Global warming discussion III

[lomiller]

Mmm could that be caused by this volcanic action ????

Scientists Discover Undersea Volcano Off Antarctica

New Underwater Volcano Found

No, it couldn’t.

A garden variety volcano doesn't have anywhere near the energy to do that. A super-volcano may get into the right range but I think someone would have noticed a currently erupting supervolcano...

 

[Reality Check]

...WUWT...

Why should we waste our time with your advertisement for the climate change denier web site WUWT, Haig ?
Here we have the idiocy of WUWT insulting Dr. Gavin Schmidt and then irrationally demanding that Dr. Gavin Schmidt answer some quite technical questions from Dr. Roger Pielke Sr.
ETA: Several of the questions are advertisements for Dr. Roger Pielke Sr papers and even a book by him!

Dr. Gavin Schmidt is the Director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York and presumably a busy person. He does not have the time to answer questions from every climate change skeptic in the world! He certainly need not waste his time with deniers such as Anthony Watts (thus the step of blocking Watts in Twitter).

There are places that present actual valid climate science as has been pointed out to you.
There is one question that unfortunately suggests real ignorance on Pielke's part:
"Since it is claimed measured that a large fraction of the heat from human input of CO2 and other greenhouse gases has been going into the deeper ocean over the last 10-15 years (as an attempt to explain the “hiatus” as the standard physics that water has a higher heat capacity than land requires), why is the global average surface temperature trend still used as the primary metric to diagnose global warming?"

The heat content of the oceans points out that the "hiatus" in surface temperatures is not a "hiatus" in global warming. There are several explanations about why surface temperatures have not been rising as fast in the last 10-15 years as in past decades - that heat is contained in the deep ocean is not one of them .

ETA: And the obvious answer that seems to have escaped Pielke is that heat content is not temperature!
More seriously though, it would be foolish to pick a certain ocean depth, measure the temperature there and use that as a global average temperature while ignoring the surface temperatures which
* cover the entire world (are actually global!),
* have been measured for a couple of centuries (not about 50 years),
* have a more comprehensive coverage,
* can be verified using satellite measurements,
* and are a lot easier and cheaper to measure.

 

[Reality Check]

Surprise, surprise, ...

The honest answer is that you are continuing to display a great deal of ignorance about what you cite, Haig - what a surprise !
Dr. Roger Pielke Sr is demanding that Dr. Gavin Schmidt answer his questions - we are not Dr. Gavin Schmidt!
Then Anthony Watts goes on an insulting and irrational rant about Dr. Gavin Schmidt with respect to an interview and the questions.

 

[Reality Check]

Nope, the cause of ALL the climatic problems isn't excess Co2 - it's plant food and we will need all the food we can grow soon.

Nope - merely repeating the ignorance found in climate change myths does make you look good, Haig.
CO2 is plant food

The effects of enhanced CO2 on terrestrial plants are variable and complex and dependent on numerous factors.
...
Conclusion
A specific plant’s response to excess CO2 is sensitive to a variety of factors, including but not limited to: age, genetic variations, functional types, time of year, atmospheric composition, competing plants, disease and pest opportunities, moisture content, nutrient availability, temperature, and sunlight availability. The continued increase of CO2 will represent a powerful forcing agent for a wide variety of changes critical to the success of many plants, affecting natural ecosystems and with large implications for global food production. The global increase of CO2 is thus a grand biological experiment, with countless complications that make the net effect of this increase very difficult to predict with any appreciable level of detail.

So what you are advocating, Haig, is the displacement of millions of people through sea level rises (along with other bad effects of global warming) just to do an experiment on whether higher CO2 levels are good for plant growth :

 

[Mikemcc]

Plus barring those people from the possible economic growth that might fund the health care to reduce the population growth... so compounding their problems!

 

[Trakar]

No, it couldn’t.

A garden variety volcano doesn't have anywhere near the energy to do that. A super-volcano may get into the right range but I think someone would have noticed a currently erupting supervolcano...

I don't know, humanity is currently emitting the equivalent CO2 of several super volcanos a year and a lot of people seem to be overlooking that quite easily. To put this in relative terms, to equal the 35Gt of CO2 humans are dumping into the atmosphere each year would require an ongoing volcanic eruption that ejected 850 kilometers of magma per year (roughly the equivalent of half of lake Ontario).

 

[Trakar]

NOAA's state of the climate report for April is up:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/global/201504

I saw that as well, and with el nino becoming a factor it could be a bad summer and fall in the northern hemisphere (not to mention poor Australia's issues),

 

[Trakar]

So I'll post this again and ask whether anyone else thinks this is the best argument yet against deniers?

[qimg]http://images.tapatalk-cdn.com/15/05/19/7c0ca08beba6942c1166cacb3247f151.jpg[/qimg]

Not a bad piece but not compelling to those uninterested or ideologically unable to accept changes in their current world view.

