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Comments 38151 to 38200:
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Non-Scientist at 00:36 AM on 28 February 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #9A
"Global warming won't cut winter deaths as hoped"
This topic, and the related topic of summer heat induced death are a tad misleading. The death rate of all causes is 100%: you are going to die at some point, and today there will be a medical diagnosis other than old age.
But nearly all deaths due to summer heat are natural deaths of old age, and that is a quiet passing during one's sleep, rather than while hooked up to machines, after a painful fall, or due to a hospital aquired infection.
It's best not to distract from the real risks of climate change with headlines which will be mocked as meaning "Millyuns will die in the streets if you don't buy a Prius".
Moderator Response:[JH] Newspaper headlines are purposely written to grab the reader's attention and entice him/jher to read the article.
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Michael Whittemore at 22:49 PM on 27 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
Its silly to imply climate models are getting it wrong when they are not designed to factor in certain aspects of the climate. Climate models should be adjusted each year to factor in increased ocean heat, volcano eruptions and what ever else is not accounted for.
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Michael Whittemore at 22:41 PM on 27 February 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #9A
Its great to hear that the IPCC will now start to focus on ways to reduce the impacts of climate change. Its getting a little pointless when the only arguments we are hearing are conspiracy theory's.
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MA Rodger at 20:50 PM on 27 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
chriskoz @11.
Klimont et al (2013) shows sulphate emissions to 2011. There is a balance between rising emissions in the developing world and falling emissions in the developed world. This also results in emissions increasing at lower latitudes.
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chriskoz at 20:19 PM on 27 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
tstreet@9,
Human aerosol emissions can be acounted for quite reasonably in the past 100y or so, as seen on this graph from tamino:
The emissions clearly peaked in 70s, after they started cleaning what you've experienced in Denver, and what other experienced throughout the whole NAmerica & Europe.
I don't see any jump on this graph as the result of recent boom in China. The graph ends at 2000 however, and would love to see latest update on this account. But so far, I don't see anything what you describe as "what's going on in China" on this graph.
So my conclusion: "if China cuts its emissions", there will be no "ugly spike in [global] warming", because the drop in aerosol emissions should not be very signifficant. Perhaps the local temps would be affected. But the global effect might well be diluted. Often, what looks grandiose & very scary (especially when seen through sensationalism of the media) may not be actually a big deal when seen through the actual data analysis.
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MA Rodger at 20:06 PM on 27 February 2014CO2 lags temperature
I asked @433 "Anybody any ideas?" It appears from the comments @ 434, 435 & 436 that dwm's answer to this question is "No. I have no idea whatever."
This still may not be the definitive answer to my question (dwm has not shown here much skill in providing such answers, even when well positioned to do so), so if anybody else has any ideas, I would be happy to learn of them.
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ubrew12 at 19:44 PM on 27 February 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #9A
"Debunking Charles Krauthammer’s climate lies" is missing a link, which is here
I hope everyone reads Krauthammer's piece as its a classic 'doubt is our product' piece of misinformation. If 'doubt is your product' then you aren't served by shedding a light on the problem, in this case, of future climate. Rather you are served by spray-painting out the light on the problem that's being shed by others. Hence its extremely important for Krauthammer to claim that he doesn't know whether Global Warming is real or not, because it excuses his lack of prediction of future climate. No light from him. Despite this ambivalence, he is somehow 'certain' that the climate scientists don't know what they're talking about- no light from them. This leaves us all stumbling around in the dark, supporting the fossil status quo, which is his intention. Its also why I call such people graffiti taggers. No constructing a bridge to the future for them. Just spray-painting over the bridge constructed by others to make it look unpalatable.
Moderator Response:[JH] Thank you for bringing this omission to our attention. The link has been inserted.
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dwm at 16:59 PM on 27 February 2014Humidity is falling
scaddenp, I pointed out that we are all still waiting for a good source (of a data record), and I asked for a good source if you have one, so why are you asking me for my source?
This is getting off topic, but since you asked.. I don't disagree with the precautionary principle. The problem lies with how you define precautionary. For instance, I am alarmed by those who advocate for pro-active measures such as geoengineering based on climate science which is, in my opinion, still in its infant stage.
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scaddenp at 13:18 PM on 27 February 2014Humidity is falling
dwm - are you seriously suggesting that Clausius-Clapeyron relation doesnt hold in the atmosphere? Furthermore water vapour are constrained by OLR measurement. What is your estimate (I would love to know your source...) that the error range in the humidity estimates invalidate model estimates.
Next question, suppose for whatever reason you decide that you dont trust models are the best predictors of future climate, and yet the physics of AGW is not in doubt. What predictor of future climate do you suggest policy makers use which you think has better skill than climate models?
Uncertainity cuts both ways. Suppose the errors are such that warming ends up much faster than predicted? The precautionary principle would seem to apply.
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paulhtremblay at 12:51 PM on 27 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
Bob @49. Thanks, got it now. I pretty much understood you post, but your the visual from your link really made me see.
