Arguments
Recent Comments
Prev 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 Next
Comments 98751 to 98800:
-
John Mason at 02:42 AM on 13 January 2011The Queensland floods
John, Good to hear you are managing, but my heart goes out to those stricken by this calamity. Here in Mid-Wales we have our first sou-westerly Warm Conveyor of 2011, with orographic enhancement leading to maybe 100mm of rain - but it's steady moderate stuff, not the convective deluges you guys have had. With regard to the AGW element of this, one way to look at it is to imagine the weather being the lump sum of money and AGW being the interest - as Kevin Trenberth noted, 4% per extra degree Fahrenheit (or ~6% per degree C if you like). Cheers - John -
muoncounter at 02:37 AM on 13 January 2011The Queensland floods
John, As one who lives in a hurricane-prone area, I feel your pain. Keeping up the good work in spite of natural disaster is the mark of a real trooper. I heard this morning that Australia's coking coal industry will suffer because of this flooding and that may increase the world steel price. No one can say that the increased risk of disasters of this magnitude won't affect the world's economy. Best of luck to you and yours! -
The Physical Chemistry of Carbon Dioxide Absorption
RW1 - The link I gave you was behind a paywall; here's an accessible link to Myhre et al 1998. Long live Google Scholar! -
The Physical Chemistry of Carbon Dioxide Absorption
RW1 - The most up to date calculations appear to be from Myhre et al (1998); these results are discussed a bit over at Real Climate - The CO2 problem in 6 easy steps. RC has some excellent references and links in that article. The total radiative forcing, the difference in energy leaving the atmosphere, per doubling of CO2 is about 3.7 W/m^2. Note that this is based on piece-by-piece integrations of atmospheric effects (it's more than a bit too complex to calculate by hand), and includes both CO2 absorption widening as well as the increasing altitude of final CO2 emission (where the atmosphere thins enough that the CO2/volume allows radiation to space); given the lapse rate, a rise in CO2 emission altitude means that the emitting CO2 will be colder, and hence emit less energy. If you disagree with these numbers, then do the work, and submit your results to Geophysical Research Letters as a reply to Myhre. -
HumanityRules at 02:23 AM on 13 January 2011The Queensland floods
Good to here you're well John. No doubt within the AGW scenario harder punches are expected the question really is whether AGW theory is an accurate description of what's going on here. It's also worth considering that nature alone can pack a pretty hard punch. Even in the relatively short history of white settlement in the Brisbane area it's possible that the 1893 was harder although it probably didn't cause so much misery to so many souls. garythompson as the response suggests AGW allows for both drought and flood. The problem is that normal precipitation is also not inconsistent with AGW. Once you have all the bases covered it makes me wonder just what is the power of these sorts of statements. But this is a terrible tragedy, best of luck to all Queenslanders. -
DSL at 01:36 AM on 13 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
Or, Ville, we simply wouldn't be. I must congratulate SUV . . . errr 13MPG, though. This is the first time I've heard the argument that CO2 is too heavy to make it to the upper troposphere and stratosphere. Perhaps some of the more vocal "skeptics" could weigh in on this? GC, perhaps? Cruzn? KL? -
Bob Lacatena at 00:44 AM on 13 January 2011Understanding the CO2 lag in past climate change
222, archisteel, I'm pretty sure a LIB is a Little Ice Blanket, a technique used by scientists to combat global cooling during the LIA. I read that on some really, really trustworthy and informative site, like WUWT, so it must be true. Don't ask what a LICk is, though... you don't want to know. -
johnkg at 00:31 AM on 13 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
#50 - h Pierce You posted the same question on what looks like a denialist site and R. de Hann gave a reasoned response. There is so much dust in the atmosphere by natural causes that even the tons of rubber caused by tire wear simply disappear in the real big numbers. The hundreds of millions of tons of dust stirred up by the wind moving over the Gobi, Sahara and other deserts, the hundreds of millions of tons of dust and particles set free during natural forrest fires all over the world and hundreds of millions of tons of emissions from our volcano’s. You won’t see the effects from tire wear from space but you can certainly see the forrest fires, the volcanic eruptions and the dust storms. Yet again, it’s all a matter of common sense. The rubber dust, most of it sticks to the road and is washed into the sewer where it is mixed with dirt and sewage. Modern sewage plants contain trillions of bacteria that clean up the sewage and one of the products that comes is fresh earth for your garden or your balcony flowers. I noticed you did not respond. -
