Rasmussen: 69% Say It’s Likely Scientists Have Falsified Global Warming Research

[Wicked Jester]

Please cite and reference this proposed situation.

I know of no such situation, however, the atmospheric "greenhouse" effect returns almost as much energy to the Earth's surface as the Earth initially and directly receives from the sun. This has the rough effect of doubling the amount of energy the earth's surface would receive from the sun in an atmosphere without greenhouse gases.

Of course you don't. That you know little of the pseudoscience upon which the whole AGW hoax is buitl is abundantly clear.

Here is the energy budget upon which the hoax is based:

Actually, that's a graphical representation of Trenberth's research results, from the looks of it, his 1997 paper published in Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society February, IINM.

If you really insist on going over this again in detail, please save a copy so we can refer back to it the next time. That said, it would probably be better to us a little more up-to-date graphic as both the TOA and transfer ratios have seen some slight revisions over the last 15 years, but what are you gonna do, unlike dogma, science is always about new understandings shaping what we know and how we understand things, it would certainly be easier if the world simply conformed to the way we think it should work, but I don't want you to get all blurry eyed so let's look at what you've got,...again, <sigh>



LOL, seriously?!

"Science doesn't know about night!"

yeah okay, this isn't a preschool "teach your baby to read compendium," its time to put down the picture books and pay attention to what Trenberth's research involved and recorded. In simple, dated, graphic terms that diagram was meant to illustrate the general elements of a snapshot of the Top Of Atmosphere (TOA) energy imparted by the Sun into the Earth system, how that energy translates through and in interaction with our planet's atmosphere and surface, and then how that energy is re-emitted and transmitted through our atmosphere back out into space. The sun shines on one hemisphere of the Earth 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, every year. When the Sun is shining on the Earth, the majority of the energy that it delivers to the Earth is in the form of visible wavelength (shortwave, red to violet light) slightly biased toward yellow, light energy. When this energy is re-emited it is in the form of InfraRed (IR) light. 100% of our Earth's surface emits longwave (IR) radiation 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, every year.


Left-hand side of the graph we are only dealing with energy coming into the open system.
You don't count the atmosphere as part of the Earth? It's evident that Trenberth and anyone else properly reading and using his findings or that graphic should interpret the atmosphere as a very distinct and important part of the atmosphere, after all, the total solar energy impingent upon the Earth, at TOA is 341W/m^2(~100%), but the amount that reaches the atmosphere/surface boundary is only 184W/m^2(~54%) that means that elements of the atmosphere have absorbed (becoming more energetic/heating-up) or reflected nearly half of the energy impingent upon it. Looks like, from the graph, that the reflected amount from the atmosphere is 79W/m^2(~23%) meaning that the atmosphere absorbed about 78W(~23%) over the atmospheric column depth. So we have the Earth (atmosphere + surface) absorbing (161 + 78 =) 239W/m^2 (~70%) of the Sun's energy and reflecting 102W/m^2 (~30%) of the Sun's energy.



Okay, other side of the graph, and we are dealing with radiation that is present and exiting the system


No, it is saying that the warmed atmosphere is emitting a total of 532W of energy, 333W into the surface and 199W into space. But that is more a difference in completeness and perspective than substance so far.



No, at a given period, the Earth is absorbing a total of 239W/m^2 from the sun and emitting a total of 239W/m^2



The atmosphere is a part of the Earth. the entire Earth is intercepting a total of 341W/m^2 of primary solar energy, 102W/m^2 are being reflected and 239W are being absorbed directly by the atmosphere and the surface of the planet Earth. 239W are also being emitted by the atmosphere and surface of the planet to the heat sink of space.



The effect you are trying to understand is known as "insulation," it occurs when energy emitted in one portion of an object is retarded (or delayed) in its ultimate exit from that open system. Greenhouse gases act as an insulation factor delaying the exit of energy from the Earth system, as the longwave emissions bounce around a bit between the surface and the lower levels of the atmosphere before they finally escape. Increase the Greenhouse gases, increase the insulation factor. Simple century old science with a lot of very basic and solidly supporting evidence and observation throughout chemistry and physics in support of its precepts.



ever wrap an insulating blanket around a water heater?



If you insulate your room to the point that your electric heater is emitting more heat than can escape from the room, then your room will continue to warm until it reaches a point where there is as much heat escaping as there is being pumped in by the heater. In the case of the Earth, the planet is emitting as much energy as it is absorbing. so it is at rough equilibrium in its current state, as the atmospheric GHG content increases so will the insulation factor, making the planet gradually warmer while maintaining balance in absorptions and emissions.



If that confused you, it wasn't because anyone attempted to confuse anything, it is just a simple explanation of what is happening using representative values (100%) etc., comparing these values to Trenberth's we can see a pretty fair approximation.
Of course, this first graph merely represents the Left half of Trenberth's graph.

Incoming Radiation 100 341(100%)
Reflected Radiation 30 102 (30%)
Absorbed by surface 28 161 (47%)
a bit off on that one but if you look at how they've split up the emissions and absorption areas its easy to see where the difference in methodology is yielding some slightly differing values for secondary processes, and that is simply an matter of preference between the research approaches. As long as the overall numbers and major events are covered, it really doesn't matter which method you use to reflect the complicated interactions that make up the secondary and tertiary processes.



No, it says that there are 100 total units of energy being intercepted at the top of the atmosphere, 30 of these units are being reflected away and 70 units are being absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere and surface. 23 of those units absorbed by the atmosphere are re-emitted and absorbed by the surface.



This is the equivilant of the right-hand side of the Trenberth graph and is devoted to the emissions of radiation from the Earth.

We can see that it is flawed right off the bat because it shows no LW radiation incoming from the sun which is not so. Do you believe for a second that no longwave radiation from the sun reaches the earth?

The previous graph deals with incoming radiation, this one deals with internal Earth system interactions during the emission process. We start with 117 units of energy emitted by the surface, 111 of those units are absorbed by the atmosphere, 6 of those excape directly. 64 of those absorbed by the atmosphere are also re-emitted and escape (64 + 6 = 70%).

In your second chart, the red arrow on the left claims that 117 "energy units" of LW radiation is leaving the surface of the earth. The green arrow on the right claims 23 "energy units" of "latent heat" are being radiated and the pink arrow on the far left claims 7 "energy units" of "sensible heat" are being radiated. That gives a total of 147 "energy units being radiated by the surface of the earth...

No, we have 117 units of energy being emitted by the surface of the Earth, 6 units escape directly and a 111 units are absorbed by the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and combine with the other sources of energy transfer from conduction/convection (7 units) and evaporation (23). Add in the shortwave absorption from the initial incoming radiation and we get a total atmospheric energy content of 160 units, 96 of these units are re-emitted toward and re-absorbed by the surface, 64 of these units are emitted out to space and (with the initial 6 units that escaped directly from the surface) balance out the amount of energy that the Earth (atmosphere and surface) absorbed from the sun in the first place (70%).

It really isn't complicated or confusing as long as you understand what is going on and follow the progression laid out and discussed at the site linked, which is the reason I linked the site instead of just linking a picture and then making up my own esxplanation of what the picture should be showing instead of paying attention to the information the pictures, and more importantly the research the pictures are based upon, are trying to confer.

New NASA Data Blow Gaping Hole In Global Warming Alarmism - Yahoo! News

Kinda blows a hole in all that mumbojumbo you probably just spent the last hour writing.

Must suck to spend all that time writing a bunch of nonsense, only to have it blown out of the water in one quick and easy post, eh?

 

[gslack]

I am not going to post your long-winded and twisted response to wes or wyre again. I will let them slap you fake science man....

I just want to know why you had to go and get another graphic to confound the thing? The discussion was over the graphics you linked to and bringing in another one to back them is confounding the problem.

Frankly I find you attempts to cite the sources of the graphics in some obscure science journal article off hand like that, when we know dam good and well you either googled your ass off to find it, or you followed a link or reference somewhere in the article or graphic. Pretty lame dude...

LOL GO ahead genius DISPROOF them and all their fake science which not gooder than your truer science.....LOL

 

[Trakar]

New NASA Data Blow Gaping Hole In Global Warming Alarmism - Yahoo! News

Kinda blows a hole in all that mumbojumbo you probably just spent the last hour writing.

Must suck to spend all that time writing a bunch of nonsense, only to have it blown out of the water in one quick and easy post, eh?

