comment. -
macwithoutfries at 20:49 PM on 1 March 2011Roy Spencer’s Great Blunder, Part 2
It is important to also note in the paragraph about sensitivity that the current value of between 2 and 4.5 °C / CO2 doubling is the short-term sensitivity - while the long term sensitivity is most likely around 6 °C / CO2 doubling ! -
Tom Curtis at 20:44 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
Hank @212, that is actually a very informative and helpful post for anyone not clear on the greenhouse effect. I heartily recommend it, something I could not say about almost all of Judith Curry's other posts. Of course, the crazies still come out in the comments ... -
Berényi Péter at 20:07 PM on 1 March 2011Various estimates of Greenland ice loss
#12 muoncounter at 14:31 PM on 1 March, 2011 Your link to Vinther et al 2006 doesn't work Sorry, corrected. JOURNAL OF GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH, VOL. 111, D11105, 2006 doi:10.1029/2005JD006810 Extending Greenland temperature records into the late eighteenth century B. M. Vinther, K. K. Andersen, P. D. Jones, K. R. Briffa & J. Cappelen How would a paper published in 2006 have data through 2009? I have appended recent data from Ilulissat, Nuuk and Qaqortoq, but I've already said that. In addition, Vinther only looked at the southwest coast. Yes, that's the region for which we have long records. It's easier to talk about regions where no measurements were taken, but somewhat less accurate. -
Martin at 19:43 PM on 1 March 2011Visualizing a History of CO2
Very, very cool! This is one of the few examples I've seen in the the climate debate blogosphere that successfully combines information and entertainment. I think we need more stuff like this to appeal to a broader audience. I just hope, nobody will be bothering you demanding royalties for Mind Heist. -
Kevin C at 19:13 PM on 1 March 2011Roy Spencer’s Great Blunder, Part 2
Thanks for your great work in wading through this stuff and collecting all the relevent responses and links. That's a big job done. Without wanting to detract from what you've done, I would like to suggest that what SKS needs is long term is an article based on your work, but slightly different in tone. The good stuff on SKS is written in a detached tone - what wikipedia calls NPOV. Your essay at the moment is still slightly polemical in tone. Why is this important? Because with the good articles on SKS I can give them directly to a contrarian and they have to confront the ideas, because the language is neutral. If the language isn't neutral, then they reject the content before they get to it. The underlying problem is the form of communication. Polemical language is a form of in-group communication. It strengthens ties within an ingroup, by making those already in the group feel good about being in the group, and increases respect for the speaker for being right-thinking. But at the same time, it fails in communicating to anyone not in the in-group, because the tone immediately tells that person that the speaker is not right-thinking. So, for example, a hostile reader would immediately set 'How do I know Roy Spencer is aware of the truth-deficient nature...' against 'I obviously can’t know what Roy’s motivations are...' and turn your own words against you. Which begins to suggest to me that what we need is a wiki for turning good source material like yours into polished NPOV articles to live in the argument section long term. Because it takes multiple readers to pick up on things like this. -
John Brookes at 19:04 PM on 1 March 2011On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
Hmm. Google maps link didn't work. Another try:
View Larger Map -
John Brookes at 19:02 PM on 1 March 2011On the reliability of the U.S. Surface Temperature Record
Actually, Watts did recently have a somewhat bizarre post where he analyzed data from Australian weather stations. He divided them into "rural" and "not rural", and then showed that they had different temperature trends over the last 100 years. What was interesting was his classification of stations. The Ceduna station was classified as "not rural". Here is a pic of the weather station
It looks even better in -
Riccardo at 18:53 PM on 1 March 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
Finally damorbel came to the right point in his comment #424. He simply needs to add an heat source and he's done. I don't have much hope he'll do, though. -
damorbel at 18:39 PM on 1 March 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
Re 420 KR you wrote:- "the atmosphere is warmed by the Earth, and hence the heater/block/wood/ice analogy holds, not your warming of a room through a blanket." In #420 you said it yourself "solar energy (shortwave) passes right through the atmosphere and warms the Earth" If you blocked the Sun off (and you can) the Earth would cool. This is because the Sun is external to the Earth and its atmosphere. If instead the same amount of heat as given to Earth by the Sun was generated inside the planet, then changing the atmosphere, the emissivity etc. would affect the planetary temperature just the same as changing the number of blankets on your bed. -
