The Evidence for Human Caused Climate Change Part III

[Dale]

Oh my, this is going meta

Yeah it is meta. The Green Savior simply becomes the problem. Makes you all look like idiots for pushing it so hard.

 

[Ziggy Stardust]

Yeah it is meta. The Green Savior simply becomes the problem. Makes you all look like idiots for pushing it so hard.

Those alarmists, always so rude

The meta was that I find your comment about irony quite ironic. I will explain the more complex remarks I make from now on.

 

[Crezth]

Yeah it is meta. The Green Savior simply becomes the problem. Makes you all look like idiots for pushing it so hard.

Yeah well we still control the hearts and minds of the public.

If you can't play with the big boys, get off the field.

 

[brennan]

Climate scientists have said 17 years is the period to determine the human fingerprint on climate change.

They said it was the minimum period. And your analysis method (duh, it looks flat, duh) is... well... inappropriate?

Please do not repeat your contention that these graphs are flat for the last 17 years without performing a proper analysis.

You haven't once responded to the fact that if temperatures had indeed been static during the prevaling conditions of the last decade that this would show an underlying warming trend that is totally at odds with the claims that warming is not occuring.

Do you agree relative humidity has been decreasing?

No.

What a lovely graph. It's funny how a global warming sceptic has so seriously lost touch with the facts that his denial of global warming is a graph that shows global warming.

I am.

Prove it. Planes weren't even getting close to the sound barrier until the latter half of the second world war so the barrier was not even known until then except as a problem in propellor design), there are a few disputed claims of various aricraft in this period 'breaking the barrier' in dives, V-2s were supersonic over southern England in 1944 and Chuck Yeager definitively broke the 'barrier' in 1947. A problem in aeronautics that was discovered and solved in only a few years doesn't sound to me like people thought it was impossible to achieve. There is not one mention on the wiki page that people ever believed that supersonic flight was impossible at any stage.

A wrist radio was impossible at the time Dick Tracy wore it in the comics.

and as I pointed out, miniaturisation of radios was a decade old reality at the time.

Anything that converts wind into motion must lose a portion of the converted energy as heat.

Jesus wept... and since ALL energy gets turned into heat eventually what the hell form of energy do you think all that wind energy gets turned into anyway?

Every theory always begins with one guy. Who is disbelieved and made fun of because he's proposing something that current science disagrees with.

What, every single new idea ever was mocked? Bollocks. Did, for example the inventors of the jet engine get mocked for their ideas, which ultimately enabled easy breaking of the sound barrier? No. Was Einstein mocked for his paradigm shifting theory of Relativity? No. The list goes on.

So where are you right now? Your facts are wrong, your whole rhetorical position is not backed up by historical trends and you are fighting the corner for a guy who can't read a graph. Have fun with that.

 

[Dale]

Yeah well we still control the hearts and minds of the public.

If you can't play with the big boys, get off the field.

You might want to check your facts. In both the US and Australia the environment doesn't even rate in polls on population concerns.

You just sent yourself off the field.

They said it was the minimum period. And your analysis method (duh, it looks flat, duh) is... well... inappropriate?

Please do not repeat your contention that these graphs are flat for the last 17 years without performing a proper analysis.

You haven't once responded to the fact that if temperatures had indeed been static during the prevaling conditions of the last decade that this would show an underlying warming trend that is totally at odds with the claims that warming is not occuring.
No.
What a lovely graph. It's funny how a global warming sceptic has so seriously lost touch with the facts that his denial of global warming is a graph that shows global warming.

Point to where I denied global warming.

And you don't agree that relative humidity has been dropping? Even though satellites record a significant decrease? Even though alarmist climate scientists such as Trenberth state in peer-reviewed papers that relative humidity has dropped?

Now who's the denier?

