Dear Dr. Hannon:

Thank you for posting the information regarding the referenced study. As a water quality scientist and horticulturist, I learned years ago to be wary of so-called predictive models such as that reported. Generally, these models are only successful at predicting the expectations of the modeller unless truthfully grounded and calibrated with real-time data from field observations.

Sorry, but this exercise sounds like just one more offfice-bound scientist using a mathematical model as a basis for a published paper. Frankly, it also demonstrates how science has been misappropriated by special interest groups, including some academic scientists, lawyers, and public relations specialists for private gain.

Truthfully, what is the most potent radiative gas in our atmosphere? Water vapor. It just baffles me how discussions of global warming and its causes skirt around the importance of water vapor to this phenomenon while wildly exaggerating the importance of carbon dioxide, a primary nutrient required by all living organisms, which has a proportionate partial pressure in our atmosphere of less the .04%! Assuming that the two planetary systems contain rougly equivalent masses of carbon, one ten thousandth of Venus' total planetary mass is atmospheric carbon dioxide, while on Earth only .0001% of the planet's carbon budget is found in our atmosphere. Consequently, the staggering proportion of earthly carbon resides as bicarbonate in our ocean and as gases, liquids, or solids in our geological strata, demonstrating the cybernetic regulation of carbon on Earth by aqueous chemistry.

Remarkably, the chemistry of carbon dioxide and its aquionic electrolyte, carbonic acid, are coordinated by water and cybernetically regulated by organismal physiology. This is the one truthful thing to be demonstrated by the cited model. Plants NEED carbon dioxide, catalytically converted in their leaves to carbonic acid, for growth. Most people are unaware that carbon becomes nutritiounally limited for growth during the afternoon hours because of its very low atmospheric concentrations. Consequently, many greenhouse operators use methane powered carbon dioxide generators to enhance primary productivity.

Apparently, many physicists have never experienced the pleasure of greenhouse employment, as many still incorrectly describe the greenhouse effect. Having worked in greenhouses over the years, it is disheartening to see this analogy misappropriated and abused by scientists, especially physicists, who should know better. Unfortunately, they continue to pass along their fallacies to new generations of eager but naive students. Globally, or in a greenhouse, water vapor and water moderate our climate, not carbon dioxide. The changes of physical state for water to water vapor are the basis for the meteorological cycle and the reason we all like to weather watch with experts such as the outstanding meteorologists at Accu-Weather, including you.

Water is so under-rated in its importance to our planet. Water is the difference between our beautiful planet and scorched, dessicated Venus: likewise, for our planet and deeply frozen, dehydrated Mars. The Greenhouse Effect moderates our ambient temperatures protecting us from Venusian and Martian extremes. Their is NO such thing as a runaway greenhouse effect! Mars and Venus experience extremes because they have NO greenhouse effect and its regulatory, protective benevolence for organismal physiology.

Simple observations tell simple truths. Which night is colder; a calm, arid starry summer night or a muggy, close, sticky summer evening? Which region is cooler at night; an arid, waterless sub-tropical desert or wet, humid, sub-tropical forest? While absolute and relative humidities are highly variable globally, variances in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations are limited and equitably distributed around the globe. Consequently, absolute humidity, not carbon dioxide,is responsible for the slight measured increases in average global nocturnal temperatures. As scientists, we have a responsibility to accuracy and truthfulness, yet these simple facts are generally disregarded and not reported to a gullible public.

It's no coincidence that the greenhouse effect, atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations and global warming have become front and center for public scrutiny since Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and the cancellation or dismantling of many planned or constructed nuclear power plants. Nuclear power is an exorbitantly expensive, exotic way to boil water for the steam generation of electricity that requires enormous public governmental subsidies for their construction. Consequently, the purported threat of carbon dioxide and global warming are being deceitfully, if not fraudulently manipulated to benefit the nuclear power industry, since nuclear power plants do not emit carbon dioxide to the atmosphere.

Nuclear power plants do, however, massively waste water vapor, the most important radiative atmospheric gas by far. For those interested, copies of state and federal air and water quality discharge permits are available for public inspection. These list the qualitative and quantitative parameter requirements of permitted power plant facilities. Unequivocally, the number one substance quantitatively discharged from nuclear power plants is water vapor to the atmosphere or indirecly heated water discharged to cooling reservoirs which then evaporates into the atmosphere.

Legally, fraud is defined as a deliberate practice to gain unfair or unlawful advantage over others. It's time for climate scientists, nuclear physicists, geologists, and public relations specialists to tell the truth and expose any hidden agendas aimed at public manipulation through the deliberate, perhaps fraudulent misrepresentation of science for economic advantage, particularly the cash-strapped nuclear power industry.