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dwm at 12:50 PM on 27 February 2014Humidity is falling
JH and others: as I said, we are years away from having reliable humidity data for the various levels of the atmosphere, and moreover, as humidity is not uniform, we understand very little of the complex interactions of having different humidities in different layers of the atmosphere and in different regions of the earth. The facts that we don't have the data, and that we don't understand the complexities of the interactions, don't allow you to indulge in the weak defense of "It's the old "if you don't know everything, you know nothing" gambit."
If that is not the case, please tell me where I can find the data showing humidity levels of all layers of the earth's atmosphere for the different regions, tropic, sub-tropic..., for the past century, or heck, how about just the past 20 years.
Without a very good idea of what humidity leves have been, climate models are left in the "best guess" scenario, and since water vapor is the most important greenhouse gas, their reliability is very much in question.
Moderator Response:[JH] Your personal opinions matter little on this website. If you cannot document your assertions, merely repeating them constitutes sloganeering- which is prohibited by the SkS Comment Policy.
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scaddenp at 11:05 AM on 27 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
You can get the historical radiative forcing from aerosols from the IPCC reports
Aerosols have improved since 1990 but way worse than 1950. What matters from climate point of view is the net forcings. Aerosols have got worse but dont cool because overwhelmed by increased CO2.
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tstreet at 08:18 AM on 27 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
Someone else can probably be more quantitative, but I would think that the amount of heat reflecting emssions put out by China would be at least what the U.S. and others were emitting during the period when we had a significant cooling effect. I do remember that pollution used to be a lot worse in places I have lived like Denver, but it doesn't seem close to comparing with what is going on in China.
However, I would be interested also in the actual quantitative impact on the results of the models and if the models try to take into account the cooling effect of ongoing heat refleting emissions.
If/when China cuts its emissions to that approaching western standards, it seems like this is going to cause an ugly spike in warming.
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Chris8616 at 07:41 AM on 27 February 2014A Hack by Any Other Name — Part 2
Not sure how you come up with the destinations, but the first thing a hacker would do is to use a proxy(even with Tor), preferabily from a country not assocciated with his own.
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Doug Bostrom at 07:39 AM on 27 February 2014A Hack by Any Other Name — Part 2
For all the wind emitted in other places about this topic, one would think the windy would blow here at least a little bit, at what is surely the true nexus of all the hot breezes.
It's true that it's more pleasant to agree than than disagree; what better than to flock with other agreeable, agreeing folk?
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Rob Honeycutt at 06:08 AM on 27 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
funglestrumpet... Just last night I went to a lecture on climate change where one of the speakers was a lead author for both the IPCC AR4 and AR5 reports.
This was someone who is very deeply involved in the science. He's a leading climate modeler and probably has as thorough an understanding of both the scientific side of this issue as he does the political side.
He made a very important point saying that, you have to remember, just a few months ago we had every member nation sign off on a statement saying that there is a >95% likelihood that humans have been causing warming and that the potential impacts are serious. This includes nations like the US with our fracking, Australia and China with vast deposits of coal, other oil producing nations, and more.
All these member nations have agreed that this is a serious problem that cannot be denied.
He made very clear that the BAU emissions scenarios are very severe. But he also said he is an optimist. He believes we can fix the problem. He did add that the time is now. We can no longer wait. Actions have to happen now, and primarily it sounded like the most favored instrument is going to be a carbon tax.
Yes, there has been irrational delay. Yes, we should have started long ago. Yes, there are still contrarian scientists who's opinions are being elevated far above where they actually should be.
I would suggest this is part of the process. You have to remember, we're also telling some of the largest corporations on the planet that we're going to have to pretty much stop using their products as they currently produce and sell them. These are products that are largely responsible for the prosperity of the past 150 years.
The transition is not going to be easy because these companies do not want to go gentle into that good night (apologies to Dylan Thomas).
I'm with Tom and chriskos here. This is not a time for rage. It is a time for a steady hand on the tiller. Stay true to the published science. Communicate it as clearly and as often as you possibly can.
We're going to show Lovelock that he's wrong.
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Dikran Marsupial at 05:42 AM on 27 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
funglestrumpet, I'll make one last comment on this topic. The reason that "fighting dirty" works for skeptics is because none of us actually want to forgo the benefits of fossil fuel use. As a result, those of us more susceptible to the cognitive biases that we all have will easily accept bogus arguments if it means they don't need to do anything. However those very same cognitive biases means that people are often very good at spotting bogus arguments that argue they should do something that they don't already want to do, and it will make them dig in their heels and ignore anything else you might want to say. So, while your hyperbolic partisan nonsense may go down well with some "warmists" that are impatient at the very slow rate of progress being made, it will go down like a lead balloon with the people whos minds you need to change if progress is going to be any faster. If you want to seek attention, fighting dirty is a good approach, if you actually want something done about climate change, it is a very bad approach.
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funglestrumpet at 05:31 AM on 27 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
Tom Curtis @ 53
You hit on one of the battlegrounds of the whole issue: time. If only we had enough of it, we could afford the luxury of sorting out, or at least trying to sort out, such anomalies that you correctly identify. Of course, if Professor Lovelock is correct in his new book, the time battle has already been lost. What a pity we have all frittered away so much of while relying on fair words and promises that have proved to be empty.
