AUSTRALIA’S Minister for Climate Change, Penny Wong, recently suggested that most of the global warming since 1960, about 85 percent, has happened in the oceans and that change in ocean heat content is thus the most appropriate measure of global warming.
But, calculating from first principles, according to this data the oceans have absorbed far less energy than the IPCC estimates for the impact of rising carbon dioxide levels. While the government data suggests a warming rate of 0.38 watts/ m2 the IPCC data suggests a warming rate of 3.6 watts/ m2 . This is a significant discrepancy of nearly 10:1 and needs to be resolved. If the oceans really are the major heat sink for the planet where is the rest of the energy going? Alternatively, is the error in the IPCC estimates.
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UPDATE JULY 14, 2009
While in the following calculations I determined a discrepancy of 9:1 in the rate of warming from Australian government data relative to IPCC findings. In reviewing these calculations I now realise I made a significant error. I had wrongly assumed that the claimed positive feedback from water vapour was proportional to the carbon dioxide concentration. This is not correct, the claimed positive feedback is proportional to the temperature rise and that change does make a difference to the calculations and needs to be corrected. The revised calculations still show a paradox although only about 3:1.
READ MORE HERE: http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2009/07/a-climate-change-paradox-part-2/
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Here’s my logic:
On June 24, 2009, the Minister for Climate Change posted ‘Response to Senator Fielding’s questions about the climate change science’ ( http://www.environment.gov.au/minister/wong/2009/tr20090624c.html ).
This article included the above graph and comments reproduced below. The straight red line on the ocean heat content graph, however, is my addition and was not part of the original article. The line was placed by eye and is not claimed to be a least squares line of best fit.
The quoted items below are taken from the Minister’s website.
“In terms of the climate system as a whole, only about five percent of the warming since 1960 has taken place in the air.”
“Most of warming since 1960 (about 85 percent) has happened in the oceans. Thus, in terms of a single indicator of global warming, change in ocean heat content is the most appropriate.”
“The change in ocean heat content since 1960 is shown in the figure below. Note the significant warming trend since 1998.”
I note that the graph is labeled ocean heat content which cannot be correct given that the value is shown as zero prior to 1975. However the text suggests it is actually change in ocean heat content which would seem reasonable. I have assumed that to be the case.
The graph shows that over the last 30 years the oceans have absorbed 15*1022 joules of energy and as the red line shows this has been very close to linear over that time. Using a linear approximation implies the oceans have absorbed about 15*1022 / 30 or 5*1021 joules per year.
How does this compare with the claimed degree of global warming from rising carbon dioxide – expressed in watts / m2. Convert ocean warming first to watts = joules per second. There are 60 * 60 * 24 * 365 seconds per year = 3.15*107 seconds per year. So the oceans are absorbing 5*1021 / 3.15*107 joules per second = 1.6*1014 watts
Now to get watts / m2 we need to divide the watts by the surface area of Earth. The Earth is a sphere of radius 3960 miles = 6336 km. Its surface area = 4*pi*radius2 = 5*108 sq km (Wikipedia quotes 5.1*108 sq km). Since there are 106 m2 per km2 this equates to 5*1014 m2. Thus the oceans are absorbing energy at the rate of 1.6*1014 / 5*1014 watts/ m2 which equals 0.32 watts/ m2.
The article states that 85 percent of the warming has taken place in the oceans which would seem to be saying that 85 percent of the retained heat due to AGW is being stored in the oceans. From this it follows that the total retained heat is 0.32/0.85 or 0.38 watts/ m2.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in their 4th assessment report (summary for policy makers) claim (page 12, 4th bullet point) that “…..global average surface warming following a doubling of carbon dioxide concentrations. It is likely to be in the range 2 to 4.5C with a best estimate of about 3C”.
Now to get a 3C rise at the average claimed emission temperature (255K) requires an additional energy input (additional energy retained by greenhouse gases) of 11.3 watts/ m2. This assumes the 3C is an equilibrium level. If it is not then the retained energy must be still higher so the 11.3 is a minimum figure.
