Don’t underestimate the importance of the nameless basic model. It sounds small, but in the culture and philosophy of climate science it’s bigger and carries more weight than the massive hairy GCMs. Like an invisible gossamer web, it’s overarching. It spans and defines all the other models. When they produce “dumb” answers, the basic model holds them in, for thou shalt not stray too far from the climate sensitivity defined by the basic model. It defines what “dumb” is. (It’s just “basic physics” after all.) One model to bind them all. What could possibly go wrong?
A lot, apparently. The physics might be right, but the equations are calculating imaginary conditions. The answers might be arithmetically correct but useless at the same time. They miss the real route that energy flows through to space.
By definition, as long as the basic model is wrong, the GCM models can never get it right.
It’s not like climate scientists consult the oracle of the basic model every day, or even once a year… they don’t need to. They were taught it their climate larval stage, often long before they’d written one paper. The basic model shows that the warming of the 1980s and 90s was “caused” by CO2. Then the GCMs are tuned to that trend and that assumption.
The silent basic model is thus the whole nub of the problem. People have been arguing about the parameters when they should also have been talking about the equations that connect those parameters — the architecture. They added the separate warming forces before they did the feedbacks, but they should have done the feedbacks first and then added them all together after.
My favorite line below: “Once two numbers are added, there is no way of telling what the original numbers were just from their sum.” The models can’t figure out what was man-made and what was natural…
In the basic model the atmosphere responds the same way to all forms of warming, always the water vapor amplification and never simple rerouting.
Good news here, we’re in a low-acronym-zone today. This post is ASR and OLR-free, low on WVELS. No equations!
The solar model starts again soon…
–Jo
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19. Comments on Conventional versus Alternative
Dr David Evans, 11 November 2015, David Evans’ Basic Climate Models Home, Intro, Previous, Next.
This post completes the first two parts of this series — problems with the conventional basic climate model, and fixing them with the alternative basic climate model. Here are just some general comments, tying together some of the main ideas. There are hardly any acronyms, and no equations.
After this the series will embark on its third and final part, an hypothesis about the main cause of global warming. Kindly note that whether the third part of the series eventually proves to be right or wrong has no bearing on the correctness of these first two parts about climate model architecture.
This post is only about basic models, not GCMs, except where it specifically states otherwise.
Two Major Errors in the Conventional Architecture
The conventional basic climate model is just based on a radiation balance. It adds the radiation imbalances due to the various influences on climate, which for basic models are principally the changes in absorbed sunlight and the changes in CO2. Then a response, consisting of the Planck sensitivity and feedbacks, is applied to the sum of the radiation imbalances, in order to calculate the surface warming — see Fig. 2 of post 3. This response calculates the surface warming required to bring the net radiation back into balance. Simple — but simplistic, and the problems of climate science stem from it.
Once two numbers are added, there is no way of telling what the original numbers were just from their sum. Hence the response in the conventional model has no way of distinguishing the source of the radiation imbalance — a W/m2 of increased absorbed sunlight or a W/m2 of decreased outgoing heat appear identical to the response. Perhaps owing to the state of climate knowledge in 1896 when this model architecture arose with Arrhenius, the response is the “solar response” — the response of the Earth to extra absorbed sunlight. It can be largely estimated from the Stefan-Boltzmann equation, and the main feedbacks to surface warming involving moist air. So, the simple radiation balance architecture induces the conventional model to apply the solar response to all climate influences; one size fits all. This is the first major error.
The feedbacks are part of the sole conventional response, so the same feedbacks are also applied to every radiation imbalance, regardless of source. It needn’t be this way (see Fig. 1 of post 5), but in the conventional basic climate model all feedback are in response to surface warming. But this is absurd: solar warming mainly heats the surface, which is quite unlike blocking some heat from escaping to space from the upper troposphere by increasing CO2. Why should they have the same feedbacks? Couldn’t there be feedbacks to increased CO2 that are not responses to increased surface warming? This is the second major architectural error.
The feedbacks to surface warming are well-known and presumably thoroughly researched by now. However the rerouting feedback proposed in post 7 is apparently new, which would appear puzzling at first because it is fairly obvious. The rerouting feedback is just that the extra heat in the upper troposphere due to increased CO2 causes more emission of heat to space from water vapor — so some of the heat blocked from escaping via emissions by CO2 molecules just reroutes out to space via water vapor molecules instead. It is a response to increased CO2 concentration, or more precisely, a response to the warming in the upper troposphere caused by increased CO2. It is not a response to surface warming, or it would be triggered by increased absorbed sunlight that warmed the surface. It presumably went unnoticed because it is in the blindspot of the conventional architecture — in which only feedbacks to surface warming exist. How many other feedbacks are there in that blindspot?
The Dam Analogy
To explain how the conventional climate architecture arose, and how to fix it, consider the dam analogy.
The amount of heat on Earth is like the amount of water in a dam. There is one inflow to the dam—a river of absorbed sunlight from the Sun (sunlight reflected by clouds and ice does not heat the Earth). Water flows out of the dam through four pipes, one for each of the main sources of emission of heat to space. The pipes are only partly full; they could carry more if the water level in the dam rose. When the dam is in its normal “steady state”, neither filling nor emptying, the inflow from the Sun is equal to the total flow through the outlet pipes.
…
– Response to More Sunlight
What happens if the absorbed sunlight steps up to a new level? More water would flow into the dam, so the water level would rise. When steady state was resumed, the total outflow would match the new inflow and there would be more water in the dam — more heat on Earth.
Hotter objects emit more heat, and it’s the same at the outlet pipes. More water through the surface pipe implies more emissions from the surface, which means that the surface must be warmer, which means a higher “global temperature” (the average temperature of the air at the surface, where we live).
– Response to More Carbon Dioxide
What happens if the concentration of atmospheric CO2 increases? This is like impeding the flow of heat to space through the CO2 pipe with a partial blockage. (Btw, the flow in the CO2 pipe has declined about 4% since 1750. That is, from about 21% of total emissions to about 20%.)
The input to the dam is unchanged, so the total outflow remains the same when steady state resumes. So the effect of increasing CO2 is to redistribute the heat radiating to space—less from CO2, more from the other pipes.
The conventional basic climate model dates back to 1896, when climate data was sparse. People could estimate the solar response almost entirely from lab-based data. But those lab-based principles could not be used to directly estimate what would happen in the whole atmosphere (with clouds, rain and convection) if the radiation to space was merely redistributed.
So a fateful piece of reasoning was applied (in what has become a ten trillion dollar mistake — climate spending worldwide is about US$1.5 trillion annually): blocking an outflow from the dam was assumed equivalent to increasing the inflow by the same amount. The amount of water in the dam would be the same in either case. Switching from blocking outflow to extra inflow does not alter the net inflow, so radiation is still balanced. So it appears logical, doesn’t it?
So the conventional basic climate model calculates the surface warming due to increased CO2 as equal to the surface warming due to increased absorbed sunlight, where the increase in absorbed sunlight is the same as the reduction in emissions of heat to space by CO2. This is where the conventional architecture comes from.
It’s effectively the same in the large computerized climate models—the GCMs. While the GCMs treat an increase in absorbed sunlight differently to an increase in CO2 by taking many more factors into account, the end results are similar. The GCMs apply mainly the same feedbacks to extra CO2 as to extra absorbed sunlight, and calculate a similar surface warming for a given radiation imbalance (compare Fig.s 2 and 3 of post 17).
GCMs are a bottom-up model, trying to take everything into account and consequently drowning in uncertainty. But they are tuned to reproduce the warming of the 1970s to 1990s — which is assumed to be entirely due to increasing CO2, because the rate of observed warming is roughly the same as that calculated by the basic climate model. So, ultimately, the GCMs are tweaked to match the basic model.
But hang on! How can redistributing the outflow between the pipes be equivalent to adding more water into the dam? The amount of outflow is different! More sunlight mainly heats the surface, while extra carbon dioxide blocks some heat from being radiated to space from the upper atmosphere. They seem pretty different.
Generations of climate scientists have convinced themselves this logic is correct. What if they got it wrong? What if there is more to it than merely balancing the radiation?
The dam analogy instead suggests that if the CO2 pipe is blocked a little then the water would just back up a fraction then flow out the other pipes. The response of the heat is to reroute through all the other pipes. In particular, the rerouting feedback suggests it mainly reroutes through the water vapor pipe. (This is the opposite to what happens in the conventional models, both basic and GCMs, where water vapor amplification decreases the energy flow through the water vapor pipe as CO2 increases.)
The Alternative Model
An alternative basic model was developed in posts 11 to 18 that fixes these two major architectural errors in the conventional basic model. It allows for rerouting, and instead of applying the solar response (the climate response to increased absorbed sunlight) to the influence of CO2, it applies a response specifically for CO2. It also applies a radiation balance, so the radiation still balances.
(Imagine a plumber asking: you sure you want me to connect the CO2 influence to the solar response, or do I connect it to the CO2 response? “What CO2 response?” replies the conventional climate scientist, “Just apply the solar response to everything”.)
Confining our attention to just climate influences that change absorbed sunlight or CO2, the two models are exactly the same — except that the conventional model applies the solar response to the CO2 influence, whereas the alternative model applies a specific CO2 response to the CO2 influence. They differ by just one connection.
…
…
There is far more climate data available now than in 1896. When the alternative model is fitted with the data, it finds a much lower sensitivity to CO2—the UN’s IPCC overestimated future warming by a factor of five to ten. Less than 20% of the global warming of the last few decades was due to CO2.
Looking more closely at the data and the differences between the conventional and alternative models, there is no getting away from the centrality of the hotspot to the climate debate (though the supporters of the conventional model do not like to talk about it, and the public conversation oh-so-mysteriously omits it). When the Earth’s climate responds to increased solar radiation (“the solar response”) it causes the water vapor emission layer (WVEL) to ascend, thereby causing the hotspot. In the last few decades we’ve had strongly rising CO2; the conventional models apply the solar response to the influence of CO2 and consequently show a huge, prominent hotspot (like Fig. 2 of post 17). That hotspot, or more precisely the ascent of the WVEL, is the water vapor amplification that causes more than half of the warming in the conventional models, by constricting the flow of heat to space through the water vapor pipe as the surface warms. So it is extremely germane to the alarm over CO2.
But when the correct instruments for the job measure what is happening (30 million radiosondes, from the 1950s), they find no hotspot at all. Even when the satellite channels are optimized to find the hotspot, they cannot find it. The data seems reasonably clear: the WVEL did not ascend (see post 17 for more details). This is a crushing blow for the conventional models. Whilst the 30 million radiosondes might be in a conspiracy to fool the poor climate scientists, a simpler explanation is that the WVEL actually fell slightly in reality, and the solar response should not be applied to the influence of CO2 — the CO2 response causes the WVEL to fall, outweighing the surface warming and solar response which causes the WVEL to rise.
The alternative model finds the CO2 sensitivity is likely less than 0.15 °C per W/m2, compared to the solar response of 0.54 °C per W/m2 (respectively λC and MλSB of Fig. 1 of post 13). The solar response is much stronger than the CO2 response — that is, the surface warming caused by a given radiation imbalance is much greater if the solar response is applied than if the CO2 response is applied. So the one size fits all approach of the conventional architecture, applying the solar response to the CO2 influence, greatly exaggerates the warming effect of increasing CO2. The CO2 response is of course weaker because it includes its own response-specific feedbacks, such as the rerouting feedback, which are systematically precluded from the conventional model by its architecture.
The conventional model seemed to work for temperature (though not the hotspot) when the world was warming in the 1980s and 1990s, but has failed since then. A model that has the wrong architecture would act like this — correct sometimes by accident (especially if tuned to fit the data), but failing a lot of the time too, and no amount of hammering on the model can make it work all the time. It’s just wrong.
Parameters versus Architecture
Skeptics are usually skeptical because of empirical evidence that disagrees with the climate models. ‘Nuf said.
But why do the models get it wrong? Previously skeptics have questioned the three parameter values in the basic model — the total feedbacks, the reduction in radiation to space from CO2 when the CO2 concentration doubles, and the Planck constant (in order of decreasing doubts). But until now skeptics appear to have accepted the architecture of the conventional basic climate model — how those parameters are arithmetically combined to estimate the equilibrium climate sensitivity to CO2, the ECS.
Joanne and I were in that camp too until recently, thinking the problems probably lay mainly with the water vapor feedbacks as evidenced by the missing hotspot.
But it turns out it was the architecture that was badly flawed. Merely fixing the architecture, as in this series, brings the ECS into line with the empirical evidence and resolves the hotspot data (yes the hotspot is missing, because the CO2 response pushed the water vapor emissions layer down).
Establishment climate scientists are mainly believers because they believe in “the basic physics”. But they have assumed that the basic physics were applied correctly. Yes, the basic physics may well be about right, but it was applied incorrectly — the model architecture was wrong. It makes all the difference in the world.
Most everyone involved with the CO2 theory has been barking up the wrong tree for years — or at least failing to bark up a very fruitful tree. Until now most everyone focused on the parameter values instead of the architecture, which could explain why this series is apparently novel in a mature field that has been fought over so intensely.
Of course the really productive action in climate research is in non-CO2 causes, mainly the province of the skeptical blogs. And that’s where we’ll be turning in the next blog post.
Conclusions
It appears the world has been led astray by the ideas of a primitive model, a first attempt at modeling the climate that doesn’t really work. This applies to the big computerized models (the GCMs) too, because they basically have the same two major architectural flaws as the basic climate model, and they are indirectly tuned to give roughly the same results.
Fixing the model architecture has the potential to bring most establishment climate scientists and skeptics onto the same page. Of course this is just a futuristic pipe dream and won’t happen any time soon, but the potential is there. And let’s not even consider the politics of it all; I’m just talking about the science.
It’s taken a few decades to be sure the conventional model doesn’t work, because climate changes only slowly. Good news: simply fixing the model implies the CO2 will never be much of a problem.
A religion based on a modeling mistake — let’s hear it for the modern world!
Absolutely right and a fine, clear explanation.
So why does the water surface need to rise in the dam analogy before equilibrium can be restored whereas the surface temperature beneath an atmosphere does not need to rise for equilibrium to be restored?
The answer lies in the variability of the lapse rate slope as one moves up against gravity through the vertical profile of an atmosphere.
There is no significant density variation in the horizontal plane within the water behind the dam so there is nothing comparable to a variable lapse rate available to enable an adjustment process that does not require a rise in surface height.
For an atmosphere, density variations arise in the horizontal plane all the time due to uneven surface heating and so convection is inevitable even without radiative gases. Radiative gases then alter the slope of the lapse rate so as to allow the consequent convection to adjust the heights of radiative flows to space from the various available ‘pipes’ so that reallocation of emission between pipes can occur without requiring a rise in surface temperature.
For more detail see here:
http://joannenova.com.au/2015/10/for-discussion-can-convection-neutralize-the-effect-of-greenhouse-gases/
For discussion of the validity of that convective hypothesis please comment in that thread rather than this one.
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Or hysteresis, or internal losses/resistance in any case they are presumed relatively small compared to the main events because CO2 and water gas/vapor co-exist and are for the most part close coupled, both dipolar.
Nice roundup David &Jo.Thank you.
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Apologies Stephen,
I was refering to the dam level rise only. Misread, I totally agree with what you said.
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Isn’t hysteresis what Warmist’s undergo at the suggestion of a non-problem and a threat to their funding ?
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yes
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Isn’t hysteresis what Warmist’s undergo at the suggestion of a non-problem and a threat to their funding ?
10
no
11
So clear and understandable that even media types should be able to understand!
I still think that a single cell climate model, stretched to cover the globe would fare better than a multi-cell GCM. Why?
As you have ably explained, we have experienced decades of incorrect modelling, incorrect formula, incorrect physical relationships.
Now, are we expected to assume that we have got cell to cell interaction correct yet? I have no reason to believe that to be so. Do we understand how the topography under a climate cell 500 km x 500 km affects the inputs to your new / their old models?
Is each cell topography understood such that within our 500 km cell we ma have desert or mountain range or sea or lake or forest or urban sprawl, and the prevailing winds are westerly, easterly, southerly or northerly etc.
The interaction of the single cell model to its surface surroundings is immensely complex. Add on the communication to adjacent cells, propagate equation outputs through out the model, the possibilities of errors is legion.
Since the multi cell GCM model results in a contrived single global temperature ‘average’, why not average the inputs to the single cell ‘whole earth’ model and get an improved answer?
Obviously, I can be corrected (as always) if I am informed that each cell of a GCM ‘understands’ accurately what its own surface affects are. But due to the variety of topography of the earth’s surface, I would be surprised.
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Steve,
A single cell concept can accommodate the essential elements.
Basically the irradiated side transfers energy to the air by conduction and that energy is taken upwards by convection, cooling along the lapse rate slope in the process. It then flows at upper levels across to the unlit side and starts to descend, warming along the lapse rate slope in the process whereupon it then flows back at lower levels to the irradiated side.
Everything else is then just a consequence of that simple process being broken into vastly more complex components by rotation and density variations from place to place (caused in large part by uneven surface heating from the surface irregularities you mention) in three dimensions.
The essential point is that all those energy transfers are a consequence of mass absorbing heat energy by conduction and then moving up and down within a gravity field, not radiation. Radiative capability within an atmosphere counts for nothing in comparison as is implied by David’s revised architecture.
In fact, it is that basic scenario which, at its simplest, gives us the various permanent climate zones spread around the Earth at the same latitudes.
Climate change is then simply the extent to which those zones move around over time in response to internal system variability.
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Hi David,
As far as I know, there are various measurements of heat radiation available:
– heat radiation from the surface (measured some meters above surface)
– heat radiated from the atmosphere down to the surface (downwelling radiation)
– heat radiated from from Top Of Atmosphere towards space (measured from satellites)
How do they fit/agree with the new model?
30
Johannes, the basic models are focused on OLR and ASR. While the first two of your three categories may be taken into account in the total feedbacks parameter, they are otherwise not relevant to the basic models. The third category is OLR, which is taken into account in the new model.
OLR is what the CO2 question is all about. Increasing CO2 redistributes OLR between the various emitters (less from CO2 molecules, more from the surface, water vapor???, cloud tops??). The OLR emitted by the surface increases with its temperature — if we could measure or calculate how much extra OLR the surface emitted, we would know how much surface warming there was or would be.
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“…if we could measure or calculate how much extra OLR the surface emitted, we would know how much surface warming there was or would be.”
Or, and I know this is just a wild and crazy idea, we could use thermometers to measure surface warming.
Oh wait, we have – and it _is_ warming, with the prospect of 2015 being more than 1°C above the average 1850-1900 temperatures, halfway towards the 2°C threshold widely considered to mark serious impacts.
1222
Oh the old 2c scare –the political tool.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/climate-catastrophe-a-superstorm-for-global-warming-research-a-686697-8.html
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What rubbish KR,
Serious impacts are always “gonna” happen, it’s always just around the corner, just out of sight, just beyond reach.
This halfway to Armagedon you describe seems very mild, comfortable and actually quite unremarkable to me. The temps around Australia, in spite of the BOMs manufactured averages to the contrary (which are derived by artificially cooling the past to produce trends that don’t exist and lower averages artificially), have been decidedly average or below, with the Eastern seaboard where I live in particular being quite cold especially of a night, where I can’t recall having to use a doona at night in mid November in quite a long time. Yet I’m told nightly by the emissaries of the BOM that our temps have been “above average” in the Sydney region by 2 degrees C! And just in time for the Paris Treason Festival too, what luck! How would have thought such good fortune could befall our record keepers in their time of need. It’s the law of averages that an average is the result that is most open to manipulation. The entire ACORN dataset is a pea and thimble trick that bears no relation to reality.
I also see nothing remotely remarkable occurring globally either, notwithstanding a hockey stick like exponential rise in hype and hysteria.
It is to your endless shame, KR, that you have been part ( no matter how small) of this massive deception, and the end result of your “achievement” will be chaos and economic mayhem on a grand scale. You should be so proud. Hope you can look your children in the eye when you tell them how you helped the scum of the earth rob them of their futures, and that you prevaricated, obfuscated and ran interference for the biggest grab for power in the history of humanity.
1410
Some ice cores and other proxies show that the MWP, RWP and Minoan warm periods were more than 2C higher than present. And, the current definition of 2C higher is based on going back to 1880 when the world (at least the N. hemisphere) was coming out of the LIA. So that’s kind of cheating, starting with a cold period and saying 2C from there is the danger point.
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Bravo. The conventional model is based on 1896 model and has been wrong since then. It all sees so simple when you lay it out. Did the conventional modelers miss it all this time? Or did they find it but couldn’t give up all the past work they had done to promote the CAGW theme?
In your dam diagram, the sum of the outputs is 93%? Is that an error or did I miss something?
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I’ve got a dam like that here on the farm….seepage.
10
Leonard, in small print down the lower right, “minor greenhouse gases 7%”.
40
Sorry, time for me to go to the optometrist again.
Or to the Shinbone Reading Academy.
10
Minor “greenhouse” gases? Just what are those David?
We have a LWIR cooled atmosphere, cooling the SW heated surface of our planet. What on earth or atmosphere could be allowing our atmosphere to cool the surface? Empirical experiment shows that the surface of our planet would be far hotter than present if all atmospheric effects excepting 1 bar pressure were removed. 312K or higher. Could an atmosphere without radiative cooling ability cool the surface?
There are “greenhouse” liquids on the surface of our planet, but no “greenhouse” gases in our atmosphere. Two shell radiative physics will never work for volumes. (imaginary mathematical “layers” is 1896 dark ages stuff). The atmosphere is SW translucent and LWIR translucent. The oceans are SW translucent and LWIR opaque, and primarily transfer of energy from ocean to the atmosphere via molecular kinetic process. This one is not hard David 😉
You can ask – “What happens if the absorbed sunlight steps up to a new level?”, but your modelling won’t tell you. You need CFD to model solar influence on ocean temps, S-B is a dead end, even glazing engineers have abandoned it (they can still get away with FEA as glass doesn’t convect). Your modelling does not include CFD. It is solar spectral variance that varies most over and between solar cycles, TSI is irrelevant. If you can’t compute the energy accumulation variance in the oceans due to solar spectral variance, and thereby depth of absorption, then you cannot solve for solar variation.
The old Sun Tzu instruction to “build your enemy a golden bridge to retreat over” no longer applies in the age of the Internet. The “Warming but less than we thought” game ain’t gonna work, no matter how much work you put into it. “Realpolitik” didn’t work for Watts, Monckton, or Lomborg. Nor will it work for you.
David, you are a mathematician. I am an empiricist. Maths can model both the physically possible and also the physically impossible. Empirical experiment can only ever model the physically possible. Our results differ. Climate sensitivity to CO2 marginally below 0.0K (Konrad) or marginally above (David) may initially seem small, but the ethical gulf is huge. The permanent Internet record shows me choosing Science and you choosing Realpolitik.
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Konrad, you don’t understand convection or adiabatic uplift and descent so please desist until you do.
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”Konrad, you don’t understand convection or adiabatic uplift and descent so please desist until you do.”
Stephen,
I’m not the one using “immaculate convection” in my modelling 😉
There is no such thing as “adiabatic uplift and descent” in atmospheric vertical convective circulation. Rayleigh-Bénard circulation such as strong vertical tropospheric convective circulation, is driven wholly by diabatic processes, not adiabatic. The word “adiabatic” means energy being neither gained or lost from a control volume or system. Rayleigh-Bénard circulation depends on energy entering a fluid in a gravity field at low level and or exiting at a higher level. It is radiative gases in our atmosphere that allow energy to exit at a higher level. Without radiative subsidence, strong vertical circulation below the troposphere would stall.
I’ve shown you simple empirical experiments demonstrating this process. I’ve shown you my CFD modelling of the mechanisms. I’ve linked to numerous meteorology papers describing the process. Yet you persist with your “radiation phobia”.
Adiabatic cooling of an air mass on accent is matched by adiabatic heating on decent. This is buoyancy neutral, therefore it cannot drive vertical atmospheric circulation.
I will not desist, rather persist. I challenge, where are the empirical experiments demonstrating this “immaculate convection”, this “adiabatic uplift and decent”? Show me a tall gas column exhibiting strong vertical Rayleigh-Bénard circulation while maintaining an constant average temperature without energy leaving higher than energy entering.
Pointing to maths or hand waving about the atmosphere is no good. I can snap my fingers and point to thermo-siphon hot water systems to show my physics at work. Where are your empirically testable examples?
115
Konrad,
Atmospheric convective overturning would occur without radiative gases allowing energy to exit at the top.
Therefore it is not a Rayleigh-Benard circulation.
Instead the warm KE at the surface becomes cold PE at the top and returns to the surface as warm KE again in the descent.A diabatic process is only required to initiate the circulation via conduction from the irradiated surface to the mass of the atmosphere. Once parcels of rising air detach from the surface there is no more diabatic energy exchange involved unless there are radiative gases or phase changes such as water vapour condensing out.
The overall circulation is buoyancy neutral but the rising air column is buoyancy positive and the descending air column is buoyancy negative.
In the absence of radiative capability no energy is gained or lost once air detaches from the irradiated surface. It is just recycled in and out of KE and PE up and down for as long as the atmosphere continues to be held off the surface in hydrostatic equilibrium.
The science of meteorology is replete with examples of the process in operation in myriad ways.
Radiative capability merely introduces an additional complication of radiative fluxes within the mass of the atmosphere but that is a mere miniscule fraction of the energy transfers involved and is readily negated by convective adjustments as per my earlier article on this site.
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”Atmospheric convective overturning would occur without radiative gases allowing energy to exit at the top.”
Stephen,
I know this is what you are persistently asserting, but your claim is in defiance of all known physics.
I am asking you to back that claim up with empirical evidence or experiment. You cannot possibly be claiming that the process behind vertical atmospheric circulation occurs nowhere else on this planet and cannot be replicated by empirical experiment.
Maths is no good. Talk is no good. Where is your empirical evidence?
113
Well, Konrad,
All one needs for convective overturning is uneven warming at the surface below and a decline in temperature with height.Density differentials in the horizontal plane do the rest. The decline in temperature with height is caused by the declining density and pressure gradient with height and not by energy loss from the top.
Why do you say that radiative emission from the top is necessary ?
The necessary empirical evidence is all around us in the form of winds.
Are you suggesting that there would be no movement of air within an atmosphere in the absence of radiative gases ?
That is what really would be contrary to all known physics and empirical observations.
210
Stephen, no, horizontal winds are not empirical evidence of uneven heating and cooling of the surface driving strong vertical tropospheric circulation over 15 vertical kilometres.
Horizontal avection winds are often created at dawn and dusk by disparate heating and cooling of the surface. But this is not a driver of strong vertical circulation. This is typically restricted to the surface boundary layer.
Further to this, the mistake you are making is thinking the surface has equal ability to heat and cool the atmosphere. Empirical experiment proves this false.
Place these gas columns in a 20C room and allow internal temperature to equalise. Now move them into a cold room and monitor their cooling. Column 1 cools far slower as you are trying to cool it from the base (surface). After time they will equalise. Now move them back into the 20C room and allow them to heat. Now column 1 heats faster as you are heating it from the base.
Look at column 1 in the cool room. That is a demonstration of the convective physics behind night radiative inversion layers.
Note – nowhere on the internet have I ever claimed that all circulation systems would cease in the absence of radiative gasses. Quite the opposite. I am on record as say that avective winds over land would increase, but the bulk of the atmosphere would super heat and boil into space. Again the empirical evidence is on my side. There are no planets or moons within our solar system that have manage to retain an atmosphere that cannot radiatively cool.
I have empirical experiment to back my claims. Where is your empirical evidence Stephen?
113
Forgot to link the experiment.
00
Konrad,
You cannot separate convection from advection.
Convection (winds in the vertical plane) comes first and advection across the surface then follows to replace the uplifted air beneath rising columns or to remove the excess air beneath descending columns.
The atmosphere has equal ability to cool the surface by taking energy up in ascending columns and to warm the surface by taking energy back down in descending columns. The descending column doesn’t warm the surface by conduction because the specific heat of air is much less than that of the surface but the descending column does inhibit convection from beneath it (just like a greenhouse roof) so that insolation to the surface can then raise the temperature beneath the descending column to a level above the S-B prediction.
That is the mass induced greenhouse effect as it was originally envisaged before the radiative theorists came along and failed to apply basic principles of meteorology.
An atmosphere in hydrostatic equilibrium will never heat and boil off to space because KE at the surface and PE at the top are in balance and PE is not heat.
No atmosphere exists that cannot radiatively cool to some extent but the ability to cool radiatively is not essential to convective overturning.
Where does your experiment deal with the cooling along the density/pressure gradient that converts KE to PE with height within an actual gaseous atmosphere ?
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Konrad says, November 13, 2015 at 7:46 pm:
There seems to be a fundamental flaw in your thinking here, Konrad. The strong vertical circulation within the Hadley cells on Earth is driven by uneven surface heating. What happens is that rising columns of moist air along the ITCZ are fuelled by surface heating and resulting evaporation plus the subsequent in-column release of latent heat of vaporisation. This massive diabatically driven buoyant boost provides great momentum to the upward-moving currents of air. One mechanism, however, slowly and progressively drains this upward momentum of its power, the higher up the air gets. Radiative cooling. At the tropopause, this diabatic cooling process has basically exhausted the surplus energy gained down low by the rising air masses. And as a consequence, they stop rising. They are no longer able to push on up through the ever thinner atmospheric layers above. And so they float out to the sides instead. They are forced to, because more rising air is always coming up from below.
Radiative cooling isn’t “sucking” or “pulling” the rising air up towards the tropopause, Konrad. It has the opposite effect: It decelerates it. The heating from down low rather pushes the air upwards. And when heated (and therefore light) air is pushed up and away from the surface region, cooler (and therefore heavier) air automatically flows in to take its place. And we have tropospheric circulation established.
What radiative cooling does is simply stabilising the atmosphere. It keeps it in place. By keeping the tropopause in place. At the 100 mb pressure level. Like on Venus. And on Titan.
IOW, radiative cooling is essential to our atmosphere and our Earth system as a whole. Without it, no steady state to be achieved. Not until the atmosphere itself is gone into space …
10
Kristian
you seem to have misinterpreted what I am pointing out to Stephen. I am not saying uneven surface heating (and in the ITCZ massive release of latent heat of evaporation) is not a driving force in tropospheric convective circulation.
Nor am I saying that radiative cooling of air masses is“sucking” or “pulling” the rising air up towards the tropopause.
I am saying that for an atmosphere where the temperature is relatively stable, for strong tropospheric circulation to be exhibited, the energy gain of air masses at low altitude must be off set by energy loss at higher altitude to maintain that circulation, ie:radiative subsidence. Energy entering and exiting an atmosphere at low altitude simply cannot drive such circulation.
Here is the pre-warmulonian meteorology Stephen is dismissing –
”Air convected to the top of the troposphere in the ITCZ has a very high potential temperature, due to latent heat release during ascent in hot towers. Air spreading out at higher levels also tends to have low relative humidity, because of moisture losses by precipitation. As this dry upper air drifts polewards, its potential temperature gradually falls due to longwave radiative losses to space (this is a diabatic process, involving exchanges of energy between the air mass and its environment). Decreasing potential temperature leads to an increase in density, upsetting the hydrostatic balance and initiating subsidence. The subsiding air warms (as pressure increases towards lower levels), further lowering the relative humidity and maintaining clear-sky conditions. However, although the subsiding air warms, it does not do so at the dry adiabatic lapse rate. Continuing losses of longwave radiation (radiative cooling) means that the air warms at less than the dry adiabatic lapse rate (i.e. some of the adiabatic warming is offset by diabatic cooling).”
00
Stephen,
you have claimed that vertical tropospheric circulation is not an example of Rayleigh-Benard circulation. This truly beggars belief.
Please read the link I gave to Kristian. Yes, it includes radiation, but it is pre-warmulonian meteorology! This is the stuff that the warmists have been trying to erase from history. You are trying to do the same!
When you mention “the mass induced greenhouse effect” this tells me what is going wrong, and why you have invoked “immaculate convection” like the warmists do. Stephen, you are looking for a greenhouse mechanism. What you are getting wrong is that there is no NET atmospheric greenhouse effect on this planet. Stephen, you are trying to model something that doesn’t exist! Our atmosphere is cooling the surface, not warming it.
PS. You ask ”Where does your experiment deal with the cooling along the density/pressure gradient that converts KE to PE with height within an actual gaseous atmosphere ?” Answer – it doesn’t, it models the effect of energy entry and exit at different levels in a gas column in a gravity field. KE to PE doesn’t represent energy exit. It cannot therefore cause hydrostatic imbalance.
Stephen, you still haven’t shown me empirical evidence of your new “Non-Rayleigh-Benard” circulation driving strong vertical (no, not horizontal) circulation in a fluid in a gravity field.
011
Konrad,
Your link says this:
(i.e. some of the adiabatic warming is offset by diabatic cooling”
with which I entirely agree.
So, after deducting that diabatic cooling the rest is adiabatic warming just as I say but you seem to be denying the existence of the adiabatic component.
If there were no radiative capability then it would all be adiabatic processes but you would still have convective overturning.
010
Stephen,
you don’t seem to understand the text.
Adiabatic processes in an air mass don’t cause buoyancy changes (or as the text puts it – hydrostatic imbalance. Diabatic changes are required for buoyancy change.
05
Konrad,
Diabatic changes are indeed required to both initiate and terminate adiabatic uplift and descent for example between surface and tropopause BUT once the moving air parcel detaches from the surface in ascent or from the tropopause in descent the subsequent internal energy changes are entirely adiabatic in the absence of radiative gases and mostly adiabatic in the presence of radiative gases.
I see that the red thumb brigade just don’t like the simple truth set out in basic meteorology.
18
Konrad says, November 14, 2015 at 12:05 pm:
This is obviously wrong. Diabatic heating is definitely required to get the air to rise in the first place, yes. But the adiabatic expansion of the air as it rises cools the air along the adiabatic lapse rate (ALR; dry if no condensation, moist if condensation is occurring). Depending on the degree of heating, hence on the steepness of the original environmental lapse rate (ELR), the rate at which the heated air cools after it has started lifting will eventually, at some level, cause the temperature (and hence the density) of the rising air to equalise with the surrounding air. At this point the air will no longer rise. The adiabatic expansion itself has thus caused a change in buoyancy.
The adiabatic expansional cooling as the heated air rises will ultimately decelerate the upward push to zero. All by itself. However, if you include diabatic cooling from radiation to space, this balance will be reached sooner. That’s indirectly what’s in that quote:
This is of course about descending air. With ascending air, the adiabatic cooling will rather be augmented by diabatic radiative cooling.
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Konrad says, November 14, 2015 at 7:16 am:
It is not A driving force, Konrad. It is THE driving force. It is really all that’s required. Gravity takes care of the rest. At least until the atmosphere has become too thermally inflated for its own good.
Good. Because it really sounded like you did say that (or at least implied it).
Konrad, you stipulate the condition of “relatively stable temperatures”. But temps won’t be relatively stable without any radiative cooling of the atmosphere. They couldn’t possibly be. Because energy would constantly pile up inside the atmosphere without an effective way to escape. That’s the whole point. There can be no dynamic equilibrium, no steady state, in this situation. Until the thermally expanding atmosphere itself is blown off into space.
Energy exiting an atmosphere at low altitude!? If the energy enters the atmosphere via convection, Konrad, then it cannot readily exit again. Not without IR-active substances there to remove it. Isn’t that kinda the point …?
11
Kristian.
You said:
“The adiabatic expansional cooling as the heated air rises will ultimately decelerate the upward push to zero. All by itself”
The temperature and pressure of the rising parcel declines at the same rate as the temperature and pressure of the surroundings.
Thus the initial temperature and pressure differential set at the moment of uplift from the surface will be maintained indefinitely (in the absence of radiative losses) so it won’t ‘ultimately decelerate the upward push to zero’ unless an inversion layer (such as the tropopause) or the top of the atmosphere is reached.
You also said:
“energy would constantly pile up inside the atmosphere without an effective way to escape.”
If you were referring to kinetic energy (heat) then that would be right but the conversion of energy to potential energy (not heat) with height means that such an outcome cannot ensue.
Since that potential energy can return to KE in descending columns the surface can then do the necessary radiating to space to ensure continued hydrostatic equilibrium without energy constantly piling up inside the atmosphere.
The reality is that the surface at 288K radiates 255K to space to match incoming radiation and the other 33K is permanently locked into convective overturning in order to maintain hydrostatic equilibrium.
Mass causes the greenhouse effect via conduction and convection. It is nothing to do with radiative gases as I explained in my earlier post on this site.
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Konrad November 13, 2015 at 7:46 pm
“Stephen, no, horizontal winds are not empirical evidence of uneven heating and cooling of the surface driving strong vertical tropospheric circulation over 15 vertical kilometres.”
Very good science and observation punk! And get offin my lawn! This not a stick or cudgel! Try a 375 H&H magnum, 300 gr FMJ, punk! Not really for you. You should see momma rhinoceros get nervous when her difficult birth cute puppy comes lunching on my photinia bushes. Much wrong with all that!
You are demonstrating that sensible heat transfer within an atmosphere is not only dependent on a temperature gradient, but also upon the gravity induced logarithmic density, pressure gradients that truly maintains the proper atmospheric lapse. This is most apparent at the surface locations of total solar eclipse. The linear temperature lapse has been measured by aircraft at such times! Thermal Noise power distributes sensible heat?
When will anyone with a clue even try to figure how this atmosphere works? All seem to accept the book version! That book was written by some, even more stupid than you or I!
All the best! -will-
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Stephen Wilde says, November 15, 2015 at 6:50 am:
Er, only if the ELR and the ALR are and remain exactly equal all the way up through the atmospheric column. Which they never are and never do.
