Bottom line up top; its so complicated we shouldn't give simple (minded) answers. In their debate, Sarah Palin gave a much better answer than Joe Biden on this.

1. Measurement--are we really capable of measuring both temperature changes and carbon dioxide over the entire globe even today, let alone making good enough proxy estimates 100 years ago or before? The first thing you are told in a physics lab is to keep account of measurement error. I never see that in global warming studies. Proxy data for old measures, as well as new, should be given very wide error bands around them.

2. Causation--yes a theory has been developed that shows how carbon dioxide can raise temperature through the "greenhouse" effect. But its also easy to create a theory in which warming raises CO2 levels. (Say peat moss related CO2 is released in Siberia at the end of an ice age) But we really don't know the direction of causation. So if it is true that warming is associated with increased CO2, which is causing which? Increased hospital visits are clearly associated with increased deaths. Does that mean we shouldn't go to a hospital? Proving causation is a far more difficult proposition then is showing correlation between two phenomena.

3. Accelerating and decelerating tendencies--in natural phenomena we see two opposite tendencies, one that tends to accelerate a trend, we call it "momentum", in which, as in a wave or a football game, a small gain leads to a future larger gain; and a decelerating tendency, one in which it gets ever more difficult to build up the wave, or get fat and happy victorious football players to put in more practice time. Global warming models seem to emphasize the former (warming reduces ice pack which decreases reflected sunshine which adds to warming) instead of the latter (warming adds humidity to atmosphere which adds to clouds which increases reflected sunshine and cools the atmosphere.) My hunch is that if the accelerationists were correct, after 6 billion years our earth would have become uninhabitable. Waves (either in the ocean or in the stock market) tend to tumble over after they get too tall.

Your points are well made. Why would anyone in their right mind propose to spend trillions of dollars to prevent CO2 emissions based on the logic you presented? Their can be only one reason. They stand to profit from it.

We experience climate at the boundary of land, air and sea -- not exactly a stable point. So climate will always be variable and affected by cycles in the system and outside the system (sun). The climate has changed in the past but generally returns to a nominal level. How much has the climate changed where you live in the past 200, 500, 1000 years?

But the addition of CO2 offsets the energy balance. It does not have a cycle. CO2, like water vapor, reacts to temperature changes but while water vapor adjusts on a time scale of weeks, CO2 will change on the century time scale. So whatever CO2 is put in the atmosphere is going to change the climate over a long period of time. The only question is about how much and the debate is over the feedbacks. But it happens very slowly, barely noticeable during any person's lifetime, while other climate cycles are much stronger. But I expect the world's climate will be a much different place 200 years from now than it was 200 years before. This planet has no problems melting ice sheets or putting a kilometer of ice over your head. We just won't be around to see it.

CO2 concentration is now up to 387 ppm.

Reply from Mark P:

Thx for the update... when will it hit 400 ppm?

Mark,

No one seriously doubts that increasing CO2 causes increasing temperatures - but the argument has been grossly oversimplified. Radiative physics says that an increase in CO2 up to 450ppm will cause temperatures to increase by perhaps 0.4 degrees (at most.) Nobody on either side doubts that.

The dispute has to do with climate "feedbacks." Some people speculate that feedbacks will cause the planet to warm up as much as an additional 10 degrees and become unrecognizable, but there is no serious science to back this up - it is based on inadequate computer models, compounded worst case speculation, and an ignorance of the geologic record.

Quite possibly some of the worst science ever done.

Reply from Mark P:
I agree Patrick. We know that raising CO2 will cause warming, more info is needed on what feedback mechanisms will be activated and what role they will have...

Mark: Your blog on CO2 levels is well-written and logical. I'm one who believes CO2 is just one of numerous variables driving climate, and I believe some of contemporary warming is due to increasing CO2 levels and some warming is natural. However, I believe the apocalyptic predictions of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are asinine. Their predictions based on computer simulations haven't materialized. Their models didn't predict the current global cooling trend. The IPCC and many others led us to believe we'd experience runaway warming indefinitely. This isn't happening. Furthermore, I believe the recession of the Arctic sea ice and glaciers is in no way unprecedented in history and much of it can be attributed to natural factors including naturally warming and cooling oceans and solar cycles. America should definitely begin shifting to renewable energy immediately with the goal of becoming energy independent, however I don't think we should take drastic measures, and I oppose CO2 regulation and taxation. It will take time to transition our coal and petroleum-based infrastructure to renewable energy, and until we have a new infrastructure based on renewable energy we'll need to keep using coal, nuclear and petroleum energy, and we shouldn't be punished with strict regulation and taxation.

Reply from Mark P:
Did you read my mind Josh? Thx for the compliment. I believe the same thing, some warming is natural and some is man-made. I think we should as a country and a world continue researching and investing CO2 friendly energy sources until they are economically viable... when and if this occurs is anyone's guess. Continue commenting Josh!!

Anthony - here's the Global Chart

http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/webdata/ccgg/trends/co2_trend_gl.png

from here
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/

Mark - my appologies for calling you Anthony. my bad.

Reply from Mark P:

No worries, Janama. call me anything you want, lol

It will be interesting to see if the so-called "economic down-turn" has any effect on this chart.

