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old sage at 00:01 AM on 14 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
M A Rodgers please stop quibbling, the absorption of 70 w/m2 by vapourising water is a very significant proportion of the energy arriving at the surface. If you cover 1 hectare of surface with concrete and drain it, the resulting surface area presented by 1cms of rainfall shrinks from 10,000 sq m to 100 sq m as it is collected in drains. Therefore, the amount of vapour is significantly reduced.
I repeat what every schoolboy should know, that reduces cloud cover and lets more solar energy into earth's environment. The form factor and altitude of cloud formations radiate externally far more than vertically downwards.
Finally, I ask Tom Curtis to explain why when a given amount of CO2 has raised earth's temperature by t degrees - as we are asked to believe by theIPCC - it then stops retaining a single calorie of energy despite everything being in place to keep the 'blockage' of outgoing energy effective?
And please don't try to drown me in a deluge of 'off the point' rambling over radiation from gases at STP, they scatter, they absorb, but most definitely they do not spontaneously radiate from their translational kinetic energy to any significant extent. All they do is convey energy from one place to another in an energy neutral fashion.
Moderator Response:[JH] Your argumentative, word-salad responses to MA Rogers and Tom Curtis constituite sloganeering which is prohibited by the SkS Comments Policy.
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JWRebel at 14:52 PM on 13 August 2016Six charts show UK progress towards low-carbon energy
There are some modestly positive trends here. The switch from coal to wood pellets for electrical generation (mainly based on European tax rules) is no sinecure, switching one set of problems for another, albeit with a reduction in CO² emitted — burning trees is not a global solution.
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Tom Curtis at 00:11 AM on 13 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
old sage @245 @246:
1) I quote again:
"Comparing the radiative rate kR (the inverse of the lifetime) to the collisional deactivation rate kM[M], provides a quick estimate that only one out of 100,000 CO2 molecules excited into the (0,10,0) by collision or absorbing a photon, will emit."
It follows that on average, where CO2 absorption equals CO2 emissions, out of every 100,000 molecules dropping from a (0,10,0) state by emission, 99,999 will have been excited to that state by collision. Your statement that "Vibrational excitation most certainly cannot arise from mutual collisions" is nonsense. Classically, there is no better way to induce vibrations in an object than to subject it to a collision. Within quantum mechanics, the vibrational mode must have a particular energy level, so that the proportion of collisions conveying that level comes into question. However, as temperature rises, the mean energy of motion of the gas molecules rises and hence the proportion of collisions having the correct energy also increases. I quote more fully:
"At 300K (27 C) ground state CO2 molecules are continually colliding with oxygen, nitrogen and other molecules. The average collision has an energy equivalent to kT where k is Boltzmann’s constant. In units usual to the field this is ~200 cm-1 (multiply by the speed of light in cm/sec and Planck’s constant to get Joules) but some of them have much more energy. A few of the energetic collisions can vibrationally excite the CO2 to the same 650 cm-1 excited vibrational level. Because collisional processes are fast wrt radiation, the number of vibrationally excited CO2 molecules can be characterized by a Boltzman distribution. At 300 K about 6% of the CO2 molecules in the atmosphere are vibrationally excited and can radiate."
Note that the Maxwell-Boltzmann distribution that governs this is a function of temperture, not of ambient radiation. The upshot is that your claim is entirely wrong.
2) Again, you are merely arguing against well established emperical data. In that, you are like the flat earthers who, in an era of international flights and GPS insist that the Earth is flat based on misunderstood scientific principles. This is made graphic by the use of IR cameras filtered to 4.2 to 4.4 microns at which wavelength CO2 absorbs and emits radiation, but H2O and other major atmospheric components do not. Using a better quality, IR filtered camera, we can see CO2 production in a variety of circumstances:
Note the CO2 coming from exhaust pipes have come from conditions of near complete darkness. Their high rate of emissions shown by their bright temperatures, therefore are almost entirely the product of thermal collisions. As a side note, the lack of visible smoke or water vapour from the stacks (1:30 on the video) confirm that they are not emitting H2O and are emitting limited quantities of soot and hence that it is primarilly CO2 that is emitting the radiation. The CO2 from peoples breath is relatively cool, and typically cooler than the background and shows up as slightly dark. Again, level of radiation is temperature dependent.
As a technical note, this sort of footage relies on wavelengths near the edge of the absorption band so that CO2 has a low emissivity other wise distant shots would be impossible. As a consequence, the low levels of radiation associated with room temperatures do not show emissions in these cameras. Using a 15 micron filter, they would but so also would H2O.
3) Each meter cubed of dry air at standard pressure and 300 K results in the emission of about 7 Joules of energy per second, but a stack of such cubes will result in absorption of some of the emissions which limits the total amount transmited. At the the 15 micron emission peak for CO2, such absorption may well occur within the first meter, so that the total amount leaving each cubic meter may be a little less than the 7 joules.
More importantly, the CO2 emits the energy, it does not generate it. It is only able to emit the energy because it is continuously absorbing an equivalent amount of energy from thermal radiation and collisions. Therefore it cannot heat a room anymore than the high emission from room temperature walls will heat a room. In short, the laws of thermal emission do not violate the laws of thermodynamics (and if you think they do, move your discussion to the Second Law of thermodynamics thread).
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MA Rodger at 00:00 AM on 13 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
old sage @246,
I'm disappointed by your responses. What you're telling me is that you were wrong to write @340 that "according to wikipedia, the average solar energy 24 hrs/day per unit area is 141 w/m2." In itself this is fine. Who does not make unfortunate mistakes from time to time? But you sadly dodge any explanation/apology. That is poor do's.
My reason for asking for a link was that it would provide us with the same hymn-sheet to sing from. As it is you provide no link and instead @244 provide the vaguest of description - "The average surface energy per m2..." and attach the vaguest of values to it - "...is of the order 150w."
Can I cut through your reticence and suggest that the graphic above @236 provides a source of this data. The 1360/4 = 340W/sq m of TSI you sign up to @ 245/46 is given there. We also have the average solar energy absorbed at the surface "of the order of 150w" = 161W/sq m. And your 70W/sq m is also within the given range of 70-85W/sq m. (I should point out that 99cm of precipitation would require more than 70W/m sq to evaporate from the surface unless the evaporating water was at 100ºC, which is why the graphic gives a range running higher than your 70W/sq m.)
So are we happy with the graphic @236?
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old sage at 22:21 PM on 12 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
M.A. Rogers - oops 1360/4 w/m2, not kw.
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old sage at 22:08 PM on 12 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Just a couple of points of clarification:
M.A. Rogers - the gross incident energy is of course 1360/4 kw/m2. But I agree, the Google results are somewhat suspect and need further inspection.
Tom Curtis: The 6% of excited molecules you allege must come about from externally derived illumination. Vibrational excitation most certainly cannot arise from mutual collisions. It's a question of the difference between absorption and emission, your number, if true, varies with the strength of source rather than temperature of the gas.
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old sage at 20:03 PM on 12 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
M.A. Roger- do a google search and you will find the average surface energy per m2 is of the order 150w. This is to compare like with like for average surface rain fall of 99cms taking up 70w/m2.
