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Rob Painting at 08:33 AM on 5 December 20102009-2010 winter saw record cold spells
11 & 12 - Sure it's not winter 2009-2010, but given the change in Arctic weather patterns, it may become an annual skeptic talking point. -
Rob Honeycutt at 08:21 AM on 5 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
Camburn @ 350... Can you really not see that you are doing exactly what you are claiming renewables proponents are doing? You are presenting nuclear as a "proven technology" that we should be "crowing from the rooftops" about. That says to me that you are completely ignoring the inherent negative aspects of nuclear. And again, you are also ignoring that nuclear can't switched off when people go to bed at night. That means you run spin reserve. So, ultimately nuclear is not very flexible. The larger a percentage of output that is dedicated to nuclear the less efficient it is. Renewables are exactly the opposite. Everyone here is saying both are needed to address the issue of AGW. Neither is a panacea. Both have strengths and weaknesses. But we need to do everything we can to limit our use of fossil fuels. The only thing I'm going to crow from the rooftop about is our political leaders accepting publicly that we need to address this important issue so that we can begin to get serious about it. -
Bob Guercio at 08:15 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Guys, I guess I'm thinking of one thing after another. The troposphere. More CO2 so more absorption of IR. This causes the vibrational energy of CO2 molecules to increase. Somehow this vibrationalal energy gets converted to K.E. to increase the temperature. In this case, a collision results in more k.e. of the particles. Right? My intuition here is not as solid even though this is probably what is happening. Bob -
Bibliovermis at 08:12 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
The prescription medicine would still be detectable through multiple methods. Historical solar irradiance changes are also detectable. -
Bob Guercio at 07:55 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Sphaerica and everybody else who helped me. I'm sure that temperature differentials play a role in all of this but getting into that would just add complexity to a nice and simple model and make the essence of all of this more difficult to understand. Do you agree? Bob -
Bob Lacatena at 07:52 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
actually thoughtful, I think you missed HR's point. The fact is that either a solar or CO2 initial forcing will be accompanied by a strong H2O GHG positive feedback. That strong positive feedback will have the same GHG signature, and that will obscure the fact that in the case of solar forcing the initial forcing does not have such a signature. In your analogy, a better example would be for two different drivers, one who drank a lot of alcohol, and another who drank a little bit of alcohol, but combined it with prescription medicine. Both test positive for a blood alcohol content over the limit, and both caused horrific car crashes, and in that way the two are difficult to distinguish, but the prescription medicine distinction is lost without further evidence to support it. -
Bob Guercio at 07:42 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Sphaerica, You said: As a result, the CO2 in the troposphere is more likely to absorb IR in that narrow CO2 band, but then passes it on through collisions to the abundant, non-emitting O2/N2, raising temperatures and somewhat "blocking" that band of radiation. Alternately, the CO2 in the more rarefied stratosphere is more often excited by collisions with the more abundant O2/N2, and emits the gained energy through radiation before it can pass it on through another collision. Me: I can't believe this but I understand this perfectly. I've had one of those Eureka moments. I'll add one fine point for total clarity or maybe I'm simply rephrasing what you guys have said. And I'm keeping with my very simple model of an atmosphere of two layers, the troposphere and stratosphere and composed only of nitrogen and carbon dioxide. Temperature depends only upon the kinetic energy of the molecules. Thus, after a collision, a molecule with no vibrational energy may now have vibrational energy and that molecule has less kinetic energy. So this diminution of kinetic energy from multiple molecules lowers the temperature. That molecule that has more vibrational energy deexcites and emits IR that may be absorbed by another deexcited molecule or it may simply fly off into space. This IR flying off into space is kinetic energy that is now lost forever from the stratosphere. I also now believe that, as Tom has stated, it doesn't matter whether we are talking about the steady state or the transient state with these states being as I have defined them. So I can now make my model simpler yet. I won't talk about whether or not we are at equilibrium! It's amazing how much you can do in Physics without the heavy mathematics. Just say "you've got it!" and I'll run with it. I also would like all you guys that helped me to send me email so that I can acknowledge you with your real names and, something tells me, titles. robertguercio@optonline.net Thank you, Bob -
Bob Lacatena at 07:41 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Bob,Are you guys interpreting these two very important emails the same way that I am?