 

[Old Hippy]

Doesn't matter HOW you spin it, the models fail as they estimate climate sensitivity too high. Land temps rising significantly slower than models. Ocean surface temps rising significantly slower than models. OHC rising significantly slower than models. Humidity rising significantly slower than models (as shown by decreasing RH).
.

well you know i disagree there and just link...
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/indicators/

see I've never read much of levitus et al 2009... it is just covered to much in denialist blogs I always got it second hand or in graphs third hand

but the last couple of days I've read his work on correcting the Bias in argo, and Now reading Levitus 2012 I am happy to use his models... thats how i will spin it... lets see how the bloggists spin it .... Gone over to the dark side maybe

The fact is simple. ~3C for doubling CO2 is just too high

as for 3C being to high well it depends which model you use ( and an understanding of models... there limits,as well as purpose)
http://www.skepticalscience.com/A-detailed-look-at-Hansens-1988-projections.html

Spoiler :

A detailed look at Hansen's 1988 projections
Hansen et al. (1988) used a global climate model to simulate the impact of variations in atmospheric greenhouse gases and aerosols on the global climate. Unable to predict future human greenhouse gas emissions or model every single possibility, Hansen chose 3 scenarios to model. Scenario A assumed continued exponential greenhouse gas growth. Scenario B assumed a reduced linear rate of growth, and Scenario C assumed a rapid decline in greenhouse gas emissions around the year 2000.

Misrepresentations of Hansen's Projections
The 'Hansen was wrong' myth originated from testimony by scientist Pat Michaels before US House of Representatives in which he claimed "Ground-based temperatures from the IPCC show a rise of 0.11°C, or more than four times less than Hansen predicted....The forecast made in 1988 was an astounding failure."

This is an astonishingly false statement to make, particularly before the US Congress. It was also reproduced in Michael Crichton's science fiction novel State of Fear, which featured a scientist claiming that Hansen's 1988 projections were "overestimated by 300 percent."

Compare the figure Michaels produced to make this claim (Figure 1) to the corresponding figure taken directly out of Hansen's 1988 study (Figure 2).



Figure 1: Pat Michaels' presentation of Hansen's projections before US Congress



Figure 2: Projected global surface air temperature changes in Scenarios A, B, and C (Hansen 1988)

Notice that Michaels erased Hansen's Scenarios B and C despite the fact that as discussed above, Scenario A assumed continued exponential greenhouse gas growth, which did not occur. In other words, to support the claim that Hansen's projections were "an astounding failure," Michaels only showed the projection which was based on the emissions scenario which was furthest from reality.

Gavin Schmidt provides a comparison between all three scenarios and actual global surface temperature changes in Figure 3.



Figure 3: Hansen's projected vs. observed global temperature changes (Schmidt 2009)

As you can see, Hansen's projections showed slightly more warming than reality, but clearly they were neither off by a factor of 4, nor were they "an astounding failure" by any reasonably honest assessment. Yet a common reaction to Hansen's 1988 projections is "he overestimated the rate of warming, therefore Hansen was wrong." In fact, when skeptical climate scientist John Christy blogged about Hansen's 1988 study, his entire conclusion was "The result suggests the old NASA GCM was considerably more sensitive to GHGs than is the real atmosphere." Christy didn't even bother to examine why the global climate model was too sensitive or what that tells us. If the model was too sensitive, then what was its climate sensitivity?

This is obviously an oversimplified conclusion, and it's important to examine why Hansen's projections didn't match up with the actual surface temperature change. That's what we'll do here.

Hansen's Assumptions
Greenhouse Gas Changes and Radiative Forcing
Hansen's Scenario B has been the closest to the actual greenhouse gas emissions changes. Scenario B assumes that the rate of increasing atmospheric CO2 and methane increase by 1.5% per year in the 1980s, 1% per year in the 1990s, 0.5% per year in the 2000s, and flattens out (at a 1.9 ppmv per year increase for CO2) in the 2010s. The rate of increase of CCl3F and CCl2F2 increase by 3% in the '80s, 2% in the '90s, 1% in the '00s, and flatten out in the 2010s.

Gavin Schmidt helpfully provides the annual atmospheric concentration of these and other compounds in Hansen's Scenarios. The projected concentrations in 1984 and 2010 in Scenario B (in parts per million or billion by volume [ppmv and ppbv]) are shown in Table 1.