Even though, from what you write, you appear not to understand at all the concept of convective stability vs. instability, take som time to ponder what is going on in the atmosphere on a daily basis:
http://eesc.columbia.edu/courses/ees/climate/lectures/atm_phys.html
Figure 1: http://eesc.columbia.edu/courses/ees/slides/climate/Lec2Fig1dry.html
The source also mentions an opposite situation, where the ELR is steeper than the DALR all the way to the tropopause. This is a purely hypothetical example, however, meant for instructive purposes only. Such a situation never actually occurs in the real world. In reality, the only way surface-heated air will be able to be whisked all the way to the tropopause is through the in-column release of latent heat of vaporisation. Normal, pure dry convection from the solar-heated surface up will always stop short far, far below the tropopause, simply because there is no way an ELR steeper than 9.75 K/km could ever be sustained consistently over time and over column depths of 5-10-15 kilometres. It doesn’t happen. Only within the boundary layer (<2km, up to 3-5 km in some desert areas, due to particularly high rates of surface heating):
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/5/5f/PBLimage.jpg
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Kristian,
I know perfectly well that locally the ELR and ALR differ with the consequence described.
However, for an atmosphere as a whole, ELR must average out to the ALR over time otherwise there will be a permanent imbalance and the atmosphere could not be retained.
So, for an atmosphere in hydrostatic equilibrium, it is the case that on average and overall, for a pure adiabatic process, temperature and pressure of the average rising parcel declines at the same rate as the temperature and pressure of the average surroundings.
08
Stephen, now you’re being ridiculous.
Convection does not occur as a result of the global average relationship between the mean ALR (somewhere on the continuum between dry (non-condensing) and moist (condensing)) and the mean ELR. Following that logic, there would be no convection on Earth, because the mean ELR would always equal the mean ALR. Which is absurd.
I’m talking about what happens in the actual atmosphere, Stephen. On a local and daily basis. It works by way of constant imbalances.
Konrad claimed that adiabatic cooling (and warming) in our atmosphere cannot cause buoyancy changes. It can and it does. That’s what it does.
102
Kristian,
In the actual atmosphere on a local and daily basis convection works by way of constant imbalances just as you say. Convection always works to negate the thermal effect of imbalances.
However, the global average of all those imbalances nets out to the mean ELR equalling the mean ALR otherwise there could be no atmosphere.
As regards buoyancy changes they are caused entirely by diabatic processes.
During an adiabatic process the buoyancy remains unchanged because the temperature and pressure of the rising or falling parcel of air changes at the same rate as the temperature and pressure of the surroundings on average.
There is, quite simply, no other available logical solution to the observation that planets can retain gaseous atmospheres indefinitely regardless of the radiative capability of the constituents of that atmosphere.
19
Stephen Wilde November 13, 2015 at 5:25 pm
Replying to Konrad a while back made these fantasy claims!
“All one needs for convective overturning is uneven warming at the surface below and a decline in temperature with height.”
Really now! Where has that ever been demonstrated?
“Density differentials in the horizontal plane do the rest.”
Your alleged ‘density’ differentials? are caused by what beside ‘your fantasy’?
“The decline in temperature with height is caused by the declining density and pressure gradient with height and not by energy loss from the top.”
“Why do you say that radiative emission from the top is necessary ?
The radiative exitance to space tends to increase an otherwise stable lapse. This is the cause for both spontaneous upward heat transfer by unknown method, perhaps pressure wave transfer from the noisy surface atmosphere, and all thermally or density induced vertical convection of both sensible and latent heat!
“The necessary empirical evidence is all around us in the form of winds.”
Lateral convection is induced by both the Earth’s centrifuge and all other thermally induced upward atmospheric mass transfer. Like EMR flux gaseous mass transfer cannot exist in opposing directions. Such must be circular in the atmospheric geometry!
“Are you suggesting that there would be no movement of air within an atmosphere in the absence of radiative gases?”
As far as I can tell Konrad, Kristian, and myself, are not suggesting anything! We all are clearly pointing out, that from Stephen’s postings on this blog, Stephen has not the slightest clue as to how Earth’s atmosphere or any other planetary atmosphere may possibly work! 🙁
07
Kristian November 14, 2015 at 4:52 am
Konrad says, November 13, 2015 at 7:46 pm:
(“Stephen, no, horizontal winds are not empirical evidence of uneven heating and cooling of the surface driving strong vertical tropospheric circulation over 15 vertical kilometres.”)
“There seems to be a fundamental flaw in your thinking here, Konrad. The strong vertical circulation within the Hadley cells. What happens is that rising columns of moist air along the ITCZ are fuelled by surface heating and resulting evaporation plus the subsequent in-column release of latent heat of vaporisation.”
This claim has been throughly debunked by the CFD guys at Cal Tech, and their physical demonstration of air flow about a spinning sphere, even with no internal gravitational attractive forced to local airmass, no any differential surface temperatures!
That physical model demonstrates the Earth’s centrifuge. The sphere’s ‘equator’ has the highest surface velocity. The surface roughness at that equator, determines the tangential acceleration of the surrounding air mass. This tangential acceleration can be shown as a combination of both a rotational acceleration, trying to match that equatorial surface velocity, and an orthogonal radial acceleration. This radial acceleration, is observed as smoke, punk, or colored incense; proceeding radially outward from the equator, then drifting poleward to complete the cycle.
“This massive diabatically driven buoyant boost provides great momentum to the upward-moving currents of air. One mechanism, however, slowly and progressively drains this upward momentum of its power, the higher up the air gets. Radiative cooling.”
What massive Kristain nonsense! That upward momentum, local atmospheric mass at 4 km altitude has (100 Mph)/(458 m/s) worth of mass momentum, but has nothing to do with sensible or latent heat, nor can this mass momentum ever become EMR flux! Newtonian kinetic energy (momentum) has no temperature. Such cannot be radiated away by thermal EMR!
“At the tropopause, this diabatic cooling process has basically exhausted the surplus energy gained down low by the rising air masses.”
You again try to convert all the different forms of power accumulation into your internal energy (U), that has absolutely no physical relevance! A juvenile attempt to discard the concept of entropy. That entropy, which has always been senseless, but useful. If it ain’t broken do not try to fix it!
The always present atmospheric EMR exitance to space does increase atmospheric density at every altitude, which correspondingly attempts to increase pressure at that altitude but cannot! Pressure at any altitude must remain at the above mass/unit area x accelerative force of gravity at that altitude. The only observable evidence of atmospheric EMR exitance is the altitude of the constant temperature 10-20 kPa tropopause at that geometric location. All temperatures below that are increasing exactly as determined by the locat thermal lapse. Less humidity means higher surface temperature at that location.
“(And as a consequence, they stop rising. They are no longer able to push on up through the ever thinner atmospheric layers above. And so they float out to the sides instead. They are forced to, because more rising air is always coming up from below.)”
You just blew away all of meteorology! No identifiable atmospheric molecules in a fantasy ‘air parcel’. Each is free to hang out with any other atmospheric molecule or not! No parcel, no adiabatic, no work or entropy production in moving weightless atmospheric mass about. No concept of Newtonian kinetic or gravitational potential energy! All is thermodynamically isentropic. An atmosphere must remain an isopotential to itself!
All the best! -will-
17
Kristian November 15, 2015 at 4:24 am
Konrad says, November 14, 2015 at 7:16 am:
(“I am not saying uneven surface heating (and in the ITCZ massive release of latent heat of evaporation) is not a driving force in tropospheric convective circulation.”)
“It is not A driving force, Konrad. It is THE driving force. It is really all that’s required. Gravity takes care of the rest. At least until the atmosphere has become too thermally inflated for its own good.”
You get such bolds claims from where? The tropical driving force of upward advection is mechanical. How do you demonstrate a such heat source for upward advection when the density on the fluid advected is higher than the surround because of all the water condensate also being convected upward.What is convected is sensible and latent heat, and stinky! The heat helps that advection process. None of that heat ever returns to the surface. all is dispatched to space via EMR.
08
Kristian November 16, 2015 at 12:32 am
“Konrad claimed that adiabatic cooling (and warming) in our atmosphere cannot cause buoyancy changes. It can and it does. That’s what it does.”
You have measured such changes from continual self buoyancy how? Do yoy have even a concept of how that may happen?
What do yoy mean by “adiabatic” cooling and warming, when no vertical motion of the atmosphere can possibly be adiabatic? The gas is free to intermix with the whole environment!
07
Stephen Wilde says, November 16, 2015 at 3:01 am:
But I am not talking about the global average situation, Stephen.
No, they very clearly are not. As I explained. You need diabatic heating (or a physical obstacle like a mountain range) to get air to rise, but you don’t need anything other than adiabatic cooling to get it to stop rising and subside. As explained in the quote and accompanying figure provided above, and now below.
You are just restating your flawed ideas, Stephen. As always. You’re clueless. Read the quote once more:
The pressure changes at the same rate, Stephen, but not the temperature and hence not the density. That’s the whole point.
The cooling rate of the ascending parcel is fixed at 9.75 K/km (the DALR), as long as condensation is not occurring. However, the temperature gradient of the air surrounding the parcel as it rises (the ELR) is not. It is normally always less steep (6-7 K/km). And so the rising parcel will naturally stop rising after say 1-3 kilometres. Because it cools faster (at a higher rate) than the surrounding air. If it rises swiftly enough, it will end up cooler than the surrounding air, hence denser, at it will start sinking.
Expressed here:
Figure 1: http://eesc.columbia.edu/courses/ees/slides/climate/Lec2Fig1dry.html
90
Kristian said:
“you don’t need anything other than adiabatic cooling to get it to stop rising and subside.”
To stop it rising you need either a non adiabatic change in the rate of cooling by the parcel and/or the surroundings or arrival at the top of the atmosphere.
The former requires a diabatic intervention such as direct solar energy absorption by ozone at the tropopause or by radiative loss from within the parcel and the latter requires insufficient kinetic energy at the base to cause further uplift against gravity which is again a diabatic intervention.
and:
“At the same pressure, density differences are determined by temperature differences (ideal gas law).”
But such temperature differences can only be caused by diabatic interventions.
Every movement of a parcel in the vertical plane is caused by a combination of diabatic and adiabatic processes. My comments apply only to the adiabatic component whereas you are confusing the adiabatic and diabatic components and treating them as interchangeable.
08
Stephen Wilde says, November 16, 2015 at 9:23 pm:
Again you are simply restating your own flawed idea about how this works.
Stephen, we take it one more time: If the temp gradient in the air surrounding the rising parcel, cooling at a fixed rate of 9.75 K/km, is less steep (and it always will be beyond a certain level off the solar-heated ground), then the parcel will gradually lose its buoyancy. It simply cools faster than the air layers into which it ascends. This progressive loss of the parcel’s buoyancy comes directly as a result of its adiabatic expansional cooling as it rises into ever lower external pressures, a process which fully determines its cooling rate – the dry adiabatic lapse rate.
This is common knowledge among meteorologists and atmospheric physicists alike, Stephen.
Yeees. Like I said. The original heating to make the parcel rise is diabatic. I am, however, not talking about the original heating. I am talking about the subsequent adiabatic cooling. The subsequent adiabatic cooling will directly and all by itself affect (as in erode) the buoyancy of the rising parcel. Which is what I’m pointing out to Konrad …
Hehe, no, Stephen. I am not confusing the two. You apparently don’t understand what I’m talking about here. That’s a very different thing …
61
Kristian said:
“If the temp gradient in the air surrounding the rising parcel, cooling at a fixed rate of 9.75 K/km, is less steep (and it always will be beyond a certain level off the solar-heated ground), then the parcel will gradually lose its buoyancy. It simply cools faster than the air layers into which it ascends. This progressive loss of the parcel’s buoyancy comes directly as a result of its adiabatic expansional cooling as it rises into ever lower external pressures, a process which fully determines its cooling rate – the dry adiabatic lapse rate.”
Well of course such a differential bewtween the DALR within the parcel and the ELR outside the parcel would lead to the difference between the temperature and pressure inside and outside the parcel eventually disappearing so that uplift ceases but that isn’t the point.
If the ELR outside the parcel differs from the ALR then that is due to diabatic processes affecting the lapse rate outside the parcel.
Taking the atmosphere as a whole the ELR is distorted to the warm side as much and as often as it is distorted to the cold side and so such differences net out to zero globally.
If they did not net out to zero there would be a permanent imbalance which would cause the atmosphetre to be lost.
It is true that in rising columns it is mostly the case that the ELR is less steep than the DALR because of the intervention of water vapour which as a GHG introduces a diabatic component.
However, in descending columns of dry air which has no water vapour induced diabatic component that is offset out by the more steep DALR.
You have misled yourself by not looking at the atmosphere as a whole and failing to distinguish between ascending and descending columns.
06
Kristian,
Look at Figure 4 here:
http://joannenova.com.au/2015/10/for-discussion-can-convection-neutralize-the-effect-of-greenhouse-gases/
The whole system balances out such that you cannot simply assert that
“the temp gradient in the air surrounding the rising parcel, cooling at a fixed rate of 9.75 K/km, is less steep (and it always will be beyond a certain level off the solar-heated ground)”
That assumption on your part is simply not correct. The ELR is less steep than the DALR in some places and more steep in others with any residual imbalance being dealt with at the tropopause which introduces diabatic energy transfers again to stop further adiabatic uplift and to provide a diabatically induced starting temperature for adiabatic descent.
05
Kristian,
It has taken me a few hours but I’ve spotted the flaw in your scenario.
You pointed to the situation where a rising parcel cools at the DALR but the surroundings do not. That is a common situation in meteorology because cold or warm air is frequently advected horizontally so as to distort the DALR locally or regionally.In that situation the article you refer to is perfectly correct.
However, for radiative gases it is the parcel itself that fails to follow the DALR because of its own radiative absorption or emission characteristics whereas the surroundings (mostly non radiative Oxygen and Nitrogen) do, on average, follow the DALR.
Therefore, you have the GHG situation precisely reversed.
In the absence of any GHGs at all there would still be irregularities in the rate of cooling with height but it would always average out to the DALR because both warm and cool air would be advected horizontally to the same extent overall.
It is only the presence of GHGs, in particular water vapour, that gives our troposphere an average lapse rate that is somewhat less than the DALR.
Then, in order to keep the atmosphere as a whole stable, that divergence from the DALR in the troposphere must be negated by an equal and opposite divergence from the DALR in another higher layer such as the stratosphere, mesosphere or thermosphere.
05
Kristian,
There it is.
This is the reason for all the nonsense in Stephen’s comments.
He needs for radiative energy exchange to play a part in the non-radiative process of the Tropospheric pressure gradient, the Adiabatic Lapse Rate.
This is why he rejects work (a noun) as the measure of non-thermal energy exchange and refers to work as a process (a verb).
This is why he can say that Potential Energy can have a temperature. 😮
This is why Stephens fantasy has been adopted by Dr. Evans.
And . . .
This is why I’ve become completely disillusioned with this series of blog posts and this website in general.
The Adiabatic Lapse Rate is an empirically derived phenomenon. IOW, first the phenomenon was observed, and only later was it explained using existing physical laws. Radiative energy transfer plays no part in it.
For the luke-warmer, the greenhouse effect must exist. The Adiabatic Lapse Rate operating in the Troposphere negates the GHE ™. This is a thorn in the side of the luke-warmer and therefore must be removed.
None of Stephen Wilde’s fantasy has ever been observed either in the lab or in Nature. It’s all hypothetical conjecture and it’s so bad it’s not even wrong.
A sorry state of affairs indeed. 🙁 🙁 🙁
Abe.
06
Stephen Wilde says, November 17, 2015 at 5:02 am:
For the umpteenth time, Stephen: I am not talking about the whole system. I am talking about what happens in one instance of convection, at one particular time in one particular place. I am talking about what actually happens in each separate case as heated air ascends.
How hard is this to grasp!?
Sigh. No, Stephen. The ELR is only ever steeper than the DALR (>9.75 K/km) near the Earth’s surface when the ground is heated strongly by the Sun. That’s why and how the heated surface air buoys up in the first place. At all other times in all other places, however, it is less steep.
http://www.geog.ucsb.edu/~joel/g110_w08/lecture_notes/stability/stability.html
40
Stephen Wilde says, November 17, 2015 at 1:15 pm:
Er, no. Just … no.
51
Kristian,
There is nothing in that link which contradicts what I have told you.
In particular:
i) It also refers to absolute stability where the rising parcel always cools more rapidly than the environment.There is as much absolute stability as absolute instability in an atmosphere at hydrostatic equilibrium but you seem not to accept that.
ii) They are referring to the entire atmosphere just as I am so if you are not doing the same then your comments are off topic.
ii) A parcel of radiative gases will clearly absorb IR from the surface and therefore will distort the lapse rate to the warm side at denser lower levels but will radiate more to space at higher less dense levels and start returning the lapse rate slope towards the DALR whereas a parcel of non radiative gases clearly would not distort the DALR at all.
I don’t think I can help you further and in any event this is not the place to try.
12
Just-A-Guy
i) Radiative exchanges allow energy to leak into or out of the adiabatic process via diabatic means. In the absence of radiative exchanges there would be a pure adiabatic process during uplift or descent with diabatic processes only being involved at surface and tropopause. I do not ‘need’ radiative exchanges at all but I do recognise that they exist. Apparently you do not.
ii) I say that potential energy does not have a temperature. You appear to agree.
iii) David Evans is a good scientist and does careful research.
iv) I am not a lukewarmer since I have explained why I think that the thermal effect of GHGs nets out to zero at the surface. You seem to agree.
v) I have been saying for several years that adiabatic processes do negate the radiative greenhouse effect. You seem to agree. However that leaves us with a mass induced greenhouse effect.
Everything I have said is basic meteorology complying with the laws of physica and supported by observations.
24
Stephen Wilde says, November 18, 2015 at 9:26 am:
But I am not talking about stability and whether or not there is as much stability as there is instability in our atmosphere, in the global average. I am only talking about individual cases of instability. As I’ve told you now a half dozen times, Stephen …
Off what topic!? This whole worthless line of ‘discussion’ simply started with my pointing out to Konrad (not you) that adiabatic cooling does indeed have the ability to affect the buoyancy of rising air. You’re the one who had to poke your nose into this particular subject matter, I didn’t poke my nose into yours. So who continues to be off whose topic here …!?
The DALR, the rate at which a rising (or sinking) parcel of air in the troposphere cools (or warms) as it ascends (or descends) when no internal condensation is taking place, is never ‘distorted’ by radiative absorption by or emission from the parcel, Stephen. This seems to be at the core of your misunderstanding. The ELR is what is distorted by radiative absorption and emission. The temperature gradient up through the ambient, relatively stable air masses surrounding the ascending (descending) parcel.
The DALR is what it is, Stephen. Always. 9.75 K/km. You know, Γ = -dT/dz = g/c_p. Radiation has no role in it. Gravity and the specific heat of the air is all that matters. You should know that by now …
Try and understand the difference between the ALR and the ELR. Between the normal tropospheric temperature gradient as observed and the adiabatic lapse rate (the cooling/warming rate of rising/sinking packets of air). One is affected by radiation, the other one isn’t …
31
Kristian said:
“The DALR, the rate at which a rising (or sinking) parcel of air in the troposphere cools (or warms) as it ascends (or descends) when no internal condensation is taking place, is never ‘distorted’ by radiative absorption by or emission from the parcel, Stephen. This seems to be at the core of your misunderstanding. The ELR is what is distorted by radiative absorption and emission”
So that is all it comes down to?
I say that radiation distorts the DALR but you object to that by saying that the DALR is not distorted but the ELR is instead.
Well, I would have thought it pretty obvious from all my writings that I am accepting that the DALR is fixed by mass and gravity but that the involvement of radiation (a diabatic process) leads to an ELR that is different from the DALR. The ELR is the distorted DALR.
That distortion has the potential to destabilise the system and destroy the atmosphere in the absence of a corrective mechanism so I have explaned in detail how convective adjustments could correct that potential system instability. One must consider both stability and instability plus ascent and descent. Just considering individual cases of instability completely misses the point.
To understand the corrective mechanism one needs to consider the entire atmosphere at all heights and locations around the sphere and I achieved that with my separate article showing the lapse rate structure that would be necessary to achieve stability despite diabatic radiative influences.
Previously you were saying that rising parcels cooled because heat moved out to the surroundings because of work done by the molecules inside the parcel against molecules outside the parcel but I and others have told you repeatedly that such a movement of energy would be a diabatic process and not an adiabatic process.
Despite all that you insult me and confuse readers as a result of your petty failure to understand simple terminology.
02
Kristian said:
“adiabatic cooling does indeed have the ability to affect the buoyancy of rising air”
I actually agreed with you on that point which was why one does not need radiation from GHGs to initiate convective overturning.Things went awry when you started lecturing and insulting me about what you perceived as ‘flaws’ in my narrative which now appear not to have been flaws at all.
01
Kristian,
Now you’ve got me confused.
Adiabatic cooling during uplift does not have the ability to change buoyancy. Only diabatic effects within the parcel or affecting the surroundings can do that.
The temperature, density and pressure gradient with height (caused by gravity) combined with uneven surface heating (creating density variations in the horizontal plane) creates buoyancy and then diabatic processes (radiation, conduction and water vapour phase changes) interfering with the adiabatic process during uplift and descent change buoyancy after the air parcel has detached from the surface.
You correctly pointed out one of Konrad’s errors but made other errors of your own which I commented on.
Furthermore you intervened in my communications with Konrad. It was not me intervening in your communications with him.
We should leave it there.
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Stephen Wilde November 18, 2015 at 9:39 am
@Just-A-Guy,
“Everything I have said is basic meteorology complying with the laws of physics and supported by observations.”
Nothing Stephen W writes even comes close to the standards of now dusgraced meteorology! All is but Stephen’s fantasy, has no physics, and has no repeatable observation! 🙁
Stephen Wilde November 18, 2015 at 6:17 pm
@Kristian,
“Despite all that you insult me and confuse readers as a result of your petty failure to understand simple terminology.”
No one understands your fantasy! Some accept fancy words from anyone!
Stephen Wilde
November 18, 2015 at 6:22 pm
@Kristian,
“Things went awry when you started lecturing and insulting me about what you perceived as ‘flaws’ in my narrative which now appear not to have been flaws at all.”
Does not know how to handle his obvious mistakes!
Stephen Wilde November 18, 2015 at 9:43 pm
@Kristian,
“Now you’ve got me confused.”
Seems not hard to do!
“You correctly pointed out one of Konrad’s errors but made other errors of your own which I commented on. Furthermore you intervened in my communications with Konrad. It was not me intervening in your communications with him. We should leave it there.”
Yes Stephen just leave it there, if you can.
You have your on blog, and even your one article on this blog. Please stop with your fantasy on David’s series!
03
Steven,
Your position seems to be the result of arbitrarily conflating energy transported by photons with energy transported by matter. BB absorption and emission is the only relevant mechanism that converts between them and in the LTE steady state, absorption == emission. Don’t be confused by claims that the Earth and its atmosphere is not in the steady state. If the atmosphere was not in the steady state, it would either continue to warm or cool until it was and the time constant of the atmosphere itself is very short.
The data fully supports the idea that only photons matter for the radiant balance of the planet. Obsessing about atmospheric complexity and non radiant energy only adds irrelevant uncertainty to support excessive effects and gets in the way of understanding how the system really works which is evident from the LTE steady state which is that each W/m^2 of the 239 W/m^2 of input results in 1.6 W/m^2 of surface emissions and an average temp of about 287K and that this is the result after all complexity, known and unknown, has had its influence. Notice how absurd the idea is that 1 W/m^2 of forcing results in more than 3 W/m^2 of positive feedback to offset the 4 W/m^2 of emissions corresponding to a temperature increase of 0.8C. If each W/m^2 of input had this effect, the surface temperature would be close to the boiling point of water, moreover; due to the 1/T^3 behavior of sensitivity (slope of SB), the sensitivity of the next W/m^2 must be less than the average for all preceding W/m^2 of forcing (unless you can show some physics that overrides the immutable Stefan-Boltzmann Law).
When CO2 collides with CO2, there’s a finite probability that state can be exchanged, but when CO2 collides with O2 or N2, the only possible ‘exchange’ results from the CO2 molecule emitting a photon and returning to the ground state. Conventional climate science incorrectly considers that the vibrational energy of CO2 is directly converted into the linear kinetic energy of molecules in motion. The confusion arises because photons hitting a temperature sensor and molecules in motion hitting the sensor will both manifest as temperature.
The basic error is that while joules are joules, conversion between different forms follows specific rules that tend to be ignored. To fully understand the LTE atmosphere, the energy transported by photons and the energy transported by matter must be considered to follow separate paths with little NET interaction.
Venus also gets in the way of understanding as the consensus tries to explain this as runaway GHG. However, its not the solid surface of Venus that’s in equilibrium with the Sun, but its the top of its cloud layer (Venus is runaway clouds, not runaway GHG’s). The difference between the temperature of this cloud layer and surface temperature is consequential to a lapse rate caused by gravity, except that the direction is down and the temperature increases as you enter the atmosphere. Consider the gas giants as other examples of a gravitationally induced lapse rate heating an atmosphere.
If you want to make a comparison between the Venusian surface and the Earth surface, its more like the solid surface of Earth beneath the oceans, which is at a constant temperature (like the Venusian solid surface) dictated by the temperature profile of water which is also a function of gravity.
George
11
Stephen Wilde says, November 18, 2015 at 6:17 pm:
I don’t object to it. I’m telling you it is incorrect. You obviously don’t understand the difference between the ALR and the ELR. The former is NOT influenced by radiation. The latter definitely IS. The temperature gradient in stable, ambient air can NEVER be decribed as an ALR. It is ALWAYS an ELR. Likewise, the cooling rate with altitude inside a convectively rising packet of air can NEVER be described as en ELR. It is ALWAYS an ALR.
It is that simple, Stephen. That basic.
That’s exactly what it ISN’T! The ELR and the ALR are NOT interchangeable! Just like microscopic and macroscopic energy.
What point, Stephen? I am not addressing your ‘point’ or any of your warped ideas of how the atmosphere works. From the start I have only been discussing individual cases of instability in order to address Konrad’s notion that adiabatic cooling cannot and does not cause changes in buoyancy. It can. And it does. I couldn’t care less about your strange, privately concocted ideas about the atmosphere. Which is why I directed my attention to one of Konrad’s comments and not to one of yours … Because I find Konrad an interesting guy with interesting ideas and findings. A guy with whom it is actually worth discussing issues like this. You’re not such a guy.
I don’t care about your ‘corrective mechanism’, Stephen. And so it is NOT what I’ve been discussing (or even alluded to) here at all. Feel free to address it yourself all you want, but leave me out of it!
I am not going there again, Stephen. People who know basic thermodynamic principles can only shake their head in disbelief at your continued failure to grasp the fundamental difference between HEAT [Q] and WORK [W]. Heat simply CANNOT move out to the surroundings because of work done. It’s like saying carbon dioxide moves out in the form of nitrogen. Or that the Moon revolves around the Earth, and so the Sun rises each morning. They are two completely different and fundamentally unrelated entities. ‘Heat’ and ‘work’ are simply two separate kinds of energy transfer.
Energy is what moves out to the surroundings, but not in the form of a “heat transfer” due to a temperature difference, but rather as a result of mechanical expansional “work done” against an external pressure. The energy is transferred by way of WORK [W], not by way of HEAT [Q], Stephen. And the energy transferred is taken from the system’s ‘internal energy’, its U, directly related to its temperature.
How many times has this simple fact been pointed out to you? You still act as though you’ve never heard it once!
It is precisely what makes the process in question adiabatic: Q=0, so dU = Q – W = -W = -PdV.
http://snowball.millersville.edu/~adecaria/ESCI107/esci107_lesson05_stability.pdf
http://teacher.pas.rochester.edu/phy121/lecturenotes/Chapter17/Chapter17.html
http://physics.bu.edu/~duffy/py105/Firstlaw.html
It is very obvious, Stephen, that you still think U (the ‘internal energy’ of the system, being directly related to its temperature) is somehow equal to ‘heat’. But ‘heat’ within the field of thermodynamics is fundamentally different from U. It is Q: energy transferred to or from the system by virtue solely of a temperature difference. U is energy held statically inside the system. Q is a transfer of energy to or from the system, changing the U in the process. Just like ‘work’ [W] is. That’s why the 1st Law of Thermodynamics reads like it does: ΔU = Q – W. The change in the system’s ‘internal energy’ [U] from the initial to the final state is equal to the energy transferred to/from it as a result of a temperature difference [‘heat’, Q] minus the energy transferred to/from it by the performance of mechanical ‘work’ [W] on/by the system.
Temperature changes with U. U changes with Q and/or W. If Q is zero (as – by definition – in an adiabatic process), then U changes only with W. And that’s what it does. Simple as that …
10
Stephen Wilde says, November 18, 2015 at 6:22 pm:
Say what!? I am quoting you verbatim:
This is what started this whole debacle, Stephen.
10
“Adiabatic cooling – As an air parcel rises in the atmosphere, it encounters less pressure. It therefore expands, which does work on the surrounding air. Since energy is conserved, this work is performed at the expense of the kinetic energy of the air molecules. This results in a lowering of the parcel’s temperature.
Adiabatic heating – As an air parcel sinks in the atmosphere, it encounters more pressure. It therefore contracts (shrinks), or has work done on it by the surrounding air. This work results in increased kinetic energy of the air molecules and a higher temperature. ”
I regard that as a misleading description.
A rising parcel encounters progressively less pressure from the weight of the air above and expands. That is not work done against the surrounding molecules because the reduction in pressure occurred prior to the expansion. Work against surrounding molecules is only necessary if the surrounding molecules are at the same or a higher pressure so as to resist that expansion.
Likewise a falling parcel is progressively compressed by the increasing weight of the molcules above and contracts. The increase in pressure from above occurs prior to the contraction. Work by surrounding molecules is only necessary if the molecules within the parcel are at the same or a higher pressure so as to resist that contraction.
Thus expansion into reducing pressure requires no work against the surrounding air and contraction into increasing pressure requires no work against the surrounding air.
Instead, work is done relative to the gravity induced pressure gradient and so can best be described as work done with or against gravity.
The work done in changing the volume requires no heat or energy moving in or out of the parcel. All that happens is that KE within the parcel transforms to PE or back again.
It is as simple as that and that is in accordance with the laws of thermodynamics.
http://courses.washington.edu/bhrchem/c152/Lec01.pdf
For gases rising or falling within a gravity field the transformation between KE and PE is affected not only by height but by the distance between molecules which is related to the gravity induced density gradient.
https://www.grc.nasa.gov/WWW/K-12/airplane/fluden.html
The net effect within an atmosphere is to provide vast amounts of available convective energy to drive convective overturning.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convective_available_potential_energy
In the equations it makes no difference whether W is work done against the surrounding molecules or work is done against the gravity induced pressure gradient, either way the equations work out fine.
The only difference is that if W relates to work between molecules then that is a diabatic process but if W relates to work against the pressure gradient then the process is adiabatic.
It is essential to understand meteorology before getting uppity about adiabatic and diabatic processes.
02
Stephen Wilde
November 19, 2015 at 9:32 am
“Adiabatic cooling – As an air parcel rises in the atmosphere, it encounters less pressure. It therefore expands, which does work on the surrounding air. Since energy is conserved, this work is performed at the expense of the kinetic energy of the air molecules. This results in a lowering of the parcel’s temperature.”
Why is energy ever conserved in an atmosphere? You cannot ever show any “work” being done ‘by’ or ‘on’ your fantasy parcel!
02
Mods!Once more once for proper threading. Please delete the incorrect!
Kristian November 19, 2015 at 6:03 am
Stephen Wilde says, November 18, 2015 at 6:17 pm:
(“So that is all it comes down to? I say that radiation distorts the DALR but you object to that by saying that the DALR is not distorted but the ELR is instead.”)
“I don’t object to it. I’m telling you it is incorrect. You obviously don’t understand the difference between the ALR and the ELR. The former is NOT influenced by radiation. The latter definitely IS. The temperature gradient in stable, ambient air can NEVER be described as an ALR. It is ALWAYS an ELR.”
Almost as arrogant and wrong as Stephen! No one knows what an atmospheric non-condensing non-radiating gravitational lapse would be! Mars apparently has no longer an atmosphere because of this.
“Likewise, the cooling rate with altitude inside a convectively rising packet of air can NEVER be described as en ELR. It is ALWAYS an ALR.”
Wrong again! There is no fantasy adiabatic packet of air moving vertically in this atmosphere! The change in altitude is always isentropic (no work, no entropy generation). Your neuvo-physics internal energy is more fake than is an adiabatic air parcel. Both are only deliberate attempts to confuse!
“I am not going there again, Stephen. People who know basic thermodynamic principles can only shake their head in disbelief at your continued failure to grasp the fundamental difference between HEAT [Q] and WORK [W].”
You Kristian fail to see that your ΔU = (Q-W) is wrong for an atmosphere! Pressure or the change in gas pressure is part of what the rest call sensible heat, but not part of you call internal energy.
You claim: “It is precisely what makes the process in question adiabatic: Q=0, so dU = Q – W = -W = -PdV.”.
No work is involved! either! Atmospheric PdV is not work, it is a different form of power or energy. The correct expression with mass, for this Earth’s atmosphere: isentropic exponent κ = ΔΡ/Δρ = Cp/Cv = 1.4. In a viable atmosphere the pressure decreases at a lesser rate than density with altitude. But that ratio is a tropospheric constant, providing a constant (linear temperature lapse). Increasing altitude is but a decrease in “energy density”, somthing not considered by neuvo-physics! 🙁
All the best!-will-
02
Will Janoschka,
Stephen Wilde,
ROTFLMAO!
Will: The Law of Conservation of Energy applies everywhere in the Universe. That includes Earth’s atmosphere. That’s why we refer to it as a law. 😮
Stephen: The Pressure Gradient is nothing more than the measure of the change in molecular density with height. Work done on the Pressure Gradient is by definition the amount of work done by molecules on molecules at varying heights. 😮
I’m soooo glad that I refresh this page every so often!
Comic relief is so hard to find these days. All we need now is SillyFilly to join the fray and we’d have a three ring circus. 🙂
Abe
PS. Will: Given that you’ve stated that an atmosphere has no weight, I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re only function here is obfuscation.
PS. Stephen: Given that . . .
I’ve come to the conclusion that you too are only here to obfuscate. No one can really be that dense, can they?
Hmm . . .
10
Just-A-Guy November 19, 2015 at 2:01 pm
@Will Janoschka, You wrote:
(“Why is energy ever conserved in an atmosphere?”)
“Will: The Law of Conservation of Energy applies everywhere in the Universe. That includes Earth’s atmosphere. That’s why we refer to it as a law. :o”
Who is “we”? Are you pregnant, or merely have mice in your pockets? The concept of conservation of energy was formally falsified in abstract algebra by Emmy Noether in 1917! Where have you been? That proof was to satisfy the requirements for Einstein’s General Relativity within a gravitational field. But has been extended to never be a requirement except for Keplerian mechanics, with no work!
Stephen: The Pressure Gradient is nothing more than the measure of the change in molecular density with height. Work done on the Pressure Gradient is by definition the amount of work done by molecules on molecules at varying heights. 😮
What absolute arrogance with no understanding!
There is never any work done in the relocation of atmospheric mass between altitudes. The atmosphere remains isopotential with respect to itself.
“PS. Will: Given that you’ve stated that an atmosphere has no weight, I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re only function here is obfuscation.”
If you would ever check history rather than your toilet Abe, you would notice that Archimedes clearly demonstrated that atmosphere has no weight in 272 BC, way before mass or gravity was invented by clueless academics! Abe, I’ve come to the conclusion that you’re only function here is to be an incessant troll!
“No one can really be that dense, can they?”
That is difficult for most! You clearly demonstrate that such is possible!
01
Will Janoschka,
Lets take a look at what Mathpages.com has to say about this.
In simple English for the Isentropically Dense:
The cleuless academic called Einstein produced a theory to accurately describe the invented concept of gravity. Emmy Noether, who devised a way to prove conservation of momentum, conservation of energy, conservation of electric charge, etc. etc. etc., showed that using general relativity to describe the Universe as a whole (the words ‘global time co-ordinate’ are used in the article) her proof didn’t work. But, if you examine a given sub-set of the Universe, (the words ‘region of interest’ are used in the article) her proof does apply. 😮
IOW, according to you, the only case in which Noether’s Theorem doesn’t apply is in the case of General Relativity which describes gravity, a concept that you claim was “invented by clueless academics”, (like Newton and Einstein).
Thank’s for the laugh! 😉
Abe
00
Will Janoschka,
Let’s now look at what John Baez from UCR has to say about Noether’s Theorem.
So, taking into consideration that thermodynamics is the topic under discussion and further taking into consideration that thermodynamics belongs to classical mechanics, it’s clear that Noether’s theorem does apply and therefore there is conservation of energy according to Noether, the person you referenced! 😮
BTW. I try not to look at the toilet very often because I usually find that the undigested remains of your BS passes right through me and ends up floating there next to the rest of the corn. 😉 (Pun Intended)
Notice too, that Einstein refered to her, Noether’s, work as “penetrating mathematical thinking”. But what does he know, he’s just a clueless academic.
Abe
00
Stephen Wilde says, November 19, 2015 at 9:32 am:
I’m sure you do. But I’m sorry to disappoint both you and all the magical inhabitants of your little self-invented bubble world, Stephen. It’s not. It’s not misleading at all. In fact, it’s right on the money. It’s the standard description you’ll find everywhere. Just look up any textbook on the subject.
And all textbooks on the subject and all people knowing anything about it would disagree with you. And not just diagree. The latter ones would most likely laugh out loud or, alternatively, gape in awe and wonder at your blatant ignorance of even the simplest of physical principles. This is only silly, Stephen. How is it at all possible not to get this!? How can someone, a grown man, even attempt to stubbornly argue against it!?