As for the general topic, I think we have reached an impasse.
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funglestrumpet at 05:25 AM on 27 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
chriskoz @ 52
I offer my apologies for the incorrect spelling of your name. My only excuse, and a weak one at that, is that I wrote the post in a hurry. Certainly no insult was intended.
As for the general topic, I think we have reached an impasse.
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william5331 at 05:15 AM on 27 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
Perhaps someone knows the answer to this one. It came about because of the headline in this morning's Press. China chokes on smog: crops die. How does the quantity of particulate air pollution from China compare with the amount put out by volcanoes. There was a theory that the lack of warming when America was putting out mega amounts of pollution was due to this pollution. She cleaned up her act and atmospheric warming continued. What would the effect be of China cleaning up her act.
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Rob Honeycutt at 03:21 AM on 27 February 2014A Hack by Any Other Name — Part 2
It all has that feeling you get when someone has broken into your home. It's that sense of being violated. You don't know who they were but you know they were, at one point, there in your livingroom unhooking the cords to your kids' Wii they got for Xmas. They were in your office going through your desk drawer. They were in your bedroom going through your wife's family heirlooms.
It really is a sick feeling. And it's just phenominal to me that there are people out there with such low standards of morality as to believe it's okay to do this.
I also find it sickening that other bloggers scoff at the whole thing (no, I'm not going to reward them with links to their sites) when they, too, should be expressing a sense of indignation.
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Tom Curtis at 23:27 PM on 26 February 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #8
chriskoz @7, glad to here you have enjoyed settling in Godzone - but why did you settle for being a cockroach, when you could have been a banana bender like our illustrious host?
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chriskoz at 22:48 PM on 26 February 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #8
Glenn@6,
Thanks. Having relocated few times in both hemispheres, I never considered myself a "permanent resident" of any country, until I bought a house in Denistone, NSW, 7y ago. At that time I wasn't so sure of moving my personal investments from US to OZ and settle down. But I gradually grew more comfortable here and I feel like OZ now :-)
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Tom Curtis at 22:42 PM on 26 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
fungelstrumpet @50, given the urgency of the situation, what is needed is greater adherence to principle. Not less. If you want effective action, lobby for the reform of campaign funding laws so that:
1) Only citizens (ie, natural or naturalized residents entitled to vote) can donate to political parties;
2) No citizen can donate more than 1/10th of modal weekly earnings;
3) Only citizens and NFP charitable organizations can fund advertizing on political issues; and
4) Any citizen so doing must identify themselves, and the extent of their funding on the advertizing material; while NPF charitable organizations must identify their sources of funding, or be entirely citizen funded with the same limits as for political parties.
At the same time, campaign for a strict and enforcable requirement that media should either clearly identify their programs and articles as being not intended as news and current affairs, and not claimed to be true - or adhere to a strict requirement of true and fair reportage.
In other words, kill the mechanisms whereby the US has become a plutocracy masquerading as a democracy.
However, if instead you give up on principle, the most effective thing you will do is to harm the efforts of those who are trying to combat global warming in a principled way. It is not just morally wrong (more than sufficient objection in any event), but it plays into the hands of the deniers. If you tell untruths, it will give deniers an excuse to paint the legitimate opponents of climate change as untruthful. If you resort to violence, it will give them a chance to portray us as fanatics. At the very best you will sink our reputation to their level so that the conflict will be percieved as simply a surrogate for political affiliation. In short, you will wet the powder in our biggest gun - the truth.
If you love your children, and have hopes for your progeny - do not be such a fool as to abandon principle in the fight against climate change.
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mgardner at 22:34 PM on 26 February 2014Increasing CO2 has little to no effect
Just_Curious@151
Your questions are quite clear and logical. One way to better understand these things, if you are not an expert yet, is to simplify the 'experiment' you are thinking about. For example:
Let's say we have an atmosphere of nitrogen and some CO2 only. Looking at a layer near the surface (say a hundred meters) in isolation (as if there is nothing above it), how would we characterize (a) the absorption of radiation from the surface and (b) emission at the top? (With the same pressure and temperature, of course.)
If you can explain that, you are already something of an expert, and the rest of it is much easier to follow.
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chriskoz at 22:17 PM on 26 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
funglestrumpet@50,
Please pay attention to the correct spelling of my username. Remember that some people, especially people coming from different cultures, do mind such details. In 100% opposition to e.g. "drive by trollers", I treat my username as my personal trademark, not only on SkS but also on other blogs, easily recognised by all people who know me.
Re your issue of "action on climate change", I have not much to add to what I said @45 and to DM@51. In case you misunderstood @45, I repeat that "I sympathise with your opinion" (i.e. I fully understand the urgency of the "action") but I obviously disagree with you how to do it. However that issue is off topic in this thread, which is about shoddy science by certain "skeptic" scientists.
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Dikran Marsupial at 21:21 PM on 26 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
funglestrumpet wrote "I have decided that the time has come to start fighting and fighting dirty if necessary. Yes, we will lose some standards."