Tom Curtis - 7w /m3 for radiation by CO2, 40 times as much H2O vapour of similar characteristics in the air means 280 w/m3. My living room is 90m3 so why do I bother heating it. Have you even considered how the tiny weight of CO2 in a m3 could generate 7 watts?
This column needs to be renamed so as to include surreal.
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stevecarsonr at 15:34 PM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
Tom,
Thanks for the paper. It doesn't look like it made it through peer-review - well, I can't find it published anywhere. I was looking so I could see the figures referenced (that don't appear in the draft online paper).
Interesting paper. The question posed is an good one, but more interesting would be the comparison with a naive forecast, i.e. the skill. So, for example, if the UK has outperformed Germany for 5-years in a row, then the sensible naive forecast is to say "UK will outperform Germany this year". When you win, you get a tick. As far as I can see the paper says "yes, win = tick". But like with the naive forecast which says "the weather tomorrow will be the same as today" you don't get a tick for skill unless you beat the naive forecast. That is, you need to have skill.
My weather forecasting has a brilliant track record, but it has no skill over the naive forecast.
How good are forecasts at predicting a change? For example, when we look at forecasts of GDP growth, the "forecasts" are great when the economy has been growing at 1-3% each year and the next year the growth is 1-3%. Hurray for the forecast!
When last year was 2% and next year is -1%, the forecasts (mostly) turn out to be rubbish. Likewise, when last 3 years were -1%, -2%, -3% and next year is +5% the forecasts turn out to be (mostly) rubbish. Not all of them though. A few are always right. Like many people visting the casino, there are always a minority that make money. Just different ones each time.
How were the forecasts of the UK not joining the Euro vs the countries that did join the Euro?
UK was predicted to do worse than the Euro block. How did that one turn out?
Some papers predicted very large growth in "intra-Euro" trade based on economic fundamentals. The results were basically - slight improvement vs the past. Compared with forecast, awful.
I'm happy to learn more here about economics forecasting: i) the comparison with reality; ii) the skill. A few more papers, even ones that are published in peer-reviewed economics journals will be appreciated.
1. Some examples of predictions of gloom in the midst of hope that were right - economy tracking up, majority of economists said "it's going to be real bad next year" and they were correct.
2. Some examples of predictions of hope in the midst of gloom that were right - economy in recession, majority of economists said "next year will be great" and they were correct.
But I'm sure my anti-intellectual bias in not placing faith in economics forecasting will be easy to demonstrate.
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Tom Curtis at 14:24 PM on 12 August 2016Climate inertia
sauerj @2, there are three climate sensitivity values it is helpful to know about.
First, the Transient Climate Response (TCR) is the temperature in the 70th year after when the only change in forcing consists of a 1% increase in CO2 levels per annum. The 70th year is when CO2 levels double under that condition. TCR is approximately 1.5 C per doubling of CO2, or 0.4 C/(W/m^2). It is important because it closely approximates to the immediate temperature response to forcing when forcing is increased more or less steadilly. It corresponds, more or less, to the red line in the graph above.
Second, the Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS) or Charney Climate Sensitivity is the temperature increase following a doubling of CO2 that is experienced once radiative/convective equilibrium is reestablished, but with no changes to land cover, or ice sheet extent as a result of feedbacks. It is approximately 2.8 C per doubling of CO2, or 0.76 C/(W/m^2). It is also the temperature we will achieve in 50-200 years if we increase CO2 concentration to a given level and hold it constant. The above graph is confused in that it purports that that is the brown line, but at ECS thermal equilibrium in the ocean has been established, so it should also be the yellow line.
Finally, if you allow forests to become deserts (or vice versa), and ice sheets to melt, you get the Earth System Sensitivity (ESS). That is not well constrained, but is likely 33% or more greater than the ECS. The grey shaded area is the ESS as determined from a particular period. Again, it is only relevant if we hold CO2 concentrations constant at their peak value.
In practise, if we should bring net anthropogenic emissions to zero, the ocean and chemical weathering will absorb CO2 at a rate that approximately balances the rate at which temperatures approach, first the ECS and then the ESS. The result is an approximately constant temperature near the TCR. Therefore with rational climate policy, ECS and ESS are more or less irrelevant. Even a continuation of 10% of emissions, however, will hold CO2 levels constant in the short term (up to 200 years) and rising in the long term so that temperatures will increase to ECS and then ESS values. Indeed, greater than ESS values because of the rising CO2 levels. That is why zero net emissions within the next 50 years is a must for any sensible climate policy.
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sauerj at 13:35 PM on 12 August 2016Climate inertia
I'm a bit confused, and need help understanding. Hansen's and other articles say that there is one equilibrium average global surface temperature based on CO2 concentration, and that it is ~3.0C (2.5 - 4.0) rise for every doubling of CO2 above a base concentration. This can be expressed as Teq = 3.0 x (Ln(CO2_new/CO2_base) / Ln(2)). If I apply this math to 400ppm (new) and 290ppm (base), I get 1.39C rise, which is the brown line in the lower chart. I understand that this is the average global surface temp increase, and that it would be more in the higher latitude regions, etc. And, I understand that this is the equilibrium temperature and that it will take ~135+/- years to reach full equilibrium based on a SkS chart I saw several months ago (from that I surmised that the 1st-order process lag is about 45 years); although another SkS article suggested this lag time is much less.
If I do the calculus, I get a the following crude model expression: Temp = Teq (above) x [1 - exp (- time_yrs/45 years)]. If I apply this expression to actual temps since 1955 (LINK), this fits very well, in terms of hitting the actual annualized or 30-year avg temps (lines in above chart). One could go on & find the best fit 'gain' multipler and 'lag time constant' using SOLVER for the minimum sum of squares of error; a project for another day.
All the above concepts are simple, straight forward and easy to understand. But, this article introduces two new temperatures (much higher than the Tequil that I've learned about so far). I don't understand what the RED and gray region temps represent, and how they are are applicable to benchmark temperatures like UNFCCC's agreed +2.0C limit; or Hansen's chart in 'Storms' that shows that the Antarctica ice formation started to develop at +4.5C. Are these RED and gray region temperatures on a different scale (apples-to-oranges) vs these latter benchmark temperatures? Are these RED and gray temps actually applicable to apples-to-apples comparison with the temperatures used in the bulk of scientific documents.
Bottom-line, what exactly do the RED and gray region temps represent in a tangible sense and in comparison to the normally discussed brown curve temps? Thank you!
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nigelj at 12:26 PM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
Tom Curtis @24
Singapore, Taiwan, Japan and Hong Kong are all high wage asian economies, most with strong manufacturing bases.
Will London really lose its financial capital status? I thought this came mainly from strength in insurance etc and Brexit won't change that much.
It's probably pointless to speculate on what form of Brexit will prevail. However regarding free trade, most of Europes tariffs are on farm products. Britian doesn't export significant agricultural products. Britian exports some manufactures but the EU tariffs on non member countries are not large for manufactured products. Ditto for services.
Don't get me wrong, Brexit will hurt financially, but maybe not that much longer term. Britain could join the TPPA as an alternative fta.