Yes, I think that's exactly it, it all seems to add up to the fact that the primary mechanism by far is IR emission by CO2 in the stratosphere, as professor Robock explicitly says and Gavin implies when he says "First, all GHGs emit as well as absorb, and whether you will get warming or cooling in a region depends on the ratio of the change in absorption and the change in emittence." I think Gavin's spot-on comment probably meant that what you told him was correctly stated, but he didn't emphasize how much importance lay in the pieces missed. -
damorbel at 07:34 AM on 5 December 20102nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
Re #294 Tom Dayton you wrote:- " I can't get past even your second paragraph, which seems to be gibberish." My 2nd para. goes like this:- 'Sun/Earth system is in considerable disequilibrium.' You may not be familiar with the thermodynamic meaning of the term 'equilibrium'; a thermal system is out of equilibrium when there is a temperature difference inside the system. This means that the entropy is below the maximum and there will be energy transport within the system according to the 2nd law of thermodynamics. The reason why the wavelength of incoming radiation is of no great importance is fairly simple; incoming radiation is either scattered (the albedo or reflected, if you like) or absorbed; the third possibility, transmitted, is not generally considered in planetary physics for reasons that should be self-evident. By definition the absorption does not affect the scattering, it is the scattering that affects the absorption. However it remains true that the scattering that gives the albedo its characteristic wavelength function i.e. its spectral characteristic. From this you will realise that the total scattering depends only on the amount of scatteing material present and the magnitude of the scattering is independent of the direction of arrival of the scattered wave; meaning the material that causes the albedo (scattered solar radiation) will have the same total effect on the emitted radiation, even though the response is in a different part of the spectrum. It is this that makes the emissivity and absoptivity the same in terms of power, even if not at the same frequency. -
Billhunter at 06:54 AM on 5 December 2010A basic overview of Antarctic ice
Albatross at 05:19 AM on 5 December, 2010 "PS: I have not "cherry-picked" data, nor is applying an OLS model and stating the statistical significance of the model fit "arm waving"." I didn't mean to imply you were arm waving. My reply was to Phillipe. I think our conversation was being productive until Phillipe stepped in and flat made a claim that global ice loss was statistically significant because on a graph it appeared to be. There was nothing unique about such an observation because we know ice melts and we can see it. My similar statement was not based on the visual graph but was a rough rule of thumb mathematical estimate of the effect of reducing the ice loss percentage by 30 to 40% from subtracting the antarctic ice gain from the arctic ice loss and by increasing the extent by 50% by adding the Antarctic maximum extent to the Arctic maximum extent. Should come out to be roughly the same significance as the Antarctic ice gain though it may fall on either side of the arbitrary significance line. Perhaps Phillipe misinterpreted what I was estimating. Consistently pursuing these arguments will remove any arm waving whether intended or not. Then of course to move the conservation forward in the spirit of consistency, it is always important to include all the elements of a theory in your theory. If the theory is feedback from loss of polar albedo (polar amplification) then the antarctic land mass should also be included in the calculations to estimate the significance of polar albedo loss (and polar amplification) to determine if the loss of albedo is in fact currently statistically significant. I think this is entirely consistent with the mathematical approach you offered in post #74 and allows each argument to be fully weighed in and avoid inconsistencies. My comment on "other months" was simply a layman's observation that the arctic ice extent differences seem relatively compressed during the equinoxes as opposed to the solstices. Since albedo is an ongoing year round phenomena I simply thought they should also be included though I realize that significantly ups the workload. I think it is important to get to solid answers as populations and the use of plant resources continue to accelerate. And the only way to get to solid answers is through a combination of critical, complete, accurate, and consistent collection and evaluation of data. Where we can go astray as a specie is through improper weighting of risks. The weighting of risks is inherently (philosophically and functionally) democratic in nature as none of us possess crystal balls and crystal balls is all we have until we get solid answers. Because of that fact, the only thing to be achieved by inconsistency is the exact opposite of that which we wish to achieve. That issue has already been well explored in philosophical and psychological literature and represents an ongoing concern supporting the viewpoint of Judith Curry. -
muoncounter at 06:39 AM on 5 December 2010We're heading into an ice age
#150: "poor ability to predict the glacial cycle using models" You are aware that the Oerlemans paper you refer to bases its explanation on a model study? Experiments with a Northern Hemisphere ice-sheet model show that the 100,000-yr cycle and its sawtooth shape may be explained by ice sheet/bedrock dynamics alone. This cycle seems to be an internally generated feature and is not forced by variations in the eccentricity of the Earth's orbit. Too bad just about everybody else goes with the orbital variations. -
Ned at 06:36 AM on 5 December 2010Positive feedback means runaway warming
It probably goes without saying, so I didn't bother saying this in my comment above. But obviously the consequences of a Venusian style runaway warming are so completely unacceptable, that even a very small probability of that outcome needs to be taken seriously. So I guess I'd characterize my position as "this is very unlikely to happen, but we should be investing a lot more in understanding the relevant processes (clathrates, etc.) just in case". -