Table 1: Scenario B greenhouse gas (GHG) concentration in 1984, as projected by Hansen's Scenario B in 2010, and actual concentration in 2010



GHG 1984
Scen. B 2010
Actual 2010

CO2 344 ppmv 389 ppmv 392 ppmv
N2O 304 ppbv 329 ppbv 323 ppbv
CH4 1750 ppbv 2220 ppbv 1788 ppbv
CCl3F 0.22 ppbv 0.54 ppbv 0.24 ppbv
CCl2F2 .038 ppbv 0.94 ppbv 0.54 ppbv



We can then calculate the radiative forcings for these greenhouse gas concentration changes, based on the formulas from Myhre et al. (1998).

dF(CO2) = 5.35*ln(389.1/343.8) = 0.662 W/m2

dF(N2O) = 0.12*(N - N0) - (f(M0,N) - f(M0,N0))

= 0.12*(329 - 304) - 0.47*(ln[1+2.01x10-5 (1750*329)0.75+5.31x10-15 1750(1750*329)1.52]-ln[1+2.01x10-5 (1750*304)0.75+5.31x10-15 1750(1750*304)1.52]) = 0.022 W/m2

dF(CH4) =0.036*(M - M0) - (f(M,N0) - f(M0,N0))

= 0.036*(2220 - 1750) - 0.47*(ln[1+2.01x10-5 (2220*304)0.75+5.31x10-15 2220(2220*304)1.52]-ln[1+2.01x10-5 (1750*304)0.75+5.31x10-15 1750(1750*304)1.52]) = 0.16 W/m2

dF(CCl3F) = 0.25*(0.541-0.221) = 0.080 W/m2

dF(CCl2F2) = 0.32*(0.937-0.378) = 0.18 W/m2

Total Scenario B greenhouse gas radiative forcing from 1984 to 2010 = 1.1 W/m2

The actual greenhouse gas forcing from 1984 to 2010 was approximately 1.06 W/m2 (NASA GISS). Thus the greenhouse gas radiative forcing in Scenario B was too high by about 5%.

Climate Sensitivity
Climate sensitivity describes how sensitive the global climate is to a change in the amount of energy reaching the Earth's surface and lower atmosphere (a.k.a. a radiative forcing). Hansen's climate model had a global mean surface air equilibrium sensitivity of 4.2°C warming for a doubling of atmospheric CO2 [2xCO2]. The relationship between a change in global surface temperature (dT), climate sensitivity (&#955, and radiative forcing (dF), is

dT = λ*dF

Knowing that the actual radiative forcing was slightly lower than Hansen's Scenario B, and knowing the subsequent global surface temperature change, we can estimate what the actual climate sensitivity value would have to be for Hansen's climate model to accurately project the average temperature change.

Actual Climate Sensitivity
One tricky aspect of Hansen's study is that he references "global surface air temperature." The question is, which is a better estimate for this; the met station index (which does not cover a lot of the oceans), or the land-ocean index (which uses satellite ocean temperature changes in addition to the met stations)? According to NASA GISS, the former shows a 0.19°C per decade global warming trend, while the latter shows a 0.21°C per decade warming trend. Hansen et al. (2006) – which evaluates Hansen 1988 – uses both and suggests the true answer lies in between. So we'll assume that the global surface air temperature trend since 1984 has been one of 0.20°C per decade warming.

Given that the Scenario B radiative forcing was too high by about 5% and its projected surface air warming rate was 0.26°C per decade, we can then make a rough estimate regarding what its climate sensitivity for 2xCO2 should have been:

λ = dT/dF = (4.2°C * [0.20/0.26])/0.95 = 3.4°C warming for 2xCO2

In other words, the reason Hansen's global temperature projections were too high was primarily because his climate model had a climate sensitivity that was too high. Had the sensitivity been 3.4°C for a 2xCO2, and had Hansen decreased the radiative forcing in Scenario B slightly, he would have correctly projected the ensuing global surface air temperature increase.

The argument "Hansen's projections were too high" is thus not an argument against anthropogenic global warming or the accuracy of climate models, but rather an argument against climate sensitivity being as high as 4.2°C for 2xCO2, but it's also an argument for climate sensitivity being around 3.4°C for 2xCO2. This is within the range of climate sensitivity values in the IPCC report, and is even a bit above the widely accepted value of 3°C for 2xCO2.

another way to view hansons predictions in relation to 3C

Spoiler :

Hansen's Accuracy
Had Hansen used a climate model with a climate sensitivity of approximately 3.4°C for 2xCO2 (at least in the short-term, it's likely larger in the long-term due to slow-acting feedbacks), he would have projected the ensuing rate of global surface temperature change accurately. Not only that, but he projected the spatial distribution of the warming with a high level of accuracy. The take-home message should not be "Hansen was wrong therefore climate models and the anthropogenic global warming theory are wrong;" the correct conclusion is that Hansen's study is another piece of evidence that climate sensitivity is in the IPCC stated range of 2-4.5°C for 2xCO2.

