Where do you stand on the GW/AGW issue?

[Dr. Imago]

Think about the column of atmosphere that sunlight radiates through, then tries to radiate back through. We cannot adequately replicate that on a smaller scale.

Have we tried? It's a simple question. I think we can get a reasonable scientific "proof of principle" model that's every bit as valid as the current forecasting models.

The rest of your argument is valid, but is contingent upon a lot of supposition that (1) these measurements are accurate, (2) that we actually knew with relative certainty what the temperatures were when those phenomenological findings occurred, (3) that they accurately reflect climatologic conditions at the time the CO2 layers were stored, and (4) that they are relevant.

Personally, I see no clear evidence that solar is playing a "minor" role. That, to me, seems to be pure opinion, and since I last publicly commented on this subject I've done a lot of homework.

-Dr. Imago

P.S. At the time of this post, it is roughly 11 (47%) yes, to 10 (43%) no, to 2 (9%) "need more info". While this poll in and of itself is hardly scientific, clearly opinions vary widely on the subject.

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

Man made global warming is a scam to tax.

 

[Earthborn]

What those types of articles never seem to point out is the relevant fact (they do actually loiter on irrelevance quite nicely) which is the approximate CO2 content of the atmosphere WHEN THE FOSSIL FUELS RUN OUT.

Hint: It ain't nothing to worry about.

I love to see your maths that it is nothing to worry about. (Hint: We still have hundreds of years of known reserves for coal, previously unreachable or undiscovered reserves oil and gas are opened every year... I don't see how converting all that carbon deposited during thousands of millions of years into atmospheric CO₂ is not going to be something to worry about.)

 

[Hindmost]

I have been trying to follow the global warming science for about eight years now. Withing the last two years, I have shifted to the AGW camp. The overall data is too compeling to ignore and just say it is not a problem.

The process of sequestering fossil fuels took millions of years. In the last 150 years, we have burned a significant portion of those fuels and released carbon dioxide. (I am curious what percentage of the total fossil fuels have been burned already) It seems that such a short term release would have to have some effect on climate. With other atmospheric factors such as water vapor and aerosols, it is still difficult to determine the ultimate outcome, but the trends look bad.

Hopefully it won't greatly affect these guys...

http://www.ecology.com/dr-jacks-natural-world/most-important-organism/index.html

glenn

 

[Corsair 115]

Man made global warming is a scam to tax.

Enacted by who? Administered by who? Collected by who?

 

[JEROME DA GNOME]

Enacted by who? Administered by who? Collected by who?

Various governments.



I can't wait for the breathing tax. (you know humans expel CO2)

 

[Pixel42]

The question, really, is whether the CO2 follows the temperature or visa-versa

Surely it's both. CO2 is both a cause of, and a consequence of, global warming. Previous warmings have been initiated by many things - variations in the earth's orbit, the drifting of continents away from the poles etc etc - and that warming has then led (after a few centuries) to CO2 being released from the oceans and permafrost and a further warming. This current warming seems to have been primarily initiated by the greenhouse gases we have pumped into the atmosphere but it too, after a century or two, will lead to further warming as the oceans and permafrost yield up their CO2.

 

[a_unique_person]

Various governments.



I can't wait for the breathing tax. (you know humans expel CO2)

 

[a_unique_person]

Surely it's both. CO2 is both a cause of, and a consequence of, global warming. Previous warmings have been initiated by many things - variations in the earth's orbit, the drifting of continents away from the poles etc etc - and that warming has then led (after a few centuries) to CO2 being released from the oceans and permafrost and a further warming. This current warming seems to have been primarily initiated by the greenhouse gases we have pumped into the atmosphere but it too, after a century or two, will lead to further warming as the oceans and permafrost yield up their CO2.

yep

 

[Bluefire]

I voted "No", but what I actually mean is:

The climate is always changing, and has always changed, which is natural. By the science it seems humans can affect it to a small amount (the couple of tenths of a degree that is a direct effect of incrased Co2 is rather uncontroversial.)

What I say "no" to is the "doomsday" scenarios. Eg. I don't believe
1. That humans are facilitating a "runaway" global warming
2. That an increase in temperature spells doom and gloom for the world.

I'm sure there will be both warmer and colder periods of time in the coming thousands of years. Hopefully we will not handicap our technical development and industry with the likes of kyoto-protocols, so when the really big temperature changes _really_ comes (probably naturally) we will have the ability to adapt to it reasonably well.

 

[Lonewulf]

I can't wait for the breathing tax. (you know humans expel CO2)

Not a bad idea.