When something expands against the external pressure of its surroundings, Stephen, that something performs WORK on those surroundings, which means it expends energy expanding. If there is no external pressure at all, and ONLY then, the something is able to expand freely and no work is done, no energy expended.
Thermodynamic WORK [W] is a transfer of energy from the thing performing the work to the thing on which the work is performed.
This is not something that in any way or fashion is up for discussion, Stephen. It is not a matter of opinion. It is just how it is. It’s the way these phenomena and procesess are defined. In physics.
It is just too funny (but also a bit painful) to watch how you always end up putting up links that you – after having skimmed it to find merely one sentence in there to misrepresent in glorious fashion – claim or imply support your view, when – if you only bothered to read the whole thing – it rather proves to support mine (the view of standard physics). So too this time around.
Just read the entire document, Stephen. What does it say, what does it show on pages 6-8 and 14-20? And what particular atmospheric process does the line “The change in PE is the work done. Force is mg and distance is h or z” apply to? And what other (but simultaneous) process does it not apply to?
Study especially pages 7-8 and 15-18.
This is precisely what I’m talking about. You have got this all completely mixed up inside your head. You’re totally confused and boastful about it.
This describes the process of convective uplift, Stephen. What happens? The rising air parcel somehow does ‘work’ against gravity? Draining it of internal KE? NO!!!! The opposite! The surrounding air masses do ‘work’ on the rising parcel, which means energy is transferred to the parcel. Which is the reason why it rises. It is effectively pushed up by a positive ‘pressure gradient force’. There’s your W = Δmgh. The parcel isn’t losing any internal KE from this process. And so it doesn’t cool from it. It simply gains gravitational PE as it’s being pushed upwards. Directly from the externally transferred energy, from the pushing, i.e. from the positive ‘work’ done on it.
The process that does cool the rising air parcel is an altogether different one, one that still occurs simultaneously to the uplift itself. The adiabatic one.
The uplift isn’t the adiabatic process, Stephen. There is nothing in the convective uplift itself that does anything to cool the rising air. The cooling comes solely from the expansion of the air as it rises.
And that’s the adiabatic process: The expansion against a lower external air pressure on ascent and the contraction/compression under a higher external air pressure on descent.
As the parcel ascends into surrounding air layers of progressively lower pressures, it expands, and as it expands, the parcel does ‘work’ on the surrounding air masses. And when ‘work’ is performed, energy is transferred. By definition. KE is not converted internally into PE. Energy is transferred from one system to another. From the system performing the work to the system on which the work is performed.
You will notice how the adiabatic (expansional) work transfer on ascent moves in the direct opposite direction from the convective (positive pressure gradient force) work transfer on ascent. In the former process, the parcel loses internal KE from expanding and cools as a result. In the latter process, the parcel gains gravitational PE from being lifted (pushed up).
http://www.atmo.arizona.edu/students/courselinks/fall10/atmo551a/CAPE.doc
Priceless!
11
Keeping up with this threading more fun than the Paris “peace talks” with ISIL!
00
Kristian November 20, 2015 at 5:07 am
Stephen Wilde says, November 19, 2015 at 9:32 am:
(“I regard that as a misleading description.”)
“I’m sure you do. But I’m sorry to disappoint both you and all the magical inhabitants of your little self-invented bubble world, Stephen. It’s not. It’s not misleading at all. In fact, it’s right on the money. It’s the standard description you’ll find everywhere. Just look up any textbook on the subject.”
‘Thus expansion into reducing pressure requires no work against the surrounding air and contraction into increasing pressure requires no work against the surrounding air.’
Please read that again with understanding!
“The change in PE is the work done. Force is mg and distance is h or z” apply to? And what other (but simultaneous) process does it not apply to?
Study especially pages 7-8 and 15-18.”
————————————–
The net effect within an atmosphere is to provide vast amounts of available convective energy to drive convective overturning.
—————————————-
And try to interpret that correctly!
“This is precisely what I’m talking about. You have got this all completely mixed up inside your head. You’re totally confused and boastful about it.”
Could it be that neither of you understands this atmosphere sufficiently to be able to comment on it?
“This describes the process of convective uplift, Stephen. What happens? The rising air parcel somehow does ‘work’ against gravity? Draining it of internal KE? NO!!!! The opposite! The surrounding air masses do ‘work’ on the rising parcel, which means energy is transferred to the parcel.”
Do you Kristian, have anyone that agrees with your interpretation? I’m not saying that this is ‘wrong’, only that I do not believe.
In this atmosphere, I perceive a definite structure of sensible heat (temperature),
pressure power (mass flow rate), and latent heat (phase property). Each is nicely getting along with the two others with no rancor, nor is any ‘work’ required for relocation of any part of this atmosphere, within this atmosphere!
“Which is the reason why it rises. It is effectively pushed up by a positive ‘pressure gradient force’. There’s your W = Δmgh. The parcel isn’t losing any internal KE from this process.”
Whatever you Kristian may mean by internal KE which you refuse to define, but do imply that it is ‘only’ the accumulation of power as expressed by mass as a thermometric expansion of such mass. Where is the associated accumulation of power as an increase in pressure by ‘any’ compressible fluid. Air tools can do much ‘work’ with only mass flow. Never any need for your non-defined internal energy, nor any sensible heat.
“And so it doesn’t cool from it. It simply gains gravitational PE as it’s being pushed upwards. Directly from the externally transferred energy.”
There is absolutely no gravitational PE ever expressed by any atmosphere at any altitude.
“The process that does cool the rising air parcel is an altogether different one, one that still occurs simultaneously to the uplift itself. The adiabatic one.”
There is none of your cooling by process (whatever that may mean) The defined lower temperature at altitude (lapse) is not a process. It is a state of lower atmospheric energy density at altitude. Such results (is expressed) as a linear temperature lapse with altitude!
“The uplift isn’t the adiabatic process, Stephen. There is nothing in the convective uplift itself that does anything to cool the rising air. The cooling comes solely from the expansion of the air as it rises.”
There is no scammer non-defined cooling anywhere in this atmosphere. Earth’s atmosphere expresses many time varying locational,changes in local atmospheric temperature, i,e, Changes in sensible and latent heat!
“And that’s the adiabatic process: The expansion against a lower external air pressure on ascent and the contraction/compression under a higher external air pressure on descent.”
Nice presentation of typical meteorological scamming of all! There can be no atmospheric adiabatic anything, as there is no fixed atmospheric volume for fixed atmospheric gas molecules. If local noise (temperature) is excessive, molecules just leave for a more quite environment. This is expressed in neuvo physics as some sort of equilibrium, that can never be actually described by idiots! Did I do good Konrad?
‘
02
To conclude:
There are two (2 !!!) distinct processes occurring during natural convective uplift:
1) The mechanical uplift itself, and
2) The original diabatic heating of the air packet and its subsequent adiabatic expansion as it ascends up the atmospheric column.
Only one of these two parallel processes – the second one – ever affects the temperature of the air packet. The other one – the first – only ever moves it.
Stephen openly, happily and shamelessly conflates these two fundamentally discrete physical processes and – most likely unwittingly – churns them into one sticky stew. But even though they are of course directly related on a causal level, their energies strictly do not mix. Why? Because the one involves the exchange of MICROscopic energy, while the other involves the exchange and conversion of MACROscopic energy. Process 1) pertains only to the air packet as a whole. What is moved is its ‘centre of mass’. Process 2), however, concerns the air packet’s ‘internal (thermodynamic) energy’, its U, which is directly associated with the air’s temperature through the motion of its individual molecules.
Bulk air, packet as a whole, ‘centre of mass’: MACRO level. Molecules, internal energy: MICRO level.
Here’s what happens:
Heat from the solar-heated surface of the Earth is absorbed (unequally) by the air directly above it. This heat shows up as an increase in the heated air packet’s internal (microscopic, molecular) KE. And as a result, its temperature goes up. However, as the air packet warms, it also naturally expands and so does work on the surrounding air, which means that the packet ends up losing some of its original KE input again directly. This is the reason why air free to expand will warm less from an equal amount of heat input than air not free to expand, which is simply the difference between c_v and c_p: γ = c_p/c_v = 1.4.
In order to be able to finally cancel out the initial perturbation and restore balance, enabling it to fall back to a normal, stable state, in dynamic equilibrium with the atmosphere at large, the air packet still somehow needs to rid itself of the excess internal KE remaining after this original heat input/work output ‘event’. If it weren’t allowed to lift, then this could only be accomplished through slow conductive and radiative heat loss and/or gradual mixing (of mass) with the surrounding air.
The beauty of our atmosphere, however, is its dynamic way of dealing with a surplus of absorbed KE piling up down low. The heated air itself spontaneously moves, up and away from the surface, bringing the energy with it. By way of convective uplift. And this is where the second process comes in.
The heated surface air expands as a result of the original temperature increase. This expansion is essentially adiabatic; it cools the heated packet adiabatically, somewhat – but far from completely – offsetting the concurrent diabatic heating. But after this original expansion, with no more diabatic heating, the air packet needs for the external pressure containing it to go down in order to be able to expand and cool adiabatically any further. In our atmosphere this will happen only if it moves higher up the air column.
The funny and convenient thing is that this is something that will happen all by itself upon its initial expansion. Because of something neat called the ‘pressure gradient force’.
The pressure gradient force works like this:
https://okulaer.files.wordpress.com/2015/11/pressure-distribution-in-a-fluid1.png
At hydrostatic equilibrium – no parcel movement either up or down – the pressure (force times area) from below equals the pressure from above + the weight (mass times gravity) of the parcel itself.
To upset this equilibrium, to make the parcel rise, to make it buoyant, the pressure from below needs to become greater than the pressure from above + the parcel’s own weight.
How does this come about? Simply by the parcel expanding while maintaining its original mass.
Let’s say we start at hydrostatic equilibrium. The pressure from above is 9x1m^2=9 and the weight of the parcel is 1. 9+1=10. The pressure from below, then, is 10x1m^2=10, and so 10=10.
We then heat the parcel, letting it expand in the process. As a result, its area subjected to external forces is now larger than before. The pressure from above is now 9x2m^2=18, but the weight of the parcel is still 1 (its mass is after all unchanged). 18+1=19. The pressure from below, however, is now 10x2m^2=20, and so 19<20. An imbalance is created and a net upward force arises, because the total force pushing up from below on the parcel is now greater than the total force pushing down on it from above plus its own weight, which means that the hydrostatic equilibrium is broken. The parcel is effectively pushed up. Convective uplift is initiated.
Take note: This now positve net upward force is not pushing each individual air molecule inside the parcel up. It is pushing the parcel as a whole, as one macroscopic unit, conceptually associated with its ‘centre of mass’.
The ‘end product’ of all this is basically the atmosphere outside the parcel exchanging gravitational potential energy with it. The total amount of gravitational potential energy in the atmosphere remains the same, but now a tiny amount of it is ‘transferred’ from the rest of the atmosphere to the lifted air parcel. The ‘centre of mass’ of the remaining atmosphere simply drops ever so slightly (hardly detectable), while the ‘centre of mass’ of the parcel lifts significantly.
However, potential energy doesn’t in itself do anything. ‘Potential energy’ is more of a budgetary device enabling us to keep track of the energy in a system, as it appears to move sometimes into and sometimes out of existence. You can’t observe, you can’t feel potential energy. It’s in the name. It’s about the potential to do ‘work’. A system with a lot of potential energy has the potential to do more work than a system with less potential energy. But it is never the potential energy itself performing the work in the end. As soon as the potential is unleashed and the system starts working, the potential energy is converted directly into kinetic energy. Kinetic energy is energy as we observe and feel it. It is what heats, it is what performs work. ‘Active’ energy.
So what really happens is this: As our parcel warms and expands from the original diabatic heating, (macroscopic, Newtonian) kinetic energy is transferred from the outside atmosphere to the parcel, to its ‘centre of mass’, propelling it upwards (force (mass times acceleration) times distance = ‘work’ [W]). This is simply the net upward pressure gradient force. Now, as long as the parcel actually accelerates upwards, its ‘centre of mass’ KE will increase. However, at the point where the parcel has finally come to a full stop and it cannot ascend any further, all of its mechanical (macroscopic) KE is converted into gravitational (macroscopic) PE. All that’s left is the parcel’s potential to do mechanical work on its descent. This potential is exactly equal to the work put in to get the parcel aloft to where it is now. All the KE transferred – from beginning to end – from the rest of the atmosphere to the parcel’s ‘centre of mass’, lifting it deep into the atmospheric column, is now stored as gravitational PE inside the parcel. Likewise, before the lifting process started, the KE moving the parcel from its initial to its final altitude didn’t appear as KE at all. It was stored as gravitational (positional) PE in the rest of the atmosphere.
The ‘strength’ of the original push (plus the local, surrounding ELR) will determine how high the parcel will go, and the ‘strength’ of the original push depends on the amount of original (diabatic) heating and hence expansion.
12
Kristian,
Although you’ve posted your replies here, in proper chronological order, Steven Wilde has decided that this format is not good enough and so has decided to respond to the comments you post here, in this sub-thread, below, towards the end of the comments section beginning with this comment.
As if his statements weren’t confusing enough, now the reader has to scroll up here to see what you wrote and then back down to see his replies. Of course he could have placed a link in his comments below pointing to the oiginal comments here but didn’t. 🙁
Abe
00
Konrad
You may be interested in some observations I made along similar lines to your experiments.
I started with two thermally insulated baths covered with thin LDPE. One had 1cm of water and the other no water. The bottom of the baths were covered with black tape. The set up is shown here:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/bzlc13oagkjemi6/Exp_Start.JPG?dl=0
That photo was taken a few minutes after start up. The bath without water had much less thermal inertia.
This is the baths after 1 hour:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/7yr5e4p2s65h7dr/Exp_Set_Up.JPG?dl=0
The condensation forming on the LDPE is evident. I expect there was conductive heat loss through the thin membrane with good transfer from the condensing water.
Both sides reached 65C at the peak of sunlight in Melbourne on 5th Nov. It was near clear sky conditions but there were wispy clouds that caused the air sides to wander a few degrees.
I terminated the experiments after 2 hours 10minutes as the temperature was beginning to fall:
https://www.dropbox.com/s/kishu14wpfp1mpt/Exp_Final_Temp.JPG?dl=0
Clearly evaporating water carries a huge amount of heat from a water surface heated by the sun. The water surface would be much hotter without the evaporative cooling. Fortunately there is radiative transfer of the atmospheric heat into space through radiative gases to cool the earth. I think we need a different analogy to the David’s pipes to reflect reality.
510
Rick,
I will take a better look after work, but yes, the condensation indicates energy loss through the LDPE film. Can you give me a description of what factor you were trying to isolate?
00
I was aiming to see how hot they got without evaporative or convective cooling.
I was also interested to see if the one with water got hotter than the one without. From that perspective they reached the same maximum temperature. It is inconclusive in this regard because I do not know how much heat was lost through the LDPE.
00
Konrad,
You say, yet again: Empirical experiment shows that the surface of our planet would be far hotter than present if all atmospheric effects excepting 1 bar pressure were removed. 312K or higher. Could an atmosphere without radiative cooling ability cool the surface?
Please justify this figure of 312K which you trot out incessantly without any reference to anything. If you are so certain, the least you could do is to explain to us all how this figure is determined.
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David Cosserat November 18, 2015 at 8:57 am
@Konrad,
“You say, yet again: (“Empirical experiment shows that the surface of our planet would be far hotter than present if all atmospheric effects excepting 1 bar pressure were removed. 312K or higher. Could an atmosphere without radiative cooling ability cool the surface?”)
“Please justify this figure of 312K which you trot out incessantly without any reference to anything. If you are so certain, the least you could do is to explain to us all how this figure is determined.”
Have you even looked at Konrad’s ’empirical experiment’? There are several minor mistooks, but none that you could find! Earth’s radiative atmosphere does indeed cool (lower temperature) of the surface in every case! What is is your favoured surface temperature? Why?
03
Will,
Your response moves me on not a jot because you fail (as did Konrad) to provide a link to his ‘experiment’. This is in keeping with your usual blocking approach on these blog trails, criticising everyone (often rudely and/or sarcastically) but without providing any useful counter information. Ever.
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David Cosserat November 19, 2015 at 9:26 am
“Will,
Your response moves me on not a jot because you fail (as did Konrad) to provide a link to his ‘experiment’. This is in keeping with your usual blocking approach on these blog trails, criticising everyone (often rudely and/or sarcastically) but without providing any useful counter information. Ever.”
Konrad’s experimental evidence is all over blogspace! Only deliberate trolls refuse to find it! Earth’s radiative atmosphere does indeed cool (lower temperature) of the surface in every case! What is is your favoured surface temperature? Why?
02
Kristian November 19, 2015 at 6:03 am
Stephen Wilde says, November 18, 2015 at 6:17 pm:
(“So that is all it comes down to? I say that radiation distorts the DALR but you object to that by saying that the DALR is not distorted but the ELR is instead.”)
“I don’t object to it. I’m telling you it is incorrect. You obviously don’t understand the difference between the ALR and the ELR. The former is NOT influenced by radiation. The latter definitely IS. The temperature gradient in stable, ambient air can NEVER be described as an ALR. It is ALWAYS an ELR.”
Almost as arrogant and wrong as Stephen! No one knows what an atmospheric non-condensing non-radiating gravitational lapse would be! Mars apparently has no longer an atmosphere because of this.
“Likewise, the cooling rate with altitude inside a convectively rising packet of air can NEVER be described as en ELR. It is ALWAYS an ALR.”
Wrong again! There is no fantasy adiabatic packet of air moving vertically in this atmosphere! The change in altitude is always isentropic (no work, no entropy generation). Your neuvo-physics internal energy is more fake than is an adiabatic air parcel. Both are only deliberate attempts to confuse!
“I am not going there again, Stephen. People who know basic thermodynamic principles can only shake their head in disbelief at your continued failure to grasp the fundamental difference between HEAT [Q] and WORK [W].”
You Kristian fail to see that your ΔU = (Q-W) is wrong for an atmosphere! Pressure or the change in gas pressure is part of what the rest call sensible heat, but not part of you call internal energy.
You claim: “It is precisely what makes the process in question adiabatic: Q=0, so dU = Q – W = -W = -PdV.”.
No work is involved! either! Atmospheric PdV is not work, it is a different form of power or energy. The correct expression with mass, for this Earth’s atmosphere: isentropic exponent κ = ΔΡ/Δρ = Cp/Cv = 1.4 . In a viable atmosphere the pressure decreases at a lesser rate than density with altitude. But that ratio is a tropospheric constant, providing a constant (linear temperature lapse). Increasing altitude is but a decrease in “energy density”, somthing not considered by neuvo-physics! 🙁
02
Repost!!!
Kristian November 19, 2015 at 6:03 am
Stephen Wilde says, November 18, 2015 at 6:17 pm:
(“So that is all it comes down to? I say that radiation distorts the DALR but you object to that by saying that the DALR is not distorted but the ELR is instead.”)
“I don’t object to it. I’m telling you it is incorrect. You obviously don’t understand the difference between the ALR and the ELR. The former is NOT influenced by radiation. The latter definitely IS. The temperature gradient in stable, ambient air can NEVER be described as an ALR. It is ALWAYS an ELR.”
Almost as arrogant and wrong as Stephen! No one knows what an atmospheric non-condensing non-radiating gravitational lapse would be! Mars apparently has no longer an atmosphere because of this.
“Likewise, the cooling rate with altitude inside a convectively rising packet of air can NEVER be described as en ELR. It is ALWAYS an ALR.”
Wrong again! There is no fantasy adiabatic packet of air moving vertically in this atmosphere! The change in altitude is always isentropic (no work, no entropy generation). Your neuvo-physics internal energy is more fake than is an adiabatic air parcel. Both are only deliberate attempts to confuse!
“I am not going there again, Stephen. People who know basic thermodynamic principles can only shake their head in disbelief at your continued failure to grasp the fundamental difference between HEAT [Q] and WORK [W].”
You Kristian fail to see that your ΔU = (Q-W) is wrong for an atmosphere! Pressure or the change in gas pressure is part of what the rest call sensible heat, but not part of you call internal energy.
You claim: “It is precisely what makes the process in question adiabatic: Q=0, so dU = Q – W = -W = -PdV.”.
No work is involved! either! Atmospheric PdV is not work, it is a different form of power or energy. The correct expression with mass, for this Earth’s atmosphere: isentropic exponent κ = ΔΡ/Δρ = Cp/Cv = 1.4 . In a viable atmosphere the pressure decreases at a lesser rate than density with altitude. But that ratio is a tropospheric constant, providing a constant (linear temperature lapse). Increasing altitude is but a decrease in “energy density”, somthing not considered by neuvo-physics! 🙁
02
Konrad November 12, 2015 at 8:24 pm
“Minor “greenhouse” gases? Just what are those David?”
How many Red thumbz you gotz now punk? You’s still payen? I gets one within seconds of each post, prolly from Stephen! Perhaps “rate of thumbs” is the real criteria! 😉
01
Jo/David, I haven’t read all the posts on this nameless model, the model without a name, or maybe more alarmingly the model that must not be named, it’s early winter in old blighty so plenty of long evenings yet. Anyway has GEM been suggested? A bright perfectly structured transparent little acronym of the mildly surprised sounding formation of the words Good’Evans Model.
G’Day, Paul.
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This is the best post in the series. As a layman, I thought it was a great example of science communication. Well done.
150
May I ask another question(s)? How do CO2 molecules “trap” 15m radiation rather than just delay its transit as photons are bounced up and down and presumably eventually find a free path to space? If it is blocked or delayed in the CO2 pipe, what is the mechanism for this to be rerouted via the WV pipe? Is it absorbed and re-emitted in the same band as the CO2 molecules and provides more paths to space?
20
CO2 can only emit heat to space at 15 microns from the top of the CO2 cloud surrounding the Earth — upwards emissions from CO2 molecules beneath the top layer will almost certainly be absorbed by a CO2 molecule at a greater altitude.
Hot objects emit more heat. Likewise, the amount of emission at 15 microns to space is determined by the temperature of that top layer of CO2.
So CO2 traps heat by just not emitting as much as the surface. If the CO2 top layer was as warm as the surface there would be no trapping.
No delays involved or relevant, AFAIK.
As CO2 increases: The changes in the emission spectrum of CO2 occurs mainly in the wings, further away from 15 microns, where the top layer of CO2 that can emit to space is in the upper troposphere. More CO2 raises this top layer in height, to a colder part of the upper troposphere, so it emits less to space. So the upper troposphere loses less heat to space. So it is warmer than before. So the water vapor molecules there are warmer, and that is where the top layer of the water vapor is (the WVEL). So the WVEL emits more to space — effectively some emissions to space have been rerouted from CO2 to water vapor. (At different wavelengths, energy transferred from CO2 to WV by thermal collisions.)
There may also be other feedbacks not in response to surface warming that are omitted from conventional models, which contribute to the low value of CO2 sensitivity found by fitting the data.
160
David,
Unfortunately I haven’t had time to give your posts the time they deserve so apologies in advance if I’ve missed points.
“More CO2 raises this top layer in height, to a colder part of the upper troposphere, so it emits less to space. So the upper troposphere loses less heat to space.”
This seems to be an instantaneous view. Add the time dimension and the upper troposphere air cools as it drifts polewards in the convection cells and eventually dissipates the heat to space.
To my mind, the most fundamental mathematical error of the IPCC modellers is to start with CO2 – as per their brief – rather than taking its effects as a perturbation to the water vapour heat pump that is clearly the primary temperature regulator of our water planet.
The sceptic’s hockey stick graphs – the satellite data showing a dramatic rise in atmospheric water vapour and cloud coverage as sea surface temperatures approach 30˚C and temps hitting a brick wall there – demonstrate this clearly.
That said, I think your approach of showing that they haven’t even got the basic model correct has clout.
Best of luck with getting the message out.
60
“what is the mechanism for this to be rerouted via the WV pipe? Is it absorbed and re-emitted in the same band as the CO2 molecules and provides more paths to space?”
Each atmospheric molecule radiates what it can to the ‘lower radiance space’. Looking down from space, the CO2 band appears to have a emission temperature of 210 K.
Downward at the tropopause; optical depth is approximately 1 km for the 14-16 µ CO2 band, but 5 km for the WV continuum. Two optical depths give an emissivity of 87%, while four give an emissivity of 98%. This is what sets the spectral radiance (apparent temperature) for all radiant frequencies of the atmosphere. WV continuum (most of the frequency range), appears as a temperature of 250 K, while the whole CO2 13-18 µ band appears as 210 K. The optical window 8-13 µ band appears as near surface temperature 285 K, except for the 65% cloud cover, where that surface is replaced by cloud top temperature. The ‘mechanism for this atmospheric activity is atmospheric sensible and latent heat!
You attempt to treat the atmosphere as a quantum mechanical process! Please post the number of molecules in the whole atmosphere. From that number, please justify considering QM rather than thermodynamics, for any atmosphere!
517
Will, you post that number, and you justify considering QM rather than thermodynamics. This is your trip, not anyone else’s. It may have merit, but any merit it may have is lost in gratuitous rhetoric and (willfully?) obscure claims.
And yes, there may be a point where QM and thermodynamics elide in some real-world conditions. If so, you tell us about the interface or refute the notion.
171
A quote from the first paragraph of New Science 19: “Don’t underestimate the importance of the nameless basic model. It sounds small, but in the culture and philosophy of climate science it’s bigger and carries more weight than the massive hairy GCMs. Like an invisible gossamer web, it’s overarching. It spans and defines all the other models”.
What David & Jo are saying is that the “Warmists” are like spiders. Spinning a web of deception to the tune of US$89trillion to be squandered by 2030.
Well if this is the case then it is time the spiders most feared predator takes control and wipes them of the face of the Earth. And what is this predator? BIRDS. We need a remake of Hitchcock’s famous 1963 movie “The Birds” with in this case the victims being “Warmist spiders”. But in reality it will not be the birds that wipe out the “warmist spiders, but the imminent GM/LIA.
32
Seriously what David’s fine research has achieved is expose the “Theory of AGW” as very seriously flawed. To think that US$89trillion will be squandered by 2030 in adopting this ” belief system” makes one feel very ill. We all need to do our utmost to stop this “decarbonisation charade” proceeding any further – it will without any doubt lead to “Economic Armaghedon”.
81
Make that “Armageddon” – one wine too many it seems.
00
With “Armageddon” on my mind I am sure many of you saw that 1998 movie of the same name. The theme song/video for that movie by Aerosmith is absolutely brilliant – Steve Tyler at his best. Isn’t it ironic that this “hot movie & theme song/video” were released in 1998 – the “El Nino Global Temperature Spike Year” that led to Mann’s infamous “Hockey Stick” nonsense and “AGW Doomsday Predictions” and later on that equally ridiculous fictional (clearly not non-fictional) Oscar winning documentary by Al Gore entitled “An Inconvenient Truth” (2006). It is a mad mad world we live in.
10
“causes more than of the warming”. More than half?
20
Yep. Fixed. Thanks Brian.
10
Well done, David and Jo. That is so easy to understand. It is so logical and it is going to be very difficult to refute, as there is absolutely no logic, or scientific basis, for saying that heat waylaid by CO2 on its way to space must be considered as additional sun radiation reaching the earth’s surface. Brilliant.
Now, the next bit is not easy, but we can all help. We must get the message out.
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I would like to suggest that the new model be named the ABC Model (Alternative Basic Climate model) if only to confuse the faithful followers of the AGW sect in Australia who label themselves believers in “Climate Change”.
They will see the label and think; “this must be OK it’s endorsed by ‘their’ ABC”. 😉
I apologise to international readers who might not get the joke. Some of you may have watched the footage shown on this blog that was shot in David and Joanne’s home by the Australian Broadcasting Commission some years ago. And if comparing what went to air and what was not shown doesn’t convince you that the ABC is totally biased on this issue then I would suspect you are also a faithful follower.
I still can’t comprehend fully how so many otherwise intelligent folks amongst my family and friends still believe in this fairy tale. I’ll continue to do my best to disabuse them… hopefully without alienating them too much!
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I was thinking the Jo Model – rolls right off the tongue and should be easy for David to remember.
Or maybe the ITSS Model – similar to the KISS rule (It‘s the Sun, Stupid)
Keep up this very important body of work!
20
Try this suggestion from AndyG55
Former President of Greenpeace Scientifically Rips Climate Change to Shreds
This is a lecture delivered by Dr. Patrick Moore, co-founder of Greenpeace Int’l, to the Institution of Mechanical Engineers in London.
It is the most wonderful piece and really gets the point across.
You may need to find a copy from a less ERRrrr inflammatory source or just print it out and hand it to them.
00
Putting aside “our” ABC(to privatization preferably), how about the “ENact Model” We know enact is to put into practice(an idea or suggestion). But in this instance its – “Evans Nova alternative climate theory”
30
Feel it needs an “A” on the end, say for algorithm. Then it becomes the “ENacta model” or “ENacta modeling”…..No
00
The errors of the accepted basic model are a classic case of proceeding on basic assumptions at an early stage but never getting around to testing and quantifying properly those basic assumptions. The mismatch to empirical data should have been a major red flag. This is science properly followed through at last.
50
Hi David.
It’s the mechanism of the CO2 de-humidifier in the Perth Four-Step that I still have a problem with.
The RTMs simulate temperature and radiation as a function of gas composition almost perfectly, they are amazingly accurate every time they are tested. They do so automatically without anyone having to decide if water vapour will or won’t be affected by infra-red from CO2. They punch in the standard atmosphere structure, add the observed ground temperature and regional humidity as constraints, hit Go, and it spits out radiation and temperature predictions which are always found to be correct for that particular set of boundary conditions.
That’s the “basic basic” physics which works properly… under clear sky conditions at least.
If a GCM is an RTM that permits the gas species to move independently then the GCMs have already tested for the WVEL effect and not found it. Nobody decides whether to model a re-routing feedback in an RTM, it happens automatically simply by H2O and CO2 being in the same grid cell of the virtual atmosphere. The researcher can’t decide to not model a radiative re-routing feedback, any conceivable interspecies radiative transfer is just implicit from solving the equations of radiative transfer for the gas mixture (ie what RTMs do, and do accurately). And a GCM is an RTM with extras, so it does everything an RTM does plus more, like move fluids around.
If “conventional basic models” (your term) are permitted to redistribute gas species AND (as you say) “the basic physics may well be about right” then the suppression of the WVEL by CO2 should have been seen in basic climate model simulations 20 years ago. Presumably it wasn’t as your series of posts on this topic are the first I’ve heard of such a phenomenon.
The basic basic physics (of clear-sky radiative transfer) is right, so I see only three remaining ways out of that conundrum:
1) The “conventional basic models” you are talking about do not permit gas to move around, so you are talking about RTMs which cannot test for this outcome anyhow.
2) The “conventional basic models” you are talking about permit gas to move around and therefore according to your assumption that “the basic physics may well be about right” the “conventional basic models” have already tested for WVEL suppression, and didn’t find it, and therefore your hypothesis of CO2 causing the WVEL suppression is on shaky ground.
3) There is a bug in the “basic physics” of the advection of moisture that is keeping H2O aloft in the model instead of drying out the troposphere according to your hypothesised mechanism, but that contradicts your assumption “the basic physics may well be about right”.
No argument from me about whether the WVEL was suppressed. I’m not arguing with radiosondes. I’m just not sure how CO2 caused it, especially if (by the above reasoning) it should have been seen in “conventional basic models” long ago. There’s at least three different ways to resolve that, maybe more than three if I have not been heretical enough. What do you reckon?
_ _ _ _ _
Also, minor nitpicking:
What did aluminium ever do to you that you now hate it so much?
i.e.
Error, please replace singular indefinite pronoun with a plural or prepend 'al' to continue.143
Andrew McRae said:
“They punch in the standard atmosphere structure”
and:
“the suppression of the WVEL by CO2 should have been seen in basic climate model simulations 20 years ago.”
The Standard Atmosphere just gives the average net outcome, it doesn’t attempt to describe the redistribution between pipes that keeps the entire system stable.
By punching in the Standard Atmosphere structure one is actually ignoring all the lapse rate variations and consequent convective adjustments. It works because they all net out to zero even with GHGs present. The Standard Atmosphere makes no reference to radiative components within the atmosphere but it still works.
The Standard Atmosphere is not designed to capture those lapse rate changes and convective adjustments so if GCMs /RTMs are relying on it how do they spot any suppression of the WVEL by CO2?
513
You couldn’t be more wrong. Run it yourself. http://hitran.iao.ru/gasmixture/spectr
For example, pick “USA model, mean latitude, winter”, L=50m, and Radiance Spectrum output. Different radiative components are obvious in the resulting spectrum.
Not at all. An RTM just won’t show the convective influences. When I said “standard atmosphere” I meant the typical vertical profile of gas concentrations, pressure, density, and temperature. Of course temperature can change at different altitudes purely by radiation as the simulation proceeds, therefore lapse rate changes are not entirely ignored by using the Standard Atmosphere as the starting point for the simulation.
That’s why this should have been seen in GCMs already. If adding CO2 reroutes more OLR into H2O, then RTMs have been simulating re-routing for over 30 years, and GCMs based on those RTMs should also have been simulating the CO2 dehumidifier. It doesn’t require anything new in the realm of GCMs.
So why hasn’t anyone noticed it before?
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Andrew,
“Different radiative components are obvious in the resulting spectrum”
Doesn’t the radiance spectrum just show the final netted out scenario?
How would it reveal the adjustments that took place in order to arrive at it?
“lapse rate changes are not entirely ignored by using the Standard Atmosphere as the starting point for the simulation”
Well then you have the starting point and the end point. How does that help to identify the convective adjustments that occurred between the two?
How would one know that emissions out to space had shifted from one pipe to another?
414
Andrew, you haven’t really read much of this series have you?
You say “conventional basic models” as if you are quoting me. Plural? There is only one conventional basic climate model. It was derived and defined in post2 and post 3, and its significance was discussed in post 1. It is in the climate textbooks, in numerous papers, the Charney Report, dates back to Arrhenius, and guides everything in climate science. It has three parameters, joined up in a radiation balance architecture. Everyone knows it. This is what we are talking about; I thought after 19 posts most people would get that. Yet in your point “2)” you seem to think it is the GCMs.
You laud the radiation transfer model (RTM) is the GCMs. You say they are “amazingly accurate every time they are tested”. Just “hit Go” and they spit out he answers. Ah, the Oracle. Nonsense Andrew: if they were so accurate, how come they predict these, when reality is this? There is more to GCMs than RTMs, but they are not even remotely close at getting the upper troposphere correct.
When I said “basic physics” I think it was fairly clear I was referring to the basic physics in the climate model, spelled out just three paragraphs before I said “the basic physics may well be about right”:
So you are wrong to use that to imply that I think the RTMs are correct and their failure to spot the rerouting feedback means said feedback does not exist, or that there cannot be a bug in the “basic physics” of the advection of moisture in the GCMs. Something about the GCMs is clearly very wrong. It is quite clear what the problems are in the conventional basic model.
What is this “gas moving around” you refer to? In rerouting, the upper troposphere sheds more heat to space from WV molecules and less from CO2 molecules. The molecules can transfer energy by thermal collisions.
Something is suppressing the WVEL, as you say, and the rerouting feedback fits the bill. The alternative model finds in post 18 that the CO2 sensitivity is about a third of the solar sensitivity, which can only mean some sort of feedback specifically to increasing CO2 – which is in the blindspot of the conventional basic model and possibly the GCMs. If the WVEL emits more it must descend, in line with the missing hotspot.
911
I had read the entire series prior to making that comment. Your powers of clairvoyance are terrible.
Yes, because that plural is the same meaning as what you wrote:
That’s your use of the plural right there. The plural makes sense because your “conventional basic climate model” is an abstraction which is meant to represent the essence of all other climate models that the establishment actually uses.
Your hyperlink points to the output from “a typical conventional climate model (the GISS model E, 5/4 * CO2, 100 year response, Lat–Hgt)” which is NOT an RTM, it is a GCM. The 100 year response was from an “interactive coupled atmosphere-ocean model”. Not an RTM, a GCM. You have shown a GCM was erroneous.
You even said in the previous paragraph “The GISS Climate Model E, a prototypical GCM”, so you must know it was a GCM.
Your reply above correctly states “You laud the radiation transfer model (RTM)”.
Why on earth do you think that highlighting errors in GCMs shows RTMs are wrong? Maybe you’re the one who doesn’t understand the meaning of the words you are typing.
I gave you a link to a page full of RTM outputs which all compared very accurately to spectroscopic measurement. It’s not my opinion that RTMs are accurate to the real atmosphere, it’s a fact 30 years old. You don’t have to believe me, but you do not get to sit there and rubbish my statement unless you first do even the merest amount of reading on the topic. What were you doing for the last three months if you don’t know RTMs work properly? Just look at their outputs compared to measurement and you will see it.
But they can’t predict changes in water vapour distribution because they only simulate radiative transfer. Get it?
Okay, then I misunderstood the meaning of “basic physics” in that statement. With my improved understanding, none of the three options I outlined are correct.
As the “conventional climate model” was neither an RTM not a GCM, my first two options are out.
The third option was half wrong. You seem to be saying it is possible There is a bug in the “basic physics” of the advection of moisture yet this doesn’t conflict with your earlier confidence in the “basic physics” because the “basic physics” referred only to three accepted parameters in the “conventional climate model” (singular!) which you “derived” from the state of the art.
That introduces another hazard though. You did not derive the “conventional climate model” to be a strawman. It is supposed to represent the essence of all conventional climate models, such that any criticism of it is also a criticism of the models the CliSci mob actually use. Indeed when you talk about the two main flaws, you also said:
So you have actually claimed here that the GCMs do not model radiative re-routing to H2O in the upper troposphere. That is absurdly unlikely because the RTM is the component of a GCM that handles the distribution of radiation, and RTMs are correct as shown by comparison to spectrometer measurements. However I admit my personal incredulity is not a counter argument and the issue could only be settled by checking the source code of the RTMs that the ModelE, CCSM, HadGEM, and GFDL GCMs actually use.
