THE popular view on global warming is that the sun has had a negligible influence on climate – at least over the last few decades compared to carbon dioxide. But taking into account the entire range of possible total solar irradiance (TSI) satellite composite since 1980, Nicola Scafetta, just published in Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics, concludes that the solar contribution to climate change could range from a slight cooling to a significant warming, as large as 65% of the total observed global warming.
Here’s a short extract suggesting the science is far from settled:
“DETERMING how solar activity has changed on decadal and secular scales is necessary to estimate the solar contribution to climate change. Unfortunately, how solar activity has changed in time is not known with certainty.
“Direct TSI observations started in 1978 with satellite measurements. For the period before 1978 only TSI proxy reconstructions have been proposed. These TSI proxy models significantly differ from each other, in particular about the amplitude of the secular trends.
“Unfortunately, TSI satellite composites since 1978 are not certain either. Two major composites have been proposed: the PMOD TSI composite which shows an almost constant trend from 1980 to 2000; and the ACRIM TSI composite which shows an increasing trend during the same period. GCMs and EBMs adopted by the IPCC (2007) assumed that TSI did not change significantly since 1950 and that, consequently, the sun could not be responsible for the significant warming observed since 1975.
“These estimates are based on TSI proxy models such as those prepared by Lean (2000) and Wang et al. (2005) which are apparently supported by PMOD. However, the above TSI proxy models would be erroneous if the ACRIM TSI composite more faithfully reproduces the TSI behavior during the last decades. The ACRIM-PMOD controversy is quite complex and, herein, a detailed discussion on this topic is not possible.
“A recent work by Scafetta and Willson (2009) reopened the issue by providing a careful analysis of the most recent TSI proxy model (Krivova et al., 2007) based on magnetic surface fluxes. This has been done by establishing that a significant degradation of ERBE TSI satellite likely occurred during the ACRIM-gap (1989–1992.5), as the ACRIM team has always claimed. Moreover, Scafetta and Willson invalidated the specific corrections to Nimbus7 that the PMOD TSI composite requires and confirm the opinion of the original Nimbus7 experimental team that no sudden increase of the Nimbus7 sensitivity occurred on September 29, 1989 (see Hoyt’s statement in Scafetta and Willson, 2009). Finally, Scafetta and Willson (2009) showed that the agreement between PMOD and the proxy reconstruction about the absence of a trend between the TSI minima in 1986 and 1996 is coincidental because a careful comparison between the proxy model and the unquestioned satellite data before and after the ACRIM-gap proves that the TSI proxy model by Krivova et al. (2007) is missing an upward trend…
**********
Notes and Links
Empirical analysis of the solar contribution to global mean air surface temperature change. Journal of Atmospheric and Solar-Terrestrial Physics (2009), doi:10.1016/j.jastp.2009.07.007 By Nicola Scafetta, Department of Physics, Duke University, Durham, NC 27708, USA
Abstract
The solar contribution to global mean air surface temperature change is analyzed by using an empirical bi-scale climate model characterized by both fast and slow characteristic time responses to solar forcing. Since 1980 the solar contribution to climate change is uncertain because of the severe uncertainty of the total solar irradiance satellite composites. The sun may have caused from a slight cooling, if PMOD TSI composite is used, to a significant warming (up to 65% of the total observed warming) if ACRIM, or other TSI composites are used. The model is calibrated only on the empirical 11-year solar cycle signature on the instrumental global surface temperature since 1980. The model reconstructs the major temperature patterns covering 400 years of solar induced temperature changes, as shown in recent paleoclimate global temperature records.
The photograph of the sun was taken from Lammermoor Beach, Central Queensland, last week by Jennifer Marohasy.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
“THE popular view on global warming is that the sun has had a negligible influence on climate – at least over the last few decades compared to carbon dioxide.”
http://www.globalwarmingart.com/wiki/Image:Climate_Change_Attribution_png
But not for the first half of the 20th century. Just so we don’t get to the absurd position that someone will probably make that climate modellers don’t consider the Sun at all.
As Vincent Gray has indicated, the FIRST thing that any climate model has to do is recognize the existence of day and night. Averaging solar irradiance will not yield any clue about an average temperature. Going by the Kiehl-Trenberth model, for instance, an average surface insolation of 168 watts per square meter corresponds to an average earth temperature of minus 40° Fahrenheit, i.e., Antarctic conditions. No one can seriously believe that, yet no one in climate science challenges the average irradiance calculation.
Of course the millions of amperes of electrical current entering into the earth system into the polar regions and the recently discovered “Magnetic Flux Tubes” from the THEMIS mission make no contribution to the Earth’s thermal state either.
(Those Birkeland Currents are also responsible for the Earth’s rotation).
Given these “facts” it is fairly obvious why it is so difficult to explain climate observations when the only solar factor is restricted to its irradiance – it’s a little like assuming that the temperature light on a car engine is the principal source of radiation of the car while underneath another source of energy is at work.
Happens when you use the wrong ideas to explain something.
Alan Siddons – pity your description isn’t relevant to climate modelling at all. It’s not what’s done. How amazingly stupid if that’s what you think or are you just making shit up as denialists also love to do?
Well Sinkers – simply put up the relevant papers showing how your climate predictors work.
Combine K-T for surface and air, of course, and you get 235 watts per square meter, corresponding to minus 3° Fahrenheit on a blackbody. The disparity between this and the earth’s actual temperature is why radiative forcing theory was invented. To account for the difference. In other words, the concept of “radiative forcing” only exists because a valid method of guessing a planet’s temperature has never been devised. Yet Luke believes this is irrelevant to climate modeling. So who’s the stupid one?
Who’s the stupid one? Well, it isn’t Luke. Climate models usually timestep many times a day. They don’t use a daily average; they fully resolve diurnal variation.
“In other words, the concept of “radiative forcing” only exists because a valid method of guessing a planet’s temperature has never been devised.”
Who makes this stuff up? A forcing is just something that produces a change from the current steady state.
Note that Luke has not contested the conclusion that solar influences could account for from zero to 65% of post 1950 warming? That is, the critical period for the alarmist camp is subject to serious review and all he wants to talk about is pre-1950 stuff. Good one, boy wonder. Keep it up, then follow through with an insult to divert attention from the issue.