I really like your choice of the word "ridiculously" in the sentence that begins, "The earth's climate is ridiculously complicated..." The more I study the more I am amazed. Our world is truly a marvel and a wonder, and deserves our awe, and my chief fear is that certain eco-freaks will turn the general public away from environmentalism with their militant attitudes.

The CO2 levels at Mauna Loa have been fairly erratic lately. The trend-line is more saw-toothed and less smooth. Each quirk of the line causes a flurry of debate, especially among bloggers who are expecting the level to show some reflection of a cooling PDO, (which might cause CO2 to be absorbed.) The debating can get so fast and furious that I sometimes have to remind myself we are talking about changes that amount to one or two molecules per every 100,000,000.

It seems to me that any kind of certainty regarding CO2 being the chief warming driver requires two things:
1. We know for certain that the average global temperature has been incredibly stable over the last few thousand years or so with no MWP's or LIA's and that the warming over the last 150 years is truly unprecedented over that period of time.
2. Climate scientists currently understand all the natural drivers of long term climate change so well that they can confidently say that natural fluctuations cannot possibly account for the warming of the last 150 years.

If you are not absolutely certain of the above two things, you are forced to look at AGW with at least some degree of skepticism.

How can anything amounting to 380 parts per million be considered significant? The world has been led down the wrong path with this man made global warming nonsense.

Reply from Mark P:
Simply b/c we are raising the levels quite dramatically and it is proven the CO2 absorbs infrared radiation

Seeing that current plot of CO2 concentrations from the Mauna Loa site reminded me of the supposition by Joe D'Aleo of ICECAP back in April:
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/2008_co2_monthly_maximum_at_mauna_loa_looks_like_will_be_lower_than_2007/

In his story, Mr. D'Aleo discusses a posting on the Climate Audit blog site by one of his friends named "aurbo":

"Since the beginning of the Mauna Loa data stream in 1958, no annual mean period has been observed with a CO2 concentration lower than the previous year although it came close in the mid 1960s. There is a chance that this record may be broken in this year or next. In just a few instances has the annual maximum in CO2 been lower than the prior max. Since we are just two months away from the normal annual maximum which is currently well below last year's max (see here) this will likely be one of those exceptional years."

aurbo specifically referred to the CO2 concentration plot at that time:
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/MAUNALOA0308.jpg

where the curve appeared to moved in a distinctly short-term downward trend.

Going further, Mr. D'Aleo's friend said:

"I think that the anomalous decline in the slope of the Mauna Loa CO2 curve during this past boreal winter which is normally a season in which CO2 rises rapidly, is directly tied to the Central Pacific SST. Cooling SSTs raise the oceans’ solubility of CO2 which it then extracts from the atmosphere. In the 50-year history of the Mauna Loa record, the slope of the CO2 curve became more positive during the positive PDO regime, ~1975-2005, which favored warm Tropical SSTs (El Niños) with just a few brief La Ninas. PDO regimes usually last for about 30 years. Now that the PDO has shifted into a negative phase, we should see cooler La Nina patterns becoming more prevalent with fewer and briefer El Nino episodes. The 20th Century contained two positive PDO regimes and one negative one. Little wonder why there was a net rise in Globally averaged temperature during that period. Consistent on-site measurements of CO2 didn’t begin until the latter half of the last negative PDO. Furthermore, should CO2 concentrations at Mauna Loa now show a decline, it would suggest again that CO2 is a lagging indicator, not a leading one."

Looking at what happened to the concentration plot and trendline since that time back in April, the curve, as again presented by Mark shows how Mr. D'Aleo and his friend's "discovery" of a possible change in the notably upward moving trendline was ultimately dashed. So to was their possible link to the theory that CO2 is just a lagging indicator to ocean temperatures.

Reply from Mark P:
Thank you for that information, well-researched and well-thought out Dennis

I think global warming is over
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/main.jhtml?xml=/opinion/2008/11/16/do1610.xml

Reply from Mark P:

I hope you are right, but I don't think you are...

I have been reading these posts for some time and enjoy the thougtful discussion.
I have a question: Are the factors that influence climate change infinite?

Reply from Mark P:
Thank you from me and the commenters Bruce. What do you mean by infinite? Do they ever change? If that is what you meant, I believe they are the same factors, but the mix of them is always changing. For example, in the future, something may happen to the solar output, and the amount of energy reaching the earth's surface may rise or fall. Or the amount of CO2 changes. Or the albedo changes etc..

Interesting observation of Brett. How about the converse: does warming of the earth's environment create a rise in the CO2 levels? Perhaps the rise in temps and C02 both work together to make more rises.

I urge everyone to go to the Drudge Report and click on "Freezing Heat"....it is not so much about the article itself which appeared in the London Telegraph outlining some more of the inaccuracies of Hansen and GISS...but the huge response in the commentaries that followed. I really believe this global warming scare is losing it`s steam.

CO2 is a greenhouse gas and physics has clearly demonstrated that it absorbs infrared radiation. This provides a small amount of warming to the atmosphere which in turns allows it to hold more water vapor. Water vapor is also a greenhouse gas, so there is an automatic feedback warming mechanism with CO2 and water vapor.

Beyond that, the warming atmosphere results a reduction of seasonal snowfall. This is most pronounced and significant at around 65 degree north latitude. The southern hemisphere does not have sufficient land masses around 65 south latitude so this is why there is such a lopsided response on our planet.