I agree "scexit" is a worry. Theres a further possibility that the entire EU could unravel.
However Britain does gain some things. They can run a tighter immigration policy, and there are some monetary savings. I have grown sceptical about immigration, although I basically lean liberal. The OECD did a huge study on past immigration in Europe and concluded it hasn't given any real economic benefits as below:
I don't know exacly what economists think, and havent seen a poll, but certainly in my country of NZ, the predominant opinion of economists in the media and treasury and reserve bank is in favour of free markets, privatisation etc. It's like a religion.However a couple of comments in favour of economists. They do recognise some regulation is required to correct market failures, and the IMF has recently recognised that "neoliberalism" hasn't worked in some respects. To some extent it's politicians that make a mess of economic policy, or get captive to lobby groups wanting regulations removed etc. I half agree with you. It's not a simple issue.
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Tom Curtis at 11:16 AM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
nigelj @23, I would not trust your common sense too much on this issue. First, the countries in Asia that do very well economically are those with low wages which give them an advantage in manufacturing. Unless Britain is prepared to follow that low wage route the comparison is not apt. Admitedly Australia is also doing reasonably well at the moment, but that is based on a vast resource base being sold cheaply to Asia. As Britain does not have that resource base, again the comparison is not relevant.
Personally, I don't think anybody can exactly predict the economic impact of Brexit, and I doubt serious economists will try. It will almost certainly be negative, but how negative depends on:
1) To what extent some city within the EU supplants London as the financial capital of Europe. London has been the financial capital in part, at least because it has been a convenient, English speaking location through which the US has channelled its European investments. With the UK's withdrawal from the EU, it is not clear it can continue to serve that role, and almost certainly not as well. Further, the ability to speak English is now sufficiently widespread on the continent that the UK provides the US no particular advantage in terms of communication anymore.
2) The nature of the final exit agreement. Those which will preserve close economic ties will also preserve the European regulatory structure (as with Norway). That will result in little negative impact, but great political cost to a government pursuing it. The alternative will be terms of trade no better than, for example, Australia or Canada, which will come at a moderate economic cost.
3) Can the UK preserve its unity. It is all very well for May to claim that no new referendum on Scottish independence is required or appropriate, but given the Brexit vote was (if anything positive) a vote for sovereignty, it would be hypocritical to not likewise allow sovereignty to the Scots - something the Scottish nationalists will be keenly aware of. Refusing a second referendum on Scottish independence is likely to greatly reduce cooperation between the Scotish parliament and the British government. Allowing it, on the other hand may result is Scexit which again would have a large negative impact on the English economy.
So, while there may only be a small to moderate negative impact, there is plenty of room for a very large negative impact.
With regard to economic experts, I think you will find that experts obtaining media exposure are filtered in the sameway as are climate "experts". They are almost certainly more representative of actual economic expertise, but they are by no means a fair sample. A large proportion of macroeconomists are not fans of neo-liberalism in any form. What proportion I could not say, but there is certainly no consensus of macroeconomists in favour of it.
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nigelj at 10:37 AM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
Tom Curtis @ 21
There's a lot of sense in what you are saying about economists and Brexit, in general terms.
However you make the point economists are predicting that with Brexit Britian will have reduced gdp growth. Even a trained ape should be able to see Brexit will hurt Britain economically in terms of raw gdp performance. Whats concerning is that economists cant really put a reasonably accurate, proven figure on this. They can only really claim it will hurt . Sure I agree with you that what economists say is better than nothing, but it just isn't very good either.
However commonsense suggests Brexit may not hurt that much. Plenty of other countries are not part of the EU and do well economically, especially in Asia.
However it appears to me the economists kind of got drowned out in the Brexit debate. It was politicians on both sides of the debate making blatantly outrageous claims about economic aspects of Brexit, and I think they just made it up as they went along, probably ignoring the advice of their own economists!
Regarding frustration with "economic experts". The economics community has promoted an ideology of neoliberalism that promotes very free markets, privatisation and deregulation, etc. The economists and politicians told us all that it would lead to higher wages and a trickle down effect. This clearly hasn't happened in places like America and this is proven by hard data discussed in the Economist Journal. I'm not sure about Britain but I suspect maybe it hasn't happened much. People are understandably frustrated and have lost faith in the experts.
Neoliberalism also promotes very free immigration and we were all told everything would be marvellous. However this has produced at least some downsides, so again can you understand why people loose faith in the experts?
Free markets are fine in many cases and immigration obviously has value, but I think a borderless world is a fantasy with huge problems. There have to be at least some controls. Brexit was caused by a failure of the ruling establishment to acknowledge this sort of thing.
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Climate scientists make a bold prediction about sea level rise
A paper reassessing the satellite altimeter estimates of global mean sea level rise was published in May 2015 by the Uni of Tasmania, CSIRO and others in Nature Climate Change.
This graph from the paper shows that when possible biases in the early satellite record are taken into account, firstly the sea level rise becomes about 10 mm less over the last two decades. Secondly there has been an acceleration of the rate of sea level rise over this period. They say ‘our revised record indicates that the rate of rise has increased over the last 2 decades (independent of how we estimate the vertical land motion), consistent with other observations of the increased contributions of water and ice from Greenland and West Antarctica.’
The two papers taken together presumably provide more confidence in the conclusion that sea level rise has accelerated over the last two decades and give an even higher estimate of this acceleration.
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nigelj at 10:01 AM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
stevecarsonr @20
I just meant that we can have some faith in economists in terms of microeconomics and supply demand curves etc.
I agree we should certainly be very suspicious of any economic "forecasts"and I certainly am, especially gdp growth or wage growth. The record in this area is very poor. Macroeconomics certainly has some grey areas that are not convincingly resolved.
I'm not an economist but find it pretty interesting. If you are interested in forecasting and macroeconomis in general I suggest the book "Post Capitalism" by Paul Mason. This book clearly suggests capitalism is evolving into a new form of capitalism, but it also goes over economic history and economic cycles, and analyses why predictions often haven't worked. I think the book also touches on climate change in the later chapters and how capitalism relates to this. The book is not promoting communism or anything so dont be put off.
One of the big problems is that economics is based on a set of assumptions on how people behave as I'm sure you would be aware of. But people simply dont behave rationally. However incorporating human behaviour in economic modelling is hard, but there are some good recent attempts to do this.
However some of the problem is politicians. Economists are right about some things, but politicians ignore their findings when it suits.
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Tom Curtis at 09:36 AM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
stevecarsonr @20:
As can be seen below, economic forecasts can be accurate.
"Looking at Table 3, we can see that in 455 out of 567 observations, the forecasted relative growth differential was the same as the outturn differential. This means that considering the aggregate forecasts, the OECD’s forecasts of the relative growth of G7 countries was correct on over 80% of occasions. The statistic for Table 3 is 207.5 – significantly above the 1% critical value of 10.83 – and indicating that we can reject the null hypothesis that the forecasts and observations are independent. There is therefore a statistically significant link between forecasts of relative growth and the outturn growth differential. This indicates overwhelming evidence that the OECD’s forecast of the relative annual growth of G7 countries over the sample period can be useful to users of these forecasts seeking to understand countries’ relative growth prospects over the horizon we have used."