Tom Curtis at 00:25 AM on 13 January 2011The Queensland floods
adelady, the throw away comment you read may have been the one @5 above. -
gallopingcamel at 00:19 AM on 13 January 2011Graphs from the Zombie Wars
Keith Pickering, Even Lubos Motl likes your post even though he has a quibble with the arithmetic. http://motls.blogspot.com/2011/01/climate-sensitivity-from-linear-fit.html Any comment? -
Daniel Bailey at 23:17 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
I would echo the sentiments that others have so ably expressed about the safety and well-being of not only you and your family, John, but of that of all afflicted by the Queensland floods. May you continue to stay safe and dry! The Yooper -
adelady at 23:07 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Thanks for mentioning cyclones Eric. I saw a throwaway comment somewhere that the previous best-known major SE Queensland floods were caused by rain events at the tail end /edge of cyclones. I've not checked it but it did ring a bell. Somebody's sure to put those stats together in the next few days. -
Eric (skeptic) at 22:46 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Historic Australian floods: http://www.ga.gov.au/hazards/flood/flood-basics/historic.html are correlated with La Nina http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/enso/climaterisks/years.risk.html plus cyclones. -
michael sweet at 22:38 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
James Hansen wrote earlier this summer concerning the heat in Moscow and floods in Pakistan: "Finally, a comment on frequently asked questions of the sort: Was global warming the cause of the 2010 heat wave in Moscow, the 2003 heat wave in Europe, the all-time record high temperatures reached in many Asian nations in 2010, the incredible Pakistan flood in 2010? The standard scientist answer is "you cannot blame a specific weather/climate event on global warming." That answer, to the public, translates as "no". However, if the question were posed as "would these events have occurred if atmospheric carbon dioxide had remained at its pre-industrial level of 280 ppm?", an appropriate answer in that case is "almost certainly not." That answer, to the public, translates as "yes", i.e., humans probably bear a responsibility for the extreme event." I am sure the same answer would fit the Queensland flood. It would not have happened without AGW. I lived in Acacia Ridge in western Bisbane for three years. I think of my Aussie friends all the time. -
h pierce at 22:24 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
#40 Chemware Modern synthetic rubber contains anti-oxidants and UV protectants, and it does not degraded to any appreciable extent when exposed to air, sunlight, and microbes. I have used tires that are over 20 years old and they haven't changed much at all in physical appearance. And there is no mold or moss growing on them. -
Mila at 22:14 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Current status of La Nina: http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf BTW: I was just searching the web for the place where John lives when the new article appeared - all Australians I ever knew came from Sydney so I sort of assumed that he must be from Sydney as well and so was not worried about him - a classical example of wrong generalization -
Anne-Marie Blackburn at 22:01 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Glad things are not too bad for you, John - here's hoping it stays this way. The scale of this disaster is unimaginable. -
Paul D at 22:00 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
13MPG Read this document (The Absence of Stratification and Rapidity of Mixing of Carbon Dioxide in Air Samples) from the Journal of Biological Chemistry (1927), about the diffusion of CO2 in air, in particular the summary: http://www.jbc.org/content/73/2/379.full.pdf The point is that if you were correct about CO2, then we would be detecting stratification of gases in the atmosphere and we would all be CO2 breathing creatures, not air/oxygen breathing creatures. -
Eric (skeptic) at 21:53 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
13MPG, I second the start here recommendation. The only argument of yours that I haven't previously read here was the atmospheric pressure increase. This paper http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.energy.2010.07.017 says that "a crepuscular atmosphere having a carbon dioxide content of 683 ppm, ... a pressure of 1.021 bar,..." so that argument is wrong too. -
MarkR at 21:23 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Best of luck to you and your family John! RE: #2 - the extreme events case has already been pretty well explained. As well as extreme events, there are expected to be regional changes in precipitation. Total global precipitation is expected to go up because of more water vapour in the atmosphere, but some regions will see less & others more. Summary of IPCC graphs here! -