Luckily, either way, that is not fatal to your overall argument because even if RTMs are correct and have therefore been simulating re-routing ever since RTMs existed, there is still the chance for something to be lost in translation between the RTM component and the rest of the climate simulation.
I’m wondering if you have read your own series of posts. Your keystone evidence from radiosondes is that upper tropospheric humidity decreased when mainstream theory says it should have increased. The radiosonde evidence is not radiation measurement, it’s humidity measurement. To decrease humidity in the upper troposphere is not merely a redistribution of radiant energy flows but requires a gas in bulk to migrate downwards. Thus… gas moving around must be simulated, and that requires a GCM not an RTM. Not knowing exactly what you meant by “conventional basic model” I suggested three different resolutions to the WVEL phantom menace depending on what type of model you were referring to. (It turned out to be none of those three.)
How???
Do I have to invent a mechanism by which that can happen, or have you already thought of one?
I expected the answer to be in part 14 or part 15, but the closest I can recall you getting to an explanation was this in Part 15:
That doesn’t explain how the water vapour became confined. Is it a chemical mechanism, radiative mechanism, something else?
If I had to guess, I would guess that where the air is dry enough for CO2 to make a difference, the extra CO2 steals radiation from the H2O, and as the H2O becomes comparatively less energetic (cooler) it will fall, converting gravitational potential energy into kinetic energy, until it again has enough KE to be stable in altitude. It is now lower than before, it is warmer, the Planck emission is more, and the effective average WVEL has lowered. I may be guilty of a poor memory, but I do not recall reading any similar explanation so far in the series.
Is this your position? : The moisture advection, or some other fluid-related aspect of the GCMs, have incorrect physics in them, and that is why GCMs didn’t lower the WVEL even if their RTM component may appear correct when tested separately.
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Andrew and David,
I hope you will both forgive my intervention here but the above posts mostly seem to reflect terminological differences rather than matters of substance.
I think the important point is this question from Andrew:
“That doesn’t explain how the water vapour became confined. Is it a chemical mechanism, radiative mechanism, something else?”
It is a mechanical process involving convective overturning.
I pointed out a couple of times in comments and in my separate thread that reducing the lapse rate slope inevitably reduces the vigour of upward convection simply because colder air aloft decreases stability and warmer air aloft increases stability.
If one reduces the vigour of convection then more humidity gets time to build up at lower levels and the WVEL will fall. Additionally, clouds condense out at higher temperatures when humidity is higher so clouds form and radiate to space from a lower warmer level. The WVEL and cloudtop EL must both fall.
The GCMs appear not to be getting that right.
They appear to assume more vigorous convection from a warmer surface plus more humidity from a positive water vapour feedback because they leave the lapse rate slope unchanged i.e. no warming distortion of the lapse rate slope at higher levels.
That goes to the heart of David’s distinction between the effect of increasing ASR at the surface and the thermal effect of CO2 at a point off the surface. The two processes must be treated differently but the GCMs treat them both as increasing ASR at the surface.
In reality we see a lapse rate distortion to the warm side within rising convective columns which leads to warming aloft which reduces the vigour of convection and gives a falling WVEL/cloudtop EL.
Furthermore, GCMs extrapolate the surface warming effect beneath rising columns (caused by slower convection) globally and do not reflect the fact that the sign of the CO2 effect is reversed beneath descending columns as described in my earlier post.
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Andrew, “That’s your use of the plural right there.” Yes, to describe both the conventional basic climate model and the alternative basic climate model, as well as any other unconventional basic climate models.
Yes of course the link went to a GCM not an RTM. The next sentence was “There is more to GCMs than RTMs, but they are not even remotely close at getting the upper troposphere correct.”.
You say “You did not derive the “conventional climate model” to be a strawman.”. Presumably you meant “conventional basic climate model”?
You say “It is supposed to represent the essence of all conventional climate models, such that any criticism of it is also a criticism of the models the CliSci mob actually use.” No. I have never said that, nor do I believe that. It is a very significant model in its own right. See post 1. It gives a first estimate of ECS.
As it happens, the GCMs follow it reasonably closely, both in general architectural features and in results. The Charney Report uses the conventional basic climate model to estimate the surface warming caused by a doubling of CO2 as (page 9, Sec 3.1.2) “to lie in the range of 1.6 to 4.5 K, with 2.4 K a likely value.” AR5 (p. 1033) gives the ECS as 1.5°C to 4.5°C. All that research and money, 34 years on, and the establishment are still at where the basic model was in the Charney Report back in 1979.
Thank you for clarifying what “gas moving round” you were referring to; I didn’t know that’s what you meant. Your initial comment makes more sense to me now.
Yes, the Paltridge explanation isn’t relevant to the suppressed WVEL, AFAIK.
40
Andrew,
I don’t have a position on how the WVEL descends due to rerouting. I don’t know the precise mechanism. I do know that the WVEL emits more OLR so must descend (unless local lapse rates are somewhat distorted). I also know that allowing the CO2 to have its own response finds that it is much less than the solar response (post 19), so there are some CO2-specific negative feedbacks, of which rerouting is the obvious one (any other suggestions anyone?).
Maybe Stephen’s mechanism is correct.
The gravitational explanation, which you have elaborated on in your last comment, was what I originally thought was correct — and I put that in the post 7. However I became dubious when Joe Born pointed out in the comments I was arguing that the WV was both more energetic (emitting more OLR) and less energetic (descending in the gravitational field).
Your suggestion that the greater concentration of CO2 suppresses the WVEL directly seems plausible to me, though like all our explanations is only qualitative at this stage. It is original AFAIK. May I add it to post 7, properly credited of course?
Andrew, care to elaborate on it, or send me an email with your preferred description, for adding to post 7 (and maybe as a note in next post on series)?
Stephen’s explanation may be describing the same sort of thing from a meteorological point of view. Any comment Stephen?
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David,
I don’t yet know enough about Andrew’s suggestion to be able to comment usefully.
AFAIK the meteorological description is the only solution I am aware of that fits both basic known physics and observations.
23
Andrew said:
“If I had to guess, I would guess that where the air is dry enough for CO2 to make a difference, the extra CO2 steals radiation from the H2O, and as the H2O becomes comparatively less energetic (cooler) it will fall, converting gravitational potential energy into kinetic energy, until it again has enough KE to be stable in altitude. It is now lower than before, it is warmer, the Planck emission is more, and the effective average WVEL has lowered”
That suggestion appears to involve CO2 molecules cooling H20 molecules by conduction so that they radiate less (how else could it ‘steal’ radiation?)
The problem then is as to how CO2 molecules at a given height could ever be colder than CO2 molecules at the same height given their ability to absorb radiation from the surface.
29
Should have said:
The problem then is as to how CO2 molecules at a given height could ever be colder than H20 molecules at the same height given their ability to absorb radiation from the surface.
27
Stephen,
Your objection about H2O unable to remain less energetic whilst surrounded by more energetic particles sounds like a pretty good objection.
i.e. – No molecule is an island (for long).
Alternatives… crickets… Inspiration isn’t striking at the moment.
I’ll try random ideas instead.
Radiation becomes thermalised when inter-molecular collisions occur quicker than the photon re-emission delay. If we are talking about 5km altitude then maybe thermalisation occurs, but at 20km, maybe not so much. May have an effect??
If thermalisation isn’t happening, due to quantisation the 15μm photons will remain 15μm photons no matter how many times they bounce between H2O and CO2. That ought to be considered. It would mean H2O can’t take energy from from CO2 and re-emit it at a wavelength that CO2 can’t recapture. So how does re-routing happen?
It can only happen where thermalisation is significant, which is at the higher pressures. But is that low enough altitude that H2O is too abundant for CO2 to make any difference (via radiative absorption)? How does the re-routing happen?
I was taking the re-routing for granted and puzzled about how it affects the WVEL. But now I question the re-routing again, due to quantum effects. But there’s also a high probability I don’t understand the quantum effects of radiative transfer. Maybe the wavelengths are not locked in at 350mbar.
Temporarily stumped.
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Andrew,
I’ve no problem with you casting around for alternative possibilities but why not just accept that my convective description, complying as it does with both basic physics and observations (and with David’s new architecture) might have some merit ?
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I did some more reading and was reminded that transfer of absorbed photons into thermal energy is not only possible, but is practically required by the OLR spectral observations.
The fact that the characteristic curve from WV OLR matches the blackbody temperature of that altitude indicates thermal energy is transferred to line emissions, so it is possible for spectral absorption at that altitude to be transmitted to thermal motion, so thermalisation of radiation must be occurring in the region of interest (at 350..200mbar).
There’s no quantum locking of wavelengths.
CO2 has a strong absorption coefficent than H2O at the 667/cm band at surface level mixture, so that whole band is undoubtedly stronger than H2O at altitude 8km where H2O is present at much lower mixing ratio.
The CO2 is should be strong enough to make a difference at 8..10km.
I think that means the re-routing is probably back in the game.
00
Thanks Andrew.
The latest explanation of the rerouting and mechanism is:
Increasing the CO2 concentration warms the upper troposphere, because the emissions spectrum changes and less OLR is emitted from the upper troposphere by CO2 molecules. (See the last diagram on this page of Barrett-Bellamy and compare it to the blackbody radiance temperatures drawn on an observed emission spectrum such as from Nimbus.)
This heats neighboring molecules, including water vapor molecules in the WVEL, so more OLR is emitted by water vapor molecules.
How does increased CO2 cause the average height of the WVEL to decline?
Atmospheric water vapor is dynamic, so meteorology is involved. In contrast, CO2 is relative-ly static and well-mixed, so radiative concerns are usually sufficient to explain its behavior.
Upper tropospheric warming by increased CO2 distorts the local lapse rate, lowering it because less heat is lost to OLR (the average lapse rate is 6.5 °C per km, a positive number). The atmosphere around the WVEL altitude becomes warmer and more stable. The moist air rising by convection thus rises less vigorously, so not as high, and so the average height of the WVEL declines. The WVEL is warmer both because the upper troposphere is generally warmer and because the WVEL is at a lower altitude.
Because increasing CO2 lowers the vigor of convection in the upper troposphere, humidity builds up and clouds condense at lower levels, suggesting the average height of the cloud top emission layer would also decline. So the rerouting feedback may involve an increase in OLR from cloud tops as well as from the WVEL.
This explanation of the lowering of the WVEL by the rerouting feedback relies only on the altered movements of water vapor due to increased CO2, rather than on radiation transfer.
10
A couple of thoughts: The 15 um back-radiation at 8 – 10 km (the average height of the WVEL) would increase as the CO2 concentration increased, because there are more CO2 molecules above the WVEL in the wings of the CO2 blockage (where the big spectrum changes occur as the CO2 concentration increases). This would make the CO2 molecules at the WVEL height more energetic.
At that height, as I understand it, LTE predominates, so thermal collisions are far more frequent than re-emissions of absorbed photons. So the CO2 molecules that absorbed a photon mainly transfer energy to the WV molecules by thermal collision rather than re-emit the photon.
Maybe, following Andrew’s original comment, the WV just above the WVEL is where the energy is being taken out of the WV population — they are emitting OLR more frequently, so they cool and fall down. It’s plausible, maybe. Like burning off the very top of the WV molecules. That allows the WV to be both more energetic (emitting more OLR), and the WVEL to fall.
Btw, recall that the WVEL is fairly dynamic, moving up and down locally. We are only talking average heights here.
23
Hmmm.
Is it a matter of energy being taken out of the WV population? Is that necessary at all?
Convection must be less vigorous if there is a reduction of the lapse rate slope and so the WV population doesn’t rise as high in the first place.
On that basis there is no need for more complex speculations. An explanation should be as simple as possible but no simpler.
Anyway, if H20 molecules are constantly receiving collisional energy from CO2 molecules and then passing that energy on by radiating it out to space they would remain warm and not fall wouldn’t they?
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David Evans November 13, 2015 at 9:45 pm ·
“A couple of thoughts: The 15 um back-radiation at 8 – 10 km (the average height of the WVEL) would increase as the CO2 concentration
increased, because there are more CO2 molecules above the WVEL in the wings of the CO2 blockage (where the big spectrum changes occur as the CO2 concentration increases).”
Only if the fantasy of ‘back radiation’ can ever be demonstrated. If such can be demonstrated, all of Maxwell’s equations are successfully contradicted. What odds do you give on any such demonstration happening in your lifetime?
There is no more CO2 emission spectrum fill in at the pressure and temperature at 8-10 km. all of the claimed fill in comes from the WV and cloud top continuum. Please use ModTran to give you the very sparse CO2 lines outside of 14-16 µ at that altitude. You cannot use the Doppler spectrum from 100kPa.
“This would make the CO2 molecules at the WVEL height more energetic. Maybe, following Andrew’s original comment, the WV just above the WVEL is where the energy is being taken out of the WV population — they are emitting OLR more frequently, so they cool and fall down.”
Good God! using quantum mechanics as a concept for atmospheric thermal EM radiation. Look up the energy requirements for a CO2 molecular population inversion leading to CO2 emission at 9.6 µ This is the quantum effect. The thermal effect is from the resonant bending moment (noise) completely maintained by the temperature of the gas. It is not some tempory excited state that relaxes. There is no measurable temperature change for even a large number of CO2 molecules spontaneously emitting 0.066 ev wavelets. The vast N2 and O2 neighbors continuously supply any flux emitted in a direction of lower 14-16 µ radiance!
“It’s plausible, maybe. Like burning off the very top of the WV molecules. That allows the WV to be both more energetic (emitting more OLR), and the WVEL to fall.”
It is in no way plausible, it is fantasy!
“Btw, recall that the WVEL is fairly dynamic, moving up and down locally. We are only talking average heights here.”
You simply cannot ever write intelligently of an average altitude or temperature. Over the whole band from 5-80 µ is highly non linear over even a ΔT of 20°C. Perhaps an average spectral exit flux has some meaning.
The whole tropospheric column temperature is much greater sunside than nightside. While the actual lapse is a complex trade between the gravity induced laps, as modified (reduced) by the actual production of sensible heat from the latent, powering EM exitance from that altitude. At condensing altitudes rate of dispersion of produced sensible heat tending to new equiblrium lapse strictly limits rate of condensation. The rate controls the lapse not the other way round. As the condensate collects at cloud lower level some re-evaporates also maintaining the finely tuned lapse.
Andrew McRae is already introducing much nonsense into your well prepared series, and he is an amateur!! Just wait ’till the highly paid pro come ’round for lunch! Guess which delicacy they plan to fest upon!
All the best! -will-
[You could have said this in a less confrontational and edgy manner and it would still get your point across.] AZ
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Will mashed:
…”Here we present observationally based evidence of clear-sky CO2 surface radiative forcing that is directly attributable to the increase, between 2000 and 2010, of 22 parts per million atmospheric CO2.”…
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v519/n7543/full/nature14240.html
This evidence does not contradict Maxwell’s equations, it only contradicts your nonsense!
Breath-taking audacity. In the link I gave the very first picture was a comparison of observed OLR and RTM-calculated OLR, where the overall curve follows a classic blackbody shape but with some chunks removed where in the 15μm band the surface radiative flux has been attenuated by the atmosphere.
False! If this radiation band had been spatially modulated within the atmosphere its frequency would not have changed and its energy would still be detected in the average from the sensor as the receiving radiosonde moved through the sky.
Scattering? Such desperation. Short wavelengths like UV scatter much more than long wave lengths like ‘red’, and this is longwave infra-red in question! If this band had been merely scattered, not attenuated, then 15μm radiation of strong 288K intensity should be received by spectrometers looking between 30° and 90° away from nadir at the top of the atmosphere. Where is your evidence of this occurring? No wibbly-wobbly word salad, no hand waving. Janoschka, where is your observational evidence?
You have no evidence of scattering, no evidence of spatial modulation, and the observed amplitude modulation is therefore only explicable by absorption and attenuation of the flux.
And regardless of your radiative rantings, RTMs can only be empirically tested in the real atmosphere by making the same type of measurement as that picture. You cannot dispute that the RTM simulated the spectroscopic measurement almost perfectly. In 1970! It is old news that RTMs work properly.
Just word salad! Seriously, can anyone extract any cohesive meaning from those two sentences? It took me three attempts and there is nobody else on this blog who is as cryptic as that. You could have simply written: “Emission of heat during condensation of rising air will warm the surrounding air and reduce the lapse rate.” Only 35% of the words and much easier for everyone to understand. The idea in your head may be true, but the rest of us will never know it as long as you write word salad.
Janoschka, nearly every paragraph you write is incomprehensible and the few shown above that can be understood are often demonstrably false. Whether that is because you have a mental disorder or bad English skills or are just a very gifted troll, I don’t know and don’t care. The end result is the same. You should not accuse others of being unable to write intelligently while you are posting falsehoods and word salad in every comment. Every comment!
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Andrew McRae November 14, 2015 at 3:08 pm
wj:”[comment 14.2.1.4.2] While the actual lapse is a complex trade between the gravity induced laps, as modified (reduced) by the actual production of sensible heat from the latent, powering EM exitance from that altitude. At condensing altitudes rate of dispersion of produced sensible heat tending to new equilibrium lapse strictly limits rate of condensation.”)
am:”Just word salad! Seriously, can anyone extract any cohesive meaning from those two sentences? It took me three attempts and there is nobody else on this blog who is as cryptic as that.”
Indeed! I have no need to cater to idiots!
If you can point out an error, (with or without understanding), perhaps I can improve the statement, without introducing misdirection or confusion.
“You could have simply written: “Emission of heat during condensation of rising air will warm the surrounding air and reduce the lapse rate.” Only 35% of the words and much easier for everyone to understand.”
But such would only be BS as you wish to write on toothpaste boxes! You seem to have no concept of understanding! Only selling to those that think they know, rather than admit “I do not know”, all that retain any personal integrity!
AM;: The idea in your head may be true, but the rest of us will never know it as long as you write word salad.”
The rest of you that refuse to learn, I could not give a shiat about!
Many do not agree. Some then read again then express WTF over! My audience, not ever a CCC troll!
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Andrew McRae November 14, 2015 at 3:08 pm
(“Will mashed: [comment 14.2.1.4.2] Only if the fantasy of ‘back radiation’ can ever be demonstrated. If such can be demonstrated, all of Maxwell’s equations are successfully contradicted.”)
from somewhere not identified: …”Here we present observationally based evidence of clear-sky CO2 surface radiative forcing that is directly attributable to the increase, between 2000 and 2010, of 22 parts per million atmospheric CO2.”…
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v519/n7543/full/nature14240.html
This evidence does not contradict Maxwell’s equations, it only contradicts your nonsense!
All that you have demonstrated is that you have no education nor experience Of electro-magnetic radiation whatsoever! Like most of the CCC trolls, you claim the EM ‘radiance’ (a potential) actually implies a flux (EM power transfer between locations). Such is the epitome of ignorance.
wj:(“[comment 14.2.1.5] Your RTM’s never can replicate any flux attenuation (absorption of steady state electromagnetic radiative power) by this atmosphere, nor were they ever, since 1975 intended to do such.”)
“Breath-taking audacity. In the link I gave the very first picture was a comparison of observed OLR and RTM-calculated OLR, where the overall curve follows a classic blackbody shape but with some chunks removed where in the 15μm band the surface radiative flux has been attenuated by the atmosphere.”
Just what do your fantasy graphs have to do with the why and when of what was measured 1968-1974?
wj:”[comment 14.2.1.5] All in situ measurements have used an amplitude modulated thermal source for such identification. The result is a measurement of combined low pass filtering of amplitude or spatial modulation by the path thermal mass, and scattering by that path.”
“False! If this radiation band had been spatially modulated within the atmosphere its frequency would not have changed and its energy would still be detected in the average from the sensor as the receiving radiosonde moved through the sky.”
You are spouting only of your ignorance of EMR, complete with ignorance of what amplitude or spatial modulation may mean! You radiosondes measure only thermometric temperature that has nothing to do with atmospheric EMR flux transfer!
Scattering? Such desperation. Short wavelengths like UV scatter much more than long wave lengths like ‘red’, and this is longwave infra-red in question! If this band had been merely scattered, not attenuated, then 15μm radiation of strong 288K intensity should be received by spectrometers looking between 30° and 90° away from nadir at the top of the atmosphere. Where is your evidence of this occurring? No wibbly-wobbly word salad, no hand waving. Janoschka, where is your observational evidence?
And what may you mean by scattering? The useful 8-13 µ band has moderate amplitude attenuation, but sufficient spatial scattering to quite limit useful identification at distances greater than 30km! All of my observational evidence is still classified by the US Government. The paywall for the original
is one case of Millers from any Russian sailor!
“You have no evidence of scattering, no evidence of spatial modulation, and the observed amplitude modulation is therefore only explicable by absorption”
The techniques of amplitude modulation, and directional deviation were all developed in the 60s-70s to establish the limits of atmospheric ‘seeing’ all developed at an obscene price!
It is you that ‘must’ demonstrate that the numbers in the HiTran database have anything whatsoever to do with attenuation of equilibrium, or very low frequency (more than 6 minutes per cycle).
Good God what a Confused arrogant climate academic, CACA (kaka)!
perhaps more later David!
010
Will mashed:
Nope. It was from somewhere identified, it was from the next hyperlink that you certainly didn’t even bother to read or you would have noticed that’s where the quoted text was from. You aren’t even interested in reading evidence, let alone incorporating it into your world view.
Nope, that is not a quote, I never used the word “radiance” in that comment. You are a troll.
The question was whether back-radiation exists, and that is a flux, not a statement about the net direction of power transfer. An EM sensor (such as a spectrometer) can measure a signal from backradiation regardless of whether the net energy flow is into or away from the sensor, it only requires backradiation to create a variation in input flux into the sensor. But in that aspect of radiative transfer, the sensor cannot be behaving any different to the boundary layer of air.
The effect on net irradiance of the boundary layer is then obvious. As the net radiative power transfer is the difference between outgoing and incoming radiative fluxes, an increase in incoming flux (as observed) must either increase a net radiative gain or decrease a net radiative loss. During the day there is a net radiative gain by the earth, during the night there is a net radiative loss, and the backradiation affects both.
Really basic stuff that you either do not understand or pretend you don’t understand.
I laughed. You are writing comedy now, surely.
As I said, every comment you write is either word salad or false and you now demonstrate you cannot do any better even when pressured to do so.
No further correspondence will be entered into on this topic.
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“[You could have said this in a less confrontational and edgy manner and it would still get your point across.] AZ”
Can you give an example of what you claim?
01
Andrew McRae November 12, 2015 at 11:44 pm
This is the true CCC nonsense. What spectroscopic measurement have you done? Reading about it is not enough, nullius in verba! There is no such 30 year old fact! There is only a 30 year continuous intent distract and confuse for profit!
Your RTM’s never can replicate any flux attenuation (absorption of steady state electromagnetic radiative power) by this atmosphere, nor were they ever, since 1975 intended to do such. The purpose of such model is only to access path length effects on atmospheric seeing. Such flux attenuation has never been measured in situ nor in a lab under atmospheric conditions, as no one knows how to do that!
The only measurements that can distinguish the EMR attenuation through a gas path of some of reasonable length from the flux from that gas path must provide a means for identifying just what is being absorbed.
All in situ measurements have used an amplitude modulated thermal source for such identification. The result is a measurement of combined low pass filtering of amplitude or spatial modulation by the path thermal mass, and scattering by that path. Absorption of flux by an atmospheric path at or near radiative equilibrium temperature simply does not have a viable measurement technique! Such is but CCC fantasy!
All the best! -will-
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Andrew, Stephen:
The rerouting mechanism is difficult to explain in solely radiative terms – Andrew and I are not coming up with anything much. However Stephen’s approach using meteorology provides an adequate explanation for the mechanism, and I think he has it right.
It is important to note the dynamism of water vapor, moving around and up and down– the movements of the water vapor bring meteorology into the picture. In contrast, CO2 is relatively well-mixed and static, so there is little or no role for meteorology.
How is this for a mechanism (basically what Stephen was saying):
1. Increasing CO2 warms the upper troposphere, as the increased concentration raises the CO2 emission layer at wavelengths in the wings about 15 microns. This may be thought of as increased back radiation from CO2 above, or simply less net cooling of the CO2 by OLR.
2. The warming causes local distortion in the lapse rate – at heights which were previously above the CO2 EL at a given wavelength but are now underneath it, and which are now warmer, have a decreased lapse rate (they lose less net heat to OLR). In this zone, the upper troposphere is warmer and more stable. (This sounds a lot like Paltridge’s explanation for the drying out of the upper troposphere – the lower troposphere becomes more stable, so less water vapor is entrained to rise into the upper troposphere.)
3. Increased stability and lower lapse rate at these heights, which include the WVEL (which is the average of the dynamic water vapor), cause water vapor ascending in this zone to ascend less far and less vigorously (as Stephen said in Comment 14.2.1.1). That lowers the average height of the top of the water vapor, i.e. it lowers the WVEL.
4. The WVEL is warmer because it is in the warmed zone. So it emits more OLR.
This explanation of WVEL suppression and rerouting has the advantage that the RTMs can be entirely correct – the mechanism falls outside their purview. The GCMs would need to find the lowered WVEL in the altered movements of water vapor (on short time scales and possibly at sub-cell spatial scales).
Done. I don’t feel that’s terribly clear, but it makes sense to me. Anyone care to improve on it?
11
Let’s make it even simpler.
The models assume that CO2 causes more absorbed radiation at the surface (solar plus increased DWIR) which leads to a higher surface temperature, faster convection along a stable lapse rate slope which leads to water vapour at a greater height with a higher water vapour emissions level and a tropospheric hot spot.
The observations point to the same absorbed radiation at the surface but CO2 causing a distorted lapse rate slope with warmer air aloft which inhibits convection leading to water vapour failing to rise so high with a lower, warmer water vapour emissions level and no tropospheric hot spot.
The GCMs anticipate a faster rate of convection from more CO2 but reality shows us a slower rate of convection from more CO2.
Problem solved.
As I have said several times in earlier posts here and elsewhere the presence of radiative gases assists radiative loss to space from within the atmosphere whereas in their absence all energy would have to be returned to the surface by the downward leg of convection before it could be emitted to space.
Therefore the presence of radiative gases means that convective overturning need work LESS hard in order to retain hydrostatic equilibrium (run slower) if radiative gases are present.
Climate science currently assumes the opposite and that error is incorporated in all the models.
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Stephen, “…which inhibits convection leading to water vapour failing to rise so high with a lower, warmer water vapour emissions level and no tropospheric hot spot”, and the lower WVEL results in more OLR from water vapor, and thus the rerouting.
00
Yes, a useful addition. Better to make it explicit rather than simply imply it.
IMHO the error in the models has now been precisely defined 🙂
28
Stephen says:
The greater WV at a given altitude due to surface warming seems safe enough.
The question mark is over your assumption that they assume lapse rate is constant. If they assume that you will have to prove they assume that. I had assumed it was a outcome of running the simulation, not fixed at the beginning. Regardless whether they do or don’t assume it, it seems rather unlikely that the GCMs would exhibit fixed lapse rate in response to either surface warming or H2O increase because the standard scenarios for basic RTMs already have different lapse rates for different temperature/WV combinations.
See MODTRAN online here: http://climatemodels.uchicago.edu/modtran/
1. Start with the Midlatitude Winter scenario. Notice the plot on the right of Temperature at different heights. This is the coldest and least GHG scenario. The lapse rate is modelled as exactly -6.0K/km.
2. Pick the Midlatitude Summer scenario and be careful to note how the Temperature/Altitude changes, the graph scale changes so you cannot tell visually, you have to check the numbers. With more water vapour, the model lapse rate gets steeper. It’s -6.38K/km.
3. Pick the Tropical scenario, which has the most WV and highest surface temperature. The model lapse rate gets steeper again. It’s now -6.66K/km.
I would be surprised if that was incorrect because these lapse rates are standard inputs to the model, not outputs, but the correctness isn’t my first point. First point is…
The above amplification of the lapse rate co-incidental with increasing WV and temperature as a stock-standard test scenario for an RTM probably implies that GCMs would be considered wrong by mainstream Cli-Sci if they didn’t exhibit these changes in lapse rate between seasons, and would have been “repaired” long ago. Assuming the GCMs keep lapse rate constant seems unlikely, but still, if you dig into the code or the papers about them maybe you will find differently. If you don’t want to do that digging, just go with what seems likely, which is they do not assume a constant lapse rate.
Second point is the correctness.
For “warmer air aloft” you want a lapse rate reduction, that’s the opposite of these standard scenarios.
If the above scenarios are real evidence of more GHGs causing steeper lapse rates then you may have a problem saying the opposite happens at the WVEL.
I’d like to say more, but it would be better for you to have a think about these summer/winter differences and comment on whether they are problematic for the meteorological lapse rate modification.
~ ~ ~ ~
David says:
For explaining this scenario, a mechanism happening at 8km, it is backradiation from the CO2 above it which reduces net cooling at that altitude, so it is both.
I get the stability part, because warmer air is less dense air, means a rising air pocket has less buoyancy force when it reaches 8km so won’t rise as fast/far.
But wait… you also warmed the surface, so the air started off less buoyant than before when it began rising. Do the two effects cancel out?
I’d guess… If there is more warming at 8km than the surface, then No.
That will have to do for the moment.
Still haven’t decided on this meteorological solution as I want to hear more from Stephen regarding summer/winter discrepancies.
50
Andrew,
I seem to recall that the models apply the global average moist lapse rate of 6.5C per km which accommodates the seasonal and latitudinal variations that you mention. Obviously the models will adequately deal with seasonal and latitudinal lapse rate variations but they don’t accurately apply the effect of CO2 changes off the surface as per David’s revised architecture since their architecture places all the warming effect from CO2 at the surface.
That is why David’s architectural revision is helpful.
The position is slightly more complex than summarised in this thread. CO2 reduces the lapse rate slope until somewhere around the point of hydrostatic balance but then the slope steepens again above that point due to increasing emissions to space. The inflection point is density related.
See my diagrams here:
http://joannenova.com.au/2015/10/for-discussion-can-convection-neutralize-the-effect-of-greenhouse-gases/
26
Andrew, “Do the two effects cancel out?”
The bigger picture is that surface warming or the solar response causes increased WV and a rising WVEL (and maybe a steeper lapse rate to add vigor to the upward convection of WV). But the radiosonde data since the 1970s implies a steady or even descending WVEL. Thus we deduce that the rerouting feedback (or other feedbacks to increasing CO2) is lowering the WVEL (and maybe a less steep lapse rate and more stable upper troposphere, reduce upward vigor at WVEL heights).
Surface warming and the rerouting are tugging in opposite directions. For the last few decades, rerouting (WVEL) down seems to have won slightly.
Btw, at the MODTRAN link given I don’t see seasonal scenarios, or how to read off tropospheric lapse rates except by using the rollover on the graph then getting out the calculator.
00
Stephen,
If you know the models have lapse rate variations (in either input or output) then you know (now) they aren’t assuming the lapse rate is constant.
In hindsight I should have looked more widely for actual in-situ seasonal lapse rate data, not manufactured model inputs. Haven’t found much yet so I’m probably DDG’ing the wrong terms. Interesting that this example from Florida seems to show identical lapse rates in February and August. If that is typical then I do not know how the MODTRAN scenarios can be realistic. It’s Bizarro-World.
I don’t see how your answer resolves the summer/winter test. You’re saying the ELR steepens below “the point of hydrostatic balance”, then reduces again above that point, but does that leave the ELR overall the same afterwards as before? How can there be any single “point of hydrostatic balance” when every point in the atmosphere is achieving hydrostatic balance? Did you mean the tropopause?
Sorry but from my point of view that answer contained no information, just more mystery.
The summer/winter test is a pretty straightforward test. Twice per year the Earth does a natural GHG injection experiment where more H2O is pushed into the troposphere of a hemisphere. If the MODTRAN input scenarios were representative of reality then they show the change in lapse rate from a combination of increasing a GHG (any GHG) and surface warming is lapse rate steepening all the way from H=0 to H=10km. That sounds like it is fatal to any theory that says there is an anti-greenhouse effect at the WVEL that pushes the lapse rate shallower. I would like you to explain why that line of argument is either A) not relevant in any way to your lapse rate hypothesis, or B) relevant but mistaken, or C) relevant and correct.
~ ~ ~
David,
Okay they are opposite but not equal, so not necessarily cancelling. Helpful to keep the observed end result in mind I guess.
>> “except by using the rollover on the graph then getting out the calculator.”
Well, yes, that’s how I did it. Afraid of getting out the calculator? Isn’t that like hearing Jacques Cousteau say he’s afraid of getting wet? Heheh.
~ ~ ~
Guys, I’m all ClimateChanged out from the weekend and this thread has reached the depth limit. I’ll take a few days off from thinking about this, perhaps in the hope of getting some more inspiration.
So don’t expect a reply soon, and perhaps we may begin a new thread on this page or elsewhere for the next round of WVEL mechanics.
60
Andrew,
I meant that the models assume that the lapse rate is constant in relation to any thermal effect from CO2. They get the seasonal and latitudinal variations adequately. They assume that CO2 warms the surface whereas in fact it warms the air off the surface so as to distort the lapse rate slope. Can you show that they do accommodfate lapse rate distortions caused by CO2?
The point of hydrostatic balance should perhaps be better described as the point of hydrostatic equilibrium where the upward pressure gradient force matches the downward force of gravity. That would be at or near the centre of mass which is well below the tropopause.
If you look at my diagrams you will see that the entire rising column has the lapse rate shited to the warm side so that there has to be an overshoot to a point above the tropopause.
Likewise the entire descending column has the lapse rate shifted to the cold side and the tropopause drops.
Thus the ELR does not match the DALR in either column but the two distortions offset each other’s thermal effect at the surface which is then corrected by horizontal surface winds.
I would say that the answer to your question is A – not relevant. Water vapour is special in that it is lighter than air and releases latent heat of condensation at height which is known to alter the lapse rate slope hence the moist and wet lapse rates.
The models already use the average global lapse rate which includes the effect of water vapour and so they adequately mirror the seasonal and latitudinal effect. AFAIK they do not take the extra step of mirroring any lapse rate slope changes from adding more CO2. Nor do they need to do so for all practical purposes because the DALR is set by mass and gravity whereas the mass of CO2 is too small to have a significant effect. The effect of CO2 on the lapse rate is likely vastly overstated in my diagram relative to the reality but it makes the necessary point.
37
“The models assume that CO2 causes more absorbed radiation at the surface (solar plus increased DWIR) which leads to a higher surface temperature, faster convection along a stable lapse rate slope which leads to water vapour at a greater height with a higher water vapour emissions level and a tropospheric hot spot.”
Where is your evidence that that is what the models assume?
“The observations point to the same absorbed radiation at the surface but CO2 causing a distorted lapse rate slope with warmer air aloft which inhibits convection leading to water vapour failing to rise so high with a lower, warmer water vapour emissions level and no tropospheric hot spot.”
Where is your evidence of any such sort of observations, by anyone, at any time?
“The GCMs anticipate a faster rate of convection from more CO2 but reality shows us a slower rate of convection from more CO2.”
What sort of reality can you ever express?
You spout but have no science. You promote meteorology, but can never express meteorological terms! The CCC has their adjusted observations, you have none! Your spouting is even less scientific than that of Gary Novak pravda, or even Doug Cotton!! 🙁 Do you also have a book to sell!
82
I think of the alternative climate model as the top-down climate model.
30
Richard , rather than a bottom up or top down model, i try to imagine a central middle atmospheric model that accounts for both incoming and out going radiation in the same way that a ring road in a city deals with incoming and outgoing traffic during the rush hours.In the evening rush hour,when the sun is setting, traffic (outgoing radiation) can become congested at the “ring road” ,the basic model suggests it is trapped , but Dr Evans shows that the traffic (radiation) will simply leave by a alternative less congested route . In the morning rush hour ( as the sun rises ) not all the incoming traffic ( short wave from the rising sun ) uses the ring road to get to the city centre ( ground level ) some of the incoming traffic uses the ringroad to avoid the city centre ( short wave radiation being reflected from the atmospheric ring road back out to space. PS i’m not sure yet whether or not to describe this analogy as a one ring road system or a city with an inner and an outer ring road .
20
This post clearly demonstrates one of my basic theorems about theories. Until you get the qualitative aspects of your theory correct, any quantitative use of your theory is very likely to fail to fit reality.
Using the standard theory of climate change fails to fit the empirical data when all the data is considered. The standard methods of data correction to make the data fit the theory fail to describe reality nor the theory if viewed over a large enough volume of 4 space (3D + time).
Computations using “Good’Evens” theory with a very simple modification of the core theory’s plumbing yield results that match the data much more closely than the best of the standard theories. The cause of this improvement is the simple fact that the qualitative aspects of the theory better matches reality. It follows that the quantitative results will better match reality.
I would observe that if what you are using doesn’t have to work, it doesn’t matter what you use. If it does, then using things that incrementally better match reality is the most important part of your process. Eventually, your process will become good enough to be useful in the real world where all of us must live. If living is not your goal, then it doesn’t matter what you do.
51
The final phrase “what you do” would be better as “what you use.”
00
Chuckle 🙂
30
Thank you Dr Evans (and Jo) for this effort. It must have taken both hard work and long hours.
Without having deleved into the details, I too think that multiple pipes, and the analogy of a dam, whose water will find different ways around (changing or new) obstacles is persuasive.
I hope it will be well received and treated fairly, by people who still care for real proper science.
Apparently, those who don’t (or don’t care) feel that they by now are so many that they can get away with this openly. However I hope that this will be proven wrong, hopefully in the near future ..