(Source)
This is a particularly relevent study, as it studies the ability of economists to forecast which of two economies will perform better. That is equivalent to forecasting under which policy an economy will perform better given particular choices in policy. Based on that, when economists universally predict that the UK economy will perform worse under Brexit, there is a significantly better than chance that it will perform worse under Brexit. Based on the study above, they have a 1 in 5 chance of being wrong, but that is significantly better than the predictive accuracy of wishfull thinking (the alternative to economic forecasts in this area).
Personally, I believe the fundamental economic issues for Brexit are sufficiently clear that the forecasts for worse growth with Brexit are more likely to be true than that study indicates. That is not guarantteed. The UK may enter a Norway like agreement with Europe werein it retains the same favourable trade arrangements as members of the EU on condition of maintaining compliance with EU regulations, in which case the Brexit impact will be negative in the short term due to uncertainty, but otherwise irrelevant. Such an agreement, however, is politically unlikely given the reasons for the "yes" vote to Brexit; and that being the case the downside of more expensive exports to and imports from the largest nearby trading block are pretty much a foregone conclusion. Couple that with the fact that Brexit removes the major reason for London to be the financial capital of Europe and the downside starts looming very large.
Further, even in the example from Nate Silver you provide, forecast accuracy is significantly better than chance; and that It is not that the experts are proven worthless, but that they are proven less accurate then they think they are. In the mean time, the nonexpert predictions in economics do tend to be worthless, and to the extent that they are better than that, it is based on their relative expertise in economics.
Given this, if all economists think Brexit will be an economic negative for Britain, odds on it will be. Therefore it should be of concern that the Brexit campaign was not conducted on the basis that there would be an economic cost, but that it would be worth it for "increased sovereignty" (although even that later claim is dubious). That it was instead conducted in denial of the economic advice and on the basis that "people in this country have had enough of experts" certainly shows the Brexit campaign was based on a rejection of expertise as a guide to policy, just as is the Clexit campaign.
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nigelj at 09:23 AM on 12 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Michael Sweet @ 18 and 21.
Thank's for those details on the Jacobsen research. Its certainly very compelling and I'm convinced.
I was wondering in my post above how a totally renewable grid caters for days with little wind in parts of a country, and whether having a surplus of renewables power would be sufficient. It appears Jacobsen have proposed a surplus of renewables, along with some storage, but apparently not much surplus or storage is required.
We should also not let "perfection become the enemy of the good". No grid is going to be 100% reliable in all circumstances regardless of the power source. So long as reliability of renewables is high and this appears feasible if its properly done.
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stevecarsonr at 08:17 AM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
nigelj,
"One could also say it has a truly dismal record at forecasting anything. But we cant just totally ignore economists. There are parts of economics that are reasonably soundly proven. It's the best we have."
Yes, there are parts of economics that are reasonably sound. Microeconomics, for example. Macroeconomics, not so much consensus. So what? I don't ignore microeconomics or macroeconomics. I'm fascinated by the subject.
The actual question is, "Is it anti-intellectual to ignore the forecasts of people who have been just as much wrong as right with their forecasts?"
I say, no.
You say, yes, because they are "the best we have". Sounds hopelessly fluffy to me.
Back when doctors used leeches to cure people, there was a crowd saying "well, it's the best we have". Applying reason to problems is what I believe in rather than fluffy optimism.
Critical thinking is why there has been so much progress in science, medicine and economics. Accepting rubbish from inappropriately-titled "experts" because "it's the best we have" is - my unproven hypothesis - one of the ways that has held back much progress.
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Tom Curtis at 08:09 AM on 12 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
old sage @238:
"Any other body, earth included, will discharge its energy with a modified spectrum and gases, which obey quantum mechanics and are below the threshold for excitation do not radiate except with a very low probability."
Indeed, "Comparing the radiative rate kR (the inverse of the lifetime) to the collisional deactivation rate kM[M], provides a quick estimate that only one out of 100,000 CO2 molecules excited into the (0,10,0) by collision or absorbing a photon, will emit." (source) The collisional deactivation rate is "~ 105 s-1" (same source). Further, "At 300 K about 6% of the CO2 molecules in the atmosphere are vibrationally excited and can radiate." (Source) Multiplying out, that means approximately 6% of CO2 molecules will radiate in any given second at 300 K at 15 microns wavelength in any second. But with 9.52 x 10^21 molecules of CO2 per meter cubed at standard atmospheric temperatures and pressures, that is 0.572 x 10^21 photons emitted per second from gaseous CO2 per meter cubed per second across the 15 micron band.
At 15 microns wavelength, each photon has 13.25 x 10^-21 Joules of energy, so that each meter cubed of air at standard pressure and 300 K radiates approximately 7.58 Joules per second, or 7.58 Watts, with the energy divided equally among all directions. Added up over the thickness of the troposphere and the the resultant radiation is very significant.
The upshot is that while the probability of any given molecule radiating between excitation and collision is very small, the probability of each molecule radiating in a given second is only moderately small (6%) and there are a very lot of molecules. Of course, we don't need this maths because this is just another attempt by old sage to prove that the observed IR radiation from CO2 in the atmosphere does not exist. No matter how many times he hides his eyes from the observational data, it does not go away.
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nigelj at 07:15 AM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
Regarding experts, economics and Brexit.
Economics is called the dismal science, because it deals with dismal things. One could also say it has a truly dismal record at forecasting anything. But we cant just totally ignore economists. There are parts of economics that are reasonably soundly proven. It's the best we have.
Brexit had a lot of lies and scaremongering on both sides of the debate, especially on costs. The truth is likely in the middle. Look at it logically. Britain is leaving a free trade zone so there must be costs in this. But look at what Britain actually exports and the costs should not be large.
Brexit was an ideological war and a very confused one. The first casualty of war is truth.
I think Brexit happened because certain problems with the EU and immigration, etc, etc were left unresolved and even ignored, and things boiled over. Im not sure if Brexit was wise but I certainly see why it happened. The "establishment and governing elite" only has itself to blame for ignoring reasonable concerns by the general population.
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nigelj at 07:09 AM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
One Planet Only Forever
I agree climate sceptics expressing concern for suffering of poor people is missleading. I would go further and say in my experience many (but not all) climate sceptics couldn't care less about poor people.
There seems to be a strong anti social welfare and anti income support agenda with many climate sceptics in my experience. Climate scepticism is driven by certain world views, as well as a sense of entitlement as you have noted.
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michael sweet at 06:47 AM on 12 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Nigelj,
Jacobson et al (2015) Low-cost solution to the grid reliability problem with100% penetration of intermittent wind, water, and solar for all purposes won the Cozzarelli prize awarded "for outstanding scientific excellence and originality” to 6 out of ~3,000 papers published in 2015 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. His simulations of the US power grid showed that renewable energy could provide 100% of all power (all power, not just all electricity) with high reliability. While I am not expert and cannot assess Jacobson's work, it seems to me that he would not have won the Cozzarelli prize from the National Academy of Science if the paper was not solid work.