Did it really take an hour?! I was just typing while watching the preseason games, guess I was watching more than paying attention to the post.

As to the Forbes editorial piece if they could actually indicate where their Spencer's paper actually makes any finding worth noting and paying especial attention to, his article might actually deserve the title he gave it,...as it is I'm left applauding Yahoo for linking "Is 94-Year-Old Zsa Zsa Gabor Going To Be A Mother?" as "related content!"

As it is, it is a paper with a lot of hand waving and very little substance. There is no statistic relevence to the data derived and the greatly simplified model that Spencer used to characterize his data did not include oceans or any large bodies of water, no major ENSO patterns, no water or hydrological cycle at all, and looks to be even further and specifically tweaked to produce exactly the results predetermined. Most damning of all, even duplication of his processes and methodology fail to reproduce the data he claims, "misdiagnosis" indeed, at least Spencer can be counted on to keep getting the same thing wrong in the same general manner time after time. If you ever find the time to dig through the post-publication peer-review letters of this "paper" you might get a few grins and giggles but to Spencer, it will remain the machinations of small minded bureaucrats and dogmatic gate-keepers who keep insisting on evidence and supporting theories instead of just accepting his brilliant revelations, regardless of the fact that even he can't make a compelling and well supported argument in favor of them!

 

[IanC]

As it is, it is a paper with a lot of hand waving and very little substance. There is no statistic relevence to the data derived and the greatly simplified model that Spencer used to characterize his data did not include oceans or any large bodies of water, no major ENSO patterns, no water or hydrological cycle at all, and looks to be even further and specifically tweaked to produce exactly the results predetermined. Most damning of all, even duplication of his processes and methodology fail to reproduce the data he claims, "misdiagnosis" indeed, at least Spencer can be counted on to keep getting the same thing wrong in the same general manner time after time. If you ever find the time to dig through the post-publication peer-review letters of this "paper" you might get a few grins and giggles but to Spencer, it will remain the machinations of small minded bureaucrats and dogmatic gate-keepers who keep insisting on evidence and supporting theories instead of just accepting his brilliant revelations, regardless of the fact that even he can't make a compelling and well supported argument in favor of them!

I find it funny that Spencer is denegrated for trying to understand a small piece of the climate puzzle by using actual observational data whereas the 'scientific elite' are taken at face value for their general models that are 100% likely to be wrong!

I have often seen references to predictions of future climate by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), presumably through the IPCC assessments (the various chapters in the recently completedWorking Group I Fourth Assessment report ican be accessed through this listing). In fact, since the last report it is also often stated that the science is settled or done and now is the time for action.

In fact there are no predictions by IPCC at all. And there never have been. The IPCC instead proffers “what if” projections of future climate that correspond to certain emissions scenarios. There are a number of assumptions that go into these emissions scenarios. They are intended to cover a range of possible self consistent “story lines” that then provide decision makers with information about which paths might be more desirable. But they do not consider many things like the recovery of the ozone layer, for instance, or observed trends in forcing agents. There is no estimate, even probabilistically, as to the likelihood of any emissions scenario and no best guess.

Even if there were, the projections are based on model results that provide differences of the future climate relative to that today. None of the models used by IPCC are initialized to the observed state and none of the climate states in the models correspond even remotely to the current observed climate. In particular, the state of the oceans, sea ice, and soil moisture has no relationship to the observed state at any recent time in any of the IPCC models. There is neither an El Niño sequence nor any Pacific Decadal Oscillation that replicates the recent past; yet these are critical modes of variability that affect Pacific rim countries and beyond. The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, that may depend on the thermohaline circulation and thus ocean currents in the Atlantic, is not set up to match today’s state, but it is a critical component of the Atlantic hurricanes and it undoubtedly affects forecasts for the next decade from Brazil to Europe. Moreover, the starting climate state in several of the models may depart significantly from the real climate owing to model errors. I postulate that regional climate change is impossible to deal with properly unless the models are initialized.

The current projection method works to the extent it does because it utilizes differences from one time to another and the main model bias and systematic errors are thereby subtracted out. This assumes linearity. It works for global forced variations, but it can not work for many aspects of climate, especially those related to the water cycle. For instance, if the current state is one of drought then it is unlikely to get drier, but unrealistic model states and model biases can easily violate such constraints and project drier conditions. Of course one can initialize a climate model, but a biased model will immediately drift back to the model climate and the predicted trends will then be wrong. Therefore the problem of overcoming this shortcoming, and facing up to initializing climate models means not only obtaining sufficient reliable observations of all aspects of the climate system, but also overcoming model biases. So this is a major challenge.

The IPCC report makes it clear that there is a substantial future commitment to further climate change even if we could stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases. And the commitment is even greater given that the best we can realistically hope for in the near term is to perhaps stabilize emissions, which means increases in concentrations of long-lived greenhouse gases indefinitely into the future. Thus future climate change is guaranteed.

So if the science is settled, then what are we planning for and adapting to? A consensus has emerged that “warming of the climate system is unequivocal” to quote the 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Working Group I Summary for Policy Makers (pdf) and the science is convincing that humans are the cause. Hence mitigation of the problem: stopping or slowing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere is essential. The science is clear in this respect.

However, the science is not done because we do not have reliable or regional predictions of climate. But we need them. Indeed it is an imperative! So the science is just beginning. Beginning, that is, to face up to the challenge of building a climate information system that tracks the current climate and the agents of change, that initializes models and makes predictions, and that provides useful climate information on many time scales regionally and tailored to many sectoral needs.

We will adapt to climate change. The question is whether it will be planned or not? How disruptive and how much loss of life will there be because we did not adequately plan for the climate changes that are already occurring?

Kevin Trenberth
Climate Analysis Section, NCAR

as is often the case, the scientists actually doing the analysis are far less certain of the results than the newspapers or message board posters who report them as proof of their opinions.

 

[Old Rocks]

As it is, it is a paper with a lot of hand waving and very little substance. There is no statistic relevence to the data derived and the greatly simplified model that Spencer used to characterize his data did not include oceans or any large bodies of water, no major ENSO patterns, no water or hydrological cycle at all, and looks to be even further and specifically tweaked to produce exactly the results predetermined. Most damning of all, even duplication of his processes and methodology fail to reproduce the data he claims, "misdiagnosis" indeed, at least Spencer can be counted on to keep getting the same thing wrong in the same general manner time after time. If you ever find the time to dig through the post-publication peer-review letters of this "paper" you might get a few grins and giggles but to Spencer, it will remain the machinations of small minded bureaucrats and dogmatic gate-keepers who keep insisting on evidence and supporting theories instead of just accepting his brilliant revelations, regardless of the fact that even he can't make a compelling and well supported argument in favor of them!

I find it funny that Spencer is denegrated for trying to understand a small piece of the climate puzzle by using actual observational data whereas the 'scientific elite' are taken at face value for their general models that are 100% likely to be wrong!

I have often seen references to predictions of future climate by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), presumably through the IPCC assessments (the various chapters in the recently completedWorking Group I Fourth Assessment report ican be accessed through this listing). In fact, since the last report it is also often stated that the science is settled or done and now is the time for action.

In fact there are no predictions by IPCC at all. And there never have been. The IPCC instead proffers “what if” projections of future climate that correspond to certain emissions scenarios. There are a number of assumptions that go into these emissions scenarios. They are intended to cover a range of possible self consistent “story lines” that then provide decision makers with information about which paths might be more desirable. But they do not consider many things like the recovery of the ozone layer, for instance, or observed trends in forcing agents. There is no estimate, even probabilistically, as to the likelihood of any emissions scenario and no best guess.

Even if there were, the projections are based on model results that provide differences of the future climate relative to that today. None of the models used by IPCC are initialized to the observed state and none of the climate states in the models correspond even remotely to the current observed climate. In particular, the state of the oceans, sea ice, and soil moisture has no relationship to the observed state at any recent time in any of the IPCC models. There is neither an El Niño sequence nor any Pacific Decadal Oscillation that replicates the recent past; yet these are critical modes of variability that affect Pacific rim countries and beyond. The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, that may depend on the thermohaline circulation and thus ocean currents in the Atlantic, is not set up to match today’s state, but it is a critical component of the Atlantic hurricanes and it undoubtedly affects forecasts for the next decade from Brazil to Europe. Moreover, the starting climate state in several of the models may depart significantly from the real climate owing to model errors. I postulate that regional climate change is impossible to deal with properly unless the models are initialized.