SJT “A forcing is just something that produces a change from the current steady state”.
Yes…in a model. The model is based on differential equations and a forcing is an input signal that forces the equation’s response.
The point you, Luke and Nick seem to be missing is that climate modeling is primitive. Why don’t you read through the IPCC fairy tale again and see how many likely’s, not likely’s and not likely at all’s there are in the literature. I have never seen science language like that ever and I’m sure that’s part of what Alan meant when he said “…a valid method of guessing a planet’s temperature has never been devised”.
Models are NOT valid science yet. They may be valid mathematical and philosophical exercises but they are not legitimate climate science.
Yes, Gordon, that’s pretty much what I’m saying. But I’ll go a step further. Me and Jelbring and Gilbert and Schreuder and Thieme and Gerlich and Tscheuschner and Thüne and Kondis and Chilingar and Abdusamatov and Nahle keep pointing at it: the models are wrong. So far, the considerable research thrown at this issue has told us only that the effect of CO2 is INDISCERNIBLE, all the brouhaha notwithstanding.
See http://www.examiner.com/examiner/x-7715-Portland-Civil-Rights-Examiner~y2009m8d18-Carbon-Dioxide-irrelevant-in-climate-debate-says-MIT-Scientist
Writer Dianna Cotter catches the main point better than most climate scientists do: “heat is radiated out in to space at a far higher rate than any modeling system to date can account for.” This isn’t supposed to happen. But a radiant energy ABSORBER can’t be anything other than a radiant energy CONVEYER, just as Kondis and others have insisted.
“The second law of thermodynamics prohibits carbon dioxide from arresting or reversing the spontaneous downhill flow of energy, putting advocates in the awkward position of insisting that a trace atmospheric component’s innocent participation in a natural heat dissipation process is responsible for warming a planet. The fictitious ‘trapped heat’ property, which they aggressively promote with a dishonest ‘greenhouse gas’ metaphor, is based on their misrepresentation of natural absorption and emission energy transfer processes and disregard of two fundamental laws of physics.”
http://www.ilovemycarbondioxide.com/FAQ.html
Or, as Monckton simply puts it, “Outgoing long-wave radiation is not being trapped as predicted”
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/originals/co2_report_july_09.pdf
The only real question to my mind is when climate scientists will pick up this cue and start re-examining their cherished prejudices and models. I won’t be holding my breath, though.
Back to Pierre Duhem (1906)
That article Alan linked to by Dianna Cotter is very good.
Douglass and Knox show that the radiative imbalance of the TOA is intrinsically connected with climate phase shifts, that is steps;
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/08/11/ocean-heat-content-and-earth%e2%80%99s-radiation-imbalance/#more-9865
This dovetails with the recent step papers by Tsonis and David Stockwell. The mechanism for the radiative basis of ENSO is cloud cover;
http://climatechange1.wordpress.com/2009/08/18/sea-level-data-exposes-el-ninos-secret/
And as the new Sun and Yu paper show, coupled with the cloud cover variation [and this is what Spencer has been saying for some time] is an El Nino caused relaxation of the trade winds. El Nino does accumulate; the accumulation is radiative based; take a bow Mr Sun. Now, can the AGW lads go home and leave us alone please?
Yes, Graph C from the Cotter article which compares the OLR from ERBE with the computer models is a bit of a killer. Now, if only Miskolczi could prove his S_T window of 62 w/m2 is correct and the official K&T one of 40 w/m2 is not this thing could really be wrapped up.
“Now, can the AGW lads go home and leave us alone please?”
If ENSO is accumulative, then on a geological timescale, we should be in a cauldron by now, and there should have been no ice ages.
I like that photo at the top. It can really show what the sea is doing now and in the recent geological past.
Note well the abrupt angle below the sand dune.
Sea level changes measured on the flats here are the best global temperature records we have.
Cheers all
Gavin,
“Sea level changes measured on the flats here are the best global temperature records we have.”
I’m assuming from your quote that you have never lived on the coast and witnessed first hand the impact of storm activityand king tides, nothing to do with AGW.
Well spotted little will; ENSO is accumulative unless that accumulation is countered by equivalent La Nina events; which did not happen between 1976 and 1998 but which has happened post 1998.
Pandanus:
From experience, any of the impacts you mention could temporarily change the course of our meandering stream below its normal outfall, but a study that compares salt water intrusions inland from the frontal dunes with say wear and tear on freshwater lakes and dunes will be useful.
Also; a casual observer may miss long term impacts on mature trees and forests that develop at the rich junction of streams and dunes.
Yes, coastal wetland infrastructures, dependent hierarchies etc are a little more complex than piers, breakwaters or sewage discharges.
The truth is, I actually lived on a main dune between former wetlands and the sea in an old wooden cottage for some time.
So …. we have climate models are primitive … 2nd law thermodynamics invalidated … Miskolczi again …. El Nino builds heat over 50 years … step papers – uh huh !
Luke: “Well Sinkers – simply put up the relevant papers showing how your climate predictors work.”
Got that wrong for a start – we are not into predictions – makes us like Witchdoctors, etc, you know.
Readers are well advised to listen to the Goon Shows that the BBC produced, over the years, to understand Sinker’s intellectual tack here. It might help those new, to imagine Sinkers as Eccles, or Major Bloodknock, or other objects of “inconvenience”.
Perhaps someone can assist me, a biologist, with some technicalities. What is the relationship between: (a) total solar irradiance (b) insolation (c) solar magnetic output?
If I understand things correctly, feature (c), the solar magnetic influence, is most relevant to solar effects on climate via interaction with the cosmic-ray/cloud-nucleation mechanism. Is that correct?
Any assistance would be much appreciated.
TSI is solar radiation incident at the top of the atmosphere; insolation is solar radiation measured at a particular location on the surface of the Earth and good luck with the solar magnetic influence.
We’re supposed to believe that the 1 ppmv (one part per million by volume) of CO2 in the atmosphere that results from combustion of fossil fuels makes a big difference.
Meanwhile, nobody seems to care about the environmental heat effects of Earth’s molten core — heated by the decay of heavy elements. Anyone ever seen a “climate chaos” model that takes into account this substantial source of heat?