Dr. Hannon, thank you for allowing me the opportunity to express my views. Happy Holidays! Hope you get all that snow you're dreaming about sometime soon.

Hayes - Thanks for your comment. I'd just like to clarify that I'm not a Ph.D., so no Dr. title here.

You are correct that water vapor is the most significant greenhouse gas, however, the hydrologic cycle keeps the water vapor within a certain range. The concern around carbon dioxide is that it remains in the atmosphere for 50-200 years before it is absorbed into a sink or becomes part of another chemical reaction. CO2 concentration has increased from 280 PPMV to over 360 PPMV since the middle of the 18th century.

Well, Laura, I guess I promoted you, but I'm certain you are worthy of it. Easy for me to say, since I'm not a PhD either.

Thanks for your feedback. Yes, that is the standard deflection offered by most physical scientists, especially physicists, regarding the significance of water and water vapor to our climate. This is done to exaggerate the impact of carbon dioxide upon global warming.

Reportedly, the mass of water vapor in our atmosphere can be up to one hundred times greater than carbon dioxide. This does not take into account the massive amount of water condensed in the atmosphere as liquid or ice crystals. Structurally, the bi-polar water molecule, gas and liquid, is significantly more excited than carbon dioxide by external radition, especially in certain infrared band widths. I have yet to see any significant information on the radiative loss of energy by atmospheric carbon dioxide after the sun goes down. It must be very significant as demonstrated by the rapid cooling of the atmosphere on a calm, arid night in the nearby Mojave Desert after a bright sunny day. Similarly, the coldest nights of winter are always those with very low humidities. Apparently, the very low mass of atmospheric OCO retains very little heat energy overnight as OCO molecules lose the thermal stimulation of the Sun or reflected heat energy from the Earth. Why is this simple observation ignored by climate physicists? The mass of OCO in the Martian atmosphere is one hundred times greater than that of the Earth. Measurably, Mars is much, much colder than Earth and experiences much greater daily variations in temperature than the Earth while having a very similar rotational period of twenty-four hours. Tellingly, the missing variables on Mars are oceanic water and atmospheric water vapor.

Please understand, global warming is very likely occuring. I am not dismissing it as a measurable phenomenon. However, the importance of water vapor is largely ignored for the reason you just cited, consequently it's real-time impact on average global temperatures is not actively pursued by climate scientists despite its routine world-wide monitoring by meteorologists. Laura, why is only temperature reported in global warming studies while the parameter of relative humidity is never publicly reported? It would be interesting to determine the correlation between average relative humidity and temperature at those monitoring stations recording average increases in temperature as reported in the public media.

Objectively, climatologists cannot ignore the impact of water vapor upon global temperatures, only selectively choosing to study carbon dioxide. As a BS biologist, I can be just as dismissive about carbon dioxide and tell you it is regulated by organismal physiology. However, studying air and water quality just makes good sense and should be standard policy. I used to make a living doing just that for the San Antonio River Authority in SA, Texas. We should not have to manufacture crises for questionable human intervention in order to secure scientific funding from stingy politicians. Being from Wisconsin, you must remember former Senator William Proxmire and his attention-grabbing Golden Fleece Awards. That man loved pouncing on scientists and ridiculing their basic scientific research as frivolous even though remarkable advances usually occur serendipitously through very basic research, for example carbon nanotubes, which are deposited as black graphitic soot after thermal decomposition of graphite, hydrocarbons or carbon oxides.

Although it's misinterpreted by many to express a correlation between increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide and global warming, the now-famous Keeling Curve as measured at Mauna Loa in Hawaii by scientists at the Scripps Institute of Oceanography at UCSD, is not capable of such a correlation. It does however clearly establish a direct correlation between atmospheric OCO concentrations and biological respiration further demonstrating the relationship between atmospheric OCO concentrations and organismal physiolgy. Clearly, like the meteorologically regulated water cycle, the carbon cycle is also cybernetically controlled by aqueous chemistry and living organisms.

What does this mean? On Earth, there is no direct correlation between temperature and carbon dioxide concentrations. As publicly acknowledged by Dr. Keeling, there is however, a direct correlation between temperature and biological respiration, a massive global process which directly impacts air and water quality via the atmospheric or oceanic exhaust and removal of gaseous, liquid, and solid metabolic waste products, including carbon dioxide. Personally, I am skeptical of the accuracy of studies guestimating the mean residence time of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Many investigators may be incorrectly associating mean residence time with the increase in partial pressure of atmospheric carbon dioxide. Regardless, geologically, four hundred years is nearly instantaneous. There are trees older than the reported mean OCO residence time. Truthfully, the Keeling Curve demonstrates the daily and seasonal biological demand for carbon dioxide by photosynthetic organisms. The oceanic and atmospheric OCO turnover may be much more rapid than presumed. Analogously, we know the biological oxygen demand exerted by aquatic organisms, especially bacteria, can quickly deplete the mass of diatomic oxgyen in a sample of water if overloaded with catabolically consumable organic materials.