JMurphy at 20:24 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
13MPG, before your first post, you should have read Beginners Start Here, The Big Picture, and Most Used Skeptic Arguments. If you had read all that first, your post would have had very little left that hadn't been already looked at, discussed and countered. -
David Horton at 20:21 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Glad you are ok John. Keep smiling. -
jyyh at 19:53 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Looking out the window I'm seeing the highest piles of snow in S Finland for my lifetime (under 40 of them) and more coming from the sky. Glad of not to have to go to the store today. Inquiring how are your food supplies? You hang in there. -
Riccardo at 19:31 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
13MPG building new theories from a measured event is a nice intellectual exercize. But before claiming its validity you need to confront it with reality. There are several troubling claims in your comment, starting from the sinking of CO2, the flooding (sic) of the Atlantic Ocean, the cooling from 1998 and the halving of the european population in the 17th-18th century during the so-called little ice age. Your theory does not stand even the most trivial sanity check. -
Philippe Chantreau at 19:07 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Glad to know you're safe and sound John. -
Philippe Chantreau at 19:06 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
13MPG, this has to be the most grotesque conflation of nonsense and misinformation I have ever seen. Thanks for the laugh. -
Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 18:33 PM on 12 January 2011The science isn't settled
@aspiratelooksat50 - 'pro' means 'for', 'anti' means 'against'. I don't know of anyone who is 'pro-AGW', although I have read facetious comments, mostly on denier sites, saying 'warming will be good'. I don't imagine any thinking person wants earth to be hotter than it's ever been since humans evolved. -
Albatross at 18:13 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Hi John, Fingers crossed-- glad to hear that you are coping. Just to add to your comments above. From Dai, Trenberth and Qian (2004) concluded that: "From 1950 to 2002, precipitation increases over Argentina, the southern United States, and most of western Australia resulted in wetter conditions (i.e., higher PDSI) in these regions. However, most of Eurasia, Africa, Canada, Alaska, and eastern Australia became drier from 1950 to 2002, partly because of large surface warming since 1950 over these regions". And "During the last two–three decades, there was a tendency of more extreme (either very dry or very wet) conditions over many regions, including the United States, Europe, east Asia, southern Africa, and the Sahel." The recent deluges of rain over Queensland are, in part, related to the current La Nina, with the heavy rains likely being exacerbated by the record high SSTs surrounding Australia and attendant increase in water vapour content in the atmosphere. The increase in precipitation and weather extremes is consistent with a warming planet and accelerating hydrological cycle. To quote Trenberth: "Because one of the opening statements, which I’m sure you’ve probably heard is “Well you can’t attribute a single event to climate change.” But there is a systematic influence on all of these weather events now-a-days because of the fact that there is this extra water vapor lurking around in the atmosphere than there used to be say 30 years ago. It’s about a 4% extra amount, it invigorates the storms, it provides plenty of moisture for these storms and it’s unfortunate that the public is not associating these with the fact that this is one manifestation of climate change. And the prospects are that these kinds of things will only get bigger and worse in the future." -
13MPG at 18:13 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
I am a climatologist by hobby mainly because I study and occasionally chase hurricanes. I can use the most basic aspect of science and demonstrate why earth won't become venus. Look at the periodic table. Air is a solution (meaning no molecular bonds) of roughly 3/4 nitrogen and 1/4 oxygen and trace gasses (21%?). When an atom bonds to others to become molecules, the atomic weight combines. When air becomes saturated...when the total atomic weight of water in a given point of the atmosphere grows higher than the total atomic weight of the air that is holding it up, it falls down as rain, snow, dew, etc. Now, Carbon Dioxide has a much heavier atomic weight than air or water vapor. Thus when CO2 gets ejected into the atmosphere, it falls harmlessly to earth where the trees use it for food. To this day, the military uses CO2 as fire suppression on the lower levels of ships (engineering areas) because it naturally sinks in air. Because of CO2's heavier atomic weight, barometric pressure (the weight of the atmosphere on the earth) has not increased at all in the last 150 years. If CO2 were building as they say, the