damorbel at 18:24 PM on 1 March 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
Re 422 KR you wrote:- "In other words, you have agreed that the atmosphere acts as insulation, raising the temperature of the Earth." What is it about insulation that will 'raise the temperature' of anything? Sure when you have something with a temperature elevated above its environment, wrapping it in a first layer of insulation will slow down the rate of cooling but it won't increase the temperature. Adding a 2nd layer of insulation will slow down the rate of cooling further and the outer surface of the 1st insulation layer will become warmer but the final temperature will remain the same as the environment. If your 'something with a temperature elevated above its environment' is also a heat source, when you add a second layer of insulation the surface of the 1st layer of insulation will become warmer and the heat source itself might increase in temperature, depending on how it works. This is not very exciting stuff, perfectly normal common experience. I think your problem arises because gas compressed in a gravitational field has a temperature gradient, thus is the source of your so-called greenhouse effect. Now that really is counter intuitive and, since it involves gravitational energy, it isn't generally understood. -
hank at 18:22 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
It may amuse (warning, facepalm risk) to see the same issue raised here: judithcurry.com/2010/12/02/best-of-the-greenhouse/ -
damorbel at 17:55 PM on 1 March 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
Re 421 RickG you wrote:- "Electromagnetic radiation is a form of energy. Trying to dance around words does not help your argument." Rick, the 2nd law of themodynamics is about the direction energy transfer; radiation is the means of transport, not the transport itself. Radiation is specified by its amplitude, frequency and direction, this is insufficient to measure energy transfer. To find out about how much energy is transferred through a given surface a mathematician would integrate all radiation passing through it over time. What I disagree with is taking the different radiation components passing in one direction and calling that energy transfer. For thermal energy, to qualify as energy change it would need to cause a temperature change derived from the thermal capacity and amount of energy; tthat is the hole in the greenhouse argument. If you examine the GHE argument carefully you will find it claims a temperature rise as consequence of loss of energy, the fact that it is a loss is frequently hidden away with the phrase 'net energy' transfer, as good an example of 'dance around words' as you will find. -
Albatross at 17:14 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
RW1 opines, "Show me the detailed output data of the radiative transfer models used that corroborates that the 3.7 W/m^2 number claimed by the IPCC is the downward emitted amount and not the incremental absorption or reduction in total transmittance." Que?! Gregory, Jonathan, Mark Webb, 2008: Tropospheric Adjustment Induces a Cloud Component in CO2 Forcing. J. Climate, 21, 58–71. Forster, P. M., and J. M. Gregory, 2006: The climate sensitivity and its components diagnosed from Earth Radiation Budget data. J. Climate, 19, 39–52 Myhre, G., E. J. Highwood, K. P. Shine, and F. Stordal, 1998: New estimates of radiative forcing due to well mixed greenhouse gases. Geophys. Res. Lett., 25, 2715–2718. Forster and Gregory (2006) is especially helpful. "One way or another I'm going to get to the bottom of this." Wow-- I can't wait for the revelations. Back to earth though--you really are way behind in the game. You can indeed get to the bottom of this" by a) actually, listening to others who are sincerely trying to guide you, b) actually then reading the pertinent literature and allowing the content to resonate, c) being willing to learn fro others, and d) not assuming something nefarious is going on. For goodness' sakes even Spencer and Lindzen et al. do not dispute the 3.7 W/m number or what it represents. Either you are a brilliant soon-to-be Nobel physicist laureate or you are a D-K. Please do not try and insult others by trying to claim otherwise, you have been called on your game. You have been wasting everyone's time for a while now-- enough is enough. Do you perhaps also have issues with the Stefan-Boltzmann constant that you need to get to the bottom of? -
owl905 at 17:06 PM on 1 March 2011Roy Spencer’s Great Blunder, Part 2