Anyhow, while the above is clear, what is not so clear is how the oceans and weather responds to CO2 warming. Changes in precipitation being the most significant. Since precipitation is expected to increase overall, there will be more snowfall during the winter, which could result in cooling if it was not melting so fast. At one time, it was also not clear how other pollution influences the climate. The most notable being sulfate aerosols from burning coal. It took a lot of hand waving to provide convincing proof that they provide enough short term cooling to account for temperatures witnessed between 1950 to 1975. Many people do not realize that CO2 levels have not been steadily rising ever since the industrial revolution. During the period of WW2, between 1938 to 1949 CO2 levels were fairly stable.

Final point. It is not clear how warming of the atmosphere has historically resulted in CO2 levels naturally going up. For example, during past glacial/inter glacial periods CO2 rose as temperatures rose, but we know humans were not responsible for that. So, there are natural feedback mechanisms that result in higher CO2 levels from warming. It could be thru ocean outgasing, oxidation of CH4 from either methyl hydrates, the thawing of bogs in the Northern Hemisphere or some other mechanism. So, given that CO2 causes warming and warming causes CO2 to rise, there is this feedback mechanism within our earth that can potentially result in extreme climate fluctuations. In other words, we can have either polar bears or crocodiles living within the artic circle. Which do you prefer?

Reply from Mark P:
Well thought out and well written! Maybe you should take my place writing this blog once a week Andrew...

Personally, I believe that as long as we have good convection currents of a homogeneous atmosphere, that CO2 cannot cause global warming. CO2 surrenders the heat it captures rather quickly. On Venus, the atmosphere is thick and soupy with its 40+ mile layer of non-homogeneous atmosphere of CO2 and doesn't have the benefit of a lot of convection currents. Venus surrenders very little heat to the colder upper levels and is hot.
Mars on the other hand has a light CO2 atmosphere that has meaningful convection, thus, Mars remains cold.
When you look up into the sky and see all of those clouds, you know that the convection process is operating here on Earth just fine. WE have a large Oceanic volume that will take time to cool. Because the Oceans have warmed up, they are the biggest source of CO2.
Remember, the CO2 man is releasing has all been in the atmosphere at one time or another. It holds true if we are using oil, gas, peat moss or any other organic material. All of the organically captured CO2 has already been in the atmosphere. Man is not creating additional CO2.

Robert

Reply from Mark P:
Great points Robert. However, we are releasing CO2 into the atmosphere that would of been trapped below the earth's surface. A convection oven works with convection currents, adding heat at the bottom of the oven makes the whole oven hot doesn't it? No matter how big the oven (earth) is, adding heat to it will cause it to warm..

Your graph shows about a 2.2 parts per million increase in CO2 over the past five years as compared to a conservative 0.7 PPM over the last 150 years. Is this not reason for concern about the rate of increase, and the ultimate impact on, the disturbing increase in global temperatures; notwithstanding the other factors impacting climate change?

Reply from Mark P:
0.7 PPM the last 150 years? I don't think that is correct. I agree that rising CO2 levels are a cause for concern... even considering the other factors

The graph shows 2 lines. Which is the CO2, and what is the other?

Reply from Mark P:
The red is measured levels, I believe the black is an average of the past 6 months..

Also, of course we need to be skeptical of predictions for the future. But if we wait until we're absolutely certian that the human-created increase in CO2 is causing global warming, it may be too late to do anything about it. Every day every one of us makes many decisions without being absolutely certian of their correctness. If we did nothing until we were absolutely certian, we would do absolutely nothing.

Hmm! Interesting!

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

Without feedbacks, you would have to assume that CO2 and temps are linear.
At some point the earth would catch on fire.

Reply from Mark P:
Feedbacks definitely play a role. I guess how big we will see...

Proof that it is all for the money,
If this were real, and really would kill us all
No country would allowed to pollute all they wanted to.
Russia, India, China, etc all produce more CO2 than we do. Added to the 160 countries that have to do nothing about CO2 pollution
and are the ones getting paid from carbon credits

We are the ones that are the suckers.

If you want to bring Co2 levels back down to pre-industrial revolution levels then we must build my "Underwater Suspension Tunnel" idea! It may take a hundred years to back to those levels again but the Tunnels are up to the task and computer modeling will prove it! If you would like to talk to me about them I am also on the forum and I would be glad to explain to all of you how they work. I don't know but perhaps Bret would like to ask me a few questions about them?? What you think Bret?

