General AGW discussion thread

[Atraveller]

Per-capita emissions are misleading. The EU workforce is less productive than the U.S, so it takes more workers to produce the same GDP. Of course if you divide total emissions or total energy consumption by a larger, less-productive workforce, it appears every person is somehow thrifty. To a significant degree, it's just an illusion.

This is a major problem because it implies there's a solution in hand. IE, the wasteful nations must simply handle emissions like Europe.

However emissions per GDP unit are a more revealing indicator. We also must consider emissions don't stop at arbitrary boundaries, such as the current EU states.

Geographic Europe's average CO2 emissions per normalized GDP unit are 0.5 kg per PPP dollar: http://www.nationmaster.com/red/grap...&int=-1&id=EUR

By contrast the U.S. CO2 emissions per normalized GDP unit are 0.56 kg per PPP dollar: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/en...r-2000-ppp-gdp

There is little difference. It appears there's less room to make cuts than first appears.

It is a tough problem, mainly because no one wants to bare any of the pain - but we all will eventually.

I saw one proposal that CO2 emmisions be granted based on the size of the country - ie. per square mile - in which case countries like Canada and Brazil would make out like bandits, Countries like the UK, or Italy would be punished...

Then there was the Saudi proposal that the western world compensate them for the loss in oil revenue as oil sales decreased....

Basing cuts on GDP would seem to be punishing to emerging countries, whose GDP isn't that great ie. Indonesia and Malaysia.

Basing it on population would be punishing to countries like India and China - While Canada and Australia would make out like bandits.

[Atraveller]

Is it against the rules of this thread to post a link to an Op-ed piece?

Friedman at the NY times has an interesting perspective on climate change

Global Weirding

[Ronald Brak]

The difference between the per capita CO2 emissions of France and the United States is not an illusion caused by different levels of productivity. It is a result of France using much less fossil fuel than the United States. Worker productivity per hour in France is 94% that of the United States while France produces only around 30% of the per capita CO2 emissions of the United States. Obviously the 6% difference in productivity is not causing this huge difference in emissions. The fact that France uses fossil fuels for less than 11% of it electricity generation makes a very real and non-illusory difference.

[tusenfem]

An interesting paper (for William or more likely against William) was just published in GRL:

Sudden cosmic ray decreases: No change of global cloud cover by J. Calogovic et al. (Geophys. Res. Lett., 37, L03802, doi:10.1029/2009GL041327)

[Jetlack]

An interesting paper (for William or more likely against William) was just published in GRL:

Sudden cosmic ray decreases: No change of global cloud cover by J. Calogovic et al. (Geophys. Res. Lett., 37, L03802, doi:10.1029/2009GL041327)

amazing a moderator still shilling for the AGW agenda.

Now thats impartiality for you!

[Ivan Viehoff]

Per-capita emissions are misleading. The EU workforce is less productive than the U.S, so it takes more workers to produce the same GDP. Of course if you divide total emissions or total energy consumption by a larger, less-productive workforce, it appears every person is somehow thrifty. To a significant degree, it's just an illusion.
....
Geographic Europe's average CO2 emissions per normalized GDP unit are 0.5 kg per PPP dollar: http://www.nationmaster.com/red/grap...&int=-1&id=EUR
...
By contrast the U.S. CO2 emissions per normalized GDP unit are 0.56 kg per PPP dollar: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/en...r-2000-ppp-gdp

A very popular argument among apologists for the US's large carbon output, but it's really an argument by distraction from the main issue.

The main issue is not a country's production, but its consumption.

It's all very well to say that the USA can produce a car for so many kg of carbon but someone else produces it for a bit more carbon, and therefore it should be produced in the US. But at the end of the day responsibility for carbon consumption lies how many cars the USA consumes as opposed to other people consuming those cars. (Though we really need to consider the lifetime carbon of those cars - US cars are on average of poor fuel efficiency: and it may well be worth expending a bit more carbon in producing more fuel efficient cars.)

If a country is more efficient at producing something for lower carbon output than another country, then global trading of carbon permits should allow production to move towards more carbon-efficient production systems. (Though in fact trade theory predicts produciton moves towards locations with comparative advantage, not absolute advantage, but lets not go into that just now.)

The world needs, for example, Australia to produce iron ore. If it has large extractive industries and very small population, then inevitably it has large carbon emissions per capita. Likewise as a result of Canada's extractive industries it has high carbon per capita. It doesn't mean that the Australian and Canadian consuming sectors are necessarily inefficient by developed world standards (I don't know whether they are or aren't). They are doing that extraction on behalf of many others who will consume, and that consumption really ought to be counted against the carbon account of the consumers, not the producers.

This is not special pleading on behalf of my own country. My own country, Britain, has reduced its carbon output of late. It supposedly, therefore, has one of the very best carbon records on the planet. But we cheated. What we have actually done is outsource our carbon to other countries. Consumption has gone up, world carbon output has gone up as a consequence, it just wasn't emitted locally. In my view, that's cheating. What counts is our consumption, not our production. We could specialise in services and close all of our high carbon stuff, but we would still be consuming and driving the world's total carbon output.

[tusenfem]

amazing a moderator still shilling for the AGW agenda.