actually thoughtful at 06:32 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
Humanity Rules introduces a new, high bar for a fingerprint. Let's apply it to a different milieu and see what happens. I go out and get drunk. I drive home, hit another car with a woman and 2 kids. They all die. One would expect that I would be charged and convicted with vehicular manslaughter, DUI and a few other crimes. Enter HRlogic! As I myself did not hit the other vehicle (it was rather my vehicle that hit their vehicle; indeed those poor unfortunates did not die from *my* car - it was instead various objects within their own vehicle that led to their untimely death. No fingerprint here). But it gets worse! My actual fingerprints are on the glass that contained the alcohol - 1) I didn't touch the alcohol 2)Even if you ignore the HRlogic in (1) - yes, I drank the alcohol - the fact that this alcohol interacted in predictable, knowable ways with my own biochemistry is not my fault - my only fingerprints are on the glass! The jury, following HRlogic, finds me innocent! I am back in the bars now. HR - care to drive in my town around 2am (when said bars close and me and my HRlogic fingers are driving home again)? -
muoncounter at 06:24 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
#52: Chris G, nice approach! Hope you don't mind, I tweaked it a bit and came up with a similar plot. I started in 1900.05 (January 15) and used a 3 sample average (hoping this would give a seasonal winter, ie DJF average). Then picked every 12 (should now be each winter) and then applied a smaller mean (since the dataset should now be sampled in years). Similarly for summers (JJA) beginnning in 1900.6. I hope I'm not reading too much into WFT's ability to resample monthly data into annual. Indeed winter rises faster than summer, although not by as much as NH rises faster than SH. -
Camburn at 06:20 AM on 5 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
Rob@348: No one thinks nuclear is the only solution. People who believe in AGW should be shouting from the rooftops for nuclear. It is proven tech. They aren't. It shows the falasy of their arguement. Baseload is extremely important to people. Cost is extremely important to people. I don't believe in the magnitude of GAWG that some do. The error bars, the missing links in the hypothosis all point out that it is not as strong as some would have others believe. I am a conservative, and have not figured out, now that the opportunity has presented itself, why we are not building more nuclear baseload plants to take the place of coal/petroleum/gas power plants. We have a resource that is available for over 1,000 years. Rather than burn a short term finite resource, it makes much more sense to use a long term resource. The cost of implimenting a grid system to try and provide "baseload" ability of solar/wind is huge. We have infrastructure in place to utilize nuclear right now. Reliable, baseload power. The future is in elec vehicles for short spans of travel. Those vehicles will be recharged at night for the most part. Interuptions of available electricity will only slow the advancement of elec propulsion on a large scale. That is why in an earlier comment I stated that CPS makes sense in the southwest, but not really anywhere else. Nuclear can and should be filling that gap. It is a win win for everyone. -
cjshaker at 06:14 AM on 5 December 2010We're heading into an ice age
This article is quite interesting as well. It explains ice sheet/bedrock dynamics, and explains the rapid deglaciation. He also contends that ice sheet/earth crust dynamics are enough to explain the 100,000 year cycle. He contends that raised bedrock and low summer insolation are enough to start the next glaciation cycle. http://igitur-archive.library.uu.nl/phys/2007-0730-200322/oerlemans_80_modelexperiments100000yr.pdf Chris Shaker -
cjshaker at 06:03 AM on 5 December 2010We're heading into an ice age
Daniel Bailey asks And your source for that claim would be...? Re: cjshaker >"I think the bottom line is that climate modelers don't really understand the glacial >cycle, nor how it really works." I make that claim because of articles like this one, which appear to show poor ability to predict the glacial cycle using models http://www.igsoc.org/annals/5/igs_annals_vol05_year1984_pg213-214.pdf And this one, which attempts to use spectral analysis to predict future behavior of the glacial cycle http://www.nosams.whoi.edu/PDFs/papers/surveysingeo_time_series.pdf Chris Shaker -
Albatross at 05:19 AM on 5 December 2010A basic overview of Antarctic ice
Bill, "Since it appears to be statistically insignificant it probably either is or very close to it." Now the goal posts shift, again. OK, I'll look into that for you. But I have a bunch of things to take care of this weekend...so please be patient. Actually, I do not have the global data for sea ice. Those data I showed earlier were area from NSIDC while the graph I posted was extent data from "Cryosphere today". PS: I have not "cherry-picked" data, nor is applying an OLS model and stating the statistical significance of the model fit "arm waving". The reason for me selecting the months I did is because (if you have read the original post) we have been discussing the impact of changes in albedo around the time of the solstices. -
actually thoughtful at 05:01 AM on 5 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
Based on this thread, I have come to some conclusions for energy goals in the United States. Currently electricity comes from the following sources: 2005 energy production
Source:
http://montaraventures.com/blog/2006/10/09/how-does-the-us-produce-electricity/
So, we need a future that is different. Based on the statement that 60% of energy consumption is baseload, we should aim for for a fossil free future that looks something like this:
coal 0%
nuclear 30%
petroleum 0%
hydro 5%
renewable 65%
gas backup (normally not used, but available): 20%
This will require an intermediate stage where gas takes on a larger role as we get off of coal and ramp up renewables and supporting technologies.