Check out “Seismologists measure heat flow from Earth’s molten core into the lower mantle”, November 27, 2006, http://www.innovations-report.com/html/reports/earth_sciences/report-74868.html
CO2 isn’t the only “greenhouse gas”, and the Sun isn’t the only source of heat.
Thanks Cohenite for clearing up some issues for me re total solar irradiance (TSI) and insolation. What I’m still unclear on is: does TSI include solar magnetic output? I would have thought yes, since magnetism is an electromagnetic radiation just like light and heat (only with different wavelengths). Is that correct? Can anyone help me here?
I am trying to evaluate the recent meeting between the Fielding and Wong camps. The Wong camp evidently felt solar variation was too small to greatly affect climate. But there is a recent model in this field where solar magnetic variation can have substantial effects on climate via altered cosmic ray flux and cloud seeding.
Indeed, the proportion of magnetite with a very low reflectivity of solar radiation and hematite stained grains which proportion changes proportionally to the intensity of solar irradiance (discounting other granetoids for the moment) indicate that energy incoming from the Sun to the Earth’s surface is higher than the reported by satellites. The sedimentary samples that I have examined show an average of 2.25% of magnetite and 6.25% of HSG. These proportions are the result of high levels of solar irradiance that have not been registered by satellites.
When I examined grains from sedimentary layers of riverbeds, I found the proportion of HSG was far higher than the proportion of HSG in samples of sea sedimentary layers. The difference is due to the absence and relatively null proportion of magnetite in my riverbed samples because, as I have indicated above, magnetite has a very low reflectivity of solar radiation, that’s it. So, there is a clear error in satellite measurements of TSI.
The problem is that we are not taking into account the remainder particles that are strike on the Earth’s atmosphere which are in hyperenergetic states and percolate to the surface through “cracks” in the geomagnetic field. The flux of neutrons, for example, in units of hundreds of counts per hour has increased dramatically since April 18 up to date (above 8200 counts per hour).
Consider that I have not taken into account tunneling that is the way by which hyperexcited photons (high energy density) can break the Coulomb barrier and hit on the surface. The fact is that here, in Monterrey, we have recorded ~670 W/m^2 per hour of insolation. That’s far more insolation than the insolation that it is suppossed that we should be receiving from the Sun (348 W/m^2 per day). Consequently, something is going on different, but it’s not the atmospheric carbon dioxide or the whole Earth’s atmosphere, but in geomagnetic field, Milankovitch Cycles and Total Available solar Energy.
Some people say “No”, mother nature (reality) says “yes”.
Correction:
“The fact is that here, in Monterrey, we have recorded ~670 W/m^2 per hour of insolation.”
It should have said:
“The fact is that here, in Monterrey, we have recorded ~670 W/m^2 per day
of insolation.
Whew, that’s a relief Nasif!
David Elder
The solar magnetic factor – all magnetic fields are produced by electric currents without exception and in terms of the Plasma Model the sun is powered electrically from external electric power sources. The magnitude of electric currents entering the Earth are in the order of millions of amperes via the polar Birkelands routinely measured by satellites – and the earth’s thermal state is basically the result of those electric currents with a diurnal modulation from radiation. However mainstream climate science has not moved from the mechanical physics of the Victorian Era in which no role for electricity exists in space, so they do not view the earth system as an electrical one – a greenhouse effect is proposed to explain the thermal of a planet in the absence of electrical forces.
This comment will get the AGW trolls into apoplexy – but that’s expected from those suffering cognitive dissonance.
Correction – “the thermal behaviour of a planet in the absence….”
Alan Siddons wrote:
Actually, that’s not true. If we use the ideal gas law we can calculate a dry adiabatic lapse rate that explains why the surface temperature of earth is significantly higher than the black body calculations suggest. Given: that our atmosphere has a significant fraction of good old H2O in it; that H2O undergoes phase changes (solid to liquid to gas and visa versa) which requires significant amounts of heat; that our planet rotates, producing significant “forced” (horizontal) convection; and that there is (vertical) convection happening all the time as well, any variations from what simple adiabatic lapse rate calculations say can easily be accommodated by these phenomena. And you will note that, as seen from space, earth’s radiative temperature is just as black body calculations suggest it should be.
Nasif,
Watts per hour, watts per day, are equally nonsensical units. Such juvenile mistakes do not encourage readers to delve into your harebrained cosmic speculations.
But annual watts are OK?
http://www.atmos.uiuc.edu/colloquia/080430.htm
Louis,
If all magnetic fields are without exception caused by currents, please tell me why me what current is driving my little horse shoe magnet?
nick
“Watts per hour, watts per day, are equally nonsensical units.”
you don’t have a clue of what you are talking about
Coho, I can’t see any annual watts there. The nearest is to an annual cycle of energy. Well, you can have Joules/year, or Joules/day, if you want, but watts per day just makes no sense.
Watts are already a measure of energy for a period of time. It makes no sense to express them in a period of time again.
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 22nd, 2009 at 8:48 pm
Nasif,
Watts per hour, watts per day, are equally nonsensical units. Such juvenile mistakes do not encourage readers to delve into your harebrained cosmic speculations.
What the expression means is the total radiation received along 12 hours of insolation. You can express it also, for July for example, as 20,801 W/m^2 per month, which means the total power received per Month. We don’t see the necessity of writing it because it is so simple that all scientists know what the expression meaning is.
Please concentrate on the scientific aspects of the post and don’t go over there inventing errors where errors do not exist. You can find expressions like this in books of astrophysics, ecology, physics, thermodynamics, etc.
Comment from: SJT August 22nd, 2009 at 11:22 pm
Watts are already a measure of energy for a period of time. It makes no sense to express them in a period of time again.
Hah! How do you express insolation or total radiation received per square meter of surface?
Perhaps you meant rather than per period of time, to multiply by the period of time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watt_hour
“Energy in kilowatt hours is the product of power in kilowatts and time in hours; it is not “kilowatts per hour”.”
Comment from: SJT August 23rd, 2009 at 8:45 am
Perhaps you meant rather than per period of time, to multiply by the period of time.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watt_hour
“Energy in kilowatt hours is the product of power in kilowatts and time in hours; it is not “kilowatts per hour”.”
