Ray #979 – So the core issue in terms of measurement comes down to:
what changes should we expect to see in the planet’s ‘radiation signature’ as a result of changes in CO2 in the atmosphere?
Is it possible to measure these at all with current technology?
Surely you agree that it’s an interesting and measurable piece of information. Why can’t we look at existing IR sensor data? We need a broad measurement, not specific to any area.
Is that graphic you link to meant to show physical measurements, or model output? Showing the link in this context implies that it represents physical observed data, but the paper abstract talks mostly about model output.
dhogazasays
These crackpots have had their say. In fact they’ve had way more than their fair share of say. Enough is enough. Having to endure the same crap over and over again has made the comment threads worse than useless — they’re actually counterproductive.
I reiterate my suggestion: stand up for sanity by using the “delete” button often, or simply close threads to comments altogether. Yeah that would be bad, but still better than letting crackpots ruin the blog.
What Tamino says …
David Wright says:
Apparently the reality of the CRU expose’ has not sunk in.
Oh, gosh, stealing e-mails means that scientists have to spend countless hours fighting every flat-earth, young-earth, anti-science crap all the time.
Go jump off a cliff, David Wright. A high one. Because, after all, Einstein proved that Newton was wrong, therefore, such a jump can’t harm you, can it?
Molnarsays
Dwight(955):
“I, for one, can learn a lot by hearing people respond to what you, undoubtedly, think are crackpot or even malicious ideas.”
The ideas themselves are not the problem. The problem is that they are being discussed over and over again. There are now even entire websites made for this. But the noise still does not go away. Care to guess why?
dhogazasays
dhogaza, thanx for that.
You’re very welcome, and I’m glad you found my layman’s answer useful…
So let’s say, (very simply) in a perfect world, over the next 20-30 years, we basically stop all burning of FF for energy, and the CO2 content in the atmosphere is now above 400 PPM, how do we get to halving that amount? Will the CO2 sinks keep on absorbing? or are they now at equilibrium to their new state?
Scientists who specialize in such stuff can probably answer the specifics, but I can’t. What’s true, though, is that eventually, if you’re not pouring CO2 into the atmosphere, a new equilibrium state will be reached, unless warming reaches the point that other stuff adds new feedbacks (methane clathrates melting, etc.
I guess what I am trying to understand, is if we even get to a point where the net increase of CO2 in the atmosphere is finally stopped, is mankind going to be able to lower it back to a safer level? or do we have to adapt to a new reality?
Well, the political message, as informed by science, is “try to limit increases to a 2C global average”, and this means adapting to a new reality.
One which scientists hope is manageable.
But to do so requires some drastic measures, more so than if we’d listened 10 years ago (I personally believe that listening to science 20 years ago was never possible, even without the immense counterattacks by the far right wing)
ZTsays
I doubt that any individual scientists are getting rich from grants.
Here are two links which indicate that the IPCC chairman (who is not a climate scientist) might want to clarify his business dealings.
Gore and others also have directorships and consultancies. The stock answer is that this represents putting the person’s money where their beliefs lie. And this may well be quite laudable. (Cheney and Paulson also had ‘some investments’, after all).
Rod Bsays
Ray Ladbury (980), Yes. I was narrowly thinking of simply keeping a house in Arizona cooler.
Jim Eagersays
Leo, think about it this way: We humans are not just adding more CO2 to the atmosphere, we are adding more carbon to the active carbon cycle. Carbon in the active cycle is constantly exchanged among the atmosphere, the ocean and the biosphere and is permanently removed from the active cycle and sequestered as carbonate rock very, very slowly. This will insure that atmospheric CO2 will remain at elevated levels for a long, long time. Long as in not hundreds but thousands of years. Slowing and then halting the increase in CO2 will not be enough, we will also need to figure out how to draw down atmospheric CO2 and sequester carbon from the active cycle.
To get a better handle on this you might want to read David Archer’s The Long Thaw: How Humans are Changing the Next 100,000 Years of Earth’s Climate. Click on “Books” in the right hand side bar for more information on the book.
michaelsays
945 Garry Grams
In terms of the question about the optimum temperature for life on earth, a useful way of posing the question may be how well might life on earth (as it currently is) respond to the coming changes.
By anyone’s measure an uptick to 4-6 degC added on the RHS of the graph represents a massive impulse (‘step change’) which the earth system has never experienced. We are clearly moving from a period of relative stability (post the thermal batching period, around 250 kyears ago) into an ultra dangerous regime of which there are no analogues to which anyone on this earth can point to.
Now to the question of whether anything might be able to survive that step change (or regime change) during the coming decades. For this purpose, it is useful to look at data on extinction records. The following page has some useful information: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event
with the graph on extinction intensity being a key graph to use in the context of the question posed.
Take that graph on extinction intensity and align with the graph on temperature variations from the above link. What appears to have hurt living systems most is the change in the system, not necessarily always the absolute numbers. Clearly the periods of high temperature have not helped living systems, but equally as important to recognise is that ecosystems do not respond well to systemic change, such as being induced by AGW.
For example, even in recent years the relatively small changes in climate have led to significant impacts in crop stability. Wheat crops, for example, have been hit hard through fungal infections. We may go through a relatively short period in which fungi have a great time. One might stupidly point to them as some of the temporary ‘winners’ in this changing situation, as increasing numbers of threads in the tapestry of life are pulled out, and equally there are going to be ‘losers’, humans primary amongst that class.
The take home message: the original question that was asked may be the wrong question to ask to access the most meaningful insight. A question posed around the degree and rate of climate change that might cause unprecedented destabilisation and wholesale destruction of life on earth may provide greater insight into the times ahead.
Going forward, the changing system may lead in the coming decades to unprecedented extinction events. A perilous time for all on this earth.
Jim Eagersays
Dwight, surely there are more than enough existing comment threads in the archives where you can learn from responses to crackpot or even malicious ideas.
Tamino is not the only one who would find discussion of the most recent developments in the science much more productive than turning every thread into a game of whack-a-mole.
Brian Dodgesays
@Leo G — 27 December 2009 @ 10:29 PM re CO2 lifetime
see http://www.nature.com/climate/2008/0812/full/climate.2008.122.html
“”The lifetime of fossil fuel CO2 in the atmosphere is a few centuries, plus 25 percent that lasts essentially forever. The next time you fill your tank, reflect upon this”.
“The climatic impacts of releasing fossil fuel CO2 to the atmosphere will last longer than Stonehenge,” Archer writes. “Longer than time capsules, longer than nuclear waste, far longer than the age of human civilization so far.”
My lay understanding is that a lot gets sucked up by the ocean (ThermoHaline Circulation) in a few hundred years, more gets absorbed by CaCO3 over a few thousand years, but some, maybe a quarter, depending on how high the starting peak is, takes hundreds of millenia to be absorbed by igneous silicate rock weathering. If it gets warm enough to grow lotsa Azolla in the Arctic ocean in the summer time, that can suck a significant amount out over millenia – http://www.google.com/#hl=en&safe=off&q=petm+azolla+co2+drawdown
As an aside, and a suggestion for another area where Gavin et al. might bring in someone who knows about this — an excess of nitrogen is another feedback from human use of fossil fuels (specifically internal combustion engines, which burn nitrogen from the air while burning petroleum). I’d guess might expect surprises from the big nitrogen pulse we’re causing.
Re this comment, you must look at dates. One cite seemed to be from 1992, one from 1998. The science has moved on quite a bit since then.
The remaining one didn’t have a clear date for the interview, though the page was from this month. But the timescale Dr. Hansen gave for possible “greenhouse runaway” was “centuries”–which are often excluded from discussion of effects of AGW since we have to survive the shorter run first, so the conflict may be more apparent than real.
(caution, played fast and loose with significant figures)
(note, for my own calculation, surface (sea floor) sediment is assumed to have constant C amount, thus ‘outflow’ (including burial underneath more sediment) is assumed to be equal to production, and for this calculation, it is assumed none of this ‘outflow’ is directly back into the ocean or atmosphere – this could be wrong of course (CaCO3 dissolution, CH4 from organic C, etc.))
_____________________________________________________
Residence time of CO2 based on amount/outflow, years:
ALUM + D + surf.sed. as one r _ 205,250 __ _ 206,970
_____________________________________________________
For perspective, amounts, Gt C (note soil amounts given by David Archer (see below) much larger than here)
A atmosphere ________________ _______ 597 ______ 762
L vegetation, soil, detritus_ ______ 2300 _____ 2261
U surface ocean _____________ _______ 900 _____ 1018
M marine biota ______________ _________ 3 ________ 3
ALUM as one reservoir _______ ______ 3800 _____ 4044
D intermediate and deep ocean _____ 37100 ____ 37200
ALUM + D as one reservoir ___ _____ 40900 ____ 41244
p.293
”
the real carbon
uptake follows a sum of exponentials, rather than a single exponential decay. After the
fastest exponential decay is finished, there is still CO2 left in the atmosphere awaiting
slower uptake mechanisms.