Now thats impartiality for you!

As a member of BAUT I am allowed to have my own opinion about the validity of AGW.

Then again, this is just a paper on the dependence of cloud cover and cosmic rays, which may or may not have an influence on climate.

I posted the link to this paper because William is a strong proponent of cosmic ray generation of clouds.

[joema]

The difference between the per capita CO2 emissions of France and the United States is not an illusion caused by different levels of productivity. It is a result of France using much less fossil fuel than the United States. Worker productivity per hour in France is 94% that of the United States while France produces only around 30% of the per capita CO2 emissions of the United States. Obviously the 6% difference in productivity is not causing this huge difference in emissions. The fact that France uses fossil fuels for less than 11% of it electricity generation makes a very real and non-illusory difference.

Your numbers are wrong -- French worker productivity is about 85% of the U.S., but your point is essentially correct -- about France. http://www.ilo.org/global/About_the_...3976/index.htm

France is just one country. The worker productivity of Europe in general is lower, which throws off most per capita comparisons. That is why per GDP comparisons are more revealing and less misleading.

France CO2 emissions per GDP dollar are about 1/2 that of Europe or the United States: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/en...r-2000-ppp-gdp

So France is interesting in this regard, but is hardly a proxy for all of Europe.

One reason France has fairly low CO2 emissions per GDP is they use nuclear fission for 79% of their electricity: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/en...-sources-total So it's not magic -- just science. But is there a meaningful lesson here? Presumably the point of mentioning France with reference to the U.S. is the implication they have a solution useful to the carbon emissions problem -- that's the discussion topic.

So what would it take for the Europe or U.S. to "be like France" and have similar low fossil fuel consumption for electricity? Let's examine that:

French electrical consumption was 447 billion kWhr in 2007, vs the 3.9 trillion kWhr for the U.S. About 79% of France's electrical production was nuclear based -- that definitely lowers carbon emissions. On average, France's 59 nuclear plants each produce about 447E12 watt hrs * .79 / 59 = 6E12 watt hrs per year.

For the U.S. to be like France would require how many of these fission plants? 3.9E15 watt hrs * .79 / 6E12 watt hrs per year = 513 new nuclear reactors.

[joema]

A very popular argument among apologists for the US's large carbon output, but it's really an argument by distraction from the main issue.

It's an answer to an "argument by distraction" -- that of focusing on per-capita statistics when per-GDP statistics are more revealing.

US cars are on average of poor fuel efficiency: and it may well be worth expending a bit more carbon in producing more fuel efficient cars.

This is another argument by distraction, and typifies the disproportional focus on the transportation sector when discussing energy or emission problems.

Personal and commercial transportation energy only constitute about 20% of total world energy consumption: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_e...nd_consumption

If every car on earth disappeared overnight and was replaced by magic carpets, total energy consumption would only decrease by 20%. Since world energy consumption grows by about 2% per year, in about 12 years consumption (hence carbon emissions) would regain roughly the same levels as before cars vanished (PDF): http://www.eia.doe.gov/oiaf/ieo/pdf/world.pdf

That illustrates the severity of the problem. Marginal improvements to vehicle efficiency are a good idea, but will not materially change the overall picture.

[lomiller1]

You are skewing the numbers by including the poor contries in the EU. The difference in CO2 emissions per capita persists and ever grows when you only look at the wealthiest EU countries.

For example France has a GDP per capita of $42000 yet emits 1/4 the CO2 per person as the US. Denmark, Norway and Ireland have higher GDP per captia then the US yet emits only half as much CO2 per person. Germany and Japan have slightly lower GDP per captia then the US but also emit only 1/2 as much CO2 per person.

[joema]

You are skewing the numbers by including the poor contries in the EU...

Emissions don't stop at EU boundaries, or at only certain wealthy states. It's a global problem. If comparing U.S. to Europe, it's fair to include all European states, not just selected ones.

If picking only certain states, you could equally pick only certain states from the U.S. E.g, Washington State gets 60% of their electricity from renewable hydropower.

....Denmark, Norway and Ireland have higher GDP per captia then the US yet emits only half as much CO2 per person...

Norway and Denmark both have significantly worse energy consumption per GDP unit than the U.S: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Energy_Intensity.png

Norway has the highest per-capita consumption of electricity: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/en...ers-per-capita

Does that mean they're wasteful or environmentally irresponsible? No. Just like the U.S, structural differences in the nation's economic and energy systems account for much of this.

Each year the energy and carbon efficiency of most advanced nations improves. The U.S. is no different in that regard: http://www.eia.doe.gov/emeu/aer/txt/ptb0105.html

[lomiller1]

Emissions don't stop at EU boundaries, or at only certain wealthy states.

Irrelevant. We are trying to determine the potential economic costs of CO2 emissions, The fact that France achieves good levels of GDP/Person with much smaller CO2 emissions per person proves very substantial cuts can be made with minimal economic impact using current technology.

Norway and Denmark both have significantly worse energy consumption per GDP unit than the U.S: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Energy_Intensity.png

Also irrelevant. We are not discussing energy consumption we are discussing CO2 emissions and what effect reducing them would have on the economy. Using energy that results in less CO2 emission is a perfectly acceptable way to reduce CO2 emissions.