Nope; you are confused. I meant INSOLATION. You know what I meant?
“The fact is that here, in Monterrey, we have recorded ~670 W/m^2 per day of insolation.”
I think you may mean the insolation averaged over a day – it’s hard to tell. But you should try to get it right. Your current wording is an amateurish error. See:
Wiki, again
Terms such as ‘watts per hour’ are meaningless in practice
or this
Word Power: Watts per Hour? Amps per Hour? No Such Things!
or this
A watt is a watt – there is no such thing as “watts per hour”, or “watts per day”.
@ SJT…
Perhaps this table, elaborated by a good friend of mine, could help a bit:
Quality Definition Dimensions SI Units Comments
Length Fundamental property of Space L Metres Position
Mass Fundamental property of Matter M Kilogrammes Substance
Time Fundamental property of Change T Seconds Duration
Velocity Rate of Change of Position L/T or LT^-1 Metres/Second
Acceleration Rate of Change of Velocity LT^-2 Metres/Second/Second
Force Mass times by Acceleration MLT^-2 Newtons
The Newton is an SI unit of force defined as the product resulting when a mass of 1 kilogramme is accelerated at a rate of 1 metre per second per second.
Work Force times by Distance Moved ML^2T^-2 Joules
The Joule is an SI unit of energy equal to the work done when a force of one Newton acts over a distance of one Metre.
Power Rate of doing Work ML^2T^-3 Watts
The Watt is an SI unit of Power equal to one Joule per Second. Power times by Time equals
Work.
Brilliance Illumination per unit area MT^-3 Watts per square metre
Brilliance times by Area equals Power.
Energy Mass times by Velocity Squared ML^2T^-2 Joules
Energy is Dimensionally equivalent to Work.
Heat Rate of Production of Energy ML^2T^-3 Watts
Heat is Dimensionally equivalent to Power
Insolation Solar radiation energy received kW hour/m^2/day
on a given surface area in a given time
If you wish to know how NASA measures insolation and the units they use for insolation, visit:
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=1355
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 23rd, 2009 at 9:53 am
I think you may mean the insolation averaged over a day – it’s hard to tell. But you should try to get it right. Your current wording is an amateurish error. See:
Wiki, again
Terms such as ‘watts per hour’ are meaningless in practice
or this
Word Power: Watts per Hour? Amps per Hour? No Such Things!
or this
A watt is a watt – there is no such thing as “watts per hour”, or “watts per day”.
I think I understand your idea. However, the units for insolation are kW h/m^2/day. I don’t think the scientists at NASA, astrophysicists, ecologists, biologists, climatologists are amateurs.
Hunter
At the atomic scale it’s charged particles in motion in your horseshoe magnet ? But it isn’t that simple – the horseshoe magnet had to be initially zapped by a stronger magnetic field to magnetize it in the first place. So why are some volumes of matter magnetic and others not? I don’t know – we don’t really understand magnetism all that well, come to think of it and I use its properties at work on a routine basis – it’s one of those givens we tend not to question because it works.
So why is the mineral magnetite magnetic? Electric currents at the atomic scale? Or has it something to do with its atomic structure. But one fact is clear, to generate a magnetic field we need electricity – that’s unequivocal. I also made an analogy with an automobile and it’s dashboard temperature light – a better one is it’s headlights as the radiating energy source, equivalent to the Sun’s radiation that is itself powered by galactic sized electric currents.
This is why the AGW point is correct that the Sun’s radiation isn’t capable of explaining the observed thermal effects on the Earth’s surface – it isn’t but they then assume it’s CO2 that is the additional forcing while in terms of the Plasma Model it’s the electric currents powering the Earth’s rotation that are generating it’s internal heat which is then perceived as surface effects. And it’s not a simple case of internal electric currents – the Earth is encapsuled by plasma double layers which exist because of the continual movement of electric charge between the Earth and the plasma of space – and those electric currents also radiate in the microwave spectrum – and instead of downwelling IR being inferred to solely come from atmospheric CO2, we have the additional source from atmospheric electric currents, and which source then dominates?
Of course if you don’t believe that electric currents occur in the Earth’s atmosphere then existing ideas need to be stretched to beyond their limits to explain things. As Fred Hoyle might have pointed out, the AGW mob are thinking with the wrong ideas but because of their Platonic background where facts are deemed true by consensus, changing their minds needs a little more than rhetoric. I doubt another ice age could change their belief system, so entrenched is it in their pysche.
david elder “…does TSI include solar magnetic output? I would have thought yes, since magnetism is an electromagnetic radiation just like light and heat (only with different wavelengths)”.
I think the ‘magnetic’ in electromagnetic is your clue. Magnetism is produced by varying electrical charges and the ‘electro’ part stands for ‘electric field’. They work hand in hand. An electric field produces electric charges, and when they flow, a magnetic field is produced. In an EM field, I think the E vector (electric field) is perpendicular to the M vector (magnetic field).
Light is an electromagnetic field. One has to understand that it is the human eye that is receptive to the vibrations (frequency) of an EM field in a particular frequency spectrum (the visible spectrum). We humans make a big deal about light because we can see it and we depend on it. We see it only because vibrations in the visible spectrum stimulate receptors in the eye. And we are supposed to believe that all happened through evolution and several amino acids coming together by chance.
I think the cosmic rays being refered to in the article come from sources other than the Sun. However, the Sun is continuously emitting a plasma (protons and electrons, according to Akasofu) which behave like an electric current and the articles seems to infer that the plasma interferes with cosmic rays which help water vapour droplets to begin forming in the atmosphere. The plasma emitted is cyclical and depends on factors within the Sun.
As Louis has pointed out, current science, and climate science, does not allow for the interaction of the the solar plasma with the Earth’s magnetic field. As Akasofu points out, the magnetic field diverts the plasma but the plasma interacting with the magnetic field produces electric currents in our atmosphere and in the Earth’s surface. Akasofu has indicated that electrical currents are traveling around in our atmosphere and are at least the source of the Aurora. Who knows what they are doing to the climate and the weather.