 

[macdoc]

I don't know, humanity is currently emitting the equivalent CO2 of several super volcanos a year and a lot of people seem to be overlooking that quite easily. To put this in relative terms, to equal the 35Gt of CO2 humans are dumping into the atmosphere each year would require an ongoing volcanic eruption that ejected 850 kilometers of magma per year (roughly the equivalent of half of lake Ontario).

Separate factors here .....Haig is not talking CO2 emission but straight heating from lava which is miniscule.
Recall he doesn't think CO2 has any significant effect.

So he thinks underwater volcanoes are heating the ocean purely with transfer from magma....you may guffaw at your leisure.

 

[macdoc]

Gavin has always answered my questions.
But you should hear what he thinks about the deniers.....not pretty.

 

[CapelDodger]

So he thinks underwater volcanoes are heating the ocean purely with transfer from magma....you may guffaw at your leisure.

And lets not forget this is supposed to be a new phaenomenon that just happens to coincide with a 40% increase in atmospheric CO₂2. Because the Sun.

 

[Haig]

Separate factors here .....Haig is not talking CO2 emission but straight heating from lava which is miniscule.
Recall he doesn't think CO2 has any significant effect.

Nope, that's not what I think.

It's hypocritical to discuss the melting glaciers and sea ice in the Antarctic and NOT even mention the significant volcanism there.

The proportion of "made man Co2" to that which is naturally occurring Co2 is NOT significant.

BTW All that volcanism does churn out a lot of naturally occurring Co2 too

Our climate is changing but the additional warming from "made man Co2" is not significant and Co2 is not the main GHG.

Water vapor is the most significant GHG! Any plans to control / restrict it

So he thinks underwater volcanoes are heating the ocean purely with transfer from magma....you may guffaw at your leisure.

Show where I say that ? You can't because I didn't ... You should apologize for misrepresenting my points but I doubt you will

Then there is the Pause / Hiatus that's been going on for almost 2 decades while Co2 almost doubles ! The Alarmists flounder to explain it after denying it was real

You may guffaw at your leisure

 

[lomiller]

Please provide some supporting references here, uranium itself is about as common as tin and zinc in the Earth's crust. And while the most common isotope isn't used in most GenII and GenIII designs, it can be used in breeders to produce more reactive fuels, and this doesn't even begin to explore the use of Thorium as either breeder feedstock or in accelerator catalyzed systems. But this gets back into a discussion about advanced design systems rather than our grandfather's nuclear power. Even here, the primary references I have at hand seem to indicate current known stocks (at the current market price - price increases mean that economically viable reserves jump up tremendously) are sufficient to support the current global nuclear production level for a couple hundred years or more. if we were to increase the planet's reactors by 10 fold it would reduce that supply to 20 years, assuming no change in market prices and that new systems would use fuel in the same manner as the 50year old designs currently on-line (I don't think those assumptions are valid).

See below:
At $260/Kg uranium reserves are 7 635 000 tU (identified and inferred)
Electricity production from Nuclear is 372 GWe (~3200 TWh) which uses ~62 000 tU.
Current global electricity production is ~20 000TWh, replacing this with nuclear would consume ~390 000 tU. (19 years worth of fuel)
Add in replacing oil and you need another ~40 000TWh per year or 780 000tU (6 years worth of fuel)

Again, I’m not suggesting we don’t keep expanding nuclear capacity, just pointing out that the technology in its current state is only a small part of the picture. The same is true of renewable and conservation but the hope is enough small parts can add up to something bigger.

https://www.oecd-nea.org/ndd/pubs/2014/7209-uranium-2014.pdf

Total identified resources (reasonably assured and inferred) as of 1 January 2013 amounted to 5 902 900 tonnes of uranium metal (tU) in the <USD 130/kgU (<USD 50/lb U3O8) category, an increase of 10.8% compared to 1 January 2011. In the highest cost category (<USD 260/kgU or <USD 100/lb U3O8) which was reintroduced in 2009, total identified resources amount to 7 635 200 tU, an increase of 7.6% compared to the total reported in 2011.

At the end of 2012, a total of 437 commercial nuclear reactors were connected to the grid with a net generating capacity of 372 GWe requiring some 61 980 tU, as measured by uranium acquisitions. Taking into account changes in policies announced in Belgium, France, Germany, Italy and Switzerland following the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant accident, world nuclear capacity by the year 2035 is projected to grow to between about 400 GWe net in the low demand case and 680 GWe net in the high demand case, representing increases of 7% and 82% respectively. Accordingly, world annual reactorrelated uranium requirements are projected to rise to between 72 000 tU and 122 000 tU by 2035.

 

[lomiller]

Nope, that's not what I think.