barometric pressure would have increased .5mb at sea level in the last century. That has not happened. The cyclical shift In ocean currents and temperatures gradually went from cool to warm in the '30s and again in the early '80's. this cycle starts in Pacific lags a decade or so in the Atlantic (PDO and AMO respectively). When the Pacific warmed, so did the land next to it then the Atlantic followed. The result was honest scientists seeing actual global warming. Now the pacific ocean is back in it's cold phase and scientists are trying to hide the resulting temperature drop. In the next 5 years the Atlantic will go cold too. The pacific went cold extremely early this time. The only time this can be archaeologically proven to have happened before was in the 13th century when archaeological evidence shows a likelihood of the Northwest Passage being open briefly at the very end Medieval Warm period which peaked drastically then ended suddenly at the end of the 13th and 1st half of the 14th century. To see what followed, google "little ice age". It seems plausible that the opening of the "Northwest Passage" flooded the Atlantic Ocean with cold dense fresh water blocking the Gulf Stream which moderates temperatures along the Americas, West Indies, Europe and even it even impacts Africa as the cold "Canary Current". The sudden drop in temps along the eastern US and Eur-Asia was preceded by a decade or so of slow global cooling and extreme weather in Europe resulting in crop failures, just like the cooling that has been happening since 1998. The last "little ice age" killed half the population of Europe due to starvation and plague. Is it possible that all the crop failures in the news lately are simply history repeating itself? No, and neither are the plunging temperatures, record snows in areas that haven't seen such things since the 1700's which was the peak of the last "little ice age". I have already heard some folks in the weather watching community comparing this winter to the winter Washington and the American Revolutionary Army spent at Valley Forge.Moderator Response: [Daniel Bailey] Welcome to Skeptical Science. First rule to observe here is to abide by the Comments Policy. That means NO accusations of fraud or dishonesty, among other things. Even by intimation. Your comment hangs precariously across that line. Future comments of this nature will be summarily deleted. As to the scientific content of your comment, for someone studying climate science there is so much in error. Please follow the advice and direction JMurphy expressed so well in comment number 47 below. Your compliance is appreciated, as is substantive dialogue. Thanks! -
archiesteel at 17:52 PM on 12 January 2011The science isn't settled
@apiratelooksat50: "Just being curious and not accusatory, do you and/or the other posters here look at other sites that are not pro-AGW? " You seem to be under the impression that this site is "pro-AGW". It isn't. It is pro-science. This isn't an debate of ideas, or of opinion. It is a scientific debate. Sites that have an obvious political agenda (such as WUWT) are not science sites. Your comment about "libs" in a different thread belies your political views. You should really stop looking at the science through a partisan lens. -
archiesteel at 17:49 PM on 12 January 2011Understanding the CO2 lag in past climate change
@apiratelooksat50: "Do libs not listen to Buffett?" What's a "lib," and what does it have to do with climate science? -
Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 17:46 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
As a further addendum, much (most) of Victoria in south eastern Australia has suffered drought for the last decade or more. It is expected to continue to get warmer and drier in Victoria as global warming progresses. A desalination plant is under construction to provide Melbourne with improved water security. Melbourne water storage is currently at 53.7% capacity gaining about 300 gigalitres since June 2010 (about twice the water of 2009 but only a bit more than half the amount of water held in storage in 1997). Yet across the state and in Melbourne this summer we've had a lot of rain, record precipitation events and major floods with this season's La Nina. http://www.melbournewater.com.au/content/water_storages/water_report/zoom_graph.asp A lot of people are commenting on the 'cool' summer. But it only feels cool by comparison with the record heat of recent years. In actual fact, the mean monthly maxima and minima for Melbourne this summer are still above 30 year averages (including the 1981 to 2010 average). Compare recent months in Melbourne here (scroll down for links to recent months): http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/dwo/IDCJDW3050.latest.shtml With monthly averages here (you can select the period): http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/averages/tables/cw_086071.shtml Melbourne and Victoria are not the world and therefore that data on its own does not allow inferences to be drawn about what is happening at a global level. Nevertheless what's happening here in Victoria does illustrate the local climate change that is already occurring, in line with what Australian scientists have been telling us will happen with global warming. -