Nasif “However, the units for insolation are kW h/m^2/day.”
Yes. but kWh is a unit of energy. A watt is a unit of power, as is kWh/day.
But I don’t think that is what you meant. 10 kWh/m2/day is a typical insolation.
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 23rd, 2009 at 12:04 pm
Nasif “However, the units for insolation are kW h/m^2/day.”
Yes. but kWh is a unit of energy. A watt is a unit of power, as is kWh/day.
But I don’t think that is what you meant. 10 kWh/m2/day is a typical insolation.
The expression 1 kWh/m^2 is equivalent to 3600 kJ/m^2. However, 1 kW/m^2 is not equivalent to 3600 kJ/m^2, but to 1 kJ/s/m^2.
I don’t see any problem in how NASA scientists use the units for insolation. It is clear why we must write kWh (energy), not just kW (Rate of doing Work).
Please, read my coment to SJT at Nasif Nahle August 23rd, 2009 at 9:57 am. There is a very clear explanation about units in that post.
Don’t worry, Nick. Many people get confused with this issue, including the scientific concept of heat. Opportunely, there are many references to physical quantities.
Nick Stokes “Watts per hour, watts per day, are equally nonsensical units. Such juvenile mistakes do not encourage readers to delve into your harebrained cosmic speculations”.
The standard term is watt-hour (or kilowatt-hour), which the electrical utility uses to charge you for your electrical consumption. It’s the number of watts of electrical ‘energy’ you consume in an hour, so what’s so hard to understand about watts per hour?
Power = EI = voltage x current. The voltage is generally held constant, with alternating voltage having an equivalent direct voltage called the RMS, or root mean square voltage. In North America, we use 120 volts AC. So, if I’m driving a 100 watt light bulb, I am delivering 120 volts @ 0.83 amps. That only tells you the number of charges flowing per second at a fixed voltage, or the rate of work being done.
None of this tells you what the total energy expended is in one hour. The time factor comes in when you calculate the ‘energy’ used over a time frame, which is watts x time. Energy has a time component but power is a rate of doing work.
Energy is measured in watt-hours or kilowatt-hours which is pretty much the same as watts per hour. I looked up the Wiki article on insolation and I think they are out to lunch with their description of power and energy. Then again, I’m just a skeptical scumbag.
Louis Hissink re permanent magnets…”But one fact is clear, to generate a magnetic field we need electricity….”
Louis…the magnetism in a permanent magnet is apparently due to the motion of the electrons about the nucleus in ferromagnetic material. In any orbiting body, there is a centripital force between the orbiting body and the focus, directed toward the focus, like someone swinging a ball of a string. The string pulls in on the ball, which is a centripital force as opposed to a centrifugal force which would point out the way.
The orbiting electrons spin on an axis, in an similar analogy to the Earth spinning on its axis. As they spin, they form a magnetic dipole which tends to add to the centripital force and oppose any external magnetic field. In ferromagnetic material, billions of atoms exist in domains in which the dipole momentums from the electrons add together. The domains are normally in a random order, but when an external magnetic field is applied, they align.
You’re right about magnetic fields requiring electricity because electrons are electricity and they cause the magnetic dipoles that form the permanent magnet. There is a distinction, however, between charges acting as point charges and those under the influence of an electric field, which produce ordered currents. Under those conditions, a current encountering a magnetic field will create an electromagnet.
I found it interesting that charges create an electric field but there is no equivalent magnetic charge. It is being sought but so far it’s either elusive or it isn’t there. We have a long way to go in the understanding of nature.
BTW…about the eye and light (electromagnetic wave). The only way an eye can work is if it has a water base. It has to pass light frequencies and the resistance to those frequencies increases something like 10 million times on either side of the visible light spectrum. I can’t bring myself to accept this all happened by a fluke. I am not hinting at a religious explanation, just that we have no idea what is going on or where we came from. We also have no idea how light signals get translated by the brain from an electrochemical form to a form of intelligence.
Gordon,
Thanks for that technical explanation about magnetism at the atomic scale – and indeed we know so very little!
As for human vision – Michael Talbot in his book “The Holographic Universe” described an experiment with how the mind fills in visual gaps by way of a simple visual experiment he included in the book, so my memory informs. If you can hold of it, the experiment is described on page 164, which demonstrates our visual blind spot inside the eye. So vision is essentially holographic.
I tend to follow Amit Goswami’s ideas set out in his book “The self aware Universe” in which he posits that physical reality is an epiphenomenon of consciousness, in contrast to the prevailing view that consciousness is a phenomenon derived from physical matter. By that I mean the consciousness underlying our physical organism which seems incredibly intelligent, and not the mechanics of our egos which are the products of our brain’s activities. Talbot touches on this as well, I add, and David Bohm introduced the idea of an implicate order.
I’ve also noticed the intellectual habit of assuming that electricity is electrons only, wrong! It just happens that plasma in solid matter is restricted to electrons but when matter is disassociated it’s then the motion of charged particles, and those generate magnetic fields. But then what underlying “thing” ends up producing a magnetic field when electrically charged particles move through it?
One thing I’ve always wondered about was proton spin – why do protons spin? Apart from the mundane use of that property in proton precession magnetometers, what really drives that motion?
As for electricity and magnetic fields – I’ve discovered it’s a chicken an egg conundrum – you seem not to be able to have one without the other, which leads to the philosophical conclusion that maybe the universe always existed.
But I do feel a little jealous of our AGW folk here – it must be a blessing to be so totally certain one is right.
Gordon, watts per hour does not mean power*time. Does miles per hour mean distance*time?
But even if it did, the statement was that insolation was ~670 W/m^2 per day. If you interpret that as insolation =~670 watt-days/m^2, then what on earth does that mean?
Nick Stokes,
Isn’t this getting into a terminological mess?
If insolation ~ 670 watts/m^2 per day simply means that over 24 hours the amount of radiation the Earth receives over a square area of 1 meter is 670 watts. What else could it mean.
Nick Stokes,
I think I see what you are getting to – the Watt is defined in SI terms as 1 joule per second of time.
So 670 watts in terms of insolation are the emission of radiant energy of 670 joules per second.
