A few things that caught my eye this past week.
In the news
US scientist sentenced to prison for fake HIV vaccine research [link]
This is a good analysis: Extremes of 2014 in review | Guest post at ClimateLabBook by @FMassonnet:[link]
Scientists struggle to understand South Asian heat waves [link]
BBC article on Science paper describing the serious outcome of different emissions scenarios for the ocean: [link]
New papers (mostly paleoclimate)
Paper finds ‘pronounced influence of solar activity on global climatic processes’ [link]
New paper explains how atmospheric pressure and density in upper atmosphere varies over solar cycles [link] …
Rapid Arctic Ocean acidification threatens creatures within ten years – study [link]
Northern Greenland warmer 1000 years ago, warmer in the 1920s too [link]
New paper finds another non-hockey-stick in China [link]
Indian monsoon rainfall has dropped since the ’50s, but climate change should increase it. What’s going on? [link]
New paper finds Arctic water temperatures were a remarkable 6C warmer during Holocene Climate Optimum ~9800 years ago [link] …
New paper finds the largest lake on Earth abruptly became a desert over only few hundred years! (Over 1000 years ago) [link]
New paper: Severe dry period in Dead Sea region related to the Homeric Grand Solar Minimum 2800 years ago [link] …
New paper: Drought in N China linked to natural ENSO & Asian Monsoon (both linked to solar activity by other papers) [link]
Aboveground carbon loss in natural and managed tropical forests from 2000 to 2012 (open access) [link]
Claim: “Some forestlands cool climate better without trees” [link] …
New paper finds increased CO2 or methane will have ‘essentially no effect’ upon global temp. or climate [link] …
Lindau Nobel Laureate Meeting
Periodically there is a meeting of Nobel Laureates. Not surprising, but this is the first time I’ve ever heard of this.
36 Nobel Laureates have signed the Mainau Declaration 2015 on Climate Change [link] I can’t find who the signatories actually are (but I suspect that ‘Nobel Laureate’ Michael Mann was not invited to this meeting]. Additional details and context are provided [here].
Of particular note in this context, Ivar Giaver gave a talk Global Warming Revisited. A pod cast is available [here], but the quality of the recording is very spotty. Some comments i spotted on twitter:
People are still debating over Giaver intervention on climate change over lunch
1st question at Steven Chu’s discussion: climate change. Then Giaever walks in. Chu v politely says he’s completely wrong.
About science
The null ritual, the tragic statistical flaw at the heart of science [link] …
The Feynman Lectures on Physics now free online [link]
Dan Kahan: Ambivalence about “messaging” [link]
U.S. – Secret Science Reform Act of 2015 [link]
The importance of meta-analysis and systematic review: How research legacy can be maximized via adequate reporting [link]
Warmist fear of debate is crippling: “activist arguments are never sharpened by encountering the opposition” [link]
“New paper explains how atmospheric pressure and density in upper atmosphere varies over solar cycles [link] …”
I bet that the response will be strongly at variance with that where there is a stronger local minimum in the solar wind speed at sunspot maximum, not every sunspot maximum has a pronounced SW minimum at sunspot maximum. Though I cannot access the rest of article to see exactly which solar cycles they are looking at.
typo above.. not every sunspot cycle.
El Nino episodes can be useful as a proxy. Usually the slowest and weakest solar wind episode occurs around a year or so after sunspot minimum. Almost every solar cycle has an El Nino episode around a year after sunspot minimum. It was while the solar wind was so slow particularly around 2009 that the thermosphere was seen to cool and shrink. When a significant period of slow solar wind does occur at sunspot maximum, an El Nino episode will also occur. That suggests that the effects of slow solar wind are dominating over the effects of higher levels of radiative forcing at cycle maximum. So I suspect that the thermosphere behaviour at a solar wind minimum at sunspot maximum, will be contrary to the expected radiative response.
http://snag.gy/ppB3v.jpg
The influence of de Vries (~ 200year) solar cycle on climate variations: Results from the Central Asian Mountains and their global link
For me this begs the question why solar deniers continue to downplay the suns influence on climate. This is not even Milankovitch sized cycles and yet the suns influence is readily seen. By comparison the recent warming attributed to GHG is just a small blip on the radar.
There is no de Vries periodicity in solar activity, Leif Svalgaard says that it not there, and that the only regular long term period of variation is solar minima roughly every ten solar cycles, with a mean interval of around 107yrs. I agree with that, and my solar cycle model gives a long term mean of 108.3yrs.
These couple of lines from the abstract confirm to me that the authors don’t have a clue about the real scales of solar forcing variability which is largely short term, or the regional responses, it is absurd to suggest such long delays:
“Analysis has shown that climate response to the long-term global solar forcing has a regional character. An appreciable delay in the climate response to the solar signal can occur (up to 150 years).”
I don’t believe that:
If you go toward the bottom of this paper you’ll see the various cycles charted:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S003101821200096X
Strong evidence for the influence of solar cycles on the Late Miocene lake system revealed by biotic and abiotic proxies
See figure 7
I will agree I wondered about that regional bit too, but it’s only an abstract
Also there was a recent paper here talking about a 150 year switch between greenland and antarctica being ocean related of course.
Regardless of what is found in the various terrestrial proxies, it does not appear in the solar data.
No, I would consider that nearly impossible with the exception of solar winds striking only parts of the earth. Like you say what data? Although I don’t know if they meant solar data as they instead said regional response. Still it’s a stretch for me too but I don’t know much. Like I said maybe they explain it better in the paper vs what we see in the abstract.
“CO2 and methane will have effectively no effect”
Oculaer has a 2 part post, with an explanation of why this may be correct.
https://okulaer.wordpress.com/2015/06/20/why-atmospheric-mass-not-radiation-p1/
“Essentially”
How does the average Greek feel about global warming?
From “Extremes of 2014 …”
…
Antarctic: the all-time high record in sea ice extent
Antarctic sea ice extent reached the unprecedented value of 20.1 million km² on average for September (Fig. 5). The long-term increase in Antarctic sea ice extent over the past decades keeps polar scientists puzzled given the global warming signal (Fig. 1), but recent studies suggest that this positive trend is not incompatible with internal variability.
…
So the high Antarctic sea ice extent may by due to internal variability, but the low Arctic sea ice extent has to be due to ACO2? Seems like both could be simply internal variability.
US scientist sentenced to prison for fake HIV vaccine research [link]
” Han continued to spike the results to avoid disappointing Cho, his mentor, after the scientific community became excited that the team could be on the verge of a vaccine.”
I believe Han regarding “avoid disappointing Cho, his mentor, ”
Shame, in its many cultural manifestations as motivation to cheat in science. Western and Eastern worlds collide. My guess is that we will be seeing these cultural differences more in the future as the Asian world re-awakens.
“Rapid Arctic Ocean acidification threatens creatures within ten years”
Horrific.
Or is it soporific?
(aka pokerguy)
That study from PMEL comes from ground zero for ocean acidification alarm. The same place that deliberately misrepresented the Netarts Bay oyster hatchery problem. See my guest post or essay Shell Games.
Went and read thempaper behind the article. pH strongly influenced by summer runoff (e.g. McKinzie delta) and by currents (e.g. Bering Strait), Arctic Gyre. Seasonality is greater than CO2 acidification. They claim, for example, less summer ice means more acidification as more CO2 can be directly absorped. They overlook that less summer ice also means more biological activity, which raises pH. They did not even sample seasonality. The sample surveys were done Oct of 2011/2012. Another very poor PMEL unscientific alarm.
Can we stipulate that any time something is “scheduled” to happen within 10 years they are just making it up?
‘US scientist sentenced to prison for fake HIV vaccine research”
Pretty bad, but can’t help thinking the attempt to disrupt the global economy for perhaps generations is many orders of magnitude worse.
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The Lake Chad study is a nice confirmation of the WHOI result reported in 2013, that the Sahara was not desert between 11000 and 5500ybp, for which there is also some sparse archeological and ground penetrating radar data. They cored the Atlantic off North Africa and analyzed/age dated the dust content.
The Sahara was desert before and after this period.
This is particularly interesting because it represents an abrupt regional climate change. The switch from desert to savanna ~ 11000 ybp could possibly be explained by the Younger Dryas, itself explained by the Lake Agassiz freshwater pulse through the St. Laurence, interupting the thermohaline circulation. But not the switch back to permanent desertification ~5500ybp. Cannot be sea level, because the major rise stopped ~8500ybp. What ever caused the West African monsoon to shift south at ~5500ybp, it was not CO2. And, the WHOI papers say that climate models have been unable to replicate this shift by permuting parameters, suggesting they are missing some important phenomenological stuff.
Did some poking around on the African (Sahara) wet period. Indeed, there are papers linking the onset of the wet period to the abrupt end of the YD.
A number of papers attribute the end of the AWP to slight changes in Earths orbit. This fit well with the early notion that desertification was gradual. The WHOI sediment cores, now confirmed by the Lake Chad study, show it was quite abrupt. Potsdam Institute built a coupled atmosphere/biosphere model of a strong ‘Charney effect’ positive feedback. Charney effect ismthe hyposthesis that water stressed vegetarion changes soil moisture retention, humidity, and albedo causing an accelerated vegetative collapse. That is partly contradictory, as vegetation has a lower albedo, and lower humidity cools better. Their model did, however, succeed in providing the sought after desertification tipping point. Gavin Schmidt celebrates this. Problem is threefold. First, the Potsdam model assumes its conclusion. Second, new new sediment cores from off the Horn of Africa containing plant pollen and leaf wax suggest the Charney effect did not contribute to east African desertification. Third, the effect is disproven by the Sahel; the ecosystem gradient from desert is gradual. The Horn core team is positing circulation changes in the Indian ocean, without being able to say how or why.
Bottom line, we know the ‘abrupt’ end to the AWP happened as a shift from the Tropic of Cancer equatorward of the West African Monsoon, but not why.
Your library probably has this one:
http://www.amazon.com/Meteorology-Tropical-Springer-Environmental-Sciences/dp/3540426361
It’s worth reading. Not much physics, but a lot of observational science that may be correct even without formulas behind it.