If CO2 levels are a lagged response to temperature changes, then 800 years ago the Earth should have been burnt and drowned. The documentary could be called "The Snorkel Camels of Murmansk", starring Dr. Roy Spencer. "The last time carbon dioxide levels were apparently as high as they are today — and were sustained at those levels — global temperatures were 5 to 10 degrees Fahrenheit higher than they are today, the sea level was approximately 75 to 120 feet higher than today, there was no permanent sea ice cap in the Arctic and very little ice on Antarctica and Greenland,"" ... http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/10/091008152242.htm Even the most thick-skinned medieval chroniclers would have noticed that warm n wet trend at the door ... the window ... the roof. -
hank at 16:53 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
PS, as you've made it clear you don't know how to find this on your own -- here's how: http://www.google.com/search?q=site%3Aipcc.ch+"3.7w" By contrast, if you just searched for IPCC 3.7w you would get about 13,400 results -- many of them copypasted denial stuff, johndaly, wattsup, and so on. While there's a pony in there somewhere, the site-limited search finds it fast. -
RW1 at 16:49 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
Again, technically all the incremental absorption, whatever it may actually be, is 'radiatively forced' - it's just that half of it is 'forced' in the same general direction it was already going. -
hank at 16:36 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
Brief quote below: see original and thread for more: http://www.physicsforums.com/showpost.php?p=2288531&postcount=35 "... Unfortunately, you can't read this off MODTRAN very well. There are two reasons for this. One is that it depends on the latitude. The second is that it depends on the altitude of the sensor. Part of the problem is the appropriate definition of a forcing. I describe it, with references, in msg #1 of "Estimating the impact of CO2 on global mean temperature". ... The reason you get a difference at higher altitude is that the atmospheric temperature profile in this calculator is held fixed, and so the calculator actually has stratospheric warming as a response to an increase temperature offset. What happens in reality is that the stratosphere cools.... The upshot is that to get a sensible value for the forcing response to doubled CO2, you should really take the lower altitude sensor. Also, you can't have a tropical atmosphere over the whole planet. The value you get will be somewhere between the tropical atmosphere and the standard 1976 atmosphere; and you also need to consider clear sky and cloud as well. All told, the MODTRAN calculator will get you into the right ball park; but it can't serve as a refutation of the forcing for doubled CO2, which is about 3.7 W/m2 to 10% accuracy or better." -
hank at 16:32 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
Another reference and explanation: http://www.physicsforums.com/showpost.php?p=2288531&postcount=35 -
hank at 16:24 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
Word salad. -
RW1 at 16:23 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
Tom (RE: 201), I'm well aware of the IPCC definition of 'radiative forcing' and the passages you're citing, and I know exactly what they are claiming. In a more general sense of the term, technically all the 3.7 W/m^2 is 'radiatively forced'. Show me the detailed output data of the radiative transfer models used that corroborates that the 3.7 W/m^2 number claimed by the IPCC is the downward emitted amount and not the incremental absorption or reduction in total transmittance. If it's agreed that only half the incremental absorption affects the surface, and the model simulations take this effect into account, then the incremental absorption should be 7.4 W/m^2. Show me this. I don't see this information in any of the sources provided by your or anyone else here. You can lecture me all you want about not being interested in the truth or call me a troll, but simply declaring these things correct on the basis of authority or majority goes against science and logic. One way or another I'm going to get to the bottom of this. -
Daniel Bailey at 16:18 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
@ Tom Curtis (201) Ditto to what Albatross said. Devastating. Game, set, match to TC. Though I'm undecided if ending your comment with a simple "QED" would've been over the top or a masterstroke coup de grâce. The Yooper -
dhogaza at 16:17 PM on 1 March 2011Preference for Mild Curry
doghza @26, 10 degrees climate sensitivity means about 11 degrees temperature increase by 2100, with another 4 in the pipeline on Business as Usual. With that high a climate sensitivity, I think the real risk we are facing is not massive economic disruption and human hardship following drought, but of a Venus style runaway greenhouse.