In that case (speaking for myself rather than SkS) please can you do so elsewhere (or preferably not at all). I find this attitude reprehensible and deeply cynical, and think it would be ultimately counterproductive. The debate needs some truth and clarity, the last thing we need is yet more hyperbolic partisan nonsense (lets leave that to Dr Spencer et al.).
Lets move onto a more sensible discussion, please?
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funglestrumpet at 20:57 PM on 26 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
Kriskoz @ 48
I could agree with both you and Tom Curtis if we had time for the system to change organically. But we just don't have that time. I have been following the problem of climate change since the mid-eighties, when it first gained public prominence. Since then we have had all kinds of major conventions, meetings, and the like, with a lot of fine words about what needs to happen and how we are going to go about it. What we very definitely have not had is meaningful action to combat climate change, apart from some token gestures that the politicians think will placate the public.
With the levels of temperature rise currently predicted, it is difficult not to invoke the expression: Desperate needs call for desperate measures. I, as much as anyone, support the democratic process and abhor injustice. But I abhor even more the idea that this generation is, thanks to its inaction, going to impose conditions on future generations which will be unbearable and with an almost certain considerable loss of life. In my book that trumps any desire to protect the status quo. Sometimes one is faced with having to decide on the better of two evils, unpleasant is such a choice ever is.
I choose to sacrifice some of the niceties of today’s society in order to achieve some meaningful action to protect future generations. If we do not get that action, and get it soon, then the very real danger is that there will not be any social niceties, because there will not be any society in which those niceties can exist.
Perhaps you and Tom are unaware of the other major issues that face the next generation, and even the younger members of this generation. Issues that are all exacerbated by a failure to tackle climate change. We face a major problem with oil supply. Despite all the jubilation about fracking, we are just not discovering anything like enough new oil fields to meet the demand in the near future as existing oil fields dry up, let alone demands further into the future. Oil cannot readily be substituted by electricity, yet it is central to agriculture and to transportation of its produce. Oil is not the only commodity facing shortages. We have a major problem with potassium and phosphorus depletion, which are essential to food production. We cannot simply build factories to produce more. Supplies are finite as far as planet earth is concerned. We face copper shortages and all that that means for electronics and electrics and the role they play in today's society. On top of all those we have population growth, which is going to significantly raise the demand of all commodities and oil to use in transportation of same. I recommend Our Finite World blog for detailed discussion of the foregoing. Climate change, important as it is, does not exist in a vacuum.
Perhaps I am wrong and you and Tom are fully aware of these issues and I am missing something, but if that is the case, I cannot understand your complacency. As I see it, the need for positive action is urgent. Yes, there are standards to protect, but only until they are superseded by more important issues. Had I and my family been on the Titanic, I would have joined an orderly queue for the lifeboats, but only for so long. When it dawned on me that if I continued to queue, i.e. maintain my standards, I would not get on one, I would have left the queue and fought tooth and nail to get myself and my family onto one of them so that they might survive. My take on climate change is that we are now at that point.
You and Tom are welcome to continue ‘queuing’. I have decided that the time has come to start fighting and fighting dirty if necessary. Yes, we will lose some standards. But at least if we fight hard enough, soon enough, we might be able to save the society in which those standards be reinstated when things are more stable. If we fail, what value those standards? They will only be part of a memory of better times.
If you disagree with the above, please put forward your ideas as to how we can get the meaningful action that our current behaviour has so clearly and spectacularly failed to deliver.
B.A.U. not only leads to climate change because of increased fossil fuel usage, it also leads to it because the politicians will contine their inaction unless we change the business as usual of not forcing them into action.
Moderator Response:[JH] You are now skating on the thin ice of sloganeering and excessive repitition, both of which are prohibited by the SkS Comments Policy. Please cease and desist. If you do not, your future posts that are in noncomplioance will be deleted in their entirity.
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Tom Curtis at 19:40 PM on 26 February 2014Increasing CO2 has little to no effect
Just_Curious @151, KR @152 makes a very astute point.
The result of the fact that most energy absorbed as IR radiation is redistributed to the adjacent atmosphere as some for of kinetic energy via collisions is that the IR radiation from any level of the atmosphere is set the temperature at that level of the atmosphere, plus the radiation not absorbed by that level of the atmosphere. When the radiation leaving the top of that atmosphere is calculated on that principle, with a suitably high resolution, the result is a stunningly accurate prediction by the models of the observed radiation. Any such calculation shows that the greatest impact on outgoing radiation in terms of percentatage of radiation blocked at a given wavelength, is the impact of CO2; and will also show that the active wavelengths of CO2 coincide with the peak IR radiation from the Earth:
(In this graps, the strong spike around a wavenumber of 600 is CO2. The smaller spike around 1100 is ozone. Methane is responsible for the effect around 1300-1400, with H2O responsible for the rest of the reduction in OLR, which is shown by the red shaded region.)
The result is that CO2 is by far the strongest of the IR active gases, with the exception of water vapour. It also means that the greenhouse effect of CO2 is not blocked by that of water vapour.