60
Been wondering about the diagram, because it appeals to me. Wouldn’t the CO2 pipe be better represented as follows:
1) Mostly (entirely?) below dam water level.
2) A vertically elongated triangle with flat bottom and concave curved sides.
3) 80% of the cross-sectional surface area blocked by a gate (from the bottom up), which has moved up slightly over time to represent a 1% loss in available cross-sectional area for water flow.
This would indicate that the flow out of the CO2 pipe is limited by the remaining cross-sectional area open to water flow.
Maybe I am taking the analogy too far 😀
00
oops – replying here was a bit random >.>
00
I should add – no idea what shape would be appropriate for the other pipes, but the round CO2 pipe kinda bothers me 😛
00
It did me too, but it’s just a first pass diagram. Intended to instil the idea into the mind before getting into the details.
I was trying to come up with better ways to show the idea while still keeping the dam analogy. There are better, more accurate ways to be sure, but you lose the instant recognition of the idea in the process.
10
I’m going off-topic here, but as a German and English language speaker, I’m always irritated by the American use of the word ‘dumb’ when referring to stupidity. I suppose (or should I say ‘guess’ here to keep the English suitably Americanised?)that it’s come from the German word ‘dumm’ – meaning stupid, dull, or silly.
The Germans also have the delightful ‘dummkopf’, defined in my dictionary as a ‘blockhead’ – an English word not heard much these days unfortunately!
Here in the UK, ‘dumb’ has, in the days before the English language was mangled, generally referred to a person who can’t speak.
I prefer words such as stupid, ridiculous, laughable – they add variety and colour in a way that the appalling ‘dumb’ never can!
00
I agree, it’s all a bit silly isn’t it?
10
Dummkopf is a great word that has entered the English language.
As a Canadian, I like UK expressions like “thick” and “daft” which I still recall from Beatles interviews. And, of course, American English uses phrases like “one taco short of a combo plate”, which, when you think about it, is pretty funny. Maybe we can appropriate this structure into something like, “one tree ring short of a useful climate theory”.
10
BallBounces: variants in the UK include ‘a sandwich short of a picnic’ and ‘as thick as nineteen lavatory seats bolted together’
Much better than ‘dumb’!
00
Thank you very much for this execellent post. This discussion helps to make the model clearer to my math deprived brain. I tend to think of the gases of the two “greenhouse gas” pipes (CO2 and H2O) as actually restricting the flow in those respective pipes according to their concentration so as to clarify the process in my own head. This also may help explain another problem I’ve had with the conventional model for some time. If in the usual GCM’s a large part of the warming comes from positive feedback where a rise in CO2 causes some obligate atmospheric warming which then causes a rise in water vapour (effective increase in WVEL) which then causes additional warming, why then doesn’t that additional warming then cause additional increase in water vapour (and perhaps even CO2 through various mechanisms) and then yet additional warming? Why is it not a continuous positive feedback loop and why do the models not then predict out of control accelerated warming? Positive feedback is a nasty thing so what keeps the conventional model from turning the atmosphere into a blast furnace? It makes way more sense to me in the four pipes model.
60
Hi David and Jo, great work and very very interesting stuff. Around mid 2013 I took a look at some olwir data from NOAA, totalled it over the globe and graphed it, compared with satellite temps, and derived an SB graph. Probably full of holes, data quality issues, etc, but you might like to take a look. Cheers, Robin (ps – just another electrical engineer)
http://www.kiwithinker.com/2014/10/an-empirical-look-at-recent-trends-in-the-greenhouse-effect/
60
Robin, interesting post you put up.
I was reluctant to use NOAA’s OLR data because it didn’t have sufficient resolution for the model in post 18, but you have used it well for another purpose.
Good argument. This would seem to support the rerouting feedback or something very like it, while directly opposing water vapor amplification. Lindzen’s 2011 result and the missing hotspot also agree. All the empirical observations are saying if it gets hotter there is more OLR. No missing heat.
This series of posts suggests how the conventional models got it wrong, and that the fairly mundane answer probably is just “rerouting”, which was overlooked because it is not a feedback to surface warming.
(One cannot see voltage or current, so electrical engineers are used to inferring everything, working with black box models — EE is all models. Transferring those skills to climate is easy.)
61
Robin, big caveat has to made there. Remember blackbody theory can only make predictions about blackbodies… or greybodies with the appropriate emissivity scalar, but the thermal band reflectivity of the air is nil so the air is close to being a blackbody for OLR.
Anyhow, when you apply S-B law backwards to figure out effective emissivity, you have to use the temperature of the atmospheric blackbody. One key requirement for a blackbody is that there is as much radiative power going into it as out of it. Whatever virtual surface in the atmosphere meets that criteria is the surface whose temperature (or emissivity) is predicted by the formula.
The physical surface of the earth does not qualify, as there is more radiation going into it than coming out of it (due to convection carrying the rest of the power and convection only goes upwards).
However I would be cautious about assuming the satellite-derived TLT temperature is the blackbody temperature, because the satellites make their calculations from oxygen emission lines, whereas most OLR is from H2O and CO2. May relate to different virtual surfaces if the two species have very different average heights of emission.
Having said that, even with a proper calculation using the radiosonde temperature at the WVEL altitude (350mbar) it would be surprising if the trend was the opposite of what you calculated. I’d guess you would still get a trend in the same direction, just different magnitude.
Since you are more interested in trends in emissivity, you could try a differential analysis. (Your diagram shows emissivity over time, but the causality being tested is emissivity over temperature or maybe emissivity relative to CO2 concentration if you really want to put the cat amongst the pigeons).
I’ll try to find the trend in WVEL emissivity over time.
If F is the radiosity…
F = E * σ * T^4
E = F/(σ*T^4)
These are functions of time, so…
E(t) = F(t)/(σ*T(t)^4)
We want the trend over a period, so
plug this into WolframAlpharemember all your tricky differential calculus rules. 😉dE(t)/dt = ( T(t)*F'(t) – 4*F(t)*T'(t) ) / (σ*T(t)^5)
In the formula the rates of change can be taken from the trend of the 21 year period (1979-1999) and use the average of the whole period as the “actual value at point in time”.
The time rate of change of temperature at the 350mbar level might be guesstimated from Santer’s radiosonde diagram as being being 0.0 and 0.1°/decade. Getting the data from the MetOffice the 300mb trend is 0.013°/year and at 500mbar it’s 0.009°/year. So 350mbar will be pretty close to ( 0.25×0.009 + 0.75×0.013 = ) 0.012°/year.
Unfortunately the data they give out is anomaly, not absolute, and we need absolute. From the standard atmosphere model, temperature at 8km is 236K. The change over the interval is less than 0.3 out of 236. I’ll use the stereotypical value for temperature in the hope the difference from the real average is not significant to the end result.
Now for OLR at TOA, which you already have. From the data in your spreadsheet, the average OLR over the interval is 231.17 and the trend is -0.01 .
dE(t)/dt = ( T(t)*F'(t) – 4*F(t)*T'(t) ) / (σ*T(t)^5)
Substitute…
dE(t)/dt = ( 236 * -0.01 – 4 * 231.17 * 0.012 ) / ( 5.67*10^-8 * 236^5)
dE(t)/dt = −0.00032 /year
This also says the emissivity is virtually unchanging, though slightly decreasing based on those figures.
That is interesting because a decrease is what greenhouse theory predicts, but is the opposite of the trend you found using satellite TLT.
Some sensitivity analysis…
Repeat the calculation with 237, -0.012, 232.0, 0.015 ….
dE(t)/dt = −0.00039 /year
Repeat the calculation with 235, -0.008, 230.0, 0.009 ….
dE(t)/dt = −0.00025 /year
So it is relatively robust to small errors in measurements.
Over 20 years what difference is that: −0.00032 * 20 = −0.0064 difference in emissivity.
That’s a difference in outgoing radiosity of −0.0064 × 5.67×10⁻⁸ × (236^4) = -1.1 W/m^2
Which in conventional dogma is the same as increasing input by 1.1 W/m^2.
How does this compare to the mainstream prediction of change from CO2 over that period?
dF = 5.35 × ln (369.5÷336.8) = +0.5 W/m^2
Well isn’t that interesting. When the radiosonde WVEL temperature and NOAA OLR are examined with the Stefan-Boltzmann theory it says emissivity reductions between 1979 and 2000 have made double the radiative forcing in the lower troposphere than global warming theory predicts from CO2.
Probably some clever person will happen along shortly to explain where my analysis has gone wrong. But gosh it was fun while it lasted.
60
A great way of thanking David and Jo would be by using the “tip box”.
—
Thanks.Yes. That’s very helpful. – jo
50
Is there an error here?
It adds the radiation imbalances due to the various influences on climate, which for basic models are principally the changes in “absorbed absorbed” ??? Sunlight?
11
Thanks! Fixed.
10
I believe that “New Science 3: formula (11) should use a division sign instead of a multiplication sign.
“It is less than one. If it were greater than or equal to one then the infinite sum implicit in the denominator in Eq.s (7) and (9) would not converge and the computed surface warming would be infinite.)”
01
CC Reader: It is a division already, effectively, because the second factor is raised to the power of -1. It was expressed this way to emphasize that lambda-0 is one divided by 3.2, the Planck feedback value from AR5.
20
thinking about the anology using pipes, the conventional models restrict flow through the water vapour pipe also, as a result of the co2 pipe outflow being restricted. It’s like they are both controled by a single tap.
with the David’s model, I believe from what I have read, that a better anology would be one in which the co2 outflow and the water vapour outflow pipes are also controled by a single tap,,,but,,,this tap, when turned to restrict the outflow from the co2 pipe similtaneously opens up flow through the water vapour pipe.
This way there is no rise in water level.
00
Great stuff David. You should send your work to the IPCC, the Whitehouse and to every alarmist centre.
I have learnt a great deal reading this series as well as the very informative comments by individuals like Stephen Wilde who clearly know their stuff. I trust the regular readers of your site will show their appreciation appropriately (Tip Box). Once again congratulations.
31
With all due respect Andrew … what makes you think any of the organisations you mention are interested in the truth? I share your enthusiasm but it is governed by experience suggesting that truth is one of the last things on their list of priorities… that is, assuming it is even on the list.
42
Jo,
You say:-
Have you been reading JRR Tolkien perhaps?
10
Who is Sauron? Soros?
30
The orcs are easy to identify, greenies 🙂
20
Philip: Joanne doesn’t read Tolkien. I slipped that in as a last minute edit.
40
I am certain you will not get anyone building/using a GCM to accept:
‘”they basically have the same two major architectural flaws as the basic climate model”
You will need to be more specific on how the GCM architecture fails to get any attention on that front. The CO2 response is not assumed to be the same as the solar response in GCMs so that flaw does not apply – at least not directly to the atmospheric cells and earth surface level in the models.
This paper tries to isolate the influence of the WVEL in a CGCM:
https://wiki.umn.edu/pub/WaterVapor1/WebHome/Tropospheric_Water_Vapor_and_Climate_Sensitivity.pdf
It might be of interest in terms of what can be constrained in the models. It is not evident to me what is assumed in the model architecture, what can be paramaterised and what is calculated in the models. (I am somewhat surprised that doing model runs is now termed “Experiments” as if the data produced has relevance to the real measured world.)
It would be interesting to see if anyone has ever correlated the WVEL from the various models with actual data.
50
astute comment RW. When you say “ever” in the last paragraph are you excluding papers where it is included but not specifically isolated as a parameter?
20
It could be parameterised input or it could be a determined variable.
From the particular paper I referenced the water vapour distribution has been both parameterised and determined as an intermediate variable depending on the model set up.
I am interested in a comparison of a range of models with each in its least constrained case. Then compare the WVEL form all the models with measured results. Do they all show an ascending WVEL? Is there significant variation and why?
30
One can only wish …
Although it may seem obvious, the odds are heavily against it being done. I recall a comment from Judith Curry along the lines of “No one goes back to re-test older model versions, there is no interest”. If the WVEL is parameterised in the current crop of models, why would anyone then test “determinations” of the same variable ? More exciting, and rewarding, to “re-parameterise” and conduct another “experiment” (model run)
00
Rick: That these flaws exist in the conventional basic climate model is beyond doubt — just look at Fig.2 of post 3. That’s just maths.
Some might dispute that these flaws are material — but fitting climate data to the alternative model, which is the same model but with the flaws fixed, shows that the ECS drops by an order of magnitude to less than 0.5C. So they are almost certainly very material.
Some might dispute they are present in the GCMs. However comparing Fig.s 2 and 3 of post 17, or simply perusing the literature on GCMs, shows that they are present to a substantial degree in the GCMs too. Those figures show that the solar response is being applied to the influence of CO2 — broadly the same feedbacks, producing the same water vapor amplification, which is the opposite to the rerouting feedback idea. The radiosondes and Spencer’s satellite analysis that looked for the hotspot would imply rerouting is occurring but not water vapor amplification. The long term rise in OLR with temperature, the pause, and Lindzen’s 2011 paper would back that up.
The significance of the conventional basic model is discussed in post 1. AGW will not be invalidated without invalidating that model (a necessary but not sufficient condition).
The paper you mention reports on GCM “experiments”. But GCMs have a faulty architecture.
The GCMs, like the basic model, are so badly wrong they need substantial modification. All the GCMs rely on a strongly rising WVEL (a hotspot) to get enough warming from CO2 to match the observed warming from the 1970’s to 90’s. But there was no hotspot, so none of the GCMs correlate with the observed WVEL movement, even in sign. So it almost certainly wasn’t CO2 causing that warming.
22
David
Can you provide a paper by another author that looks at the WVEL used in or produced by the various GCMs and compares that with measured results? I know you have given an example. I would like to know if anyone else is making the same observation and, more specifically, how the various GCMs compare with regard to this aspect.
20
Rick, no I don’t know of any such study or paper. It’s sort of an everyone-knows thing — if there is no water vapor amplification (i.e. ascending WVEL) then the surface warming due to CO2 is much too small to account for the bulk of the warming since 1900 or 1970. So they all need it.
GISS model E is a prototypical GCM. There are variations on it, but it is middle of the pack AFAIK.
In the later part of this series we try to find what did cause the global warming, and find it is probably changes to EDA (see post 10) — or at least, EDA seems like a sufficient answer that fits much of the anomalous evidence, though we do not know exactly what cause the changes in EDA.
None of the GCMs have any inputs for EDA. If EDA is the true main cause of warming, the GCMs will always need to exaggerate CO2’s contribution to fit the observed warming in decades past, but still get it wrong when EDA stopped warming the world (the pause) or cooled (next). That exaggeration of CO2 is the water vapor amplification (it’s the sole big positive feedback, and they all do it).
To fix the GCMs, one needs to add a rerouting feedback specific to CO2 and allow inputs that produce EDA to account for most of the warming. That is probably too big a leap to happen anytime soon.
43
It would be interesting to see a brave modeller come up with an external albedo parameter that matched reality for albedo spatially in the period 1990 to 2010 then tune to other parameters for the same period as the basis for determining CO2 sensitivity.
I found this abstract on Albedo and GCMs but have not looked at the paper:
http://www.researchgate.net/publication/252210953_22_Views_of_the_Global_Albedo_-_Comparison_Between_20_GCMs_and_2_Satellites
The abstract indicates that the models do not replicate albedo very well. This could be some more specific evidence for an unexplained albedo factor.
Manabe’s recent work shows the models are not all good predictors of cloud feedbacks but some are reasonable.
20
Rick,
There is this:
http://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2008/02/common-climate-misconceptions-the-water-vapor-feedback-2/
And this from NASA:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/GlobalWarming/page5.php
So H2O as a positive feed back is ‘gospel’
30
NASA needs to update their website as this statement is clearly wrong:
“Perhaps the most well known feedback comes from melting snow and ice in the Northern Hemisphere. Warming temperatures are already melting a growing percentage of Arctic sea ice, exposing dark ocean water during the perpetual sunlight of summer. Snow cover on land is also dwindling in many areas. In the absence of snow and ice, these areas go from having bright, sunlight-reflecting surfaces that cool the planet to having dark, sunlight-absorbing surfaces that bring more energy into the Earth system and cause more warming.”
00
Let’s call the “un-named basic model” the 1896 model.
If someone tries to defend it they will have to acknowledge the age of the model.
40
David,
Maybe many of us who did Science a while back often started with the Sun’s radiation, bremsstrahlung, Fraunhofer lines, spectra from hydrogen, Balmer, Lyman, etc series and so on to other elements, Wein, Planck, SB and beyond. Those who did applied spectroscopy learned of excitation energies, molecular spectra, etc and some like self actually used emission spectrographs powered by flame for straight emission and for atomic absorption, plus spark discharge before lasers came along, then plasma.
Also, most of us worked in the UV-visible spectrum, for IR spectrometers were far fewer and for specialists studying materials like polymers and plastics.
The point is that the excitation source, its temperature and power, were generally arranged, in the mind and on the bench, to simply have more than adequate energy to excite the spectra of interest. We were not interested in the properties of the source, so long as it was, like the horsepower of the Rolls Royce, adequate. Put in more power and the faint lines became stronger. There was most emphasis on the atoms giving the spectrum of the test material.
In your theory presented here, there is equal interest between emission and absorption, with the interest extending into energy regions that were, as noted, not part of our main interest. Few of us, IIRC, would have thought in terms of delicately poised emission energies defining the temperatures of gas processes. It is almost like we looked at (say) Planck’s relationship graphed one way round, while you swapped axes and thus what is dependent on what.
I mention this merely to say that entrenched concepts can cause the going to be hard and useful responses to take some time. Almost like a paradigm change, to use yesterday’s expression.
So, belatedly, some tentative comment. You accept a logarithmic dependence of absorption with concentration of CO2 in air, maybe based on direct measurement, Beer’s Law etc. Yet I cannot see a similar assumption for water vapour. The main difference between the two, overall for our purposes, is the difference in available phases of each under Earth conditions, but I cannot see this being a factor in the drop off of intensity with concentration of water vapour. Comment?
Next, I’m having a tough time with other atmospheric gases like N2 and O2. I did some CO2 laser research a few years ago and note (this from Wikipedia) that other gases are needed to achieve efficient lasing. Are these other gases in the air part of the energy scheme, or are they just a conceptually inert bystander?
The population inversion in the laser is achieved by the following sequence:
1. Electron impact excites vibrational motion of the nitrogen. Because nitrogen is a homonuclear molecule, it cannot lose this energy by photon emission, and its excited vibrational levels are therefore metastable and live for a long time.
2. Collisional energy transfer between the nitrogen and the carbon dioxide molecule causes vibrational excitation of the carbon dioxide, with sufficient efficiency to lead to the desired population inversion necessary for laser operation.
3. The nitrogen molecules are left in a lower excited state. Their transition to ground state takes place by collision with cold helium atoms. The resulting hot helium atoms must be cooled in order to sustain the ability to produce a population inversion in the carbon dioxide molecules. In sealed lasers, this takes place as the helium atoms strike the walls of the container. In flow-through lasers, a continuous stream of CO2 and nitrogen is excited by the plasma discharge and the hot gas mixture is exhausted from the resonator by pumps.
Geoff
10
Geoff, I like your comment that “It is almost like we looked at (say) Planck’s relationship graphed one way round, while you swapped axes and thus what is dependent on what.”
Logarithmic WV? I suppose there would be, but maybe it is not material here because the concentration of WV barely changes AFAIK. Instead the analysis focuses on the height and thus the temperature of the WVEL — which determines OLR from WV. I presume the gradient of concentration of WV near the WVEL is pretty much constant — in any case I have no information on it.
So if there is some logarithmic effect due to changing WV concentration near the WVEL, I am ignorant of it and am translating an implied change in OLR from WV into height when I should be translating it into a mixture of height and concentration changes (which suggests I would overestimate height changes).
However because I am only using the sign of the change in WVEL height to argue for rerouting (WVEL descends) over water vapor amplification (WVEL ascends) I doubt it makes much difference.
Down near the surface, under high pressure and temperature, the WV absorption wavelengths join up into the “water vapor continuum”, which extends right across the infrared AFAIK. That would be the endpoint for a logarithmic WV effect, but it only occurs very close to the surface (tens of meters).
30
“Logarithmic WV? I suppose there would be, but maybe it is not material here because the concentration of WV barely changes AFAIK.”
You have finally hit on it, square in the nose! Percentage wise you are correct BUT:
The whole concept of optical depth of a gas at any wavelength is logarithmic, with constant density! Atmospheric density with altitude is also logarithmic. What are the mathematical consequences of such, both from the POV from the surface (high density first), and from space (low density first)? With all the clamor of EMR, has anyone with a proper math background ever checked? I can do the EMR part correctly, but only after I get the geometry correct!
How do the two log functions interact? The linear temperature gradient with altitude is almost trivial by comparison!
All the best! -will-
17
David
The latest data from the US satellite measuring atmospheric CO2 levels shows that far from being the well mixed gas assumed in the IPCC modeling there are concentrations over certain areas and “rivers” of CO2 flowing around the planet. The high levels shown in the Arctic, where water vapour levels are low, fits with your hypothesis of energy transfer from CO2 to water vapour but the reverse should also hold with CO2 emmissions levels lower in areas of high atmospheric water vapour. Do you, or anyone else, have satellite data showing such a linkage.
32
Peter, the increased emittance of OLR from WV and decreased OLR from CO2 due to rerouting as the CO2 concentration increases doesn’t have much impact on the relative concentrations of those gases or their distributions, AFAIK, except that the WVEL descends slightly.
But as for changing OLR from WV and CO2 as their concentrations vary, no, I don’t know of any data. Interesting point though.
40
Peter: An interesting comment. I’ve often wondered what the local CO2 concentrations in the air are following a rainstorm.
20
Rain in most areas is weakly acidic, in some part due to carbonic acid, no? If so, then some local CO2 must be absorbed by the condensing cold water droplets, which CO2 must come from the high air.
10
Fred Harwood: Agreed entirely. I’m also curious to know what molecular interaction there might be (if any) between CO2 and water vapour in the atmosphere. I wonder if any work has been done on the chemistry? Given your observation regarding weakly acidic rain, it’s reasonable I suppose to imagine that CO2 levels do indeed vary depending on water vapour in the air.
Yet CO2 is measured on dry gas samples only, and it seems that stations globally get much the same values. Interesting!
00
David,
Curiously that statement is not always true. Consider the sum of the components of two sets; one set consists solely of integers I and the second set consists solely of decimal fractions F in the range 0 < F < 1. If you sum two independent numbers, one from each set, you will generate a real number where the information from each set is preserved. The integer component does not change because I + 0 = I and the decimal fraction F is also preserved because F <1 and so F + point 0 = F. This arithmetical curiosity forms the basis for combining two independent variables in image processing. Using an appropriately designed colour look-up table a variation in hue can code for the integer component of the sum while variations in saturation (richness of colour) can code for the decimal component. This technique of combining two independent variables, for example surface height as hue and surface amplitude as saturation, can produce some startlingly beautiful maps in geoscience.
00
“David,
Curiously that statement is not always true. Consider the sum of the components of two sets; one set consists solely of integers I and the second set consists solely of decimal fractions F in the range 0 < F < 1."
And your claim is never mathematical addition or summation! Such is mathematical concatenation! David is correct!
11
Will,
Addition is concatenation.
10
Hi Jo,
I’ve written to my MP with links to all 19 papers, requesting that somebody in DECC has a look and either explains why they’re wrong or does something about it before it’s too late. I’m not naive enough to believe it’ll get a fair hearing, but will make a nuisance of myself till I get a reasoned response. If you let me have an email address I’ll keep you informed.
Ian
41
Months ago, before my stroke, I saw research suggesting there is no WVEL; air dumped above storms, esp. tropical, is wrung dry. Resulting CS is about 0.3.
00
The conventional models are tuned to a starting point and conditions and from there we see a graph of tens of climate model results, all of them well above the graphed line of actual temperatures.
Are we at a stage where the ‘Evan’s’ model can also be graphed and added to the graph to compare its match with the actual temperatures ?
00
Not yet. So far the alternative model shows that less than about 20% of the global warming since maybe 1950 or 1973 was due to increasing CO2.
But we don’t yet have a description of what is driving global warming, and how much there is. In post 10 and in future posts I argue that it is mainly EDA, the third input in Fig.1 of post 13. EDA is omitted from conventional models.
01
David,
Have you seen this?
http:/b/hockeyschtick.blogspot.co.at
Conclusions
Four eminent modelers formed the central dogma of the IPCC AGW theory. Their theory claims the zero feedback climate sensitivity (Planck response) is 1.2 ~ 1.3 K for 2xCO2. When multiplied by the feedback factor of 2.5, this gives the canonical climate sensitivity of 3 K claimed by the IPCC .
However, this IPCC dogma fails due to the lack of parameter sensitivity analysis of the lapse rate for 2xCO2 in the one dimensional model (1DRCM). The dogma also contains a mathematical error in its derivation of the Planck response by Cess (1976). Therefore, the IPCC AGW theory and its canonical climate sensitivity of 3 K for 2xCO2 are invalid.
This study derives a climate sensitivity of 0.14 K from the energy budget of the earth.
01
CC Reader your link isn’t working fro me but perhaps you mean Kimoto? This came up in the comments to post 3: here and here and a few more back-and-forths.
00
Dr. Evans, no disrespect ment. The entry got away from me. The entry is proceeded by this statement. Stephen Wild referenced one of your earlier posts. The following address is how I found it and it is the current entry. It looks like you have started the dominos to fall. Perhaps the author is a reader?
:http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.co.at
Wednesday, November 11, 2015
Why the basic global warming hypothesis is wrong; CO2 climate sensitivity exaggerated 21X
Kyoji Kimoto, a Japanese chemist, scientist, and fuel-cell computer modeler & inventor, has a new essay below explaining why the basic anthropogenic global warming hypothesis is wrong and leads to highly exaggerated climate sensitivity to doubled CO2. Kimoto finds climate sensitivity of only 0.14C, a factor of 21 times smaller than the IPCC canonical climate sensitivity estimate of ~3C per doubled CO2.
12
Sorry, but Kimoto’s stuff is incorrect. He dresses it up well, but it shows little understanding of either what the models are or how the climate works.
20
I like warming, I like more CO2 in the air, and I think Earth’s climate is better than it has been in at least 500 years — and, as a result, ‘global warmunists’ think I’m insane, and even most”deniers” think my position is extreme!
.
If I had a climate model, I’d want constructive criticism.
.
Here are five concerns I have with the Evans / Nova 21st Century Climate Physics Model assumptions, and the “sales” effort I’ve seen so far.
.
(1) Almost no existing demand for the product:
Ridiculous climate forecasts from past decades need to be publicized to build demand for a new climate physics model. Few people realize GCM average temperature projections, based on the old climate physics model, have been very inaccurate for decades.
.
(2) More CO2 always causes more warming ?:
This assumption has too much contradictory evidence:
(a) Rising CO2 without warming from 1940 to 1976,
(b) Rising CO2 without warming since the early 2000s,
(c) Geologists claim the Ordovician-Silurian and Jurassic-Cretaceous glaciations happened with CO2 content 5 to 10 times higher than today.
.
They say high levels of CO2 in the air have sometimes been accompanied by global COOLING in the past, implying that the warming effect from more CO2 in the air approaches zero rapidly, and that’s why there has never been runaway warming.
.
I don’t understand why Mr. Evans has chosen to assume each doubling of the CO2 level causes an identical amount of warming.
.
There’s no scientific proof CO2 rising beyond 400 ppmv. would cause enough warming to be measurable in real life!
.
Climate modelers claim more CO2 always causes warming, amplified by strong positive feedback mechanisms, ending up with runaway warming.
.
I’m much more inclined to believe geologists, and proxy studies of the past climate, using real data — that’s real science.
.
I’m not inclined to believe climate modelers’ demonization of CO2, because they inaccurately predict the future climate using no data at all — that’s not real science, it’s nothing more than computer games, climate astrology, and personal opinions disguised as ‘science’!
.
If a new climate physics model uses unproven assumptions about CO2, that climate modelers also use for their computer games, then it’s built on a potentially weak foundation.
.
.
(3) Only minor, harmless climate changes are addressed:
What about the large, sometimes abrupt, climate changes that happened irregularly during Earth’s 4.5 billion year history? They are important — minor changes of a degree or two over a century are not important, and no one would even notice them if not for 40 years of hearing environmentalists’ incessant bellowing about a coming climate catastrophe!
.
.
THE EVANS / NOVA FUTURE CLIMATE PREDICTION:
.
– From the October 9, 2015 SUNDAY EXPRESS :
“Between 2017 and 2021 he (Evans) estimates a cooling of about 0.3C before the mini ice age in the 2030s.”
.
.
(4) Make global cooling prediction during hottest October on record !:
Bad timing to start predicting global cooling, starting as soon as 2017 !
.
Government agencies frequently make arbitrary, repeated surface temperature data “adjustments” to force actuals toward the climate model projections.
.
So if there’s actual cooling of a few tenths of a degree C. in the future, I’m not confident government bureaucrats will allow their surface temperature data to reflect it.
.
And that would mean the future climate would have to feel cool for people to notice global cooling — assuming it had it been “adjusted” out of the surface data.
.
.
(5) Near-future climate predicted to tenths of a degree C.:
There was no need for any prediction, especially a short-term prediction with 0.1 degree C. precision !
.
If the prediction is wrong, as most predictions of the future are, people will assume the underlying model was wrong!
.
Good models don’t have to be able to predict the future — that’s a myth — they just have to accurately summarize a process.
.
The future is rarely predictable — yet people love to make and hear (usually wrong) predictions, and I’ll never understand that.
.
If the global cooling prediction was made to get media attention, it will.
.
But one could get attention with a lower risk prediction too, such as: “No warming in the next decade”, or “global cooling starting in the next decade” ?
.
On the other hand, I’ve been wrong before.
I thought the world was going to end in 2012.
03
Richard,
You caustic comments in entry’s 9, 13 and 18 have been responded to by Doctor Evans and Gia in a very precise manner which I believe have answered your five points. I hope the water meter in your garage was repaired, may I recommend wrapping it with an electrical tape and don’t forget to plug it into power Did you really have to pay for the repair or did the water company pay?
00
If you think my comments that disagree with Mr. Evan’s assumptions or approach are “caustic”, then I wonder what word(s) you would use to describe Mr. Will Janoschka’s November 15, 2015 at 11:04 am reply to me?
I did not see you respond to his extremely rude post to say he was “caustic”.
It would have been constructive If you had responded to ANY sentence in my post so there could be a debate about something … but instead, the first few words you chose for your post were a character attack: “Your caustic comments … ”
The water meter in my garage was replaced. I paid the water company $300 out of my pocket. The new water meter is protected with a heat tape and three other protective devices. My point was that during 27 years with no heat tape, or any other protection on the nearby pipes, starting in 1987, my water meter did NOT freeze until February 2014 (which was supposedly after 27 years of “global warming”.)
10
Read note 7.2.1.2 – it discusses the third portion of this series which is called the “Notch Theory” . The Doctor has predicted that the temperature start falling in 2017.-2021 time frame. A 03C in temp will put us back to the 1980’s temperature, when this whole CAGW really got rolling.
00
I previously read the notch filter articles from 2014 in the archives.
There were many educated people posting comments to disagree.
00
Richard Greene November 14, 2015 at 3:40 am
“I like warming, I like more CO2 in the air, and I think Earth’s climate is better than it has been in at least 500 years — and, as a result, ‘global warmunists’ think I’m insane, and even most”deniers” think my position is extreme!”
So what?
.
“If I had a climate model, I’d want constructive criticism.”
So where is ‘your climate model’ that the rest of us can stomp upon troll!
“Here are five concerns I have with the Evans / Nova 21st Century Climate Physics Model assumptions, and the “sales” effort I’ve seen so far.”
Identify any attempt at some product for sale whatsoever!
.
“(1) Almost no existing demand for the product:”
Indeed and no product! troll!
(2) More CO2 always causes more warming ?:
Indeed the IPCC/CCC quoted claim! Do you have a point?
(3) Only minor, harmless climate changes are addressed:
“What about the large, sometimes abrupt, climate changes that happened irregularly during Earth’s 4.5 billion year history?”
Where is your model that does address such things, troll?
(4) Make global cooling prediction during hottest October on record !:
“Bad timing to start predicting global cooling, starting as soon as 2017 !”
Only to a marketeer, that has not a clue troll!
(5) Near-future climate predicted to tenths of a degree C.:
“There was no need for any prediction, especially a short-term prediction with 0.1 degree C. precision !”
CCC trollism at its finest!! There is no prediction except of the null hypothesis!
The whole point of David’s series is to carefully demonstrate that the self appointed Clueless Arrogant Climate Academic Clowns CACAC! (kaka in Roman or Cyrillic) must be the lowest of life forms or below!
All the best! -will-
28
Mr. Will Janoschka
I have an internet “budget” for criticizing anyone else’s intelligence or character online.
No matter how many people insult me, I will respond with no more than one rude post every six months.
Criticism and character attacks are very common online.
I try not to add to the hostility.
But sometimes I read a post so rude, and so inane, that it deserves a rude comment in return.
You, Mr. Janoschka, easily qualify for my second half of 2015 “insult budget”, even though the year is not over yet.
Responding to my well constructed, easy-to-read, post, with your inane character attack, is like a man wearing extremely expensive designer shoes stepping in a steaming pile of animal waste products.
My post = expensive designer shoes.
Your post = the pile.
If you were drunk when posting, I recommend you stop drinking.
If you don’t understand English, take a class.
Rude people like you make the internet a hostile place where different opinions are not welcome.
Since the moderator allows you to make such rude posts here, I’ve lost my appetite for further comments here.
So I guess you have won the battle — you’ve single-handedly driven off a website with an extremely inane rude post that demonstrates you had no clue about ANY of the points I was making.
If you ever want to visit Michigan USA, where I live, I recommend that you stay sober and polite — some people here would not tolerate your extreme rudeness, as I (almost) have.
50
Sadly, the argumentation I see here is very much like the six blind men who encountered an elephant and then attempted to describe it from what they found at their points of contact. Now, each description was quite accurate for what each experienced but all were very wrong when considering an elephant as an elephant. None had a sufficiently large context to encompass the whole elephant. Hence, while the descriptions were accurate given their very limited context, none had a clue about the elephant other than something existed that was called an “elephant”.
For the most part, what I see is one side of the argumentation from the very limited perspective of well controlled laboratory experiments and the application of the limited context generalization of the law derived from those experiments. The other side of the argumentation is from the perspective of a lot of experience with measuring weather, whatever that is, and an analysis based upon that experience. What I see lacking is the full context of the earth’s weather system on both sides. Clearly, there is more happening in that context that we don’t know than we do or even can know without being an omniscient god.
We are attempting to understand a very large and very complex system in which each active component ultimately has an impact upon every other active component. The nature and strength of that impact is as much or more determined by the arrangement of interacting active components as it is on the behavior of each independent component. As a consequence any measurement done on that system will be “contaminated” by those impacts and won’t quite follow our favorite list of scientific laws we have discovered in the laboratory. First because we don’t know all of the components and, secondly, we have even less knowledge about how the components are interconnected.
Both the favorite list of scientific laws can be well known and the measurements taken of the weather system can also be well known but the resulting analysis based upon either can be totally beside the point. For much the same reason that the understanding of an elephant by the six blind men is both correct and totally beside the point for understanding the elephant as an elepant.
One side is seeing coconuts and the other side is seeing peaches. About the only thing in common is that both are fuzzy. The weather system gets lost in the heat of holding tight to ones locally correct interpretation without working to place both into a more complete context. The flaw is to be found in a much too premature attempt to reduce the discussion to specific mechanisms without first getting a sufficiently detailed understanding of how the weather system is put together and how it behaves. It is one thing to know and understand specific mechanisms. It is quite another thing to know how a system behaves that has a larger number of known and unknown mechanisms dynamically interconnected in many known and unknown diverse ways.
The path to a better understanding is through the path that David is taking. It is a top down systems approach that delays the specification of mechanisms until the system behavior is understood. To the experimentalist, this will look like hand waving BS. To the theorist, the experimentalist looks like he is fill of it. Both sides are right and wrong at the same time because both have ignored the consequences of ignoring full context.
The bottom line is that one must understand the problem before one can solve it. If you don’t understand it, you can’t even know you have found a solution even if it accidentally is “the” solution. The systems approach is the best way to develop an understanding of a complex problem. Using that approach it is vital not to reduce your analysis to solution form too soon. Meaning: not before you really understand the problem.
There is more but this is enough for now.
60
Thanks Lionel. Some days it seems there isn’t much awareness of how to solve problems or what is being done here.
20
I share your frustration.
I fear that, in a world that communicates in 30 second sound bytes and 150 character tweets, we will continue to stay frustrated. The inhabitant of this kind of world will stop reading at the first paragraph of my post. He will fail to see the underlying problem expressed by that paragraph and will be confused because an elephant has nothing to do with climate.
Everything must be immediate, concrete, simple, and painfully obvious. The thought that there are problems worth solving that take decades to understand, decades more to implement a solution, and volumes to document has no entry point into this kind of mind.
21
Sure, as long as that’s not an excuse for waffling about allegorical diversions and using three times more words than necessary.
For example you could have written only the 3rd and 7th paragraphs and it would have gotten your point across.
The “stream-of-consciousness” writing technique is okay for brainstorming or auditing one’s own arguments, but to actually broadcast the whole journey instead of just the destination can be a bit wearisome depending on the length of the journey. Some of it is poetic perhaps, but whatever is useful is more certainly valued by your frequently hurried audience.
I sympathise because I do not like to take things on faith and so I expect other people do not want to take my conclusions on faith. Therefore I pre-emptively provide more backstory, “working”, and explanation than some people are comfortable with. But I do edit out thoughts and paragraphs if they turn out to be non-essential.