Well, let's not split hairs. Curry apparently believes there's a good chance we're totally screwed, or (if you're right) totally fucked. Take your pick :) -
KR at 16:00 PM on 1 March 20112nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
damorbel - We've demonstrated how the atmosphere acts like insulation, to which you've completely agreed except for your objection about sunlight going through the atmosphere. We've then shown you how that isn't an issue with SW radiation, and that the heat goes from sun -> Earth -> atmosphere -> space. In other words, you have agreed that the atmosphere acts as insulation, raising the temperature of the Earth. Not to mention there have been multiple demonstrations the greenhouse effect via line by line integrations, energy balance models, energy conservation, and basic radiative and spectral physics. This includes a couple of simple models you have implemented yourself based on the text here. Since you've agreed with every step of the energy flow discussion here - are you still objecting to the greenhouse effect? -
RW1 at 16:00 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
"You also may be not making a mistake, and I have simply misunderstood you. It is true that the presence of evapo/transpiration and convection, by making energy transfer more efficient, cool the surface compared to the temperature it would be if all energy transfers in the atmosphere were radiative (about 70 degrees C). So in that respect, the fact that evapo/transpiration carries energy into the atmosphere, a portion of which does eventually escape to space does mean the surface is cooler than it otherwise would have been." Having re-read this of yours, it is NOT what I meant. What I was saying is that kinetic energy (evaporation & transpiration) transferred from the surface into the atmosphere has be returned to the surface in equal and opposite amounts - mostly in the form of precipitation, weather, etc. Any amount of it radiated into the atmosphere that ultimately leaves at the top of the atmosphere, results in less kinetic energy returned to the surface in the form of colder precipitation mostly, which cools the surface, resulting in the surface emitting an equally opposite amount less than it would otherwise. -
citizenschallenge at 15:56 PM on 1 March 2011Roy Spencer’s Great Blunder, Part 2
Excellent, well written and most informative, looking forward to #3 Thank you -
Albatross at 15:53 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
Tom @201, Devastating. Your last sentence also nails it. -
Tom Curtis at 15:46 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
RW1 @198:I admit I have not yet verified if what he's claiming is correct or not, but you have neither verified what the IPCC is claiming the 3.7 W/m^2 represents from the model simulations. I've looked all through the IPCC 2007 report, I don't find this information - they seem to be really ambiguous about where exactly the 3.7 W/m^2 is derived from. I've also looked all over the internet and cannot find verification either way.
Let me reiterate what I first pointed out to you @209 on the "A Swift Kick in the Ice Thread" where this dicussion started; ie, that the IPCC explicitly claims that the radiative forcing from doubling CO2 is 3.7 w/m^2, and that "radiative forcing" is the change in net irradiance at the top of the atmosphere. To be quite clear, an increase in incoming radiation or a decrease in outgoing radiation both increase the radiative forcing, so a reduction in Outgoing Long-wave Radiation increases radiative forcing. Therefore, by simple logic, if the IPCC claims that doubling CO2 will increase radiative forcing by 3.7 w/m^2, then it is also claiming that doubling CO2 will reduce OLR by 3.7 w/m^2. The only way it does not have this implication is if changing CO2 levels in Earth's atmosphere could some how change the Sun's level of activity. So, what did the IPCC say in these mysteriously hard to find passages for which I have already provided you a link? The definition of Radiative Forcing:The definition of RF from the TAR and earlier IPCC assessment reports is retained. Ramaswamy et al. (2001) define it as ‘the change in net (down minus up) irradiance (solar plus longwave; in W m–2) at the tropopause after allowing for stratospheric temperatures to readjust to radiative equilibrium, but with surface and tropospheric temperatures and state held fixed at the unperturbed values’. Radiative forcing is used to assess and compare the anthropogenic and natural drivers of climate change. The concept arose from early studies of the climate response to changes in solar insolation and CO2, using simple radiative-convective models. However, it has proven to be particularly applicable for the assessment of the climate impact of LLGHGs (Ramaswamy et al., 2001). Radiative forcing can be related through a linear relationship to the global mean equilibrium temperature change at the surface (ΔTs): ΔTs = λRF, where λ is the climate sensitivity parameter (e.g., Ramaswamy et al., 2001).