[joema]

Irrelevant. We are trying to determine the potential economic costs of CO2 emissions, The fact that France achieves good levels of GDP/Person with much smaller CO2 emissions per person proves very substantial cuts can be made with minimal economic impact using current technology.

France gets 79% of their electricity from nuclear reactors. This contributes to their low per-capita CO2 emissions. The U.S. would have to build about 500 new reactors to achieve that -- that's five times the number currently in operation. What works for France isn't necessarily technically or politically viable for other countries. I think France also reprocesses nuclear fuel. For the U.S. to use the France's "current technology" to lower CO2 emissions, this would entail massive nuclear fuel reprocessing.

Also irrelevant. We are not discussing energy consumption we are discussing CO2 emissions...

It's common to discuss energy consumption in this context. If you look up the thread a few posts, you'll see other posters mentioning how much energy the U.S. consumes. You didn't complain about THAT being irrelevant.

[lomiller1]

France gets 79% of their electricity from nuclear reactors. This contributes to their low per-capita CO2 emissions. The U.S. would have to build about 500 new reactors to achieve that -- that's five times the number currently in operation.

The US has at least 5X the resources to build them with so if France can build 100 reactors there is no fundamental reason the US couldn’t build 500. Look at it this way, the US also needs to build 5X as many highways, does that mean France will inevitably have a better highway system?

I think France also reprocesses nuclear fuel. For the U.S. to use the France's "current technology" to lower CO2 emissions, this would entail massive nuclear fuel reprocessing.

So reprocess the fuel…

It may have it’s drawbacks but it’s still better then unchecked CO2 emissions.

It's common to discuss energy consumption in this context. If you look up the thread a few posts, you'll see other posters mentioning how much energy the U.S. consumes. You didn't complain about THAT being irrelevant.

Energy consumption is also one way to cut CO2 emissions. This doesn’t change the fact that we are concerned with reducing CO2 emissions, and energy consumption may or may not be a part of that.

[joema]

The US has at least 5X the resources to build them with so if France can build 100 reactors there is no fundamental reason the US couldn’t build 500. Look at it this way, the US also needs to build 5X as many highways, does that mean France will inevitably have a better highway system?...So reprocess the fuel…It may have it’s drawbacks but it’s still better then unchecked CO2 emissions...

Conceptually I agree with you. I'm not saying it's technically impossible. I just wanted to make clear there were hurdles to doing it -- political and technical.

To build reactors on that scale would require widespread use of breeder reactors and plutonium recycling, as there's not enough fuel using the current, inefficient "once through" cycle. This would probably require something like the Integral Fast Reactor (IFR). This appears technically achievable, solves most of the waste problem, plutonium recycling problem and fuel availability problems. However I doubt politically if it would ever work: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/pages/frontl...iews/till.html

[Ronald Brak]

One reason France has fairly low CO2 emissions per GDP is they use nuclear fission for 79% of their electricity: http://www.nationmaster.com/graph/en...-sources-total So it's not magic -- just science.

Personally, I've always been of the opinion that the reason France's electricity sector produces less CO2 emissions per kilowatt-hour than United States was because of their reliance upon non-fossil fuel generating capacity, rather than because they were invoking the powers of the supernatural.

But is there a meaningful lesson here? Presumably the point of mentioning France with reference to the U.S. is the implication they have a solution useful to the carbon emissions problem -- that's the discussion topic.

So what would it take for the Europe or U.S. to "be like France" and have similar low fossil fuel consumption for electricity? Let's examine that:

French electrical consumption was 447 billion kWhr in 2007, vs the 3.9 trillion kWhr for the U.S. About 79% of France's electrical production was nuclear based -- that definitely lowers carbon emissions. On average, France's 59 nuclear plants each produce about 447E12 watt hrs * .79 / 59 = 6E12 watt hrs per year.

For the U.S. to be like France would require how many of these fission plants? 3.9E15 watt hrs * .79 / 6E12 watt hrs per year = 513 new nuclear reactors.

As the United States will probably build over 470 gigawatts of generating capacity over the next thirty years, equal to over 1,000 average French reactors, this doesn't seem to be a problem.

Mind you, this capacity certainly doesn't need to be nuclear, it just needs to be low emission. For example, France is currently investing in large scale wind farms as it is cheaper than new nuclear.

[Ari Jokimaki]

An interesting paper (for William or more likely against William) was just published in GRL:

Sudden cosmic ray decreases: No change of global cloud cover by J. Calogovic et al. (Geophys. Res. Lett., 37, L03802, doi:10.1029/2009GL041327)

Here's the PDF (I think Calogovic et al. was mentioned before in this thread when the paper was available by "in the press" service):

http://crosbi.znanstvenici.hr/datote...09GL041327.pdf

The preliminary results from the Cern's CLOUD-project were also officially published this week (Duplissy et al. 2010), but this has been mentioned here also before because the journal gives papers out right after they have been submitted and the whole peer review happens in public (again, not much to cheer for the cosmic ray hypothesis supporters):

http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.n...8235-2009.html

[William]

An interesting paper (for William or more likely against William) was just published in GRL:

Sudden cosmic ray decreases: No change of global cloud cover by J. Calogovic et al. (Geophys. Res. Lett., 37, L03802, doi:10.1029/2009GL041327)

There appears to be a either a measurement problem problem with the paper you linked to or there is a data problem. The following is a paper that shows there is a reduction in cloud water content with a Forbush decrease in cosmic ray counts.