So the statement of 670 watts/m^2 per day is somewhat tautological, to say the least.
So you are right, it’s a bloody nonsense as AGW was in the first place.
Comment from: Louis Hissink August 23rd, 2009 at 6:58 pm
Nick Stokes,
I think I see what you are getting to – the Watt is defined in SI terms as 1 joule per second of time.
So 670 watts in terms of insolation are the emission of radiant energy of 670 joules per second.
So the statement of 670 watts/m^2 per day is somewhat tautological, to say the least.
So you are right, it’s a bloody nonsense as AGW was in the first place.
Dear Louis,
Nick also said it was futile to write kWh/m^2 per day. However, we have to make the distinction with respecti to kW alone because we are considering total radiation energy.
1 kWh = 3600 J These are units of energy
1kW = 1 J/s These are units of power.
So we must write kWh.
I made a mistake. It should have said:
“1 kWh = 3600 <bkJ These are units of energy
1kW = 1 J/s These are units of power.”
OK! And when expressing total incident solar radiation energy on one square meter during one day, we must write it as follows:
kWh/m^2/day.
Then it is absolutely essential that we express energy in kWh units so that the expression is not considered as power. Writing only kW (dropping the unit hour) is a tremendous lack of knowledge of physics.
OK… Now that we have clarified that it is correct to express insolation in units of “kWh/m^2 per day”, the next step is that Nick Stokes must to support scientifically what he wrote in his post above:
“Such juvenile mistakes do not encourage readers to delve into your harebrained cosmic speculations.
Nick Stokes “Gordon, watts per hour does not mean power*time. Does miles per hour mean distance*time?”
I realize the term watts/hour is fundamentally incorrect but I think the implication should be fairly easily understood. When we say miles per hour, we are usually refering to distance in the numerator with time in the denominator. A watt-hour, on the other hand, has both in the numerator. Something per something only refers to a numerator/denominator setup.
An electrical watt is the amount of work done by those electrons to produce the heat/light we relate to a light bulb. Electrical energy is defined as power x time, and there is no denominator, therefore we say watt-hour rather than watts/hour. I don’t see what is wrong with using the latter, however, even though it is technically wrong.
WRT insolation, it seems they are only adding units of area to express a flux density. I get a little frustrated with the math, not because I dislike math or don’t appreciate it, rather, I find that math sometimes gets in the way of what is being said. When you come down to it, what is it they are saying? You have a mass of atoms making up a surface and they have been agitated by solar radiation. In their excited state, they radiate their own energy which interferes with the energy that excited them, producing interference patterns. None of that is talked about or regarded by the equations. What does it all mean?
Nasif, yes, kW-hr/m2 per day is a feasible unit. Not a very sensible one, though, unless you are thinking about solar power for electricity. 1 kW-hr per day is just a roundabout way of saying 1/24 kW. And I’m sure it isn’t what you meant by “The fact is that here, in Monterrey, we have recorded ~670 W/m^2 per day of insolation.”. 670 kW-hr/m2/day is about 28,000 W/m2, which is getting to the sort of insolation you might get on Mercury. Or if you meant 670 W-hr/m2/day, that’s somewhere out beyond Jupiter.
As to the rest of my statement, well, if it can be this hard to sort out something so elementary, it doesn’t encourage me to follow you into your more fanciful speculations.
Louis Hissink “…and David Bohm introduced the idea of an implicate order”.
Bohm was one of my favourite physicists, and he and Einstein were friends. I have waded through Bohm’s implicate order theory but I was far more interested in the explorations of the human mind he did with Jiddu Krishnamurti. They make quite clear the difference between the ego-mind, which is conditioned thought, and the intelligent mind, which acts independently of conditioned thought but which can be submerged by it. The Cosmic Joke refered to in Zen seems to be that we tend to live in the distorted ego-mind, which does not work very well, yet we are oblivious to the natural intelligence available to us simply by getting the ego-mind to shut up long enough to allow the intelligence to operate.
I’m not a religious person in the traditional/orthodox sense but I can’t help thinking there was a significance to the life of Jesus Christ. I realize a lot of that is romanticized in my mind but something Thomas Didymous said about Jesus coincided with what Bohm and Krishnamurti talked abou. In some recently found scrolls, Didymous refered to Jesus as having said ‘everything we humans need in life is already within’. To me, that was a reference to the natural intelligence we are all born with.
That’s the message of Krishnamurti in a nutshell. He claims we need look no further than the intelligence available in our unconditioned minds to understand reality and our realtionship to it. He claimed further that we create images in our minds through which we filter reality. Bohm concured, and coming from a theoretical physicists of his emminence, I found that very meaningful.
Most people who go through university don’t even have a clue about how their minds work. Some scientists seem to come about that naturally, like a Bohm, an Einstein, a Pauling or a Feynman. Each one to a man has a humility about himself which suggests to me he has an awareness of ego and its stupidity. From what I am seeing today in the world with regard to scientists, there are too many who care more about their self-images and about being right than they do about science.
Thanks to Gordon Robertson at 11.31 am 23 August for advice on possible role of solar cycles on climate via magnetic effects. I think I’ve got the idea now.
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 24th, 2009 at 7:17 am
Nasif, yes, kW-hr/m2 per day is a feasible unit.
Nope… It’s the correct unit for insolation.
Not a very sensible one, though, unless you are thinking about solar power for electricity. 1 kW-hr per day is just a roundabout way of saying 1/24 kW. And I’m sure it isn’t what you meant by “The fact is that here, in Monterrey, we have recorded ~670 W/m^2 per day of insolation.”. 670 kW-hr/m2/day is about 28,000 W/m2, which is getting to the sort of insolation you might get on Mercury. Or if you meant 670 W-hr/m2/day, that’s somewhere out beyond Jupiter.
1. It’s not what I’m thinking, but what clean and good physics establishes.
2. Nope… You cannot express kWh/m^2/day like W/m^2 per day. You can convert kWh/m^2/day to kJ/m^2/day; yes, that is, energy units to energy units, power units to power units, etc. You can also convert kWh/m^2/day to BTU/ft^2/day.
As to the rest of my statement, well, if it can be this hard to sort out something so elementary, it doesn’t encourage me to follow you into your more fanciful speculations.