That was from section 2.2 of WG1 concealed under the obscure title of "The Concept of Radiative Forcing". The effect of CO2:The simple formulae for RF of the LLGHG quoted in Ramaswamy et al. (2001) are still valid. These formulae are based on global RF calculations where clouds, stratospheric adjustment and solar absorption are included, and give an RF of +3.7 W m–2 for a doubling in the CO2 mixing ratio. (The formula used for the CO2 RF calculation in this chapter is the IPCC (1990) expression as revised in the TAR. Note that for CO2, RF increases logarithmically with mixing ratio.) Collins et al. (2006) performed a comparison of five detailed line-by-line models and 20 GCM radiation schemes. The spread of line-by-line model results were consistent with the ±10% uncertainty estimate for the LLGHG RFs adopted in Ramaswamy et al. (2001) and a similar ±10% for the 90% confidence interval is adopted here. However, it is also important to note that these relatively small uncertainties are not always achievable when incorporating the LLGHG forcings into GCMs. For example, both Collins et al. (2006) and Forster and Taylor (2006) found that GCM radiation schemes could have inaccuracies of around 20% in their total LLGHG RF (see also Sections 2.3.2 and 10.2).
That was carefully concealed in section 2.3.1 of WG1, titled "Atmospheric Carbon Dioxide". So what was it you wrote? That you've "...looked all through the IPCC 2007 report, I don't find this information - they seem to be really ambiguous about where exactly the 3.7 W/m^2 is derived from"? Really, you've looked all over, but never managed to look at the specific pages you were explicitly linked to? And specific mention of the types of models used, with references to three scientific papers that include the equations is being "really ambigous about where exactly the 3.7 w/m^2 is derived from"? Don't be absurd. Apparently you have also looked "all over the internet" with similar lack of success. But, again, without looking at the page that scaddenp explicitly linked you to. On that page you would have found a detailed discussion of all the issues raised here, along with images from a textbook, including the three @192 above showing the detailed mechanism used in calculating spectra in LBL models, and comparing LBL model results with reality. You would even find the actual formula (as if that would do you any good):
And if that was not enough to clarify, you could always have looked up the actual textbook (as I have previously suggested).
If that was not enough, you could also followed my link @192 above to SoD's seven part discussion of climate models and atmospheric physics in which he step by step builds an open code radiative transfer model. That is, of course, if your diligent search of the net had not already found it by noticing all seven posts in the "Recent Posts" section of SoD, or finding them in the "Atmospheric Physics" category (again, such careful concealment of information).
If that was not enough, you have had, for over a hundred posts now, the opportunity to double check one well known radiative transfer model (Modtran) for internal consistency, as I linked you to that before the discussion came to this thread. Of course, that would be difficult and time consuming, just as it was difficult and time consuming for all those scientists who developed multiple models, and fact checked them against literally hundreds of thousands of observations, only to have their work dismissed by a electrical engineer who thinks his word is better than their about what the output of their models actually represents. And his acolyte.
This whole discussion has become a waste of time. Clearly you will not do even basic research, and will not think about the outcomes of what research you do. I have long believed you are a troll, but have persisted in the discussion on the basis that interested readers may also have been confused by George White. Well for anyone who can think, it is diamond clear by now that George White's claim about the 3.7 w/m^2 radiative forcing from doubling CO2 is simply an error, and an error that anyone half way knowledgeable on the subject could not make. If you are still confused, it is because you want to be - you do not want to know the truth.