Comment;
The cloud albedo is dependent on water droplet size. Clouds reflect more sunshine into space when the water droplet size increases. The area of cloud cover is only one parameter that needs to be measured.

It should be noted that there is paleoclimatic data that shows there is close correlation with planetary temperature and GCR changes. There is smoking gun evidence to support the assertion that there is a causal relationship.

The question "Does or does not GCR affect planetary cloud cover? will be decided by the affects of the current massive increase in GCR and the change in the solar magnetic cycle (it appears the sun is moving toward a Dalton like cycle minimum). Based on what has happened before the planet will cool.

It is interesting that record snowfall is being attributed to global warming. GCR has rapidly increased in the last year. Is there any change in "weather"? The El Nino event is starting to weaken. It will be interesting to see how the "weather" changes this summer and next winter.

As the paper I linked to above noted planetary warming is less than 40% of what is predicted by the IPCC based on current CO2 levels. Something is fundamentally incorrect with that theory.

As Susan Soleman's paper notes, 30% the 20th century warming was due to changes in stratospheric water content. Soleman's paper notes that stratospheric water content was started to decrease which is causing the planet to cool. Tinsley predicted an inverse relationship between GCR intensity and stratospheric water content. (Stratospheric water warms the planet via the H2O greenhouse affect.)

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpre...k-forebush.pdf

Cosmic ray decreases affect atmospheric aerosols and clouds
Close passages of coronal mass ejections from the sun are signaled at the Earth’s surface by Forbush decreases in cosmic ray counts. We find that low clouds contain less liquid water following Forbush decreases, and for the most influential events the liquid water in the oceanic atmosphere can diminish by as much as 7%. Cloud water content as gauged by the Special Sensor Microwave/Imager (SSM/I) reaches a minimum approx. 7 days after the Forbush minimum in cosmic rays, and so does the fraction of low clouds seen by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) and in the International Satellite Cloud Climate Project (ISCCP). Parallel observations by the aerosol robotic network AERONET reveal falls in the relative abundance of fine aerosol particles which, in normal circumstances, could have evolved into cloud condensation nuclei. Thus a link between the sun, cosmic rays, aerosols, and liquid-water clouds appears to exist on a global scale.

[William]

Here's the PDF (I think Calogovic et al. was mentioned before in this thread when the paper was available by "in the press" service):

http://crosbi.znanstvenici.hr/datote...09GL041327.pdf

The preliminary results from the Cern's CLOUD-project were also officially published this week (Duplissy et al. 2010), but this has been mentioned here also before because the journal gives papers out right after they have been submitted and the whole peer review happens in public (again, not much to cheer for the cosmic ray hypothesis supporters):

http://www.atmos-chem-phys-discuss.n...8235-2009.html

Ari,

Something does appear to be modulating cloud droplet size (see my comment above) and stratospheric water content.

It appears that the planetary response to a change in forcing (increase in CO2 levels by 40%) is negative feedback (planet resists changes) rather than positive (planet amplifies changes). That has a number of implications concerning what is required to cause the past cyclic abrupt cooling events. (The existence of a very large cyclic forcing mechanism. Insolation changes at 65N cannot possibly have caused the glacial/interglacial cycle.)

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/conten...cience.1182488

Contributions of Stratospheric Water Vapor to Decadal Changes in the Rate of Global Warming

Stratospheric water vapor concentrations decreased by about 10% after the year 2000. Here, we show that this acted to slow the rate of increase in global surface temperature over 2000 to 2009 by about 25% compared to that which would have occurred due only to carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. More limited data suggest that stratospheric water vapor probably increased between 1980 and 2000, which would have enhanced the decadal rate of surface warming during the 1990s by about 30% compared to estimates neglecting this change. These findings show that stratospheric water vapor represents an important driver of decadal global surface climate change.

http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?...2009JCLI3461.1

Why Hasn't the Earth Warmed as Much as Expected? Stephen E. Schwartz, Robert J. Charlson, Ralph A. Kahn, John A. Ogren, Henning Rodhe Issued January 19th, 2010

The observed increase in global mean surface temperature (GMST) over the industrial era is less than 40% of that expected from observed increases in long-lived greenhouse gases together with the best-estimate equilibrium climate sensitivity given by the 2007 Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Possible reasons for this warming discrepancy are systematically examined here. The warming discrepancy is found to be due mainly to some combination of two factors: the IPCC best estimate of climate sensitivity being too high and/or the greenhouse gas forcing being partially offset by forcing by increased concentrations of atmospheric aerosols; the increase in global heat content due to thermal disequilibrium accounts for less than 25% of the discrepancy, and cooling by natural temperature variation can account for only about 15%. Current uncertainty in climate sensitivity is shown to preclude determining the amount of future fossil fuel CO2 emissions that would be compatible with any chosen maximum allowable increase in GMST; even the sign of such allowable future emissions is unconstrained. Resolving this situation, by empirical determination of Earth's climate sensitivity from the historical record over the industrial period or through use of climate models whose accuracy is evaluated by their performance over this period is shown to require substantial reduction in the uncertainty of aerosol forcing over this period.