The current projection method works to the extent it does because it utilizes differences from one time to another and the main model bias and systematic errors are thereby subtracted out. This assumes linearity. It works for global forced variations, but it can not work for many aspects of climate, especially those related to the water cycle. For instance, if the current state is one of drought then it is unlikely to get drier, but unrealistic model states and model biases can easily violate such constraints and project drier conditions. Of course one can initialize a climate model, but a biased model will immediately drift back to the model climate and the predicted trends will then be wrong. Therefore the problem of overcoming this shortcoming, and facing up to initializing climate models means not only obtaining sufficient reliable observations of all aspects of the climate system, but also overcoming model biases. So this is a major challenge.

The IPCC report makes it clear that there is a substantial future commitment to further climate change even if we could stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases. And the commitment is even greater given that the best we can realistically hope for in the near term is to perhaps stabilize emissions, which means increases in concentrations of long-lived greenhouse gases indefinitely into the future. Thus future climate change is guaranteed.

So if the science is settled, then what are we planning for and adapting to? A consensus has emerged that “warming of the climate system is unequivocal” to quote the 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Working Group I Summary for Policy Makers (pdf) and the science is convincing that humans are the cause. Hence mitigation of the problem: stopping or slowing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere is essential. The science is clear in this respect.
However, the science is not done because we do not have reliable or regional predictions of climate. But we need them. Indeed it is an imperative! So the science is just beginning. Beginning, that is, to face up to the challenge of building a climate information system that tracks the current climate and the agents of change, that initializes models and makes predictions, and that provides useful climate information on many time scales regionally and tailored to many sectoral needs.

We will adapt to climate change. The question is whether it will be planned or not? How disruptive and how much loss of life will there be because we did not adequately plan for the climate changes that are already occurring?

Kevin Trenberth
Climate Analysis Section, NCAR

as is often the case, the scientists actually doing the analysis are far less certain of the results than the newspapers or message board posters who report them as proof of their opinions.

Seems to me that he is pretty certain of what is neccessary. And what the results will be if we fail to plan for the inevitable.

But that is not going to happen.

 

[wirebender]

Actually, that's a graphical representation of Trenberth's research results, from the looks of it, his 1997 paper published in Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society February, IINM.

Feel free to bring forward the most up to date representation you like. My bet is that it will still have the earth receiving more energy from the atmosphere than it does from the sun.

LOL, seriously?!

"Science doesn't know about night!"

Aparently not because the energy budget upon which agw alarmism is based does not incorporate night into the budget. You didn't know that?

yeah okay, this isn't a preschool "teach your baby to read compendium," its time to put down the picture books and pay attention to what Trenberth's research involved and recorded. In simple, dated, graphic terms that diagram was meant to illustrate the general elements of a snapshot of the Top Of Atmosphere (TOA) energy imparted by the Sun into the Earth system, how that energy translates through and in interaction with our planet's atmosphere and surface, and then how that energy is re-emitted and transmitted through our atmosphere back out into space. The sun shines on one hemisphere of the Earth 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, every year. When the Sun is shining on the Earth, the majority of the energy that it delivers to the Earth is in the form of visible wavelength (shortwave, red to violet light) slightly biased toward yellow, light energy. When this energy is re-emited it is in the form of InfraRed (IR) light. 100% of our Earth's surface emits longwave (IR) radiation 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year, every year.

You don't seem to grasp the fact that if the model upon which you base your hypothesis doesn't reflect reality, then none of your findings based upon your model will reflect reality either; as is clearly the case with climate science.


The energy budget upon which alarmism is based divides the incoming solar energy input by 4 (P/4). This effectively renders the earth as a flat disk that is being constantly irradiated across its entire surface with a magnitude of energy equal to a sort of twilight.

The warmists energy budget divides the incoming solar energy because it assumes the earth is a black body. It isn't. You can use blackbody calculations on a star because they radiate roughly the same amount of energy in every direction. P/4 works when you have a 3D 360 degree self illuminating body. If you strech it out flat, the nunbers still reflect the reality of radiation from a star.

The earth, however, is not a 3D 360 degree self illuminated body. The earth is (as far as energy input goes) a 3D 180 degree illuminated hemisphere and the input of the sun, in order to reflect reality must be expressed as P/2.

The warmist energy budget assumes that the amount of solar energy received by the earth over 12 hours is the same as satellite measurements over 24 hours. The fact is that if you calculate solar input over 12 hours as it is actually received, and let the earth be a sphere rather than a flat disk, you don't need a greenhouse effect to account for the resulting temperature.

Left-hand side of the graph we are only dealing with energy coming into the open system. You don't count the atmosphere as part of the Earth? It's evident that Trenberth and anyone else properly reading and using his findings or that graphic should interpret the atmosphere as a very distinct and important part of the atmosphere, after all, the total solar energy impingent upon the Earth, at TOA is 341W/m^2(~100%), but the amount that reaches the atmosphere/surface boundary is only 184W/m^2(~54%) that means that elements of the atmosphere have absorbed (becoming more energetic/heating-up) or reflected nearly half of the energy impingent upon it. Looks like, from the graph, that the reflected amount from the atmosphere is 79W/m^2(~23%) meaning that the atmosphere absorbed about 78W(~23%) over the atmospheric column depth. So we have the Earth (atmosphere + surface) absorbing (161 + 78 =) 239W/m^2 (~70%) of the Sun's energy and reflecting 102W/m^2 (~30%) of the Sun's energy.

Except that is not what the graph portrays, is it? Why might the foundational tool for alarmist be left to the interpretation of the viewer? Further, the graphic is clearl labeled, "ENERGY RELEASED BY THE SURFACE". It is clear that you are interpreting the graphic to be stating something that it is not stating. The words on the graphic have meaning and if you must discount them and assume that they mean something else, or shouldn't be considered at all, you ar straying off the reservation and fabricating your own energy budget.

No, it is saying that the warmed atmosphere is emitting a total of 532W of energy, 333W into the surface and 199W into space. But that is more a difference in completeness and perspective than substance so far.

Are you denying that the graphic is stating quite clearly that 333 wats per square meter of energy is being delivered to the surface of the earth by the atmosphere in the form of backradiation? If you believe it says something else, then explain that column labeled 333 backradiation and 333 at the surface and a sentence fragment at the surface saying "ABSORBED BY SURFACE".

If the creator of the budget had meant something else, or desired to say something else, do you not think he would be bright enough to actually say something else?

No, at a given period, the Earth is absorbing a total of 239W/m^2 from the sun and emitting a total of 239W/m^2

We have already been through the "given period" and seen that that approach does not reflect reality. And again, your statement does not reflect what the graphic says. You are off the reservation again, fabricating your own energy budget. Don't worry, I see lots of people do it because they know as well as I do that the budget upon which climate alarmism is founded and remains founded is total BS.

The atmosphere is a part of the Earth. the entire Earth is intercepting a total of 341W/m^2 of primary solar energy, 102W/m^2 are being reflected and 239W are being absorbed directly by the atmosphere and the surface of the planet Earth. 239W are also being emitted by the atmosphere and surface of the planet to the heat sink of space.

And yet, in the graphic I provided and the graphics you provided, the energy is clearly notated as being ABSORBED BY THE SURFACE and released or radiated by the surface. You can get lost in the atmosphere if you like, but at the beginning of this exchange, I said:

"climate science speaks little about the realities of the world either. For example: Describe a mechanism, supported and predicted by the laws of physics that would have the atmosphere of the earth delivering more than twice the amount of energy to the surface of the earth that it receives from the sun."

To which you said:

"Please cite and reference this proposed situation.

I know of no such situation, however, the atmospheric "greenhouse" effect returns almost as much energy to the Earth's surface as the Earth initially and directly receives from the sun. This has the rough effect of doubling the amount of energy the earth's surface would receive from the sun in an atmosphere without greenhouse gases."

Now you are completely ignoring what both my graphic and your own say with regard to energy absorbed by the surface of the earth and energy radiated by the surface of the earth. If the authors of either graphic intended to say what you are saying, they would not have labled the graphics as they did. If you don't believe the basis for climate alarmism any more than I do, why are you attempting to defend it?