-
Albatross at 15:11 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
Phila @25, Well stated, thank you. As a former resident of Africa I could not agree more with what you said. We westerners are by a long stretch (and sadly) totally alienated from nature, and it shows. -
Rob Honeycutt at 14:58 PM on 1 March 2011Australia's departing Chief Scientist on climate change
BP... Please show me the research that backs up what you're saying. -
adelady at 14:34 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
Doug, if developing countries see carbon intensive industry as the "only" way to develop, that would be yet another nasty consequence of historical and virtual colonialism. If we are really concerned about this as an issue, then we should redouble our efforts to show, clearly, that the way we chose to develop our industry and society was not the best way. We now have a better way. You **can** skip the dirty step - you just have to choose. -
muoncounter at 14:31 PM on 1 March 2011Various estimates of Greenland ice loss
BP, Your link to Vinther et al 2006 doesn't work; your link to 'supplementary data' is a txt data file that ends in 2005. How would a paper published in 2006 have data through 2009? In addition, Vinther only looked at the southwest coast. Here's a graph from their monthly data, averaged over summer and fall:
Both summer and autumn have mild long term warming trends; both seem to turn up in the early '80s. Those seasons seem to be key to understanding Arctic melt: Per Serreze 2009 et al, "it makes sense that the surface warming signal has emerged first in autumn. Less sea ice at summer’s end (September), as observed, has enhanced upward heat fluxes to the atmosphere."
Here's a more regional study, Box 2002:
Based on temporal and spatial statistics, distinct and meaningful patterns of temperature are evident in Greenland instrumental temperature records spanning 1873–2001. These include a steady decay of spatial correlation, a lack of correlation between west and east coasts, and the presence of opposite temperature trends between west and east coasts that are themselves not statistically linked.
So it would seem that no broad conclusions can be drawn from Vinther, which is just the southwest Greenland coast.
Box (who analyzed 27 stations throughout Greenland) goes a step further:
The 1873–2001 western Greenland warming trends observed in this study are meaningful in the context of observed Greenland ice sheet melt rates. The mass balance of the ice sheet sector south of 73°N latitude and west of Kap Farvel was negative for the second half of the last century. This appears not to be affected by changes in precipitation, implicating the observed warming and potential ice dynamical changes.
Yeah, that negative ice mass balance just keeps on rearing its ugly head.
-
wild monkeys at 14:31 PM on 1 March 2011Motl-ey Cruel
I don't think it's surprising we can't see any "hot spot", as the effects of greenhouse effect are currently overwhelmed by arctic amplification. -
Tom Curtis at 14:28 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
Doug Proctor @18, 1) There is immediate feedback from a series of treaties in that you can immediately see who signs and who doesn't, and almost immediately see who complies with their obligations and who doesn't. 2) By proceding through a smaller number of treaties, you set up a reiterative process. 3) The arguments are perfectly valid. The question is, do we use our knowledge of game theory to set up a process that can avoid the worst of the coming catastrophe, or do we simply throw it all in the to hard basket, thereby sabotaging (by defecting) those who are willing to give it a go? -
RW1 at 14:27 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
"Having said that, I do not see the relevance to the basic point at issue - is it George White, or all the world's radiative transfer modelers who are correct in their interpretation of the output of radiative transfer models?" There is yet another possibility too. They assumed or convinced themselves that there was a remote possibility that the full 3.7 W/m^2 of incremental absorption could somehow make it back to the surface through multiple absorptions and re-emissions. I've seen this claim argued before, though ultimately never convincingly. Maybe they used this as a rationalization to count it all as a "just in case" precaution. I don't know. Without knowing the detailed specifics of the outputs of these model simulations there's no way to know. -
Tom Curtis at 14:23 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
Alex C @17, no! The problem with a long term agreement, even with penalty is that it is a one round prisoners dilemma. You either join the agreement, or not. By turning it into a succession of smaller agreements, you make the process reiterative. Best strategy in a one of prisoners dilemma is to default, while the best strategy in a reiterated prisoner's dilemma is some version of being nice at the start, and then reflecting the play of others. The term "Tragedy of the Commons" is used correctly in the main article as it is defined. However, that technically correct usage is a rhetorical device on a par with the various communist nations in the Soviet era calling themselves "Democratic Republics". It is used to justify, yet again, depriving people with traditional property rights of those rights without compensation for the advantage of commercial ventures. -