Read the references to this paper and you will find out about peer reviewed work supporting renewable energy. Jacobson 2008 identifies the most promising non-fossil power supplies. It had 600 citations a year ago. Some of the conclusions have modified because of technical developments (Jacobson 2015 is state of the art). By contrast, virtually nothing is published in peer reviewed journals supporting nuclear.
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MA Rodger at 06:13 AM on 12 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Old Sage @240,
You say that "according to wikipedia, the average solar energy 24 hrs/day per unit area is 141 w/m2." It would be worthwhile if we other commenters had sight of this Wiki reference. I have attempted to find it for myself but it is remaining elusive. Do provide the link.
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JWRebel at 03:38 AM on 12 August 2016Climate inertia
Great article though somewhat terrifying, since it is very hard to quantify additional risks posed by positive|negative feed back loops for carbon sinks and possible short-lived methane contributions. There may be some hope in drawing down CO² levels by enhanced weathering or other efforts (at the scale of current global military spending), but social inertia stymies the kind of efforts we need to cut emissions and energy waste, develop sustainable energy alternatives, and draw down CO² at the scale required by the risks bearing down on us.
(I almost filed this one under the insert tab, mistakenly fixated on the inert response to risks we prefer to think of as tentative.)
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Tom Curtis at 01:57 AM on 12 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
old sage @240:
"Before it became an imperative to diversify from fossil fuel energy sources, what I am saying was settled science."
The "settled science" from before"... it became an imperative to diversify from fossil fuel energy sources" can be seen easilly in the following clip from a 1950s film:
Clearly old sage's assertion to the contrary is a pure fiction, and one for which he will have zero citations. old sage has a repeated history of such inventions asserted without evidence with the intention to deceive and I wonder that the moderators tolerate it.
I will note that the imperative to diversify from fossil fuels is a consequence of the science, not the other way round as old sage, contrary to his tin foil hat assertions in his final paragraph.
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One Planet Only Forever at 01:52 AM on 12 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
stevecarsonr@16
I have a BSc in Engineering and an MBA. Both were obtained in the 1980s. Since then as a Professional Engineer in Canada I have been pursuing the best understanding of things with the objective of ensuring that the desired actions of a pursuer personal benefit are restricted to acceptable activity.
I whole heartedly agree with you that economists can be wrong because many of them fail to acknowledge that success can be obtained by people who are willing to dismiss or ignore better understanding that is contrary to their personal desires.
However, a leader of the Brexit side famously declared in an interview the people are fed up with experts. He did not get specific. It was a piece of propaganda hoped to appeal to people who preferred not to have to understand information that would be contrary to their preferred beliefs. An example would be expert opinion that Britain would not actually save the amount boldly declared on the side of the Leave campaign bus.
so your request for proof of the accuracy of economist predictions is missing the point.
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old sage at 01:38 AM on 12 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
Mr Tamblyn, please spare me a graduate level explanation of the various form of energy which can exist and put some effort into quantifying them. Spontaneous generation of energy from gases at atmospheric temperature and pressures - is negligeable, look up the numbers yourself in any decent text book. If you want CO2 to radiate, get it to low pressure in a vacuum tube and put a high voltage across it and it will be accelerated sufficiently to generate, it will produce hardly anything left to itself.
According to wikipedia, the average solar energy 24 hrs/day per unit area is 141 w/m2, the energy needed to get the world average rainfall -99cms- to vapour, at the surface, is 70w/m2. Half of all energy is occupied in the vapourisation of water - and that is assuming all the energy gets past the cloud cover shutter and makes it to the surface. Just get away from your models, look around, and take note of the physical manifestation of the automatic negative feedback provided by the shutter which operates courtesy of water vapour whether in the form of droplets or aerosols. Water vapour is the critical component.
Before it became an imperative to diversify from fossil fuel energy sources, what I am saying was settled science. GHG's are the result of a conspiracy of silence by physicists who know their subject. If you can prove that heating from CO2 stops at a certain concentration and why, you will have proven it doesn't happen in the first place.
Moderator Response:[PS] Old sage. Time to reread the comments policy if you wish to comment further on this site. In particular:
Sloganeering: If you make an assertion, back it with your sources. Use the link button in the editor.
Tone: If you want to troll without the slightest interest in a reasonable discussion, this this is not the forum for you.
In short, you are busy demonstrating a misunderstanding of the science and complete unwillingness to learn different. Wilful ignorance cannot be helped, but people here will try to correct misunderstandings. Disparaging their efforts and repeating nonsense will not advance a conversation.
If you actually want a sensible discussion, then I suggest you look at where you think measurements of real world observations contradict theory. You could begin by providing an alternative explanation of what is measured by instruments measuring back-radiation, the extreme accuracy by which the Radiative Transfer Equations predict observations of radiative spectra, etc.
Please note that posting comments here at SkS is a privilege, not a right. This privilege can be rescinded if the posting individual treats adherence to the Comments Policy as optional, rather than the mandatory condition of participating in this online forum.
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Paraquat at 22:45 PM on 11 August 2016Climate scientists make a bold prediction about sea level rise
As a persistent (pest?) pro-nuclear person on this blog, this is probably a good time for me to say that I would like to see some kind of worldwide declaration (or even international regulation) adopted that all future nuclear power plants should be constructed a miniumum of 30m above sea level. I actually said so even pre-Fukushima (yes, really). I wasn't thinking of tsunamis at the time, but rather that rising sea levels and increased typhoon activity could result in record-breaking storm surges, and thus coastal floods. It was actually the Hurricane Katrina disaster in 2005 that started me thinking along those lines. The point was demonstrated again in 2008 by Hurricane Ike, which put Galeveston, Texas, under water.
Of course, it's not just nuclear power plants we have to be concerned about - any critical infracture that is now being planned in coastal areas should be taking global sea level rise into consideration. I make no predictions just how fast and high the seas will rise, but it's better to err on the side of caution.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 22:19 PM on 11 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
old sage.
Lots of gobbledegook in your comment. So lets look at some basics.Molecules in a gas can contain energy in multiple forms. They have kinetic energy of linear translation - they are zipping along. They have kinetic energy of rotation, they are rotating and if their moment of inertia is non-negligible then there is energy in that rotation. The individual atoms within the molecule are in motion relative to the whole. The intra-molecular bonds are non-rigid so the individual atoms are jiggling around relative to the centre of the molecule. As in any spring-like system their is kinetic energy and potential energy. Then, within individual atoms, their electrons can be in higher or lower energy states.
Then there is potential energy due to the separation of the molecules. Inter-molecular forces such as Van Der Waals forces tend to attract molecules together so that when they are separated there is potential energy due to that separation just like in a gravitational field. And as they draw closer to each other potential energy is converted to kinetic energy of translation.
So collections of molecules have energy in multiple forms, held in different parts of the system. A molecule in a gas can move in three axes - it has 3 degrees of freedom. Similarly it can rotate around 3 axes, and if the Moment of Inertia around each axis is non-trivial, there are up to 3 more degrees of freedom. There are from zero (for a single atom) to 1 (for a diatomic molecule that can only experience stretching) to many multiple degrees of freedom associated with poly-atomic molecules that can undergo mutiple different forms of stretching and bending of the intra-molecular bonds. And the different electron energy levels for individual atoms within the molecule constitute additional degrees of freedom.