LeRoux’s ideas neatly tie the general circulation together,
from pole to equator, and across time scales,
at least as far as the surface motion is concerned.
The ITCZ which wets the tropics, results from air mass convergence from the opposite poles. The winter pole creates a greater volume of polar air masses and pushes the ITCZ to the summer hemisphere. This seems to apply everywhere but the Eastern Pacific where the channelling action of the quite meridional alignment of the Andes Mountains explains the exception.
http://memoirs.gsapubs.org/content/201/1/F23.large.jpg
During the last glacial, solar variation tended toward anomalously more sunshine during winter but anomalously less sunshine during summer – hence less melting. This meant less difference between the hemispheres for most of the year, and consequently, the ITCZ was more constrained to a narrower belt around the equator.
But, during the Holocene Climatic Optimum, orbital change meant anomalously more sunshine during summer and anomalously less sunshine during winter. Thus, the winter hemisphere pushed the ITCZ further into the summer hemisphere. With this broader range, the ITCZ wandered into present day Sahara Desert.
Since that time, orbits have again given us the same pattern as the LGM – less sunshine in Arctic Summer, and consequently, the ITCZ does not as easily migrate poleward.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/90/InsolationSummerSolstice65N.png/600px-InsolationSummerSolstice65N.png
When looking at the Jo Nova link regarding Greenland, readers may remember my long article ‘historic variations in arctic ice’ carried here a couple of years ago and then the greatly expanded version carried at wuwt
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/08/22/historic-variations-in-arctic-sea-ice-part-two/
In the interests of fairness I should point out that the second graph in jo nova’s piece appears to go up to around 1970. The graphic from Kinnard is therefore truncated and does not therefore show the huge loss of ice he claims from 1990. I think his is a poor piece of work for reasons stated in my article, but Jo’s graphic does not really represent what he wrote.
My article contains hundreds of scientific reports from the era and since. Basically it is not easy to discern too much difference between sea ice levels between the 1920/40 period and much of the current era (2012 excepted)
The 1930’s and 1940’s are currently the two warmest consecutive decades in Greenland (see article for context) according to Phil Jones.
Whether ice core proxies have much validity is debatable as the arctic does not seem to represent global conditions in general
tonyb
Northern Greenland warmer 1000 years ago, warmer in the 1920s too
The Arctic opens and closes. It has opened and closed in the same bounds for ten thousand years.
This new analysis of Northern Greenland ice cores does support a natural cycle with no influence from man-made CO2.
All researchers should look at this and try to relate it to their own theories and to the theories of others. I believe it strongly supports Pope’s Climate Theory.
http://joannenova.com.au/2015/06/greenland-warmer-1000-years-ago-warmer-in-the-1920s-too/
http://popesclimatetheory.com/page76.html
They think it is just the sun, but solar cycles are not always in the right phase.
The warmer water that made up the moisture that built the ice for the ice core did come from the warm water in the polar oceans and that warm water was circulated by ocean currents from tropical waters.
When the northern oceans are thawed it does snow more.
The warm ocean currents get warmer and cooler and that does open and close the polar oceans.
The sun is not in the right phase for every warming in the past ten thousand years.
Albedo is always in the right cycle for every warming and cooling in the past fifty million years.
People treat ice extent and albedo as a result or feedback.
IR out and Albedo out are the only two things that cool the Earth and IR is always in the wrong direction to have caused any change.
Albedo makes up all the difference and it is always in the right direction at the right time.
No other forcing is always in the right phase to have caused warming or cooling.
The tragic statistical flaw piece understates the problem, IMO. The fundamental is stat packages that automate many stats like P values. But the user has to be aware of underlying assumptions, else the results are not valid. For example, autocorrelation (a phenomenon in much climate data) invalidates OLS, and its Hurst effect reduces the effective N, thereby increasing uncertainty. eschenbachmhad a lovely recent post on this at WUWT. The shame is that competent statisticians are almost never consulted, and peer review does not review such essentials. This leads to dreck like Shakun’s 2012? proxy paper on CO2/ocean temp, torn apart using simple parametric techniques in essay Cause and Effect.
Kahan:
“(here’s what they need to do: get off their lazy asses & do some field research).”
They’re blaming aerosols, which is plausible, but another plausible explanation is that the models just don’t have any skill.
Ak
Indian Monsoon failure is a regular feature of life and has been for centuries.
Kipling wrote of a number of them -based on fact- which caused terrible famine.
http://www.kiplingsociety.co.uk/rg_william1.htm#famine
There is an abundance of British Colonial records which would detail the monsoons appearance or failure. Like all rainfall events there seems to be little regularity to them
tonyb
Well Tony, the whole structure of the Himalaya/Tibetan Plateau complex, including the Tropical Easterly Jet, combined with ENSO and the state of the West Pacific seem well suited to chaotic behaviors due to annual variations in non-linear interactions. I’d expect frequent variations on scales ranging from annual to century or longer, over a wide margin.
And we mustn’t forget the Tarim Basin and Sudden Stratospheric Warming Events associated with it. IMO the regional effects of increased GHG’s are likely to have a larger effect on global climate than any global “forcing” will.
And the GCM’s don’t get any of those regional phenomena even close to right. AFAIK.
Raising Statistical Standards
John Christy’s 2015 testimony to Congress shows that CMIP5 climate model bias is so high that modeled tropospheric temperature predictions from 1979 to present are about 5 times higher than reality!
Such serious non-reproducibility requires Raising the bar on statistical significance
Valen Johnson proposed: Revised standards for statistical evidence PNAS
In the “New paper…” link, Hockey Schtick get completely taken in by a bogus new theory, but it fits into their “alternative” view of physics. In this “theory”, you can get the surface temperature of 288 K by plugging it in as a parameter, then adding CO2 reduces it as long as you don’t consider infrared radiation anywhere. Formidable stuff.
Absolutely false misrepresentation, all so typical of “Jim D,” who in essence claims Maxwell, the greatest physicist in history on the topics of HEAT and RADIATION, and the first to propose the gravito-thermal GHE is entirely due to atmospheric mass/gravity/pressure & NOT radiation, had an allegedly “alternative” view of physics. LOL
The other two greatest physicists in history on the topics of HEAT and RADIATION, Carnot & Clausius agreed with Maxwell’s gravito-thermal GHE. Read Carnot’s book which uses the atmosphere as the “model” for heat engines and corroborates the gravito-thermal GHE of Maxwell. According to Jim D, Jim D knows more than these giants about the physics of heat transfer and radiation in the atmosphere.
In fact, Jim D’s pseudo-scientific Arrhenius radiative GHE is the “alternative” “fissixs”, which confuses the CAUSE with the EFFECT, and fails to account for the DOMINANCE of non-radiative processes of convection & SV condensation over “radiative forcing” & radiative-convective equilibrium in the troposphere.
As Chiningar et al calculate in the linked paper, radiation only accounts for 8.51% of tropospheric heat transfer. Any increase in RF in the troposphere is easily overcome by negative lapse rate feedback, accelerated convection, evaporation, and WV condensation in the upper troposphere.
Contrary to Jim D’s typically false claims, the HS ‘greenhouse equation’ in the post DOES NOT assume the surface temperature or lapse rate in advance and calculates an exact replica of the 1976 US Standard Atmosphere from the surface to top of the troposphere using only the basic principles of the barometric formulas, atmospheric mass/gravity/pressure, and the equilibrium temperature with the Sun, without any “radiative forcing” from GHGs whatsoever.
I have already shot down in greater detail this same false claim from “Skeptical Science” author Glenn Tamblyn in the comments of this post (& in many other posts):
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2015/03/paper-explains-earths-climate-by.html
Hmmm. Maxwell/Clausius/Carnot vs Arrhenius. My understanding is that one of the factors that persuades the IPCC and others that they are on the right track is that their models correctly predict troposphere warming and stratosphere cooling. Question : Is stratosphere cooling equally supported by the two theories, or does it provide a useful indication as to which is correct?
This is a job for Judith.
Apologies: I posted the wrong link for “I have already shot down in greater detail this same false claim from “Skeptical Science” author Glenn Tamblyn in the comments of this post (& in many other posts):”
Correct link: http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2015/07/new-paper-finds-increased-co2-or.html
Mike Jonas: Both GHE theories acknowledge that CO2 and other GHGs act solely as cooling agents to radiatively cool the stratosphere, mesosphere, and thermosphere. Where the Arrhenius radiative GH theory goes horribly wrong is assuming CO2 and other GHGs magically reverse their roles to become warming agents solely within the troposphere. I’ve been asking the warmists for years why CO2 allegedly switches roles from warming agent to cooling agent in the tropopause and have yet to receive a coherent answer. Even Gavin & RC & other prominent bloggers can’t agree on an answer to this fundamental question, and here’s why their various explanations are bogus:
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/08/why-does-co2-cool-stratosphere-warm.html
Unfortunately we have the following:
1. Weather models which rely on and utilize the standard view of GHGs
2. No testable weather model that uses the Carnot approach.
The choice is easy: a Physics that has skill ( albeit not perfect) versus a ‘physics’ that could not predict the next hours weather.
Ask Judith if she is willing to throw standard radiative physics out the window.
Ask Christ and Spencer if they will throw microwave radiative physics out the window along with their temperature work.
Ask a Flir engineer.
A paper does not overturn a paradigm.
Hockey, This Maxwell/Clausius/Carnot paper appears to be doing nothing more than proving a sloppy analogy is a sloppy analogy. The “33C discrepancy” has about 2 C or 10 Wm-2 of slop. TSI/4 has about 2% slop because the tropopause to upper stratosphere and likely even mesosphere aren’t “negligible”. So TSI/4 and the “33C discrepancy” aren’t real “foundations” of GHE just fairly crude approximations used as illustrations. Gravito/thermal is a bit of a novelty sideshow and not a main attraction either. A doubling of CO2 will have about a 1% impact on the rate of energy transfer and none of the “ideal” models of a complex planet can get close to that.