”
I had been fuzzy on this point before, but it’s nice to see it written this way. Basically there is exponential decay of the perturbation toward a temporary equilibrium which itself is decaying toward another temporary equilibrium etc, except that continuuing emissions will shift temporary equilibria upward at least in the short-term… and then the climate feedbacks also shift things…
I would think that the most rapid decay does tend to be on the timescale of the residence time of CO2 in the atmosphere or surface ocean (3-4+ years each), reflecting the temporary equilibrium between the atmosphere and surface ocean. However, on p. 286:
”
Of the 9 Gton C/year carbon release from fossil fuels and deforestation from the year
2000 to 2006, 5 Gton C/year is taken up naturally, half by the ocean and half into the
terrestrial biosphere (Canadell et al. 2007). One might conclude from these numbers that the
uptake time for CO2 must be only a few years, but this would be a misconception. The rate
of natural CO2 uptake in any given year is not determined by the CO2 emissions in that
particular year, but rather by the excess of CO2 in the atmosphere that has accumulated over
the past century.
”
and
“A typical ocean surface mixed layer is 100 m deep, and it will equilibrate with the
atmosphere (that is, take up as much CO2 as it will) in about a year.”
Then, shouldn’t most of the oceanic uptake in any given year be in response to emissions in the prior year? Or if the equilibration where on the timescale of the residence times, the last few years of emissions?
(Land uptake is complicated (some is itself anthropogenically forced – reforestation, N-cycle changes?). Would it make sense to expect, outside of climate feedbacks, that the respiration of CO2 is roughly proportional to total organic C ? In which case, atmosphere – land C equilibrium would be approached over decades according to the residence time of C in the land surface reservoir … ??? Of course, depends on which ecosystems are involved… (I don’t know.))
BUT NOTE AN ERROR
p. 293
“The atmosphere today
contains about 200 Gton C in excess of the natural 1,750 value.”
Presumbaly that 1750 Gt was a mix up between mass of C (mostly in CO2) and mass of CO2.
———
PS Snowball Earth aftermath – oceanic CO2 disequilibrium with atmosphere –
That’s a good point. However, isn’t some portion of geologic emission directly into the ocean? The ocean should be accumulating some CO2 during a snowball, with geologic emission and carbonate dissolution and an absence of ions from silicate weathering to reduce dissolution and form more carbonate minerals.
weathering is shown as drawing (per year) 0.2 Gt C from the atmosphere each year, but also taking 0.2 Gt C from rock – presumably this is carbonate mineral weathering plus some fossil organic C – both of which are a sort of geologic emission; the organic C either oxydizes or else short circuits it’s way directly back to sediments. Other geologic emission might come from organic C oxydized and emitted from rock, and of course, most from inorganic C which is resupplied to the geologic reservoir by carbonat minerals, reacting with silicates to produce other silicates plus CO2 in the reverse of the net chemical weathering + carbonate mineral production.
In equilibrium, the CaCO3 from weathering and dissolution would be redeposited as CaCO3, but while in solution it helps the ocean hold additional CO2, and thus formation of solid carbonate minerals should be associated with a release of CO2 from water upon equilibration. In contrast, weathering of silicates allows ultimately allows additional CO2 to be pulled out of the nongeologic reservoirs to form carbonate minerals, which can later add to the geologic CO2 emissions.
Many such details are not shown in diagrams I’ve seen (dissolution and formation rates of solid carbonates, organic C weathering, organic C sedimentation, geologic elemental + organic C emission directly to air, directly to water, carbonate weathering, geologic CO2 emission to air, geologic CO2 emission to water).
It would be nice to see these sometime. And also, the sensitivity of both silicate and carbonate weathering and dissolution to climate (I know this information is out (and that it’s quite complex, really – nonlinear responses, limiting factors, etc.) there but I haven’t seen a synopsis – I want to spend more time reading about atmospheric circulation in particular).
Prof T Heidricksays
Thanks Gavin this is a beginning. Actually not trivial. It quotes 1990 as the beginning as 1/80 the forcing function. Now we can look back. My guess is 200 years ago the combination of fewer people and much less heat generation is much less bigger than 1/80..probably about equal (think about the fewer people and only fire to generate heat)It is a good place to start.
Thanks again
Prof T Heidricksays
I just looked up populayton. In 1810 it was 1000, million and now 6500 million, i.e a factor of 6. Heat generation per person is probably at least 10 times.( to be confirmed).so now we have a 60 multiple which would compensate for the 1/80. This definately is worth a more detailed look based on your “trivial” numbers.
Prof T Heidricksays
I realize if the #’s are only 1/80 in 1990 they will be much less 200 years ago so this may not work. However, based on all the NASA, Waterloo stuff I am not convinced it is Carbon. I personally think it is aerosols, SOX,NOx which we also know kill AND the increased heat generation. I will definately get some students to look at the simple heat balance. I don’t “believe” the 1/80 as you seem to just like warmers do “believe” in Carbon so it is worth a look.
Prof T Heidricksays
I guess my point is, as a former Associate Editor of the ASME’s JOurnal of FLuids Engineering and Chairman of their COodinating group on Fluid Measurements..I don’t think the mechanisms are well enough understood to spend trillions on Carbon. There are many other psossibilites,and we know polltionm kills. SO lets start there.
TH
Greg Goodknightsays
Barton Paul Levinson (#896), try Shaviv & Veizer (2003) for references for radiocarbon, temperature and CO2 estimated over most of the Phanerozoic.
For the rest of you, snide sarcastic remarks are the rule here, at least if you challenge the status quo that realclimate promotes. I’ve been reading contrary peer reviewed literature for the past three years and can cite references, too. But until the attacks subside there really isn’t much point to it, is there?
“Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.”
I may have fooled myself just as Feynman had warned his students against, but I find the cosmic ray theories in light of an energetic sun (an 8000 year maximum in the latter 20th century, if you believe Solanki) to be more convincing than an unverified positive feedback warming teased from a 0.01% increase in the fraction of the atmosphere that is CO2, *some* of which is from fuel uses. It has been ~19 years since the first paper from Friis-Christiansen linking solar cycle length with temperatures, and that science thread has been steadily gaining ground despite horrendous attacks. Killing Kirkby’s CLOUD funding
Hit the reset button, guys. Good science is being done by folks who are not believers in significant AGW due to CO2. The GCM are incomplete; there is important physics missing from them, and when added to the GCM the impact of CO2 will be reduced.
Garrettsays
Or is there a natural tendency for the atmosphere to re-align itself to the 250-300 PPM?
With the Copenhagen failure (who could have guesed lol), I think we be lucky to stabilize at 600 ppm hundreds of years from now. In the near term, the righ wingers will win. In the long term, WGAF, we will all be dead any way, let our great great grandchildren deal with it.
Just like Pontious Pilate, we wash our hands of it.
Congrats to Glen Beck, Rush, Shawn, and the bunch!
So, lets go on polluting as usual, who GAF any more.
Doug Bostromsays
“Apparently the reality of the CRU expose’ has not sunk in.”
Comment by David Wright — 27 December 2009 @ 10:24 PM
The reality is that you can look at the front, middle and rear sections of an arbitrarily large number of newspapers and not see a peep about it. Similarly, tune into a large, random selection of television or radio news programs, and nary a word.
The story had no power, no path to follow. The importance of the TomskTwaddle lies in informing us of the psychology of the contrarian community, specifically that it is substantially divorced from reality. Apparently, contrarians actually deeply believed that Joe Public would waste valuable time parsing ambiguous snippets of years-old emails, follow some tortured logical path and join a half-baked rebellion against rationality.
How sadly diagnostic of the group that cannot accept established physics.
Larrysays
One suggestion I have for a future post is: the implications of climate feedbacks that do (or may later) affect the terrestrial (or marine) carbon uptake through the limitations of other nutrients (e.g. biologically available nitrogen).
There are a number of recent papers on this topic, including these two:
Hey Gavin. Appreciate your heroic efforts. However. From this lay perspective, you guys are not achieving the traction you might wish for your message.
TRY: BPL – do you have references for the successful model predictions you note?
BPL: The original sources are a couple of RealClimate posts by people I trust (e.g. Gavin). Nonetheless, I knew this question would come up, so I’ve been collecting relevant references. Here’s the partial list I’ve come up with so far:
1 That the globe would warm, and about how fast, and about how much.
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
Broecker, Wallace S. 1975. “Climatic Change: Are We on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?” Science 189, 460-463.
“If man-made dust is unimportant as a major cause of climatic change, then a strong case can be made that the present cooling trend will, within a decade or so, give way to a pronounced warming induced by carbon dioxide. ”
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
2 That the troposphere would warm and the stratosphere would cool.
Prediction:
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
3 That nighttime temperatures would increase more than daytime temperatures.
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
4 That winter temperatures would increase more than summer temperatures.
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
5 Polar amplification (greater temperature increase as you move toward the poles).
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
6 That the Arctic would warm faster than the Antarctic.
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
7 The magnitude (0.3 K) and duration (two years) of the cooling from the Mt. Pinatubo eruption.
Hansen, J., Mki. Sato, R. Ruedy, A. Lacis, K. Asamoah, S. Borenstein, E. Brown, B. Cairns, G. Caliri, M. Campbell, B. Curran, S. de Castro, L. Druyan, M. Fox, C. Johnson, J. Lerner, M.P. McCormick, R.L. Miller, P. Minnis, A. Morrison, L. Pandolfo, I. Ramberran, F. Zaucker, M. Robinson, P. Russell, K. Shah, P. Stone, I. Tegen, L. Thomason, J. Wilder, and H. Wilson, 1996: A Pinatubo climate modeling investigation. In The Mount Pinatubo Eruption: Effects on the Atmosphere and Climate, NATO ASI Series Vol. I 42. G. Fiocco, D. Fua, and G. Visconti, Eds. Springer-Verlag, pp. 233-272.