Moderator Response: Fixed image tag. -
Bob Guercio at 05:00 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Folks, I corresponded via email with a distinguished professor at Rutgers and this is that correspondence. Dear Bob, You correctly wrote up what Gavin told you, but he is wrong. The stratosphere cools because its emissivity goes up with more CO2, and it still absorbs the same amount of energy being emitted from below. It is a balance of energy. You cannot just look at one term. Designing a graph with not enough room to do it correctly is not a good reason in my opinion to do it wrong. Alan Alan Robock, Professor II (Distinguished Professor) Editor, Reviews of Geophysics Director, Meteorology Undergraduate Program Department of Environmental Sciences Phone: +1-732-932-9800 x6222 Rutgers University Fax: +1-732-932-8644 14 College Farm Road E-mail: robock@envsci.rutgers.edu New Brunswick, NJ 08901-8551 USA http://envsci.rutgers.edu/~robock On 12/2/2010 10:22 AM, Robert Guercio wrote: > Dear Alan, > > I'm sure you're correct; however, here is the email correspondence > that I had with Gavin. > > The ordinate should be (watts/meter square wavenumber) and I had > trouble making it all fit. I was actually working pixel by pixel and > I guess I was a bit lazy but that is easily corrected. > > The solar insolation that I used was very fictitious as everything > about my model is. I just kept on playing with different numbers > until the fictional atmosphere that I came up with made for "good" > graphs. > > Bob > > > > ----- Original Message ----- From: "RealClimate" > -
cjshaker at 04:55 AM on 5 December 2010Ocean acidification isn't serious
The bleaching of coral reefs seems to actually be caused by fungus, which is transported across oceans by dust in the wind as the climate naturally warms and dries. http://imars.usf.edu/~cmoses/PDF_Library/Shinn%20et%20al%202000.pdf It looks like fungi have been attacking coral reefs for a long time http://www.biolbull.org/cgi/reprint/198/2/254.pdf Chris Shaker -
Bob Guercio at 04:50 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Sphaerica So CO2 prevents energy from escaping from the troposphere into the stratosphere in the CO2-IR bandwidth, My blog does this. and CO2 actively cools the stratosphere by emitting energy in the CO2-IR bandwidth. Once I fully understand this, I'll incorporate it into my blog and maybe it will be complete. This sentence that you wrote would be part of my opening statement. And then my blog, as it is now, would address the first method and I'll then add the second method. This has been like wrestling an alligator. The problem is that, as far as professionals are concerned, all this is so trivial that they wouldn't waste their time on it. It's probably in some climate textbook or maybe not; maybe it's a problem at the end of some chapter on stratospheric chemistry or some such name! Thank you, Bob -
Albatross at 04:42 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
HR @55, "So fingerprint = correlation? Is that all? Wow." Umm, not quite. Read some more of Santer's seminal works. Earlier you said "The problem I have is that those two options aren't the only possibilities." Referring to options other than solar and volcanic forcing. But then @ 55 you misrepresent the findings form a study to try and support the “it’s the sun” argument. Also, I asked you to present a model here which does not include solar or volcanoes and that explains the nature of the observed long-term warming trend. -
Billhunter at 04:32 AM on 5 December 2010A basic overview of Antarctic ice
Philippe Chantreau at 03:04 AM on 5 December, 2010 "I don't know how one can look at the data and come to that conclusion. Whatever analysis this assertion is based on is in error. The decline of global sea ice is statistically significant." The claim was made based upon a monthly analysis that ice gain in the Antarctic which also is visibly easy to see on a graph was NOT statistically significant. Thus the appropriate response would be that since there is a positive trend provided by the southern ice that reduces the loss of Arctic ice by nearly half on a month by month basis that the trend globally may also not be statistically significant. When one decreases the percentage of ice loss by both increasing the denominator and decreasing the numerator a mathematical answer is called for. Saying it is easily visible is not an appropriate response when somebody had already responded that something that is easily visible mathematically is not significant. (i.e. antarctic ice gain). The correct response is a third category, which Albatross can easily do as he obviously already has all the data and we can get away from the highly unscientific approach of arguing via cherry picking mathematical tests vs visual tests. All that is required to test this hypothesis is to add the two categories together in post #74 and do the math. An interesting variation if our objective is to test the statistic significance of the "pole" albedo issue would be to add in the land mass of antarctic as virtual sea ice serving the same purpose the core area of the Arctic serves. In that way we could test the statistical significance of "pole" ice. Then we can really begin to treat these issues consistently and better weigh the significance of each argument in a consistent manner without a lot of arm waving. -
Bob Guercio at 04:23 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Dan, Success! Thank you, Bob