Well…
Only about 1/3 of surface energy is imparted to the atmosphere by radiative forcing.
So if you increase downward forcing 3.7 W/m2 (effectively reducing outward forcing 3.7 W/m2) the temperature will rise will be about 1.23 W/m2 or 0.33 °C.
So there will be forcing but it will be most at night and about 1/3 the predicted value.
The “no warmers” are about 2/3 correct and 1/3 wrong, Arrhenius is about 1/3 correct. Carnot is about 1/3 wrong.
It is bunk, and I stepped aside for Judith who can discern dragonslayer gravitothermal stuff that doesn’t acknowledge infrared radiation. She does draw a line at this, so I want to see what she has to say about this link that she pointed to. This is where this blog can be useful in sorting out the chaff for its readers. They won’t listen to me, but they will listen to Judith. Don’t be fooled by appeals to authority like Maxwell, etc.
No worries HS. It’s fake but accurate (in the Clifford Irving sense), just like Dr. Lew. and Murry Salby.
Hockeyschtick – thanks.
Steven Mosher – we have climate models that rely on and utilise the standard view of GHGs, and consistently overestimate global temperature. Does that help to clarify things?
Steven Mosher | July 4, 2015 at 11:56 pm | says
“Unfortunately” we have the following:
1. Weather models which rely on and utilize the standard view of GHGs
Actually, weather models primarily rely upon the Navier-Stokes equation, which has NO inputs for ‘radiative forcing’ from GHGs. On the contrary, the Navier-Stokes equation inputs are dependent upon PRESSURE/DENSITY gradients, GRAVITY, DYNAMIC & KINEMATIC VISCOSITY, and CORIOLIS forces, NONE of which are related to GHG “radiative forcing,” and the first 4 terms are instead directly related to the derivations of the gravito-thermal GHE.
http://wray.eas.gatech.edu/physicsplanets2012/LectureNotes/Lecture25.pdf
And please read the 1976 US Standard Atmosphere document to see why temperature is a LINEAR function of KINEMATIC VISCOSITY all the way from the surface to the edge of space, and which has absolutely nothing to do with GHG radiative forcing.
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/12/why-atmospheric-temperature-is-linear.html
2. No testable weather model that uses the Carnot approach.
Baloney. Adiabatic processes in the atmosphere as described by Carnot et al form the basis of all of the barometric formulas, including portions of the Navier-Stokes equation.
The choice is easy: a Physics that has skill ( albeit not perfect) versus a ‘physics’ that could not predict the next hours weather.
Already debunked above, the physics that predicts weather is primarily based upon Navier-Stokes, which uses the same barometric relations as the gravito-thermal GHE, NOT radiative forcing from GHGs.
Ask Judith if she is willing to throw standard radiative physics out the window.
Ask Christ and Spencer if they will throw microwave radiative physics out the window along with their temperature work.
Ask a Flir engineer.
There is nothing being “thrown out the window.” As Chilingar et al have calculated, only 8.51% of heat transfer in the troposphere is radiative, and the remaining 91.5% non-radiative heat transfer processes easily overcome and erase with negative feedback from accelerated convection, evaporation, condensation from changes in radiative forcing to DOMINATE the tropospheric radiative-convective equilibrium.
Thank you very much Dr. Curry for posting the link to this paper for discussion. You are the mark of a true scientist who is willing to advance science through discussion of other scientist’s viewpoints, whether or not you or “the consensus” agrees with or endorses their work.
A paper does not overturn a paradigm.
The history of science is rife with papers overthrowing the “consensus.” “”Science is the belief in the ignorance of the experts” – Richard Feynman
CaptDallas says
TSI/4 has about 2% slop because the tropopause to upper stratosphere and likely even mesosphere aren’t “negligible”
That reminds me – the TSI/4 paradigm is actually only true for a planet with a precession angle of 0 degrees. For a planet with a precession angle of 90 degrees, the divider should be TSI/2. Earth has a precession angle of 23.44 degrees which results in a divider of 3.502, not 4. The reason is that each pole receives zero insolation for half of the year, therefore the solar insolation distributed over this smaller surface area is not TSI/4, it is TSI/3.502. This is explained in Chilingar et al and other publications. This is yet another glaring error of the “consensus.”
Gravito/thermal is a bit of a novelty sideshow and not a main attraction either. A doubling of CO2 will have about a 1% impact on the rate of energy transfer and none of the “ideal” models of a complex planet can get close to that.
Gravito-thermal is not a “novelty sideshow” and in fact completely explains the temperature profile of the entire atmosphere including the 220K to 288K tropospheric temperature gradient of 68K. In addition, the Navier-Stokes equation IS the gravito-thermal GHE plus Coliolus forces in REAL TIME, but has nothing to do with GHG radiative forcing.
Assuming doubled CO2 has a 1% impact on the rate of energy transfer, and radiative transfer constitutes only 8.51% of tropospheric heat transfer, the consequence would then be a 0.851% change in heat transfer, i.e. negligible.
Jim D once again makes absolutely false, gross mischaracterizations regarding the gravito-thermal GHE. BTW Jim D, YOU are the main reason I stopped commenting here a couple years ago since you never let any science or evidence get in the way of spouting your asinine opinions on everything. Congratulations on polluting this site with your time-wasting continual nonsense.
The gravito-thermal GHE DOES in fact explain a 33C “greenhouse effect” from the center of mass/ERL to the surface, AND it also explains an ‘anti-greenhouse’ effect from the ERL to the top of the troposphere which is even larger (NEGATIVE 35C) than the +33C “greenhouse effect,” and which replicates millions of observations. Here’s why the Arrhenius radiative GHE confuses CAUSE with EFFECT and DOES NOT explain the NEGATIVE 35C anti-greenhouse effect from the 255K ERL at ~5.1km geopotential altitude to the top of the troposphere:
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/12/why-man-made-global-warming-theory.html
hockeyschtick: radiative transfer constitutes only 8.51% of tropospheric heat transfer
Where does that figure come from. It is certainly disparate to the energy flow diagrams of Stephens el, Trenberth et al, and others.
Despite their assertion, weather models do have radiative transfer, as Judith can attest if and when she shows up, and they would go pretty wrong very quickly without it. This is just another boldly wrong assertion by this crew. I thought Judith evicted the dragonslayers, but they are back in this guise.
I have a post, probably for Tues, on radiative transfer
hockey, “Gravito-thermal is not a “novelty sideshow” and in fact completely explains the temperature profile of the entire atmosphere including the 220K to 288K tropospheric temperature gradient of 68K.”
Pretty much all of physics is design to “explain” stuff and all of the explanations have limits. Gravity and a gaseous atmosphere are going to produce some “ideal” gas law relationship and if you hold the right things constant you can get a “fit”. Once you get out of the “fit” sweet spot range though things aren’t so tidy.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/9/9d/Comparison_US_standard_atmosphere_1962.svg/512px-Comparison_US_standard_atmosphere_1962.svg.png
Below that 220K temperature there is about 12% of the atmosphere remaining that doesn’t follow simple “ideal” models. That 12% is responsible for about 50C warmer than otherwise polar temperatures or somewhere around 10Wm-2 of “global” energy impact. Since the poles are the heat sinks for about 50% of the energy transfer in the lower troposphere, the typically overlooked upper atmosphere is the player causing the most angst for the hardcore believers and skeptics. If you want to “explain” things, explain them to the turbopause at about 184K and 65Wm-2. Then you have only about 50% of GHE/GTE unexplained.
BTW, if you could make Earth’s atmosphere magically all CO2, the turbopause temperature would still be about the same.
Steven Mosher: A paper does not overturn a paradigm.
Granted, that’s hard to refute because “paradigm” is so poorly defined, if it is defined at all. Nevertheless, some papers have had profound impacts, such as Einstein’s of 1905; the Hodgkin-Huxley paper on nerve conduction; the Michelson-Morley experiment; McClintock’s paper on “jumping” genes; Watson and Crick on DNA structure; the first measurement of mid-ocean spreading; the Arrhenius paper on CO2 absorption/emission spectra and global climate; and many others.
You have written the metaphorical equivalent of “An oak tree can not grow from an acorn”, or “A boulder can not start an avalanche”.
HS,
This is what is frustrating about Climate Science for non scientists like me. I’m sure this information however scientific is considered fringe by the mainstream maybe even laughable. It looks good and for all I know 100% correct but it really doesn’t educate me as I am unable to decipher it from the CO2 physics I’ve read. I’ve read things that are kind of inbetween as well. The only thing it does do is keep me uninformed due to conflicting information. Whatever, the future will come and it will show whose right. For now count me ignorant. You certainly should keep up your pursuit of the truth with your convictions you’ll certainly need to stand against the mainstream however much good it will do. Thanks for your imput anyway.
hockeyschtick: I’ve been asking the warmists for years why CO2 allegedly switches roles from warming agent to cooling agent in the tropopause and have yet to receive a coherent answer.
The only “warming agent” is the sun, right? CO2 absorbs LWIR in the bands emitted by the Earth surface, then transmits some of that energy to the atmosphere via molecular collisions (because the mean time to collision is lower than the relaxation time of the radiation-excited CO2 molecule), where the atmosphere is densest. Increased pressure produces increased density which reduces the mean time to molecular collision. Increased CO2 concentration produces increased absorption of radiation, increased rate of transfer of radiant energy to kinetic energy, and decreased rate of transmission of radiant energy from surface to tropopause and higher.
Do you really not understand that? I can see how you might believe it to be wrong or incomplete, but surely you can understand that CO2 does not change from a “warming agent” to a “cooling agent”.
Typo in my reply above to CaptDallas which should read:
Assuming doubled CO2 has a 1% impact on the rate of energy transfer, and radiative transfer constitutes only 8.51% of tropospheric heat transfer, the consequence would then be a 0.0851% change in heat transfer, i.e. negligible.