Phila at 14:23 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
Doug Proctor: Which all of us, not just Gore in his castle and Suzuki in his wilderness cabin, have a right to achieve. This is a common argument, with a grain of truth to it. However, when someone in the First World tells me, well-meaningingly or otherwise, that "the underdeveloped world sees carbon-based energy use more important to well-being" than some environmentalist cause, I tend to get irritated. Attempts to speak for the underdeveloped world have a fairly ugly history, and that ugliness becomes more pronounced the more monolithic their views are claimed to be. It can't be said often enough that poverty is not a synonym for ignorance or naivete. Many poor people around the world take a passionate interest in local and global environmental issues, and are interested in alternative forms of development (e.g., leapfrogging) and measures of wealth. In some cases, they may even be better informed about these issues than the average American, since problems that are abstract for many of us affect them directly. For this reason, and lots of others, we should hesitate to put words in their mouths, or treat them as some rubberstamp for our own ideologies. Instead, we should make an effort to find out how specific populations actually feel about issues like deforestation, pollution, climate change and so on. In other words, we should try listening to them, instead of treating them as a ventriloquist's dummy. -
hank at 14:22 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
Enjoy! http://www.modtran.org/ http://download.cnet.com/Modo/3000-2054_4-77505.html -
Berényi Péter at 14:16 PM on 1 March 2011Australia's departing Chief Scientist on climate change
#15 Rob Honeycutt at 10:16 AM on 1 March, 2011 You just took it a little too far and started turning it into a political statement. The only remotely political statement was about my preference for saving people instead of a globe made of iron. I understand not everyone shares my priorities, but tolerance for expression of a diversity of opinions and beliefs is supposed to have some merit after all. Let's not forget it is a sui generis political thread where I've ventured that far. It is about the resignation of Dr. Sackett from a genuinely political post while quoting some of her political pronouncements like "I worry about this because there is actually something we can do about it and still we're not acting quickly enough." In other words, all the radiative physics related to the greenhouse effect is wrong. In one sweeping gesture you push 150 years of accepted science onto the floor so you can make your case. No, you have not read it carefully. There is nothing wrong with radiation physics. If there is a body heated by a steady incoming flux which is only radiatively coupled to its environment and its effective emissivity ε is decreasing while its absolute temperature T is increasing in a way that ε×T4 is kept constant, there is no heat accumulation in that body whatsoever. That is, as soon as its effective emissivity stops decreasing, its temperature also stops increasing. In this case there is no committed warming at all. Now, effective emissivity of Earth is not measured properly. If satellite measurements are to be believed, there's a 6.4 W/m2 radiative imbalance, which is impossible. Direct measurement of heat accumulation rate shows it is negligible. Therefore the pipeline is empty, the radiative balance is almost perfect. It simply means the surface warming which has already happened was enough to restore balance. Of course we can not conclude from this that equilibrium climate sensitivity is small. But there's a somewhat subtler proposition which is true: it is either small or the time constants involved are huge. That is, either there's nothing to worry about or we have plenty of time for adaptation, so we can relax anyway. The conspicuous urgency in Dr. Sackett's public pronouncements is unwarranted. -
Marcus at 14:01 PM on 1 March 2011Prudent Risk
Well done, RSVP, way to display your complete ignorance of biology-& most especially evolution. As has been pointed out to, the only reason viruses, bacteria & insects develop such rapid resistance is because of their extremely short life-cycles-which allows for the rapid accumulation of genetic mutations, one of which might lead to resistance & be passed on to the next generation-& even this can be overcome if you sustain the selective pressure strongly enough & for long enough (i.e. you can avoid antibiotic resistance in bacteria by maintaining exposure to a strong dose of antibiotics for a sufficiently long time. Longer lived animals & plants, who take months to years to decades to breed, develop the necessary mutations to survive selective pressures over a much longer time frame-a time frame that we're currently not giving them. -