Please cite and reference this proposed situation.

The effect you are trying to understand is known as "insulation," it occurs when energy emitted in one portion of an object is retarded (or delayed) in its ultimate exit from that open system. Greenhouse gases act as an insulation factor delaying the exit of energy from the Earth system, as the longwave emissions bounce around a bit between the surface and the lower levels of the atmosphere before they finally escape. Increase the Greenhouse gases, increase the insulation factor. Simple century old science with a lot of very basic and solidly supporting evidence and observation throughout chemistry and physics in support of its precepts.

Yes trakar, I understand insulation perfectly. You, obviously do not. If you want to insulate your home, you use a material that does not absorb heat. If something absorbs and then emits heat, it is not an insulator. It is a conductor.

If you look at CO2 compared to the primary gasses in the atmosphere, it is clear that it is not an insulator. CO2 is, by definition of its properties a radiative conductor. You could rightly call it an insulator if it reflected IR, but that isn't what it does at all. CO2 is the opposite of a reflector, it is an absorber and absorbers facilitate conducting heat from one place to anohter. At that point, you must consider where it is conducting heat to and when you consider the second law of thermodynamics and the physics that govern vectors and EM fields, it is more than obvious which direction the heat being conducted.

Try jumping into a cold body of water. Tell yourself that it is lucky for you that the water is so good at absorbing your radiant energy because if it weren't, you would be dying of hypothermia.

It is like this trakar. If socalled greenhouse gasses trap radiation but do not emit it, then backradiation can not happen. If they absorb and emit radiation, then you can't make the claim that they act as an insulator.

Tell me trakkar, if energy is radiating from the surface of the earth at or near the speed of light, and that same energy is absorbed and emitted by CO2 molecules at or very near the speed of light, how much do you think that so called greenhouse gasses actually "slow down" the escape of heat into cold space?

Here is a hint. It takes a packet of IR about 0.0049 seconds to reach the top of the troposphere from the surface of the earth passing through concentrations of CO2 equal to that found in the atmosphere.

http://www.biocab.org/Mean_Free_Path.pdf

ever wrap an insulating blanket around a water heater?

Yeah. But I always use a materail that does not absorb and emit IR as it would be useless as an insulator Anyone who puts a radiative conductor around a water heater expecting to save money will be in for a bit of a surprise when the power bill comes in. Funny you should mention blankets. Well, not really funny because all you warmists eventually get to blankets. I posted ths on another thread some while back for another warmist and his blanket analogy. Pardon me for cutting and pasting it here.

"Human Body Emission

As all matter, the human body radiates some of a person's energy away as infrared light.

The net power radiated is the difference between the power emitted and the power absorbed:

Applying the Stefan Boltzman Law

The total surface area of an adult is about 2 m², and the mid- and far-infrared emissivity of skin and most clothing is near unity, as it is for most nonmetallic surfaces.[ Skin temperature is about 33 °C, but clothing reduces the surface temperature to about 28 °C when the ambient temperature is 20 °C. Hence, the net radiative heat loss is about

"

If you put a 20C blanket (which is colder) on a warmer 33C body, the surface temperature is going to reduce to about 28C. Heat flowed from the warmer body to the cooler blanket just as the 2nd law of thermodynamics predicts.

It is true that the blanket will trap warm air between the body and itself, but that heat will not increase the temperature of the body. The atmosphere as a blanket hypothesis just doesn't work because your blanket is -20C.

What do you think happens when you wrap a -20C blanket around a -18C earth? Just as the surface temperature of a human body drops from 33C to 28C when you wrap a blanket around it, the earth's temperature will drop as well. Wrapping a -20C atmospheric blanket around it certainly won't cause its temperature to increase by nearly 33C up to 15C.

In either case, the blanket on your body or the atmosphere around the earth, a temperature increase of the body, or the earth would be a violation of the 2nd law of thermodynamics.

Now if you care to try, feel free to explain how any amount of atmospheric CO2 in an atmosphere that averages -20C can cause the earth's -18C temperature (with the sun as its only energy source) to warm by 33C to 15C?

If you are going to try, provide some laws of physics to support your explanation.

If you insulate your room to the point that your electric heater is emitting more heat than can escape from the room, then your room will continue to warm until it reaches a point where there is as much heat escaping as there is being pumped in by the heater. In the case of the Earth, the planet is emitting as much energy as it is absorbing. so it is at rough equilibrium in its current state, as the atmospheric GHG content increases so will the insulation factor, making the planet gradually warmer while maintaining balance in absorptions and emissions.

Do you believe that an analogy in which you put perhaps meters of dense, non absorbing insulation material in a room in any way represents the earth and its atmosphere? No matter how much you insulate your room, you will never get one watt more out of that energy source (heater) than you pay the electric company for. You can not get more energy out than you put in. (if necessary go back to the graphics. They are clearly indicating that more energy is radiating from the surface of the earth than it is getting from its only energy source) If you did, you would be violating the 2nd law of thermodynamics. Of course if you did, you would have an energy source for a perpepetual motion machine and would be a bazillionaire this time next week.

Your analogy fails with regard to CO2 however, because CO2 is not an insulator. It is a radiative conductor in that it does not reflect IR but absorbs and immediately emits it.

If that confused you, it wasn't because anyone attempted to confuse anything, it is just a simple explanation of what is happening using representative values (100%) etc., comparing these values to Trenberth's we can see a pretty fair approximation.

No, that didn't confuse me.

a bit off on that one but if you look at how they've split up the emissions and absorption areas its easy to see where the difference in methodology is yielding some slightly differing values for secondary processes, and that is simply an matter of preference between the research approaches. As long as the overall numbers and major events are covered, it really doesn't matter which method you use to reflect the complicated interactions that make up the secondary and tertiary processes.

The minor differences are really irrelavent because at the bottom line, you still have X energy from the only energy source (the sun) being absorbed by the surface of the earth; and in the end you have X + (?energy from nowhere?) radiating from the surface of the earth. You can't have more energy radiating from the surface of the earth than it receives from its only energy source.

No, it says that there are 100 total units of energy being intercepted at the top of the atmosphere, 30 of these units are being reflected away and 70 units are being absorbed by the Earth's atmosphere and surface. 23 of those units absorbed by the atmosphere are re-emitted and absorbed by the surface.

That graphic clearly states that 28 + 23 "energy units" are reaching the surface of the earth less 6 "energy units" that are being reflected leaving 51 "energy units" being absorbed by the surface of the earth. You keep dodging what the models claim is happening at the surface because instinctively you must know that the whole house of cards fails at the surface.

This is the equivilant of the right-hand side of the Trenberth graph and is devoted to the emissions of radiation from the Earth.

Thanks, but I knew that.

The previous graph deals with incoming radiation, this one deals with internal Earth system interactions during the emission process. We start with 117 units of energy emitted by the surface, 111 of those units are absorbed by the atmosphere, 6 of those excape directly. 64 of those absorbed by the atmosphere are also re-emitted and escape (64 + 6 = 70%).

117 "energy units" emitted by the surface of the earth but only 51 "energy units" absorbed by the surface of the earth by its only energy source. You may find it easy to skip over that little detail, but I want you to describe to me, in detail, the mechanism by which the earth's surface can emit more than twice the amount of energy it absorbs from its only energy source. As part of your explananation, I also want you to describe the physical laws which predict and support the idea that an illuminated surface can emit more than twice as much energy as it absorbs from its only source of illumination. And show your math.

No, we have 117 units of energy being emitted by the surface of the Earth,

You keep glossing over that 117 "energy units" being emitted by the surface of the earth but when that surface only absorbs 51 "energy units" from its only energy source, you have some splainin to do if you expect me to buy it. Again, describe to me, in detail, the mechanism by which the earth's surface can emit more than twice the amount of energy it absorbs from its only energy source. As part of your explananation, I also want you to describe the physical laws which predict and support the idea that an illuminated surface can emit more than twice as much energy as it absorbs from its only source of illumination. And show your math.

96 of these units are re-emitted toward and re-absorbed by the surface.

We run into a bit of a problem here as well. We must go back to the heater surrounded by reflectors. If you had a heater with an output of 1000 watts per square meter surrounded by reflectors, even perfect reflectors, you could never coax a single watt of energy out of that heater that you did not buy from the electric company. You are trying to tell me that if I surrounded that heater not with reflectors, but radiating conductors which by their very nature scatter energy, I could somehow coax more than 2.000 watts out of that heater while only paying the electric company for 1,000? Is that what you are saying?