Chilingar et al have calculated (p 823-824 in the linked paper) only 8.51% of heat transfer in the troposphere is radiative, and the remaining 91.5% non-radiative heat transfer processes easily overcome and erase with negative-feedback from the negative lapse rate feedback & accelerated convection/evaporation/WV condensation resulting from changes in radiative forcing to dominate the tropospheric radiative-convective equilibrium.
It is helpful to use an electrical circuit analogy to illustrate radiative-convective equilibrium in the troposphere. Here are two peer-reviewed papers which do so, both of which illustrate how convection “short-circuits” radiative ‘resistance’ or forcing to dominate radiative-convective equilibrium.
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/11/modeling-of-earths-planetary-heat.html
In addition, increased CO2 ACCELERATES negative-feedback convection & latent heat transfer to the upper atmosphere for three reasons:
1. It has a higher molecular weight than air
2. IR absorbed by CO2 is preferentially transferred by collisions with the other 99.6% of the atmosphere, rather than emission of photons. Some estimates place the frequency of collisions 2-3+ orders of magnitude higher than the likelihood of emission of photons by CO2 in the troposphere. These collisions heat the remaining troposphere to accelerate convection.
3. IR from CO2 is absorbed within the first 10 microns of the ocean surface and is entirely used-up (plus 4X more additional energy from below) in the phase change to water vapor. This latent heat is then carried to the upper troposphere and condenses, cooling the atmosphere and surface.
Also, by Wein’s Displacement Law, the 15 micron emission of CO2 is equivalent to a BB temperature of -80C. Photons/waves from a lower temperature/frequency/energy body at -80C cannot transfer HEAT to a higher temperature/frequency/energy body (surface).
Jim D says gravity/mass/pressure is “bunk” with respect to the atmosphere, and yet again absurdly & falsely claims radiation is not considered by the Maxwell/Clausius/Carnot gravito-thermal GHE. He is, however, absolutely correct about one thing: his realization “they won’t listen to” Jim D.
A paper can begin to overthrow a paradigm, in the simple sense that it first states the new idea that ultimately becomes the new paradigm after the revolution works itself out. The history of science is full of such cases. We in the USA just celebrated a political case, the Declaration of Independence was a paper. Likewise is science.
But there then has to be the revolution that actually overthrows the paradigm. This is a lengthy struggle, a war of ideas (and therefore people). Some revolutions succeed, while others fail. Likewise in science.
hockeyschtick: Chilingar et al have calculated (p 823-824 in the linked paper) only 8.51% of heat transfer in the troposphere is radiative, and the remaining 91.5% non-radiative heat transfer processes
Is there an open access version? The important paper seems to be this one: [1] Sorokhtin, O.G., Chilingar, G.V., Khilyuk, L.F. and Gorfunkel, M.V. (2007) Evolution of the Earth’s Global Climate. Energy Sources, Part A, 29, 1-19.
The “bunk” is the denial of the observation-based energy flows, such as this where we see that the surface receives almost twice as much IR from the atmosphere as solar radiation. No theory ignoring the large IR contribution from the atmosphere is going to make anything balance at the surface.
http://lasp.colorado.edu/home/sorce/files/2011/09/Kiehl_Trenberth_revised.gif
Hockey, “Typo in my reply above to CaptDallas which should read:
Assuming doubled CO2 has a 1% impact on the rate of energy transfer, and radiative transfer constitutes only 8.51% of tropospheric heat transfer, the consequence would then be a 0.0851% change in heat transfer, i.e. negligible.”
The change in radiant heat transfer in the lower troposphere is close to negligible and the 1% change may not end up being all that significant either. That is beside the point though. The majority of radiant heat transfer is in the lower density portion of the atmosphere and that is where just about all simple ideal models just don’t work well enough to be useful. For example a doubling of CO2 will likely cause some cooling in the stratosphere. Well, Arctic and Antarctic winter conditions are similar to stratospheric condition with greater density. You will likely see some additional cooling during polar winters but that increases advective heat flow which should produce some surface warming, Arctic Winter Warming for example which is actually an indication of greater heat loss but results in a “warmer” surface if you consider -26C instead of -30 C warming.
Solar variation has near negligible impact on “troposphere” temperatures based on any “ideal” up/down model, but the variation in ozone production in the stratosphere can have a fairly large impact on polar temperatures which in turn impacts pole ward advection and lower troposphere temperatures. Confidently figuring out what a 1% change will produce in a complex system isn’t all that easy. Simple up/down models are pretty much going to be useless whether Hansen, Maxwell, Carnot, Clausius or anyone else puts their name on them. Right not the modelers are just tickled to death with their up/down radiant kernel “skill, but that isn’t doing them much good at figuring out regional variations is it?.
CD:
“…Arctic Winter Warming for example which is actually an indication of greater heat loss but results in a “warmer” surface if you consider -26C instead of -30 C warming.”
Point an IR measuring device at a cars radiator. It’s warmer than before. The system is working fine. I think these NH pole measuring improvements are finding a similar thing.
matthewmarler says
“The only “warming agent” is the sun, right? CO2 absorbs LWIR in the bands emitted by the Earth surface, then transmits some of that energy to the atmosphere via molecular collisions (because the mean time to collision is lower than the relaxation time of the radiation-excited CO2 molecule), where the atmosphere is densest. Increased pressure produces increased density which reduces the mean time to molecular collision. Increased CO2 concentration produces increased absorption of radiation, increased rate of transfer of radiant energy to kinetic energy, and decreased rate of transmission of radiant energy from surface to tropopause and higher.”
What you are forgetting is that the “decreased rate of transmission of radiant energy from surface to tropopause and higher” is a negligible 8.51% of tropospheric heat transfer per Chilingar et al calculations in the linked paper, in comparison to the 91.5% negative-feedback dominance of the non-radiative processes of accelerated convection & WV latent heat transfer to the top of the troposphere. For example, using CaptDallas’ claim above that doubled CO2 decreases rate of transmission of radiant energy by 1%, 1% of 8.51% is 0.0851%, i.e. negligible & easily overcome by accelerated convection.
From Chilingar et al p 824:
“Physically, an explanation of the cooling effect of the atmosphere with the high content of “greenhouse gases” is the high efficiency of the convective heat transfer from the planet’s surface to the lower stratosphere, from which this heat is rapidly dissipating into the outer space through radiation. As the greenhouse gases absorb the Earth’s heat radiation in the lower layers of troposphere, its energy transforms into the heat oscillations of the
gas molecules. This, in turn, leads to expansion of the gas mixture and its rapid ascent to the stratosphere where the heat excess is lost through radiation into the outer space.”
For these reasons and the others I already mentioned above, CO2 acts as a net cooling agent at all levels of the entire atmosphere.
The primary GHG water vapor also acts as a negative-feedback cooling agent, as proven by the fact that the wet adiabatic lapse rate is one-half of the dry rate, accelerates convection and latent heat transfer, acting as a large net cooling agent for the troposphere.
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/11/why-greenhouse-gases-dont-affect.html
I have a copy of the paper you requested, Evolution of the Earth’s Global Climate. Energy Sources, Part A, but unfortunately don’t know of an open access link.
ragnaar, “CD:
“…Arctic Winter Warming for example which is actually an indication of greater heat loss but results in a “warmer” surface if you consider -26C instead of -30 C warming.”
Point an IR measuring device at a cars radiator. It’s warmer than before. The system is working fine. I think these NH pole measuring improvements are finding a similar thing.”
Yep, if you want to know how efficient the radiator is you consider the source and sink temperatures not the “average” system temperature docha?
hockeyschtick: From Chilingar et al p 824:
That one I have, but those rates are presented, not derived.
Elsewhere I have written that, inasmuch as the rates of the processes of surface cooling are superlinear, and working with the rates of energy transfer presented in Stephens et al, a doubling of the CO2 concentration is not likely to raise the surface temperature even as much as 1C. Like you and those authors, I have written that the non-radiative cooling of the surface has been overlooked. But I am finding the rates presented in Chilingar hard to believe.
hockeyschtick: I have a copy of the paper you requested, Evolution of the Earth’s Global Climate. Energy Sources, Part A, but unfortunately don’t know of an open access link.
If you are willing to email a copy to Prof Curry, she may be willing to email it to me.
Jim D fires back with the Trenberth cartoon and claims,
“The “bunk” is the denial of the observation-based energy flows, such as this where we see that the surface receives almost twice as much IR from the atmosphere as solar radiation. No theory ignoring the large IR contribution from the atmosphere is going to make anything balance at the surface.”
The Trenberth cartoon is false physics for multiple reasons including confusing the CAUSE with the EFFECT and that HEAT cannot be transferred from a higher frequency/temperature/energy body to a lower frequency/temperature/energy body, but for the sake of argument I will assume it can be.
Using Trenberth’s figures, the net IR radiation “recycled” by GHGs is 350 W/m2 – 324 = 26 W/m2 net from GHGs “recycled” to the surface. Although the cartoon shows an atmospheric window of 40 W/m2, Trenberth told Dr. Noor van Andel that the window is actually 60 W/m2, but was fudged in the budget to make things balance.
Thus, a net of 26 W/m2 is “recycled” by GHG “back-radiation” to the surface, plus 60 W/m2 that goes through the atmospheric window, plus 24 thermals + 78 latent heat = 188 W/m2 that is not “recycled” or “trapped” by GHGs.
26/188 = 13.8% of tropospheric heat transfer “trapped” by GHG back-radiation is quite close to the Chilingar et al calculation of the relative contribution of radiative heat transfer in the troposphere of 8.51%.
Using CaptDallas’ claim that doubled CO2 increases IR recycling by 1%, we are left with 1%*13.8% = 0.138%, i.e. negligible even using Trenberth’s own figures. Further, any surface warming due to this 0.138% increase in radiative forcing would easily be dominated by the non-radiative processes plus the atmospheric window.
Question for you Jim D: If I point a solar cooker at the clear sky during the day or the night to concentrate the 324 W/m2 of back-radiation, does the focal point of the solar cooker:
a) increase
b) decrease
c) no change in temperature
Arrgh… meant to write in the last comment
…HEAT cannot be transferred from a lower frequency/temperature/energy body to a higher frequency/temperature/energy body, but for the sake of argument I will assume it can be.