The ocean heat graph from the Minister ends in 2006. According to Mauna Loa data in 2006 the carbon dioxide concentration was 383 ppm which represents 0.45 doublings and hence an increase in global warming retained energy of 11.3 * 0.45 = 5.1 watts/ m2. Not all of this represents energy absorbed by the planet because of the claim that the planet has warmed. This warming will increase the energy radiated back out to space.
The Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia ( http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/info/warming/ ) shows the claimed warming in 2006 was 0.4C. SkepticalScience.com ( http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-warming-stopped-in-1998.htm ) shows temperature rise graphs from three sources and all show about 0.4C temperature rise in 2006. Using the same claimed effective emission temperature as above (255k), a rise of 0.4C will increase emitted energy by 1.5 watts/ m2. Thus the net additional energy retained by Earth will be 5.1 – 1.5 = 3.6 watts/ m2.
This presents a considerable conflict. Ocean heat assessment suggests earth is gaining energy at the rate of 0.38 watts/ m2 while carbon dioxide analysis suggests the rate is 3.6 watts/ m2. This is a difference of nearly 10:1 in two different analyses of the same quantity. Both cannot be right.
I note that the Minister specifically draws attention to the “significant warming trend since 1998”. This could be taken to mean a claim that the linear slope does not apply.
This is a somewhat risky assumption since there are other periods where the slope is well above the slope of the red line. None the less, using the local slope over the years since 1998 corresponds to about 8.8*1021 instead of the average of 5*1021. That would make the retained heat in the oceans about 0.56 watts/ m2 for a total retained heat of 0.66 watts/ m2. This is still 5.5 times lower than IPCC claim for the impact of carbon dioxide. Also, if we accept the higher slope since 1998 it means the average ocean energy absorption over the earlier years is reduced to 8*1022 joules over 23 years corresponding to 0.22 watts / m2. Since the carbon dioxide concentration from the Mauna Loa data in 1998 was 366.6 ppm this represents 0.39 doublings equivalent to an additional 4.4 watts / m2 or about 3 watts/ m2 after allowing for temperature rise making the discrepancy over those years worse (3 vs 0.22 is a ratio of 13.6:1)..
What the Minister’s own data shows is that the oceans have only absorbed between about 9 and 14 percent of the excess anthropogenic global warming energy implied by IPCC data. Yet they claim the ocean absorption represents 85 percent of this energy. The oceans are by far the biggest heat sink on the planet. If they are only absorbing at most 14 percent of the excess energy it is extremely difficult to see where the rest of the energy could be going.
Could the error be in the ocean heat content – maybe the exponent should be 23 not 22? Oceans cover 70 percent of the Earth’s surface or 3.5 *1014 m2. If the energy is spread over the top 700 m as the graph caption states, the volume of water is 3.5 * 700 * 1014 = 2.45 * 1017 m3 . Water has a thermal capacity of 4.18 million joules per degree per m3. Hence the 15 * 1022 joules will raise the surface ocean temperature by 15 * 1022 / ( 2.45 * 1017 * 4.18 * 106 ) degrees = 0.15C (This by the way is exactly the same result as Bill Kinninmonth cited in his email to Professor English reproduced on Joanne Nova’s website.). This result assumes the energy is distributed uniformly throughout the 700 meter depth. If it is concentrated near the surface the rise would be higher. To match the IPCC predictions the energy absorption would have to be 5.5 to 10 times higher suggesting an ocean temperature rise of at least 0.8C to 1.5C over the last 30 years. No such rise has been reported.
It would seem that the only plausible alternative left is that the error is in the IPCC estimates and that the current value should be about 1.5 +0.38 = 1.88watts/ m2 (additional energy radiated plus rate of energy storage in the oceans). If so by 2070 the additional energy input over today would be 1.88 * 0.55/0.45 = 2.3 watts / m2 (We have had 0.45 doublings with a further 0.55 to go by 2070.).