Good!!! So go ahead, then! Write a single word about my “fanciful speculations”.
Nasif, you just don’t read stuff properly. I didn’t say that you can “express kWh/m^2/day like W/m^2 per day”. I said “1 kW-hr per day is just a roundabout way of saying 1/24 kW”. So you can express kWh/m^2/day like W/m^2. The conversion factor is 1000/24.
And you haven’t dealt with the fact that expressed in what you now claim are the correct units, your “insolations” are ridiculously large.
What did you mean?
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 24th, 2009 at 10:07 am
Nasif, you just don’t read stuff properly. I didn’t say that you can “express kWh/m^2/day like W/m^2 per day”. I said “1 kW-hr per day is just a roundabout way of saying 1/24 kW”. So you can express kWh/m^2/day like W/m^2. The conversion factor is 1000/24.
And you haven’t dealt with the fact that expressed in what you now claim are the correct units, your “insolations” are ridiculously large.
What did you mean?
I read what you wrote:
You said: “670 kW-hr/m2/day is about 28,000 W/m2”.
You’re wrong because kW/h/m^2/day are not equivalent to W/m^2. 🙂
You said: “Gordon, watts per hour does not mean power*time. Does miles per hour mean distance*time?”
You’re wrong because in clean physics, Watt is power. If you write W*s, it is power per time, that is, energy. 🙂
You said: “Nasif “However, the units for insolation are kW h/m^2/day.” Yes. but kWh is a unit of energy. A watt is a unit of power, as is kWh/day. But I don’t think that is what you meant. 10 kWh/m2/day is a typical insolation.”
And you’re wrong because kWh/day is not expressed correctly and kWh alone is a unit of energy, not power. 🙂
You wrote: “And you haven’t dealt with the fact that expressed in what you now claim are the correct units, your “insolations” are ridiculously large.”
Again, you’re wrong because I wrote “670 Wh/m^2/day”. Convert 670 Wh/m^2/day to kWh/m^2/day, please?
0.67 kWh/m^2/day. Heh! 🙂
Mine is clean, clear and cool physics… 😉
Now, please, tell me about my “fanciful speculations”.
OK, Nasif, we’ve finally (?) got a figure. Insolation 670 Wh/m2/day.
That is 670*3600 J/m2/day, or, 670 * 3600 / (3600*24) J/m2/s
which is 27.92 W/m2.
TSI (direct solar power at TOA) is about 1364 W/m2.
No wonder your physics is cool there in Monterey!
If you’re going to tell the world’s scientists that they have their atmospheric science all wrong, and it’s all due to tunneling of hyperexcited photons or whatever, you need all the credibility you can get. If you can’t even get this elementary starting figure right, you have none.
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 24th, 2009 at 11:24 am
OK, Nasif, we’ve finally (?) got a figure. Insolation 670 Wh/m2/day.
That is 670*3600 J/m2/day, or, 670 * 3600 / (3600*24) J/m2/s
which is 27.92 W/m2.
TSI (direct solar power at TOA) is about 1364 W/m2.
No wonder your physics is cool there in Monterey!
Amazing! You keep yourself on the same errors you have made in your past posts… You cannot express insolation as “W/m^2”; this is irradiance, radiant emittance, that is, power per unit area! I am talking about insolation… Energy per unit area per unit time. Got it?
Besides, you are doing it wrong: 670 Wh/m^2/day = 2 412 kJ/m^2/day, or 0.67 kWh/m^2/day.
If you’re going to tell the world’s scientists that they have their atmospheric science all wrong, and it’s all due to tunneling of hyperexcited photons or whatever, you need all the credibility you can get. If you can’t even get this elementary starting figure right, you have none.
Is it your “scientific” argument against my assertions? It’s a very poor argument, Nick. Could you go a bit more technical and specific, please?
Do you think “tunneling” and “hyperexcited photons” don’t exist?
I don’t think the whole atmospheric science is wrong; it is just that there are some people which have “unexplainably” forgotten many real phenomena. Think for example in solar photon streams, plasma, energy stored by subsurface materials of land and oceans, total emittancy, negative induced absorption, etc. Have you heard about this “things” from AGW proponents?
With this post I’m finishing this nonsensical “dialogue” with Nick Stokes.
Nick wants to express insolation in terms of energy. Well… the energy implied in 670 Wh/m^2/day is 2412 kJ/m^2/day.
Watts is a unit of power. 1 Watt = 1 Joule / second.
1 kW = 1 kJ/second.
Watts*second (W*s) is a unit of energy and it is equal to 1 Joul.
kWh is a unit of energy and it is equal to 3600 kJoules.
Units of power per unit area, irradiance, radiant emittance, brilliance = W/m^2
(Notice that W is power, not energy).
Units of insolation are kWh/m^2/day, or Wh/m^2/day, or J/m^2/day, or kJ/m^2/day.
(Notice that kWh is unts for energy, not power)
Annual average of insolation in Monterrey = 182530.9 kJ/m^2/year = 50.7 kWh/m^2/year = 50703.03 Wh/m^2/year = 0.14 kWh/m^2/day = 140 Wh/m^2/day = 504 kJ/m^2/day.
So, 0.67 kWh/m^2/day, or 2412 kJ/m^2/day is not a “cool” August day in Monterrey, as Nick has said.
Question @Nick: Why is it so hard for you to accept real magnitudes?
A last thing:
I made a mistake in the next paragraph:
“…the energy implied in 670 Wh/m^2/day is 2412 kJ/m^2/day.”
It should have said:
“…the energy implied in 670 Wh/m^2/day is 2412 kJ.”
Soooorry… 🙂
So Monterrey gets average 0.14 kWh/m2/day? And 0.67 kWh/m2/day in August? Well, here is a table of data from a solar heater supplier. It doesn’t show Monterrey, but SF gets 4.89 kWh/m2/day on average, and 6.51 in August. You still haven’t got this units thing right.
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 24th, 2009 at 2:25 pm
So Monterrey gets average 0.14 kWh/m2/day? And 0.67 kWh/m2/day in August? Well, here is a table of data from a solar heater supplier. It doesn’t show Monterrey, but SF gets 4.89 kWh/m2/day on average, and 6.51 in August. You still haven’t got this units thing right.