Mark; Really good post! Finally we can talk a little about CO2. As you have said, CO2 causes some warming. The Earth has a heat exchange with incoming and out going heat. The Earth takes in twice as much heat as can escape. This is due to GHG's the largest being water vapor. CO2 cannot fully escape our atmosphere. It is trapped and is backing up in the troposphere, and the stratosphere is now colder. To say that sending CO2 by burning fossil fuels into the atmosphere and expecting no result is ridiculous. The energy of the IR is transferred to the CO2 molecules which make them tumble faster, creating a blanketing effect. This is called global warming!
In the next 100 years the projections assume a rise between 2 to 5 Celsius. This depends on how much CO2 is in the troposphere. Also there are consequences coming from a warmer world. Already the Arctic is in a feedback loop. Less ice equals less reflectivity and more absorption of heat. This causes more warming of ice so that is what is meant as a positive feedback loop. Carbon sinks, The biosphere, and the oceans will only accept a small amount of CO2. The ocean acidification has started and cannot hold anymore carbon, so that is added to the atmosphere. Scientist are now pumping up colder water from the lower parts of the ocean to see if this is one way to reduce CO2 emissions. Scientists are now dropping thousands of tree stater darts in deforested areas, to see if carbon will reside there, even if the ecosystem has been destroyed. To say there is no effect from heating the planet makes no sense. When you go to buy some seeds and notice that your area for growing tomatoes is now earlier you will know three things; People in the Arctic are getting warmer, you will get more rain; and disease from insects will increase. Yes the Earth is complex , yet man could make a whole in the Ozone. Why shouldn't more CO2 make it hotter. Too much CO2 is now anthropogenic. Scientists don't know when the tipping point will be. In the last 150 years the heat has slowly and steadily increased. This is one of the most consistent effects you will ever experience in Science. Notice that no one is talking about a cooling period. Now there may be solutions,or inventions, or you will have the amount of CO2 they had at the end of the Jurrasic period. Now you know where we get our oil from, don't you?
Great writing, thanks KIPP

Reply from Mark P:
Thank you very much Kipp. Your comments are some of the most intelligent and well-thought out comments here. I appreciate the time and effort you but into them, and please continue reading and commenting. You don't even begin to realize how much a "novice" like me learns from your comments...

I don't think it is accurate at all to say that it is "agreed" that CO2 causes warming. It IS accurate to say that it is "agreed" that, ALL OTHER THINGS BEING HELD EQUAL, rising levels of CO2 will cause some warming. This important caveat is often (and often conveniently) overlooked. As you indicated, Mark, Earth's climate system is ridiculously complicated, and we simply do NOT have anywhere NEAR a complete understanding of it. To suggest that we "know" that even "some" of the warming that took place since the beginning of the Industrial Revolution is caused by CO2 in general - or human emissions thereof in particular - is to suggest that we know more than we really do. We don't know if the warming has anything to do with CO2 levels at all - negative feedbacks in the Earth's climate system may negate any warming from CO2 completely, for all we actually do know at this stage. We also know that rising temperatures WILL cause CO2 levels to rise, based on the solubility of CO2 in water (the oceans, in particular) decreases with increasing temperature, so the "cause vs. effect" relationship is definitely not "settled" in favor of CO2 causing temperature change (as opposed to the other way around).

Furthermore, they can repeat the alleged "fact" that CO2 levels were 280ppm prior to the IR all they want, however that figure is nothing more than a fiction based on the mistaken assumption that air bubbles trapped in ice cores are a closed system, which they are not - and further accepting that (based on a completely ARBITRARY assumption) those air bubbles are 85 years younger than their depth in the cores otherwise indicated, an assumption made based on the "inconvenient truth" (pardon the pun) that the ice core derived CO2 proxy data didn't match up with the Mauna Loa measurements.

Finally, the fantasy of "energy independence" is something that politicians have been spewing nonsense about since the Seventies. It won't happen, EXCEPT for ONE way - a catastrophic economic contraction. So-called "renewables" will not amount to anything more than bit players in the energy mix, because they simply don't provide either the quantity or the portability of energy needed to fulfill our needs. For an honest appraisal of the situation, read the book "Gusher of Lies." The economic success of the US is the reason that its energy consumption outstrips domestic energy sources (that, and the fact that there is a continuing campaign to stop the US from actually USING its own natural resources). The UN likes to point to energy use vs. *population* to suggest that the US is an energy pig, however we produce more of the worlds global economic activity as a proportion than we consume energy as a proportion, so we have nothing to feel guilty about.

Mark: After reading your comment to Josh I was a little surprised. Josh makes good common sense
arguments, except the fact that there has been a moderate cooling. As there are other natural factors to consider, the PDO is cool and ENSO is neutral. Also if you want to be a scientist like Dr. Hansen, who has his butt in too many pies, so be it. If you want to follow in the traditions of a truly good scientist, find your answers in science, and be weary of the press
and the unjust influence of those who cannot separate the difference. I have found Science to be so universal and complex that I save my politics for those blogs that are political. The IPCC is only one assessment, and there are thousands. Global Warming was stumbled upon in the 1840's, and so many people have committed there whole lives to the facts and nothing less.
Whether you choose the true course is your decision to make be it skeptic or believer. Either way it is about the scientific facts, and nothing less than that should suffice.
Thanks,KIPP

We also know that warming can cause a rise in atmospheric CO2 - and the mechanism is well described. There is an inverse relationship between water temperature and 'solubility' of CO2.

In the recent atmospheric record, what data suggests the rise in CO2 caused the increase in temperature, and not the other way around?

Are the parameters of the oceans' CO2 cycle and ocean currents, and their interaction with temperature, so well estimated that the model supports the current theory?

Reply from Mark P.

Paolo, colleagues of mine recently brought up that point, that increases in CO2 may be caused by increases in temperature, not the other way around like everyone assumes. Do you know where I can find some information on that?
paquette@accuweather.com

Thank you!