A basic principle in Physics is the Equi-Partition Theorem. In a collection of molecules the total available energy will tend to be equally distributed between each degree of freedom. And the Thermodynamic (or kinetic) definition of temperature says that temperature is proportional to the energy in the translational only degrees of freedom. So a gas at temperature X has a certain amount of its energy in translational movement, and the rest in other modes of action. This is the basis for the calculation (and observation) of the specific heats of different substances. Not all added energy goes into something that impacts temperature - linear translation.
An important wrinkle in all of this is quantum mechanics. Translational movements aren't quantised whereas rotational, vibrational and electron energy levels are. This constrains the possible energy changes that can occur, and as an aside, modifies the specific heat of substances. And changes to the number of degrees of freedom available to a substance in its solid, liquid and gas forms, along with potential energy changes as molecules move apart during vaporisation is a big factor in why the enthaplies of Fusion and Vaporisation for a substance can be large compared to their specific heat.
So when molecules collide, it is an extremely complex interaction. They accelerate towards each other as the collision approaches, drawn together by Van der Waals forces, converting potential energy to kinetic energy as they approach. After the collision, the reverse happens and they experience a deceleration as they move apart, losing kinetic energy to potential energy in the process.
During the collision, the forces between molecules and atoms come into play creating a collision with a defined, non-zero duration, and complex interplay between all the degrees of freedom of the molecules. The conservation laws of Energy, Momentum and Angular Momentum apply but many complex interactions are possible. For example, as the atoms are vibrating, jiggling, they are momentarily changing the Moments of Inertia of the molecule. To conserve Angular Momentum, the angular velocity needs to change.
All these complex interactions allow energy transfer between the many degres of freedom, within the constraints imposed by quantum mechanics. So all this complexity is driving the Equi-partition theorem, tending to ensure that all the different modes of energy storage, across all available molecules, tend to have the same share of the total energy, within the constraints imposed by quantum mechanics.
So how does a gas absorb and emit photons? One potential way is electron energy level transitions within individual atoms. This is the basis of the classic Lyman and Balmer series for hydrogen for example. But the energy levels needed for such transitions are typically beyond the energy content of IR photons. Most electron energy level transitions need quanta of energy associated with visible light and above. Not Infrared.
How else can photons be absorbed or emitted? Basic theory, from Maxwells Eqns, says that an electric charge that is accelerating can potentially create a photon. Similarly, a passing photon can excite movement in an electric charge. This is the basis of transmitting and receiving antennae.
But a molecule is electrically neutral, it doesn't expose its internal electric charges, from electrons and positrons, to the outside world does it? Yes.
This depends on the 'electro-negativity' of the individual atoms within a molecule. Electro-negativity for an atom essentially describes how strongly that atoms tends to hold electrons to it. Oxygen is strongly electo-negative for example, while Hydrogen is weak. So in a molecule with atoms having differing electro-negativities, where the atoms are arranged assymetrically, this can produce a 'charge-separation'; electrons tending to cluster on one side of the molecule. Water is the classic example of this with the Oxygen side of the molecule tending to be negatively charged, and the Hydrogen side positive.
So now the molecule is 'displaying' an electric charge to the outside world. Potentially able to interact with a passing photon or to emit one. This is the property that allows molecules to absorb or emit IR photons. It requires an exposed electric charge and acceleration. Linear motion of molecules can't supply this - apart from the briefest moments during a collision, they aren't accelerating. But vibration and rotation can. Both involve accelerations, and if a molecule has a charge separation then absorption and emission events are possible.
So some gas molecules can absorb and emit infrared photons because they can generate a charge separation and they are assymetrical. And when they tend to gain or lose energy from their rotational and vibrational degrees of freedom due to absorption or emission events, the intricate interplay of collisions, billions of times per second re-establishes the balance.
Long story short. Gases can and do absorb and emit IR photons due to the presence of charge separations across the molecules. -
michael sweet at 20:06 PM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Haze,
The basic plan for renewable energy systems (as described by Jacobson in the links above) is to build wind and PV solar for the bulk of energy supply. Storage is then built. The storage is more expensive than the wind and solar plants. Jacobson (and others) find that the entire system cost is cheaper than fossil fuels.
We are currently just starting to convert to renewable energy. It is not economic to build the most expensive parts of the system first. People build out the wind and solar first since that is cheapest. Once those are in place energy storage will be constructed. (A few facilities are being built as demonstration plants). Storage options depend on the country. Since gas peaking plants are already in place it makes the most sense currently to use those for storage, since there is no cost to build them.
It seems to me that it is not fair to judge the performance of a renewable system when it is only partly constructed. No-one proposes a wind only system for all power, storage is required.
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michael sweet at 19:52 PM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Bob,
That is just the "M". The "O" is additional to that. No money is set aside for decomissioning the plants. I think we agree.
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michael sweet at 19:51 PM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Nigelj,
This SkS article describes Jacobson's plan is some detail and has peer-reviewed links. His analysis of the reliability of his plan was peer reviewed but I do not have time before work, I will post it later today. If you follow the citations to Jacobson's work you will find hundreds of similar analysis for different areas.
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Paul Pukite at 19:23 PM on 11 August 2016Murry Salby's Correlation Conundrum
Dikran pointed me here
Salby is at it again this year with a new presentation with slightly different yet still deeply flawed arguments. https://youtu.be/sGZqWMEpyUM
This is the same guy who wrote the textbooks "Physics of the Atmosphere and Climate" and "Fundamentals of Atmospheric Physics". Based on his contrarian nature when it comes to fundamental science, one has to call into question everything he has written. Same goes for Lindzen, I am finding.
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old sage at 18:08 PM on 11 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
So much gobbledegook here its difficult to know where to start. Atmospheric gases are governed by kinetic theory, they engage in inelastic collisions and conserve energy and momentum, no surplus energy is generated to form photons. Stefan Boltzmann BB radiation applies only to a special situation in which a continuum of energy levels are provided by the body in question. Any other body, earth included, will discharge its energy with a modified spectrum and gases, which obey quantum mechanics and are below the threshold for excitation do not radiate except with a very low probability.
I should not need to explain how the condensate of h2o, o2 ,co2, n2 etc into raindrops scavenges energy from the atmosphere and plays the critical role it does in getting energy away but if you critics care to think about it, you can work it out for yourselves.
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stevecarsonr at 18:01 PM on 11 August 2016Rejection of experts spreads from Brexit to climate change with 'Clexit'
"On both issues there’s also a dangerous strain of anti-intellectualism, in which campaigners mock experts and dismiss their evidence and conclusions."
Do you have some evidence to put forward that economics forecasts have some accuracy?
"The Signal and the Noise" by Nate Silver (2012) summarizes forecasting accuracy. It's a book, not a peer-reviewed article, but I recommend reading it. Here is p.181-182:
"In figure 6-4, I've plotted the forecasts of GDP growth from the Survey of Professional Forecasters for the 18 years between 1993 and 2010. The bars in the chart represent the 90 percent prediction intervals as stated by the economists.