“Global cooling of the Earth’s surface has been observed following the largest volcanic eruptions of the past century, although the average cooling is perhaps less than expected from simple energy balance considerations. The Mount Pinatubo eruption, with both the climate forcing and response observed better than previous volcanoes, allows a more quantitative analysis of the sensitivity of climate to a transient forcing. We describe the strategy and preliminary results of a comprehensive investigation of the Pinatubo case.”
8 They made a retrodiction for Last Glacial Maximum sea surface temperatures which was inconsistent with the paleo evidence, and better paleo evidence showed the models were right.
Prediction:
Rind, D., and D. Peteet, 1985: Terrestrial conditions at the last glacial maximum and CLIMAP sea-surface temperature estimates: Are they consistent? Quaternary Res., 24, 1-22
9 They predicted a trend significantly different and differently signed from UAH satellite temperatures, and then a bug was found in the satellite data.
Christy, John R., Spencer, R. W., Santer, Benjamin D., Wigley, T. M. L., Meehl, G. A., Wehner, M. F., Mears, C., Schabel, M., Wentz, F. J., Ammann, C., Arblaster, J., Bettge, T., Washington, W. M., Tayler, K. E., Boyle, J. S., Brüggemann, W. and Doutriaux, C. 2003. “Reliability of Satellite Data Sets.” Science 301, 1046-1049.
Mears, Carl A. and Wentz, Frank J. 2005. “The Effect of Diurnal Correction on Satellite-Derived Lower Tropospheric Temperature.” Science 309, 1548-1551.
Santer, Benjamin D., Wigley, T. M. L., Meehl, G. A., Wehner, M. F., Mears, C., Schabel, M., Wentz, F. J., Ammann, C., Arblaster, J., Bettge, T., Washington, W. M., Taylor, K. E., Boyle, J. S., Brüggemann, W. and Doutriaux, C. 2003. “Influence of Satellite Data Uncertainties on the Detection of Externally Forced Climate Change.” Science 300, 1280-1284.
Santer, Benjamin D., Wigley, T. M. L., Mears, C., Wentz, F. J., Klein, S. A., Seidel, D. J., Taylor, K. E., Thorne, P. W., Wehner, M. F., Glecker, P. J., Boyle, J. S., Collins, W. D., Dixon, K. W., Doutriaux, C., Free, M., Fu, Q., Hansen, J. E., Jones, G. S., Ruedy, R., Karl, T. R., Lanzante, J. R., Meehl, G. A., Ramaswamy, V., Russell, G. and Schmidt, G. A. 2005. “Amplification of Surface Temperature Trends and Variability in the Tropical Atmosphere.” Science 309, 1551-1556.
Sherwood, Steven C., Lanzante, John R. and Meyer, Cathryn L. 2005. “Radiosonde Daytime Biases and Late-20th Century Warming.” Science 309, 1556-1559.
Sorry, that should have read “don’t quit smoking,” of course.
Larrysays
Another suggestion for a post:
The trend in climate science over recent decades (and currently) is every bit as interesting as the state of that science at any given point in time. A post highlighting that general trend would demonstrate how conservative the climate science actually has been, and is.
The general trend (and of course any trend has exceptions) has been: the discovery of more positive feedbacks than negative ones; the surprise that many processes have moved faster than expected (e.g. Arctic sea ice melt, ocean acidification, glacier and ice cap melt, sea level rise); the discovery of unexpected physical processes (e.g. lubrication of glaciers, melting of glaciers at their terminus); and emissions rates of GHGs that are at the high side of expectations — among other examples.
It is the nature of knowledge acquisition — science — that it will always be behind the curve, because what has been learned is rarely complete. This is especially true regarding the climate system, which is itself undergoing rapid changes in our times. The above trend should be no surprise.
Identifying and documenting the trend in climate science would likely signal many policy makers that not only the science but also its trend must be accommodated both in long range planning and in short term actions that have long-term consequences. That is, today’s science is only proto-guidance; what really matters is what the science of decades hence will tell us, as a much closer approximation of reality. Perhaps an understanding of the trend will suggest the need in decisions for an added margin of safety.
So, I suggest a post on the trend in the science, and it would also be good to have a way to access a periodically updated listing of points in the trend (both positive and negative).
simon abingdonsays
#957 “go away and stop wasting people’s time. – gavin”
Gavin, before I do so I should appreciate an opportunity to apologise to Ray who made me the very kind and considerate offer (#905) “I do hereby give Gavin permission to give Simon Abingdon my email” and who I then inadvertently provoked (#976) into his frustrated “sod off, clown!” which although wounding to me was I’m sure not meant other than in the heat of the moment.
Sorry Ray, I think we were just at cross-purposes (warm vb, warm adj, etc).
Gavin, I accept that I do not know enough to make any useful input to discussions here, so may I wish you and RC well, while still hoping that an 11th hour reprieve in the form of the discovery of a compensating negative feedback will eventually be granted. Good luck in the New Year to all of you.
For post suggestions, how about a 10-year retrospective (“Climate science in the aughts”)? Where were we in 2000 compared to now? What were the significant papers?
dhogazasays
Gary Goodknight, stomping his feet and insisting he’s right and climate science wrong, sez:
For the rest of you, snide sarcastic remarks are the rule here, at least if you challenge the status quo that realclimate promotes. I’ve been reading contrary peer reviewed literature for the past three years and can cite references, too. But until the attacks subside there really isn’t much point to it, is there?
Good night, Gary, you won’t be missed.
Ray Ladburysays
Simon Abingdon, I do not have a lot of goddamned spare time. The time I give to trying to help people understand the science is time stolen from family and friends. I do it because I think it is important.
So you will understand that I do not take kindly to having that time wasted by someone who is interested in purely semantic Onanism. I am willing to try and help anyone who sincerely wants to learn. In so doing, I hope I am helping to ease the heavy burden under which the moderators and contributors toil. However, if you are coming here with a mind to “show them pointy-headed scientists a thing ‘er two”. Or if you are interested in pontificating rather than learning, I have no interest in you. Period. I hope that makes things clear.
Ray Ladburysays
Gary Goodknight says, “I’ve been reading contrary peer reviewed literature for the past three years…”
Gary, given the dearth of peer-reviewed scientific literature that actually dissents from the consensus science, I must conclude that you are a VERY SLOW reader indeed.
Ray Ladburysays
ZT brings up Al Gore’s investments. Gee, ZT, what’s next? You gonna tell us that Al Gore is fat so climate science must be wrong. I would rather say that this demonstrates that Gore is confident that the rest of the world will have to catch up to the science eventually. Good lord, there are a lot of fair-weather capitalists among the libertarians. Isn’t the ideal of capitalism supposed to be doing good while doing well? Or do you guys just object to doing good on general principles?
Ray Ladburysays
Ljubisa Cvetkovic, You are making a lot of unwarranted assumptions in your scenario. First, you are assuming that just because the oceans are sucking up excess carbon now, they will continue to do so once we decrease emissions. That’s not correct. The reason the oceans are absorbing carbon now is because the carbon content of the atmosphere is increasing. Two systems in contact will only reach equilibrium once their chemical potentials equalize. Thus, if we just slow emissions, the amount of CO2 absorbed by the oceans will merely slow. If we start to decrease actual atmospheric CO2 content, the oceans will start to be a carbon source, slowing the decline of atmospheric CO2. If you consult a Physical Chemistry text and look at the section on chemical equilibrium, you’ll get a better idea how this will play out. Suffice to say, we don’t have to worry about CO2 going below pre-industrial levels for a VERY LONG time.
Your assumptions about fossil fuels are also incorrect. Yes, petroleum is peaking, but we still have coal, natural gas… And then there are tar sands, oil shale, etc. And if we run out of all that, we have whole forests we could burn. Scarcity will not save us, because humans seem to be just smart enough to always find a way to cook their own goose.
Ron R.says
Timothy Chase #999
;-)
Ron R.says
All this discussion about off topic conversation wasting the time of those who want to talk science and not nonsense is why, in an earlier thread I proposed that RC either maintain a sister site where these kinds of conversations can be quickly and guiltlessly redirected if they begin to wander (perhaps moderated by one or more knowledgeable people here – and I believe that other knowledgeable people would also comment there, answering questions etc) or to have double blogs on the same site (another possible solution).
The effect would be to preserve one forum strictly for science. By nature, of course, you’d still have arguments but this time they could be restricted to those of a higher level.
Radge Haverssays
Re: Frustration with certain commenters…
Not sure what the answer is, but I will point out that some may not fall into neat categories. My father who was reasonably sharp in his day, ran into some conceptual troubles in his later years and developed what I can only describe as mental blocks on certain subjects. True he had some issues and annoying ideological tendencies, but just for example though, he got it into his head that undamped harmonics (as in Galloping Gertie) must defy the laws of physics. He tried, but just couldn’t get it. The flexibility, ability to make connections, and redirect thought… gone. Hard to watch, really, but worse when he just gave up.
Jim Eagersays
Barton @1023, please, PLEASE add those cites to the foot of your Are the Models Untestable? page.
I have referred to it many times but the cites will make it far more powerful.
Yeh. I figure I’m one who understands so little that I can’t teach but I can try to reply politely and helpfully and patiently to the new userids that show up asking the FAQs and elementary-school questions and honest “never thought about this before but I wonder if …” questions.
I realize the majority of the population that can type, read, and use the Internet hasn’t thought about climate change much yet. That’s just how the world works. Newbies are endless. Buddha said something to that effect.