Tom Curtis at 17:00 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
As an addendum, the drought is still continuing in the South West of West Australia (around its capital) with dams at 30% of capacity, and 15 - 20% of Perth's water coming from desalination. -
Tom Curtis at 16:54 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
sout @4, I believe it was November of 2009 that the drought broke in Brisbane with rains that restored Wivenhoe to capacity within a week or so. For comparison, in just 24 hours yesterday Wivenhoes stored water increases by 40% of rated storage capacity whilst letting enough water through its floodgates to cause lead to the expected '74 plus level floods in Brisbane tomorrow. Its maximum capacity is 220% of its normal storage capacity to allow for flood mitigation. Last I heard, it was at 175% of normal storage capacity, or one more days rain had it not (very thankfully) relented. -
Tom Curtis at 16:48 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Hi John, I did not know that you were a fellow Brisburnian. I'm glad to here that you are safe. garythompson @2, the CSIRO has been predicting since at least 2003 that the main effect of global warming on subtropical Queensland and NSW would be longer, hotter, and drier droughts, BUT that when rains came it would be more likely to flood, and to flood more severely (check my blog for links). The reason that global warming will increase the duration of droughts is because it makes it more likely that any given year will be an El Nino year, and El Nino years bring droughts to Australia. It will be drier because it is hotter, which results in more evaporation of moisture stored in the soil. Of course, though it is more likely that any given year will be an El Nino year, La Nina's can still occur, and strong La Nina's bring floods. Hence the current flood. The reason global warming results in more rain when it floods is because warmer Sea Surface Temperatures (currently at a record level in Australian Waters). Warmer sea surfaces means more evaporation, which in turn means more rainfall. Knowing this, it was no surprise to me that the ten year drought we have recently been through was broken by record breaking floods in Queensland in March, with that record now in turn shattered. Brisbane's highest levels of flooding all occured in the 19th century, with river peaks up to 4 meters above what is currently expected. What has changed since the 19th century was the construction of the Summerset Dam which provided for a large measure of flood mitigation. That couldn't prevent '74, so they built the Wivenhoe Dam with an even greater capacity for flood mitigation, and greatly enhanced Brisbane's drainage system. These have greatly helped us, for without them floods in Brisbane would have hit '74 levels last week, well before Toowoomba's "instant inland tsunami". It has still not been enough. What nobody is yet commenting about is that Brisbane's previous episodes of mass flooding have been the result of cyclone remnants hitting Brisbane after a preceding season of massive rainfall. This time we have had the preceding season of rainfall, but no cyclone remnant. Absent global warming, Brisbane would probably only be experiencing minor flooding now, but global warming has been a game changer in the amount of rainfall we can expect from a normal rain depression. http://bybrisbanewaters.blogspot.com/2011/01/under-brisbane-waters.html -
Chris G at 16:45 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
BKSea, I don't know of any researcher willing to go out on that limb. But, I don't know all. It's a pretty thin branch no matter which side you believe. However, the same question has come to my mind more than once. Looking at ice core data, there appear to be upper and lower limits to "natural" perturbations. At times, there appear to be plateaus of relative stability at the top and bottom of these limits, with rapid changes between them. However, there is also a PETM event which is outside of these limits, as well as broad expanses of geologic time where the temperature has been outside of the recent glacial band. My two cents: We are off the map. There has never been a time like the one we are in the process of creating in terms of layout of the continents, amount of C sequestered in clathrates and permafrost, rate of climate forcing introduced, etc. We can't just can't tell whether the change will be smooth or abrupt. Looking at the forces and feedbacks involved, there's nothing that acts linearly; so, my out-on-a-limb guess is that there will be an abrupt tipping point. Heck, from a geologic time-scale perspective, the recent change in progress would look like some abrupt discontinuity on the graph. Actually, I think the number would be a) too big to be meaningful, and b) depend a lot on how deep you wanted to go in the ocean and land; atmosphere, not so much. I once did a back-of-the-napkin estimate of just the latent heat difference in the loss of Arctic ice. It was huge, and that is just a fraction of the change in heat content of oceans. -
Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 16:34 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
@ garythompson #2 - flood and drought are not mutually exclusive. You are correct regarding drought predictions for Australia but you might have missed the predictions of record rain events as the higher levels of water in the atmosphere fall as rain. What you may not know is that Australia has suffered extensive drought of extremely long duration and record high temperatures over the past decade. Only a couple of years ago (or less?) the Brisbane water supplies were as low as 16%. Now they are at almost 200% stated capacity, even though the flood mitigation section of the Wivenhoe Dam was emptied in preparation for the current wet season. When it rains it rains more intensely. Many parts of Australia have had unprecedented rain intensity with this summer's La Nina, causing major flooding in Victoria, New South Wales, north west Western Australia and Queensland. This intense rain follows years of drought. -
Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 16:12 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
John, it's good to hear you and your family are safe on higher ground. I hope things are not too difficult for you. I know there are power outages, phone outages, disruptions to transport and grocery shops sold out or closed from flooding. Today climate specialist Professor David Karoly, on ABC News 24 television, said quite clearly that because the oceans are progressively warming as a consequence of human induced global warming, the strong La Nina is stronger than it would otherwise be. From what I can research looking at flood history of Queensland, larger flood events are occurring more often as is the intensity of precipitation wherever it occurs in Australia (down in the south eastern Australia as well as further north). BTW I hope this does not conflict with comments policy, but anyone who wants to help could donate here: http://www.qld.gov.au/floods/donate.htmlResponse: Thanks for the reminder re the donation link - will add it to the main article. -
garythompson at 16:10 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
i'm glad you are ok John and i thought about you when i saw this on the news (you being the only "bloke" i know in that country). stay safe. it seems that climate scientists are suffering in the media from conflicting messages and predictions. every weather event from floods to blizzards are being blamed on global warming. a few years ago the news i heard was the global warming would cause drought, not massive rains.Response: Global warming leads to an intensification of the water cycle. Drought severity is increasing in some regions and extreme precipitation is increasing in other regions. These are not merely predictions - an increase in drought severity and extreme precipitation have both been observed. -
villabolo at 16:01 PM on 12 January 2011The Queensland floods
Glad to hear you and your family are ok John. -
actually thoughtful at 15:54 PM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
Muoncounters (graph #28 as things are now counted) shows roughly .8C of warming since the zero mark (whatever that is for that graph). It just raised the question in my mind - how many BTUs does it take to raise the temperature of Earth by .1C? This number might be a fun one to help people grasp the magnitude of such a tiny change. Every rock, every house, every leaf, every river, etc. .1C hotter than it was - all at once. -
Trueofvoice at 14:12 PM on 12 January 2011Understanding the CO2 lag in past climate change
Pirate, Clark is completely wrong in his assertion of atmospheric gas concentrations being "set", and his timeline is off as well. I'm not going to say more here because I'm already dragging the thread off topic.Moderator Response: Yes, that is off topic for this thread. -
RW1 at 13:51 PM on 12 January 2011The Physical Chemistry of Carbon Dioxide Absorption
KR, "As has been said here, repeatedly, the 3.7 TOA number means that ~7.4 W/m^2 is being absorbed and radiated isotropically from CO2." Wonderful. Point me to source and/or documentation that says the total absorbed power is 7.4 W/m^2 and that only 3.7 W/m^2 affects the surface because only half of the 7.4 W/m^2 absorbed is re-radiated downward. -
The Physical Chemistry of Carbon Dioxide Absorption
RW1 - As has been said here, repeatedly, the 3.7 TOA number means that ~7.4 W/m^2 is being absorbed and radiated isotropically from CO2. I know this - because I'm one of the people who has told you this more than once. Halving that number again is completely incorrect. Until you recognize that you will be starting from some very inaccurate premises. The additional energy not radiated to space from the Earth / atmosphere from a doubling of CO2 is therefore 3.7 W/m^2. That number comes from detailed, line-by-line calculations of IR emission across the full spectrum and through the entire atmosphere. hfranzen has done an excellent job of presenting the basic ideas. -