For every human that breathes, we plant something that takes on CO2 and expels oxygen. If they're food crops, all the better.

 

[a_unique_person]

I voted "No", but what I actually mean is:

The climate is always changing, and has always changed, which is natural. By the science it seems humans can affect it to a small amount (the couple of tenths of a degree that is a direct effect of incrased Co2 is rather uncontroversial.)

What I say "no" to is the "doomsday" scenarios. Eg. I don't believe
1. That humans are facilitating a "runaway" global warming
2. That an increase in temperature spells doom and gloom for the world.

I'm sure there will be both warmer and colder periods of time in the coming thousands of years. Hopefully we will not handicap our technical development and industry with the likes of kyoto-protocols, so when the really big temperature changes _really_ comes (probably naturally) we will have the ability to adapt to it reasonably well.

Kyoto won't handicap anything, it will just change things for the better. Just like WWII started with people still using cavalry and biplanes, and finished with ballistic missiles, nukes and jet planes.

 

[Lonewulf]

Kyoto won't handicap anything, it will just change things for the better. Just like WWII started with people still using cavalry and biplanes, and finished with ballistic missiles, nukes and jet planes.

Is it really a good idea to compare Kyoto to starting WWII?

 

[Bluefire]

Is it really a good idea to compare Kyoto to starting WWII?

I guess he made my point for me. Comparing Kyoto to a big and destructive war is kinda playing into my hands

I also think that it is an error to think that wars are good for scientific progress. Wars destroy a whole lot, and redirect development towards the efficient killing, at the expense of other developments.

Would making energy more expensive and/or limited in quantity redirect more research towards things that use less energy? I guess it would, but I'm not of the opinion that that is necessarily optimal. And the destructive effect on the industry (and daily life!) that needs much energy would be big.

 

[a_unique_person]

Is it really a good idea to compare Kyoto to starting WWII?

I'm comparing the advances in technology that are possible if we don't sit around and wait for the market to come along to the party.

 

[a_unique_person]

I guess he made my point for me. Comparing Kyoto to a big and destructive war is kinda playing into my hands

I also think that it is an error to think that wars are good for scientific progress. Wars destroy a whole lot, and redirect development towards the efficient killing, at the expense of other developments.

Would making energy more expensive and/or limited in quantity redirect more research towards things that use less energy? I guess it would, but I'm not of the opinion that that is necessarily optimal. And the destructive effect on the industry (and daily life!) that needs much energy would be big.

A lot of energy is wasted, the cheapest and most environmentally friendly energy is the energy you never use.

For some reason, the market will more than capable of helping us after global warming has affected the world, but is incapable of heading it off.

 

[Dr. Imago]

Again, does anyone know if the "proof of principle" experiments have been done, specifically at the concentrations we are talking about?

There are highschool-level experiments out there that are designed to test this. They are aimed at teaching highschool students about the effects of CO2 on global warming precisely how I've described, but they use far higher concentrations of CO2 than exist (or will ever exist) in the atmosphere.

We are talking about nearly negligible levels of change year-to-year in overall concentration of CO2, and I'd like to see if such experiments have been done at the concentrations described. I think an adequate climatologic model can be conducted in the laboratory that would prove the principle of CO2 heat re-radiation and it's actual effect on the surrounding "atmosphere" within the contained, controlled setting.

To me, this seems paramount. Right now all we have is observation and correlation, with subsequent forecasting based on the belief that those observations and correlations are causative. I'm just asking if there has ever been a proof of concept study done.

It also seems to me that we should be able to pretty accurately predict, from the actual known physical properties of CO2 ability to absorb photon energy, reach a higher energy state, then re-radiate that energy at infrared wavelengths as it returns to the ground state, what the magnitude of effect would be on an individual molecular basis. This could then be further extrapolated based on amount of energy put into the system times the total number of molecules exactly how much energy would be directly re-radiated, in the form of heat, from a group of CO2 molecules. This prediction could then be tested in the laboratory as I've described above.

This seems rather simple to me. All it requires is doing some calculations, based on the number of photon strikes a CO2 molecule would encounter during different days with different amounts and periods of sunlight. These experiments and calculations may have been done. Someone here (there are a lot of very intelligent and well-informed people participating on this forum) may know where they are or if they exist. I'm hoping that someone will share this info, if it exists. The current literature, and it's a lot, never seems to describe this in a physical chemistry sense. If it is out there, I'd just like to read it.

Thanks!