[joema]

Could someone please explain this: atmospheric CO2 has been notably increasing since 1900: http://www.grida.no/publications/vg/...page/3062.aspx

This is presumably in line with emissions from burning fossil fuels.

However pre-WWII emissions were about 1/7th of today: http://www.pewclimate.org/facts-and-...nal/historical

Yet this was sufficient to already cause a steady increase in atmospheric CO2 before WWII, seen in the 1st graph above.

The natural background flux is is about 213 GtC per year: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle

That means prior to WWII, the human fraction of total carbon emissions peaked at roughly (1 GtC/yr) / (213 GtC/yr) or 0.4%. That seems like a tiny amount, proportionally.

If an additional 0.4% contribution to the natural background flux overwhelms the earth's natural carbon cycle, it seems like that cycle is highly intolerant of any disturbance, whether man-made or natural. This implies the earth has almost no compensatory mechanisms and carbon emissions must equal carbon sinks, whether those are man made or natural.

I realize this is not a scientific statement but just intuitive. I don't doubt man has greatly damaged earth's environment in various ways. But if current AGW viewpoint is true, that means it was happening before WWII and at the then-current emissions level. When comparing the pre-WWII emissions level to the natural carbon flux, it seems very small.

That implies that at any point in the distant past, any natural change to the source/sink cycle of 0.4% would have created a runaway warming event. IOW the actual *amounts* of natural carbon emissions and sinks somehow stayed almost perfectly equal over millions of years. As unlikely as that seems, maybe they stayed mathematically balanced withing 0.4% else we wouldn't be here, IOW the anthropic principle: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

But from an intuitive standpoint it just seems a carbon cycle which is that easily overwhelmed is unlikely to have preserved life on earth for very long.

[buzgz]

As the United States will probably build over 470 gigawatts of generating capacity over the next thirty years, equal to over 1,000 average French reactors, this doesn't seem to be a problem.

This seems like good news, but I was under the impression that the U.S. was against the addition of significant nuclear energy. Do you have a reference for this ?

Why must the alternative to global warming be the reduction of CO2 produced ? It would seem that if the warming was going to produce great problems, then ideas for reducing warming (but not carbon) would be well received. From my memory ( I have no references), they have not been.

Perhaps I'm wrong and someone could provide examples of alternate methods of cooling being embraced.

[Ronald Brak]

This seems like good news, but I was under the impression that the U.S. was against the addition of significant nuclear energy. Do you have a reference for this ?

It's the natural turnover of infrastructure. In thirty years time almost all the existing coal, gas and nuclear plants in the United States will reach the end of their operational lifespan and be replaced with new capacity. But at the moment it doesn't look like this capacity will be nuclear. With many proposed nuclear plants delayed or cancelled the the percentage of electricity generated by nuclear in the US looks set to decline. Just how much total capacity will increase depends on things such as the electrification of transport and whether or not the bulk of the United States adopts efficiency standards on par with those currently in place in California.

Why must the alternative to global warming be the reduction of CO2 produced ? It would seem that if the warming was going to produce great problems, then ideas for reducing warming (but not carbon) would be well received. From my memory ( I have no references), they have not been.

Unfortunately increased carbon dioxide levels causes problems beyond just warming such as increased acidification of the oceans. Also, reducing CO2 emissions is also generally the cheapest way to reduce climate change. However, there are places where just cooling things down is helpful. For example, white roofs reflect heat back into space and cut down on cooling costs, reducing energy use and CO2 emissions.

[William]

Could someone please explain this: atmospheric CO2 has been notably increasing since 1900: http://www.grida.no/publications/vg/...page/3062.aspx

This is presumably in line with emissions from burning fossil fuels.

However pre-WWII emissions were about 1/7th of today: http://www.pewclimate.org/facts-and-...nal/historical

Yet this was sufficient to already cause a steady increase in atmospheric CO2 before WWII, seen in the 1st graph above.

The natural background flux is is about 213 GtC per year: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_cycle

That means prior to WWII, the human fraction of total carbon emissions peaked at roughly (1 GtC/yr) / (213 GtC/yr) or 0.4%. That seems like a tiny amount, proportionally.

If an additional 0.4% contribution to the natural background flux overwhelms the earth's natural carbon cycle, it seems like that cycle is highly intolerant of any disturbance, whether man-made or natural. This implies the earth has almost no compensatory mechanisms and carbon emissions must equal carbon sinks, whether those are man made or natural.

I realize this is not a scientific statement but just intuitive. I don't doubt man has greatly damaged earth's environment in various ways. But if current AGW viewpoint is true, that means it was happening before WWII and at the then-current emissions level. When comparing the pre-WWII emissions level to the natural carbon flux, it seems very small.