RC is a newbie magnet (that’s good) and a nitwit magnet (that’s good too, but in a different way).
The reward for me in all this is having the chance to learn from real science conversations between real researchers who are in the process of figurihg out new stuff. That’s the jewel. As Tamino said, having some discussion thread that isn’t always dragged down would be very informative for those who _want_ to learn.
Let me suggest an alternative — could RC direct the real researchers who may want to talk about climate with each other, in public view, but with a more aggressive filtering, to, say, Tamino’s place?
Let those of us who can learn, learn more and faster by reading some very heavily pruned threads that will be more informative, maybe?
Jim Eagersays
Greg (@1018): “I find the cosmic ray theories in light of an energetic sun… to be more convincing than an unverified positive feedback warming teased from a 0.01% increase in the fraction of the atmosphere that is CO2, *some* of which is from fuel uses””
Sorry Greg, the increase in the fraction of the atmosphere that is CO2 has not been .01%, it has been nearly 38%, which is three orders of magnitude larger than you tried to pass off as fact. Moreover, all of that increase has been caused by human activity, and most of it from burning fossil carbon fuels.
There is definitely someone here that needs to hit the reset button — the person that thinks making up their own facts is good science.
Steve Fishsays
The Virtual Academic referenced by Ron R. says– “The fantasy of communicative interaction has recently been consecrated as the exploitation of the abyss.”
Regarding the agonizing here about whether to stick to the science and exclude pseudo skeptic remarks, or be more open– The problem is that being more selective can also throw out those who genuinely want to learn, and just beginning with the science, with the bath water.
There have been many statements by pseudo skeptics praising the new openness here, but I don’t think that the monitoring has really changed standards; there have just been many more non-scientific topic threads recently. Perhaps the on-topic model should be made much more explicit (e.g. a plainly clear and detailed set of rules that is enforced), while providing both serious scientific topics along with concurrent opinion threads.
While discussing the organization of this site, I have to comment (again) about the practice of posting comments in the order they are received, but at different times so the post numbers change. For me, this means that I have to search to find posts shuffled into the sequence since I last visited because they are often very interesting and frequently have informational inline comments. I also think that this way of posting comments may have contributed to the group of individuals who think that their post was monitored out. I suggest either holding back posting so everything initially appears in the order received, or stamp posts with “Received __” and “Posted __” times.
From the abstract: “a major finding of this paper is the
sensitivity of new-particle formation rates to undesirable inputs, such as out-gassing of
chamber walls, which made it difficult to isolate the factors affecting nucleation. Thus,this pilot experiment provided very important information for improving the design of the CLOUD experiment.”
And exactly how many years was this thing in the making?
Did you consider that all the snide might have some grounding in reality Greg? I note that, despite the claim on your own readings, you did not provide references to peer-reviewed articles in your post #1018.
Lynn Vincentnathansays
#1026, Hi Simon, hope you’re still here, bec I have the “an 11th hour reprieve in the form of the discovery of a compensating negative feedback.” I’ve been trying for 20 years now to get people onto it, but so far have met with dismal failure.
It’s this — people pay attention to and believe the scientists when they say AGW is happening, is dangerous, and is threatening life on planet earth. Then in negative feedback fashion, they reduce their GHGs, they become energy/resource efficient/conservative (also saving them money and mitigating other problems to boot), they REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE, and get onto alt energy, and within a few decades we’re down below 350 ppm in the atmosphere. Problem is thus solved like a high quality thermostat doing its job thru negative feedback.
I thought about patenting this & making a mint off of it, but, what they hay, the world needs this solution and fast. So I’m offering it for free. FREE. The perfect negative feedback.
ZZTsays
Ray, I agree with your view with respect to Gore, the IPCC chairman, et al and their investments – why not put your money and energies where your mouth is?
I ‘bring this up’ (as you say) in the context of the question about scientists becoming rich from grants (which I do not believe is the case), so that the person who asked this question would know where some personal money does come into play in the context of AGW.
David Wrightsays
“Go jump off a cliff, David Wright. A high one. Because, after all, Einstein proved that Newton was wrong, therefore, such a jump can’t harm you, can it?”
Very convincing denial.
TRYsays
BPL – I think we could both agree that the strongest evidence of good predictive models would be a relatively recent publication that has, say, 10 relatively specific predictions, 5 of which has since been verified.
I struggle to see how the references you provide do this. Arrhenius, for example, projects an average 3.5 degree (I assume celsius) warming when C02 gets to 450ppm. Since we’re more than halfway there, and temperature this century is up 0.5 degrees – even if we attribute all of that to CO2, I certainly question his model. The distribution he predicts doesn’t match any warming map I’ve seen, and I see no mention of Antarctic temps in there.
Re the Pinatubo paper – Pinatubo erupted in 1991 I think, and this paper was published in 1996. I would guess that they built a model that accurately reflected what happened in the real world, but that’s much different than publishing something in 1991 that truly predicted the impact of the eruption.
[Response: The paper was submitted and accepted in Oct 1991 and published in Jan 1992. All simulations were done prior to the observations being available. – gavin]
Do you agree? Are there any recent papers (last 20 years) that have predictions that have been shown to be generally accurate?
Part of the challenge here, of course, is the old stock advisor trick. Get a mailing list of 1,000 people – send 500 of them a letter saying stock prices will go up, 500 saying prices will go down. Then take the right prediction group, send 250 a letter saying prices will go up, etc…
I think predictions published in peer-reviewed journals are at least public and open to review, so good sources.
Greg Goodknightsays
Jim Eager (#1041), the number I gave is correct for the metric I was trying to describe in the late hours last night, the fraction of the atmosphere that the increase of CO2 represents, held to one significant digit, but I suspect you already know that.
To ‘dhogaza’ (#1031), that humorous corruption and use of my name was easily discovered by my kindergarten classmates. Congratulations. There are also a number of climate scientists who are not stuck on the RealClimate plantation, and believing RealClimate ™ brand science is incomplete is not tantamount to believing “climate science is wrong”. Like any body of non-trivial work, some of it is wrong. We just disagree on which limbs need pruning. The solar-gcr wing has been vilified from the start but it has made steady progress in two decades, and the most rabid here will eventually have to deal with it in an intellectually honest fashion, or at least be quiet. When the snide sarcasm subsides (both on the RC side and by the folks thinking it’s all a hoax) we’ll all be better off.
Leo Gsays
OK, thanx everyone who answered, very generous of you.
Now comes my stupid question that has been bothering me for sometime, yet I have been unable to get a decent answer. Warning – I was an A student in high school chemistry, but never went to college, and it was such a long time ago that, well you know… LOL!
I understand the theory of C atoms absorbing and releasing radiant energy at certain wave lengths. Simple and makes perfect sense. Now the question, since we are talking about CO2, does the chemical bond between the carbon and the oxygens effect this absortion at all?
dhogazasays
To ‘dhogaza’ (#1031), that humorous corruption and use of my name was easily discovered by my kindergarten classmates.
Perhaps this explains Ray’s observation that apparently you’re a very slow reader.
I thought you promised to disappear until the snide remarks are stopped? As you as you rest your case on hand-waving assertion, the snide remarks are going to pile up, and not just from me.
There are also a number of climate scientists who are not stuck on the RealClimate plantation, and believing RealClimate ™ brand science is incomplete is not tantamount to believing “climate science is wrong”. Like any body of non-trivial work, some of it is wrong. We just disagree on which limbs need pruning. The solar-gcr wing has been vilified from the start but it has made steady progress in two decades, and the most rabid here will eventually have to deal with it in an intellectually honest fashion, or at least be quiet.
More hand-waving assertion and empty rhetoric with nothing to back it up.
So what progress has been made by the “solar-gcr” wing? Let’s see, we’re in a prolonged solar minimum this decade, yet 2005 was the warmest year on record (GISTEMP) and this decade’s the warmest on record. How does this help the “solar” wing’s progress in proving it’s the sun, stupid? Less energy from the sun equals more warming? Or less warming? Depending on which decade you’re talking about?
The GCR people still have nothing but, in essence, hand-waving. CLOUD’s gone nowhere thus far.
Meanwhile, NASA just announced that observations from the AIRS satellite monitoring program shows that water vapor feedback closely matches model predictions. Oops. One more positive checkmark on the mainstream science position. Those positive checks in the mainstream science column keep piling up, the “solar-gcr” crowd has yet to come up with anything meaningful, and you, of course, reject the mainstream scientific position which is based on solid physics matched with a large suite of observations, successful predictions, successful modeling of past climate scenarios, etc.
Ray #979 – So the core issue in terms of measurement comes down to:
what changes should we expect to see in the planet’s ‘radiation signature’ as a result of changes in CO2 in the atmosphere?
Is it possible to measure these at all with current technology?
Surely you agree that it’s an interesting and measurable piece of information. Why can’t we look at existing IR sensor data? We need a broad measurement, not specific to any area.
Is that graphic you link to meant to show physical measurements, or model output? Showing the link in this context implies that it represents physical observed data, but the paper abstract talks mostly about model output.
What Tamino says …
David Wright says:
Oh, gosh, stealing e-mails means that scientists have to spend countless hours fighting every flat-earth, young-earth, anti-science crap all the time.
Go jump off a cliff, David Wright. A high one. Because, after all, Einstein proved that Newton was wrong, therefore, such a jump can’t harm you, can it?
Dwight(955):
“I, for one, can learn a lot by hearing people respond to what you, undoubtedly, think are crackpot or even malicious ideas.”