Again, describe the physical laws that predict and support that claim and show me your math.

It really isn't complicated or confusing as long as you understand what is going on and follow the progression laid out and discussed at the site linked, which is the reason I linked the site instead of just linking a picture and then making up my own explanation of what the picture "should be showing" instead of paying attention to the information the pictures, and more importantly the research the pictures are based upon, are trying to confer.

No it isn't confusing or complicated at all. Simply stated, it is a fraud. Global warming is only manmade in the sense that the issue is manmade, the data is manmade, the crisis is manmade, and the consensus is manmade. I look forward to your detailed explanation as to how a surface that absorbs 51 "energy units" from its ONLY ENERGY SOURCE is able to radiate 117 "energy units".

When you get to the part where you are describing backradiation, we can open the topics of the 2nd law of thermodynamics, EM fields, and the physics that govern the direction of energy flow along vectors. And some observable, experimental, repeatable and best of all inexpensive evidence that you can do in your own back yard that will allow you to prove to yourself that it simply isn't happening. I look forward to it.

 

[IanC]

As it is, it is a paper with a lot of hand waving and very little substance. There is no statistic relevence to the data derived and the greatly simplified model that Spencer used to characterize his data did not include oceans or any large bodies of water, no major ENSO patterns, no water or hydrological cycle at all, and looks to be even further and specifically tweaked to produce exactly the results predetermined. Most damning of all, even duplication of his processes and methodology fail to reproduce the data he claims, "misdiagnosis" indeed, at least Spencer can be counted on to keep getting the same thing wrong in the same general manner time after time. If you ever find the time to dig through the post-publication peer-review letters of this "paper" you might get a few grins and giggles but to Spencer, it will remain the machinations of small minded bureaucrats and dogmatic gate-keepers who keep insisting on evidence and supporting theories instead of just accepting his brilliant revelations, regardless of the fact that even he can't make a compelling and well supported argument in favor of them!

I find it funny that Spencer is denegrated for trying to understand a small piece of the climate puzzle by using actual observational data whereas the 'scientific elite' are taken at face value for their general models that are 100% likely to be wrong!

I have often seen references to predictions of future climate by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), presumably through the IPCC assessments (the various chapters in the recently completedWorking Group I Fourth Assessment report ican be accessed through this listing). In fact, since the last report it is also often stated that the science is settled or done and now is the time for action.

In fact there are no predictions by IPCC at all. And there never have been. The IPCC instead proffers “what if” projections of future climate that correspond to certain emissions scenarios. There are a number of assumptions that go into these emissions scenarios. They are intended to cover a range of possible self consistent “story lines” that then provide decision makers with information about which paths might be more desirable. But they do not consider many things like the recovery of the ozone layer, for instance, or observed trends in forcing agents. There is no estimate, even probabilistically, as to the likelihood of any emissions scenario and no best guess.

Even if there were, the projections are based on model results that provide differences of the future climate relative to that today. None of the models used by IPCC are initialized to the observed state and none of the climate states in the models correspond even remotely to the current observed climate. In particular, the state of the oceans, sea ice, and soil moisture has no relationship to the observed state at any recent time in any of the IPCC models. There is neither an El Niño sequence nor any Pacific Decadal Oscillation that replicates the recent past; yet these are critical modes of variability that affect Pacific rim countries and beyond. The Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, that may depend on the thermohaline circulation and thus ocean currents in the Atlantic, is not set up to match today’s state, but it is a critical component of the Atlantic hurricanes and it undoubtedly affects forecasts for the next decade from Brazil to Europe. Moreover, the starting climate state in several of the models may depart significantly from the real climate owing to model errors. I postulate that regional climate change is impossible to deal with properly unless the models are initialized.

The current projection method works to the extent it does because it utilizes differences from one time to another and the main model bias and systematic errors are thereby subtracted out. This assumes linearity. It works for global forced variations, but it can not work for many aspects of climate, especially those related to the water cycle. For instance, if the current state is one of drought then it is unlikely to get drier, but unrealistic model states and model biases can easily violate such constraints and project drier conditions. Of course one can initialize a climate model, but a biased model will immediately drift back to the model climate and the predicted trends will then be wrong. Therefore the problem of overcoming this shortcoming, and facing up to initializing climate models means not only obtaining sufficient reliable observations of all aspects of the climate system, but also overcoming model biases. So this is a major challenge.

The IPCC report makes it clear that there is a substantial future commitment to further climate change even if we could stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases. And the commitment is even greater given that the best we can realistically hope for in the near term is to perhaps stabilize emissions, which means increases in concentrations of long-lived greenhouse gases indefinitely into the future. Thus future climate change is guaranteed.

So if the science is settled, then what are we planning for and adapting to? A consensus has emerged that “warming of the climate system is unequivocal” to quote the 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Working Group I Summary for Policy Makers (pdf) and the science is convincing that humans are the cause. Hence mitigation of the problem: stopping or slowing greenhouse gas emissions into the atmosphere is essential. The science is clear in this respect.
However, the science is not done because we do not have reliable or regional predictions of climate. But we need them. Indeed it is an imperative! So the science is just beginning. Beginning, that is, to face up to the challenge of building a climate information system that tracks the current climate and the agents of change, that initializes models and makes predictions, and that provides useful climate information on many time scales regionally and tailored to many sectoral needs.

We will adapt to climate change. The question is whether it will be planned or not? How disruptive and how much loss of life will there be because we did not adequately plan for the climate changes that are already occurring?

Kevin Trenberth
Climate Analysis Section, NCAR

as is often the case, the scientists actually doing the analysis are far less certain of the results than the newspapers or message board posters who report them as proof of their opinions.

Seems to me that he is pretty certain of what is neccessary. And what the results will be if we fail to plan for the inevitable.

But that is not going to happen.

actually Old Rocks, your highlighted section is a non sequitur. it does not follow. Trenberth points out the weaknesses of climate models and then says that we should believe the models and draw the conclusion that there will be catastrophic consequences if we dont. how is that logical?

 

[Trakar]

... Trenberth points out the weaknesses of climate models and then says that we should believe the models and draw the conclusion that there will be catastrophic consequences if we dont. how is that logical?

please highlight and demonstrate the contradictory aspects you feel are presented in Trenberth's actual statements.

 

[wirebender]

please highlight and demonstrate the contradictory aspects you feel are presented in Trenberth's actual statements.

How about we begin with a planet surface radiating more than twice as much energy as it receives from its only energy source? Global warming is manmade only in so much as the issue is manmade, the data is manmade, the crisis is manmade and the consensus is manmade.

 

[Trakar]

Aparently not because the energy budget upon which agw alarmism is based does not incorporate night into the budget. You didn't know that?

It is not an accurate statement. The Sun's direct continuous additions to the Earth only occur over one hemisphere of the planet. The Earth's continuous emissions, however, occur over the entire sphere of the planet and throughout the depth of the atmosphere. Night and Day are fully incorporated and averaged into energy budget considerations and calculations,...which you would understand clearly, if you put down the pictures you are trying to misrepresent and pick up the papers those pictures represent a simplified depiction of.

The energy budget upon which alarmism is based divides the incoming solar energy input by 4 (P/4). This effectively renders the earth as a flat disk that is being constantly irradiated across its entire surface with a magnitude of energy equal to a sort of twilight.

http://eesc.columbia.edu/courses/ees/slides/climate/insolation_adg.gif

The warmists energy budget divides the incoming solar energy because it assumes the earth is a black body. It isn't. You can use blackbody calculations on a star because they radiate roughly the same amount of energy in every direction. P/4 works when you have a 3D 360 degree self illuminating body. If you strech it out flat, the nunbers still reflect the reality of radiation from a star.

When I demonstrate mainstream climate science references talking about reflected solar energy and albedo issues, why do you presume that climate science considers the Earth to be a black body? Do you not understand what a black body is?

The warmist energy budget assumes that the amount of solar energy received by the earth over 12 hours is the same as satellite measurements over 24 hours. The fact is that if you calculate solar input over 12 hours as it is actually received, and let the earth be a sphere rather than a flat disk, you don't need a greenhouse effect to account for the resulting temperature.