Such an energy rise at equilibrium would give an additional temperature increase of 0.6C. This is of course if we assume that the currently claimed temperature rise is correct and is all due to carbon dioxide.
So many assumptions and such a paradox!
Michael Hammer,
Melbourne, Australia
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Notes and Links
This article has been cross-posted at Joanne Nova: http://joannenova.com.au/2009/07/06/the-antidote-to-150-million-quadrillion-joules/
More from Michael Hammer here: http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/author/michael-hammer/
Related information:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/02/anomalous-spike-in-ocean-heat-content/#more-8132
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1994/to:2010/scale:0.1/mean:10/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1994/to:2010/scale:0.1/mean:10/plot/uah/from:1994/to:2010/scale:0.1/mean:10
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/309/5732/284 versus
http://www.john-daly.com/mobydick/oceans.htm
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
Why did they not include the cooling of the oceans water in 2007-2008-2209? What difference would that make?
Jennifer, A gremlin stole the superscripts out of this para.
“Now to get watts / m2 we need to divide the watts by the surface area of Earth. The Earth is a sphere of radius 3960 miles = 6336 km. Its surface area = 4 × pi × radius2 = 5 × 108 sq km (Wikipedia quotes 5.1 × 108 sq km). Since there are 106 m2 per km2 this equates to 5 × 1014 m2. Thus the oceans are absorbing energy at the rate of 1.6 × 1014 / 5 × 1014 watts/ m2 which equals 0.32 watts/ m2.”
in general, if you find an easy solution to a problem, that many PROFESSIONAL people did NOT find, some scepticism might be useful.
there is a funny way to test this: call (or write an e-mail) a university mathematics department, and tell them you are an engineer and you believe you found a simple proof to a difficult problem (Fermat always is a good one). sit back and watch their reaction.
a sceptic would wonder, why those working in the field did not notice such a massive difference.
a sceptic would also look at other “easy” solutions, contradicting mainstream science, by the same author. Michael has shown in multiple other articles a lack of even the most basic concepts of climate sciences and models.
if you want to simulate this, include a “proof by example” part in your mail to the mathematics department..
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for a start, deep ocean is an obvious other ocean part, taking up energy. about one third of the energy ends up there, over 70 yaers.
http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=14776475
after 70 yr the ocean heat uptake is almost evenly distributed within the layers above 200 m, between 200 and 700 m, and below 700 m (about 20 X 1022 J in each).
melting sea ice is another oceanic part, that might take up energy.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/originals/no_evidence.pdf
Thanks for another report from Austrailia July 3.
Just a little trivia. Increase in the temperature of the top meter of water, increases the evaporation of water and the emission of CO2 that is in the water. Due to venting, underwater volcanoes and cracks in the crust, they also are not able to control other sources of heat to the ocean. The Pacific Ocean is surrounded by the rim of fire which is a great number of under water and onshore volcanoes. Even dr spencer a Geophysicist in Oklahoma knows that.
I have to agree with sod here. If you find a discrepancy in such a central area, then rather than unrolling yet more calculations, you should read what the scientists have been saying about it.
Here is a Science 2005 paper written by Hansen, Willis and other authorities. They do much of the arithmetic you are emulating. They get 0.6 W/m2 accounted for by ocean heat gain. I’m not sure why that differs from your figure, but it may include deeper ocean. And their estimate of Earth’s nett radiative heat gain is 0.85 W/m2. Presumably the remaining 0.25 goes into melting ice, heating rocks etc.
Sod, Nick,
Michael Hammer is one of those guys who likes to work things out for himself from first principles. And which bit did he get wrong?
Jo,
Thanks, I’ll fit that.
Nick & sod: perhaps you would care to debate Pielke Snr on the matter? He too seems to believe there is a discrepancy and his latest blog entry asks some interesting questions of realclimate.
The problem with the heat content is that the models are predicting one thing, and the data is showing something else.
And that something else does not support the AGW predictions.
But for AGW, the models are unquestionable, so the data must be wrong.