The ideas themselves are not the problem. The problem is that they are being discussed over and over again. There are now even entire websites made for this. But the noise still does not go away. Care to guess why?
You’re very welcome, and I’m glad you found my layman’s answer useful…
Scientists who specialize in such stuff can probably answer the specifics, but I can’t. What’s true, though, is that eventually, if you’re not pouring CO2 into the atmosphere, a new equilibrium state will be reached, unless warming reaches the point that other stuff adds new feedbacks (methane clathrates melting, etc.
Well, the political message, as informed by science, is “try to limit increases to a 2C global average”, and this means adapting to a new reality.
One which scientists hope is manageable.
But to do so requires some drastic measures, more so than if we’d listened 10 years ago (I personally believe that listening to science 20 years ago was never possible, even without the immense counterattacks by the far right wing)
I doubt that any individual scientists are getting rich from grants.
Here are two links which indicate that the IPCC chairman (who is not a climate scientist) might want to clarify his business dealings.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/6847227/Questions-over-business-deals-of-UN-climate-change-guru-Dr-Rajendra-Pachauri.html
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/6890839/The-questions-Dr-Pachauri-still-has-to-answer.html
Gore and others also have directorships and consultancies. The stock answer is that this represents putting the person’s money where their beliefs lie. And this may well be quite laudable. (Cheney and Paulson also had ‘some investments’, after all).
Ray Ladbury (980), Yes. I was narrowly thinking of simply keeping a house in Arizona cooler.
Leo, think about it this way: We humans are not just adding more CO2 to the atmosphere, we are adding more carbon to the active carbon cycle. Carbon in the active cycle is constantly exchanged among the atmosphere, the ocean and the biosphere and is permanently removed from the active cycle and sequestered as carbonate rock very, very slowly. This will insure that atmospheric CO2 will remain at elevated levels for a long, long time. Long as in not hundreds but thousands of years. Slowing and then halting the increase in CO2 will not be enough, we will also need to figure out how to draw down atmospheric CO2 and sequester carbon from the active cycle.
To get a better handle on this you might want to read David Archer’s The Long Thaw: How Humans are Changing the Next 100,000 Years of Earth’s Climate. Click on “Books” in the right hand side bar for more information on the book.
945 Garry Grams
In terms of the question about the optimum temperature for life on earth, a useful way of posing the question may be how well might life on earth (as it currently is) respond to the coming changes.
Firstly, one can look at the temperature history of earth, shown here
http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f5/All_palaeotemps.png
and recognise that one can add at the right-hand side of that graph a step change going up to about 4 – 6 degrees Celcius by about 2100 (for example see the graphs on http://www.primap.org ).
By anyone’s measure an uptick to 4-6 degC added on the RHS of the graph represents a massive impulse (‘step change’) which the earth system has never experienced. We are clearly moving from a period of relative stability (post the thermal batching period, around 250 kyears ago) into an ultra dangerous regime of which there are no analogues to which anyone on this earth can point to.
Now to the question of whether anything might be able to survive that step change (or regime change) during the coming decades. For this purpose, it is useful to look at data on extinction records. The following page has some useful information:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event
with the graph on extinction intensity being a key graph to use in the context of the question posed.
Take that graph on extinction intensity and align with the graph on temperature variations from the above link. What appears to have hurt living systems most is the change in the system, not necessarily always the absolute numbers. Clearly the periods of high temperature have not helped living systems, but equally as important to recognise is that ecosystems do not respond well to systemic change, such as being induced by AGW.
For example, even in recent years the relatively small changes in climate have led to significant impacts in crop stability. Wheat crops, for example, have been hit hard through fungal infections. We may go through a relatively short period in which fungi have a great time. One might stupidly point to them as some of the temporary ‘winners’ in this changing situation, as increasing numbers of threads in the tapestry of life are pulled out, and equally there are going to be ‘losers’, humans primary amongst that class.
The take home message: the original question that was asked may be the wrong question to ask to access the most meaningful insight. A question posed around the degree and rate of climate change that might cause unprecedented destabilisation and wholesale destruction of life on earth may provide greater insight into the times ahead.
Going forward, the changing system may lead in the coming decades to unprecedented extinction events. A perilous time for all on this earth.
Dwight, surely there are more than enough existing comment threads in the archives where you can learn from responses to crackpot or even malicious ideas.
Tamino is not the only one who would find discussion of the most recent developments in the science much more productive than turning every thread into a game of whack-a-mole.
@Leo G — 27 December 2009 @ 10:29 PM re CO2 lifetime
see http://www.nature.com/climate/2008/0812/full/climate.2008.122.html
“”The lifetime of fossil fuel CO2 in the atmosphere is a few centuries, plus 25 percent that lasts essentially forever. The next time you fill your tank, reflect upon this”.
“The climatic impacts of releasing fossil fuel CO2 to the atmosphere will last longer than Stonehenge,” Archer writes. “Longer than time capsules, longer than nuclear waste, far longer than the age of human civilization so far.”
My lay understanding is that a lot gets sucked up by the ocean (ThermoHaline Circulation) in a few hundred years, more gets absorbed by CaCO3 over a few thousand years, but some, maybe a quarter, depending on how high the starting peak is, takes hundreds of millenia to be absorbed by igneous silicate rock weathering. If it gets warm enough to grow lotsa Azolla in the Arctic ocean in the summer time, that can suck a significant amount out over millenia – http://www.google.com/#hl=en&safe=off&q=petm+azolla+co2+drawdown
As an aside, and a suggestion for another area where Gavin et al. might bring in someone who knows about this — an excess of nitrogen is another feedback from human use of fossil fuels (specifically internal combustion engines, which burn nitrogen from the air while burning petroleum). I’d guess might expect surprises from the big nitrogen pulse we’re causing.
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=excess+nitrogen+environment
http://marine.rutgers.edu/ebme/html_docs/reprints/falko_1997_Nature_387.pdf
PG Falkowski – Nature, 1997 – marine.rutgers.edu
“… evolution of biogeochemical cycles which suggests that fixed nitrogen, not phosphorus, limits primary productivity on geological timescales. Small variations in the ratio of nitrogen fixation to denitrification can significantly change atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations ….”
http://scholar.google.com/scholar?cites=1902673357676909589&hl=en&as_sdt=2000
Re this comment, you must look at dates. One cite seemed to be from 1992, one from 1998. The science has moved on quite a bit since then.
The remaining one didn’t have a clear date for the interview, though the page was from this month. But the timescale Dr. Hansen gave for possible “greenhouse runaway” was “centuries”–which are often excluded from discussion of effects of AGW since we have to survive the shorter run first, so the conflict may be more apparent than real.
Introductory material – calculations based on
http://carboncycle.aos.wisc.edu/index.php?page=global-carbon-cycle
and related material at http://carboncycle.aos.wisc.edu/,
correcting the anthropogenic surface ocean gain (should be 118 Gt, not 18 Gt)
(caution, played fast and loose with significant figures)
(note, for my own calculation, surface (sea floor) sediment is assumed to have constant C amount, thus ‘outflow’ (including burial underneath more sediment) is assumed to be equal to production, and for this calculation, it is assumed none of this ‘outflow’ is directly back into the ocean or atmosphere – this could be wrong of course (CaCO3 dissolution, CH4 from organic C, etc.))
_____________________________________________________
Residence time of CO2 based on amount/outflow, years:
Reservoir, ________________ Preindustrial, ____ 1990s, _______ 1990s without land-use change emissions
A atmosphere ________________ _______ 3.14 ______ 3.54
L vegetation, soil, detritus_ ______ 19.17 _____ 18.59 ______ 18.84
U surface ocean _____________ _______ 4.27 ______ 4.38
M marine biota ______________ _______ 0.06
ALUM as one reservoir _______ ______ 37.55 ______ 39.34
D intermediate and deep ocean _____ 366.60 _____ 367.59
ALUM + D as one reservoir ___ _ 204,500 __ _ 206,220
surface sediment ____________ _____ 750 __ _____ 750
ALUM + D + surf.sed. as one r _ 205,250 __ _ 206,970
_____________________________________________________
For perspective, amounts, Gt C (note soil amounts given by David Archer (see below) much larger than here)
A atmosphere ________________ _______ 597 ______ 762
L vegetation, soil, detritus_ ______ 2300 _____ 2261
U surface ocean _____________ _______ 900 _____ 1018
M marine biota ______________ _________ 3 ________ 3
ALUM as one reservoir _______ ______ 3800 _____ 4044
D intermediate and deep ocean _____ 37100 ____ 37200
ALUM + D as one reservoir ___ _____ 40900 ____ 41244
surface sediment ____________ _______ 150 ______ 150
ALUM + D + surf.sed. as one r _____ 41050 ____ 41394
_____________________________________________________
842 Timothy Chase
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/12/unforced-variations/comment-page-17/#comment-151445
”
David Archer (4 June 2008) The millennial atmospheric lifetime of anthropogenic CO2, Climatic Change, 90:283–297
http://geosci.uchicago.edu/~archer/reprints/archer.2008.tail_implications.pdf
”
p.293
”
the real carbon
uptake follows a sum of exponentials, rather than a single exponential decay. After the
fastest exponential decay is finished, there is still CO2 left in the atmosphere awaiting
slower uptake mechanisms.