I recomend that you read my post discussing the basics of the greenhouse effect to help get clear in your mind the relevant facts.
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Tom Curtis at 19:17 PM on 26 February 2014Increasing CO2 has little to no effect
Just-Curious @149 asks:
"1. If an infinitely thin line were extended out perpendicular from the earth, how far would it extend before it reached a 99.9% probability (aprox.) of coming in contact with a CO2 molecule? At 280 ppm and 400 ppm."
Answering this question literally, the answer is much, much greater than 150 kilometers. That is, there is essentially zero chance that such a line will strike a CO2 molecule before exiting the Earth's atmosphere.
This answer is very different from that by scaddenp @ 150, but that is because scaddenp made the "mistake" of answering the question he thought you intended rather than the question you asked. As a result he gave an approximate answer to the question, how long would an IR photon travel before interacting with a CO2 molecule if the photon was at the right wavelength, and if the CO2 molecule was in the right excitation state.
Lines do not have electrical fields. Therefore to come into contact with a CO2 molecule, it would need to strike the nuclei of the one of the three atoms in the molecule. As you have probably heard somewhere, atoms (and molecules even more so) are mostly empty space. The nuclei are very small relative to the size of the electron shells. So small that neutrons (which because they have no charge, interact only with the nuclei of atoms) have a mean free-path length of 1.91 cm when travelling through uranium oxide. In contrast, of all the CO2 in the atmosphere were to be reduced to a solid (dry ice) layer evenly covering the surface of the Earth, it would only be 0.1 cm thick. That is, you would have to increase the Earth's CO2 concentration by a factor of 19, or the thickness of the atmosphere by a similar amount, to have an approximately 50/50 chance that a neutron traveling vertically from the surface would strike a CO2 molecule. And, of course, lines are much thinner than neutrons, and so have an even lower chance of striking a molecule.
I note this not just from empty pedantry, or an inordinate love of trivia. It is to emphasize that the interactions between light and CO2 molecules are mediated by the electromagnetic force. Because of that, the IR radiation must have exactly the right wavelength if it is to interact. If it does not, if its wavelength is 18 microns rather than 15 microns, for example, it will breeze past all the CO2 in the atmosphere with no effect. Even if the wavelength is very close to 15 microns, the CO2 molecule has to be traveling in the right direction at the right speed (so that the doppler shift will result in the correct resonance), the and the molecule has to be at the correct excitation state, and so though a number of other factors. If not, the IR radiation will not be absorbed, but simply continue on its way. Consequently, for most IR photons, they will travel through the atmosphere without significant interaction with CO2. But at the crucial wavelength, their mean free-path length is quite short (and at 15 microns, is very close to 3 meters).
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mancan18 at 18:30 PM on 26 February 2014'It's been hot before': faulty logic skews the climate debate
It's high time denier skeptics were challenged. They need to be asked as to what level of CO2 in the atmosphere do they deem to be safe and as to how much warming that they believe it will cause. It is pretty clear that if we burn all the known (and unknown) economically recoverable fossil fuel reserves stored in the Earth's crust then it will put the CO2/greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere over the top and will most certainly lead to significant warming. The deniers need to actually give us some numbers as to what they think are safe.
Also, it is not simply good enough for Abbott and Hunt to say that we are acting on Climate Change and then destroy all the Climate Change advisory bodies because they will only act when the US and China act. Since Australia is more likely to be adversely impacted by climate change due to global warming than a lot of other countries, then we should be actively arguing and using our influence to try to convince the Chinese and Americans to act. We are not doing so. It again highlights the hypocrisy of the current government's policy.
Most arguments and denial relate to the manifestation and impacts of the warming we've seen so far. They do not focus on the fundamental certainties that underlie the whole debate, i.e. that increasing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere will warm the planet further and that will most certainly be due to human activity. What we are seeing so far and arguing about are only the very early signs as to what will happen.
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One Planet Only Forever at 16:31 PM on 26 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
Agnostic @ 5.
My understanding, from reading the WMO publication "Climate into the 21st Century", printed in 2003, and many other sources since then including SkS, is that the mechanism leading to warming of the oceans is a separate influence on the measured global average surface temperature.
The volcanic emissions are reducing the amount of solar energy that reaches the surface, but a lot still gets through. The reduced energy penetrating into the lower atmosphere slightly reduces the global average surface temperature compared to what it would have been without the volcanic emissions. When there is very little volcanic activity the 'clearer' global atmosphere leads to a temporarily warmer global average surface temperature. There was very little volcanic activity affecting 1998.
The ENSO trade wind circulation being more on the La Nina side of neutral is resulting in cooler surface water over a large area of the Pacific. It also produces currents in the ocean that take surface waters that have drawn heat from the atmosphere down into deeper waters, warming those deep waters. During a La Nina the warm waters in the Pacific are compressed into the western region, with cooler deeper layers of water appearing to reach the surface in the east, near South America.