Similarly, atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations have not been increasing only for the last 150 years as a consequence of the Human Ecosystem. They began climbing 10,000 years ago after bottoming out at an astoundingly low 180 ppm or .018 percent. This occurred at the peak of the last major episode of continental glaciation as measured in ice core samples from the Greenland and Antarctic ice domes. Those records go back for 400,000 years. They, too, clearly establish a direct correlation between temperature and biological respiration. As the world's average temperature dropped so did biological respiration and the mass of carbon dioxide exhausted into the atmosphere. Field data from a variety of disciplines has shown some ecosystems were eliminated by ice, others reduced by drought, and the majority impacted by lower temperatures. Consequently, oceanic and atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations are a direct measure of biological productivity. Volcanic production is minimal in comparison and perhaps episodic. However its contribution, including water vapor, will stimulate biological respiration.

Although generally ignored these days, we still live in an age of cold, snow, and ice, a fact too conveniently disregarded by too many climate scientists and policy-makers. New York has a higher probability of being entombed once again in ice than being completely submerged underwater. As continental ice regressed, terrestrial ecosystems steadily regained lost ground especially in temperate and boreal latitudes. Consequently, more water vapor is wasted into the atmosphere by biological activity. Is the urban heat island effect really a consequence of building mass or increased urban relative humidities from people, landscape plants, irrigation systems, reservoirs, electric power plants, automobiles, and other machines as all are discharging enormous quantities of water vapor into our atmosphere. Collectively, all should have a measurable impact on temperature. In equitable climate regimes, carbon dioxide and water will be converted to biomass with a secondary volume of water plasmically stored in organic tissues. We can no longer ignore these simple truths so certain groups can hoodwink the public into behaving in ways favorable for private gain. We should not have to corrupt the disciplines of aqueous chemistry and organismal physiology in order to influence international energy policies away from hydrocarbons.

People should not invest in carbon credit schemes or tropical forestation projects. These schemes are ripe for fraudulent abuse by con artists. Go to your local nursery and come home with a tree, shrub or sixpack of perennials for your home garden. Americans have literally greened their cities through this process. Horticultural products now total 6 to 7 billion dollars a year in the this country according the the American Association of Nurserymen. Additionally, homeowners can install solar panels on their houses then sell any excess electricity to their electric company for credit on their monthly bills. British Petroleum now manufactures solar panels in Maryland for home installation. I don't know about PA or elsewhere, but here in southern CA they can be purchased at Home Depot. We need more solutions, not more studies by physicists lacking expertise in aqueous chemistry and organismal physiology at institutions such as Lawrence Livermore that need massive public subsidies for nuclear fission and fusion. We can safely harness the Sun's excess nuclear fusion energy from 97 million miles away by investing in our landscapes and solar powered electricity for domestic and commercial installations as outlined above. Similarly, Penn State is to be commended on its leading research regarding the commercial production of hydrogen by bacteria from processed food wastes.

Okay, I better stop. You certainly have more festive things to do in Nittany Valley this holiday. I grew up in nearby Lock Haven having graduated from LH State College during the frigid, snowy 1970's while avidly watching and learning meteorology each night at 6PM from Joe Soebel et al on PSU'S, WPSX Weather World. I'm sure I'll have more to write another time. I really enjoy your site. Keep up the good work. The weather here in Southern California is rarely as exciting as central Pa.

Hayes Galitski
Claremont, Los Angeles County, CA

Dear Laura,
I find it hard to believe that trees in northern latitudes increase global warming by the heat they absorb. In my locality the wooded areas are several degrees cooler that nonwooded built up areas. Because of transpiration from their leaves they actually remove 'heat' in the air around them as this energy is used to evapourate water from their leaves. I don't beleive all of the factors have been calclated such as shading and transpiration etc. Also trees are not replacing barren ground. If they weren't there there would be grass, shrubs, tarmac, built up areas etc all of which absorb heat without being carbon sinks. I believe that this 'study' is deliberately misleading, because politicians have realised that there is more to be gained economically by using the scare about global warming to raise taxes and get everyone to buy new technology, than by planting forests, which in the long run is the only method of actually reducing CO2 levels.
P. Gabriel