01
Thanks for a demonstration of my point that:
“Everything must be immediate, concrete, simple, and painfully obvious. The thought that there are problems worth solving that take decades to understand, decades more to implement a solution, and volumes to document has no entry point into this kind of mind.”
I find that context, content, and process is essential for completeness. You don’t.
I make full statements. You only want “30 second sound bytes and 150 character tweets”.
There is an elephant in the room which you don’t want identified and discussed.
11
Pretending to quote something the sender never actually said is just trolling. Poor form.
Your counting ability is also a bit wonky as paras 3 and 7 sum to 1093 characters, not 150.
Plus tweets are limited to 140 characters, not 150.
You think I did not want “context, content, and process”, but this just shows you didn’t understand your own argument. It’s because the crux of the problem is at the level of complex systems that the complexity in the specific context is relevant to forming the argument. You had justified its analysis as a complex system in paragraph 3, so the same arguments and colourful analogies in paras 1,2,4,5 were redundant. That’s why they could have been jettisoned and the whole truth would still remain. All the necessary context, content, and process, was in paras 3 and 7.
I mean really, how can you justify the elephants, peaches, and coconuts. It’s poetic but nonessential.
The bottom line is that one must understand the argument before one can succinctly communicate it.
And there was no elephant involved until you introduced it, along with the coconuts and peaches. I’m not even sure how there can be enough space for the elephant while your ego is in the room. It must be a really big room.
00
I am curious. Why are you so bothered by an explanation that is so clear that even a simpleton could understand it?
I write in my style and you yours. I am not about to adapt your style and, apparently, you are not about to adapt mine. Perhaps we should leave it at that. I will no longer read your posts and I suggest you no longer read mine. It will be much less stressful for you. You might even live a bit longer.
00
Average Global temperature – is this a useful quantity?
One of the biggest issues I have with the Climate models is a sense of scale, position and their bottom up approach in modeling the Oceans and Atmosphere (Coupled Models).
From a scale perspective:
Modeling energy exchanges at the atomic and molecular level is fairly precise and this is great for “smalls systems”, however on larger scales such as at the scale of say the “Jet Stream” one has to ask the question do the models successfully determine the average temperature of this mass of moving air compared to the surrounding atmosphere of which it travels through.
From a position perspective:
As with the Gulf stream the Jet stream can increase/decrease the temperature of large areas of the planet by its position.
The average temperature of say the equatorial latitudes never drop to the temperatures of say the polar regions, therefore I am curious as to the “usefulness” of an average Global temperature in describing the state of the overall climate.
It seems that certain latitudes of the planet’s atmosphere are “anchored” to a range of temperatures from which they never deviate.
Perhaps the models should segment the planet into regions with “interfaces” between each in order to better model the temperature of the Planet, such that we specify a set of average temperatures for each region instead of one overall value.
just a thought 😀
11
And a good thought it is too.
For the past 8 years I have been pointing out that latitudinal shifting of the global air circulation pattern is the negative system response to ANY internal system forcing element in action.
In view of the effects of solar and oceanic variations the effect of our CO2 emissions would be indistinguishable from zero.
17
Like this? http://joannenova.com.au/2015/01/is-the-sun-driving-ozone-and-changing-the-climate/
00
[…] http://joannenova.com.au/2015/11/new-science-19-the-invisible-nameless-model-that-controls-the-whole… […]
00
When in question or in doubt,
Run in circles, scream and shout.
Give them hell and fire a gun;
Hoist the signal up: Well Done.
00
The problem with GCM’s is that while they may simulate a climate, after a short run time they’re not simulating the Earth’s climate. The reason is that they attempt to simulate the chaos of the response to some change and hope that the correct next state emerges, rather than guiding the chaos to a prescribed next state based on basic thermodynamic laws. Of course it doesn’t converge because to do so requires far more low level details about the system being simulated then will ever be available, so they run the model many times and average the results which only serves to isolate the erroneous assumptions in their model as these errors are constant from run to run.
What this article seems to point out is the inconsistency in the IPCC’s definition of forcing, where 1 W/m^2 of instantaneous increase in post albedo solar power is considered equivalent to 1 W/m^2 instantaneous reduction of power passing direction from the surface out to space. The difference is that an incremental reduction in power passing from the surface to space is equivalent to an incremental increase in power entering the atmosphere and in the steady state, what goes in to the atmosphere must come back out, where some leaves the top of the atmosphere contributing to the radiant balance and some leaves the bottom and contributes to surface heating. That which eventually leaves to space offsets some (the physics and the data suggests 1/2) of the instantaneous reduction. The definition of forcing doesn’t accommodate this and considers all of the reduction in emissions to space as ‘feedback’ forcing applied to the surface.
Another flaky aspect of forcing is that the IPCC metric is that it effectively excludes the negative feedback from reflection which justifies claims that GHG effects (and clouds) increase the surface temperature from 255K to 287K. What this fails to accommodate is that without reflection from clouds and ice, which is causal to the forcing, the solar input would be closer to 300 W/m^2 and the baseline temperature for the increase is about 270K and not 255K and the 15K of feedback cooling is ignored.
The bottom line is that consensus climate science could not be more wrong, is strongly codependent on political agendas and the political ramifications of the truth are devastating to those politicians who side with the alarmists. The result is that climate science is broken far beyond what incremental science can ever repair.
32
The exchange between me and Kristian above has become too long and unwieldy so I respond to his latest confused ramblings here:
Kristian said:
“It’s the standard description you’ll find everywhere”
The standard description is that rising air does work on its surroundings when it expands. That accomodates work done against the gravitational field. It appears that over the years a number of sources have come to think that work is done against surrounding molecules but to the extent that does happen it is a diabatic process because heat then moves out from the molecules in the parcel to molecules outside the parcel.
Kristian said:
“The rising air parcel somehow does ‘work’ against gravity? Draining it of internal KE? NO!!!! The opposite! The surrounding air masses do ‘work’ on the rising parcel, which means energy is transferred to the parcel.””
There is no draining of internal energy, merely conversion of KE to PE within the parcel. No energy moves in or out. Any upward movement is inevitably done against the downward pull of gtravity and therefore requires work done against gravity.
Kristian said:
“The surrounding air masses do ‘work’ on the rising parcel, which means energy is transferred to the parcel”
You don’t need surrounding air masses to push up a parcel of gas that contains KE higher than that of space.The KE in the parcel causes it to rise up against gravity until it reaches hydrostatic equilibrium even if there are no external gases at all.
Kristian said:
“The process that does cool the rising air parcel is an altogether different one, one that still occurs simultaneously to the uplift itself. The adiabatic one.”
Actually, at last, that is correct but it involves to transfer of energy in or out because no mass, heat or momentum is transferred in or out in an adiabatic process.The cooling is from the mere expansion, no pushing or pulling required at all.
Kristian said:
“And that’s the adiabatic process: The expansion against a lower external air pressure on ascent and the contraction/compression under a higher external air pressure on descent.”
That is also correct but it does not require work done against the surrounding molecules. Only against the decining pressure gradient.
Someone said that work done against the pressure gradient is inevitably work done against surrounding molecules but that is not correct.
As the pressure declines the surrounding molecules move apart as fast as the rising parcel expands so no diabatic work is required and no energy moves in or out (no transfer of mass, heat or momentum.
In descent the molecules surrounding the parcel move closer together as fast as the falling parcel contracts.
If ANY work is done between the surrounding molecules and the parcel then that MUST involve a transfer of mass, heat or momentum and that would be diabatic and not adiabatic.
This is a very common misconception which has become pretty pervasive and Kristian should not feel embarrassed at having been confused by it.
All I ask of Kristian is that he think it through and get off his high horse.
If he continues to disagree then I can live with that but I object to his imperious and condescending tone.
11
Stephen Wilde November 21, 2015 at 6:02 pm
“The exchange between me and Kristian above has become too long and unwieldy so I respond to his latest confused ramblings here:”
Indeed but both you and Kristian are still both wrong in your claims of work! From #3 above:
Kristian November 20, 2015 at 5:07 am
Stephen Wilde says, November 19, 2015 at 9:32 am:
(“I regard that as a misleading description.”)
“I’m sure you do. But I’m sorry to disappoint both you and all the magical inhabitants of your little self-invented bubble world, Stephen. It’s not. It’s not misleading at all. In fact, it’s right on the money. It’s the standard description you’ll find everywhere. Just look up any textbook on the subject.”
‘Thus expansion into reducing pressure requires no work against the surrounding air and contraction into increasing pressure requires no work against the surrounding air.’
Please read that again with understanding!
“The change in PE is the work done. Force is mg and distance is h or z” apply to? And what other (but simultaneous) process does it not apply to?
Study especially pages 7-8 and 15-18.”
————————————–
The net effect within an atmosphere is to provide vast amounts of available convective energy to drive convective overturning.
—————————————-
And try to interpret that correctly!
“This is precisely what I’m talking about. You have got this all completely mixed up inside your head. You’re totally confused and boastful about it.”
Could it be that neither of you understands this atmosphere sufficiently to be able to comment on it?
“This describes the process of convective uplift, Stephen. What happens? The rising air parcel somehow does ‘work’ against gravity? Draining it of internal KE? NO!!!! The opposite! The surrounding air masses do ‘work’ on the rising parcel, which means energy is transferred to the parcel.”
Do you Kristian, have anyone that agrees with your interpretation? I’m not saying that this is ‘wrong’, only that I do not believe.
In this atmosphere, I perceive a definite structure of sensible heat (temperature),
pressure power (mass flow rate), and latent heat (phase property). Each is nicely getting along with the two others with no rancor, nor is any ‘work’ required for relocation of any part of this atmosphere, within this atmosphere!
“Which is the reason why it rises. It is effectively pushed up by a positive ‘pressure gradient force’. There’s your W = Δmgh. The parcel isn’t losing any internal KE from this process.”
Whatever you Kristian may mean by internal KE which you refuse to define, but do imply that it is ‘only’ the accumulation of power as expressed by mass as a thermometric expansion of such mass. Where is the associated accumulation of power as an increase in pressure by ‘any’ compressible fluid. Air tools can do much ‘work’ with only mass flow. Never any need for your non-defined internal energy, nor any sensible heat.
“And so it doesn’t cool from it. It simply gains gravitational PE as it’s being pushed upwards. Directly from the externally transferred energy.”
There is absolutely no gravitational PE ever expressed by any atmosphere at any altitude.
“The process that does cool the rising air parcel is an altogether different one, one that still occurs simultaneously to the uplift itself. The adiabatic one.”
There is none of your cooling by process (whatever that may mean) The defined lower temperature at altitude (lapse) is not a process. It is a state of lower atmospheric energy density at altitude. Such results (is expressed) as a linear temperature lapse with altitude!
“The uplift isn’t the adiabatic process, Stephen. There is nothing in the convective uplift itself that does anything to cool the rising air. The cooling comes solely from the expansion of the air as it rises.”
There is no scammer non-defined cooling anywhere in this atmosphere. Earth’s atmosphere expresses many time varying locational,changes in local atmospheric temperature, i,e, Changes in sensible and latent heat!
“And that’s the adiabatic process: The expansion against a lower external air pressure on ascent and the contraction/compression under a higher external air pressure on descent.”
Nice presentation of typical meteorological scamming of all! There can be no atmospheric adiabatic anything, as there is no fixed atmospheric volume for fixed atmospheric gas molecules. If local noise (temperature) is excessive, molecules just leave for a more quite environment. This is expressed in neuvo physics as some sort of equilibrium, that can never be actually described by idiots!
Kristian November 21, 2015 at 10:18 pm
“To conclude:
There are two (2 !!!) distinct processes occurring during natural convective uplift:
1) The mechanical uplift itself, and
2) The original diabatic heating of the air packet and its subsequent adiabatic expansion as it ascends up the atmospheric column.
Only one of these two parallel processes – the second one – ever affects the temperature of the air packet. The other one – the first – only ever moves it.”
This is almost correct! The uplift of the now less dense molecules due to #2 cannot be to any kind of atmospheric packet or parcel, as each molecule is free to interact with all other nearby molecules. To the extent that each molecule does not transfer its new Boltzmann defined thermal power, kT/t, to another molecule that molecule retains its greater volume, lesser density.
This Kristian calls ‘internal energy’, to confuse all! In molecular gas terms, each molecule has the same temperature function linear with its own power density! If molecular mass is included this may be considered an energy density and all differences between Cp and Cv disappear in this physical as they must!
No work is done in the free expansion/contraction of atmospheric molecules. The very misused ‘adiabatic’ by meteorologists is never physically realized, as each molecule is free to exchange its own power and temperature with any other molecule. Gas molecular collisions are seldom elastic, they can and do remain isentropic, but not adiabatic.
Stephen Wilde November 21, 2015 at 6:02 pm
Continues on and on with his religious fantasy of KE and PE changing with an air parcel moving vertically adiabatically within this atmosphere, that has hydrostatic equilibrium! Stephen, cannot ever give even one physical example of atmospheric; KE, PE, air parcel, adiabatic, or hydrostatic equilibrium!
All the best!-will-
01
[This has gotten rather long. I’m not judging the content, just the length. I’ll leave it to Jo to make the decision but I’m doubtful she’ll approve it the way it is.] AZ
I agree, way to long! most is a copy from #3.1.2.2.sompathing!
One copy whirling at 7200 RPM, is more than enough! 😉
01
Stephen Wilde,
The exchange between you and Kristian also included Will, Konrad and myself. Those comments appeared in chronological order. That’s the way it works on blogs like this one.
Work in the context of physics, is defined as the amount of energy transfered from one location to another without the transfer of heat. That’s what it is and nothing you say or do will change that. You may not like it or you may not understand it but it is what it is nonetheless.
Yes, but the work is done by the air surrounding the rising parcel and not by the parcel iself! This is what Konrad has repeatedly tried to explain to you. When Konrad says that ‘you invoke immaculate convection’ this is what he’s referring to! Bouyancy requires a difference in density between some body and it’s surroundings. If there’s no difference in density, there’s no bouyancy and therefore no lift (or descent). You may not like this or you may not understand this but it is what it is nonetheless.
If the surrounding gas expands at the same rate as the parcel, then there is no difference in density, no difference in pressure, and therefore no more bouyancy and therefore no lift (or descent)! That’s the whole point of bouyancy. You may not like this or you may not understand this but it is what it is.
And why have you added ‘no momentum’ to the definition of an adiabatic process? Where did you come up with that? Can you prove this to be the case? Is this not just more fantasy fisiks?
It’s not a misconception. It’s the way physics works. I think that if anybody needs to be embarassed it’s you and anyone else who agrees with you.
Abe
00
Stephen Wilde,
An oxymoron. Get it? 😉
If there’s work done then it’s not diabatic because there’s no heat exchanged by definition.
Abe
00
Kristan now says this:
“The ‘end product’ of all this is basically the atmosphere outside the parcel exchanging gravitational potential energy with it. The total amount of gravitational potential energy in the atmosphere remains the same, but now a tiny amount of it is ‘transferred’ from the rest of the atmosphere to the lifted air parcel”
Potential energy has no temperature so how does an exchange of potential energy between parcel and surrounding atmosphere have any thermal effect ?
Much simpler to realise that KE is transformed to PE within a rising parcel and since all rising air is matched by falling air elsewhere it follows that PE becomes KE in falling parcels.
Adiabatic ascent or descent involves no transfer of mass, energy or momentum into or out of the moving parcel. All transfers of energy in or out must involve at least one of those transfers in which case the process is diabatic and not adiabatic.
Why does PE need to move in and out at all ?
01
From #19-3.1.2.2.55
Kristian has done monumental work here in his attempted convergence of the physics, chemistry, and meteorological concepts of this compressible semi-fluid surrounding,and held in place by Earth’s gravity. The uniqueness of atmosphere brings into play many details not demonstrable under lesser scale observation, much speculation, and much not invented here (so must be wrong) thinking!
Kristian’s pressure gradient force illustration is fine for a incompressible fluid in a gravitational field, acting on a compressible volume (density changing) volume like an ocean submarine. That submarine, however, must do work, further compressing air in ballast to reduce density and provide positive buoyancy, in order to get upward bound!
This is similar to a hot air balloon, but that balloon also increases volume, not just lowering mass within a fixed volume. Archimedes had much to consider about that difference!
Let me try to add another orthogonal POV, engineering, not for (not invented here) but because for something as complex as an atmosphere, all valid POVs must simultaneously must hold within the limits of that POV. Are we having fun yet? 😉
Kristian November 21, 2015 at 10:18 pm
“Here’s what happens:
Heat from the solar-heated surface of the Earth is absorbed (unequally) by the air directly above it. This heat shows up as an increase in the heated air packet’s internal (microscopic, molecular) KE. And as a result, its temperature goes up. However, as the air packet warms, it also naturally expands and so does work on the surrounding air, which means that the packet ends up losing some of its original KE input again directly.”
Again using the the term ‘warming’ with no specific meaning! As sensible hear is added to an unconfined volume of atmosphere at any altitude, some of the more dense molecules will spontaneously leave that arbitrary volume, isentropically! The temperature is but part of the whole. The addition of latent heat via water evaporation provides the same decrease in density, with no increase in temperature (or your internal energy), but providing the same local positive buoyancy, initiating upward advection (mass motion), convecting two entirely different types of heat (noun) upward! 😉
“This is the reason why air free to expand will warm less from an equal amount of heat input than air not free to expand, which is simply the difference between c_v and c_p: γ = c_p/c_v = 1.4.”
Atmosphere at any altitude exhibits free expansion/accumulation. Gibbs free energy! Once there is understanding of that! Then can come understanding of speedy low mass (He) molecules, mixed with ponderous hi mass (UF6) molecules, at some average temperature, that truly screw any Kinetic Theory of Gas!
I best stop tonight, as I run out of beer! Perhaps more later! As most notice, I can be nasty on Glenfiddichhhh!
All the best!-will-
01
Whoops, that should read ‘mass, heat or momentum’.
01
Just-A-Guy November 23, 2015 at 12:26 pm
Kristian,
Although you’ve posted your replies here, in proper chronological order, Steven Wilde has decided that this format is not good enough and so has decided to respond to the comments you post here, in this sub-thread, below, towards the end of the comments section beginning with this comment.
Stephen Wilde November 21, 2015 at 6:02 pm
“The exchange between me and Kristian above has become too long and unwieldy so I respond to his latest confused ramblings here:”
Have you any suggestion as to doing that better?
Some folk just want to be an innocent troll Abe, You seem to wish to take over as a self appointed mega troll
01
Will Janoschka,
Yes. Continue posting your comments in chronological order or provide a link to what it is you’re responding to.
But, wait . . . I already made those suggestions! You probably missed that, Will.
Can you prove that atmospheric gases have no weight? Or do you need a few more beers to get into ‘the right mood’?
BTW, I read up Archimedes’ treatise “On Floating Bodies” and found no reference to your claim that the atmosphere has no weight. Maybe you could explain this extraordinary claim to us ‘lesser’ humans. Or at the very least, give us a link to someone who does explain this.
IOW. Put up or shut up. 😉
OR, maybe you misunderstood Archimedes the way you misunderstood Emmy Noether’s theorem?
Abe
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Just-A-Guy November 23, 2015 at 2:21 pm · Reply
Will Janoschka,
(You wrote:
“Have you any suggestion as to doing that better?”)
“Yes. Continue posting your comments in chronological order or provide a link to what it is you’re responding to.”
Have you even on example of where I have not done that?
But, wait . . . I already made those suggestions! You probably missed that, Will.
“Can you prove that atmospheric gases have no weight? Or do you need a few more beers to get into ‘the right mood’?”
I would not even try to prove a null hypothesis!
The gases when properly constrained can have weight. The whole atmosphere or any part of it cannot demonstrate any weight (a vector force limited to the direction of much greater mass)!
“BTW, I read up Archimedes’ treatise “On Floating Bodies” and found no reference to your claim that the atmosphere has no weight.”
Did you even try to read for his elegant physical demonstration that the atmosphere has no weight? Way way before the insane academic fantasy of mass and gravity.
“Maybe you could explain this extraordinary claim to us ‘lesser’ humans. Or at the very least, give us a link to someone who does explain this. IOW. Put up or shut up. 😉 ”
I refuse to help those that demonstrate they refuse to think !
“OR, maybe you misunderstood Archimedes the way you misunderstood Emmy Noether’s theorem?”
Did you even read Emmy’s well written theorem?
I had to ask 6 high level mathematicians (that I trust) to explain. None could. All expressed that she is likely correct. And that local conservation may appear in a gravitational field, but none can ever be justified.
-will-
00
Will Janoschka,
Right off the bat, I want to thank you for responding without the use of direct insults. I’ll do the same.
Why not? We’re not discussing a subject that requires statistics. Either an atmosphere has weight or it doesn’t. If the hypothesis is ‘The atmosphere has weight’, then the null hypothesis is ‘the atmosphere does not have weight’. If the hypothesis is ‘the atmosphere does not have weight’ then the null hypothesis is ‘the atmosphere has weight’. Proving one disproves the other by definition.
Even if for some reason you disagree with what I’ve just described, we can still proceed another way.
You say that proving that the atmosphere has no weight would be, in effect, trying to prove the null hypothesis. OK then. In that case you should still be able to provide an explanation or describe an experiment that attempts to show that the atmosphere does have weight and then present the results of how that explantion is flawed or how that experiment fails.
IOW. There must be some rational explanation that is both logically valid and physically sound that shows how you came to the conclusion that the atmosphere has no weight.
On the contrary. I’m very much interested in hearing what you have to say. If you can provide some rational basis for your claim that the atmosphere has no weight, I’m all ears. I’m very much interested in learning.
Here too, even if you don’t believe me, there are still many others who read these comments. We are not alone! Don’t you think that these others will benefit from your explanation?
Abe
10
Abe,
You are very interested in learning but the insufferable anonymous blogger Will is only interested in obfuscation. Pity because he actually knows a thing or two… But his ego is so dominant and he is so obviously insecure that he has to show off by using “long words” that nobody understands rather than trying to educate.
10
David Cosserat,
I agree with you that Will obviously knows a thing or two. (Probably a lot more than he leads us to believe.)
I think that it’s because he doesn’t feel that he needs to try and educate anyone, that it’s not ‘his job’ to do so.
OTOH, I also believe that everyone who reads this blog would benefit from his knowledge and experience and would truly like to see him take a different approach. That’s why as soon as Will responded without the insults, I also stopped. (I can dish it out as well as the next person.) 😉
Will Janoschka,
How about it, Will? Are you up for the challenge?
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy November 25, 2015 at 6:31 am
“On the contrary. I’m very much interested in hearing what you have to say. If you can provide some rational basis for your claim that the atmosphere has no weight, I’m all ears. I’m very much interested in learning. Abe”
Just-A-Guy November 23, 2015 at 2:21 pm
(“Can you prove that atmospheric gases have no weight? Or do you need a few more beers to get into ‘the right mood’?”)
I gave a definitive answer to such an ill formed and insulting question! Anything with mass within the ‘gravity’ of a much larger mass can have the property of heaviness called by some as ‘weight’, but the formula weight = mg, gives only the magnitude of the vector force in only the direction of that (g). The formula is not weight. The noticeable and measurable vector force expressing heaviness is properly called weight. Once the concept of heaviness is understood, only then, can an equation, not mere assignment, be applied.
In that form of mathematics if two of the three values are known (measured), the third can readably be calculated to the appropriate limits of measurement accuracy.
In David’s whole series, it is never the mass of atmospheric component gases expressing ‘weight’ under geometry that allows weight to be measured!
Here one large question never actually considered by meteorology or nuevo-physics is, “Does this atmosphere actually express the downward vector force called weight”?
My studied evaluation, is that that vector force is completly subsumed and replaced by gravitationally induced/maintained altitude gradients of pressure, density, and temperature!
As such the entire volume is isopotential to any part of that atmosphere! NO WORK! All is isentropic! Can I prove that, or even want to? NO! Archimedes in 271 BC did such a perfect demonstration, I cannot understand why any would question!
01
Will,
Apparently you have the same misconception that most of our politicians have: changing the name changes the thing. However, consider the following link: Weight of Earth’s Atmosphere.
Yes, there is a weight to the atmosphere and it can be computed by multiplying the pressure of the atmosphere by the area upon which it rests. Similarly, a one inch cube weighing one pound applies a pressure of one pound per square inch on the surface upon which it rests. In this case as it is with the atmosphere, it is a simple matter of converting from one unit of measure to another. The same thing is being measured but only the perspective changes and not the thing.
As for the notion that the lack of work having to be done proves there is no weight, consider this. A 100 lb sack of grain resting on a scale will weigh 100 lbs. That same sack on you back will also weigh 100 lbs. In both cases, work is not being done by the surface upon which the sack rests. That you get tired and the scale doesn’t has nothing to do with the work done on the 100 lb sack of grain. The simple reason is that in neither case is the sack moved through a distance.
ALL of this is first semester high school physics. I know, I was a high school physics teacher for a number of years. Yes my students were all amazed that they and a post carrying a 100 pound sack of grain did no work.
Your “theory” that the atmosphere has no weight is quite testable. If your “theory” were true, then a tank emptied of air would weigh exactly the same as a tank filled with air. Or a box containing flying bugs would weigh exactly the same as the box with no bugs at all. Try it. You might actually learn something for a change.
20
Lionell Griffith November 25, 2015 at 11:15 pm ·
“Will, Apparently you have the same misconception that most of our politicians have: changing the name changes the thing.”
Lionell, Apparently you have the same misconception that most of our politicians have: Sloppy use of language does not matter on election day! The serfs are too stupid to know the difference.
“Yes, there is a weight to the atmosphere and it can be computed by multiplying the pressure of the atmosphere by the area upon which it rests.”
Again, sloppy, sloppy, sloppy, with intent to confuse. The mass of a one cm sq column of atmosphere in grams, is the same as surface pressure in kPa (101.3 grams)! None of those grams of atmosphere express the downward vector force (heaviness), the very concept of ‘weight’. ;-)The surface atmosphere expresses density of 1.225 kg/m3 and the scalar pressure of 101.3 kPa. This pressure, measured with an aneroid barometer is the same in every direction. Weight applies no force upward or laterally. The density and pressure of a gravity controlled atmosphere distribution, completely replace any concept of atmospheric weight. Your link above is a clear demonstration of intentional ‘dumbing down’ of the serfs! Believe that at your peril!
“The same thing is being measured but only the perspective changes and not the thing.”
Only in your self deluded mind! If you believe such, you simply cannot learn even the most simple characteristics of an atmosphere. Ripe picking for any CAGW scam! 🙁
“As for the notion that the lack of work having to be done proves there is no weight, consider this.”
I have never claimed such! Archimedes provided an excellent proof of no atmospheric weight in 271 B.C. Please find fault with that one!
The atmospheric no work concept comes from the Maxwell, Boltzmann discission of the atmospheric altitude gradiants of pressure, density, and temperature. This atmosphere is both isopotential and isentropic for any relocation of atmospheric mass within this atmosphere.
“That same sack on you back will also weigh 100 lbs. In both cases, work is not being done by the surface upon which the sack rests. That you get tired and the scale doesn’t has nothing to do with the work done on the 100 lb sack of grain. The simple reason is that in neither case is the sack moved through a distance.”
1.Any force times zero distance is zero ‘work’.
2.Any distance times zero force is zero ‘work’.
Moving atmosphere about is the #2 kind of isentropy!
“ALL of this is first semester high school physics. I know, I was a high school physics teacher for a number of years. Yes my students were all amazed that they and a post carrying a 100 pound sack of grain did no work.”
Did you also teach #2 about the atmosphere? Why not?
“Your “theory” that the atmosphere has no weight is quite testable. If your “theory” were true, then a tank emptied of air would weigh exactly the same as a tank filled with air. Or a box containing flying bugs would weigh exactly the same as the box with no bugs at all. Try it. You might actually learn something for a change.”
I have done the weight measurement of a fixed volume of a compressed gas! Function of gas mass contained. Such is never an atmosphere.
The force of gravity that you attribute to creating weight, is completely subsumed by the existance and maintainance of this atmosphere. The singular force of gravity cannot express both on the surround compressable fluid. As Archimedes carefully demonstrated, displacing atmosphere with a fixed volume, only displaces empty space!
All the best! -will-
02
Will Janoschka,
No you didn’t!
Will, in order to have a non-zero value for work there needs to be both a mass and the movement of that mass over some distance. Therefore, your statement #2, although logically valid is not physically sound. If zero force is applied to some mass then by definition that mass was not moved any distance.
IOW, zero force = zero distance every time.
IOW, when you say ‘any distance times zero force’ the ‘any distance’ part of that statement is always a distance of zero. By definition.
Huh?! As soon as there is movement of some mass, any mass, there must be some force involved that causes that movement.
Isn’t it enough that Stephen Wilde promotes ‘immaculate convection’?
Now you chime in with ‘immaculate translation of mass’!
Double Huh! The answer to your first question is NO! The answer to your second question is because it’s not physics!
Please wake up and desist!
Abe
10
Just-A-Guy November 26, 2015 at 9:00 am ·
Will Janoschka, Posts only his POV! Never corrupted buy other! I have no need for consensus or agreement! If you do not like, go suck beans!
“Will, in order to have a non-zero value for work there needs to be both a mass and the movement of that mass over some distance. Therefore, your statement #2, although logically valid is not physically sound. If zero force is applied to some mass then by definition that mass was not moved any distance.”
What total neuvo-physics BS! Rotational inertia of this planets surface does continually accelerates lower atmospheric mass laterally, if not at surface velocity! This is and is always considered ‘work’.
However, After that initial acceleration, the momentum of that mass provides the continuum of motion, in whatever direction. The continued motion of any atmospheric mass no longer requires the application of any continuing force! As per all of Newton’s laws of motion.
Engineers notice that the missile keeps going, after the initial 12 second thrust burnout! What do you observe or ever notice?
“IOW, zero force = zero distance every time.”
Please describe reason for the obvious continual displacement of atmospheric mass in your illusionary concept!
02
Will Janoschka,
Yes, you’re right of course. I left out the third option and that is for a mass moving at a constant velocity. In that case, there is a change in position of the mass in question. The change in position, the distance moved, is constant over time. There is no longer any work being performed on that mass.
OK?
Now that we’ve gotten that out of the way, let’s take a closer look at how wrong you are by pointing out how right you are.
These words, which you wrote to support your POV, are an extremely good explanation of how the conservation of momentum functions. As you know, conservation of momentum requires that there be no change in the way distances are measured from place to place which is called invariance.
You do remember Noether’s Theorem, right? That was your reference for supporting your POV that conservation of energy cannot be justified in a gravitational field under Einstein’s General Relativity.
In fact,
And yet now you claim that there is conservation of something in the atmosphere. Conservation of momentum! 😮
As you’re no doubt quite aware, General Relativity has two distinct features that Newton’s Gravitation doesn’t.
1. Time dilation
2. Length contraction
You can’t have one without the other.
IOW, if there’s conservation of momentum, as you claim, then there’s also conservation of energy. (Newton’s Laws of Motion.) But, if there’s no conservation of energy, which you also claim, then there’s no conservation of momentum. (Einstein’s General Relativity.)
IOW, when you want to reject conservation of energy, (when it’s convenient for pushing your POV), you invoke General Relativity, but when you want to promote conservation of momentum, (when it’s convenient for pushing your POV), you invoke Newtonian Mechanics! 😮
What does this say about you and your POV?
Abe
10
I see. Your “theory” is that if some other force is acting on a body or collection of bodies, gravity can no longer act. That being the case, I can place a chunk of iron on top of a magnet resting on the surface of the earth and the fact that there is a magnetic force on the chunk of iron eliminates the force of gravity.
Or alternatively. I have a wooden ladder that weights 100 lbs. I rest it against a wall at a 45 degree angle. I can measure a force vector perpendicular to the wall between the ladder and the wall. By your theory, that force vector all by itself negates the force of gravity on the ladder?
I suggest you go back to high school and retake the lesson on components of force and force vectors. Sadly, I suspect it would be a futile effort.
20
Lionell Griffith Nov 26, 2015 at 11:30 am
(“The force of gravity that you attribute to creating weight, is completely subsumed by the existence (sic) and maintenance (sic) of this atmosphere. The singular force of gravity cannot express both on the surround compressible (sic) fluid.”)
I truly DNGAS of your noticing my mis-spellings! If you can notice, my concept did get across!
“I see. Your “theory” is that if some other force is acting on a body or collection of bodies, gravity can no longer act.”
I have no theory, only my measurement. Theory is for folk that demonstrate, that they cannot do, Some administrators accept such limitation, they can only teach!
“That being the case, I can place a chunk of iron on top of a magnet resting on the surface of the earth and the fact that there is a magnetic force on the chunk of iron eliminates the force of gravity.”
Will you not even consider that this atmosphere works nothing like you have been brainwashed into thinking?
02
Will Janoschka,
As I mentioned earlier, I’m glad you’ve decided to reply without insulting me personally and instead attempted to address the actual content of what I wrote. Unfortunately, this attempt didn’t work out quite so well.
While these statements are not direct insults, they’re both examples of the ad-hominem logical fallacy because rather than respond to the content of the quoted material that was presented, you chose to suggest that I didn’t read the original works.
For the case of Archimedes and the atmosphere, I would appreciate that you respond to my comment #48.1 above.
In this comment, I’d like to examine Emmy Noether’s theorem.
If you had to ask 6 high level mathematicians to explain, then that implies you didn’t have a complete understanding. If, as you say, none of them could explain, then clearly you still haven’t gotten to the point where you have a complete understanding.
If they all expressed that she is likely correct, then they too must not have a complete understanding because Emmy Noether’s theorem is mathematically correct. Of that, there’s no question.
If they expressed to you that local conservation [of energy] may appear in a gravitational field, then again, they must not have a complete understanding of how Noether’s Theorem works. Noether’s Theorem does lead to conservation of energy in a gravitational field if the field is described using Newton’s formulation of gravity because in that formulation, time is invariant.
There is no time-dilation in Newtonian Gravitation but there is time-dilation in Einstein’s description of gravity, General Relativity. The fact that time appears to flow at a different rate within a gravitational field is the basic difference between Newton’s gravity and Einstein’s. (That and length contraction).
As far as not having any justification for using Noether’s Theorem in the case of deriving conservation of energy within the context of General Relativity, there is a justification for it. That justification is the same justification that physicists apply for ignoring gravitational effects when examining the microscopic world of atoms, molecules and their interactions, and that is that those effects are so incomprehensibly small as to have no relevance.
Abe
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Just-A-Guy November 25, 2015 at 2:01 pm
“That justification is the same justification that physicists apply for ignoring gravitational effects when examining the microscopic world of atoms, molecules and their interactions, and that is that those effects are so incomprehensibly small as to have no relevance. Abe”
What arrogant nonsense! The whole blog is about the planet, its oceans, and atmosphere! How in that whole mess is temperature determined/controlled, and what meaning is there for your fantasy temperature? Considering the scale, how can gravity be ignored? Does your “Time translation symmetry gives conservation of energy;”, have any symmetry whatsoever the this scale and epoch? Why should an atmosphere exhibit conservation of anything? Are you trying to construct an atmosphere, ‘efficient’ at something?
Emmy Noether ably has proven that conservation of energy is ‘not a requirement in this atmosphere’. The thermostatically isopotential atmosphere, implies consideration of such. While the extremely lossy atmospheric mass accelerations completely belie that! The secondary purpose of this atmosphere is to dispatch entropy to space in the most efficant manner!
Emmy Noether
02
David and Jo, thanks for putting the effort into something that truly makes sense!
I started doubting the climate alarmism after I saw Al Gore’s apallingly unscientific film, with all the “shout as load as you can” climate alarm messages that you could possibly invent and squeeze into one and a half hour. After that, the more the IPCCC started to claim that they knew everything with 95% confidence, my confidence in them started to decrease in line with the global temperatures since.
Recently I have seen some people claim the famous 2nd law of Thermodynamics and the fact that a cold object cannot heat a warmer object and I started to doubt the whole “greenhouse effect”. But there was still the insulation effect. Thanks to these excellent blog post, I understand now how it works and why the climate is much more stable than the warmists continue to claim against all evidence.
Thanks again!
\Carl
00
Carl,
The second law argument has been widely misunderstood. While a cold object like clouds can’t make the surface warmer than the cloud itself, when combined with incident solar power, the cloud can contribute to the surface being warmer than the cloud or incident solar energy can do on its own. The universe is relatively linear in the energy domain and joules plus joules is more joules. Consensus climate science obfuscates this by using s sensitivity expressed as degrees per W/m^2, rather than W/m^2 of BB emissions per W/m^2 of forcing. The former is approximately linear over as narrow range of surface temperature, while the later is completely linear over the entire range of surface emissions.
The second law tells us is that a heat engine can not warm its source of heat. How this relates to the climate is that the end to end effect of evaporation includes weather and you can’t consider GHG effects from water vapor without considering the entire influence of evaporation. Weather is manifested by a global heat engine whose source of energy is primarily the surface of the ocean. Hurricanes are the proof of concept, which are localized, maximally efficient versions of the heat engine driving weather and they leave a trail of cooler water in their wake, rather than the trail of warmer water that must result if the net result from water vapor was positive feedback.
00
HuH!
Is this thread really open for comments? (This is a test)
Abe
00
Dr.Evans,
In the current article, the statement about surface heating occurring due to the redistribution of OLR caused by a decrease in OLR through the CO2 pipe is missing.
1). Does this mean that you’ve changed your view from then till now?
The diagram showing the OLR pipes in the OP above now has percentages whereas the original diagram in New Science 11 did not. If my understanding is correct, these percentages represent the amounts of OLR going through each pipe.
If my understanding is correct, according to this statement, ASR = OLR and we all agree that ASR determines the surface temperature. This means that, by definition, the percentages ascribed to each of the pipes are percentages of ASR that leave the atmosphere as OLR. That being the case, if there is more OLR leaving the atmosphere through the surface pipe and ASR has not changed then after the redistribution of OLR the surface temperature has not changed.