When the trade winds shift to the El Nino side of neutral the warm surface waters spread eastward over more of the Pacific. The result is less heat energy being taken from the atmosphere down into the ocean depths. When a very strong El Nino forms, a much larger surface of the equatorial Pacific is warm, including the waters near South America. This type of event temporarily bumps the global average surface temperature because the trade winds spreading away from the warmer surface are warmer, leading to other areas of the surface of the globe also being warmer.
So 1998 was an extreme aberration from the norm produced by a very strong El Nino, stronger than any that have occurred since then, combined with very little volcanic dimming. That makes it a year that should not be the basis for starting an evaluation of a trend, or for any meaningful comparison to other years that do not have similar temporary forcing.
That rather obvious point seems to have been 'curiously' missed by some well-informed people. They claim to be 'just questioning the validity of the science' when they point out a lack of significant warming in the recent global average surface temperature values compared to 1998. And they get rather testy when evaluations like the one performed and published by Cowtan and Way show they have even less of a basis for their preferred claim about the rate of warming in the global average surface temperature data since that 1998 time period.
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MA Rodger at 16:28 PM on 26 February 2014Humidity is falling
"It's the old "if you don't know everything, you know nothing" gambit." Bizarrely, such a 'gambit' usually stands as the corollary of "I understand everything that is known and totally disagree with your position. Therefore..."
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One Planet Only Forever at 15:45 PM on 26 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
John,
I believe the merge in the opening statement was meant to be emerge as is presented towards the end of the article. It is a little thing, and I know this is a reprint of your article in the Guardian, but I wondered about the wording when I read the opening statement.
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Increasing CO2 has little to no effect
Just_Curious - "...when a photon strikes a CO2 molecule it re-radiates exactly the same amount of energy without losing energy to heat, either by heating itself or surrounding molecules." No.
Checking the numbers, that is not actually the case. Relaxation to emission of a radiation excited CO2 molecule takes about 10-6 seconds, whereas at sea level pressure a CO2 molecule will undergo a collision about every 10-9 seconds. There are therefore about 1000 collisions exchanging energy at sea level before that molecule can emit.
What happens is that the air mass containing the absorbing CO2 (including O2, N2, etc.) molecule warms due to the absorbed energy, and (statistially) some other GHG molecules will radiate at some frequency in their spectra in a matching amount, due to the changed temperature of the air mass. Not the same molecule in 999/1000 cases.
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Just_Curious at 14:29 PM on 26 February 2014Increasing CO2 has little to no effect
Ok thanks Scaddenp
Just to clarify
1. Yes that is what I meant, I used a line analogy rather than a photon traveling in a straight line.
2. If I read you correct then, when a photon strikes a CO2 molecule it re-radiates exactly the same amount of energy without losing energy to heat, either by heating itself or surrounding molecules.
3. Yes I understand that the only way heat leaves earth is by radiation, but is it not greatly diminished in the band that CO2 responds to.
4. My question is, does air, primarily O2 and N2 give off Long wave radiation when it's heated. What is radiating the heat at the top of storm clouds?
5. Maybe a better way to ask the question, what percentage of the total heat budget is in the long wave radiation band that CO2 responds to. If none of that band were allowed to escape, then the earth would have to heat to expel more at the frequency bands that gets through.
I'm new at this but enjoy reading all the discussions, thanks
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Bob Loblaw at 13:38 PM on 26 February 2014Humidity is falling
For all those wanting to engage dwm in his continued trolling, please note that when he says "the issue is completely understood and settled" (my bolding) he is engaging in step 4 of The 5 characteristics of scientific denialism (Impossible expectations of what research can deliver).
It's the old "if you don't know everything, you know nothing" gambit.
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Bob Loblaw at 13:29 PM on 26 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
paulh:
As for baselines: look at the top figure in the blog post itself. It's hard to read the axis labels, but I'm pretty sure it starts in 1950 and goes to 2010 in 10-year increments. In the first four years, the GISTEMP observations go from about -0.24 to +0.03, and then in three more years they drop back to about -0.25. These are all anomalies, not temperatures - they are the difference between the actual temperature that year and an arbitrary baseline (usually the mean for a period of years, often up to 30).
If you wanted to start a comparison between a model and GISTEMP, beginning in 1950, the question is whether you align the model and GISTEMP for a single year (1950), or for a period of years. Using the mean of several years smooths out the GISTEMP observations as well as the model results, reducing the effect of short-term noise on the comparison.
If you chose a single year, 1950 was "cold" in GISTEMP, so matching the model for that one year starts it off cold for the entire comparison. Let's say you pick 1954 instead, which has a spike in GISTEMP running above the general trend. From that point, your comparison would be biased on the high side (GISTEMP above the model).
As a general rule, there is no particular reason top favour 1950 over 1951, 1952, 1953, or 1954, etc. - they are all just years in a sequence. Yet we can easily see that picking different individual years in that short period will give a very different visual impression, ranging from GISTEMP well below the model to GISTEMP well above the model. A different choice in which single year to use can shift the position of the model values by close to 0.3 in relation to the observations.
In jargon-speak, the result (using a single year) is not robust: a different (arbitrary) choice gives different results. Cherry-picking is the art of knowing that your choice makes a big difference in the results, and choosing the one that misleads the reader down the path you want to take them.