Quick answer: yes I buy the CO2 stuff, but let's not let it distract us from the bigger picture.

The effects of human activity on climate are well known and accepted in the urban heat-island phenomenon. Cities are hotter than the country for some reasons, and those reasons are many and complex. But at the end of it all, everybody knows that song, "Hot times, summer in the city..."

People escape to the country to cool off. More and more people complain that the countryside is disappearing. With our population approaching seven billion, and our use of the land with vast farms and highways and deforestation, it's easy to imagine this heat-island effect going global.

I'm a friend of science, but in a complicated situation like GCC, the scientific details can distract us from the big picture. Single studies can be co-opted by both sides of the argument to point and say, "see, we're right!"

The simple truth is, that at least in the city, human activity can warm us up. And to those who doubt that puny humans can damage the Earth on a large scale, yes we have already removed mountains, diverted rivers, leveled forests, and dug mines with an area exceeding the Grand Canyon. Humans can do anything we set our minds to doing. Not only that, we're here to stay. Our activities are not static and isolated.

The human body is also "ridiculously complicated". It took a very long time to determine that increased exposure to cigarette smoke killed people. We didn't need to understand all the complexity in order to demonstrate the causal relationship between cigarette smoke and adverse health consequences. Industry apologists spread "fear, doubt and uncertainty" about tobacco studies then, just as industry apologists do the same today about climate science -- for much the same reason. In spite of the best efforts of the tobacco industry to obfuscate the issue, the message from the basic science was clear from the first studies of the early 1960s.

The message from the basic science regarding the role of CO2 in global climate change is similarly clear today. Some of us are more willing to hear it than others.

Look, I'm no scientist or meteorologist. But how can they predict the weather for the coming years when they can't even get tomorrow right? I'm in NYC and next wednesday's high is supposed to be 37 degrees. That's fahrenheit not celsius. That is for November 26th, not January. Are you kidding with this global warming stuff?

Reply from Mark P:

Good point! Well, almost everyone knows the story, just b/c it is going to be really cold this week does not disprove global warming, and vice versa....

The link between GW and CO2 is undeniable...

temp change rate vs CO2 imbalance
http://bp0.blogger.com/__6PO0G1BcJM/SH425_eRB3I/AAAAAAAAADc/PjaO3wcb14g/...

But the addition of CO2 offsets the energy balance. It does not have a cycle. CO2, like water vapor, reacts to temperature changes but while water vapor adjusts on a time scale of weeks, CO2 will change on the century time

So MisterBob, just out of curiosity, what happens to the energy when the CO2 molecule gives up the energy?

Okay, so the CO2 absorbs energy, but it has to be released at some point in time. What form is the energy and where does the energy go???

Mark P wrote "when will it hit 400 ppm?"

Going up about 2 ppm per year, so in about 6--7 years.

Reply from Mark P:

Or possibly sooner if we continue to increase our rate of release? I wonder when the last time the earth had hit 400 ppm....

Kipp, the strange insults you direct toward Jim Hansen are unsupportable. FYI he is the world's most respected climate scientist, and for good reason. As time goes on, more scientists are joining him. You might find it helpful to read this article about the recent "coming out" of Canada's leading climate scientist.

So MisterBob, just out of curiosity, what happens to the energy when the CO2 molecule gives up the energy?

Don't know, I am not a climatologists. But I did something similar for a neutral particle traveling through a plasma. So my best guess would be the particle would reradiate isotropically after some relaxation time with the radiated energy having some cross section for recapture. The net effect would be an exponential decay in distance of the energy which could escape. But as I say, I'm just guessing. I would be interested in hearing the real explanation.

Mark Paquette: Thanks for the compliment. You are a novice, but I am a photographer. When I Got into this last year I thought it would be simple. Go figure. If you read the first paragraph of Andrews post, that should answer your question about temperatures and CO2. A simple explanation is if mankind started without CO2 we would not exist. CO2 stabilizes the atmosphere to keep us at just a certain temperature at specific degrees and water vapor is not consistent like CO2. We would be living on temperatures like the moon. How long did it take for life to exist on Earth. Without a stabilized environment, life would not grow. The Earth has an energy budget and while the sun,s influence has been measured, it does not equal the constant rise of temperatures. If you read the last IPCC assessment report it talks about how the incoming IR is measured in watts, compared to the existing IR reflected out, and that is twice as much. This is proof of the greenhouse effect at work. Scientists are afraid that if the atmosphere has more and more CO2 from dying ecosystems, deforestation, fossil fuels, and warmer oceans, that increasing CO2 will eventually kill us. In the most recent book by Spencer Weart,"The History of Global Warming",2008 edition, Dr. Weart uses Venus as an example. Venus is hotter than Mercury, in it's relative distance to the sun. Why you ask. Well the last probe proved that once there was water on Venus and the heat eventually had extruded all the water out. It's atmosphere is CO2. Warmer temps will by 1.5 Celsius, release all the methane clathrates under the permafrost in the Arctic and methane is twenty times that of CO2, although it's life in the atmosphere should be 20 years. I have a great skeptic argument for you perhaps in your next post. Don't work too hard,
Thanks Again, Kipp

Andrew wrote: During the period of WW2, between 1938 to 1949 CO2 levels were fairly stable.