Daniel Bailey at 12:23 PM on 12 January 2011The science isn't settled
Re: apiratelooksat50 (35) Hmm, good question (no one's ever asked me that). I try to keep up on the literature itself as it comes out while reading older stuff I missed earlier as I find the time. That means reading a lot of stuff from NATURE, AGU, PNAS, GRL, AMS (I'm sure I'm forgetting some of the biggies; that's what links are for). Full studies I have access to or can find a free PDF of somewhere (Google Scholar is your friend in this regard). Abstracts and review articles also. Science sites. As for blogs, I pretty much limit myself to the science-based ones that have proven themselves over time (RC, Open Mind, Skeptical Science, Science of Doom, Chris Colosse's place, Neven's Sea Ice blog, etc). I frequent ScienceDaily and ReportingClimateScience for hints to advance notice of breaking papers. To boil that down: Peer-reviewed articles are the core. Augmented by commentaries in both scientific venues and scientific sites & blogs proven trustworthy. And then distill it down to this: Is it credible? Does it agree with what we have established as foundational? Why or why not? If not, what significance does that have (if any)? If it seeks to overturn established tenets, then exceptional claims require an even greater level of exceptional evidence. Etc. We were all given a mind. Some choose to use it for thinking. Some let others do the thinking for them. Our choice. (Apologies to any here whose site I didn't specifically name; I blame senescence) Oh, I listen to Buffett (and pretty much everything from 1960-2000 or so). And I'm pretty conservative. The Yooper -
Bob Lacatena at 11:47 AM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
39, BKsea, Off the top of my head, from what I observe and understand, the answer is "both." That is, the ocean is a vast heat/CO2 sink, so it is damping both the warming and the growth of CO2 in the atmosphere. On the other hand, from what we've seen of past events, such as the termination of interglacial periods and other events, there can be spikes when certain tipping points are reached. These don't need to be the same "tipping points" people think of in relation to runaway warming... just points where "slow-and-steady" abruptly transitions to "oh-shi*". But right now I'd say "more slowly and monotonically drifts" is the better description, with the understanding that that same damping will apply to trying to slow things down now that they've started. That is, even if we stopped all CO2 emissions right now, that "slowly and monotonically drifts" would continue for a very, very long while. -
Chemware at 11:40 AM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
#18, h pierce Sorry, you are wrong about rubber. It does degrade, though it does take a while. Sunlight is pretty vicious to rubber and plastic, and rubber eventually degrades because of the initiators used in its synthesis. -
BKsea at 10:58 AM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
From a basic systems perspective, a system's response to a perturbation can either be underdamped, in which case the system rapidly changes, overshoots and oscillates to a new equillibrium. Or, it can be overdamped, in which case it more slowly and monotonically drifts to a new equillibrium. Is there any evidence whether climate response to CO2 behaves in either of these fashions? -
Eric (skeptic) at 10:55 AM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
#18 keithpickering and #21 Sphaerica, I never figured trend was relevant in those variables (AO, etc). The relationship of those to global average temperature is not linear, and the variables themselves are somewhat cyclical (not linear). However, the AO to amplification link that I talked about doesn't seem to be evident. AMO being oceanic rather than atmospheric looks a little more promising. I am only trying to explain fluctuations in the rate of global temperature increase to help determine the factors that control amplification of warming from CO2 or ocean storage of CO2 warming, both of which fluctuate. -
keithpickering at 10:46 AM on 12 January 2011Could global warming be caused by natural cycles?
#20 Robert Way: I quite agree, and I'm in the process of redoing all these graphs with explicit y-scales. See my post from a few days ago, "Graphs from the Zombie Wars" for an example. #28 Rob Honeycutt Please use these any way they might be useful -- if you can get that right-click thing working. #29 H Pierce Yes indeed. One needs to remember that AMO and PDO are temperature indices, i.e., they are detrended subsets of the global temperature dataset. Therefore one expects to see short-term correlations. It's the long-term trend that's the issue.
Prev 1968 1969 1970 1971 1972 1973 1974 1975 1976 1977 1978 1979 1980 1981 1982 1983 Next