That implies that at any point in the distant past, any natural change to the source/sink cycle of 0.4% would have created a runaway warming event. IOW the actual *amounts* of natural carbon emissions and sinks somehow stayed almost perfectly equal over millions of years. As unlikely as that seems, maybe they stayed mathematically balanced withing 0.4% else we wouldn't be here, IOW the anthropic principle: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anthropic_principle

But from an intuitive standpoint it just seems a carbon cycle which is that easily overwhelmed is unlikely to have preserved life on earth for very long.

Your point is interesting. There is believed to be a feedback mechanism that regulates atmospheric CO2. How fast that feedback mechanism operates is not known. As atmospheric CO2 increases rainwater becomes slightly more acidic which increases weathering of rocks. That has a benefit to ocean life as it increases the amount of trace nutrients that are carried into the oceans. One hypothesis is that due to the increased trace nutrients ocean life sequesters more CO2 which hence regulates the atmospheric CO2.

Basic observations concerning the carbon cycle do not have an explanation which indicates the fundamental science concerning this subject is not understood.

This subject should have a separate thread.

For example, during the glacial phase of the current glacial/interglacial cycle, atmospheric CO2 should increase rather than decrease by 30%. Calculations indicate that the shrinkage of the biosphere due to desertification and because of the ice sheets more than offsets the greater amount of CO2 that colder ocean can hold. This problem has been known for 20 years. There is currently no accepted explanation.

This paper is a review paper that asks the same question that you do.

http://www.gps.caltech.edu/~als/GBC/...d_huh_2003.pdf

Non-steady state carbonate recycling and implications for
the evolution of atmospheric PCO2

The search is for feedbacks or other mechanisms that will act to stabilize the atmospheric composition in the habitable range that appears to have obtained without significant interruption
for at least the past 700 m.y. and probably much longer.


There is no doubt, given the fossil and isotopic records, that there has been a steady deterioration in Earth surface temperatures over the last 60 m.y., from essentially global tropical conditions with ocean bottom water temperatures of approx. 12C to the present ice age conditions [6]. In the contemporary Earth surface environment, CO2 is close to being a limiting nutrient for terrestrial vegetation, especially C3 plants (trees, shrubs, etc.). Strongly enhanced growth is observed in greenhouse experiments with artificially increased PCO2 [7], and greatly reduced growth results at PCO2 150 ppmV (c.f. preindustrial interglacial value is V280 ppmV). C4 plants, mainly grasses, are much more resilient to both low PCO2 (limit V20 ppmV) and low PH2O. Between 8 and 5 Ma, a drastic change in the relative preponderance of C3 and C4 plants occurred in response to decreasing PCO2 [8].

[Ari Jokimaki]

There appears to be a either a measurement problem problem with the paper you linked to or there is a data problem. The following is a paper that shows there is a reduction in cloud water content with a Forbush decrease in cosmic ray counts.

Laken et al. (2009) have already shown that apparent correlations from Svensmark et al. (2009) do not present a causal relationship. Calogovic et al. (2010) study gives support for the Laken et al. study. You have been shown both of these papers before and yet you keep offering Svensmark et al. as only truth on the matter. Laken et al., by the way, are using same data as Svensmark et al., so it will be interesting to see you try to explain how the measurement or data errors you are claiming only affect others but not Svensmark et al.

I cannot help noticing that Svensmark et al. once again play with uncorrected ISCCP data. Already the Svensmark & Friis-Christensen (1997, "SF97") which presented the original cosmic ray claims was based on cloud changes produced by ISCCP viewing angle problem. Just compare SF97 figure 2 and Evan et al. (2007) figure 3. The figure 3 presents the cloud data from areas less affected by viewing angle problem by black dashed line and you can see that in the black dashed line the large cloud changes SF97 base their correlation has completely vanished. The whole cosmic ray issue is based on spurious cloud trends in ISCCP cloud data.

[William]

Laken et al. (2009) have already shown that apparent correlations from Svensmark et al. (2009) do not present a causal relationship. Calogovic et al. (2010) study gives support for the Laken et al. study. You have been shown both of these papers before and yet you keep offering Svensmark et al. as only truth on the matter. Laken et al., by the way, are using same data as Svensmark et al., so it will be interesting to see you try to explain how the measurement or data errors you are claiming only affect others but not Svensmark et al.

Ari,
Science is trying to understand what is happening not a debating game. Think about the observations. A Forbush event is a massive interruption to the heliosphere and the ionosphere. The paper you quote does not disprove Svensmark's finding that there is a 7% reduction in the cloud water content (based on satellite measures) during a Forbush event. The paper states that they do not like the time delay or that the observation is not statistically significant. The paper you quote provides a long list of papers from different authors that supports Svensmark's finding. The paper you quote includes this curious sentence:

A growing body of work has claimed that solar activity may indirectly influence cloud cover on Earth via a modulation of the GCR flux [Svensmark and FriisChristensen, 1997; Pudovkin and Veretenenko, 1995; Todd and Kniveton, 2004; Harrison and Stephenson, 2006]. Some researchers have suggested that such a relationship may have even contributed a significant portion of the anomalous climate changes observed in recent decades [Svensmark, 2007]. Due to the enormous sociological importance of climate change it is essential to carefully examine such claims in great detail.