..If the economists' forecasts were as accurate as they claimed, we'd expect the actual value for GDP to fall within their prediction interval nine times out of ten, or all but about twice in eighteen years.
In fact the actual value for GDP fell outside the economists' prediction interval six times in eighteen years, or fully one-third of the time. Another study, which ran these numbers back to the beginnings of the Survey of Professional Forecasters in 1968, found even worse results: the actual figure for GDP fell outside the prediction interval almost half the time. There is almost no chance that the economists have simply been unlucky; they fundamentally overstate the reliability of their predictions."
I haven't kept my old copies of The Economist that I subscribed to from 1992 to 2007 but from time to time they also covered the woeful inaccuracy of economics' forecasters.
Well, I ask the article writer to justify their confidence in economics forecasts with actual data on the accuracy of economists forecasts vs what transpired.
Otherwise, mocking "experts" in economics forecasting seems like a very defensible intellectual activity. Accepting "experts" in economics forecasting seems like hopeless gullibility. I was originally drawn to this blog by its title. Skeptical means questioning.
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barry1487 at 17:55 PM on 11 August 2016Climate Bet for Charity, 2016 Update
"We're adding a new widget to the SkS right-side sidebar that will be updated on a monthly basis."
Hi Rob. It'd be good to see that widget, or alternatively an update to the graph here, which was going to be updated monthly, but hasn't been since March. Your chart is more intuitive than KT's.
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BBHY at 16:25 PM on 11 August 2016Climate scientists make a bold prediction about sea level rise
The new paper offers an explanation why the acceleration of sea level rise, as measured by satellites, from the 90's (post '93) through the 2000's was less than expected.
The answer is that the rate of sea level rise in the 90's (post '93) was boosted by the recovery following the Pinatubo eruption. Had the eruption not occured, the rate of sea level rise in the later 90's would have been smaller, the rise in the 2000's would have been the same, and the acceleration of sea level rise over those two decades more clearly evident.
Hope that clears things up a bit. Predictions of future sea level rise depend not so much on the current rate of rise, but on the rate of the acceleration of the rise over time. A small diference in the acceleration rate has a dramatic effect on the estimate of sea level rise for the year 2100 and beyond.
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Tom Curtis at 16:06 PM on 11 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
old sage @234 presents an incoherent, simplified model that he claims refutes the greenhouse effect. While it could be dealt with as a 2nd law of thermodynamics argument, it is simpler to simply note that:
1) Contrary to old sages claim, the immediate response to placing his half mirrored shell is to increasing incoming photons by 50% (not twice as he claims). The number of photons increases to double only once equilibrium is achieved and nothing in his model indicates that equilibrium will be achieved instantaneiously. He merely assumes it.
2) Unless and untill he refutes the very well established (for over a century) Stefan Boltzmann Law that equates the radiation from a body with its temperature, "the balance will be maintained as before and no temperature difference arises" is simply false. Indeed, given the Stefan Boltzmann law and related results it cannot be the case.
3) Between the time of the placement of the half mirrored shell and temperature rising sufficiently to accomplish equilibrium, there is a positive energy imbalance at the surface in his model. That positive energy balance provides the additional energy needed to raise the surface temperature. Once equilibrium is achieved, there is no further change in temperature as there is no energy imbalance to drive the change.
So, all that is necessary for old sage's model to justify his conclusions from it is that a physical law that is both confirmed by literally hundreds of thousands of laboratory and field observations, and derivable from quantum mechanics be false (and hence that quantum mechanics also be false), and that equilibrium be achieved instanteiously given any perturbation. Given that, old sage's conclusions from his model are pushing well into the anti-science level achieved by geocentrists and flat earthers.
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Tom Curtis at 15:52 PM on 11 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
old sage's post @233 is essentially a rehash with slightly different (and very confused terminology) of his post @222 and is more than sufficiently rebutted @225. In particular, his claim that "dry gases in the atmosphere do not radiate significant energy" is abundantly refuted by the graph @225 showing (at one location) the downward radiation from those dry gases which he claims to be insignificant. His rebuttal of the abundant observational evidence refuting his claim consists entirely of the rhetorical question, "where can it [the energy] come from?"
That would be from the energy transported to the atmosphere by shortwave radiation (79 W/m^2), evaporation (84 W/m^2), sensible heat (20 W/m^2) and, most importantly, IR radiation (approximately 378 W/m^2). (378 rather than 398 because of the approximately 20 W/m^2 atmoshperic window)
Note: 378 W/m^2 rather than 398 W/m^2 because of the approximately 20 W/m^2 atmoshperic window. Adding the sums will show the total to balance the 219 W/m^2 upward radiation from the atmosphere (ie, 239 minus the atmospheric window) plus the 342 W/m^2 downward IR radiation. Because the energy radiated from the atmosphere is continuously resupplied, the thermal capacity of the atmosphere is largely irrelevant except as it effects diurnal and seasonal temperature ranges.
old sage's rhetorical question only has bite of you maintain a scrupulous ignorance about what observations show about energy flows into and out of the atmosphere.
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nigelj at 12:32 PM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Haze @16
South Australia gets 43% of its electricity from wind power, under ideal conditions. This is from "energy in south australia" on wikipedia and is backed up by a reference to the clean energy council. The rest of their power is from fossil fuels.
Obviously if the wind isn't blowing, reliance will switch back to gas. This doesn't invalidate the use of wind power. Wind power with gas backup is better than relying on a totally fossil fuelled grid. With a dispersed well designed wind grid, reliance on gas backup is fairly low.
However it would be interesting to know how a totally wind powered system would go, with no fossil fuel backup. In other words, how much total wind power would be needed for days when parts of S Australia have no wind. In other words how much spare wind capacity the system would need. I recall some engineering article claiming its not as much as we might think, but cant remember the article. Maybe some expert knows.
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chriskoz at 12:12 PM on 11 August 2016Climate scientists make a bold prediction about sea level rise
I haven't read (Fasullo 2016) but this explanation:
the satellites began measuring in 1993, right after a large volcanic eruption (Mount Pinatubo). This eruption temporarily reduced global warming because particles from the eruption blocked sunlight. Just by coincidence, the timing of the satellites and the eruption has affected the water rise so that it appears to be linear. Had the eruption not occurred, the rate would have increased.
is confusing, or even defies my logic. If the starting point of SLR curve in question is 2 years fter Pinatubo (which happened in 1991), which means it's a local minimum, then the tread calculated from such cherry picked start should be larger than the average trend after smoothing the variability. It's like cherry picking a strong LaNina starting year for the temp trend: the measured trend appears larger than the average. Opposite happens when deniers of statistics try to pick a strong ElNino year (e.g. 1998) as the starting year and to claim that global warming has "stopped".
In our case herein, cherry picking 1993 (a local minimum) overestimates the trend. So how the statement "Had the eruption [local minimum] not occurred, the rate would have increased" makes sense?
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Haze at 11:48 AM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
scaddenp@14. From your comment "Keith - you seem to be saying that lives lost in evacuation dont count? How many would have died if the area had not been evacuated?