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CBDunkerson at 04:19 AM on 5 December 20102nd law of thermodynamics contradicts greenhouse theory
damorbel #277: "How so? A has only 10% absorption capacity, B has 75%. Now the absorption capacity is always equal to the emission capacity, after all the reflection part cannot emit as well as reflect, can it? So both objects have the same temperature, any difference would clearly break the 2nd Law of thermodynamics." I'm sorry, but what part of 75 units of energy is greater than 10 units of energy don't you understand? Yes, an object cannot emit more energy than it absorbs. Ergo, if the more reflective object is only absorbing 10 units of energy it can only emit 10 units of energy. Those 10 plus the 90 reflected equal the 100 total incoming and thus incoming and outgoing energy are in balance. Ditto the less reflective object except that it is absorbing and emitting 75 units of energy. 75 > 10. It has absorbed and is emitting more energy. Higher energy absorption and emissions equals higher temperature. For the 90% reflective object to be the same temperature it would have to be emitting the same 75 units of energy... which added to the 90 units reflected would be 165 units total... which runs afoul of the law of conservation of energy... an extra 65 units of energy can't just spontaneously appear from nothing. You seem to be arguing that absorption and emission are the same for all objects... rather than that they are the same for each object. That clearly isn't the case because an object can't absorb energy it has reflected away. Taking Tom's example of a theoretically 100% reflective object it is clear that it would absorb no energy... and thus would be at absolute zero. The more energy an object reflects the less it absorbs and the colder it is. -
Daniel Bailey at 04:06 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Re: Bob Guercio (137) 1. First type this symbol: < 2. Next, type: img width="500" src="http://image_url/" 3. Replace the URL in Double Quotes "" with the actual URL intended 4. A common error is to have an extra / at the end of the URL; this can be avoided by using the preview function Hope this helps! The Yooper -
Daniel Bailey at 03:55 AM on 5 December 20102009-2010 winter saw record cold spells
Re: Rob Painting (10) Here's one from January 7th, 2010
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Bob Guercio at 03:39 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Bob Moderator Response: Fixed. See the help on posting images; you need an html tag: img src= "url" width=no more than 500 inside the usual lt and gt brackets. I don't get it. Could you please put exactly what you typed inside quotes or brackets. Thank you, Bob -
Rob Honeycutt at 03:35 AM on 5 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
Camburn @ 344... "What this thread shows is the reluctance of people to address co2 emmissions with the tech that is available and proven." This is patently, and utterly false. Virtually everyone here who has posted has stated they believe that nuclear belongs as a solution to CO2. What people here are NOT willing to say is that it is the ONLY solution. Conversely, the the nuclear proponents have been completely unwilling to accept any of the positive aspects of renewables. As I stated previously nuclear does somethings very very well. Stable, level output. If we needed exactly that then nuclear would be the perfect solution. That is NOT what is required. That does not perfectly address electrical demand. I'm sorry if you can't see it but nuclear also has negatives that nuclear proponents like Peter Lang are unwilling or incapable of seeing. And, once again, the grid level storage solutions presented in Dana's original article apply equally well to mitigating the losses of nuclear spin reserve off-peak as it does to the intermittency of renewables. -
Bob Guercio at 03:30 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
134.Sphaerica at 03:12 AM on 5 December, 2010 Bob, I actually think that once you sort it out, you can come up with a simple explanation. . Figuring what to leave out is the key to any simple model created for explanatory purposes, as you well know (and despite what the "it's not realistic" crowd moronically screams). I think that I understand what you are saying. Regarding your comment about realism, I doubt if these people have ever had even a basic Physics or Chemistry course. Bob -
Bibliovermis at 03:24 AM on 5 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
Another irony about people who push nuclear as The Solution is that many of them also argue that there is no problem; references to CAGW are a plain indicator. Lang has provided a good service here though. His posts have been a case study in how not to discuss a contentious topic. This was a thread about renewable baseload & how it could be achieved. Exhortations that such a feat is impossible belong aside those that heavier than air flight is impossible. -
Bob Lacatena at 03:22 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