It's hypocritical to discuss the melting glaciers and sea ice in the Antarctic and NOT even mention the significant volcanism there.

It's "hypocritical" not to mention something that physics says is irrelevant?

Nope, that's not what I think.

The proportion of "made man Co2" to that which is naturally occurring Co2 is NOT significant.

1/3 of all CO2 currently in the atmosphere is “man made”, a fact that is verified by its isotope signature.

Furthermore this only accounts for 40% of human CO2 emissions with the remainder being absorbed by oceans and terrestrial eco-systems. It’s already known that as the earth warms (due to CO2 in the atmosphere) this absorption turns to further emission and more warming. We know empirically that this process happens because it’s what causes glaciers to melt at the end of a glaciations.

Water vapor is the most significant GHG!

No it's not. Water vapor doesn't stay in the atmosphere long enough to change climate. It comes out of the atmosphere as rain or snow in days, not decades or centuries.

 

[Haig]

It's "hypocritical" not to mention something that physics says is irrelevant?

Show where it is claimed ALL Earth's Volcanism is ... "physics says is irrelevant" ?

While you at it, Show where it is claimed the Pause / Hiatus is ... "physics says is irrelevant" ?

1/3 of all CO2 currently in the atmosphere is “man made”, a fact that is verified by its isotope signature.

Furthermore this only accounts for 40% of human CO2 emissions with the remainder being absorbed by oceans and terrestrial eco-systems. It’s already known that as the earth warms (due to CO2 in the atmosphere) this absorption turns to further emission and more warming. We know empirically that this process happens because it’s what causes glaciers to melt at the end of a glaciations.

No, that's disputed ...

"CO2 released from use of fossil fuels have little influence on the observed changes in the amount of atmospheric CO2, and changes in atmospheric CO2 are not tracking changes in human emissions."

The phase relation between atmospheric carbon dioxide and global temperature

Abstract
Using data series on atmospheric carbon dioxide and global temperatures we investigate the phase relation (leads/lags) between these for the period January 1980 to December 2011. Ice cores show atmospheric CO2 variations to lag behind atmospheric temperature changes on a century to millennium scale, but modern temperature is expected to lag changes in atmospheric CO2, as the atmospheric temperature increase since about 1975 generally is assumed to be caused by the modern increase in CO2. In our analysis we use eight well-known datasets: 1) globally averaged well-mixed marine boundary layer CO2 data, 2) HadCRUT3 surface air temperature data, 3) GISS surface air temperature data, 4) NCDC surface air temperature data, 5) HadSST2 sea surface data, 6) UAH lower troposphere temperature data series, 7) CDIAC data on release of anthropogene CO2, and 8) GWP data on volcanic eruptions. Annual cycles are present in all datasets except 7) and 8), and to remove the influence of these we analyze 12-month averaged data. We find a high degree of co-variation between all data series except 7) and 8), but with changes in CO2 always lagging changes in temperature. The maximum positive correlation between CO2 and temperature is found for CO2 lagging 11–12 months in relation to global sea surface temperature, 9.5–10 months to global surface air temperature, and about 9 months to global lower troposphere temperature. The correlation between changes in ocean temperatures and atmospheric CO2 is high, but do not explain all observed changes.

No it's not. Water vapor doesn't stay in the atmosphere long enough to change climate. It comes out of the atmosphere as rain or snow in days, not decades or centuries.

Yes it is. It's not simple but ...

"Water vapour is by far the most important contributor to the greenhouse effect. Pinning down its precise contribution is tricky, not least because the absorption spectra of different greenhouse gases overlap."

"A simplified summary is that about 50% of the greenhouse effect is due to water vapour, 25% due to clouds, 20% to CO2, with other gases accounting for the remainder."

More problems for the CAGW crowd ...


Do Climate Projections Have Any Physical Meaning?

The evidence shows that these people do not know how physical meaning emerges from physical theory. They do not know how to recognize physical meaning, how to present physical meaning, nor how to evaluate physical meaning.

In short, they understand neither prediction nor falsification; conjointly the very foundation of science.

Climate modelers are not scientists. They are not doing science. Their climate model projections have no physical meaning. Their climate model projections have never had any physical meaning.

To this date, there hasn’t been a single GHG emissions climate projection, ever, that had physical meaning. So, all those contentious debates about whether some model, some set of models, or some multi-model mean, tracks the global air temperature record, or not, are completely pointless. It doesn’t matter whether a physically meaningless projection happens to match some observable, or not. The projection is physically meaningless. It has no scientific content. The debate has no substantive content. The debaters may as well be contesting theology.

So, when someone says about AGW that, “The science is settled!,” one can truthfully respond that it is indeed settled: there is no science in AGW.

 

[Trakar]

Nope, that's not what I think.

It's hypocritical to discuss the melting glaciers and sea ice in the Antarctic and NOT even mention the significant volcanism there.