Earth is not flat, the solar beams don’t strike on the surface completely perpendicular with respect to the horizontal surface, and the horizontal surface is not regular. Monterrey also has a very rich orography.
Nick… Divide 6.51 kWh/m^2/day by, precisely, 22 days. Got it? The daily average is 0.3 kWh/m^2/day.
Why you cannot accept real measurements? Forget your models, Nick! This is the real world!
You know what? I don’t know why I’m following your… irrational “dialogue”. I have had enough pacience with you.
Take a book of 101-Physics and learn physical units.
patience
@Nick Stokes…
Start your lessons with this one:
http://www.gcse.com/maths/averages.htm
Well, Nasif, that table I linked had about 80 places in the lower 48. The annual average varied from 3.6 kWh/m2/day to 5.5. Lots of rich orography there. Are you still telling me that Monterrey gets 0.14 kWh/m2/day? Do you have a source?
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 24th, 2009 at 3:23 pm
Well, Nasif, that table I linked had about 80 places in the lower 48. The annual average varied from 3.6 kWh/m2/day to 5.5. Lots of rich orography there. Are you still telling me that Monterrey gets 0.14 kWh/m2/day? Do you have a source?
Are you joking? Hah! The length of daylight period in Monterrey in August is about 12:50 hours! Assuming the insolation was 0.67 kWh/m^2 for each measurement during the 12:50 hours, the total insolation would have been ~ 8.7 kWh/m^2/day. However, considering the factors which modify insolation, it was 4.8 kWh/m^2/day.
You have to learn how to differentiate “total radiation received by insolation during one month” from “average daily insolation”. 🙂
Please, don’t tell me I have to teach you multiplication…
Ask for a source? Well, Nick, here it goes:
http://eosweb.larc.nasa.gov
Enjoy it!
🙂
No, Nasif, your statement was:
Annual average of insolation in Monterrey = 182530.9 kJ/m^2/year = …= 0.14 kWh/m^2/day
Now it’s 4.8 kWh/m^2/day.. How does 0.14 become 4.8? Does /day mean /hour?
You are babbling.
Nasif,
According to Wikipedia, in SI units, 1 Watt = 1 joule/second. They seem to conflate power with energy as well, so I suspect we are obsessing over the picking of nits, rather than fundamentals.
Naturally our in house PC censors here cannot join in this nit-picking, not being credentialed in this area.
Gordon,
Jiddu Krishnamurti influenced me profoundly – and U.G. Krishnamurti even more. I was introduced to JK’s ideas as a teenager but quickly left it once I understood his point. Those who remained in the JK circle, in my view, listened to JK’s ideas but didn’t hear anything, hence the incessant repetition of JK’s teachings – and how religions come to exist, I suppose.
But today I am like U.G Krishnamurti – and I only discovered his ideas by accident a decade ago – much to the disapproval of the JK’s I know.
But as mentioned earlier, I find Goswami’s ideas useful in understanding physical reality as a starting point, (subject to the usual caveats when blatant contradictions force one to change one’s mind).
Comment from: Louis Hissink August 24th, 2009 at 8:59 pm
Nasif,
According to Wikipedia, in SI units, 1 Watt = 1 joule/second. They seem to conflate power with energy as well, so I suspect we are obsessing over the picking of nits, rather than fundamentals.
Naturally our in house PC censors here cannot join in this nit-picking, not being credentialed in this area.
You are right. Obviously, Wikipedia is confusing the terms. That’s why I decided not following the nonsensical Nick Stokes’ game, because his main source is Wikipedia; This is not a scientific dialogue, but Nick’s obsession for finding something wrong where there is nothing wrong.
@Nick… The lenght of daylight in Monterrey is 12:50 hours. You must learn multiplication.
Source of the 182530.9 kJ/m^2/year:
Manrique, Jose Angel V. Heat Transfer. 2002. Oxford University Press. England. Page 287.
Divide that number by 365 days. Notice that the units are kJ/m^2/year and I converted them to kWh/m^2/day.
You must focus on the scientific aspects of my assertion, which you say are “speculations”.
End of this nonsensical discussion.
Nick Stokes “1 kW-hr per day is just a roundabout way of saying 1/24 kW”.
Actually, it’s not. I realize that when you use parameters such as Kw and hr, they should cancel when multiplied. You seem to be saying 1 Kw-hr/24 hr = 1/24 Kw. However, it’s really 1 kw x 24 hr = 24 Kw-hr. Otherwise, the longer you applied power to a load the less it would cost, which would be great.
Also, it makes no sense that the longer you use power the smaller it gets. 1 Kw-hr is the amount of energy consumed in an hour when 1 Kw of power is supplied constantly. It only makes sense that in 24 hours the amount of energy consumed is 24 times greater.
Gordon, this is yet more nonsense. 1 kWh is 3,600,000 J. And 3,600,000 J per day is 150,000 J/hr, or 150000/3600=1000/24 J/sec
Which is 1000/24 W, or 1/24 kW.
This stuff is really elementary.
Comment from: Nick Stokes August 25th, 2009 at 6:00 pm
Gordon, this is yet more nonsense. 1 kWh is 3,600,000 J. And 3,600,000 J per day is 150,000 J/hr, or 150000/3600=1000/24 J/sec
Which is 1000/24 W, or 1/24 kW.
This stuff is really elementary.
The problem with you, Nick, is that you don’t know how to differentiate units of energy from units of power. Again:
1 kWh (energy) = 3 600 000 Joules (energy)
1W*s (energy) = 1 Joule (energy)
The concept changes when you imply area, time and period.
If you say 1 kW (dropping “h” for hour) you are no long referring to energy, but to POWER:
1 kW (power) = 1000 Joules/second (power)
1 W (power) = 1 J/second (power)
1 kWh/m^2 per day (insolation) = 3600 kJ/m^2 per day (insolation)
1 Ws/m^2 per day (insolation) = 1 J/m^2 per day (insolation)
And yes, it is elementary stuff; the problem is that you, Nick, confound physical concepts and units.
Here an excellent energy units converter:
http://www.biocab.org/Converter.html