This is incorrect to my understandings, please support your understandings with citiation or reference to compelling supporting evidences.

Except that is not what the graph portrays, is it?

It isn't, it is fully described and explained in the paper initially alluded to.

Are you denying that the graphic is stating quite clearly that 333 wats per square meter of energy is being delivered to the surface of the earth by the atmosphere in the form of backradiation?

Why do you ignore almost half of the atmospheric re-emissions to only focus upon the emissions that are re-absorbed into the surface? The atmosphere continuously re-emits a total of 532 Watts, 333 of those Watts are absorbed by the surface materials of our planet and 199 of those re-emitted Watts escape to space. Your primary difficulty in understanding seems to come from trying to isolate individual portions of the system without looking at or understanding how all of the various elements work together to produce a balanced and accurate description of events.

And yet, in the graphic I provided and the graphics you provided, the energy is clearly notated as being ABSORBED BY THE SURFACE and released or radiated by the surface. You can get lost in the atmosphere if you like, but at the beginning of this exchange, I said:

"climate science speaks little about the realities of the world either. For example: Describe a mechanism, supported and predicted by the laws of physics that would have the atmosphere of the earth delivering more than twice the amount of energy to the surface of the earth that it receives from the sun."

To which you said:

"Please cite and reference this proposed situation.

I know of no such situation, however, the atmospheric "greenhouse" effect returns almost as much energy to the Earth's surface as the Earth initially and directly receives from the sun. This has the rough effect of doubling the amount of energy the earth's surface would receive from the sun in an atmosphere without greenhouse gases."

Now you are completely ignoring what both my graphic and your own say with regard to energy absorbed by the surface of the earth and energy radiated by the surface of the earth. If the authors of either graphic intended to say what you are saying, they would not have labled the graphics as they did. If you don't believe the basis for climate alarmism any more than I do, why are you attempting to defend it?

I am not ignoring your statements I am simply pointing out where they are in error and explaining what the graphic and more importantly the paper from which the graphic was lifted, actually says. "Earth’s Annual Global Mean Energy Budget," J. T. Kiehl and Kevin E. Trenberth, 1997 Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, though in looking at the actual paper I see that it is slightly different from the graphic you present so yours must be a later revision or re-working of the original graph. Regardless, the original graphic was not intended to be a strictly accurate portrayal, but rather, in the words of the author:
"... The values put forward in Fig. 7 [the Trenberth graphic] are reasonable but clearly not exact. The purpose of this paper is not so much to present definitive values, but to discuss how they were obtained and give some sense of the uncertainties and issues in determining the numbers..."

Almost the entire discussion and discription of the radiation budget itself is involved with detailing the atmopheric data, explaining the physics involved in various aspects of radiation transfer within the atmosphere and between the atmosphere and the surface areas of the planet (ocean and land).

Starting here ( Climate and Earth&rsquo;s Energy Budget : Feature Articles ), however, and going through the six pages following that one, does offer a pretty good overview of the processes in a general discussion format. If you are still having problems please feel free to us it as a reference to detail, with supporting cites, where your understandings differ from those offered by Rebecca Lindsey in this NASA EarthObservatory presentation.

I know of no such situation, however, the atmospheric "greenhouse" effect returns almost as much energy to the Earth's surface as the Earth initially and directly receives from the sun. This has the rough effect of doubling the amount of energy the earth's surface would receive from the sun in an atmosphere without greenhouse gases."

...Please cite and reference this proposed situation.

7(h) The Greenhouse Effect

The Greenhouse Effect
Greenhouse Effect: Background Material

NOAA Paleoclimatology Global Warming - The Story

Many more available upon request, both nationally and internationally.

Yes trakar, I understand insulation perfectly. You, obviously do not.

fiber glass insulation works to create a retardation of energy flow by short circuiting both conductive and convective heat transfer methods. the dead air spaces in the matting prevent the circulation of hot air from the surface of the water heater from quickly transferring that heat away from the body of the hot water heater, the low overall density of the material and the naturally low level of thermoconductivity of glass fiber retards the direct conductive flow of heat from the surface of the water heater. Now, with greenhouse gases the method of insulation is different but the effect is the same. When molecules of a greenhouse gas intercept a long wavelength photon the process generates motion in the molecule, the high energy orbital of the electron that absorbed the photon is unstable and within a fairly short period that electron will re-emit that photon and drop back down into a more stable orbital position. The average distance that a photon can travel in our atmosphere before it is absorbed, is known as the mean free path of that photon. The fewer the ghgs, the further a photon's mfp, the further a photon's mfp the weaker the insulation factor. The more ghgs we have in the atmosphere, the lower the mfp and the greater the insulation factor.

If you want to insulate your home, you use a material that does not absorb heat. If something absorbs and then emits heat, it is not an insulator. It is a conductor.

Pure nitrogen is completely transparent to most short and long wavelength energy (a perfect conductor). GHGs are darkly opaque to a broad range of long wave length energy (an insulator that impedes the progress of the flow of energy).

thermal Insulator
The term thermal insulation can refer either to materials used to reduce the rate of heat transfer, or the methods and processes used to reduce heat transfer. Heat energy can be transferred by conduction, convection, radiation. ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_insulator

thermal conductor
An object that conducts heat easily from one side to the other, or from one end to the other.
library.thinkquest.org/C006669/data/Chem/glossary.html

It is like this trakar. If socalled greenhouse gasses trap radiation but do not emit it, then backradiation can not happen. If they absorb and emit radiation, then you can't make the claim that they act as an insulator.

as per definition, thermal insulators reduce the rate of heat transfers.

Tell me trakkar, if energy is radiating from the surface of the earth at or near the speed of light, and that same energy is absorbed and emitted by CO2 molecules at or very near the speed of light, how much do you think that so called greenhouse gasses actually "slow down" the escape of heat into cold space?

The time between when a when a ghg electron absorbs an IR photon and when that electron drops back down to a stable orbital generally ranges from a few milliseconds to a few tenths of a second. The problem is that when the mean free path is short (increasing concentrations of GHGs) a given IR photon may intercept millions of GHG molecules before it ultimately escapes to space or is reabsorbed by the surface only to start all over again.

("Infrared radiation and planetary atmospheres" - Infrared radiation and planetary temperature | Print Edition - Physics Today

“…Adding more greenhouse gas to the atmosphere makes higher, more tenuous, formerly transparent portions of the atmosphere opaque to IR and thus increases the difference between the ground temperature and the radiating temperature. The result, once the system comes to equilibrium, is surface warming. The effect is particularly spectacular on Venus, whose ground temperature is 730K. If the planet were a blackbody in equilibrium with the same solar radiation received by the planet, the ground temperature would be a mere 231K.
The greenhouse effect of CO2 on Earth and Mars is visually manifest as the ditch carved out of the Planck spectrum near 667 cm^-1. That dip represents the energy that would have escaped to space were it not for the opacity of CO2…”

)

Here is a hint. It takes a packet of IR about 0.0049 seconds to reach the top of the troposphere from the surface of the earth passing through concentrations of CO2 equal to that found in the atmosphere.

http://www.biocab.org/Mean_Free_Path.pdf

Beyond the fact that nothing in that poorly cobbled to together manifesto supports your asserted transit speed of any given emission of IR from the surface to space, it doesn't appear to ever have been published in any relevent science journal.

(Hint: it hasn't been published because the methodology and practices are insufficient to produce the findings declared and no legitimate journal would accept such jr. high hijinx while hoping to maintain any measure of scientific credibility.)

Now if you care to try, feel free to explain how any amount of atmospheric CO2 in an atmosphere that averages -20C can cause the earth's -18C temperature (with the sun as its only energy source) to warm by 33C to 15C?

If you are going to try, provide some laws of physics to support your explanation.

The first visit, is the above listed paper by RT Pierrehumbert
Cookies Required

Additionally, we could go back to more than a century ago with the researches and papers by Fourier, Tyndall, Arrhenius, Kirchoff, Bolzmann, Einstein, Schwartz and the rest of the founders of atmospheric radiative transfer that are the principles still applied and used to accurately account for the physics involved in the radiative transef of energy through our atmosphere.