Please take heed. This is a well constructed example of modus ponens based on your statements. IOW, the only way the argument presented can be refuted is if one or more of your statements is inaccurate.
2). If you haven’t changed your position in question 1), how then do you justify an increase in surface temperature simply by the redistribution of OLR?
Abe
PS. If my calculation is correct, this blog-post will be closed for comments sometime within the next 24 hours. In order to continue this conversation, could you leave it open?
00
Abe,
1) No, I haven’t changed my view. Don’t see how those statements suggest I have. Yes, those percentages represent the flows through the pipes — only thought of adding them to the dam diagram them later.
“we all agree that ASR determines the surface temperature”
No, ASR does not determine the surface temperature. The OLR radiated by the surface “determines” its temperature (in the sense that if you know one you know the other, there is an invertible relationship between the temperature of the surface and the OLR it emits). Of course, the OLR radiated by the surface is heavily influenced by the ASR absorbed by the surface. Perhaps you are overlooking the distinction between the OLR radiated by the surface (about 45 W/m2, see post 14) and the total heat radiated by the surface (about 390 W/m2).
ASR = OLR only for the whole planet, not for the subsystems like the surface. The only way energy enters and leaves the planet is radiation, so ASR = OLR is just saying input = output. However the surface also sheds energy via convection/conduction and evaporation, and it receives radiation from the atmosphere.
2) No, one of the statements used to construct your argument was wrong. Sorry. It’s like a big set of simultaneous equations. The steady state OLR comes from four emitters (four pipes) plus some minor ones, and has to exactly match the ASR input. The OLR from the pipes also have to satisfy the interior constraints of the climate, such as heights of the emitters, the lapse rate connecting them, etc. When all that is done, the OLR of the surface is monotonically connected to the OLR it emits (presumably a T^4 relationship, because it is essentially like SB).
(Pushed comment time out to 70 days temporarily.)
00
“(Pushed comment time out to 70 days temporarily.)”
Thank you! This is a mindless unprovoked attack on your fine presentation of what is so very very wrong with the whole modeling concept! Abe is being but a warmist troll again! The big big big variable pipe in the sky is the the most variable conversion of latent heat to sensible heat for proper efficacy in the EMR dispatch of waste power to space. There can be no understanding of this planet’s radiative exitance to space until the control mechanism for this process is understood and demonstrated. All else is religious/political fantasy!
All the best! -will-
14
Oh relax Will. I presented some pretty new ideas, and a different way of conducting a black box analysis. For people used to focusing on the internals of the box, it could be hard to integrate it all with what they already know. Depending on your background, this material can be difficult at first.
Anyway, it is useful to see where and how people misunderstand it.
Happy Christmas!
00
“That will involve the surface pipe carrying more OLR, which would require the surface to warm — and the $64 trillion question is, how much warmer?”
So why does the water surface need to rise in the dam analogy before equilibrium can be restored whereas the surface temperature beneath an atmosphere does not need to rise for equilibrium to be restored?
The answer lies in the variability of the lapse rate slope as one moves up against gravity through the vertical profile of an atmosphere.
There is no significant density variation in the horizontal plane within the water behind the dam so there is nothing comparable to a variable lapse rate available to enable an adjustment process that does not require a rise in surface height.
See post number 1 above:
“For an atmosphere, density variations arise in the horizontal plane all the time due to uneven surface heating and so convection is inevitable even without radiative gases. Radiative gases then alter the slope of the lapse rate so as to allow the consequent convection to adjust the heights of radiative flows to space from the various available ‘pipes’ so that reallocation of emission between pipes can occur without requiring a rise in surface temperature.
For more detail see here:
http://joannenova.com.au/2015/10/for-discussion-can-convection-neutralize-the-effect-of-greenhouse-gases/“
06
Dr. Evans,
As per our e-mail exchange on 24 Dec., I’ve waited several days to respond because of the holidays. I trust that all went well and you and Jo were able to enjoy them together with the rest of your family.
And now, back to our regularly scheduled program.
Error of equivocation.
de·ter·mine verb
3rd person present: determines
1. cause (something) to occur in a particular way; be the decisive factor in.
“it will be her mental attitude that determines her future”
synonyms: control, decide, regulate, direct, dictate, govern;
“chromosomes determine the gender of the embryo”
deciding, decisive, conclusive, final, definitive, key, pivotal, crucial, critical, major, chief, prime
“money is the determining factor”
2. ascertain or establish exactly, typically as a result of research or calculation.
“officials are working with state police to determine the cause of a deadly bus crash”
synonyms: ascertain, find out, discover, learn, establish, calculate, work out, make out, deduce, diagnose, discern; check, verify, confirm; informal figure out
“determine the composition of the fibers”
When I said determines, I meant the first definition: causes. And you clearly agree:
ASR is the input side of the equation. This input of EMR is what causes the Earth to heat up by absorbing the EMR that reaches the surface. Yes, we can determine (definition 2. i.e. calculate) the Earth’s surface temperature by measuring the EMR radiating away from the surface and that’s what you refer to as OLR, but that’s not what I’m referring to.
Internal contradiction. You stated that ASR = OLR. This means that ASR determines (definition 1.; i.e. regulates) OLR. The component of OLR that radiates directly out to space is just a percentage of the total OLR from all of the pipes when added together. If ASR = total OLR and total OLR is determined by ASR then the percentage of OLR leaving the surface directly to space through the surface pipe must also, by definition, (as a percentage of the total), be determined by the ASR.
IOW. Not heavily influenced but rather completely governed by ASR.
Tautology. The OLR of the surface is the OLR it emits. This statement and what follows do not shed any light on the subject at hand. Maybe you meant to say something else?
There are two other specific misunderstandings of what I wrote, but let’s see if we can get a handle on the ones posted here first, yes?
Abe
00
Just-a-Guy, you are playing semantics.
Natural language is not specific enough to describe the relationships involved sufficiently. Yes, in climate everything is related to everything so everything “causes” everything. But that gets us nowhere and so is for lawyers with dictionaries.
You need to come to grips with this part of my reply (52.1):
So, as you quoted me,
Do you disagree that “there is an invertible relationship between the temperature of the surface and the OLR it emits”? It looks from the general tenor of your reply that you do, but you haven’t offered any argument as to why.
There is no contradiction is what I am saying. You are just applying binary dictionary definitions to a more nuanced and complicated system. If you want the complete story, see Eq. (4) of post 16.
Is there any part of Eq. (4) of post 16 or the material leading up to it that you disagree with? If so, please clearly state the statement and why you disagree with it.
The statement “the OLR of the surface is monotonically connected to the OLR it emits” should obviously have read “the temperature of the surface is monotonically connected to the OLR it emits”.
00
Dr. Evans,
😮
Every symbol that we use to represent a value or concept in an equation has a pre-defined and very specific natural language explanation behind it. If it didn’t, we couldn’t teach others any basic math much less algebra, calculus, or any Physics. At all. Full stop. That you would even make such a statement is perplexing to say the least.
You clearly misunderstood my use of the word determines. No semantic games being played here. That misunderstanding lead you to respond in a way that didn’t address my comments. Your current response further evades responding to those comments.
Non-sequitur. Everything may be related to everything else, but cause and effect is a one way street. Everything does not cause everything else. With or without the quote marks. 😉 This statement is even more perplexing than the previous one.
Straw man. I’ve made no statements as to whether or not the temperature of a body can or cannot be calculated from the EMR that it emits. Considering the two perplexing statements quoted above and the meaning behind them, I can see how you came to the wrong conclusion about the general tenor of my reply.
So to be clear. If we measure the OLR radiating from a body, we can calculate it’s temperature. If we know the temperature of a body, we cannot calculate the OLR without also knowing the composition of that body. Yes, if we’re discussing a black-body you’re statement is correct. If you want to treat the Earth as a black body then yes to that too. My original comment doesn’t address this aspect of your article.
I agree that there is a relationship between the temperature of a body and the OLR that it emits, but I disagree that the relationship is invertible. The temperature causes the OLR. The OLR does not cause the temperature. We can convert one value to the other in an equation, but we cannot invert the cause and effect relationship of the one to the other.
You might want to review my comment to David Cosserat below and my reply to his response.
Maybe that will clear things up.
OK then. Yes, the temperature of the entire surface is directly related to the OLR it emits. The entire surface consists of the sum of the OLR from all the pipes when added together. According to you, this hypothetical surface is around 5km above sea level somewhere within the troposphere. It was you who stated that this imaginary surface was the basis and justification for using SB. Whether I agree with your application of SB or not is irrelevant to my point. The point is the internal contradiction in your statements.
IOW, you can’t say that in order to justify using SB you need to add the OLR from all the pipes at their varying heights, and then say that you can also use SB on just the fraction of OLR that goes through the surface pipe directly out to space. The one contradicts the other.
A word on semantics.
In a political discussion, people will often play games with the semantics. In that case, there is a valid reason to say to someone that they’re playing with semantics. In a discussion about science, semantics is everything. The proper use and comprehension of words, symbols, and values is paramount. In the case of science, saying to someone that they’re playing semantics is not a valid response.
Considering how often Jo and all the regular participants on this blog decry the use of political arguments when discussing science, it’s surprising to see you use a political argument in response to a question about science.
The logical error in your statements is real and you haven’t even addressed it. I was under the impression that we were going to have a rational discussion about it, but I don’t see any sign of that occurring so far.
Abe
00
Correction.
Should read:
OK then. Yes, the temperature of the entire surface is directly related to the total OLR that it emits. The entire surface is calculated by averaging all the different heights that each pipe radiates OLR to space from. The total OLR is the sum of the different values of OLR from each of the pipes when all of them are added together.
I’m sorry for the lack of clarity in my original statements.
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy: My previous reply stands.
Perhaps you do not know I meant by “invertible”? A function is invertible if it can be inverted, it an inverse function exists. That is to say, if you know the value of one of the two quantities involved (one in the domain of the function, one in its range) then you know the value of the other. In this context it means that if you know the surface temperature you know the OLR, or vice versa — the temperatures and OLR are in a one-to-one relationship. No causation is asserted — cause and effect in a complex system described by several constraints (simultaneous equations) is not easy to determine and in any case is not relevant IMHO.
So do you agree that “there is an invertible relationship between the temperature of the surface and the OLR it emits”? I’m expecting a “yes” or a “no”, and if “no” I expect some concise reasons.
You say: “According to you, this hypothetical surface is around 5km above sea level somewhere within the troposphere. It was you who stated that this imaginary surface was the basis and justification for using SB.”
Nope, on the contrary, I have said something very different. Please see the section entitled “The Characteristic Emission Layer is Unrealistically Simple” in post 6.
Despite the huge number of words in your comments, I still have no idea what your complaint is. Please be concise.
00
Dr. Evans,
When we say, ‘correlation is not causation’, what do you think that means?
In science, using the scientific method as per Popper, unless you can show causation, the results of an experiment are invalid. That’s the whole point of the null-hypothesis and the falsification that it provides. Anything outside of these constraints is not science. The idea that cause and effect are irrelevant is one of the foundations of post modern science where only the interpretation is important and the facts are less so, if at all.
Do you reject the proposition that incoming solar radiation causes the Earth to heat up?
Do you reject the proposition that the amount of solar radiation absorbed by the Earth causes the temperature that we measure to be precisely what it is? Answering yes to either of these two questions invalidates your definition of ASR.
You brought up the issue of cause and effect being irrelevant. I couldn’t allow this to go uncontested. If that caused my reply to contain a huge amount of words, then you shouldn’t have brought it up.
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy, I asked you for a “yes” or “no” to ” “there is an invertible relationship between the temperature of the surface and the OLR it emits”” and you serve up insulting rubbish like “When we say, ‘correlation is not causation’, what do you think that means?”.
Knowing the constraints on a system allow one to know its final state as it transitions from one steady state to another, even though one might not know the more complex issue of the chain of causation that moves it to that final state. This is perfectly adequate, given the context of trying to compute sensitivity to increased CO2.
00
Dr. Evans,
As you can see, I responded to your comment #53.1.1.2 above, in three separate replies each dealing with a specific issue. This reply only deals with your position that cause and effect are irrelevant when it comes to climate because of it’s complexity.
The statement: “When we say, ‘correlation is not causation’, what do you think that means?”
Is in response to: “No causation is asserted — cause and effect in a complex system described by several constraints (simultaneous equations) is not easy to determine and in any case is not relevant IMHO.”
It is not in response to: “I asked you for a “yes” or “no” to ” “there is an invertible relationship between the temperature of the surface and the OLR it emits””
Please stop misrepresenting my statements.
1.) Knowing the constraints on a system allows one to examine the effect of the variable under examination, in this case CO2, that caused the system to transition from one steady state to another.
2.) The chain of causation is what one is trying to ascertain when examining the transition from one steady state to another.
3.) If causation has not been established, no science was done.
Therefore, . . .
What you’re really saying is that no science is needed when computing sensitivity to increased CO2.
I chose the words correlation is not causation precisely because of their clear and unambiguous implications. The scientific endeavor is the search for cause and effect. Full stop.
Do I really need to bring links to sources for this most basic of concepts?
Finally, when you say “knowing the constraints on a system”, this implies both knowledge of all the constraints on that system, and their effect on the system. Not knowing all the constraints on a system leaves the door wide open for some unknown variable to be the agent responsible (the cause) for the change (the effect) in the state of the system. And if you don’t know the effect that each of the constraints has on the system, then how do you even know that they constrain the system in the first place?
Like I said before, these concepts are so basic and self evident to the scientific endeavor, that I’m at a complete loss as to how they can even be questioned.
My response to your statements, as quoted, which you brought up in the first place, is that: I reject those statements completely and unequivocally.
Abe
00
Dr. Evans,
Not only do I understand what you meant, I answered this question when . . .
Notice the bold italics applied to the statement, “My original comment doesn’t address this aspect of your article.”
You keep insisting that the issue of whether or not a function or an equation is invertible is relevant to my original comment. So, once again, it is not. You brought this issue up and I responded to it out of courtesy to you. As before, if that caused my comment to contain a ‘huge number of words’ then you should not have brought it up.
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy, Your quoted statement seems contradictory to me. “We can convert one value to the other in an equation” implies it is invertible, yet your other statements suggest you think it is not invertible. And you keep dragging in the irrelevancy of causation. So which is it, is it invertible or not (note how I defined invertible)?
00
Dr. Evans,
In general, we can convert one value to the other in an equation. The equation is meant to represent some aspect of the real world. Even if the equation doesn’t represent some aspect of the real world, we can still convert one value to the other. The equation would be valid mathematically, but it would not be sound physically.
In the specific case of the Stephan-Boltzmann equation representing the relationship between temperature and OLR as presented in this series of articles, the values for these variables are constrained by the emissivity. When discussing a black body, we can convert one value to the other because emissivity is given a value of 1 by definition, and therefore emissivity can be ignored.
A black body is but an idealized hypothetical construct.
When discussing a real body in the real world, emissivity has a value of less than 1 and so we need to first find out, empirically, what that emissivity is. So in the real world, we cannot convert one value to the other in the Stephan-Boltzmann equation without knowing the composition of the body in question, the Earth.
The only reason you didn’t get a yes or no answer from me is because of . . .
Had you not made these statements, my answer would have been yes. And I said so in advance back then . .
I hope that this finally clarifies what you perceive as contradictory.
Causation is not irrelevant. Not in general and not in climate. Causation is central to the scientific method and, anyway, I addressed this issue above.
Abe
00
So you say that “yes” they are invertible. Good. So your original allegation of a contradiction disappears.
00
Dr.Evans,
How did you understand “yes” when I clearly said “no”?
So, you’ve misrepresented my words yet again.
Hmmm!
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy, I haven’t misrepresented your very many words, I just found them tediously contradictory and incomprehensible. Why couldn’t you just say “yes” or “no”?
So it’s “no” now, definitely? You say that the function connecting surface temperature and surface OLR is not invertible, that is that if one knows the amount of OLR from the surface then one cannot know the temperature of the surface or vice versa?
00
Dr. Evans,
Because it’s not yes or no. Please read my “tediously contradictory” words once again.
Yes for a black body.
No for a body in the real world, like and especially the Earth.
There is no contradiction in these, or any other words I’ve written. Please quote where there is a real contradiction and not where your misrepresentation has created that contradiction.
Abe
00
Dr. Evans,
I included a clear and yes, concise, explanation for why it’s only “yes” when discussing a black body, and why it must be “no” when discussing the Earth in my earlier comment.
I did that so that my reasoning could be examined by you and anyone else reading these comments. The key to the problem is establishing emissivity. The IPCC et al have got that number wrong. By using that number, your results must also be wrong.
. . . I chose those words carefully. It’s not that I think that the average emissivity of ~0.62 will give us a better result than ~0.96 or any other average value. The way I see it, emissivity, as it’s employed by SB, is a constant. I don’t see how an average will give actionable results. Although this is not directly related to my original comment, when you mentioned that the Stephan-Boltzmann equation is invertible, I felt obliged to respond. In order to respond I had to first find out what you meant by invertible.
I try to be both precise and thorough. If you look at my comments in that light, your impressions of my comments might just change. Maybe then we could concentrate on the content itself.
Abe
00
Dr. Evans,
In my original comment . . .
How is that not concise?
You had a problem with my use of the word determines. When I explained what I meant, rather than accept the clarification and move on, you referred to my clarification as a game of semantics and just ignored the clarification and then ignored the rest of what I said.
Now, with all due respect, if you don’t want to accept the clarification I gave you and insist that what I meant is what you say that I meant, then there’s no point in having a discussion is there?
When David Cosserat didn’t get what I wrote . . .
How is that not concise?
So when you claim that: (paraphrase)
Because there is more OLR going through the surface pipe directly out to space after the redistribution, then it must be that the surface temperature has gone up,
simple arithmetic and basic logic shows that not to be the case.
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy: As noted before in my reply 52.1, “we all agree that ASR determines the surface temperature” is wrong. Knowing ASR does not give you surface temperature, there are many other factors that determine surface temperature. Hence your alleged contradiction does not exist. See David Cosserat’s comment at 55.
10
Dr. Evans,
Fallacy of equivocation. What I’m talking about is the surface of the Earth. The place where UV gets absorbed by the Earth, the body of water in the dam analogy, and also the place where the surface pipe radiates directly to space. Like you said, ASR is defined . . .
So ASR is the total energy coming from the sun that is incident upon the Earth and is not reflected. UV goes right through the atmosphere and hits the surface of the planet where it is absorbed. Although I could not find an actual quote where you state this explicitly,
. . . and it’s implied when you describe the surface pipe in New Science 6:
So, when we only consider the EMR/photons that are emitted through the surface pipe, you state that these photons leave the land or sea surface. I.e., the surface of the Earth.
Which is why I quoted my reply to David Cosserat in my response to you. Rather than use the confusing words surface temperature I changed that to the temperature of the planet.
Yes, the surface you’re referring to is Ts, Surface temperature (global average air temperature at the surface). And yes, that temperature is affected by many variables.
Incoming UV is not one of them.
The water in the dam is supposed to represent the energy content of the planet, at (on solid ground) or at and below the surface (oceans, lakes etc.) of the planet. That energy comes in through one pipe, the sun, as per your diagram.
The OLR pipes tell us how that energy content exits to space. Each has it’s own process, but you need all of them to get OLR to balance with ASR.
So again, if the energy content of the earth, ASR, has not changed, then the temperature of the Earth has not changed. Just because more energy leaves through the surface pipe and less through the CO2 pipe, OLR has not changed and therefore ASR has not changed, so the temperature of the planet remains the same. The portion/percentage of OLR exiting the planet directly through the atmospheric window through the surface pipe cannot tell us anything about the actual temperature of the planet. Not before the increased concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere and not after that increase.
Therefore, once again, when you state: Because there is more OLR going through the surface pipe directly out to space after the redistribution, then it must be that the surface temperature has gone up,
simple arithmetic and basic logic shows that not to be the case.
And there is the fallacy of equivocation right there in that statement.
The surface pipe: Is talking about the land or sea surface.
The surface temperature: Is talking about Ts.
The contradiction, therefore, still remains.
Abe
01
So at some stage you confused “radiating temperature” and “surface temperature”? You could have said that in fewer words. Yes, if you know ASR then you know radiating temperature, in steady state. But knowing radiating temperature does not give you surface temperature in the real world, because the surface temperature depends on the distribution of OLR from the various emitters, which is disturbed by increasing CO2.
I see no contradiction in anything I have written on the topic.
You contradict yourself however: you say “The portion/percentage of OLR exiting the planet directly through the atmospheric window through the surface pipe cannot tell us anything about the actual temperature of the planet.” yet you agree there is an invertible relationship between OLR from the surface and surface temperature. You do see that they are talking about the same thing, don’t you?
Please be more concise. If you have a question or query I can help you, but this isn’t getting anywhere.
10
Dr. Evans,
Before you read and possibly respond to what I’m about to write, please review my Definition of Terms below in comment #74.
No. All along you have conflated the surface of the planet, solid ground and liquid oceans, with the atmosphere at the surface, the gaseous air above the surface.
To paraphrase you: “Because there is more OLR going through the surface pipe directly out to space after the redistribution, then it must be that the surface temperature has gone up.”
There’s the fallacy of equivocation right there in your statement.
The surface pipe: Is talking about the land or sea surface as per your definition.
The surface temperature: Is talking about Ts, air temperature above that surface also as per your definition.
OLR going through the surface pipe represents the radiation going from the skin directly out to space.
Surface temperature, Ts, is beyond the skin, between the Earth and space.
My question is, How do you not see, and why do you refuse to acknowledge, that if there’s an increase in the amount of OLR radiating directly out to space from the skin, bypassing the atmosphere through the atmospheric window, this does not mean that air temperature has increased?
No, there is no contradiction in what I said. Notice the words partial/percentage. SB requires total radiation across all wavelengths, not total radiation within only the sub-set of wavelengths represented the phrase ‘the atmospheric window’. That’s the way the Stephan-Boltzmann Law works, by definition.
So not only have you conflated air temperature, Ts, with skin temperature, you’ve also misrepresented my statements yet again by ignoring the words ‘partial/percentage’. Please stop this.
Even if you had not conflated these terms, an increase in the amount of OLR from the skin, cannot tell us anything about the temperature of the Earth, because that increase is offset by the decrease in OLR through the CO2 pipe as per your claim. This is because the sub-set of wavelengths going through the CO2 pipe must be included in the SB calculation in order to properly apply the Stephan-Boltzmann Law. This is by definition.
And you know this full well because you’re the one who wrote an entire post on how to apply the Stephan-Boltzmann Law to the Earth. In that post you admit that the Earth does not radiate to space from one well defined ‘surface’, (which is here called the ‘skin’ for disambiguation), as required by the SB equation. You then describe a process by which a hypothetical skin can be constructed by taking the OLR from different layers of the Earth and it’s atmosphere and adding them all together.
OLR from all the pipes added together gives us the hypothetical skin of the Earth. (The radiating ‘surface’).
Now do you see why the contradiction in your statements stands? Do you now see how the contradiction stands even without the conflation of the term surface?
Abe
PS: Please stop asking me to be more concise. Try responding to what I’ve actually said and not to what you think I might mean.
00
Just-A-Guy,
Whatever ever are you on about? I hesitate to intrude but here are the best data available:
INCOMING ENERGY FLOWS
ASR means the radiation from the Sun that is absorbed by the earth system. Of this, about 2/3 (161Wm-2) is absorbed by the earth’s surface and about 1/3 (78Wm-2) is absorbed directly by the atmosphere on the way down.
So ASR = 161+78 = 239Wm-2
Of the 161Wm-2 radiation absorbed by the earth’s surface, 138Wm-2 is transferred from the surface to the atmosphere; 22Wm-2 is radiated directly to space (through the so-called ‘atmospheric window’; and 1Wm-2 is (supposedly) absorbed permanently by the surface (thus warming it minutely).
[Just for completeness, of the 138Wm-2 transferred from the surface to the atmosphere, 17Wm-2 is transferred by conduction/convection; 80Wm-2 is transferred by latent heat of water evaporation; and only 41Wm-2 is transferred by radiation.]
OUTGOING ENERGY FLOWS
OLR means the outgoing longwave radiation from the ‘top-of-the-atmosphere’ to space. It is sum of the 78Wm-2 of radiation received by the atmosphere directly from the Sun; and the 138Wm-2 transferred to the atmosphere from the earth’s surface; and the 22Wm-2 transferred through the atmospheric window.
So OLR = 78+138+22 = 238Wm-2
So OLR exactly matches ASR (except for the 1Wm-2 supposedly absorbed).
[All figures are from Trenberth, Fasullo, Kiehl, 2009]
00
David Cosserat,
You then go about presenting values for ASR and OLR and . . .
Why?
Have I made any statements that dispute that ASR = OLR? No, I have not.
Have I made any statements that dispute the values for ASR or OLR? No, I have not.
Does anything you wrote have any relevance to my original comment or my reply to Dr. Evans’ response to that comment? No, it doesn’t.
You don’t need calculus, or even algebra, to see the error in the logic here. All you need is simple maths.
ASR = OLR. In simple math simply means 100% of ASR = 100% of OLR.
Total OLR is calculated by adding up the percentage values for all of the individual pipes:
33% for water vapor
20% for CO2
20% for cloud tops
20% for surface
07% for minor greenhouse gases
_______
100% total OLR
These values are before the increased concentration of CO2.
Dr. Evans has stated that after an increase in concentration of CO2, these percentages would change. So for example:
38% for water vapor
10% for CO2
22% for cloud tops
22% for surface
08% for minor greenhouse gases
_______
100% total OLR
The actual values both before and after the increase in CO2 are irrelevant to my point.
My point is that if before the increase in CO2 ASR = OLR
and
after the increase in CO2 ASR = OLR
and
Total OLR both before and after the increase in CO2 are equal because all that really happened was a redistribution of total OLR among and between the various pipes
then
ASR before and after the increase in concentration of CO2 must also be equal.
Therefore:
Because the temperature of the planet is completely dependent on ASR
and ASR has not changed
then
the temperature of the planet has not changed after the increase in concentration of CO2.
So when Dr. Evans claims that: (paraphrase)
Because there is more OLR going through the surface pipe directly out to space after the redistribution, then it must be that the surface temperature has gone up,
simple arithmetic and basic logic shows that not to be the case.
I don’t claim to agree or disagree with any of Dr. Evans’ statements, all of which were made during the course of this series of blog-posts. IOW, I make no claims as to the validity or accuracy of any of those statements.
So the answer to your original question is that what I’m on about is that these statements, as presented, are logically inconsistent based on simple arithmetic.
Abe
01
Just-A-Guy,
You say: Therefore: Because the temperature of the planet is completely dependent on ASR and ASR has not changed then
the temperature of the planet has not changed after the increase in concentration of CO2.
The logical error you are addressing is not in David Evans’ analysis. It is concealed in your own statement.
You have implicitly agreed that the temperature of the planet is dependent on TWO INDEPENDENT VARIABLES, not one:
(1) The ASR (which, as you correctly say, equals OLR at equilibrium) has not changed in the scenario you describe.
(2) The outflow of energy to space through the ‘atmospheric window’ has gone up – again, as you say in your hypothetical example, by 2%.
The surface temperature of an emitting body is proportional to the 4th root of the power radiated from that surface (Stefan-Boltzmann law). Since you admit the power radiated from the surface has gone up, you should not be surprised by the fact that that the surface temperature has gone up. And, consequently, so have all the other temperatures up the atmospheric column since they are controlled by the lapse rate.
David
00
David Cosserat,
The statement you’ve quoted is the logical consequence of the statements above it. It does not reflect my position, opinion, conviction, or anything else that might pertain to me.
The statements above it were all made by Dr. Evans, not me.
No I haven’t, Dr. Evans has.
Let me fix that for you:
(1) The ASR (which, as Dr. Evans correctly says, equals OLR at equilibrium) has not changed in the scenario Dr. Evans describes.
The only part of this statement that originates from me is the hypothetical value of 2%. As I said earlier, this value could be 1%, or 3.5%, or 7%. The actual value is irrelevant to the analysis of Dr. Evans’ claims. All that matters is that there has been some increase in OLR going out directly to space through the surface pipe as per Dr. Evans.
This is only partially true. Let me fix this for you also.
The surface temperature of an emitting body is proportional to the 4th root of the total power radiated from that surface (Stefan-Boltzmann law).
In Dr. Evans’ article, New Science 8: Applying the Stefan-Boltzmann Law to Earth, he goes to great lengths to explain why the total EMR from all the pipes must be taken into consideration in order to apply The Stephan-Boltzmann Law. Again, for the purposes of this discussion, I do not claim to agree nor disagree with Dr. Evans on his use of SB. I only point out his statements.
I have made no such admission. This claim was made by Dr. Evans. I only present that claim here. And that’s the real problem, isn’t it? The proportion of OLR that exits directly to space via the surface pipe can never tell us the temperature of the Earth, not before the change in the atmospheric concentration of CO2 nor after that change. (At least not according to New Science 8.)
Conclusion
Your observation that Dr. Evans’ statements lead to the conclusion that the Earth’s temperature is dependent on TWO INDEPENDENT VARIABLES is correct, but you attribute the logical error to me! 😮 So, basically, what you’ve done is confirm the results of my analysis.
Thank you. 🙂
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy,
Thanks for your clarifying reply.
I think we agree that if the flow through the upper atmosphere CO2 ‘pipe’ to space is reduced (due to a postulated step increase in the concentration of atmospheric CO2) then the consequent imbalance between ASR and OLR must be made up by an exactly balancing aggregate increase through one or more of the remaining energy flows to space (law of conservation of energy).
In any steady-state energy flow scenario involving several independent parallel channels, the proportion of energy that flows through each of the channels depends on their relative impedances. We do not need to know exactly what these relative impedances are to deduce that, in such a system, if one of the channel impedances is increased, there must be compensating increases in energy flow through all the other channels (Kirchoff’s law).
Now let us turn to the specific case of the earth’s surface. One of the four parallel energy channels from the earth’s surface is the ‘atmospheric window’ channel which radiates 22Wm-2 from the surface directly to space. The other three channels transfer energy from the earth’s surface to the atmosphere (by conduction/convection, 17Wm-2; by evapo-transpiration, 80Wm-2; and by radiation, 41Wm-2).
So, in order to maintain an argument that the surface temperature would not increase if we restrict the energy flowing through the ‘top-of-the-atmosphere’ CO2 channel (by increasing the concentration of atmospheric CO2), one would have to assume that the ASR = OLR balance will be restored only as a result of a proportionate balancing increase in the conduction/convection and evapo-transpiration energy flows from the surface, with no change at all occurring in the two radiative flows from the surface, one to the atmosphere and one directly to space.
In your attempt to justify this position you invoke the Stefan-Boltzmann law: The surface temperature of an emitting body is proportional to the 4th root of the total power radiated from that surface. But unfortunately, you then apply this backwards, implying that the temperature T before the atmospheric CO2 increase can in some way keep the outgoing radiation P at the value (22+41 = 63Wm-2 in the hypothetical discussed case) that it had before the CO2 increase. This is nonsense. The radiation P is not constrained by temperature T in any physical sense. T is simply a human measure applied to a fundamental process – the emission of radiative power P from a surface.
It is of course true that, if the earth’s surface is measured to be a certain temperature T, then the power P radiated from that surface can be calculated using the simple mathematical relationship given by the S-B law. But it is a fallacy to assume that the temperature T causes the emission P. In fact it is precisely the other way round:
The radiated power P causes the measured temperature T
Once you grasp that fundamental physical truth, all else falls into place.
In the case under consideration, all the energy flows from the earth’s surface, including both the 22Wm-2 radiation through the ‘atmospheric window’ directly to space; and the 41Wm-2 radiation absorbed by the atmosphere; and the 17Wm-2 of conduction/convection delivered to the atmosphere; and the 80Wm-2 of latent heat of water vaporisation delivered to the atmosphere, are affected by the throttling of the ‘top-of-the-atmosphere’ outlet pipe. So the flows from the earth’s surface through all those other channels increase somewhat, including the radiative ones. And so the temperature of the surface does indeed rise.
10
David Cosserat,
I’ve read your comment and there’s definitely grounds for further discussion. I appreciate you taking the time to respond and I’ll do likewise within a day or so.
Cheers,
Abe
10
David Cosserat,
Right off the bat, I apologize for taking so long in responding.
Up until now, I haven’t really presented my views on whether I agree or disagree with the content of the O/P in this article or others in the series with one exception. (as far as I recall. I’ll have to check) The comment that initiated our discussion here, comment #53 above, was only meant to point out an internal contradiction in Dr. Evans’ statements and nothing more.
Notice the if . . . then construct in the quote. In principle, any reduction in the energy flow through one of the pipes should result in an increased flow through one or more of the other pipes if and only if we have ascertained that the flow into the system (the dam) and the total flow out of the system are indeed equal. In order not to stray off topic and for the sake of this discussion, let’s postulate that this is indeed the case.
1.) It is my view that an increase in the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere will not reduce the flow of OLR through the CO2 pipe. Dr. Evans has claimed throughout this series of articles that because a higher concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere will raise the height of the emission level and because of the adiabatic lapse rate in temperature of the troposphere, the CO2 pipe will now emit less OLR directly to space.
At first glance, this seems quite plausible and most people have tended to agree with that conclusion. After all, logic dictates that if CO2 is radiating at a higher altitude and the atmospheric temperature is lower at that higher altitude then there should indeed be less OLR exiting through the CO2 pipe. This is in compliance with the Ideal Gas Law. (Our atmosphere is close enough to a ideal gas to apply these laws with confidence.)
What both Dr. Evans and yourself have neglected to account for is that an increase in the concentration of CO2 will raise the partial pressure of CO2.
The Ideal Gas Law states, in a nutshell:
Because of the lapse rate in pressure, the pressure of the atmosphere at a higher altitude will be lower thereby causing a reduction in temperature. But, and please take heed to this point, because of the higher partial pressure of CO2 at the same height where the overall atmospheric pressure has decreased, the amount of OLR going through the CO2 pipe must increase.
Disclaimer: I do not propose that using the partial pressure of one constituent of the troposphere, in this case CO2, to determine it’s radiating temperature will yield an accurate result. What I am saying, in much simpler words, is this:
There may be less molecules overall radiating at a lower temperature at a higher altitude, but there are obviously more CO2 molecules doing the radiating. Think of it like this:
At five km above the surface of the Earth, you construct a grid parallel to the Earths surface that measures one thousand by one thousand units. You place one molecule of CO2 inside 250 of those grid boxes, one molecule per box. This gives us a radiating surface for CO2 that measures 50 by 50. If you now raise that grid one km, the overall temperature will drop in accordance with the Ideal Gas Law. The radiating surface for Co2 remains the same but the temperature has dropped because the pressure has dropped.
Now double the concentration of CO2 to 500 ppmv. There are now 500 grid boxes with a CO2 molecule in them, each of which is radiating to space. The radiating surface of CO2 has now doubled. Although the overall temperature of the atmosphere has dropped, you now have twice the radiating surface as before. Each CO2 molecule may indeed be radiating less often to space, but there are twice as many molecules.
There’s other stuff I’d like to respond to in your last comment but time won’t allow it right now. And I still have to prepare a response to Dr. Evans’ comments. I would like to hear your views on what was presented so far though.
Cheers,
Abe
00
The ‘pipe’ between the surface and space is almost exactly characterized as an ideal gray body with an emissivity of about 0.62 and establishes as absolute upper bound on the sensitivity of about 0.3 C per W/m^2 per the slope of the Stefan-Boltzmann relationship for a gray body and the data unambiguously confirms this.
http://www.palisad.com/co2/tp/fig1.png
The green line represents an ideal gray body and the 22K little red dots are measurements from 30 years of satellite measurements, each being the monthly average emissions by the planet vs. the monthly average temperature for constant latitude slices of the planet. The larger dots are the averages over the entire data set, again for constant latitude slices of the planet. In effect, the transfer of energy across the globe by non radiative atmospheric processes drives the system towards ideal which is the expected result for a system with many internal degrees of freedom as changes in entropy become minimized in a steady state approaching ideal behavior.
The SB limits on sensitivity are shown as well as the mean sensitivity claimed by the IPCC (which is clearly the result of an obvious linearization error).
George
10
Just-A-Guy,
my apologies – an addendum…
I was wrong to say that the radiated power P causes the measured temperature T.
The point I should have made is that neither P nor T controls the other. Instead T and P are both controlled by a third entity: the fund of energy contained in the body (in this case the earth’s surface layer). Let us say that this fund of energy is currently E joules, resulting in a steady state surface temperature T.
Suppose we now instantaneously increase the atmospheric CO2 concentration to a higher level, thus throttling down the flow of energy to space through the upper atmosphere CO2 pipe to a lower rate than before. The effect of the throttling is that the aggregate energy flow from the surface to space is thereby reduced.
At this point OLR no longer equals ASR. The surplus ASR energy flow instead adds to the earth’s surface energy fund. The surface therefore heats up and its temperature rises. This temperature rise increases the energy flows up all the various channels to the atmosphere and to space. Eventually, when OLR again equals ASR, the energy fund is stabilised at some new higher level E’ and the surface temperature stabilises at some new higher level T’.
David
00
“So the flows from the earth’s surface through all those other channels increase somewhat, including the radiative ones. And so the temperature of the surface does indeed rise.”
I don’t think the surface temperature does rise overall.
Convective overturning is an invertible process as described here:
http://joannenova.com.au/2015/10/for-discussion-can-convection-neutralize-the-effect-of-greenhouse-gases/
such that the thermal effects of GHGs within a rising column are exactly reversed within a descending column and in the event of an imbalance convection simply adjusts so as to restore equilibrium at the original temperature set by mass, gravity and insolation.