-Dr. Imago

 

[m_huber]

You can check this from NOAA. Don't know if it's exactly what you're looking for, but they have some projections of what the global conditions would be with 2x and 4x CO2 levels.

I'm not exactly sure what a highschool level project would be. I couldn't find it anywhere, and the only thing I can imagine taking two glass containers, letting one be filled with air and the other with either air + CO2 or pure CO2, then sticking them in the sun for a long time and measuring temperature differences at the end. I'm really not sure that this would give a good impression of how much effect CO2 can have on a global scale.

Keep in mind, an increase in global temperature of less than 1ºC can have a profound impact on the planet.

 

[Hindmost]

Again, does anyone know if the "proof of principle" experiments have been done, specifically at the concentrations we are talking about?

There are highschool-level experiments out there that are designed to test this. They are aimed at teaching highschool students about the effects of CO2 on global warming precisely how I've described, but they use far higher concentrations of CO2 than exist (or will ever exist) in the atmosphere.

We are talking about nearly negligible levels of change year-to-year in overall concentration of CO2, and I'd like to see if such experiments have been done at the concentrations described. I think an adequate climatologic model can be conducted in the laboratory that would prove the principle of CO2 heat re-radiation and it's actual effect on the surrounding "atmosphere" within the contained, controlled setting.

To me, this seems paramount. Right now all we have is observation and correlation, with subsequent forecasting based on the belief that those observations and correlations are causative. I'm just asking if there has ever been a proof of concept study done.

It also seems to me that we should be able to pretty accurately predict, from the actual known physical properties of CO2 ability to absorb photon energy, reach a higher energy state, then re-radiate that energy at infrared wavelengths as it returns to the ground state, what the magnitude of effect would be on an individual molecular basis. This could then be further extrapolated based on amount of energy put into the system times the total number of molecules exactly how much energy would be directly re-radiated, in the form of heat, from a group of CO2 molecules. This prediction could then be tested in the laboratory as I've described above.

This seems rather simple to me. All it requires is doing some calculations, based on the number of photon strikes a CO2 molecule would encounter during different days with different amounts and periods of sunlight. These experiments and calculations may have been done. Someone here (there are a lot of very intelligent and well-informed people participating on this forum) may know where they are or if they exist. I'm hoping that someone will share this info, if it exists. The current literature, and it's a lot, never seems to describe this in a physical chemistry sense. If it is out there, I'd just like to read it.

Thanks!

-Dr. Imago

Let me see if I can help on this one.

The climate models are so complex, the effects of so many parameters must be taken into account simultaneously. Many of the models look at temperature rise with and without an increase of CO2 to see if the models shows an effect on global temps.

The specific greenhouse capability of CO2 is known in detail as far as what wavelengths of infrared radiation absorbed and reradiated. See this link:

http://www.hyperhistory.com/online_n2/connections_n2/climate_n2/gases.html

However, once you add in clouds, particulates, other greenhouse gases, along with CO2 and several other factors, the models can be very sensitive to small changes in each. Clouds are particularly difficult to model and the effect from high clouds versus low clouds is different...etc. A large volcanic erruption can change everything and give quite a few years of global cooling before all the particulate precipitate out.

Most models, when taken as a group, indicate that the planet is warming due to burning fossil fuels--no big secret, but again they are all sensitive to small changes.

this link give a bunch of good info. as is condenses many studies into reasonable articles.

http://www.sciencedaily.com/news/earth_climate/global_warming/

This gives a short description of the models.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Global_climate_model

glenn

 

[Dr. Imago]

With all due respect, can we please stop talking about "models" and the "predictions" and "projections" for a moment. I'm already very well familiar with those aspects of this debate.

I just want to see if anyone knows whether or not it has been specifically studied, in a controlled setting, what CO2 actually does at the concentrations described. I'm not concerned whether or not it is representative of what will happen on a global scale. I'm not concerned with the speculations about increasing amounts of CO2 efflux over the ensuing decades, for the moment. I'm concerned about what the physical properties, if you will, of one gas in a mixed, controlled microenvironment that controls for all other variables. I just want to know if these experiments have been done and what the results are.

It seems the bulk of the "pro-warming" argument rests on CO2 as a major "forcer" of climate change. Should we not understand precisely what this molecule does at the concentrations described? I'm sure that someone has done this experiment, and likely published it. I just don't know where. And, an exhaustive search of the Internet via Google has thus far turned up some interesting things, but not what I'm looking for.

In the meantime, here's the link to instructions on how to conduct the highschool experiment (at least one of them):

http://www.picotech.com/experiments/global/globalwarming.html

-Dr. Imago