A few more modern references:

"Preliminary validation of column-averaged volume mixing ratios of carbon dioxide and methane retrieved from GOSAT short-wavelength infrared spectra" - http://www.atmos-meas-tech.net/4/1061/2011/amt-4-1061-2011.pdf

The concentration of carbon dioxide (CO2) has increased from about 280 to 380 ppm over the past century due to the burning of fossil fuels associated with expanding industrial activities (IPCC, 2007). CO2 absorbs infrared radiation from the surface and hence an increase in CO2 concentrations leads to a rise in atmospheric temperature. CO2 and other trace gases such as methane (CH4), nitrous oxide (N2O), hydrofluorocarbons (HFCs), perfluorocarbons (PFCs) and sulfur hexafluoride (SF6) are greenhouse gases that are subject to emissions regulations under the Kyoto Protocol. Together, CO2 and CH4 account for over 80 percent of the total anthropogenic warming effect caused by all greenhouse gases based on the estimates of radiative forcing from 1750 to 2005
(IPCC, 2007)...

"Atmospheric influences on infrared-laser signals used for occultation measurements between Low Earth Orbit satellites" - http://www.atmos-meas-tech-discuss.net/4/2689/2011/amtd-4-2689-2011.pdf

"Global Characterization of CO2 Column Retrievals from Shortwave-Infrared Satellite Observations of the Orbiting Carbon Observatory-2 Mission" - http://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/3/2/270/pdf

"Long-term analysis of carbon dioxide and methane column-averaged mole fractions retrieved from SCIAMACHY" - http://www.atmos-chem-phys.org/11/2863/2011/acp-11-2863-2011.pdf
(please note, these are mostly observational data studies, not modellings or theoretical treatises)

Your analogy fails with regard to CO2 however, because CO2 is not an insulator. It is a radiative conductor in that it does not reflect IR but absorbs and immediately emits it.

Your definition and understandings of thermal insulators and insulation, in general, are inappropriate and inadequate.

That graphic clearly states that 28 + 23 "energy units" are reaching the surface of the earth less 6 "energy units" that are being reflected leaving 51 "energy units" being absorbed by the surface of the earth. You keep dodging what the models claim is happening at the surface because instinctively you must know that the whole house of cards fails at the surface.

There is no especial distinction of the surface be it soil or water, and the atmosphere, aside from the fact that at the surface we transition from conduction and convection being the primairy means of raditon transfer, to radiative transfer becoming the dominant mechanism of transfer.

Thanks, but I knew that.

it wasn't and isn't apparent in your treatments of the information presented.

You keep glossing over that 117 "energy units" being emitted by the surface of the earth but when that surface only absorbs 51 "energy units" from its only energy source, you have some splainin to do if you expect me to buy it. Again, describe to me, in detail,...

96 units (from atmospheric emissions) + 51 units (short wave energy directly from the Sun) = 147 units, 147 units - 23 units (latent heat/evaporation) - 7 units of sensible heat (conduction & convection) = 117 units emitted by the surface. This really isn't rocket science, just plain simple math/accounting.

As part of your explananation, I also want you to describe the physical laws which predict and support the idea that an illuminated surface can emit more than twice as much energy as it absorbs from its only source of illumination. And show your math.

As you continue to improperly state what is occurring and frame your demands in terms that aren't in accord with what science actually demonstrates, all I can do is what I have done, point out where your understandings are improper and not in accord with the science while trying to explain what the science does say and supporting my explanations with cite to solid and broadly accepted mainstream science references.

96 of these units are re-emitted toward and re-absorbed by the surface.

...You are trying to tell me that if I surrounded that heater not with reflectors, but radiating conductors which by their very nature scatter energy, I could somehow coax more than 2.000 watts out of that heater while only paying the electric company for 1,000? Is that what you are saying?

No, that is merely the confused distortion you keep trying to misunderstand my words to mean. it bears no relationship to anything I have or am stating.

When you get to the part where you are describing backradiation, we can open the topics of the 2nd law of thermodynamics, EM fields, and the physics that govern the direction of energy flow along vectors. And some observable, experimental, repeatable and best of all inexpensive evidence that you can do in your own back yard that will allow you to prove to yourself that it simply isn't happening. I look forward to it.

We've been through it before and I explained it all to the point where you didn't seem to have any questions left, and now 6 months later, you are back where you were and act like you don't remember the previous session at all. But I'm only here to share my understandings and to explore the understandings of others. If going through all of this again helps you or someone else reading this exchange to actually investigate and explore the science for themselves, then repeating myself is a small price to pay,...

 

[gslack]

Trakar you are forgetting the reason you made this new identity and spamming the threads again. You think you can change an arguments outcome by overloading with the same crap from different sources? Good luck with that, all that will happen is people get tired of you and your BS and start ignoring your asinine mile long repetitive nonsense..

 

[westwall]

Trakar you are forgetting the reason you made this new identity and spamming the threads again. You think you can change an arguments outcome by overloading with the same crap from different sources? Good luck with that, all that will happen is people get tired of you and your BS and start ignoring your asinine mile long repetitive nonsense..

Allready have.

 

[rdean]

6%

 

[westwall]

6%

Doesn't apply to me, I is a Democrat!

 

[wirebender]

Trakar you are forgetting the reason you made this new identity and spamming the threads again. You think you can change an arguments outcome by overloading with the same crap from different sources? Good luck with that, all that will happen is people get tired of you and your BS and start ignoring your asinine mile long repetitive nonsense..

Is trakar Rwatt? Some of the argument seemed familiar. If he is Rwatt, perhaps I should just bring the original argument (in which he was well and truely spanked) forward and save myself the time and effort.

 

[IanC]

please highlight and demonstrate the contradictory aspects you feel are presented in Trenberth's actual statements.

How about we begin with a planet surface radiating more than twice as much energy as it receives from its only energy source? Global warming is manmade only in so much as the issue is manmade, the data is manmade, the crisis is manmade and the consensus is manmade.

please fix the quote mistakenly attributed to me

 

[IanC]

... Trenberth points out the weaknesses of climate models and then says that we should believe the models and draw the conclusion that there will be catastrophic consequences if we dont. how is that logical?

please highlight and demonstrate the contradictory aspects you feel are presented in Trenberth's actual statements.

huh? Trenberth sets down numerous reasons why the models dont match reality and then makes an abrupt about-face and states that we should make plans to counter the IPCC predictions that he denied them making in the first place. schizophrenic much?

 

[westwall]

Trakar you are forgetting the reason you made this new identity and spamming the threads again. You think you can change an arguments outcome by overloading with the same crap from different sources? Good luck with that, all that will happen is people get tired of you and your BS and start ignoring your asinine mile long repetitive nonsense..

Is trakar Rwatt? Some of the argument seemed familiar. If he is Rwatt, perhaps I should just bring the original argument (in which he was well and truely spanked) forward and save myself the time and effort.

It's so hard to tell the clones from the real people in this forum it is difficult to know if they even know when they argue against themselves!

rwatt, olfraud, konrad, trakar, they are all basically the same. I just lump them all together now.

 

[westwall]

... Trenberth points out the weaknesses of climate models and then says that we should believe the models and draw the conclusion that there will be catastrophic consequences if we dont. how is that logical?

please highlight and demonstrate the contradictory aspects you feel are presented in Trenberth's actual statements.

huh? Trenberth sets down numerous reasons why the models dont match reality and then makes an abrupt about-face and states that we should make plans to counter the IPCC predictions that he denied them making in the first place. schizophrenic much?

He loses track of which clone he is from time to time. Oh and my wife informs me the proper term is "multiple personalities", schizotypal symptoms are different.

 

[wirebender]

It is not an accurate statement. The Sun's direct continuous additions to the Earth only occur over one hemisphere of the planet. The Earth's continuous emissions, however, occur over the entire sphere of the planet and throughout the depth of the atmosphere. Night and Day are fully incorporated and averaged into energy budget considerations and calculations,...which you would understand clearly, if you put down the pictures you are trying to misrepresent and pick up the papers those pictures represent a simplified depiction of.

Of course it is an accurate statement. The fact that you deny the model upon which alarmism is built, tells me that you don't believe it any more than I do.

The fact is that, unlike the alarmist model, the earth neither receives continuous energy on any given spot for 24 hours a day, nor emits the same amount of energy from any given spot 24 hours a day.