HS, you have some conceptual errors with the physics. IR is not “recycled”, it is emitted by the GHGs and clouds in the sky. However, now that you have admitted that 324 W/m2 is emitted by the sky and keeps the surface warmer than it would be without them, what do you suggest would happen if we increased the GHGs? Conversely, what would happen to the surface net radiation if those GHGs were not there to emit IR, like with an O2/N2 atmosphere that is incapable of doing any what you misname “recycling”? There is a difference in your “recycling” between doubling CO2 and removing GHGs entirely, right?
Jim D asks “what would happen to the surface net radiation if those GHGs were not there to emit IR, like with an O2/N2 atmosphere that is incapable of doing any what you misname “recycling”?”
Off the top of my head, Chilingar et al calculated in another one of their papers that a pure N2/O2 Earth atmosphere would be warmer ~6C than the present atmosphere with GHGs, I’m about to hit the sack right now and haven’t looked up the exact figure.
Why? Please see comments above:
http://judithcurry.com/2015/07/04/week-in-review-science-edition-12/#comment-715491
http://judithcurry.com/2015/07/04/week-in-review-science-edition-12/#comment-715412
The primary GHG water vapor cools the surface by up to 25C, as calculated in this post:
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/11/derivation-of-entire-33c-greenhouse.html
The gravito-thermal GHE is the cause of the 68K temperature gradient/lapse rate from the surface 288K to the top of the troposphere 220K, and the emission spectra seen from space from GHGs are exactly as predicted from the tropospheric lapse rate ‘anchored’ by the center of mass of the atmosphere as illustrated in the 4th fig in this post
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/12/why-man-made-global-warming-theory.html
Of course I don’t believe that IR can be “recycled,” but in essence that is what the Trenberth diagram shows. Do pyrgeometers say there is 324 W/m2 back-radiation? Yes, absolutely, but that is not a measure of HEAT flux/transfer. It is a perversion of the Stephan-Boltzmann law which only applies to the radiative potential of a true blackbody to a 0K target. Claes Johnson has written extensively on this, here is one of several posts explaining why:
http://claesjohnson.blogspot.se/2011/08/how-to-fool-yourself-with-pyrgeometer.html
Photons/waves are indeed bidirectional between hot & cold bodies, however heat transfer is one-way only from hot to cold. Lower frequency/energy photons such as from 15 micron CO2 IR emission do not have sufficient quantum energy to raise electron levels to higher orbitals in a higher frequency/temperature/energy body. Considering the wave/particle duality of light, if you consider light as a wave instead of photons, a lower frequency wave from a colder body causes destructive interference with a warmer higher frequency body and therefore radiation from a cold body is not thermalized, i.e. it cannot warm a hot body.
Jim D, please give me your answer to the solar cooker question above.
Here’s hoping we can have a productive, not destructive, dialog in the future.
HS, you probably noticed how the ground cools much faster under a clear sky than a cloudy one. That difference is IR. Clouds act as insulation. Insulators don’t have to be warmer than the surface to work. They just have to be warmer than clear skies. A blanket doesn’t have to be warmer than the body to keep you warm. A roof doesn’t have to be warmer than a house to keep it warm. You can’t explain anything without IR, and GHGs work as insulators by restricting net heat loss. An O2/N2 sky has no blocking effect, and such a sky would appear very cold and actually transparent to an IR camera. You don’t need a solar cooker to observe 324 W/m2, just an IR camera. Chilingar seems to not believe in the insulating effect of particular gases, which is why I keep telling you that his paper is bunk. You need to be more discerning about what you accept.
Jim D says “HS, how well does a solar cooker work under cloud cover. There can still be 100 W/m2 but it is diffuse. Are you going to cook anything? Think next time.”
Even with cloud cover, a solar cooker DOES concentrate some percentage diffuse far-IR GHG radiation from the sky. Regardless of the % that it concentrates, it is indeed >0%, proven by observations, and it does not matter whatsoever for the purposes of this thought experiment.
Why is this soooo difficult to answer and none of the denziens (except PA) dare answer such a simple qualitative, non-quantitative, basic radiative physics question other than with irrelevant straw man arguments and ad homs?
So, Jim D, I’ll rephrase the question for you again. Assuming a solar cooker pointed at a clear night sky can concentrate ANY % above zero of the usual 324 W/m2 GHG backradiation, does the focal point warm, cool, or no change?
HS, under diffuse light more solar radiation hits the focus directly from all the other angles than bounces off the mirrors. The mirrors do nothing for you compared to leaving the food under the cloud cover. Downward IR is also diffuse and mirrors aren’t going to do much of anything for you. I think you failed your own question.
Fascinating…
http://www.pewinternet.org/2015/07/01/americans-politics-and-science-issues/
So don’t forget, we read in these pages over and over that the vast majority of “skeptics” don’t doubt that the Earth is warming and that ACO2 contributes to that warming, we just don’t know the magnitude of the contribution. We read in these pages over and over that those who doubt that the Earth is warming or that ACO2 contributes to that warming is a tiny minority….
Hmmm…
https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2015/07/pi_2015-07-01_science-and-politics_2-021.png
Fascinating…
Better link:
http://www.pewinternet.org/files/2015/01/PI_ScienceandSociety_Report_012915.pdf
Interesting –
For those who might argue that scientists actively communicating to the public about science is undermining “trust” in science:
:
Sorry – should have pointed out that those polling data were from scientists.
More from the AAAS survey:
Not much change from 2009 (19=0, 84, 4, and 2, respectively)..
sorry…that should have been 10, 84, 4, and 2…
Jo$4ua, so which group do you think is more correct in 2014?
Skeptics generally agree that there has to be some human impact based on the physics, but 2014, prior to the announcement of the warmest year EVAH (possibly) was at the end of an ~17 year period of no statistically significant warming doncha know. Since then we have some new adjusted versions of temperature data that purports to eke out some statistically significant warming, but “global” temperatures haven’t really changed much in the past 17 years and there are plenty of US regions that have little if any warming compared to the 1930s and 40s especially in the more rural red states.
http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/itlt_60b2_United_States_contiguous.png
To some “solid” evidence wouldn’t be constantly adjusted data sets to eke out some warming. It might be evidence, but not solid evidence. Solid evidence would be something a bit more obvious and closer to home for many.
Cap’n –
==> “Skeptics generally agree that there has to be some human impact based on the physics,…”
As a “skeptic,” I’m sure that you must have some solid, empirical evidence to support that claim. Could you please provide me with a link?
Some “skeptics” in these threads seem to be prone to thinking that extrapolating from an outlier group – such as “skeptics” who are active online in the “skept-o-sphere”- s a valid way to generalize about the larger segment of the public who are unconcerned about the risks that ACO2 might pose to the climate.
Surely, you’re not one of them, right?
Jo$4ua, no links are required for my opinion or yours since neither would be “solid” evidence would they? Solid evidence for AGW would be observations above the projected model mean not observations hovering around the minimum and the “observations” requiring some tweaking from time to time to maintain that. At least some might have that opinion.
Cap’n –
==> “no links are required ”
I guess I’m a bit of a sticker. IMO, if someone is stating an opinion, they should state an opinion, not proclaim a fact; particularly, if they consider themselves as a generally skeptical person.
Now as for our differing opinions…
I’m not aware of any broad-based polling of the public’s views on the physics of the GHE. But we do have some actual evidence, which is somewhat related, on which to base opinions.
A rather high % of the subsection of the public who align with “skeptics” w/r/t ACO2 voice the opinion that there has (definitively) been no warming over the past couple of decades or that there is no evidence of warming.
I think that indirect evidence supports some speculation about the broader “skeptical” public’s views on the GHE – IOW speculation that would not be consistent with your opinion originally stated as fact.
J#shua”s habitual request for links is pointless and disingenuous.
Jo$4ua, “I guess I’m a bit of a sticker. IMO, if someone is stating an opinion, they should state an opinion, not proclaim a fact; ”
Has anyone ever recommend remedial reading and comprehension to you?
“Skeptics generally agree that there has to be some human impact based on the physics,..”
Generally is a wiggle word as is “some” and are often associated with “opinions”. What you should do is assume all blog comments are opinions unless someone mentions that they are stating facts. That is a generally sound way of interpreting blog comments.
Back to the actual point, an Aug 2014 survey question, ” There is solid evidence the Earth is getting warmer….”
72 percent think there is “solid” evidence there is warming and 45% think either there is no warming or it is natural if there is, versus 46% that think there is “solid” evidence of man caused warming. Whether the Earth is warming or not depends on what start date you pick and what data you think is more “scientific” if you are so inclined or personal experience if you are not. (Remember they surveyed “normal”Americans bored enough to complete a survey). Not what I would consider a very scientific survey question, but that is what you posted. Oddly, about 50% of the respondents that had an opinion didn’t think humans where to blame for warming, solid or otherwise.
http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/itlt_60b2_United_States_contiguous.png
If you just glace at the UAH version 6 beta data, it is easy to see why some might not consider that to be “solid” evidence of warming if that happens to be their data of choice.
If you happen to use JimD as a source you would see that he goes to some length to enhance the evidence. He would be in the 46% group. To some, having to “enhance”, “adjust”, “tweak” etc. evidence tends to make it less “solid”. But respondents looking at longer term temperature anomaly would be more likely to agree there is more solid evidence of “warming”.
http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/ihadcrut4_0-360E_-90-90N_n.png
The average bored survey answering American doesn’t seem to have Lew and Cook on their favorites list it seems. It is fun to see how y’all interpret the numbers though.
Did I miss seeing a memo? Why is everyone replacing letters in a certain annoying trolls name with @ # $ &?
Has the little fella finally been declared unmentionable?
Don, “Has the little fella finally been declared unmentionable?”
Roger that
Thanks for the confirmation, capt. The little fella must be very proud of himself.