”
I had been fuzzy on this point before, but it’s nice to see it written this way. Basically there is exponential decay of the perturbation toward a temporary equilibrium which itself is decaying toward another temporary equilibrium etc, except that continuuing emissions will shift temporary equilibria upward at least in the short-term… and then the climate feedbacks also shift things…
I would think that the most rapid decay does tend to be on the timescale of the residence time of CO2 in the atmosphere or surface ocean (3-4+ years each), reflecting the temporary equilibrium between the atmosphere and surface ocean. However, on p. 286:
”
Of the 9 Gton C/year carbon release from fossil fuels and deforestation from the year
2000 to 2006, 5 Gton C/year is taken up naturally, half by the ocean and half into the
terrestrial biosphere (Canadell et al. 2007). One might conclude from these numbers that the
uptake time for CO2 must be only a few years, but this would be a misconception. The rate
of natural CO2 uptake in any given year is not determined by the CO2 emissions in that
particular year, but rather by the excess of CO2 in the atmosphere that has accumulated over
the past century.
”
and
“A typical ocean surface mixed layer is 100 m deep, and it will equilibrate with the
atmosphere (that is, take up as much CO2 as it will) in about a year.”
Then, shouldn’t most of the oceanic uptake in any given year be in response to emissions in the prior year? Or if the equilibration where on the timescale of the residence times, the last few years of emissions?
(Land uptake is complicated (some is itself anthropogenically forced – reforestation, N-cycle changes?). Would it make sense to expect, outside of climate feedbacks, that the respiration of CO2 is roughly proportional to total organic C ? In which case, atmosphere – land C equilibrium would be approached over decades according to the residence time of C in the land surface reservoir … ??? Of course, depends on which ecosystems are involved… (I don’t know.))
BUT NOTE AN ERROR
p. 293
“The atmosphere today
contains about 200 Gton C in excess of the natural 1,750 value.”
Presumbaly that 1750 Gt was a mix up between mass of C (mostly in CO2) and mass of CO2.
———
PS Snowball Earth aftermath – oceanic CO2 disequilibrium with atmosphere –
That’s a good point. However, isn’t some portion of geologic emission directly into the ocean? The ocean should be accumulating some CO2 during a snowball, with geologic emission and carbonate dissolution and an absence of ions from silicate weathering to reduce dissolution and form more carbonate minerals.
Interestingly –
http://carboncycle.aos.wisc.edu/index.php?page=global-carbon-cycle
weathering is shown as drawing (per year) 0.2 Gt C from the atmosphere each year, but also taking 0.2 Gt C from rock – presumably this is carbonate mineral weathering plus some fossil organic C – both of which are a sort of geologic emission; the organic C either oxydizes or else short circuits it’s way directly back to sediments. Other geologic emission might come from organic C oxydized and emitted from rock, and of course, most from inorganic C which is resupplied to the geologic reservoir by carbonat minerals, reacting with silicates to produce other silicates plus CO2 in the reverse of the net chemical weathering + carbonate mineral production.
In equilibrium, the CaCO3 from weathering and dissolution would be redeposited as CaCO3, but while in solution it helps the ocean hold additional CO2, and thus formation of solid carbonate minerals should be associated with a release of CO2 from water upon equilibration. In contrast, weathering of silicates allows ultimately allows additional CO2 to be pulled out of the nongeologic reservoirs to form carbonate minerals, which can later add to the geologic CO2 emissions.
Many such details are not shown in diagrams I’ve seen (dissolution and formation rates of solid carbonates, organic C weathering, organic C sedimentation, geologic elemental + organic C emission directly to air, directly to water, carbonate weathering, geologic CO2 emission to air, geologic CO2 emission to water).
It would be nice to see these sometime. And also, the sensitivity of both silicate and carbonate weathering and dissolution to climate (I know this information is out (and that it’s quite complex, really – nonlinear responses, limiting factors, etc.) there but I haven’t seen a synopsis – I want to spend more time reading about atmospheric circulation in particular).
Thanks Gavin this is a beginning. Actually not trivial. It quotes 1990 as the beginning as 1/80 the forcing function. Now we can look back. My guess is 200 years ago the combination of fewer people and much less heat generation is much less bigger than 1/80..probably about equal (think about the fewer people and only fire to generate heat)It is a good place to start.
Thanks again
I just looked up populayton. In 1810 it was 1000, million and now 6500 million, i.e a factor of 6. Heat generation per person is probably at least 10 times.( to be confirmed).so now we have a 60 multiple which would compensate for the 1/80. This definately is worth a more detailed look based on your “trivial” numbers.
I realize if the #’s are only 1/80 in 1990 they will be much less 200 years ago so this may not work. However, based on all the NASA, Waterloo stuff I am not convinced it is Carbon. I personally think it is aerosols, SOX,NOx which we also know kill AND the increased heat generation. I will definately get some students to look at the simple heat balance. I don’t “believe” the 1/80 as you seem to just like warmers do “believe” in Carbon so it is worth a look.
I guess my point is, as a former Associate Editor of the ASME’s JOurnal of FLuids Engineering and Chairman of their COodinating group on Fluid Measurements..I don’t think the mechanisms are well enough understood to spend trillions on Carbon. There are many other psossibilites,and we know polltionm kills. SO lets start there.
TH
Barton Paul Levinson (#896), try Shaviv & Veizer (2003) for references for radiocarbon, temperature and CO2 estimated over most of the Phanerozoic.
For the rest of you, snide sarcastic remarks are the rule here, at least if you challenge the status quo that realclimate promotes. I’ve been reading contrary peer reviewed literature for the past three years and can cite references, too. But until the attacks subside there really isn’t much point to it, is there?
Most of you will enjoy the following talk from the American Geophysical Union meeting a couple weeks ago:
http://www.agu.org/meetings/fm09/lectures/lecture_videos/A23A.shtml
Alley, like many folks here, thinks CO2 is the culprit because there just isn’t any other candidate for the forcings. Watch his piece, and then watch the CERN colloquium given by Jasper Kirkby earlier this year, along with slideware:
http://cdsweb.cern.ch/record/1181073/
http://indico.cern.ch/getFile.py/access?resId=0&materialId=slides&confId=52576
“Science is a way of trying not to fool yourself. The first principle is that you must not fool yourself, and you are the easiest person to fool.”
I may have fooled myself just as Feynman had warned his students against, but I find the cosmic ray theories in light of an energetic sun (an 8000 year maximum in the latter 20th century, if you believe Solanki) to be more convincing than an unverified positive feedback warming teased from a 0.01% increase in the fraction of the atmosphere that is CO2, *some* of which is from fuel uses. It has been ~19 years since the first paper from Friis-Christiansen linking solar cycle length with temperatures, and that science thread has been steadily gaining ground despite horrendous attacks. Killing Kirkby’s CLOUD funding
Hit the reset button, guys. Good science is being done by folks who are not believers in significant AGW due to CO2. The GCM are incomplete; there is important physics missing from them, and when added to the GCM the impact of CO2 will be reduced.
Or is there a natural tendency for the atmosphere to re-align itself to the 250-300 PPM?
With the Copenhagen failure (who could have guesed lol), I think we be lucky to stabilize at 600 ppm hundreds of years from now. In the near term, the righ wingers will win. In the long term, WGAF, we will all be dead any way, let our great great grandchildren deal with it.
Just like Pontious Pilate, we wash our hands of it.
Congrats to Glen Beck, Rush, Shawn, and the bunch!
So, lets go on polluting as usual, who GAF any more.
“Apparently the reality of the CRU expose’ has not sunk in.”
Comment by David Wright — 27 December 2009 @ 10:24 PM
The reality is that you can look at the front, middle and rear sections of an arbitrarily large number of newspapers and not see a peep about it. Similarly, tune into a large, random selection of television or radio news programs, and nary a word.
The story had no power, no path to follow. The importance of the TomskTwaddle lies in informing us of the psychology of the contrarian community, specifically that it is substantially divorced from reality. Apparently, contrarians actually deeply believed that Joe Public would waste valuable time parsing ambiguous snippets of years-old emails, follow some tortured logical path and join a half-baked rebellion against rationality.
How sadly diagnostic of the group that cannot accept established physics.
One suggestion I have for a future post is: the implications of climate feedbacks that do (or may later) affect the terrestrial (or marine) carbon uptake through the limitations of other nutrients (e.g. biologically available nitrogen).
There are a number of recent papers on this topic, including these two:
Thornton et al. (2009)
Wang et al. (2009)
(This comment is partly in response to Hank Roberts (126) and Tom Dayton (567) )
Hey Gavin. Appreciate your heroic efforts. However. From this lay perspective, you guys are not achieving the traction you might wish for your message.
Happy New Year
TRY: BPL – do you have references for the successful model predictions you note?
BPL: The original sources are a couple of RealClimate posts by people I trust (e.g. Gavin). Nonetheless, I knew this question would come up, so I’ve been collecting relevant references. Here’s the partial list I’ve come up with so far:
1 That the globe would warm, and about how fast, and about how much.
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
Broecker, Wallace S. 1975. “Climatic Change: Are We on the Brink of a Pronounced Global Warming?” Science 189, 460-463.
“If man-made dust is unimportant as a major cause of climatic change, then a strong case can be made that the present cooling trend will, within a decade or so, give way to a pronounced warming induced by carbon dioxide. ”
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
2 That the troposphere would warm and the stratosphere would cool.
Prediction:
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
3 That nighttime temperatures would increase more than daytime temperatures.
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
4 That winter temperatures would increase more than summer temperatures.
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
5 Polar amplification (greater temperature increase as you move toward the poles).
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
6 That the Arctic would warm faster than the Antarctic.
Prediction:
Arrhenius, S. 1896. “On the Influence of Carbonic Acid in the Air upon the Temperature of the Ground”(excerpts) Philosophical Magazine 41, 237-276.