When considering climate models, you cannot expect them to exactly mimic all the short-term variations. Some types of models generally give smooth variations, by their nature, but complex GCMS have their own "internal variability" and thus can show larger year-to-year ups and downs, just like observations such as GISTEMP. This gives the cherry picker yet another opportunity to mislead: if you can pick a low point in the observations that matches a high point in the model run, you can make the visual difference even greater.
The proper way to "match" the starting point is to average over several years in both the observations and the model results - enough years to average out that short-term variation.
Looking back at the figure showing Hansen's projections in the blog post, notice how the model projections (starting around 1988) begin in the middle of the range of GISTEMP values for that period - not at a spike (upward or downward). The model just happens to fall very close to the value for that individual year, but it is clear that the starting point of the comparison is in the middle of the range, not at an extreme.
Rob Honeycutt provides a visual on what not do to in a recent comment on the IPCC overestimate temperature rise post.
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chriskoz at 13:04 PM on 26 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
funglestrumpet@45,
Most of the climate scientists who are affected by 'skeptic' distortions, do not share your opinion. I've never heard of any proposition of 'sanction' or 'Nuremberg' to be imposed on even the most prominent deniers.
Jim Hansen, like yourself, talks a lot about the ethical obligation to our children and grandchildren. But unlike yourself, he never considers that failure to comply with those ethical standards should incur penalties of any kind. He rather suggest that all deniers, when converted, be taken 'on board' because we need their expertise to find the scalable solution to the problem of global clean energy.
And of course Mike Mann. Note that his lawsuit (which progresses well and has big chance of winning), is not about science denial by NRO and by Mark Steyn. It is about personal harassment. If it was against science denial it would have no stance.
As much as I sympathise with your opinion, I have to agree with Tom Curtis that our society did not develop the necessary law to sanction science denial. That of course may change in the future. Future generations, especially when pressed by negative effects of AGW that are predicted to surface soon, may change their laws, like we recently changed our laws with respect to homosexualism (a good example you provide), but it's up to them to do that. The laws cannot work backwards.
Meanwhile, we should be working to set the grassroots. Mike Mann's type of lawsuit is the only reasonable sanction we have at the moment. And, as I said before, even though it's not about sscince denial but personal harassment, its eventual success would send anyway a powerful message to all denialists and make the task of eradicating denial easier.
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scaddenp at 12:39 PM on 26 February 2014Increasing CO2 has little to no effect
Others might have the numbers at their fingertips but here is some very quick answers.
1/ To make any sense of this question, I think you are really meaning, how far would a photon of suitable wavelength travel before it hit a CO2 molecule. I dont know the exact no.s but pretty much 100% by 10m.
2/ you are mixing up macroscopic (heat) and microscopic here. Think what "heat" means in the collision between photon and CO2. As such, the "efficiency" is 100%.
I think you get a better idea of what is going on if you look up Radiative Transfer Equation for the diffusion model, and also Beers Law (Beer's-Lambeth law). A bit much for a comment reply.
3/ Yes - pretty much the only way IR exits the atmosphere.
4/ Not sure I follow you but do you mean what are the other greenhouse gases, then prominent are water vapour, CH4, O3,NO.
5/ Dont really follow this at all. What CO2 does is absorb outgoing IR and then when it reradiates some of that re-radiation is going down (and by same path warms the surface). The gas itself doesnt heat.
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Just_Curious at 11:13 AM on 26 February 2014Increasing CO2 has little to no effect
I’m interested in the effects of CO2 on outgoing radiation, I have some questions.
1. If an infinitely thin line were extended out perpendicular from the earth, how far would it extend before it reached a 99.9% probability (aprox.) of coming in contact with a CO2 molecule? At 280 ppm and 400 ppm.
2. When a CO2 molecule re-radiates, what is its efficiency? I.e. energy in vs energy out. An analogy would be a number of steel balls in a row, each ball does not impart all of its energy to the next. After a certain number of balls the output is almost zero. The energy is absorbed as heat in the balls.
3. Would the long wave radiation in the CO2 bands ever reach the top of the atmosphere by the relay mode?
4. What other gases emit long wave radiation when heated. I.e. the IR we see at the top of storm clouds.
5. How much would the earth’s temperature rise if all long wave radiation (CO2 bands) were filtered and showed up as heat in the lower atmosphere?
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paulhtremblay at 11:10 AM on 26 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
@ 38 Bob Loblaw @39 Tom Curtis.
Bob, thanks for the link to Tamino. That's very interesting stuff.
Tom, my question about how Spencer manipulated by using two different baselines was not a rhetorical question. I actually don't understand the sleight of hand he used. Can anyone help? Usually Skeptical Science includes very good explanations and graphs.
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Russ R. at 10:51 AM on 26 February 20142014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #7
Tom Curtis @75,
First, apologies for the long delay. I'm not leaving you hanging; I've been out of town on a business trip. Second, apologies for the rushed nature of this comment. I appreciate and respect the time and thought you put into your responses, and I would give mine a similar amount of time if I could. But I'd rather give you a brief response than keep you waiting.
Your points, one by one.