There are delays in observing the Forbush effects due to the time delay as the ionosphere adjusts.


There are other papers that support Svensmark's findings.

For example.

http://www.springerlink.com/content/662166078h432877/

Rainfalls during great Forbush decreases

The changes of rainfall values during great Forbush decreases recorded by the low-latitudinal neutron monitor of Huancayo (47 events from 1956 through 1992) were examined. The data on precipitations were taken from the State of São Paulo and from the Amazonian region, Brazil. As a rule, the data from more than 50 meteorological stations were used for each events. The main result is the following: during strong decreases of cosmic-ray flux in the atmosphere (great Forbush decreases) the precipitation value is decreased. The effect of rainfall changes is seen more distinctly if wet seasons are considered.

I notice you have no response to the paper that I linked to above the shows planetary warming is less than 40% of what is predicted by the IPCC. In addition Susan Soloman's paper (Contributions of Stratospheric Water Vapor to Decadal Changes in the Rate of Global Warming) which shows 30% of that warming was due to changes in stratospheric water content which has since reduced.

And lastly, as I have said. This is not a game. If Svensmark's science is correct the planet will cool. The planet did cool in the past when the solar magnetic cycle moved to a Dalton minimum.

After all the name calling and claims that the time to look at the science are over, it will be interesting to see what will be the public response to significant cooling.

[Ari Jokimaki]

I notice you have no response to the paper that I linked to above the shows planetary warming is less than 40% of what is predicted by the IPCC. In addition Susan Soloman's paper (Contributions of Stratospheric Water Vapor to Decadal Changes in the Rate of Global Warming) which shows 30% of that warming was due to changes in stratospheric water content which has since reduced.

I already addressed Schwartz et al. here, so I won't play your games of endless repeat with this one. You have misinterpreted the paper.

You claim that Solomon paper shows that 30 % of 20th century warming was due to increases in water in the stratosphere. The paper doesn't say that, the 30 % figure is for the warming during 1990's. Solomon paper shows that stratospheric water vapor can be a strong factor in short time changes, i.e. in weather. However, look Solomon's paper more closely and you will see that it shows what looks like awful lot of positive water vapor feedback.

I notice that you have no response to the SF97 vs. ISCCP problems I mentioned.

Ari,
Science is trying to understand what is happening not a debating game.
...
And lastly, as I have said. This is not a game.
...
After all the name calling...

This happens almost every time with you; you start making this kind of comments trying to make it look like I'm only playing some sort of debate game here. Are you suggesting that I'm dishonest? On a related note, you haven't answered this.

[William]

I already addressed Schwartz et al. here, so I won't play your games of endless repeat with this one. You have misinterpreted the paper.

Ari,
I presented a link to Schwartz paper that show the planet was warmed less than 40% of what is predicted by the IPCC. The implications of Schwartz's paper is that climate sensitivity is negative rather than positive which means the planetary response to a doubling of CO2 will be less than 1C not 3C to 6C.

Your response is to say Schwartz should have quoted another paper that shows the warming that has occurred, is at a peculiar latitude that differs from what the IPCC predicted latitude.

Then you provide a link to my past comment concerning Mann's recent paper which made the Medieval warm period go away. As the are dozen's of papers and Historical evidence such as location of Northern settlements, ancient texts, and so on, that all support the assertion that the Little Ice Age and the Medieval warm period exist. I must admit I think Mann is incorrect. I do not know why Mann's paper does not agree with the Historic record and dozen of papers.

Do you have an explanation to that puzzle Ari?

http://www.amazon.ca/Little-Ice-Age-.../dp/0465022723

Excerpt from the book "The Little Ice Age: How Climate Made History 1300-1850"

THE MEDIEVAL WARM PERIOD
I beseech the immaculate Master of monks
To steer my journeys;
May the lord of the lofty heavens
Hold his strong hand over me.
—Anonymous, Hafgerdinga Lay
("The Lay of the Breakers")

(Little Ice Age)
THE GREAT FAMINE
When the world was half a thousand years younger all events had much sharper outlines than now. The distance between sadness and joy, between good and bad fortune, seemed to be much greater than for us.... There was less relief available for misfortune and for sickness; they came in a more fearful and more painful way. Sickness contrasted more strongly with health. The cutting cold and the dreaded darkness of winter were more concrete evils....

But one sound always rose above the clamor of busy life and, no matter how much of a tintinnabulation, was never confused with other noises, and for a moment, lifted everyone into an ordered sphere: that of the bells. The bells acted in daily life like concerned good

http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?...2009JCLI3461.1

Why Hasn't the Earth Warmed as Much as Expected? Stephen E. Schwartz, Robert J. Charlson, Ralph A. Kahn, John A. Ogren, Henning Rodhe Issued January 19th, 2010