Here, again is the energy budget upon which alarmism is based. It is taken from Trenberth himself. http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/Trenberth/trenberth.papers/TFK_bams09.pdf

Note that trenberth doesn't simply show a portion of the earth being irradiated at any given time as the more kind graphic I originally posted does. Trenberth's graphic shows the whole flat earth being irradiated at once. No attempt is made to represent the earth as a sphere because the bottom line is that his mathematics don't represent the earth as a sphere. As I have already pointed out, he divides the energy incoming from the sun as P/4 rather than P/2. His mathematical model represents the earth as a flat disk.

He deviates from reality right off the bat and when you aren't representing reality at the foundational level, your end results won't represent reality either.

Here is what a rational model of the energy input from the sun must look like:

Note the maximuim temperature is reached a short time after noon and the coolest temperatures are just after sunrise. Of course, those values shown by the orange represent the equator and decrease proportionately as one moves towards the poles. Note the max temperature occurs shortly after noon and the coolest temperature occurs shortly after sunrise. Any model that does not represent this sort of energy input from the sun does not reflect reality and trenberth's model certainly does not represent reality or anything like it.

http://eesc.columbia.edu/courses/ees/slides/climate/insolation_adg.gif

Nice, except it has nothing to do with trenberth's energy budget. His model does not represent a sphere.

When I demonstrate mainstream climate science references talking about reflected solar energy and albedo issues, why do you presume that climate science considers the Earth to be a black body? Do you not understand what a black body is?

trenberth is mainstream science. trenberth is the basis for climate alarmism, and trenberth's models treat the earth as if it were a blackbody. And yes, I understand perfectly what a blackbody is and I understand that if you represent the energy input and output of the earth in terms of P/4, you are assuming it to be a blackbody.

This is incorrect to my understandings, please support your understandings with citiation or reference to compelling supporting evidences.

We have already demonstrated pretty convincingly that your "understandings" lack quite a bit.

It isn't, it is fully described and explained in the paper initially alluded to.

And yet, they were unable to represent it in the graphical representations used to illustrate the paper? Laughable.

I am not ignoring your statements I am simply pointing out where they are in error and explaining what the graphic and more importantly the paper from which the graphic was lifted, actually says.

Of course you are, but you did the same thing the last time.

"... The values put forward in Fig. 7 [the Trenberth graphic] are reasonable but clearly not exact. The purpose of this paper is not so much to present definitive values, but to discuss how they were obtained and give some sense of the uncertainties and issues in determining the numbers..."

And that statement is in reference to the values stated on the graphic, not the physics or mechanics described. When he says absorbed by the surface, he does not mean absorbed by the surface and the atmosphere, he means absorbed by the surface of the earth. ie the actual ground, lakes, and oceans.

fiber glass insulation works to create a retardation of energy flow by short circuiting both conductive and convective heat transfer methods. the dead air spaces in the matting prevent the circulation of hot air from the surface of the water heater from quickly transferring that heat away from the body of the hot water heater, the low overall density of the material and the naturally low level of thermoconductivity of glass fiber retards the direct conductive flow of heat from the surface of the water heater.

And which "dead air spaces" do you suppose CO2 create in the atmosphere. The bottom line is that fiberglass is not a heat absorber. If it were, it would conduct the heat to somewhere else. The heat that is trapped in the dead air spaces has no place to go because the fiberglass does not absorb IR. CO2, does absorb IR and immediately emits it. Therefore, it is not an insulator.

thermal Insulator
The term thermal insulation can refer either to materials used to reduce the rate of heat transfer, or the methods and processes used to reduce heat transfer. Heat energy can be transferred by conduction, convection, radiation. ...
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermal_insulator

Since CO2 absorbs and emits IR, it is not an insulator. Rather than reduce the rate of heat transfer, by absorbing and emitting, it facilitates heat transfer.

thermal conductor
An object that conducts heat easily from one side to the other, or from one end to the other.
library.thinkquest.org/C006669/data/Chem/glossary.html

This is precisely what CO2 does. It absorbs and emits. IR is moved through the molecule facilitating the transfer of IR, not blocking it.

as per definition, thermal insulators reduce the rate of heat transfers.

Correct, but since CO2 absorbs and emits, it is not reducing the rate of heat transfer. IR moves through the molecule at, or very near the speed of light. That is facilitating the transfer of heat. If CO2 didn't absorb and emit, it might slow down the rate of transfer but that isn't what it does.

Beyond the fact that nothing in that poorly cobbled to together manifesto supports your asserted transit speed of any given emission of IR from the surface to space, it doesn't appear to ever have been published in any relevent science journal.

Feel free to point out any mathematical error on his part, or misapplied physical law.

Additionally, we could go back to more than a century ago with the researches and papers by Fourier, Tyndall, Arrhenius, Kirchoff, Bolzmann, Einstein, Schwartz and the rest of the founders of atmospheric radiative transfer that are the principles still applied and used to accurately account for the physics involved in the radiative transef of energy through our atmosphere.

Quaint. Century old discredited science in support of modern fraud. Maybe you are unaware that Professor Woods proved fourier wrong way back when and recently Wood's experiment has been redone and his findings were the same. The reason a greenhouse heats up is due to the blocking of convection and conduction with the open atmosphere; not any "trapping" of LW radiation

Your definition and understandings of thermal insulators and insulation, in general, are inappropriate and inadequate.

Your failure to understand that since CO2 absorbs and emits, it is a conductor, not an insulator shows your own understanding to be inadequate. Insulators do not transmit.

There is no especial distinction of the surface be it soil or water, and the atmosphere, aside from the fact that at the surface we transition from conduction and convection being the primairy means of raditon transfer, to radiative transfer becoming the dominant mechanism of transfer.

That statement alone is sufficient to disregard your entire argument. Are you really saying that you see no difference between stone, water, and air with regard to radiation? When trenberth says absorbed by the surface, he means the actual dirt and water of the earth. The surface. Not the air, but the actual hard surface of the earth. That you can't grasp that and reject the notion demonstrates your own disbelief of the foundational pseudocience behind alarmism.

96 units (from atmospheric emissions) + 51 units (short wave energy directly from the Sun) = 147 units, 147 units - 23 units (latent heat/evaporation) - 7 units of sensible heat (conduction & convection) = 117 units emitted by the surface. This really isn't rocket science, just plain simple math/accounting.

51 units of energy ABSORBED BY THE SURFACE. 117 units of energy RADIATED BY THE SURFACE. That is what trenberth et al say, and that is what they mean. You clearly don't believe them any more than I do but rather than simply reject them as idiots, you torture their words into something that you apparently believe makes sense.

As you continue to improperly state what is occurring and frame your demands in terms that aren't in accord with what science actually demonstrates, all I can do is what I have done, point out where your understandings are improper and not in accord with the science while trying to explain what the science does say and supporting my explanations with cite to solid and broadly accepted mainstream science references.

I am not improperly stating anything and the whole point of this is that climate science can't actually demonstrate any of the claims it makes.

No, that is merely the confused distortion you keep trying to misunderstand my words to mean. it bears no relationship to anything I have or am stating.

No. That is precisely what trenberth et al are stating. 51 energy units absorbed by the surface of the earth from its only energy source and 117 energy units radiated from the surface of the earth. The difference between the 51 absorbed from the sun and the 117 being radiated coming from what amounts to reflectors placed around the earth. 66 units of energy that the earth got from the sun that the sun didn't know it delivered.

We've been through it before and I explained it all to the point where you didn't seem to have any questions left, and now 6 months later, you are back where you were and act like you don't remember the previous session at all.

Is that what you tell your self? If it is, then you have demonstrated the essence of mental masturbation far better than I could ever explain it to anyone. Far from "explaining" , you got spanked so badly that you ran away and changed your name, and I will gladly bring forward a link to the last post I made in the conversation where I had to explain to you what the final result of your calculations meant. You did the math and were unable to accept that when you subtract EM fields, you are subtracting energy and by definiton photons. You ran away and changed your name rathe rthan admit that you had lost.

The idea that "you explained to me" is laughable and a bald faced lie. You got your ass handed to you. Would you like to see the conversation again? Will seeing it cause you to change your name again?

Here is a link if anyone cares to look. The first link is to your last comment of the discussion and the second is my response. After that, you ran away.

http://www.usmessageboard.com/envir...-warmers-whats-your-theory-6.html#post3758427

http://www.usmessageboard.com/3774581-post215.html

Neither the mathematics nor the physics has changed since you ran away the last time. Doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different result defines insanity pretty well.

I am laughing at you. Laughing real hard.