J0shua | July 4, 2015 at 3:36 pm |
“I guess I’m a bit of a sticker. IMO, if someone is stating an opinion, they should state an opinion, not proclaim a fact;”
“A rather high % of the subsection of the public who align with “skeptics” w/r/t ACO2 voice the opinion that there has (definitively) been no warming over the past couple of decades or that there is no evidence of warming.”
Do you have some evidence of that “rather high %” or is just an opinion?
J0shua | July 4, 2015 at 3:36 pm
“I guess I’m a bit of a sticker. IMO, if someone is stating an opinion, they should state an opinion, not proclaim a fact;”
“A rather high % of the subsection of the public who align with “skeptics” w/r/t ACO2 voice the opinion that there has (definitively) been no warming over the past couple of decades or that there is no evidence of warming.”
Do you have some evidence of that “rather high %” or is just an opinion?
off the top of my head..
in the skewed sample of online skeptics
50% reject the notion that there has been any statistically significant warming since 1850.. ( LIA denialist)
50% think there has been some warming… but the data is far too uncertain.
two camps: no warming,, and warming BUT.
What about the other 50percent?
Tonyb
How many of those do you suppose are simply picking the option they think supports their political position?
Mosher, you left out the group, which may be quite large, that says we do not know if there has been any warming or not, prior to the satellite era. I am in that group. Skepticism and denial are two very different positions. Claiming there has been no warming is a very strong empirical claim. Claiming we do not know is in a way no claim at all. Do you see the difference? Probably not.
Then too, the satellites say the warming shown in the surface statistical models, like BEST, did not happen in the atmosphere. How does that fit into your silly survey?
“off the top of my head..”
And such a fine point it is.
The top of your head, that is, not what came off it.
The consensus regarding Steven’s utterance seems to be false dichotomy.
The “CO2 emissions threaten ocean crisis” article’s results are from experiments. I assume those are lab experiments, but the article is heavy on dramatic predictions of doom and very light on the science. Lab experiments “predicted” a less alkaline ocean would be bad for coral. But when a natural environment with those conditions was studied, the lab experiments turned out to be wrong.
Will (some of) these guys ever stop the hyperbole before results are replicated and verified? Prolly not.
Will…these guys ever stop…
Most will never stop – they have invested their career, actually much of the finite time of their life, into this meme and they are not going to let go. Science advances one funeral at a time.
Joshua, so which group do you think is more correct in 2014?
Skeptics generally agree that there has to be some human impact based on the physics, but 2014, prior to the announcement of the warmest year EVAH (possibly) was at the end of an ~17 year period of no statistically significant warming. Since then we have some new adjusted versions of temperature data that purports to eke out some statistically significant warming, but “global” temperatures haven’t really changed much in the past 17 years and there are plenty of US regions that have little if any warming compared to the 1930s and 40s especially in the more rural red states.
http://climexp.knmi.nl/data/itlt_60b2_United_States_contiguousa.png
To some “solid” evidence wouldn’t be constantly adjusted data sets to eke out some warming. It might be evidence, but not solid evidence. Solid evidence would be something a bit more obvious and closer to home for many.
Above ground carbon loss in…tropical forests…
From the abstract: “…Latin America accounts for 43% of gross AGC loss and 54% of natural forest AGC loss, with Brazil experiencing the highest AGC loss for both categories at national scales. We estimate gross tropical forest AGC loss and natural forest loss to account for 11% and 6% of global year 2012 CO2 emissions…”
Most of the forest loss in Brazil is caused by the deliberate, and illegal, burning of the forest to convert it to soybean, palm oil and most of all, beef production. I would bet that this is also responsible for most of the global species and diversity loss as well. Brazil has laws but little enforcement and a culture of corruption. In doesn’t look good. :(
It’s been a few years since the MAGIC cruises. Has there been, as a result, any improvement in our understanding of cloud dynamics?
Richard
Secret Science Reform Act of 2015
AKA The Suppress Environmental Science Act of 2015.
This is just plain vindictive – but completely unsurprising seeing as it comes from the extreme right wing ideology I see displayed at every climate skeptic web site. If these new rules had any merit they would apply to ALL government sponsored research, not just the EPA. Do you think the Dept. of Defense or Dept. of Health & Human Resources would lay down and take this? Not a chance. You would have the entire defense contractor base and a army of angry medical lobbyist descend on Congress like fire and brimstone. It would make the biblical plague of locust look like a gentle spring rain by comparison.
But even this is mild compared to what conservatives are capable of. Check this out:
“Legislative Republicans on Thursday passed sweeping changes to the state’s open records law that would dramatically curtail the kind of information available to the public about the work that public officials do.
The proposal blocks the public from reviewing nearly all records created by lawmakers, state and local officials or their aides, including electronic communications and the drafting files of legislation. The language was included in the final version of the state’s 2015-17 budget, which passed the Legislature’s budget committee on a party-line vote late Thursday.”
When reporters asked who sponsored this legislation not a single elected official knew who inserted the language in to the budget. ???
They might as well abolish the office Attorney General since it’s doubtful there will ever be anyone to prosecute.
http://host.madison.com/wsj/news/local/govt-and-politics/republicans-vote-to-dramatically-scale-back-oversight-of-lawmakers-other/article_8901f2df-1ec2-5e74-b6ea-4a1f006aacf5.html
This is so bad it makes Obama’s war on government leaks and whistle blowers look totally reasonable.
Jack
This applies only to Wisconsin, right?
I don’t know the background and why this bill has been brought forward but if you go to the comments you will find a petition against it. I suggest you sign it and contact your senator.
Tonyb
I doubt a Texan would have standing signing their petition. I have seen similar legislation introduced in Texas but nothing this extreme. One of Rick Perry’s last act as Governor was to block access to most of his official records between his office and local government employees. You can still request records of correspondence between the Governor and the legislature though. Good ol’ Rick Perry, started in politics as a common democrat public servant back in the 80’s, never held a private sector job for 30 years and some how managed to amass a multi-million dollar fortune on a government salary. Top that off with the fact he started drawing on his state pension years before he ever left office. Talk about double dipping – he made it a science.
Fun fact: When Mitt Romney left office in Massachusetts he rounded up key computers and servers in the Governor’s office, replaced them with his own money and promptly had them ground to dust. Who knows what was on them, maybe the master plans for ObamaCare since it was cloned from the original Massachusetts RomneyCare.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/news/nation/2011/11/17/before-leaving-governor-office-mitt-romney-staff-eliminated-mail-records/xIVEQd87zi0X0tl8KrXKYM/story.html
The real tragedy is the loss to future historians. Can you imagine where we be today if Madison had burned the original Federalist Papers? I think this kind of behavior is criminal because it robs future generations of their heritage.
Jack
What Romney did sounds similar to Hilary Clintons hiding of data.
In the UK some 1 million Documents up to 200 years old were hidden from the public instead of being released under the 30 year rule
http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/oct/18/foreign-office-historic-files-secret-archive
I guess it’s good that we know about these things happening as I am sure other countries have unnecessary secrets that will never be found out.
Hope the Wisconsin affair ends well for you
Tonyb
New paper finds another non-hockey-stick in China
Go back to the records from the Roman and Medieval Time periods and see if the same cycles were in place then. If this happened before, then it is most likely that the natural cycles caused what happened recently.
New paper finds that climate change can be calculated without the greenhouse gas effect or radiative forcing:
Anthropogenic and Natural Forcings as Functions of Emission Time
Development in Earth Science (DES) Volume 3, 2015, http://www.seipub.org/des doi: 10.14355/des.2015.03.001 1
Nabilswedan
There are several interesting papers on the link including the paper by Miskolczi from 2014
Is this journal considered reputable and peer reviewed?
Tonyb
Dear Tony,
The review process does not mean that the paper is right; It is just worth publication. Few of us can be wrong, but all of us can never be wrong. It is the public, the 7 billion people, who ultimately makes the judgment. You are one of them. So what do you think of the content of the paper?
Paper mathematics is straight forward and has been reviewed by over 8,000 people including the finest 100+ climatologists. It is a summary of my book titled “Global Warming Calculation and Projection” that was published in 2009. Projection of sea level and surface temperature rise as you will find have been on track since 2007. Therefore the mathematics of the paper works in the real world and has passed the test of eight years so far. I see no reason why it should not be good for the longer term projection.
I hope that this modest publication with a modest journal will help in explaining what is wrong with our climate science and how to fix it.
Correction…
Paper mathematics is straight forward, which is a summary of my book titled “Global Warming Calculation and Projection” that was published in 2009. The book has been reviewed by over 8,000 people including the finest 100+ ……….
Thanks for the link.
PDF is here: http: http://www.pacificengineeringpllc.com/app/download/8221002/DES96389+(5).pdf
On first glance it is quite similar to the Chilingar et al papers and HS ‘greenhouse equation,’ once again corroborating the 33C gravito-thermal greenhouse effect in favor of the Arrhenius radiative greenhouse effect.
Talk about your mixed messages:
http://www1.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/cmb/sotc/drought/2015/05/zin-201505.gif
http://droughtmonitor.unl.edu/data/pngs/20150630/20150630_conus_trd.png
Jim2, interesting. But a gentle chiding, since you intrigued me enough to check howmsuchna thing coild be possible. You are comparing apples to oranges. The upper figure is the NOAA monthly Palmer index, which does wet and dry. The lower figure is USDA Drought monitor for ag, based in Lincoln Nebraska. It uses a 1-3 month soil moisure/precipitation index including expert opinion relative to ‘normal’ crop water expectations for that time in the growing season. There is no wet to the USDA figure. The USDA supplemental info does give a rough correspondence between its ‘D’ levels and the Palmer drought index, but it is only a rough set of ranges since based on different metric sets. Sure enough, ag conditions in California are terrible. Most of the rest of the country is ‘ag’ normal, including the east coast.
Thanks for that explanation. Now that I know “expert opinion” is factored into the drought monitor index, I can see why it is as it is. :)
Jim2, the USDA ‘experts’ are agronomists and farmers. I trust them. :)
Scientists struggle to understand South Asian heat waves [link]
“They [meteorologists] say low air pressure, high humidity and an unusually absent wind played key roles in making the heat unbearable but they do not know why such conditions prevailed at this time of the year.”