55 (Humanity Rules), I don't see what you see. I went through the review, and while there are frequent references to the terms "winter", "summer" and "season", they almost all have to do with data studied being limited to a particular season (e.g. MWP winters), not comparisons between the two. The only reference to a specific difference in the seasons has to do with stratospheric wind patterns, and even these were inferred from model runs, not observations. I find nothing at all in the review to support your claim. Alternately, the review also says this:...many of these solar-climate associations also seemed highly improbable simply on the basis of quantitative energetic considerations.
andRecent estimates suggest a radiative forcing drift associated with solar irradiance changes of 0.017 Wm-2 per decade (see section 2). In comparison, the current rate of increase in trace greenhouse gas radiative forcing is about 0.30 Wm-2 per decade (Hofmann et al., 2008).
So I'm not sure how anyone could make any observations on seasonal impacts of solar variations when there haven't been any. -
Bob Guercio at 03:21 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Hi All, I've tried to post an image but again I am not successful.
Could someone take care of this for me and then show me the exact code used for this image.
I was going to ask the question "The ozone layer is not at the top of the stratosphere so how does heating of the ozone layer cause the temperature to be the highest at the top?" But then I saw this image which shows the temperature increasing and then decreasing as you go up through the statosphere. This is what I would expect.
That said, how is the stratosphere defined. Apparently it is not simply simply defined by a negative lapse rate!
Bob
Moderator Response: Fixed. See the help on posting images; you need an html tag: img src= "url" width=no more than 500 inside the usual lt and gt brackets. -
Bob Lacatena at 03:12 AM on 5 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Bob, I actually think that once you sort it out, you can come up with a simple explanation. A lot of the complications can still be removed. The difficulty with anything like this lies primarily in removing relatively inconsequential complications. The reader probably does not need to know that the stratosphere is heated through UV and ozone creation, or what "optical thickness" means (that is a very confusing, obscure term that is meaningful to people that are familiar with it, but requires a paragraph just to explain, and so distracts and confuses the reader). Terms like "adiabatic lapse rate" and the 15 micron issue are similarly confusing details which do not really add anything to the heart of the explanation. A lot of things can be left out. Figuring what to leave out is the key to any simple model created for explanatory purposes, as you well know (and despite what the "it's not realistic" crowd moronically screams). The only factor that you really need to incorporate with what you have already written, IMO, is that energy is transferred at the molecular level via collision or emission/absorption, and in varying proportions depending on the density of the atmosphere. The main point is simply that energy can be absorbed one way but then surrendered in another, so that at equilibrium the total-radiation-in need not equal total-radiation-out in a particular band. As a result, the CO2 in the troposphere is more likely to absorb IR in that narrow CO2 band, but then passes it on through collisions to the abundant, non-emitting O2/N2, raising temperatures and somewhat "blocking" that band of radiation. Alternately, the CO2 in the more rarefied stratosphere is more often excited by collisions with the more abundant O2/N2, and emits the gained energy through radiation before it can pass it on through another collision. So CO2 prevents energy from escaping from the troposphere into the stratosphere in the CO2-IR bandwidth, and CO2 actively cools the stratosphere by emitting energy in the CO2-IR bandwidth. The only question left to clarify is relative amounts of these mechanisms (i.e. how much does stratospheric emission contribute to cooling, versus tropospheric "blocking"). I suspect that the latter is minor, at least as far as its influence on stratospheric temperatures (but I don't know). -
swieder at 03:12 AM on 5 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
Here are some more interesting links of actual projects/studies/companies in the field how to make renewable more reliable. - The first IEEE smart grid symposium - German company "energymeteo" - Australian company CSIRO - virtual power plant - RWE & Siemens effort: review article on VPP - VPP, microgrids, energy hubs: overview (semester thesis by R. Bühler from ETH Zürich, CH) To me it looks like the concept behind distributed energy production and virtual combination to be able to work on centralized offering for customers is gaining more and more attention and is leaving the concept/theory phase, entering in the demonstration/piloting phase around the globe. -
Riccardo at 03:06 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
Alexandre to quote from the review linked by HumanityRules:There have been suggestions that 20th century global and hemispheric mean surface temperature variations are correlated to longer-term solar variations. Advanced statistical detection and attribution methodologies confirm that solar forcing contributed to the increase in global temperatures in the early part of the century but for the latter part of the 20th century they consistently find that using realistic variations, solar forcing played only a minor role in global warming, in agreement with the practically constant mean solar forcing since 1980.