Intuitively, I would have expected the war to cause a sharp increase in man-made atmospheric CO2, given the massive amount of industrial production that took place (and all the explosives that were detonated). Does anyone have any ideas why this didn't happen?

>> theory has been developed that shows how carbon dioxide can raise temperature through the "greenhouse" effect. But its also easy to create a theory in which warming raises CO2 levels

Actually, there is no clearly described hypothesis for C02 based GW. Steve Mc has been asking for it. Right now, it's in the category of "vague speculative idea, which would appear to violate various scientific laws, unsupported by any empirical data". However, one does not need to create a "theory" for how warming raises C02 levels. That's established science: Henry's Law.

>> It does not have a cycle. CO2, like water vapor, reacts to temperature changes but while water vapor adjusts on a time scale of weeks, CO2 will change on the century time scale.

The fact that there is definitely a Carbon cycle is well establised science. The C02 average time in atmosphere is about 5 years. All the C02 in the atmosphere is in flux, and will be in the water within 5 years, to be replaced by new C02.

>> changes that amount to one or two molecules per every 100,000,000. ...amounting to 380 parts per million be considered significant?

Exactly! Great point. C02 simply does not have enough mass to effectively heat the much larger mass of ocean and crust. It's like if you sit in the stands of an olympic sized swimming pool, and point a hair dryer at the pool. Technically, you are heating the pool, but in reality, the effect of the hair dryer is insignificant, unmeasurable.

>> Simply b/c we are raising the levels quite dramatically and it is proven the CO2 absorbs infrared radiation

1) The levels are NOT rising dramatically. Historical test data shows that it was in this range in the 1800s. 2) There is NO empirical evidence that Man has effected them very much. One reasonable estimate is that man's effect on the global C02 flux is .2%. 3) Of course, C02 absorbs IR, but by itself, it means nothing.

>> (good convection currents of a homogeneous atmosphere, that CO2 cannot cause global warming. CO2 surrenders the heat it captures rather quickly.) adding heat at the bottom of the oven makes the whole oven hot doesn't it? No matter how big the oven (earth) is, adding heat to it will cause it to warm

Wrong in several ways: 1) the earth is not a convection oven, it's not insulated. 2) if AGW were correct, the heat is being added near the heat drain (top), not the surface (bottom). 3) If the effect of C02 were significant, it would only effect one of several heat transfer mechanisms, and a minor one. It's like changing the insulation on a house where the doors and windows are wide open. 4) The surface is heated by the sun, and this heat is constantly draining out the top. Any C02 heating that is occurring is above the troposphere, ie near the top. The 2nd law of thermo says that a cooler body cannot heat a warmer body. The hotter upper atmosphere, simply heats outer space quicker.

>> it may be too late to do anything about it

Not scientifically suppported. Based on known C02 flux rates, 95 years from now, we could completely eliminate C02 emissions, and then 100 years from now, there would be no man made C02 in the atmosphere.

>> that increases in CO2 may be caused by increases in temperature, not the other way around like everyone assumes. Do you know where I can find some information on that?

Everyone Assumes? Only people who get their science knowledge from the MSM. You really need to study this topic for a lot longer, if you are not aware of such basic science. It's called Henry's Law. Basically, as everyone who drinks Pepsi should know, C02 is soluable in water. Just as in a gas, an element such as oxygen will spread out about evenly, the same is true for water-air systems. The air in a Coke can has highly pressurized C02, with the relationship between the pressure in the air and coke being defined by Henry's Law. As the cap is removed, the Coke degasses C02, as the pressure on the air is released.

Similarly, atmospheric C02 and surface water C02 is balanced. Same for oxygen. That's how fish breathe. The balance is affected by temperature. The equatorial waters are constantly being heated by a hot sun. Warm water can hold less C02. Equatorial waters outgas C02 in large quantities, dwarfing Man's efforts. Polar waters absorb large quantities. Increased solar intensity would warm the entire earth, increasing outgassing, and reducing absorption, resulting in a higher atmospheric level.

MisterBob:
So MisterBob, just out of curiosity, what happens to the energy when the CO2 molecule gives up the energy?

Don't know, I am not a climatologists. But I did something similar for a neutral particle traveling through a plasma. So my best guess would be the particle would reradiate isotropically after some relaxation time with the radiated energy having some cross section for recapture. The net effect would be an exponential decay in distance of the energy which could escape. But as I say, I'm just guessing. I would be interested in hearing the real explanation.

Posted by MisterBob | November 17, 2008 6:54 PM

Well from all the AGW fanatics a resonable explanation of how the energy is released and where is goes would go a long way to supporting your cuase.

Water in the earth's atmosphere has a huge buffering capacity since it exist in the 3 states solid, liquid and gas. I suspect it the phase changes that account for the large amounts of heat and energy transfer associated with water.

On the other hand, CO2 exist mainly as a gas and CO2 ability to hold large amounts of energy that can be released later is very very limited.

So yippee CO2 can convert and absorb small amounts of solar radiattion. WOW BFD. When the sun disappears or the CO2 is transported to cooler regions what happens? Is that stored energy released and radiated back into space much like what happens with H20?

>> what happens to the energy when the CO2 molecule gives up the energy?