You seem to have completely missed the point on the evacuation made by keithpickering @2 who said:
"Meanwhile, the evacuation from Fukushima — which was not necessary under IAEA guidelines — killed 1600 people needlessly. Final score: radiation 0; fear of radiation 1600. At some point, we should hope that rationality overcomes irrationality. (My bold)
I thought his original comment addressed your point quite adequately.
A general comment the topic of intermittent power supply from renewables. The recent experiences in South Australia indicate that, as yet, renewables are not capable of maintaining the power supply required by that State. Somewhat embarrassingly the State Government had to ask the owner of amothballed gas fired power station to tum supply back on. The report on this in The Australian Financial Review on July 14 2016, is, unfortunately, paywalled. The headline and opening paragraphs of the article are below
South Australia intervenes in electricity market as prices hit $14,000MWh
"Turmoil in South Australia's heavily wind-reliant electricity market has forced the state government to plead with the owner of a mothballed gas-fired power station to turn it back on.
The emergency measures are needed to ease punishing costs for South Australian industry as National Electricity Market (NEM) prices in the state have frequently surged above $1000 a megawatt hour this month and at one point on Tuesday hit the $14,000MWh maximum price.
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nigelj at 10:51 AM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Michael Sweet @ 12
Thanks for the Jacobson website link.
Firstly I live in New Zealand, and we already use hydro, wind, and geothermal with some reasonably minimal gas backup. I'm all for renewable energy and support our system. Nuclear would be crazy for us, and ideally we should aim to get rid of the gas backup as well.
I support renewable energy, but Im not going to be mindless and uncritical about it. I was just making the point that all countries are different, and that I didn't see a need to totally rule out nuclear in every situation.
I clicked on spain on your map and the plan was for a lot of solar and wind. This could obviously work, anything is possible for a price, but they would have a lot of surplus generation in that wind power for cloudy days etc. But it can be done for a price.
I would like to see their more detailed calculations on prices comparing renewables and fossil fuel options etc. I couldn't see anything on their website, and I'm not just going to take their word for it. Has their research been peer reviewed?
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Bob Loblaw at 10:23 AM on 11 August 2016Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas
old sage:
If you want to argue "the greenhouse effect violates the second law of thermodyamics", then the proper place to do that is over on this thread. The last comment there was made in late 2014 (#1481), but you can read through the Basic and Intermediate tabs, then the comments, and then see if you have anything to say that hasn't already been debunked.
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scaddenp at 10:22 AM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Michael, I am not sure you are right about observed lifetime. Bezau is still going after 47 years with no plans to shut it that I am aware of. I do agree though that most have not made it past 40.
Keith - you seem to be saying that lives lost in evacuation dont count? How many would have died if the area had not been evacuated?
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Bob Loblaw at 10:15 AM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
michael sweet:
I think you missed that keithpickering's cost estimates in paragraph 2 of comment #6 explicitly said "neglecting O&M". It's not fair that you start to include them ;-).
As for ongoing costs, I know that Ontario's nuclear program found that some maintenance items they thought would be low cost turned out to be much greater than planned. A key factor was that pressure tubes become brittle over time (discussion here) and need replacing, and this happened a lot faster than originally expected. A recent announcement for one plant has a $16 billion price tag on refurbishment. The article says:
"OPG estimates it would need between 7.2 cents-to-8.1-cents-per-kilowatt-hour to recover the total cost of the refurbishment, below current averages of 9.2 cents-per-kwh, but more than privately-owned Bruce Power will be paid under a new contract.
...but that's probably just "O&M", so it doesn't count, right?
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michael sweet at 09:18 AM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Nigelj,
Read the Jacobson website. They have renewable energy plans for all the countries in the world. Nuclear and fossil fuel backup is not needed. The power is cheaper than fossil fuel power.
Please provide links to support your claim that some countries cannot use renewable energy as described by Jacobson. Please provide a link to support your claim that nuclear is cost effective in the long term.
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nigelj at 08:55 AM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Keithpickering @2 and 6.
Nuclear power does obviously have some risks. I do largely agree about Fukushima not killing anybody directly with radiation and the longer term cancer risk is said to be low, but they got lucky as it was only a partial melt down. Chernobyl was more drastic and has had more severe health problems, and has required permanent evacuations and a one billion dollar containment enclosure over the old reactor.
Nuclear is arguably cost effective in the long term, but disposing of the waste remains a big problem.
But no energy source is perfect. Maybe it all comes down to costs and benefits and also what resources specific countries have.
For example some countries have windy climates and excellent potential for wind power with some limited backup storage or gas fired power. Other countries dont have much wind, and would need massive backup gas power, or alternatively massively expensive battery storage, or vast numbers of wind farms at great expense to provide backup for days where half the country has no wind. In this case Nuclear might be a better option.
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michael sweet at 08:48 AM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
Kiethpickering,
It is difficult to respond to a Gish Gallop like yours. I will address a few of the gross falsehoods but the majority will have to be let by.
1) Nuclear plant life: At San Onofre power station, unit 1 ran from 1968-1992, 24 years not counting down time for maintenance. Units 2 and three ran for 28 and 29 years not counting several years of down time. Your claim of 60 year life for a nuclear power station is simply false. Actual observed lifetime is 20-40 years.
Current nuclear plants in the USA cannot operate at a profit just counting operation and maintenance costs. The longer you count the costs the more money they lose.
The Georgia plants are currently billing their customers for the finance costs, the plants would never have been started without customers being forced to finance this boondoggle. Your costs "including financing costs" do not include the finance costs.
You used cost figures from old solar and wind installations. In wind and solar costs have fallen (unlike nuclear where the costs rise over time). Current costs are much lower than your claims.
The wind turbines in Denmark are not worn out. They are being replaced by modern, larger units because the new units make more money (obviously the old units were built where the wind was best). The old units are being refurbished and resold. Your claim that the units have a 22 year working life is false.
Jacobson et al have shown that renewable energy can reliably supply the entire power supply of the USA (they have plans for the entire world). Can you provide a reference that suggests that nuclear can provide more than 10% of electricity alone? How will nulcear power ever work in Syria and Iran (or all of Africa)?
Current nuclear cannot survive without enormous subsidies, how could new build hope to compete? So called "safe" generation III nuclear is proving to be unbuildable. The Chinese are building generation II plants that have known safety defects. Generation IV and V plants will not be designed before 2050.
\Gish Gallops like yours have destroyed my faith in nuclear engineers. If you cannot support your technology without providing supportable data you should give up your argument. Even Brave New Climate has few posts any more.
Realists understand that nuclear has failed. It is too expensive. (I do not even need to mention that it is also unsafe and there does not exist enough berrilium or uranium in the world to build all the units you propose).
The question is: What has to be done to implement renewable energy according to a system similar to Jacobson's plan? Nuclear is useless in a renewable energy system because the need is for peaking power, not baseload power.
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knaugle at 07:05 AM on 11 August 2016As nuclear power plants close, states need to bet big on energy storage
#8 Ger
Sounds good on paper, but there is the issue of scale. Also, don't think your alternatives will be too cheap to meter. Some of what you propose will be really expensive. Finally, renewables work great on clear windy days, but as always what about calm clear nights?
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