The passing of time doesn't apper to help the "it's the sun" supporters. -
muoncounter at 03:06 AM on 5 December 20102009-2010 winter saw record cold spells
#11: "The image @10 is somewhat misleading" Indeed. This thread is about winter 2009-2010; the photo date puts it in winter 2010-2011. -
Philippe Chantreau at 03:04 AM on 5 December 2010A basic overview of Antarctic ice
"Since it appears to be statistically insignificant." I don't know how one can look at the data and come to that conclusion. Whatever analysis this assertion is based on is in error. The decline of global sea ice is statistically significant. -
muoncounter at 02:51 AM on 5 December 2010Positive feedback means runaway warming
#24: "I worry that our "clathrate gun" and associated ice age relics might be cocked and loaded, so to speak. " It is, as with many other questions of climate change, a question of rate of change. Thus we do not know if the loaded gun has birdshot or a deer slug. Archer 2007 is an excellent summary of methane hydrate and their climate change potential. The hydrate reservoir is so large that if 10% of the methane were released to the atmosphere within a few years, it would have an impact on the Earth’s radiation budget equivalent to a factor of 10 increase in atmospheric CO2. ... Fortunately, most of the hydrate reservoir seems insolated from the climate of the Earth’s surface, so that any melting response will take place on time scales of millennia or longer. Acoustic images of real-time methane releases as in this example are dramatic evidence that such melting is indeed occurring, albeit in isolated places. As summer Arctic sea ice continues to dwindle in the coming few years, 'science experiments' such as this will no doubt become more frequent and widespread. In my days in the offshore O&G exploration, hydrates were a well-known drilling hazard; punch a hole in one and you cause it to go unstable very quickly. These guys are going looking for them. Combine that plan with another series of avoidable mistakes such as those leading to the BP disaster and you have given your loaded gun to a bunch of drunk teenagers. Here is a long, but quite thorough 2008 Scripps Institute video on the subject. -
Riccardo at 02:35 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
HumanityRules the two warming trends are both real and shown in the figure above. It's not clear to me why you say that the solar forcing influence on winter temperatures contradicts that the influence is larger in summer. -
Phil at 02:32 AM on 5 December 20102009-2010 winter saw record cold spells
The image @10 is somewhat misleading; note the "snow" in the English channel, North Sea and Irish Sea. The area where I live appears to be covered in snow, but there was none. Clouding the issue perhaps ? (Ouch, sorry) -
Daniel Bailey at 02:08 AM on 5 December 2010Positive feedback means runaway warming
Re: Leland Palmer (24) Recent evidence supporting the clathrate gun hypothesis exists:"Evidence that massive quantities of methane gas have been released from the sea floor during past ice ages has been reported. The discovery supports the hypothesis that huge releases of ocean methane contributed to the rapid warmings of the Earth that have ended past ice ages."