or one could pick the worse posible prediction and overlay it with another prediction that uses the right choice and say see they are so totally out

 

[Old Hippy]

You might want to check your facts. In both the US and Australia the environment doesn't even rate in polls on population concerns.
:

double post i know... but i missed this ... Maybe you missed the fact that Melbourne voted in the first Federal GREEN in the house of Reps last election.... Our green savior so to speak

 

[classical_hero]

Well it is not as simple as you think it is. If it was a race between a Liberal and a Labor candidate with Greens finishing 3rd, then they would not have won the seat. Basically the Liberals played politics with the seat and allowed their flow of preferences to go to Greens before Labor to stuff them up. It was almost split even between each party, with Labor 1st, Green 2nd and Liberal 3rd, so that is how we ended up with a Green candidate. I am not sure if there will be the same candidate in that seat for the next election.

Link to video.

 

[BasketCase]

The fact is simple. ~3C for doubling CO2 is just too high.

Whether or not this is true, it's still useful for us skeptics.

It's estimated by modern science that without its current layer of CO2, the Earth would be approximately 30C colder than it is now. If an amount X of CO2 produces 30 degrees of warming, and 2X of CO2 produces 33 degrees of warming, what does that prove? It proves diminishing returns. As more and more CO2 is spewed into the Earth's atmosphere, it warms the Earth less and less. Each additional X of CO2 produces a smaller amount of warming. No links needed here; this is basic thermodynamics.

On the flip side, removing that first X of CO2 will produce the smallest cooling effect--so an effort by humans to stop or reverse global warming (assuming human emissions are causing it to begin with, which is doubtful) will see very little results until a large percentage of the CO2 envelope is removed.

 

[Crezth]

You might want to check your facts. In both the US and Australia the environment doesn't even rate in polls on population concerns.

You just sent yourself off the field.

They're all sleeper agents, ready to pounce at any moment.

Also all the god damn scientists. Do I need to mention them again? Right. Anyway they're on our side.

 

[Old Hippy]

Well it is not as simple as you think it is. If it was a race between a Liberal and a Labor candidate with Greens finishing 3rd, then they would not have won the seat. Basically the Liberals played politics with the seat and allowed their flow of preferences to go to Greens before Labor to stuff them up. It was almost split even between each party, with Labor 1st, Green 2nd and Liberal 3rd, so that is how we ended up with a Green candidate. I am not sure if there will be the same candidate in that seat for the next election.

So you wany to change the models because they dont reflect reality....

what do you have against demorcray...

the liberals, so so smart .... voters so dumb

Greens vs the other mobs that supports climate change targets might have had something to do with the vote

Link to video.

 

[Dale]

double post i know... but i missed this ... Maybe you missed the fact that Melbourne voted in the first Federal GREEN in the house of Reps last election.... Our green savior so to speak

Maybe you missed it, but he only got in due to dirty coal Liberal prefs.

Guaranteed that won't happen again.

 

[Old Hippy]

Maybe you missed it, but he only got in due to dirty coal Liberal prefs.

Guaranteed that won't happen again.

I like to see your modeling soucre for that....

is their a reason to change my personal vote... deal with reality.... Melbourne elected the first green federal lower house rep

and the alternative was a labour party rep .... my second preference when I voted


My union ... the coal miners one, even helped hand out julia's how to vote cards

 

[Dale]

I like to see your modeling soucre for that....

is their a reason to change my personal vote... deal with reality.... Melbourne elected the first green federal lower house rep

and the alternative was a labour party rep .... my second preference when I voted


My union ... the coal miners one, even helped hand out julia's how to vote cards

And I seriously hope she sticks with it and fights tooth and nail to be the PM at the next election. Wanna know why? Because having her at the helm at the next election will guarantee there won't be another leftist Govt for a decade.

It'll take that long for the Libs to fix the crap her Govt has dumped us in.

BTW, proud to say I'm not a part of a union. Never have been, never will be. Unions are only for people too stupid or too gutless to negotiate their own employment conditions. Aside from the fact they're the breeding ground of communists and anarchists.