The observed increase in global mean surface temperature (GMST) over the industrial era is less than 40% of that expected from observed increases in long-lived greenhouse gases together with the best-estimate equilibrium climate sensitivity given by the 2007 Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Possible reasons for this warming discrepancy are systematically examined here. The warming discrepancy is found to be due mainly to some combination of two factors: the IPCC best estimate of climate sensitivity being too high and/or the greenhouse gas forcing being partially offset by forcing by increased concentrations of atmospheric aerosols; the increase in global heat content due to thermal disequilibrium accounts for less than 25% of the discrepancy, and cooling by natural temperature variation can account for only about 15%. Current uncertainty in climate sensitivity is shown to preclude determining the amount of future fossil fuel CO2 emissions that would be compatible with any chosen maximum allowable increase in GMST; even the sign of such allowable future emissions is unconstrained. Resolving this situation, by empirical determination of Earth's climate sensitivity from the historical record over the industrial period or through use of climate models whose accuracy is evaluated by their performance over this period is shown to require substantial reduction in the uncertainty of aerosol forcing over this period.

http://www.leif.org/research/LeanRindCauses.pdf

How natural and anthropogenic influences alter global and regional
surface temperatures: 1889 to 2006

To distinguish between simultaneous natural and anthropogenic impacts on surface temperature, regionally as well as globally, we perform a robust multivariate analysis using the best available estimates of each together with the observed surface temperature record from 1889 to 2006. The results enable us to compare, for the first time from observations, the geographical distributions of responses to individual influences consistent with their global impacts. We find a response to solar forcing quite different from that reported in several papers published recently in this journal, and zonally averaged responses to both natural and anthropogenic forcings that differ distinctly from those indicated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, whose conclusions depended on model simulations. Anthropogenic warming estimated directly from the historical observations is more pronounced between 45_S and 50_N than at higher latitudes whereas the model-simulated trends have minimum values in the tropics and increase steadily from 30 to 70_N.

[lomiller1]

Yet this was sufficient to already cause a steady increase in atmospheric CO2 before WWII, seen in the 1st graph above.

It wasn’t sufficient to explain the pre WWII warming. To explain 1900-1940 warming you need to include changes in the Suns energy output and a relatively long period without major volcanic eruptions.

If an additional 0.4% contribution to the natural background flux overwhelms the earth's natural carbon cycle, it seems like that cycle is highly intolerant of any disturbance, whether man-made or natural. This implies the earth has almost no compensatory mechanisms and carbon emissions must equal carbon sinks, whether those are man made or natural.

Most of the carbon cycle consists of the same carbon being absorbed and re-released over an over again. Nearly all the carbon released in the normal carbon cycle was absorbed within years or decades. IOW there is no real way the natural carbon cycle can be anything but balanced because there is no new carbon involved.

[Ivan Viehoff]

It's an answer to an "argument by distraction" -- that of focusing on per-capita statistics when per-GDP statistics are more revealing.
...
This is another argument by distraction...

Fine to nitpick the minor side issues, but how about addressing the key point I made?

Which is that we should be looking at a nation's consumption, not production, as the measure of what contribution it makes to global carbon output. It makes sense to produce stuff where it is most efficiently produced. And to that extent per capita and per gdp statistics are both capable of being grossly misleading, as they both depend upon what is the rest of the economy you are averaging a particular activity over.

Production carbon-efficiency across the globe won't happen unless there is global trading of carbon permits. Which won't happen unless the developing world is a given what they consider to be a "fair" share of the initial allocation of carbon permits.

[Ari Jokimaki]

Ari,
I presented a link to Schwartz paper that show the planet was warmed less than 40% of what is predicted by the IPCC.

No, you didn't. Schwartz et al. (2010) say in their introduction that if we only look at greenhouse gases, then the observed warming is less than expected. You parrot this as if it would be their conclusion, but it actually is just a starting point of their investigation. To determine the expected total warming in contrast to expected warming only from GHG's one needs to look at all the forcings. Schwartz et al. do this later in their paper and their conclusion is that either climate sensitivity is at the low end of expected range or that there are some forcings we don't know properly (well basically their conclusion is that there is lot of uncertainty in aerosol forcing, which is not a new finding).

The implications of Schwartz's paper is that climate sensitivity is negative rather than positive which means the planetary response to a doubling of CO2 will be less than 1C not 3C to 6C.

Nonsense. Schwartz et al. say: "The warming discrepancy is found to be due mainly to some combination of two factors: the IPCC best estimate of climate sensitivity being too high and/or the greenhouse gas forcing being partially offset by forcing by increased concentrations of atmospheric aerosols;" IPCC's best estimate being 3K. How you go to negative climate senstitivity from there? Schwartz et al. also discuss this, provide a quote where they suggest that climate sensitivity is negative.

Then you provide a link to my past comment concerning Mann's recent paper which made the Medieval warm period go away. As the are dozen's of papers and Historical evidence such as location of Northern settlements, ancient texts, and so on, that all support the assertion that the Little Ice Age and the Medieval warm period exist. I must admit I think Mann is incorrect. I do not know why Mann's paper does not agree with the Historic record and dozen of papers.

In the post I linked to I asked you to provide evidence for Mann's dishonesty you claimed. You didn't provide any evidence for that here either. You are also trying to build a straw-man argument here; Mann hasn't claimed that Little Ice Age and the Medieval warm period don't exist. He is simply suggesting, and has shown evidence that MWP was not globally as warm as present. Where are the "dozen of papers" showing in a global analysis that MWP was warmer than present?

Ok, now it's your turn to repeat your arguments once again.