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The Carbon Dioxide Greenhouse Effect
So even if water vapor in the lower layers of the atmosphere did entirely block any radiation that could have been absorbed by CO2, that would not keep the gas from making a difference in the rarified and frigid upper layers. Those layers held very little water vapor anyway. And scientists were coming to see that you couldn't just calculate absorption for radiation passing through the atmosphere as a whole, you had to understand what happened in each layer — which was far harder to calculate.
The greenhouse effect will in fact operate even if the absorption of radiation were totally saturated in the lower atmosphere. The planet's temperature is regulated by the thin upper layers where radiation does escape easily into space. Adding more greenhouse gas there will change the balance. Moreover, even a 1% change in that delicate balance would make a serious difference in the planet’s surface temperature. The logic is rather simple once it is grasped, but it takes a new way of looking at the atmosphere — not as a single slab, like the gas in Koch's tube (or the glass over a greenhouse), but as a set of interacting layers. (The full explanation is in the essay on Simple Models, use link at right.)
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THen WHY OldieRocks does the link you've posted THOUSANDS of times say this..
The Carbon Dioxide Greenhouse Effect
So even if water vapor in the lower layers of the atmosphere did entirely block any radiation that could have been absorbed by CO2, that would not keep the gas from making a difference in the rarified and frigid upper layers. Those layers held very little water vapor anyway. And scientists were coming to see that you couldn't just calculate absorption for radiation passing through the atmosphere as a whole, you had to understand what happened in each layer which was far harder to calculate.
The greenhouse effect will in fact operate even if the absorption of radiation were totally saturated in the lower atmosphere. The planet's temperature is regulated by the thin upper layers where radiation does escape easily into space. Adding more greenhouse gas there will change the balance. Moreover, even a 1% change in that delicate balance would make a serious difference in the planets surface temperature. The logic is rather simple once it is grasped, but it takes a new way of looking at the atmosphere not as a single slab, like the gas in Koch's tube (or the glass over a greenhouse), but as a set of interacting layers. (The full explanation is in the essay on Simple Models, use link at right.)
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Say HUH? I thought GW predicted a COOLING in the upper atmos also.. But this kind of conflicting garbage is all over the place to explain the spectral overlap between CO2 and Water Vapor and why it still drives the majority of Climate Change.
So 1979 but then again in 2012?
If its Global Warming, shouldn't there have been bigger melts since 1979?
So 1979 but then again in 2012?
If its Global Warming, shouldn't there have been bigger melts since 1979?
Your logic escapes me, but there will be much bigger melts in the near future, as in before 2030.
Professor Jennifer Francis gave a wonderful presentation of exactly how that works. That you will not watch it, and even if your did, you would not understand it, is your problem, not mine.
Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Posted on 1 December 2010 by Bob Guercio
This post has been revised at Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming - Revised
Increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere have resulted in the warming of the troposphere and cooling of the stratosphere. This paper will explain the mechanism involved by considering a model of a fictitious planet with an atmosphere consisting of carbon dioxide and an inert gas such as nitrogen at pressures equivalent to those on earth. This atmosphere will have a troposphere and a stratosphere with the tropopause at 10 km. The initial concentration of carbon dioxide will be 100 parts per million (ppm) and will be increased instantaneously to 1000 ppm and the solar insolation will be 385.906 watts/meter2. Figure 1 is the IR spectrum from a planet with no atmosphere and Figures 2 and 3 represent the same planet with levels of CO2 at 100 ppm and 1000 ppm respectively. These graphs were generated from a model simulator at the website of Dr. David Archer, a professor in the Department of the Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago and edited to contain only the curves of interest to this discussion. The parameters were chosen in order to generate diagrams that enable the reader to more easily understand the mechanism discussed herein.
For one thing, I'm not sure that there even would be a stratosphere (ie with temperatures increasing with height) if there was no oxygen/ozone in the atmosphere as there is in your model. So it may not make sense to talk about a warmer lower atmosphere causing an even cooler upper atmosphere in such a simplified case.
Also, I understand that other variations, in water vapour, volcanic aerosols, chlorofluorocarbons and methane concentrations, can cause temperature changes in the stratosphere.
Having said that, I don't actually doubt that rising CO2 does result in a cooling stratosphere, I'm just struggling to understand how exactly and by how much.
Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
Posted on 1 December 2010 by Bob Guercio
This post has been revised at Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming - Revised
Increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the atmosphere have resulted in the warming of the troposphere and cooling of the stratosphere. This paper will explain the mechanism involved by considering a model of a fictitious planet with an atmosphere consisting of carbon dioxide and an inert gas such as nitrogen at pressures equivalent to those on earth. This atmosphere will have a troposphere and a stratosphere with the tropopause at 10 km. The initial concentration of carbon dioxide will be 100 parts per million (ppm) and will be increased instantaneously to 1000 ppm and the solar insolation will be 385.906 watts/meter2. Figure 1 is the IR spectrum from a planet with no atmosphere and Figures 2 and 3 represent the same planet with levels of CO2 at 100 ppm and 1000 ppm respectively. These graphs were generated from a model simulator at the website of Dr. David Archer, a professor in the Department of the Geophysical Sciences at the University of Chicago and edited to contain only the curves of interest to this discussion. The parameters were chosen in order to generate diagrams that enable the reader to more easily understand the mechanism discussed herein.
I don't WANT a fictious planet with no other constituent gases or particles than CO2 and Nitrogen. I want to know how the Combined absorption of WATER VAPOR and CO2 does not saturate in the LOWER atmos and CO2 increases in the UPPER atmos (where there IS no water vapor) don't matter.
One of blog comments pretty well sums up the frustration I'm describing..
For one thing, I'm not sure that there even would be a stratosphere (ie with temperatures increasing with height) if there was no oxygen/ozone in the atmosphere as there is in your model. So it may not make sense to talk about a warmer lower atmosphere causing an even cooler upper atmosphere in such a simplified case.
Also, I understand that other variations, in water vapour, volcanic aerosols, chlorofluorocarbons and methane concentrations, can cause temperature changes in the stratosphere.
Having said that, I don't actually doubt that rising CO2 does result in a cooling stratosphere, I'm just struggling to understand how exactly and by how much.