MisterBob, the answer is that the energy is quickly absorbed by adjacent air molecules, through collisions. Since the air above is generally colder than the warmed up area, while the area below is generally warmer, this extra heat is still headed out to space. The 2nd law of Thermodynamics means that heat always flows from hotter to colder, never the other way around.

"The [2nd law of Thermodynamics] holds, I think, the supreme position among the laws of Nature. If someone points out to you that your pet theory of the universe is in disagreement with Maxwell's equations � then so much the worse for Maxwell's equations. If it is found to be contradicted by observation � well, these experimentalists do bungle things sometimes. But if your theory is found to be against the second law of thermodynamics I can give you no hope; there is nothing for it but to collapse in deepest humiliation." � Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington, The Nature of the Physical World (1927)

Mark P wrote "Or possibly sooner if we continue to increase our rate of release? I wonder when the last time the earth had hit 400 ppm...."

Yes, including the possibility that the ocean and land decrease uptake capability.

Midmiocene, I think. Anyway, when the Antarctic ice sheet reformed around then. So the possiblity (over a very long time) of losing some substantial portion of the Antarctic ice sheets exists, WAIS more so that EAIS.

Dennis Hlinka,

Your quotes from icecap are exactly what I was talking about when I said, "Each quirk of the line causes a flurry of debate..."

However you have to admit it was an odd little quirk. You might even call it "unprecedented." What do you suppose caused it? The La Nina?

If you look at page 28 of this site:

http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf

You'll notice the CFS ensembles are still stuck on predicting the second dip of a double-dip La Nina.

However even weirder is a change seen on the Accuweather Sea Surface Anomalies Map. The Southern Hemisphere has warmed, but nearly the entire Northern Hemisphere's seas, north of 30 degrees, is now below normal. I almost think it has to be an error. What happened to the warm AMO? However, if it is correct, it does not bode well for a mild winter, and also it may prove to be a good test for the theory which suggests colder seas absorb more CO2.

If the Mauna Loa chart shows another dip, those fellows at icecap will be whooping it up, and you'll be feeling a tidbit of chagrin. And all for what? At most a single more molecule per million, and sometimes as little as a single molecule per hundred-million. I'm sorry, but I can't get hugely worked up about it all.

Not that it isn't interesting. However I'm humbled by how little we know. And if I had my arm twisted and was forced to predict anything, it would be this: If we can avoid a dark age, and science continues to progress, our great- grandchildren will look back upon our understanding, and deem us ridiculous Neanderthals.

Thanks Mark. I enjoy your blog posts very much.

From the graph, it looks like CO2 fluctuations are also causing our seasons to change.

Or perhaps they show that more people take vacations in the summer so factories run slower with decreased emissions.

Seriously though, I am interested in the seasonal cycles shown on the graph. I wonder what causes them, and if those forces have any impact on the long-term levels.

Reply from Mark P:
Thanks for your compliment! So many compliments this week, I'm wondering if I'm doing something wrong...

To answer your question, I believe the reason is that in the spring in summer in the northern hemisphere, the intake of CO2 by plants in the process of photosynthesis causes the downturn. With much more land in the northern vs. southern hemisphere, this process is reversed in the northern hemisphere's fall and winter, where photosynthesis is not taking place and carbon dioxide levels soar..

Beware of the deception of percentage change.

When is any company's revenue growth the greatest? The first day it earns a dollar. On that day, the company had an infinite growth day, as the revenue went from zero to some value. Is the economy dramatically affected by all these new companies bursting on the scene with unbelievably high growth rates? No, it's only a dollar in the big ocean of Earth's GDP.

If a desert had only one tree, and another tree grew in the middle of it, the desert would suddenly have doubled its forest cover.

If there is a large auditorium with 10,000 people in it. And one more person entered, it's highly deceptive to proclaim that as a big change.

Yet, that's exactly what the AGW fanatics would have us believe. Even if the pre-industrial C02 levels were as low as claimed (contradicted by biologists and actual measurements), it would only amount to adding one additional C02 molecule per 10,000 other molecules.

Just like in the previous examples, nature reacts to the actual reality of the change, not percentage changes.

>> I believe the reason is that in the spring in summer in the northern hemisphere, the intake of CO2 by plants in the process of photosynthesis causes the downturn

That's the conventional explanation, but it's contradicted by a study from the Netherlands. One would think that if explanation were correct, then in a location surrounded by vegetation, the C02 level would certainly drop in the summer. However, the C02 level actually rose during the summer and fell during the winter.

In addition, the study found no increase at all during the 3 years of the study. They did find that the measured level was very dependent on wind. Higher winds lowered the readings, while no wind made it rise, as C02 settles. The Mauna Loa data is probably showing this as well, since over the ocean around Hawaii, average wind speeds are highest during the summer trade-wind period. During the winter, the trade winds are not as prevalent.

The whole focus on trying to model climate changes over a few hundred years is driving me nuts.

1. I think we are seeing an example of "recency" where people believe that the recent past is of much more validity in predicting a trend than the totality of the data available.

2. We are seeing a belief (potentially irrational) that a highly variable and potentially unstable system is actually linear and predictable using recent data.

3. We are understimating the complexity of the system by focusing on a small number of variables that we have measured while making numerous assumption of things with inadequate data sets available.