Feedback in General: Thanks for the refresher. My experience with feedback (and feedback loops) comes from economics, where feedback mechanisms are quite common and lead to all sorts of chaotic phenomena (asset bubbles, liquidity crises, bank runs, etc.).
Ice Albedo: No disagreement. We still agree that the strength of IA feedback will not be constant, but will vary with temperature.
Water Vapour: I won't dispute your first point (that WV is not saturated in the tropics and can move to higher altitudes in addition to higher latitudes). You also correctly point out my mistake for applying the same BOE cos2 assumption as with IA feedback. I will simply agree that WV feedback will gain strength as temperatures rise.
I am going to disagree with your last two points. I don't think it requires anything more than simple assertion to argue that the addition of heat to surface water causes it to evaporate, and rise, and then subsequently condense, and fall back to the surface. I will also simply assert that vertical heat transfer can occur by convection in addition to radiation,which your response ignores. My last assertion of the day will be that in any tropical ocean location, the surface temperature after an afternoon rainfall is lower, not higher, than before.
Second, regarding "the wall" I referred to, I invite you to look at the seasonal temperature chart of any tropical island (far enough from continents to not be affected by land). Like this one for example:
You'll note that there's a pretty hard line right around 30C, that forms an upper temperature boundary. I'm not going to argue whether that's closer to 30C or 32C. Just that an upper bound exists. The colourful map you showed confirms this. What I'd like is your opinon on why such a limit exists at all? I would argue that as this temperature is approached, a "heat-dump" mechanism is triggered by evaporation and convection.
Lastly, on the subject of runaway cold events, would you agree that no such events have occured in the last 10 million years? Yet that period has seen numerous rapid temperature increases and declines, during which polar ice has advanced and retreated rapidly during transitions. Yet in every single instance, the temperature stabilized and no runaway cooling occured.
I'll continue to respond to your comment @55 when I have time.
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Riduna at 10:37 AM on 26 February 2014Global warming continues, but volcanoes are slowing down the warming of the atmosphere
On the one hand it is argued that material erupted from volcano’s can reduce solar luminosity producing a decrease in the rate of global surface warming. Sounds plausible. Is there evidence of this reduction? If so, how does it result in decline of atmospheric temperature but increase in ocean temperature?
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Tom Dayton at 09:59 AM on 26 February 2014Humidity is falling
From the IPCC AR5, Ch. 2, section 2.5.5.4 Reanalyses, p. 208:
In summary, radiosonde, GPS and satellite observations of tropospheric water vapour indicate very likely increases at near global scales since the 1970s occurring at a rate that is generally consistent with the Clausius-Clapeyron relation (about 7% per degree Celsius) and the observed increase in atmospheric temperature. Significant trends in tropospheric relative humidity at large spatial scales have not been observed, with the exception of near-surface air over land where relative humidity has decreased in recent years (Section 2.5.5).
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dana1981 at 09:35 AM on 26 February 2014Nazis, shoddy science, and the climate contrarian credibility gap
Terranova @16 - I would define a climate scientist as someone whose profession involves doing scientific research related to the climate.
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scaddenp at 08:25 AM on 26 February 2014Humidity is falling
Research is never "done" but what the latest published papers referenced here show that with the best of observation and reanalysis so far, humidity levels are not falling and furthermore the reasons for the problem with Paltridge 2009 is understood. The evidence available shows humidity is rising.
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dwm at 08:12 AM on 26 February 2014Humidity is falling
Personal insults aside, I'll repeat since you tried dodging it:
Are you suggesting that the research has been "done" now on humidity levels and the issue is completely understood and settled? As you know, humidity is technically hard to measure accurately at all alititudes for the whole world, and there is not general certainty about what those levels are, or what they have been historically. It is a very weak spot of most current climate models.
Moderator Response:[JH] Please document the source of your assertion that humidity is "a very weak spot of most current climate models."
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scaddenp at 07:05 AM on 26 February 2014Models are unreliable
Not if they bothered to read the whole paper instead just quote mining. How about this quote then:
"For example, the forced trends in models are modulated up and down by simulated sequences of ENSO events, which are not expected to coincide with the observed sequence of such events."
What the modellers firmly state is that the models have no skill at decadal level prediction. They do not predict the ENSO events and trends are modified by this long period La Nina/neutral.
A better to question is to ask what skill do models have. If you dont trust models, then you must instead rely on simpler means to guide your policy. The verification of AGW do not depend on models so by what means would you guess the effect? The models despite their flaws remain the very best means we have predicting long term changes to the climate.
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jsmith at 06:50 AM on 26 February 2014Models are unreliable
I would be shocked if I was the first to bring this up, but a recent article in Nature Climate Change contends that the models predicted more global warming (as defined by global surface temperatures only) than actually happened. To wit: "Global mean surface temperature over the past 20 years (1993–2012) rose at a rate of 0.14 ± 0.06 °C per decade (95% confidence interval)1. This rate of warming is significantly slower than that simulated by the climate models participating in Phase 5 of the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (CMIP5)." Does this in any way validate those who state that the models can't be trusted?
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