“… people felt as if it was 49C (the heat index) while the actual temperature was 43C.”
“Whereas in the southern part of Pakistan, the recorded temperature was 47C and yet people felt as if it was just around 41C because that part had high air pressure and low humidity and therefore no one died there.”
If I understand correctly, a high heat index is what kills and not an elevated temperature in and of itself.
It seems to me that the prediction for catastrophe in 2100 needs to include not only an increase in temperature, but low air pressure, high humidity and no breeze. The perfect storm.
I wonder; can the GCMs predict the perfect storm? When and if they can, then maybe GCMs will become useful. Until then…prayer seems to do just about as well as anything else.
We have put together a scheme for predicting heat index (relies on temp and humidity, which are forecast by the weather models). In spite of pitching this to Ahmedabad and weather service providers in the U.S., so far we have no takers.
They use heat index to decide whether to open cooling centers in Chicago. Wonder why Rahm would not be interestd in more advanced warning to prepare for staffing and such? Maybe just budget priorities, as the city is broke?
The alarmism needs disasters. When you forecast something that could prevent or diminish a disaster.and you are right, that does diminish the alarmism that they need. Look for a different customer, others do care.
If it could save lives why not give them a free trial period? You already generate a lot of the supporting data for your existing commercial customers and like yesterdays newspaper it’s nearly worthless when it’s past it’s ‘use by’ date anyway.
No takers? Then you need to develop a more useful product. Welcome to the industrial marketplace. It’s not like winning NSF grants.
curryja,
This may be a little OT.
I suggested to Steven Mosher on a previous thread that a forecast of temperature, made purely by forecasting that tomorrow’s temperature would be the same as today’s, had an accuracy of something like 85%.
This would indicate that any professional temperature forecast would need to do better than 85%, to be declared skilful.
Steven Mosher declared that I was wrong, and the true figure would be 10%.
Oh well. I looked up the official Bureau of Meteorology figures for the official shared airport facility in my town, for the previous 12 months, ending June 2015. This was to avoid suggestions of cherry picking.
Surprise, surprise! Over a 365 day period, the naive forecast had an 89.86% success rate, and I’m sure Steve Mosher won’t mind if I round it up to 90%. By the way, that 90% is on the basis that tomorrow’s temperature is within one standard deviation of today’s. I’m not sure what accuracy commercial forecasters claim.
Even stranger, a study by a commercial supplier of wind turbines, showed that the naive persistence forecast for wind strength varied between 73% and 78%, depending on the time of day.
Maybe percentages and probabilities need a bit more examination, before being held up as measurements of forecasting skill. Without a comparison baseline – the naive forecast – things may appear much better than they should.
RiHo08,
You quoted –
“They [meteorologists] say low air pressure, high humidity and an unusually absent wind played key roles in making the heat unbearable but they do not know why such conditions prevailed at this time of the year.”
I am intrigued by the “unusually absent wind.” It seems as though meteorologists have been seduced by the lure of climatology, where something that doesn’t happen is classed as “unusual”.
For example, climatologists, rather than accept that the Earth is not warming in line with rising CO2 levels, make claims of “missing heat”, or “unusual” aerosols, or strange oscillations with interesting acronyms. Unusual, indeed.
The lack of warming definitely appears to be “unusually absent” over the last 18 years or so, that is, if it ever existed in the first place.
In relation to climatological predictions, common sense and acceptance of reality are “usually absent”. This is a pity, because it has diverted resources from research which might have actually produced some useful results – such as finding out why the wind in question didn’t blow as expected.
Bah! Humbug!
There’s a warm wind blowing on this blog.
The science of gerrymandering:
https://img.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/files/2015/03/gerry.png
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2015/03/01/this-is-the-best-explanation-of-gerrymandering-you-will-ever-see/
apropos of what?
Gerrymandering.
https://img.washingtonpost.com/wp-apps/imrs.php?src=https://img.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/files/2014/05/districts-03.png&w=1484
The praying mantis (Sarbanes-MD) proves that gerrymandering isn’t just a Republican pastime.
You might like this, JimD:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2014/06/03/this-computer-programmer-solved-gerrymandering-in-his-spare-time/
Thanks for the non-answer. It reinforces the impression that you’re a useless tool.
> Thanks for your non-answer.
Your rhetorical question was more than welcome, Big Dave.
Only a highbrow organization like the NAS could try to sail this one past us. (Hint NAS: Electric cars are way too expensive!!!)
From the article:
…
A report from the National Academy of Sciences looks at barriers and adoption.
…
One of the more challenging jobs the auto industry has right now is explaining to consumers that the future isn’t going to be like the past. We desperately need to reduce vehicle carbon emissions in order to avoid turning the planet into a hellscape, and that means turning to cars with some kind of energy storage other than hydrocarbons we’ve dug up from the ground and then distilled. That’s where people get confused and the message stalls, a problem laid out in a recent report from the National Academy of Sciences.
…
As you might expect given the Academy’s role in advising the government, the report calls for stable federal funding for improving the energy density of batteries, as well as making batteries safer and more durable. It also calls for more research to understand the role of public charging infrastructure versus in-home or workplace charging, financial incentives to purchase PEVs (as well as research into what sorts of consumer incentives actually work), and the incorporation of charging infrastructure into building codes, among other recommendations.
…
http://arstechnica.com/cars/2015/07/why-dont-we-drive-more-electric-vehicles/
Jim2, great catch. The NAS problem that the government has spent many billions on better battery research, plus development and manufacturing grants and loan guarantees. Heck, my own company even got $2million for enhanced supercap carbons. (we succeeded). Did not save A123 or EnerVault ( my guest post on grid storage earlier this week).
Batteries are not a funding problem. $billions are thrown at them annually. They are a electrochemistry fundamentals problem. You can have high energy density at the expense of power density. You can have high power density at the expense of cycle life. You can have high cycle life at the expense of both energy and power density. You need some minimum of all three, well good luck. Cannot get there. A grass earing snake. Nevermind a little cost detail. You end up with Tesla and Chevy Volt. Both woefully inadequate
Rud
The Department of Defense has been doing battery research for decades.
Also, please note my comment back to you:
http://judithcurry.com/2015/06/25/scientists-speaking-with-one-voice-panacea-or-pathology/#comment-713576
This comment regarded the AR5 use of paleoclimate reconstructions when estimating internal variability. Looks like the attribution authors eventually realized that the paleo data used in AR3 and AR4 is flawed; ithey gave up completely the use of paleclimate reconstructions for this estimate.
We desperately need to reduce vehicle carbon emissions in order to avoid turning the planet into a hellscape,
That has not been proven with real data. Only flawed climate models indicate any problems.
http://popesclimatetheory.com/page76.html
Numerous science papers were written using the standard SIDC sunspot numbers. These are now replaced by new WDC-SILSO ‘corrected’ sunspot numbers, using totally different listing scale. In addition conversion from the old numbers to new has been subject to a variable correction factor for whole of the historic data from 1700 to 2014.
Since the old numbers are not available any longer, and no conversion factor is available, I have normalised the new data to the old scale.
Purpose of this is that the papers and articles published before 1st July 2015, can be assessed against new ‘corrected’ and now recognised as the only valid sunspot numbers.
In this link
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/NEW-SSN-annual.htm
there is a graphic and numerical (table) comparison of the old and the new sunspot numbers normalised to the old scale.
It is not important what sunspot numbers are used, because it is all relative.
What is important is the solar/climate connection is still just as strong no matter what sunspot numbers are used.
Sunspot numbers being the worst indicator for solar activity in my opinion. Subjective ,not objective and other solar metrics such as solar wind speed, ap index and solar flux are much more objective and should be the metrics of choice when evaluating solar activity.
Tom Fuller’s full parenthesized quote is MarkSteynian:
Sadly, my knowledge of show tunes is both limited and unpopular, although the unpopularity might be due more to the quality of my voice than the songs themselves.
Science News (…and now something completely different) Climate scientists discover extreme climate conditions during the Recent Epoch that every freshman Geology 3 student knows cold: Salbyists salivate, Klimate Velikovskyists recoil, peanut gallery amazed.
Judith, has there been any change in the anchovy & ENSO situation since your article of May11, 2015? If this is the correct place to ask?
I feel it is these four factors (Milankovitch Cycles, Solar Variability ,Geo Magnetic Field Strength ,Land/Ocean Arrangements/Ice Dynamic ) which govern the climate of the earth and give it a beat of 1500 years or so but never in some regular fashion ,that again being due to what I said in the above and what follows.
The factors that govern the big picture when it comes to the climate are Milankovitch Cycles, Solar Variability, and these last three, the Geo Magnetic Field Strength of the Earth , Land /Ocean Arrangements/ Ice Dynamic those last three (geo magnetic field, land/ocean arrangements/ice dynamic) determining how effective Milankovitch Cycles and Solar Variability will be when it comes to impacting the climate.
This explains why the 1470 year climate cycle is there but it is a semi cyclic feature with variability.
In addition the evidence is mounting that the climate changes in sync in both hemispheres which eliminates a redistribution of energy within the climatic system for the reason why the climate changes ,which is on weak grounds to begin with ,and strengthens the fact that it is only changes in the total energy coming into the climatic system that can change it enough to bring it into another climate regime.
I also expect lag times between solar major changes and climate are around 10 -20 years depending on the degree of magnitude change.
Those that claim longer such as the article that came out recently that said up to 150 years are in effect saying there is no solar /climate connection.
The Maunder, Dalton minimum in-fact the historical climatic record showing
very long lag times between solar/climate are not present.
The variability of solar forcing is at the scale of weather, the lag to changes in atmospheric circulation is in days. I have correlations of the planetary ordering of the solar signal at such scales through CET back to 1659, and back several more hundred years with the aid of Tony Brown’s and others compilations of British weather journals and diaries.