TimTheToolMan at 13:47 PM on 1 March 2011Dispelling two myths about the tropospheric hot spot
"1) It is very probable that Haig et al's result is either due to instrument error or to a atypical circumstances." The satellite used to measure the UV component of the TSI was purpose built for the task and doesn't have to deal with atmosphere or "winter night". The SIM data regarding UV level variability as seen above the TOA is what it is and is very probably correct. If you have an argument here it is how that data has been used in the Haigh paper. The problem is that the Frederick and Hodge paper you cited made its calculations based on the ground view of UV which is absorbed at varying rates in the atmosphere over time. And UV has also now been shown to itself vary over time. But most of all, "The goal is to define the variability in solar irradiance reaching the polar surface, with emphasis on the influence of cloudiness and on identifying systematic trends and possible links to the solar cycle." And then on top of all that, its goal isn't even to look at variation in the stratospheric temperature ranges. " taking Haigh et al's results at face value, they would predice a cooling stratosphere and a warming troposphere when the sun approaches a solar minimum" Taken at face value, Haigh et al shows that when TSI is thought to be low, its not because all components of the spectrum are uniformly low, rather they vary and so "Low TSI" doesn't necessarily mean low visible. By implication when TSI is high, we shouldn't assume that UV is also high or that visible is high, rather the combination (whatever that turns out to be when measured) is high. Regarding aerosols, that appears to be wishful thinking on your part. The effect of aerosols in our atmosphere is unknown. Every model has its own interpretation made on the dubious data we have and they cant all be right. Your point 3 is your real argument. Paraphrased (and correct me if I'm wrong) you're saying that CO2 has a particular fingerprint in atmospheric warming and reduction in UV has a different fingerprint. The problem with this argument is that the CO2 fingerprint has been deduced with the assumption (in the models) of how the atmosphere behaves and with "greater than expected" variance within TSI, this has turned out to be wrong. Before the CO2 fingerprint can be re-established, the models have to be corrected for the new knowledge about how solar radiation varies. -
Marcus at 13:28 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
Another point to consider though-regardless of its impact on *global* CO2 emissions a carbon tax-if it leads to a genuine reduction in coal & oil use-will result in significant side benefits to our local environment. The burning of fossil fuels is known to produce a number of highly toxic by-products (like benzene, mercury, cadmium, radon & particulate emissions) & the extraction of fossil fuels also does enormous damage to the environment. So a reduction in our use of fossil fuels *will* lead to significantly better environmental outcomes on a local scale. -
michael sweet at 13:28 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
Adelady, In Texas they are grid limited for wind in some areas also. A method needs to be developed to finance the wind grid to enable these projects to go forward. It will make money in the end but needs help to get started. This is where government organization can help the market get going. -
Marcus at 13:19 PM on 1 March 2011Monckton Myth #15: Tragedy of the Commons
There is something else wrong with Monckton's argument though. As a major exporter of Coal, a carbon tax could send a significant price signal to those nations that buy our Coal &-therefore-maybe create an incentive for larger economies to use *less* coal. So whilst it might not have much *direct* impact on global CO2 emissions, it could impact it quite strongly through international trade. -
RW1 at 13:17 PM on 1 March 2011Climate sensitivity is low
"Having said that, I do not see the relevance to the basic point at issue - is it George White, or all the world's radiative transfer modelers who are correct in their interpretation of the output of radiative transfer models?" Yes this is crux, but if GW is so obviously wrong as you claim, where is the smoking gun? And why haven't you presented it to him? I mean if it's so egregiously wrong, it should be easy to point directly to the specific evidence that disproves it, right? I admit I have not yet verified if what he's claiming is correct or not, but you have neither verified what the IPCC is claiming the 3.7 W/m^2 represents from the model simulations. I've looked all through the IPCC 2007 report, I don't find this information - they seem to be really ambiguous about where exactly the 3.7 W/m^2 is derived from. I've also looked all over the internet and cannot find verification either way. Regardless, I'm determined to get to bottom of this - even it means I have to get the MODTRAN software and run the simulations myself.
Prev 1876 1877 1878 1879 1880 1881 1882 1883 1884 1885 1886 1887 1888 1889 1890 1891 Next