Manabe, S., and R. J. Stouffer. 1980. Sensitivity of a global climate model to an increase of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere. Journal of Geophysical Research 85(C10): 5529–54.
7 The magnitude (0.3 K) and duration (two years) of the cooling from the Mt. Pinatubo eruption.
Hansen, J., Mki. Sato, R. Ruedy, A. Lacis, K. Asamoah, S. Borenstein, E. Brown, B. Cairns, G. Caliri, M. Campbell, B. Curran, S. de Castro, L. Druyan, M. Fox, C. Johnson, J. Lerner, M.P. McCormick, R.L. Miller, P. Minnis, A. Morrison, L. Pandolfo, I. Ramberran, F. Zaucker, M. Robinson, P. Russell, K. Shah, P. Stone, I. Tegen, L. Thomason, J. Wilder, and H. Wilson, 1996: A Pinatubo climate modeling investigation. In The Mount Pinatubo Eruption: Effects on the Atmosphere and Climate, NATO ASI Series Vol. I 42. G. Fiocco, D. Fua, and G. Visconti, Eds. Springer-Verlag, pp. 233-272.
“Global cooling of the Earth’s surface has been observed following the largest volcanic eruptions of the past century, although the average cooling is perhaps less than expected from simple energy balance considerations. The Mount Pinatubo eruption, with both the climate forcing and response observed better than previous volcanoes, allows a more quantitative analysis of the sensitivity of climate to a transient forcing. We describe the strategy and preliminary results of a comprehensive investigation of the Pinatubo case.”
8 They made a retrodiction for Last Glacial Maximum sea surface temperatures which was inconsistent with the paleo evidence, and better paleo evidence showed the models were right.
Prediction:
Rind, D., and D. Peteet, 1985: Terrestrial conditions at the last glacial maximum and CLIMAP sea-surface temperature estimates: Are they consistent? Quaternary Res., 24, 1-22
9 They predicted a trend significantly different and differently signed from UAH satellite temperatures, and then a bug was found in the satellite data.
Christy, John R., Spencer, R. W., Santer, Benjamin D., Wigley, T. M. L., Meehl, G. A., Wehner, M. F., Mears, C., Schabel, M., Wentz, F. J., Ammann, C., Arblaster, J., Bettge, T., Washington, W. M., Tayler, K. E., Boyle, J. S., Brüggemann, W. and Doutriaux, C. 2003. “Reliability of Satellite Data Sets.” Science 301, 1046-1049.
Mears, Carl A. and Wentz, Frank J. 2005. “The Effect of Diurnal Correction on Satellite-Derived Lower Tropospheric Temperature.” Science 309, 1548-1551.
Santer, Benjamin D., Wigley, T. M. L., Meehl, G. A., Wehner, M. F., Mears, C., Schabel, M., Wentz, F. J., Ammann, C., Arblaster, J., Bettge, T., Washington, W. M., Taylor, K. E., Boyle, J. S., Brüggemann, W. and Doutriaux, C. 2003. “Influence of Satellite Data Uncertainties on the Detection of Externally Forced Climate Change.” Science 300, 1280-1284.
Santer, Benjamin D., Wigley, T. M. L., Mears, C., Wentz, F. J., Klein, S. A., Seidel, D. J., Taylor, K. E., Thorne, P. W., Wehner, M. F., Glecker, P. J., Boyle, J. S., Collins, W. D., Dixon, K. W., Doutriaux, C., Free, M., Fu, Q., Hansen, J. E., Jones, G. S., Ruedy, R., Karl, T. R., Lanzante, J. R., Meehl, G. A., Ramaswamy, V., Russell, G. and Schmidt, G. A. 2005. “Amplification of Surface Temperature Trends and Variability in the Tropical Atmosphere.” Science 309, 1551-1556.
Sherwood, Steven C., Lanzante, John R. and Meyer, Cathryn L. 2005. “Radiosonde Daytime Biases and Late-20th Century Warming.” Science 309, 1556-1559.
Sorry, that should have read “don’t quit smoking,” of course.
Another suggestion for a post:
The trend in climate science over recent decades (and currently) is every bit as interesting as the state of that science at any given point in time. A post highlighting that general trend would demonstrate how conservative the climate science actually has been, and is.
The general trend (and of course any trend has exceptions) has been: the discovery of more positive feedbacks than negative ones; the surprise that many processes have moved faster than expected (e.g. Arctic sea ice melt, ocean acidification, glacier and ice cap melt, sea level rise); the discovery of unexpected physical processes (e.g. lubrication of glaciers, melting of glaciers at their terminus); and emissions rates of GHGs that are at the high side of expectations — among other examples.
It is the nature of knowledge acquisition — science — that it will always be behind the curve, because what has been learned is rarely complete. This is especially true regarding the climate system, which is itself undergoing rapid changes in our times. The above trend should be no surprise.
Identifying and documenting the trend in climate science would likely signal many policy makers that not only the science but also its trend must be accommodated both in long range planning and in short term actions that have long-term consequences. That is, today’s science is only proto-guidance; what really matters is what the science of decades hence will tell us, as a much closer approximation of reality. Perhaps an understanding of the trend will suggest the need in decisions for an added margin of safety.
So, I suggest a post on the trend in the science, and it would also be good to have a way to access a periodically updated listing of points in the trend (both positive and negative).
#957 “go away and stop wasting people’s time. – gavin”
Gavin, before I do so I should appreciate an opportunity to apologise to Ray who made me the very kind and considerate offer (#905) “I do hereby give Gavin permission to give Simon Abingdon my email” and who I then inadvertently provoked (#976) into his frustrated “sod off, clown!” which although wounding to me was I’m sure not meant other than in the heat of the moment.
Sorry Ray, I think we were just at cross-purposes (warm vb, warm adj, etc).
Gavin, I accept that I do not know enough to make any useful input to discussions here, so may I wish you and RC well, while still hoping that an 11th hour reprieve in the form of the discovery of a compensating negative feedback will eventually be granted. Good luck in the New Year to all of you.
> Apparently the reality of the CRU expose’ has not sunk in.
You first have to understand reality before you can competently talk about it.
Testing four digit rollover.
PS. Does anyone have some links on the carbon – rock weathering thermostat hypothesis that Dr Richard B Alley spoke of in AGU presentation?
I found this a good primer on long scale CO2.
H/T SpacemanSpiff: http://www.agu.org/meetings/fm09/lectures/lecture_videos/A23A.shtml
Gavin in #982,
Agree that this could be misdirection.
For post suggestions, how about a 10-year retrospective (“Climate science in the aughts”)? Where were we in 2000 compared to now? What were the significant papers?
Gary Goodknight, stomping his feet and insisting he’s right and climate science wrong, sez:
Good night, Gary, you won’t be missed.
Simon Abingdon, I do not have a lot of goddamned spare time. The time I give to trying to help people understand the science is time stolen from family and friends. I do it because I think it is important.
So you will understand that I do not take kindly to having that time wasted by someone who is interested in purely semantic Onanism. I am willing to try and help anyone who sincerely wants to learn. In so doing, I hope I am helping to ease the heavy burden under which the moderators and contributors toil. However, if you are coming here with a mind to “show them pointy-headed scientists a thing ‘er two”. Or if you are interested in pontificating rather than learning, I have no interest in you. Period. I hope that makes things clear.
Gary Goodknight says, “I’ve been reading contrary peer reviewed literature for the past three years…”
Gary, given the dearth of peer-reviewed scientific literature that actually dissents from the consensus science, I must conclude that you are a VERY SLOW reader indeed.
ZT brings up Al Gore’s investments. Gee, ZT, what’s next? You gonna tell us that Al Gore is fat so climate science must be wrong. I would rather say that this demonstrates that Gore is confident that the rest of the world will have to catch up to the science eventually. Good lord, there are a lot of fair-weather capitalists among the libertarians. Isn’t the ideal of capitalism supposed to be doing good while doing well? Or do you guys just object to doing good on general principles?
Ljubisa Cvetkovic, You are making a lot of unwarranted assumptions in your scenario. First, you are assuming that just because the oceans are sucking up excess carbon now, they will continue to do so once we decrease emissions. That’s not correct. The reason the oceans are absorbing carbon now is because the carbon content of the atmosphere is increasing. Two systems in contact will only reach equilibrium once their chemical potentials equalize. Thus, if we just slow emissions, the amount of CO2 absorbed by the oceans will merely slow. If we start to decrease actual atmospheric CO2 content, the oceans will start to be a carbon source, slowing the decline of atmospheric CO2. If you consult a Physical Chemistry text and look at the section on chemical equilibrium, you’ll get a better idea how this will play out. Suffice to say, we don’t have to worry about CO2 going below pre-industrial levels for a VERY LONG time.
Your assumptions about fossil fuels are also incorrect. Yes, petroleum is peaking, but we still have coal, natural gas… And then there are tar sands, oil shale, etc. And if we run out of all that, we have whole forests we could burn. Scarcity will not save us, because humans seem to be just smart enough to always find a way to cook their own goose.
Timothy Chase #999
;-)
All this discussion about off topic conversation wasting the time of those who want to talk science and not nonsense is why, in an earlier thread I proposed that RC either maintain a sister site where these kinds of conversations can be quickly and guiltlessly redirected if they begin to wander (perhaps moderated by one or more knowledgeable people here – and I believe that other knowledgeable people would also comment there, answering questions etc) or to have double blogs on the same site (another possible solution).