 

[Crezth]

BTW, proud to say I'm not a part of a union. Never have been, never will be. Unions are only for people too stupid or too gutless to negotiate their own employment conditions. Aside from the fact they're the breeding ground of communists and anarchists.

Hahaha, man this says more about you than the 100+ pages of bad science ever could.

 

[Old Hippy]

And I seriously hope she sticks with it and fights tooth and nail to be the PM at the next election. Wanna know why? Because having her at the helm at the next election will guarantee there won't be another leftist Govt for a decade.

It'll take that long for the Libs to fix the crap her Govt has dumped us in.

BTW, proud to say I'm not a part of a union. Never have been, never will be. Unions are only for people too stupid or too gutless to negotiate their own employment conditions. Aside from the fact they're the breeding ground of communists and anarchists.

I'm a proud greeny Unionist who happens to be self employed and make my money from the resource boom we are having at present, thanks to the minning industry...

think i will send Abbott and co a thankyou card for their efforts in the seat of Melbourne... without that one green I seriously doubt we would be well on our way to getting a carbon Trading scheme up and ruuning

its a funny old world but I did enjoy your rant...

 

[BasketCase]

without that one green I seriously doubt we would be well on our way to getting a carbon Trading scheme up and ruuning

And this would be a solution, how?? Business will simply move their production to someplace that doesn't have a carbon trading scheme.

Global warming is a global deal, and while there are some things global that can be solved locally, global warming is not one of them. The world's largest greenhouse gas emitters are precisely the same ones with the slackest environmental laws and the lowest chance of getting any new ones passed.

 

[Dale]

without that one green I seriously doubt we would be well on our way to getting a carbon Trading scheme up and ruuning

And as soon as the Libs get in, it's gone. Funny out world but I did enjoy temporary gloating. Oh and BTW, how low do you think the Green vote will be next election without Brown?

EDIT: Also too if you didn't notice, the carbon tax is no certainty to get off the ground either.
JULIA Gillard's front bench has hit the panic button over the carbon tax, with senior ministers warning it is killing the Government.

 

[Old Hippy]

And as soon as the Libs get in, it's gone. Funny out world but I did enjoy temporary gloating. Oh and BTW, how low do you think the Green vote will be next election without Brown?

Greenvoters made a conscious decision to vote green they have come from other parties ... i myself usally vote labour and but have voted for howard here is a nice picture of brown and run down of the passing of the carbon tax from overseas
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/its-official-australia-has-a-carbon-tax/story-e6freuy9-1226188707768 I wish all news reports were so straight forward listing souces of qoutes and presenting both sides of the argument in such a clear unbias way

EDIT: Also too if you didn't notice, the carbon tax is no certainty to get off the ground either.
JULIA Gillard's front bench has hit the panic button over the carbon tax, with senior ministers warning it is killing the Government.

also in case you don't notice its up... the next hurdle is the transition to a carbon trading scheme but with China introducing trail scheme similar to ours (250 million people covered to start) is not that the liberal partys prefered opton since howard and in case you have not noticed they still have the same CO2 reduction targets as labour as their official policey

So in your world view
1 liberals plotting to get agreen Representive in the lower house for the first time... is good
2 both houses passing a carbon tax bill... is good

I will realy have to go and google "temporarly gloating"

 

[Old Hippy]

And this would be a solution, how?? Business will simply move their production to someplace that doesn't have a carbon trading scheme.

Global warming is a global deal, and while there are some things global that can be solved locally, global warming is not one of them. The world's largest greenhouse gas emitters are precisely the same ones with the slackest environmental laws and the lowest chance of getting any new ones passed.

like they have not moved the bussiness anyhow ... US/Australia for example
and China spends $34 billion a year on substainablity and is introducing a trail CO2 trading scheme(covering 250 million people) similar to Australia ... China actually has lots of postive things happening... and they are well aware of the changes their ecconmy will need to make to go forward the worlds never seen such fast change as china, they keep saying they deserve the chance to "catch up with the west"... whats the US/Australia excuse??

that is where a Carbon trading shceme can come together an Asian Pacific Trading scheme

a dirrect cost to bussiness will lead to solutions of CO2 far more that just research... I have great "faith" in Bussiness making progress on this .... if it affects their bottom line... I doubt their solution will be artificial trees tho

increase profits is the best carrot available,