Until these climate change experts come up with a model that can clearly model the past million years (heck - I would settle for 30,000 years) of climate, any analysis that tries to precisely predict the next 100 years needs to be taken with bushels of salt. The planet's history over the past million years has wild temperature swings making continental ice sheets come and ago, sometimes suddenly. Modeling the climate over the next century is like trying to model the stock market based on a few hours of data without paying any attention to the major bull and bear markets over the past 100 years.

We appear to believe that the climate over the past 10,000 years is "normal." It is actually unusually warm compared to the past million years. Most of the previous million years, the planet was cold enough to sustain massive ice sheets covering a high percentage of the current world's land mass. We do not know why it is this warm now. There are theories, but nothing that is proven.

About 10,000 years ago, the climate suddenly warmed many times more than what Hansen, Mann and company are predicting as our current "Dommsday" sceanrio and two-mile thick sheets of ice covering most of Canada, the northern US, northern Europe and Russia vanished over a period of a couple of thousand years. People crossed the land mass that is now the Bering Strait, and Manhattan arose from the sea. The Great Lakes were 10 times the size they are today and a sea covered much of Eastern Canada.

If we don't understand this process, why in the world are we focusing on an increase of 100 ppm of CO2 and predicting the end of civilization and nature?

>> the process of photosynthesis

This overly formal terminology might be misleading. Plants EAT C02. That's all they eat. If someone was talking about your food supply, and said, "well, organic material might be reduced by the human's process of digestion", it would kind of miss the point.

Trees don't get any food from the ground. They get water and some minerals. C02 is their food, and their only source for C02 is the air.

Someone said "Feed the plants, put more leaves on the trees, drive an extra time around the block". The non thinking assumption by AGWers is that there is no C02 flux in nature, and that man is introducing an evil, poisonous foreign element into the environment. Nothing could be further from the truth. While claiming to be pro-environment, they advocate reduction in food for most of the biosphere.

Soils are among the world's largest source of carbon dioxide, producing 10 times more carbon dioxide each year than all the carbon dioxide emissions from human activities combined.

I keep hearing the Venus arguement and keep asking the question that if Mercury actually had an atmosphere, regardless of composition would it be hotter or cooler than Venus, and have never gotten an answer. Would someone care to enlighten me? I would greatly appreciate it, especially if it came from Kipp, because he is the one whom I see use it most often.

Dennis Hlinka: Go check the Mauna Loa website for the corrections they've made to the upward CO2 blip you were so happy to comment about above.
It's gone.

Regards.

>> if Mercury actually had an atmosphere, regardless of composition would it be hotter or cooler than Venus

Mike, your question is very insightful. It turns out that almost none of the temperature of Venus can be attributed to C02. The reason for the high temperature of Venus is Pressure. People who think they are studying science by reading pro-AGW propoganda have probably not heard of the ideal gas LAW: PV = nRT. Gravity essentially determines the temperature conditions within an atmosphere.

In fact, Venus and Mars are about at Earth temperature at an altitude where the pressure is equal to 1 Earth atmospheric pressure. Venus is slightly warmer, and Mars is slightly cooler, which makes sense, since Venus is closer to the sun, while Mars is further away. When one considers pressure and differences in solar irradiation, there is almost no role for C02.

rd | November 20, 2008 1:33 PM --- But we do understand the transition from LGM to the Holocene; it took about 10--15 thousand years. One of the concerns is to warm that much again, in only 1--2 centuries! Too fast for all God's critters.

The other concern is that it will then be warmer than at any time since the Antanarctic ice sheets reformed, millions of years ago. So these ice sheets may well melt (along with Greenland's ice sheet, of course).

In any case civilization depends upon agriculture. Humans have only practiced agriculture during the relatively benign climate of the Holocene. As we levae this on our climate adventure, we definitely risk leaving agriculture behind.

Congratulations, Gunnar, you just overturned 150 years of atmosphere physics. A Nobel is yours just as soon as you write that up and publish it.

>> overturned 150 years of atmosphere physics.

I overturned no established law of science. Arrhenius advanced this AGW notion in 1896, and it was discredited by his contemporaries. After 100 years, his AGW equation has never been confirmed by empirical evidence. Callendar advocated AGW, but fudged the evidence to advance his agenda. Thatcher advocated it for political reasons. Mann & Hansen advocated, but have been discredited. Less than half of global climate papers agree with AGW. Over 1700 scientists specifically deny AGW. This is amazing, given that the US is spending 3+ billion dollars on studies that promote AGW, and disagreeing is very dangerous to a scientists career.

I contradict nothing that is supported by empirical evidence. I simply stated facts.

>> A Nobel is yours just as soon as you write that up and publish it.

You can't get a Nobel prize for simply applying established scientific principles to the speculative claims of a small clique of pseudo scientific advocates.

Bob T,

I think you need to go back to my comments. I did not ever refer directly to the noted "blip" in the curve.

I was mainly referring to the "dip" in early 2008 that ICECAP was making so much about. Mr. D'Aleo and his friend were "wishing so hard" that they would see the summer peak fall below the peak in the previous year.

Again they are throwing anything at the wall hoping that one of their "predictions" sticks so they can lay claim to some small victory in the eyes of their followers.

But their hopes were ultimately dashed - have you notice any comments from them about how wrong their prediction was? I didn't think so.