The effect would be to preserve one forum strictly for science. By nature, of course, you’d still have arguments but this time they could be restricted to those of a higher level.
Re: Frustration with certain commenters…
Not sure what the answer is, but I will point out that some may not fall into neat categories. My father who was reasonably sharp in his day, ran into some conceptual troubles in his later years and developed what I can only describe as mental blocks on certain subjects. True he had some issues and annoying ideological tendencies, but just for example though, he got it into his head that undamped harmonics (as in Galloping Gertie) must defy the laws of physics. He tried, but just couldn’t get it. The flexibility, ability to make connections, and redirect thought… gone. Hard to watch, really, but worse when he just gave up.
Barton @1023, please, PLEASE add those cites to the foot of your Are the Models Untestable? page.
I have referred to it many times but the cites will make it far more powerful.
> redirected if they begin to wander
Yeh. I figure I’m one who understands so little that I can’t teach but I can try to reply politely and helpfully and patiently to the new userids that show up asking the FAQs and elementary-school questions and honest “never thought about this before but I wonder if …” questions.
I realize the majority of the population that can type, read, and use the Internet hasn’t thought about climate change much yet. That’s just how the world works. Newbies are endless. Buddha said something to that effect.
RC is a newbie magnet (that’s good) and a nitwit magnet (that’s good too, but in a different way).
The reward for me in all this is having the chance to learn from real science conversations between real researchers who are in the process of figurihg out new stuff. That’s the jewel. As Tamino said, having some discussion thread that isn’t always dragged down would be very informative for those who _want_ to learn.
Let me suggest an alternative — could RC direct the real researchers who may want to talk about climate with each other, in public view, but with a more aggressive filtering, to, say, Tamino’s place?
Let those of us who can learn, learn more and faster by reading some very heavily pruned threads that will be more informative, maybe?
Greg (@1018):
“I find the cosmic ray theories in light of an energetic sun… to be more convincing than an unverified positive feedback warming teased from a 0.01% increase in the fraction of the atmosphere that is CO2, *some* of which is from fuel uses””
Sorry Greg, the increase in the fraction of the atmosphere that is CO2 has not been .01%, it has been nearly 38%, which is three orders of magnitude larger than you tried to pass off as fact. Moreover, all of that increase has been caused by human activity, and most of it from burning fossil carbon fuels.
There is definitely someone here that needs to hit the reset button — the person that thinks making up their own facts is good science.
The Virtual Academic referenced by Ron R. says– “The fantasy of communicative interaction has recently been consecrated as the exploitation of the abyss.”
Regarding the agonizing here about whether to stick to the science and exclude pseudo skeptic remarks, or be more open– The problem is that being more selective can also throw out those who genuinely want to learn, and just beginning with the science, with the bath water.
There have been many statements by pseudo skeptics praising the new openness here, but I don’t think that the monitoring has really changed standards; there have just been many more non-scientific topic threads recently. Perhaps the on-topic model should be made much more explicit (e.g. a plainly clear and detailed set of rules that is enforced), while providing both serious scientific topics along with concurrent opinion threads.
While discussing the organization of this site, I have to comment (again) about the practice of posting comments in the order they are received, but at different times so the post numbers change. For me, this means that I have to search to find posts shuffled into the sequence since I last visited because they are often very interesting and frequently have informational inline comments. I also think that this way of posting comments may have contributed to the group of individuals who think that their post was monitored out. I suggest either holding back posting so everything initially appears in the order received, or stamp posts with “Received __” and “Posted __” times.
Steve
Greg Goodknight talks about the CLOUD experiment and presents the advocacy of its main researcher. On the other hand, when looking at what the experiment has really produced, we find this:
http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.net/9/C5845/2009/acpd-9-C5845-2009.pdf
From the abstract: “a major finding of this paper is the
sensitivity of new-particle formation rates to undesirable inputs, such as out-gassing of
chamber walls, which made it difficult to isolate the factors affecting nucleation. Thus,this pilot experiment provided very important information for improving the design of the CLOUD experiment.”
And exactly how many years was this thing in the making?
Did you consider that all the snide might have some grounding in reality Greg? I note that, despite the claim on your own readings, you did not provide references to peer-reviewed articles in your post #1018.
#1026, Hi Simon, hope you’re still here, bec I have the “an 11th hour reprieve in the form of the discovery of a compensating negative feedback.” I’ve been trying for 20 years now to get people onto it, but so far have met with dismal failure.
It’s this — people pay attention to and believe the scientists when they say AGW is happening, is dangerous, and is threatening life on planet earth. Then in negative feedback fashion, they reduce their GHGs, they become energy/resource efficient/conservative (also saving them money and mitigating other problems to boot), they REDUCE, REUSE, RECYCLE, and get onto alt energy, and within a few decades we’re down below 350 ppm in the atmosphere. Problem is thus solved like a high quality thermostat doing its job thru negative feedback.
I thought about patenting this & making a mint off of it, but, what they hay, the world needs this solution and fast. So I’m offering it for free. FREE. The perfect negative feedback.
Ray, I agree with your view with respect to Gore, the IPCC chairman, et al and their investments – why not put your money and energies where your mouth is?
I ‘bring this up’ (as you say) in the context of the question about scientists becoming rich from grants (which I do not believe is the case), so that the person who asked this question would know where some personal money does come into play in the context of AGW.
“Go jump off a cliff, David Wright. A high one. Because, after all, Einstein proved that Newton was wrong, therefore, such a jump can’t harm you, can it?”
Very convincing denial.
BPL – I think we could both agree that the strongest evidence of good predictive models would be a relatively recent publication that has, say, 10 relatively specific predictions, 5 of which has since been verified.
I struggle to see how the references you provide do this. Arrhenius, for example, projects an average 3.5 degree (I assume celsius) warming when C02 gets to 450ppm. Since we’re more than halfway there, and temperature this century is up 0.5 degrees – even if we attribute all of that to CO2, I certainly question his model. The distribution he predicts doesn’t match any warming map I’ve seen, and I see no mention of Antarctic temps in there.
Re the Pinatubo paper – Pinatubo erupted in 1991 I think, and this paper was published in 1996. I would guess that they built a model that accurately reflected what happened in the real world, but that’s much different than publishing something in 1991 that truly predicted the impact of the eruption.
[Response: The paper was submitted and accepted in Oct 1991 and published in Jan 1992. All simulations were done prior to the observations being available. – gavin]
Do you agree? Are there any recent papers (last 20 years) that have predictions that have been shown to be generally accurate?
Part of the challenge here, of course, is the old stock advisor trick. Get a mailing list of 1,000 people – send 500 of them a letter saying stock prices will go up, 500 saying prices will go down. Then take the right prediction group, send 250 a letter saying prices will go up, etc…
I think predictions published in peer-reviewed journals are at least public and open to review, so good sources.
Jim Eager (#1041), the number I gave is correct for the metric I was trying to describe in the late hours last night, the fraction of the atmosphere that the increase of CO2 represents, held to one significant digit, but I suspect you already know that.
To ‘dhogaza’ (#1031), that humorous corruption and use of my name was easily discovered by my kindergarten classmates. Congratulations. There are also a number of climate scientists who are not stuck on the RealClimate plantation, and believing RealClimate ™ brand science is incomplete is not tantamount to believing “climate science is wrong”. Like any body of non-trivial work, some of it is wrong. We just disagree on which limbs need pruning. The solar-gcr wing has been vilified from the start but it has made steady progress in two decades, and the most rabid here will eventually have to deal with it in an intellectually honest fashion, or at least be quiet. When the snide sarcasm subsides (both on the RC side and by the folks thinking it’s all a hoax) we’ll all be better off.
OK, thanx everyone who answered, very generous of you.
Now comes my stupid question that has been bothering me for sometime, yet I have been unable to get a decent answer. Warning – I was an A student in high school chemistry, but never went to college, and it was such a long time ago that, well you know… LOL!
I understand the theory of C atoms absorbing and releasing radiant energy at certain wave lengths. Simple and makes perfect sense. Now the question, since we are talking about CO2, does the chemical bond between the carbon and the oxygens effect this absortion at all?
Perhaps this explains Ray’s observation that apparently you’re a very slow reader.
I thought you promised to disappear until the snide remarks are stopped? As you as you rest your case on hand-waving assertion, the snide remarks are going to pile up, and not just from me.
More hand-waving assertion and empty rhetoric with nothing to back it up.
So what progress has been made by the “solar-gcr” wing? Let’s see, we’re in a prolonged solar minimum this decade, yet 2005 was the warmest year on record (GISTEMP) and this decade’s the warmest on record. How does this help the “solar” wing’s progress in proving it’s the sun, stupid? Less energy from the sun equals more warming? Or less warming? Depending on which decade you’re talking about?
The GCR people still have nothing but, in essence, hand-waving. CLOUD’s gone nowhere thus far.
Meanwhile, NASA just announced that observations from the AIRS satellite monitoring program shows that water vapor feedback closely matches model predictions. Oops. One more positive checkmark on the mainstream science position. Those positive checks in the mainstream science column keep piling up, the “solar-gcr” crowd has yet to come up with anything meaningful, and you, of course, reject the mainstream scientific position which is based on solid physics matched with a large suite of observations, successful predictions, successful modeling of past climate scenarios, etc.
That makes you a denialist, pure and simple.