Current climate models are inside out, the natural variability of atmospheric teleconnections is neither internal or chaotic, but a fairly immediate response to variations in a solar metric that the climate models do not even consider as a direct forcing. The orthodox model is analogous to the geocentric model of the solar system that the Pope defended 400 years ago.
Look carefully where -NAO increases most in the Dalton Minimum and the coldest run of years on CET are, and there’s zero Aurora sightings, page 11:
http://www.leif.org/EOS/92RG01571-Aurorae.pdf
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0277379113001145
Ulric, maybe it is different for prolonged solar minimum periods as evidence from this article suggest.
Maybe what is different for prolonged solar minima?
Look carefully where -NAO increases most in the Dalton Minimum and the coldest run of years on CET are, and there’s zero Aurora sightings, page 11:
http://www.leif.org/EOS/92RG01571-Aurorae.pdf
very telling data.
You should credit me when you quote what I wrote.
Also look at El Nino frequency 1807-1817:
https://sites.google.com/site/medievalwarmperiod/Home/historic-el-nino-events
The NAO cyclicity is strongest during the LIA while the AMO cyclicity is absent.
Ulric, the article is suggesting that during the Little Ice Age (prolonged solar minimum) it looks like the AMO phase did not respond to the NAO phase.
I thought I did through the reply. I will make sure to mention you in the future.
That reply should be below where I wrote “Maybe what is different for prolonged solar minima?”, not here. Can you please post your responses in the same comment thread.
So they claim that the AMO mode didn’t change much through the LIA, and NAO periodicity changed. There really isn’t enough information there to conclude that AMO did not respond to the NAO then.
Attribution visualized (h/t Realclimate)
http://www.bloomberg.com/graphics/2015-whats-warming-the-world/
JIm. where is internal variability in that chart? Also, I’ve seen a few papers recently that associate the depth of solar penetration with changing ocean currents. That keeps going and there are going to be huge problems for the forcings people as they find feedbacks are very different for different sources of forcing.
The largest internal variability is ENSO, and those are the wiggles you see.
No, that’s the result of a total of 5 runs so most of the natural variability has canceled out.
Internal variabilty of course I meant to say.
It is true that internal variability cancels itself, so in the long run we just have to worry about the forcing change, don’t we? Internal variability is a red herring in the debate about century scales, and can go either way anyway as you think a century ahead. So you plan for a forcing change and add error bars on both sides for internal variability.
I assume it has also had the drift corrected since that is standard procedure fior modol runs that appear to exhibit drift. Basically any possible internal variability from the model has been minimized and we are left with a curve fitting exercise.
Jim D – No, internal variability does not cancel itself, and it is not a red herring on century scales. Take a look at the Vostok data – – from 78277BP to 78200BP (77 years) the temperature fell 2.24 deg (0.3 deg per decade, faster than the CO2 warming forecast now). In the next 87 years it fell a further 1.2 deg. In this period, CO2 was recorded as 227 to 229 ppm.
Jim, the models show internal variability on centennial scales, didn’t you know that?
steven, you take out the solar variations and volcanoes and what internal variability have you seen on a centennial scale. Can one century be even a degree warmer in the global average than the previous one on internal variation alone in those models, and why has that size variation not been seen in past centuries even with solar and volcanic forcing changes present? We are not talking about anything that rivals CO2 in scale here.
Jim, such an easy question. What change in external forcing caused the Younger Dryas?
It occurred during a rapid Milankovitch-forced transition. There were some metastable states caused by differential melting. I would not use that as an example of the current climate. We should be in a Milankovitch cooling trend favoring Arctic sea ice, but you can see that is not happening lately.
Jim, so it just sprang right back in about 1000 years? Better oil that spring up. I don’t see why internal variability must be limited to either being strong enough to throw us back into an ice age or too weak to matter with absolutely nothing in between. The Arctic is going to burn you guys. Start warming up your ‘we said the Arctic would get its ice back all along despite you skeptics saying it couldn’t happen’ arguments before you need them so they aren’t as bad as the hiatus fiasco.
The Arctic is not recovering. CO2 levels of 400-500 ppm are not compatible with Arctic sea ice if you go by history.
Jim D:
“Internal climate variability, by which we mean climate variability not forced by external agents, occurs on all time-scales from weeks to centuries and millennia… …Thus the climate is capable of producing long time-scale internal variations of considerable magnitude without any external influences.” – IPCC
Saying that the Younger Dryas was a result of a metastable state allows them into the shorter term. We can wonder if the PDO, AMO and ENSO are examples of shorter term metastable states? I would use the Younger Dryas as a possible example of the current climate.
You need something very large to affect global climate. Greenland melting significantly is an example of the scale you need. Not many other candidates out there. What else are you thinking about of that scale?
When I see the ocean heat content of the North Atlantic stop dropping I’ll wonder if the Arctic will recover. So far it has been dropping right along with the drop in ocean heat transport and it is just a matter of time. If you go by history it take energy to melt ice and the energy has to be where the ice is.
There is a spot off Greenland that has not warmed in the last century. Rahmstorf had an article on it recently. I think it is modulated by Greenland’s melt somehow. It started to cool again recently. Not necessarily good news, given what it may be a sign of.
https://www.pik-potsdam.de/news/press-releases/atlantic-ocean-overturning-found-to-slow-down-already-today
I don’t think there is any doubt it is caused by melt water from greenland. You can follow the drop in pH from greenland to the cold spot. The rest of the paper is pretty questionable. All other reconstructions that I am aware of show ocean heat transport increasing up until very recently.
steven, you seem to have a slight prejudice when it comes to plausible tipping points in the ocean circulation. Not surprising to me that the ocean heat transport is increasing when the global SST and heat content is rising.
LOL Jim, it isn’t suprising to me if the transport is increasing while the temperature increases either.
You are aware that the graph is manufactured. The “temperature” line is not actual temp data but from a model output.
Jim, yes if you had 5 real worlds and averaged them out then the internal variability would probably cancel out. How many real worlds are we comparing the model runs to again?
When the ocean has a net rise in heat content, it is not internal variability. It is externally caused by definition. The ocean just doesn’t do that by itself.
Thanks Jim, you have just proven the GISS model that is the basis for graph you linked to be totally wrong because that model does in fact show that changing ocean heat transport changes the energy budget. I guess you won’t be posting that anymore.
El Ninos change the energy budget too. That doesn’t mean models are wrong to represent this. The energy balance is like a spring, large perturbations last a very short time (see 1998), but the background forcing change moves the center point. Don’t let the oscillations make you take your eye off the long-term trend. The forcing trend has no restoring force from the Planck feedback, unlike internal oscillations.
Likely true, Jim, But until you can define how long the oscillations can last you can’t define long term. The Younger Dryas last how long again?
That was a transitional climate. If we are in a transitional climate now, it is towards something more Eocene-like. Tipping points happen. You could dump enough Greenland ice to stop the Gulf Stream and temporarily cool Europe while the world is in a warming state. Global warming doesn’t mean everywhere all the time, just on average.
Jim, so it was internal variability and now you engage in special pleading.
Like I said, there are some large tipping points that could affect the balance. Greenland is one. Possibly it was a large melt-lake flowing out for the Younger Dryas. If you are pleading for a tipping point like that to save us from warming, OK, but don’t rest your hopes on Greenland, even if that is the most likely candidate. The warming may not be monotonic, as we saw before, but the forcing prevailed and the Holocene began. Milankovitch is relatively slow and weak compared to the changes going on now.
Keep at it, yimmy. I think they are starting to waver. Give it all you got. Paris could be the very last of all the last chances to save our planet, and our children, and our children’s children and blah..blah..blah
http://assets.climatecentral.org/images/made/5_2_13_news_andrew_co2800000yrs_1050_591_s_c1_c_c.jpg
Just saying the obvious.
Large tipping points or no variability at all? I think you are being a bit extreme. There has been a lot of variability measured in the AMOC in just the short period of time we have had reasonably accurate measurements for it and Greenland is still covered with ice.
http://i.imgur.com/uJHIcRm.jpg
That picture of CO2 levels looks wonderful to me. Perhaps we should raise the CO2 level more – after all the deserts aren’t completely green yet.
100% less glaciers too. What’s not to like?
Jim D | July 9, 2015 at 12:20 am |
100% less glaciers too. What’s not to like?
http://www.dmi.dk/uploads/tx_dmidatastore/webservice/b/m/s/d/e/accumulatedsmb.png
Well…
http://www.arctic.noaa.gov/reportcard/greenland_ice_sheet.html
6 GT loss last year from Greenland.
Ice mass is still above last year at this time. We could be in for another 6 GT year.
There are 3000 teratons of Greenland Ice. At 6 GT per year it will take 500,000 years to melt the ice sheet. Even at 200 GT/year the Greenland ice sheet will be there for 15,000 years.
The 100% less glacier claim is absurd. The ice sheet will still be around when the interglacial ends.
You folks might find this treatment of the global temperature anomalies since 1881:
http://gsjournal.net/Science-Journals/Research%20Papers-Climate%20Studies/Download/6128
Where is the water vapor attribution in the graphics? This raises to me an interesting question. Water vapor levels without CO2 should be enough to run a GCM reasonably accurately as they are most of the effect.
Water vapor is part of the feedback, not the forcing. It will respond whether it is CO2 or the sun doing the forcing.
Looking at Humlum’s plots, water vapor levels don’t seem to be doing so over the past 67 years. Anyone know of attribution studies looking at the change in temperature versus the change in specific or relative humidity to derive the water vapor feedback?
It has become almost impossible to keep up with the literature in ocean heat transport recently. According to google scholar the counts for the phrase “ocean heat transport” number 17,800 since 2011, 17,200 since 2014, and 12,900 in just the first 6 months of 2015. Even just reading the titles to find those that sound most interesting has become a real chore.
“At its peak around 6,000 years ago, Palaeolake Mega-Chad was the largest freshwater lake on Earth, with an area of 360,000 km2.”
A little misleading. Not the biggest freshwater lake ever or even known in the last 20,000 years. IIRC Lake Agassiz has that distinction.