As reported in Reporting Climate Science .Com Free copy of the study available here. I agree with Ned in that, to the level of understanding we have currently, the possibility of a methane clathrate/hydrate release sufficient to trigger a hydrogen sulfide release and/or leading to a Venus-style runaway situation is remote. What is disturbing, however, is that such a possibility even exists. More disturbing is that future conditions may not be a good analog for anything in the paleo record other than the PETM. Without being able to establish an upper bound to the risk, we may find out that we we didn't know was more relevant than what we did. That should be of concern to all, as this is an experiment to be run once only. The Yooper -
swieder at 02:05 AM on 5 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
#344 I think there are many posts here contrasting what you said. More important: this thread is not about nuclear in any way. The question raised is the baseload capability of renewables, not the ability of nuclear to reduce CO2. Please. -
Camburn at 01:47 AM on 5 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
What this thread shows is the reluctance of people to address co2 emmissions with the tech that is available and proven. Nuclear should be being built in the US. It is not to any scale. While the rest of the worlds large economies are building nuclear, the US languishes in debate. The stupidity of doing nothing but arguing is enough to make a grown man moan and groan with frustration. -
Leland Palmer at 01:14 AM on 5 December 2010Positive feedback means runaway warming
Wow, thanks for the quick and thoughtful response. Any thoughtful person would be thankful to be wrong about such a scenario, of course. The fact that we are coming out of an ice age, and starting from a cooler starting point might not save us from such a scenario, though. Our methane hydrate deposits are in equilibrium at ice age temperatures. The speed at which we are introducing CO2 is absolutely unprecedented, so far as I know. Also, the forcing from fossil fuel use is entirely non-random, unlike most past naturally occurring events. So, our methane hydrates could be particularly susceptible to disruption, and have had no chance to gradually lose methane, and have it safely oxidized into CO2 and sequestered via the rock weathering cycle over many thousands of years. Yes, there were warmer periods in the past, but we may have gotten to those warmer periods in a safer manner, more gradually, allowing harmless oxidation of methane at reasonable rates. The permafrost decay positive feedback is a similar concern. If this permafrost loses its frozen plant matter to decay into CO2 and methane gradually, there is no problem. If the accumulated frozen plant matter from thousands of years of ice age conditions decays within a century, though, this might add to warming in an unprecedented manner. The yedoma and thermokarst of Siberia are a similar concern. These ice age accumulations of methane and methane hydrate could also be susceptible to anomalously rapid dissociation. The PETM is worrisome, but the event that really worries me is the End Permian. As you point out, the PETM was nasty, but the End Permian mass extinction was the big one, extinguishing on the order of 90 percent of species existing at that time. Direct intrusion of the Siberian Traps volcanism into methane hydrate deposits may have been necessary to cause that one, but we don't know this for sure, so far as I know. So, I worry that our "clathrate gun" and associated ice age relics might be cocked and loaded, so to speak. Some things that might save us, as you point out, are the logarithmic nature of the greenhouse effects from the various greenhouse gases, and the diminishing returns positive feedback phenomenon. Also in favor of stability are the endothermic nature of methane hydrate dissociation, and the Planck radiation feedback. One thing that really worries me is the unpredictable nature of positive feedback phenomena. I frankly doubt the ability of anyone to predict the outcome of such a complex interlocked series of positive and negative feedbacks. If anyone could do it, it would be someone like Hansen- and Hansen is worried, too. Another thing that worries me is that estimates of the total quantity of methane hydrates differ by at least an order of magnitude. The sun is a couple of percent hotter than it was during the PETM, but several percent hotter than during the End Permian, I think. If we take the End Permian event, and add in a more rapid triggering event, a buildup of ice age methane hydrates, and a sun that is five percent or so hotter, what do we end up with? -
Alexandre at 00:54 AM on 5 December 2010The human fingerprint in the seasons
HumanityRules #55 Very well spotted. All that's needed now is to find a solar variation that would justify quantitatively the observed recent warming. Any links on this one? OTOH, I think there's plenty of evidence about another known forcing that has risen during the last half a century. -
Rob Painting at 23:50 PM on 4 December 20102009-2010 winter saw record cold spells
Check out the cool satellite shot of snow blanketing the UK (from Science Daily).
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swieder at 23:42 PM on 4 December 2010Renewable Baseload Energy
Here is a more balanced and fact-based overview i found about how renewables are seen in Australia regarding baseload in the Parliamentary Library of the parliament of Australia. -
Bob Guercio at 23:11 PM on 4 December 2010Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Tom, But more energy is coming into the earth than leaving. This applies to both the ground and deep space. My prevous remark regarding a distinction here was gratuitous. If we stabilized CO2 levels, this would continue for a few decades. Bob
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