15
Hi Stephen,
I think your proposition that atmospheric convection in some way offsets the rise in surface temperature due to increasing the atmospheric CO2 level, is… bunkum. However, as ever, I am open to being persuaded that I am wrong. 🙂
In your recent paper published on this website, you seemed to be saying that the transfer of thermal energy from one location to another due to the aggregated effects of weather events somehow reduces the energy content of the atmosphere, thus offsetting the radiative warming effect that I understand you (like me) now accept would otherwise occur as a consequence of increasing atmospheric CO2. At first sight, my reaction was that such an offsetting effect would go against the First Law. However let us examine individually the horizontal and vertical energy flows involved…
1. The only way I can see that horizontal weather effects could ‘swallow’ some of the energy in the atmosphere would be if, on average, they transferred thermal energy by convection horizontally from the bright side to the dark side of the planet, where it could be radiated to space, thereby ‘balancing the books’ and thus not violating the First Law. However this is a qualitative hypothesis. If this is what you are claiming, you need to quantify the effect so that people can judge whether this is a significant or insignificant offsetting factor. Only then can this be put forward as a serious scientific proposition.
2. Your other argument, that vertical convection somehow ‘swallows’ energy by transferring the kinetic energy of molecular motion into potential energy due to height above the surface seems to me to be quite bizarre. The atmosphere contains both a huge fund of kinetic energy and a huge fund of potential energy. This is distributed unevenly according to the lapse rate, with a consequent monotonic negative temperature profile up the atmospheric column. Averaging for climate over the long term (as opposed to observing short term variations due to short-term weather events) the atmospheric column therefore contains, at any given height, a fixed quantity of kinetic energy and a fixed quantity of potential energy, the first being calculated from an aggregation of the squares of the instantaneous velocities of each of the molecules, and the second being calculated from an aggregation of the heights above the surface of each of those same molecules. Of course both the velocity and height of each individual molecule is constantly changing at a stupendous rate, as it bounces off other molecules (or off the surface). However, the long term aggregate KE and PE averages remain constant. So convection effects don’t in the long term alter the fund of energy – and hence the temperature profile up the atmospheric column. [Note: this statement is true even though the atmosphere as a whole is not a closed system. Nevertheless, it is by definition a system in steady-state: the aggregate energy flowing into the system (ASR) is exactly matched by the aggregate energy flowing out of the system (OLR).]
So I don’t see how the vertical motion of molecules can be of any help in offsetting any radiative thermal enhancement that occurs due to increasing atmospheric CO2. The only net aggregate energy flowing up the atmospheric column is due to ASR flowing into, and OLR flowing out of, the system boundary. At steady-state ASR and OLR are of course equal and, also, both have exactly the same value before and (once steady-state is re-established) after the CO2 increase.
All the best,
David
00
David,
The answer lies in the undulations at the top of the troposphere as described in my article.
The kinetic energy stored by GHGs in the vertical rising column (more potential energy) forces the tropopause up above such columns but down above descending columns (less potential energy). At all times the total energy content (PE plus KE) remains the same thus obeying the First Law (conservation of energy).
Since the descending column starts at a lower height it delivers less kinetic energy back to the surface as the air descends along the lapse rate slope.
Warming at the base of the rising column is therefore offset by less warming at the base of the falling column.
Horizontal winds at the surface then flow between the warmer and cooler surface regions at a speed that restores the pre-existing average surface temperature.
Air flowing along the undulating tropopause stays at the same temperature despite the height change and that is what provides the necessary adjustment in kinetic energy returning to the surface to enable surface temperature to stay the same on average.
You have to remember that GHGs produce net absorption from the surface lower down and net emission to space higher up. If any imbalance arises between absorption and emission it must be corrected for and it is the deformation of the lapse rate slopes away from the DALR set by mass and gravity that causes the necessary convective changes.
03
And those deformations of the lapse rate slope mirror each other in rising and descending columns save for that vertical displacement with no temperature change at the tropopause.
00
Hi Stephen,
Thanks for your speedy reply.
Insofar as I understand what you are now saying, my initial (and brief) response is that you appear to be seeking to re-assure me that KE-PE energy conservation is indeed preserved within the earth-system boundary. If so, this is exactly what I was trying to demonstrate to you, proving that vertical convection could have no effect on the earth system’s overall energy budget (ASR = OLR).
The only way in which the phenomenon you describe could offset any warming tendency caused by enhanced CO2 would be if it caused a net amount of energy to be exported to space through the earth system boundary. So if you are claiming that the continual wobble in the height of the tropopause does indeed cause a net export of energy to space (over and above what would flow in the case of complete absence of the wobble), then you need to explain the mechanism much more clearly (at least for my simple mind). Otherwise (at least for me, and maybe for others) you really have no case.
I will, however, study your paper when I have more time – although I admit I found it hard going the last couple of times through… 🙂
Cheers
David
00
David,
What you are missing is that the continual wobbles in the height of the tropopause do not need to cause a net export of energy to space simply because no extra energy has been retained as a result of the presence of GHGs.
Instead, the variations in the lapse rate slopes cause variations in the various emissions heights such that outgoing radiation ‘blocked’ by one available exit ‘pipe’ as per David’s hypothesis is allowed out through one of the other available pipes.
It is the convective adjustment caused by the lapse rate distortions that move air up or down so as to shift the outgoing radiative flows between pipes as necessary.
Those ‘wobbles’ are simply the physical manifestation of the lapse rate distortions.
If you find the study of my paper hard going it is only because you are fixated on radiative energy transfers and don’t yet see how vertical convective adjustments can change emissions heights via non radiative processes.
01
Hi Stephen,
I have now had a chance to read through your earlier paper again and also to take on board your recent comment #61 above.
If I have understood you correctly, your proposition is that, with the earth system at a given steady state of thermal equilibrium and a mean surface temperature T, the atmospheric convection effects you describe in your paper exactly compensate for any warming effect that would otherwise occur due to an increase in the concentration of atmospheric CO2, and that it does this by appropriately altering the lapse rate.
If so that would be a truly remarkable scientific discovery.
To gain its acceptance you would need to provide a watertight physical and mathematical explanation describing how such an exact reciprocal linkage works. In its current form, your hypothesis is highly qualitative, rather than quantitative, and so in my opinion does not meet a reasonable level of credibility.
Cheers
David
00
Nothing new or remarkable about it at all in principle, hence this:
http://www.public.asu.edu/~hhuang38/mae578_lecture_06.pdf
“Radiative equilibrium
profile could be unstable;
convection restores it
to stability (or neutrality)”
My modest contribution is simply to create diagrams for how the lapse rates must change in order to achieve the effect for both condensing and non condensing GHGs if the radiative imbalances are to be restored to stability or neutrality.
If AGW theory denies that convection neutralises radiative imbalances then it is for the proponents of that theory to demonstrate that convection fails to achieve its task and I see no quantitative evidence to that effect.
Instead, AGW proponents simply assert without any evidence at all.
04
Hi Stephen,
You say: If AGW theory denies that convection neutralises radiative imbalances then it is for the proponents of that theory to demonstrate that convection fails to achieve its task and I see no quantitative evidence to that effect. Instead, AGW proponents simply assert without any evidence at all.
Sorry that’s a cop out!
You are making the same mistake as the alarmists: assuming that your prognosis is correct and then finding a theory to fit. If there was clear enough empirical evidence to convince everybody that the earth’s mean surface temperature was increasing at an un-alarming rate, then you might have a point in challenging alarmists to justify their warming theory. But the fact is that, even though you and I and many others believe that the temperature record shows exactly that, many others (with whatever motives, right or wrong) beg to differ. And it is those ‘others’ over the last 30 years who have somehow convinced politicians that there is an alarming problem to solve.
We can’t just walk away from that.
Cheers
David
00
Stephen,
OOPS: To proceed further, I must first point out a howler I found in your paper at Fig.2. That diagram and the paragraph above it is not correct. An atmosphere containing no radiative gases at all would contain a DALR of zero. This is because, at steady-state, there would be no flow of energy up through it to space. Instead all the earth’s LW surface energy would radiate to space directly without interception by atmospheric molecules.
But I understand your purpose in presenting the diagram. So I suggest that it could be corrected by changing it so that its heading reads Hydrostatic Equilibrium and all the other legends (and the dotted line) are deleted. Then it would truly demonstrate the beginning of your tale of the hydrostatic balance that lies between the up and down perturbations that you then go on to describe.
Cheers
David
00
David,
I do not think it is any sort of ‘cop out’ to refer to the settled science of the pre AGW era which accepted that for an atmosphere to remain in hydrostatic balance indefinitely suspended off a surface against the force of gravity required convection to correct for radiative imbalances.
The logic behind that position is that a radiative imbalance is prevented from causing a different surface temperature than that determined by:
i) the need to radiate as much to space as comes in from space (255K) and
ii) the need to provide an additional store of energy at the surface to provide an upward presssure gradient force to balance the mass of the atmosphere against gravity (33K)
because if the surface temperature were to change by say 1K on a long term basis then either:
i) At 287K not enough energy would be leaving to space and the volume of the atmosphere would expand constantly until it were lost to space or
ii) At 289K more energy would be leaving to space than was being received from space and the entire atmosphere would eventually congeal on the surface as a frozen solid
You see, the entire energy content of an atmosphere (KE + PE)is derived from conduction and convection not radiation simply because conduction and convection operate more slowly than radiation and so cause a delay in transmission of radiation through the atmosphere and it is that delay that causes a build up of kinetic energy at the surface which then becomes warmer than the S-B prediction.
There is no ‘howler’ in my Fig 2.
The ‘howler’ is in proposing that a gaseous atmosphere in constant convective motion and with declining density with height can acquire the same temperature from the irradiated surface to the boundary with space without any decline in temperature with height.
Only a solid can act like that. A convecting medium heated unevely from below by conduction and containing a density gradient with height will present a DALR with no radiative gases at all simply because KE at the base changes to PE with height and PE does not register as heat, nor does it radiate. That is why we need the Gas Laws which recognise that reducing density by moving molecules apart involves a reduction in both volume and temperature.
It is the proponents of the radiative theory who have got it horribly wrong in proposing that radiative gases are essential to create a DALR.
Only the non radiative physical properties of gases are required.
00
Stephen 4:14am – It is easy to see from that comment that you have a mistaken concept of energy balance in any arbitrary physical control volume. 1LOT: Energy in – energy out = 0 for energy balance achieving constant median temperature. Some basic physics:
Draw an arbitrary spherical control volume at TOA at the orbit of a CERES observatory then:
“i) the need to radiate as much to space as comes in from space (255K)..”
is confirmed, you have that correct, observed by the CERES instruments (radiometers) looking up and looking down over several annual periods (4-10 y.rs or more). Find energy in – energy out ~ 0 over long periods, find Earth stable brightness temperature of 255K, give or take. The dam analogy in this series of posts seeks to explain this to you.
——
Draw an arbitrary spherical control volume at 1.5m above ground, top to bottom at the location of many Stephenson screens for GHCN observations then:
..the need to radiate as much up as down (288K)…
is also observed from that near surface control volume sphere as a median temperature over an annual period, give or take a few degrees K.
The optical depth of Earth atmosphere (or any atm.) forces the difference at the two locations AGL (33K for Earth, a few K for Mars, around 500K for Venus).
——
“i) At 287K not enough energy would be leaving to space and the volume of the atmosphere would expand constantly until it were lost to space or
ii) At 289K more energy would be leaving to space than was being received from space and the entire atmosphere would eventually congeal on the surface as a frozen solid”
No sir, the surface median temperature has been both 287K and 289K in its history, and varies with each monthly anomaly report over a baseline, even with nearly constant energy in for median 255K at TOA. No atm. congealing or blow off is observed. The reason for that is given a reasonably fixed optical depth atm. at surface control volume, the molecules do not increase energy to achieve escape velocity or slow to ~0K due the near constant sun load, if:
energy in – energy out = (slightly unbalanced +/-)
median temperature is then slightly changing, so for energy in constant, find energy out increases or decreases slightly back to equilibrium for median surface temperature to achieve that balance as shown exists over eons.
——
“..the entire energy content of an atmosphere (KE + PE)..”
No sir, the entire energy content over a 100% or smaller control volume of the atm. gas is KE+PE+p*V which is known as its enthalpy, the conserved quantity of energy in any relevant atm. process.
That you miss these simple basics is so evident I thought a comment might help but I observe in your discussion(s) that you do not have the pre-req.s to fathom even these simple long tested physical concepts and will ignore them.
00
Lt Cusper
Of course the median surface temperature varies around 288k for a multitude of reasons so why do you think the atmosphere has never been lost?
I say it is because convection always adjusts over time to return the surface temperature to the level dictated by mass, gravity and insolation. If the surface rises to 289K as a result of GHGs (whilst mass gravity and insolation remain the same)then there is more uplift in ascending columns and more radiation escapes to space from any radiatively active gases until the surface temperature drops back to 288K. Those gases radiate to space more because they distort the lapse rate slope away from the DALR to the warm side so that they are warmer than the DALR at their height. AGW thory ignores the distortion of the lapse rate slope and proposes that they radiate less at a colder higher location along the undistorted DALR – which is completely wrong.
For our watery planet the solution is somewhat different in that, as David Evans has shown (together with Miskolczi and others) the water vapour emissions height drops so that more energy escapes to space from a lower warmer height to restore 288K.
I have explained the mechanics behind that with my lapse rate diagrams. The distorted lapse rate slope reduces the power of convection from below by reducing the decline of temperature with height. Less rapid convection from the surface allows a greater build up of humidity and at higher humidities water vapour condenses out at a lower height and higher temperature and so sends more radiation out to space at all wavelengths to negate the effect of the GHGs in blocking the outgoing 15u wavelength.
That explains both the radiosonde observations of higher humidity lower down and less humidity higher up and the absence of the dreaded ‘hot spot’.
One way or another, convection changes the emissions heights of the various ‘pipes’ relative to one another so that the system remains thermally stable and it is the lapse rate distortions that lead to the necessary convective adjustments.
It makes no difference whether total energy content is PE+KE or your more complete version.
However described, the total energy content is determined by mass, gravity and insolation.
As you say, optical depth or albedo is also relevant but that optical depth is a function of mass rather than radiation. A non GHG atmosphere may be virtually transparent to incoming solar energy but it is certainly not transparent to outgoing longwave because of conduction and convection drawing 33K from the radiation throughput at equlibrium in order to keep the mass of the atmosphere suspended off the surface against gravity.
I suggested previously that one should use the term ‘opacity’ rather than optical depth because absorption by conduction and convection makes the atmosphere opaque to outgoing IR. That fact is easily overlooked if one uses the term ‘optical depth’.
The same parcel of kinetic energy at any point in the vertical column can only carry out one task at a time. Either ir is radiated to space or it is used by conduction and convection to support the weight of the mass of higher gases. It cannot be in two places at once.
00
Evidently the atm. is still in place Stephen 7:51am. Though its composition can change, as a light individual molecule can reach escape velocity at current temp.s and depart to deep space like most of the original H2. Stephen continues to ignore the basic physical laws just as I predicted. Basic surface temperature in any arbitrary control volume (c.v.) as I described is set by 1LOT:
energy into c.v – energy out of c.v. = the change of energy in the c.v. which can be used to find the median surface temperature in the c.v. and relevant TE=KE+PE+p*V. Miskolczi writes that he finds the optical depth of clear sky on Earth has remained the same Stephen, over like 60 years IIRC. No drop.
Atm. optical depth is a function of mass mixing ratio, extinction coefficient of each constituent, gravity and overall pressure Stephen, try harder to learn and use the basics. For Earth, the atm. opacity is dominated by water vapor. Elsewhere in solar system there are multiple absorbers. It is possible to improve Stephen, without then being misleading in comments as you are now.
01
Miskolczi found that any change in optical depth /opacity from more CO2 was negated by an equal and opposite change in optical depth /opacity from water vapour. An increase in lower level humidity would account for that.
As for the rest of your latest comment it appears to bear no relation to what I said in response to your earlier comment.
00
Should have said that the drying out of the upper troposphere would account for Miskolczi’s observation.
00
You write about Miskolzci incorrectly, probably misled by 2nd hand reading as his 1st hand finding was Earth optical depth in clear sky – no change over long term if you actually get his relevant paper(s) 1st hand. Of course the rest has no bearing on what you wrote as you don’t have the basics correct Stephen.
00
Well he said this:
“As a final conclusion of this perturbation study, we can safely state that the dynamic
stability of the stationary value of the true greenhouse-gas optical thickness of the
atmosphere is mediated mainly by the amount and distribution of the water vapor in
the atmosphere, and by the surface and atmospheric temperatures.”
here:
http://www.friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/E&E_21_4_2010_08-miskolczi.pdf
But it makes no difference to my contentions anyway, I merely pointed out that his observations are consistent with my contentions (and those of Davd Evans) which are that lapse rate distortions move radiative loss to space between the various available emitters so as to keep the system stable.
You accept that long term stability but have no ideas of your own as to how it is maintained.
00
Stephen 12:01pm – Thanks for the link – I note your 1st hand paper clip is in line with my comment, however searching the link for “emissions height” returns “no results” so your 7:51am comment as written was not in line with the Miskolczi 2010 paper you link (as I replied). To discuss this paper effectively & correctly, you will need to improve to actually understand the atm. thermo. basics – especially optical depth physics. I don’t need ideas of my own when the ideas are freely available already worked in the literature – for those that can understand, have accomplished the basic pre-req.s in the field.
00
Oops,
That should be:
“That is why we need the Gas Laws which recognise that reducing density by moving molecules apart involves an increase in volume and reduction in temperature.”
00
Stephen,
You keep changing the subject, jumping from one issue to another each time I challenge you on one of them… 🙂
I don’t know why you have got the impression that I am obsessed with radiation as an energy transfer mechanism. I am on record in this very blog trail as insisting that non-radiative convection (17Wm-2) and non-radiative evapo-transpiration (80Wm-2) together dominate the energy transfer from surface to atmosphere. Radiation (41Wm-2) is a poor third mechanism and in any case is absorbed almost immediately in the lower atmosphere and stored as sensible heat (kinetic energy). Only towards the top-of-the atmosphere do radiative gases provide the essential outlet to space by converting kinetic energy (sensible heat) to radiation.
The difficulty I am having with your line of argument is principally with your idea that perturbations in the lapse rate, due to short-term vertical turbulence, in some way slow down the upward flow of energy from surface to space so as to exactly counter any increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration.
I re-read the link you provided in your comment #63 and found the following very sound piece of advice there:
The atmosphere is very close to hydrostatic balance most of the time, except at isolated locations when the vertical profile becomes statically unstable. In that situation, convection will happen to restore stability. This takes place on a very short time scale (~ a few hours), therefore after some spatial and temporal averaging the atmosphere is generally statically stable; For many applications, it is enough to replace the vertical momentum equation by the hydrostatic equation. Perhaps the only exception is in the tropics, where the atmosphere could be marginally unstable even in the time mean.
We all need to take that comment to heart! In climate discussions we should not be over-concerned with short term fluctuations. In fact only the very, very, very long term average is important. Otherwise we really won’t be able to see the scientific wood for the trees. That is why the concept of the hypothetical ‘atmospheric column’ is so valuable. Using this idea specifically to explore the physics of a long-term-averaged atmospheric column, we can more easily begin to see what happens with energy transfers without being confused by short term perturbations.
I would submit that when we take this approach, we end up very much with the conventional climate science that David Evans has analysed and exposed so carefully. His discovery of a flaw in the way water feedback is treated by mainstream climate science exposes not so much an error in basic thermodynamics but rather a human error in control system engineering. This apparent blunder is, I believe, where we should now concentrate our efforts.
Cheers
David
10
David,
You said:
“The difficulty I am having with your line of argument is principally with your idea that perturbations in the lapse rate, due to short-term vertical turbulence, in some way slow down the upward flow of energy from surface to space so as to exactly counter any increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration.”
That is a misunderstanding of my hypothesis.
For as long as they are present, GHGs cause a permanent distortion of the lapse rate in the way that my diagram shows and the thermal effect in rising columns is equal and opposite to the thermal effect in falling columns because convective overturning is an invertible process. The vertical displacement at the top is countered by a horizontal displacement at the base via winds.
Apart from that we seem to be in broad agreement if you accept the primacy of non radiative processes.
The problem seems to be that you are having difficulty seeing conceptually how non radiative processes actually work out in a real atmosphere. That is a matter of meteorology which is a specialised discipline dealing with the way the laws of physics actually play out in an atmosphere. Often those ways are counterintuitive and not well appreciated by those who are familiar with other scientific disciplines.
The link says this:
“The atmosphere is very close to hydrostatic balance most of the time, except at isolated locations when the vertical profile becomes statically unstable. In that situation, convection will happen to restore stability”
True hydrostatic balance requires that ON AVERAGE the DALR is observed from surface to top of atmosphere. If radiative imbalances occur at isolated locations then convection will happen to restore stability- so far so good.
I have extended that basic principle to the presence of GHGs (or other radiatively active material). Their effect is to create radiative imbalances more generally in the way that my diagrams show. However, the basic principle holds true, namely that convection happens in order to restore stability and re-establish the AVERAGE DALR from surface to space despite distortions along the way.
Only if convection counters ALL deviations (from whatever cause) away from the DALR set by mass and gravity by netting them out to zero can an atmosphere be retained.
01
Hi Stephen,
I am afraid that once again you have ignored the points I made in #68 and have instead just waffled on again in a vague hand-waving sort of way.
You have failed to respond to my key observation that the reference you yourself supplied fully confirms that over the long term the atmosphere is averagely stable. I had already firmly believed this and am convinced that we really don’t need to be concerned about short term variations when considering the energy balances in the atmosphere.
I am now really at a loss to move forward because I cannot understand at all what you are on about in your article. So perhaps best to leave it at that.
Cheers
David
00
I cannot understand why you cannot see that the same process that stabilises short term variations also works to stabilise long term variations attributable to compositional changes such as the level of radiative capability of atmospheric constituents.
01
Hi Stephen,
The answer is because I really don’t understand the process you are trying to describe. And I am very unlikely to do so as long as you hide behind such cop-outs as:
“The problem seems to be that you are having difficulty seeing conceptually how non radiative processes actually work out in a real atmosphere. That is a matter of meteorology which is a specialised discipline dealing with the way the laws of physics actually play out in an atmosphere. Often those ways are counterintuitive and not well appreciated by those who are familiar with other scientific disciplines.”
I believe it is your duty to explain more clearly what you are on about, not my duty to become an expert in your subject. Others here (and elsewhere) seem to be much of the same opinion.
Cheers
David
00
One often gets to a point where an explanation becomes as clear as it can be but yet the reader cannot grasp it without doing some work.
00
Just-A-Guy,
My apologies for taking so long to reply.
Thankfully, you seem to be moving off the argument that ASR “determines the surface temperature”. You had appeared to be assuming that the S-B law applied to all energy passing from the earth’s surface to the atmosphere (including non-radiant conduction/convection and evapo-transpiration) and not just to the radiative energy.
Now, to support your contention that doubling CO2 would have no effect on surface temperature, you are suggesting that the flow of energy to space through the ‘CO2 pipe’ would not be reduced because the current mainstream hypothesis is wrong. This is a different avenue of discussion and, I believe, quite interesting. I confess that I have yet to find any (readable) scientific proof. I have hitherto simply taken it to be correct.
The conventional hypothesis is superficially plausible. If all atmospheric layers suddenly contain double the CO2 concentration they had before, the probability is reduced that a photon emitted upwards from a CO2 molecule in any given layer can make it all the way to space, there now being twice as many CO2 molecules in all the layers above it than before.
So to sustain an argument that the conventional hypothesis is incorrect, you would have to show from basic spectroscopy considerations where the physicists involved went wrong. (I’m afraid your ‘grid’ example didn’t work at all for me. 🙁 )
David
11
David Cosserat,
I often take a long time to respond myself so no problem. Apology accepted.
The only place where radiation from CO2 is important when computing OLR going through the “CO2 pipe” is the height of the “emission layer” for CO2. The top layer of CO2, (the “height of the emissions layer”), is represented by the grid in my previous comment. So the grid I described doesn’t have any layers above it. All CO2 molecules in the top layer are free to radiate out to space with nothing above them to absorb that radiation. It’s true that the concentration of CO2 doubles in all the layers, including the top one. If there’s twice as many CO2 molecules in the top layer, that means there’s twice as much radiation going out to space. Even though there’s less radiation per molecule because of the lower temperature, there’s still twice as many molecules.
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy,
You appear to be under a fundamental misapprehension.
CO2 molecules at ALL levels in the atmosphere spontaneously radiate photons. Obviously the probability of a photon making it to space goes up if it is emitted from a higher level – simply because there are fewer CO2 molecules above to absorb it.
Consequently, there is a wide statistical spread of successful emissions to space over a range of levels in the upper regions of the atmosphere. And if you double atmospheric CO2, photon emissions from EVERY layer will have less chance of getting to space than before the doubling.
The characteristic emissions layer that you refer to is simply a mathematical construct. It is the height in the atmosphere at which emissions to space would occur if all those emissions were to come from a single height. But they don’t in reality.
David
11
David Cosserat,
The probability keeps going up until it reaches 100% at the level where there are no more CO2 molecules above.
Only partially roght, and therefore misleading.
There range of probabilities that a successful emission to space will occur goes from zero at ground level all the way up to 100% at a level where there are no CO2 molecules at a higher level to impede the IR from leaving the atmosphere.
Non-sequitur. The layers near the surface will remain at zero probability of direct exitance to space. The uppermost level will remain at 100% probability of direct exitance to space, because there’s no more CO2 above that level to stop that exitance.
All of mathematics is a construct. The question we need to ask before using a mathematical construct is: “Does it accurately represent the real world?” Maybe the grid was too abstract and incomplete. I’ll just add one more dimension to make it complete. Rather than being a flat two dimensional grid, think of it as a three dimensional grid with a thickness representing height above sea level. The top and bottom of the grid represent the highest and lowest distance above sea level where a CO2 molecule will successfully radiate EMR to space.
For the sake of argument, let’s say the average height of the CO2 emissions level is 8Km above sea level. The average is computed using values that range from, again for the sake of argument, 7.75Km to 8.25Km. This gives us a range of 0.5Km and that’s the value we’ll use for the thickness of the grid.
We now have a grid 1000 units by 1000 units by 0.5Km. In each of 250 grid boxes is a CO2 molecule with no more CO2 molecules above it. The molecule can be at any height within the grid box, between 7.75Km and 8.25Km above sea level, but the key is that there is no more CO2 above this grid box to impede direct emission to space.
When the atmospheric concentration of CO2 doubles, we now have 500 grid boxes with a CO2 molecule in it. This molecule can freely emit to space because there are no more CO2 molecules above it. According to Dr. Evans, the doubling of CO2 concentration in the atmosphere will cause the level of the entire grid construct to rise. For the sake of argument, let’s say the new average height of the emissions level is 10Km above sea level. Because of the higher concentration of CO2, the thickness of the grid must now be narrower. Again, for the sake of argument, let’s say the new thickness is only 0.4Km with upper and lower bounds of 9.8Km and 10.2Km.
Please note that because of the increased height of the emissions level, the temperature of the atmosphere will be lower and therefore each CO2 molecule will radiate at the new, lower temperature. At the same time, because the concentration of CO2 has doubled, there are now twice as many grid boxes with a CO2 molecule in them.
Yes, there’s a lower temperature and therefore each molecule will radiate less often directly to space, but there are twice as many molecules doing the radiating.
I hope this clears things up for you.
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy,
The reason for the long pause in responding to your original submission is that I have until today been unable to do any postings to the JoNova site due to a technical fault. Here is what I prepared in response but was unable to post:
……………………………
Despite your little bit of sophistry over ‘non-sequiturs’ etc., we now do appear to agree that upward emissions of photons from CO2 molecules that succeed in escaping to space do come from all levels, with a probability distribution from (in practical terms) zero at ground level, increasing as we ascend up the atmospheric column.
You then describe a 3-dimensional grid box of molecules between two arbitrary heights (7.75Km and 8.25Km and with an average height of 8KM) and claim, extraordinarily, that there is no more CO2 above this grid box to impede direct emission to space (your bold emphasis). This is obviously wrong, both in logic and in practice. There are plenty of CO2 molecules above 8.25Km to absorb the upwelling radiation from below. Consequently, the remainder of your reasoning is not coherent.
David
11
David Cosserat,
Part 1 – The Non Sequitur
Very clever of you to write, “non-sequiturs etc,”. There was only one non-sequitur. It’s based on one premise in your argument which was false because it was incomplete and therefore only partially true.
You state that there’s a wide statistical spread of successful emissions to space, but you do not tell us what that spread is, in practical terms, as it pertains to the Earth’s atmosphere.
The first time around, you left out both the upper and lower bounds of that probability distribution. The second time around you gave us the lower bound of zero probability of a successful emission to space but you cleverly left out the upper bound of that probability distribution.
That upper bound is 100%.
As I’ve already stated, the upper bound of successful emission to space occurs at some height, Hmax, in the atmosphere where there are no longer any CO2 molecules to impede the outward radiation from CO2 originating at lower levels, H < Hmax. In practical terms, the value of Hmax within the Earth’s atmosphere is irrelevant to the point being made. That height exists, of that there’s no question.
Your conclusion, in bold italics, that “EVERY layer will have less chance of getting to space” is only true “over a range of levels in the upper regions of the atmosphere.” It is not true for EVERY level in the atmosphere as your statement implies.
1. At ground level, the probability of successful radiation to space is zero before the doubling of CO2 and it remains zero after the doubling of CO2. The probability of successful emission to space does not get lower at these levels close to the Earth’s surface because there’s no such thing as a probability of less than zero.
2. At Hmax, the probability of successful radiation to space is 100% before the doubling of CO2 and it remains 100% after the doubling of CO2 because at this height, Hmax, whatever it may be in practical terms, there are no more CO2 molecules to impede successful radiation to space at any level higher up in the atmosphere, H > Hmax. The actual value of Hmax may change, in practical terms as it pertains to the Earth’s atmosphere, after the doubling of CO2, but that change is irrelevant to the point being made. That height exists, of that there is no question.
The false premise in your argument is false by omission. Your conclusion doesn’t follow from that premise because you say EVERY layer implying every layer in the atmosphere. That’s a non sequitur, although it is cleverly hidden.
Once the false premise is corrected by actually including EVERY level in the atmosphere, your conclusion still doesn’t follow from the argument you’ve presented. The difference is that now, the non sequitur is clear.
As far as the facts are concerned, the only one between us being cleverly deceptive is you, David. Your statements bear this out for all to see.
Abe
PS: I’ll get to your straw man in the second part of your comment shortly.
01
Just-A Guy,
You wrote,
NO. The probability of a photon emitted by the surface and reaching space through cloudless skies is only slightly less than 50% prior to CO2 doubling and will remain so even if CO2 increased by 10 fold since nearly half of all energy of all photons that leave the surface pass through the transparent regions of the atmosphere.
For some reason, the fact that the GHG effect is closer to a greenhouse with half of its roof panels removed is ignored.
11
co2isnotevil,
You’re right. I should have been more specific.
It should read: “1. At ground level, the probability of successful radiation to space on the wavelengths that CO2 absorbs and re-radiates is zero before the doubling of CO2 and it remains zero after the doubling of CO2.
This is what I meant and I thought it was clear from the context of the conversation. If I’m wrong on this, I would be more than welcome to be shown why.
He he! Nice one.
I particularly liked . . .
Abe
01
David Cosserat,
Part 2 – The Strawman Fallacy
You’ve ignored the the two clauses in my comment . . .
Last time I checked, the words, “for the sake of argument”, mean just that. Nothing more and nothing less. They do not imply, nor can it be inferred, the the actual values in the real world are the same values as those presented in my argument. The actual values, in practical terms, as they pertain to the Earth’s atmosphere are irrelevant to the point being made.
So, basically, what you’ve done is isolated part of my comments, (cherry picking), in order to misrepresent my position as something other than what it really is, (a strawman), and then proceeded to knock down the strawman!
There is a height, Hmax, beyond which no more CO2 molecules exist to impede direct radiation to space in those wavelengths that CO2 absorbs and re-radiates EMR. Hmax is an average value derived from Hlow, the lowest level from which CO2 radiates unimpeded to space, and Hhigh the highest level at which CO2 radiates unimpeded to space.
I gave these variables a value for the sake of argument, not because these are the actual values in practical terms as they apply to the Earth’s atmosphere. The actual values are irrelevant to the point being made.
Abe
00
David Cosserat,
No.
Consequently, your entire approach in this discussion has been fraught with logical errors and misrepresentations. I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt and say that you’ve done this intentionally to avoid . . .whatever it is you’re trying to avoid. I’m not a mind reader, so I won’t speculate on what it is that drove you to act in the way that you have.
A cleverly hidden insult, but an insult none the less. This is why you’ve been awarded the benefit of the doubt. Barring that concession on my part, the only thing left to conclude is that your reading comprehension is poor and your ability to construct a rational argument weak.
As they say in hip-hop circles: “You’ve been served!” 😉 🙂
Abe
00
David Cosserat,
I see there’s no reply from you yet. That’s good because I’ve actually thought of another way to present the same information from an entirely different perspective.
It has always been the position of both warmists and luke-warmers that because of an increase in the atmospheric concentration of CO2, and because of the CO2 molecule’s ability to absorb and re-rediate EMR, that this would cause an increase in radiation back towards the Earth over and above the EMR already coming from the sun. The only difference between those two camps has been how much warming that additional radiation would cause.
What I’m saying is simple. CO2 molecules don’t have a built in gyroscope that they use to radiate only downwards. They radiate equally in all directions. If more CO2 molecules means more radiation, then there must be more radiation upwards as well as downwards. And if the higher you go the greater the chance of that radiation making it out to space then the increased amount of radiation must mean that there’s more EMR that makes it out to space.
The amount of radiation increases as CO2 increases per unit volume. (total radiation)
The probability of reaching space increases as height increases. (percentage of the total radiation)
so . . .
The location where the percentage of total radiation that makes it out to space becomes 100% may be higher up in the atmosphere than before, but total radiation has increased because of the higher concentration of CO2.
Abe
00
Just-A-Guy,
The reason for the long pause in responding to your original submission is that I have until today been unable to do any postings to the JoNova site due to a technical fault. In response to your revised submission above:
You say: The location where the percentage of total radiation that makes it out to space becomes 100% may be higher up in the atmosphere than before, but total radiation has increased because of the higher concentration of CO2.
There is no “single level at which the percentage of total radiation becomes 100%” except (theoretically speaking) at an infinite distance where the atmospheric density is…zero.
In practice photons that make it all the way to space without absorption are emitted by CO2 molecules from a range of heights from mid-troposphere upwards. All such emissions have a non-zero statistical chance of getting to space without absorption – although obviously, as we ascend upwards through the layers, the reducing air density means that the probability increases that an upward emission from that layer will make it. But, as we ascend, the air density goes down so there are fewer molecules per square metre. That reduces the aggregate emission-to-space from that layer. One effect obviously offsets the other.
Imagine you view the CO2 emissions that make it to space from a ‘sensible’ pressure range up the atmospheric column (say from mid troposphere up to some arbitrarily chosen cut-off pressure high in the stratosphere). When you view this same range of pressures both before and after doubling CO2 concentration, you will (by definition) in both cases be looking at exactly the same profile of densities – and therefore exactly the same proportion of successful emissions to space from each of the layers.
What has changed is that, due to the lapse rate, the same range of pressures you are looking at after the doubling have all been elevated to a somewhat higher level above the earth’s surface than they were at before the doubling.
We are told that this results in a lower aggregate rate of emission to space because each of the layers is at a somewhat cooler level than before.
Hence the radiative imbalance caused by the doubling…
David
01
Didn’t receive an email notification to my own posting above, so just checking …
00
David Cosserat,
You won’t ever get an e-mail on comments that you post, only on other peoples comments.
Also, if you could reply to a comment using the ‘Reply’ button next to the date of the comment that you’re replying to that would help.
Abe
00
Dr. Evans,
Definition of Terms – Disambiguation of the word ‘Surface’
surface temperature = Ts: This is Surface temperature (global average air temperature at the surface), as per your definition in Table 1 of New Science 2.
skin: Although the word skin is not mentioned in either of these descriptions, it is used in the scientific literature to describe the surface of a black body and to describe the surface of the Earth. In the case of the Earth’s surface, the skin refers to the outermost layer of the solid ground and the outermost layer of the liquid oceans, seas, etc. It does not include the gases in the atmosphere near the surface of the Earth.
skin temperature: Because you’ve already taken the phrase surface temperature to mean air temperature at the surface, or Ts, I’ll use skin temperature when describing the temperature of a black body and the temperature of the Earth.
Definition of Terms – Stephan Boltzmann Law
Within the bold italics in that quote there are also the following terms:
total energy radiated: Because the quote later says across all wavelengths, this must mean per wavelength.
unit surface area: The surface here must mean the outermost layer of the black body beyond which is only space. This is the skin.
across all wavelengths: In order to use Stephan-Boltzmann properly, we need to add up all the energy radiated per wavelength across all wavelengths. It is this total that gets converted into thermodynamic temperature using the SB constant within the SB equation.
per unit time: Not unlike thermodynamic temperature, radiated energy is measured per second. Both watts and joules have a time component.
thermodynamic temperature T: This is describing the black body itself and this temperature is measured at the skin of the black body.
Within the bold italics in that quote there are also the following terms:
total radiant heat energy & E is the radiant heat energy: These must mean all radiant energy radiated per wavelength across all wavelengths.
emitted from a surface & emitted from a unit area: This surface is the outermost layer of the black body beyond which is only space. This is the skin. The unit area is a specified area of the skin.
absolute temperature: This means the thermodynamic temperature of the black body as measured at the surface.
Abe
00