Not when the "significant volcanism" is largely, if not entirely insignificant in its contribution and impact to the problem being discussed, as is the case with Antarctic volcanism.

The proportion of "made man Co2" to that which is naturally occurring Co2 is NOT significant.

What leads you to this mistaken understanding? The natural carbon cycle of our planet cycles about 720Gt of CO2 in and out of plant growth each year. Human emissions are 35Gt per year or roughly 5% of the volume of the natural carbon cycle annual fluctuation. Granted, 5% is a relatively small amount, in comparison, but it is neither unimportant, nor without important impact upon the system which it is being imposed upon. The amount we are adding to the system comes from outside the planet's active carbon cycle. Imagine a full bathtub with a washcloth over the drain, and a small trickle of water spilling from the spigot. In this analogy the water seeping through the wash cloth represents carbon that is being naturally sequestered through being trapped in ocean sediments and subducted or deeply buried in terrestrial sediments. The water trickling in from the spigot represents the amount of CO2being naturally added from outside the bathtub system by sources such as volcanism. The constant volume in the full tub represents the natural carbon cycle where the water may circulate within the system, but the small amount lost to sequestration is replaced by the small amount trickling in from volcanoes, so the system is in equilibrium. Now, lets take a quart jar that we fill from the sink and begin pouring into the bathtub, this part of the analogy is the human contribution from outside the system. while the quart jar is a relatively smaller volume than the entire tub full of water, the level of water in the tub was in a state of equilibrium/balance before we started adding water in the quart jar. Though the first several jars full of water only add a few millimeters of water it is easy to see that the system is no longer in equilibrium and that the cause of the rising levels is due primarily to the quart size jars of water we are adding from outside the system.i

BTW All that volcanism does churn out a lot of naturally occurring Co2 too

a trickle that is being balanced by the natural sequestration systems of our planet.

Our climate is changing but the additional warming from "made man Co2" is not significant and Co2 is not the main GHG.

It is the primary persistent GHG. H2O is not a persistent GHG its average persistence in the atmosphere is on the scale of days, CO2's average persistence is measured in decades. Because of CO2's long persistence time it tends to accumulate in the atmosphere which is why we see levels increasing and impacts accelerating.

You may guffaw at your leisure

Ignorance is sad, not funny. In this case, the rising CO2 levels are harming our nation, our economy, and our national security now, and increasingly so into the future. Many have already died due to the direct and indirect effects of our changing climate and many more will die due to such impacts as the problem accelerates into the future.

 

[Haig]

I read ...

The 1,000 volcanoes that go off every year produce a major amount of the 166 gigatons produced on Earth every year. Man makes six of them, 3.22%, a fact that is in every geophysical text and reference.

1. Segalstad et al find there is little difference (only a few years) between CO2 residence-time ~5-7 years and CO2 lifetime ~14-17 years. The notion that CO2 lifetime is "a thousand years or more" is based upon the highly-flawed IPCC Bern Model.

2. If CO2 lifetime was truly 1000+ years, fossil fuel derived CO2 should be much higher than 3.75%, as alarmists have claimed in the past using incorrect interpretations of C13/C14 ratios.

 

[lomiller]

Show where it is claimed ALL Earth's Volcanism is ...

So “All the worlds volcanism” is melting ice in the Antarctic? How does that work?

No, that's disputed ...

By who?

Show where it is claimed ALL Earth's Volcanism is ...

So “All the worlds volcanism” is melting ice in the Antarctic? How does that work?

The phase relation between atmospheric carbon dioxide and global temperature

The article doesn’t say what you claim.

Show where it is claimed ALL Earth's Volcanism is ...

So “All the worlds volcanism” is melting ice in the Antarctic? How does that work?

"Water vapour is by far the most important contributor to the greenhouse effect.

For reasons already explained, no it isn’t. Simply repeating a refuted claim isn’t evidence,

 

[macdoc]

Geez Haig....if you going to pretend to have an argument at least get your facts correct.

Water vapor is a powerful GHG but it drops out immediately and magnifies the effect of the CO2 which is persistent over millennia.

 

[lomiller]

I read ...

The 1,000 volcanoes that go off every year produce a major amount of the 166 gigatons produced on Earth every year. Man makes six of them, 3.22%, a fact that is in every geophysical text and reference.

I have no idea where you get a number of 166 Gt CO2 per year. CO2 typically emitted by volcanoes each year is at most a few hundred million tonnes, or less than 1% or human emissions.
Without Fossil CO2, new volcanic CO2 (~1% of human emissions) would be balanced by sequestration of carbonate rock, which is why CO2 levels don’t keep growing indefinitely over geologic time.

The CO2 cycling though plant/animal respiration are not CO2 emissions in this context as it clearly can’t create new matter out of nothing.