That is what happens when a social movement highjacks a science.
“I have to agree with sod here. If you find a discrepancy in such a central area, then rather than unrolling yet more calculations, you should read what the scientists have been saying about it.”
“Michael Hammer is one of those guys who likes to work things out for himself from first principles. And which bit did he get wrong?”
If you read the IPCC report, which is a summary of thousands of research papers, it makes doing everything from first principles a waste of time to a large degree. Does one person hope to redo an amount of research that amounts to hundreds of thousands of man hours of work?
However, if he is serious, I would suggest he starts with the free online text book of climate, then he gets back to us with his breakthroughs.
http://geosci.uchicago.edu/~rtp1/ClimateBook/ClimateBook.html
>Michael Hammer is one of those guys who likes to work things out for himself from first principles. And which bit did he get wrong?
This bit Jen “While the government data suggests a warming rate of 0.38 watts/ m2 the IPCC data suggests a warming rate of 3.6 watts/ m2 .” He has made a corker of an error – out by a fact of nearly 10.
David,
Tell us more…
” I would suggest he starts with the free online text book of climate”
Yes it’s worth every penny and not a cent more.
Anyone ever heard of Ockhams Razor.
The principle states that the explanation of any phenomenon should make as few assumptions as possible, or “Of several acceptable explanations for a phenomenon, the simplest is preferable, provided that it takes all circumstances into account.”
Michael’s explanations are from basic scientific principles and do not rely on tuning of complex models with supposed positive feedbacks which cannot be substantiated in the real world.
The ultimate conclusion, again applying Ockhams Razor and paraphrasing Bill Clinton – “Its the Sun…stupid”
Wong’s, let’s not call them answers, let’s call them fairy tales, FT, in response to Fielding’s questions centre on the new great white hope of AGW, OHC; it is Wong’s FT graphs for OHC and Steric sea rise which establishes the 700 m level; sod’s complaint, as usual, is wrong and his link to another CGM, or in this case OGCM, which models OHC below the 700 m level is both irrelevant and wrong; the reason it is wrong is that below 700m [which the Levitus paper limits itself to and the Levitus paper is the gold star for AGW OHC FT] there is no way of isolating vertical down and recycling surface heat content from that heat which is coming from the constant recycling of water through the oceanic crust and the heat generated from the mantle; Craig O’Neil has an interesting piece on this process in the April 2008 edition of Australasian Science. With that avenue gone the alternative of melting sea ice is simply inadequate to provide anywhere near the heat expenditure to satisy the discrepancy which MH has indicated; sod’s Cryosphere graph shows that the level of sea ice has been basically normal for the last 10 years during the hyperbolic declared period of the “significant warming trend since 1998” according to WONG.
That period from 1998 is of course subject to the transition to the ARGO measurements from 2002-2003; this period featured an increase in OHC greater than the OHC increase over the rest of the measured period. This discrepancy has not been addressed by either Wong or any other AGW spruiker.
Finally, Wong’s FT ceases at 2006 at which time all the other papers on OHC, including Levitus, show either a plateau in OHC, or, more likely, a steep decline.
Bunk Coho – what’s the heating pattern and profile over all oceans. You guys are amazing !
Mr. Hammer is broadly correct.
Note both graphs stop at about 2005.
This is not because there is no later data, there is, but it has to be ignored because it shows clearly that that the oceans are cooling and sea levels either stable or falling.
Ever since the Argo floats were deployed in sufficient numbers they have been telling the same tale, the oceans are cooling, and whilst initially at 2006 it was still possible to argue there were both calibration problems and difficulties with such a short run of data it is now apparent the trend they show is real. As is the satellite data on the overall fall in sea level.
Whilst Willis et al and Levitus et al argued stoutly as the first results came in around 2005 that there must be an ‘error some place’ in the data from then on the data cannot be denied. All they now do, eg Levitus et al 2009, is argue the trend from 2005 on is some kind of temporary blip.
If so as the energy calculations above show, and to paraphrase W.S. Churchill, Some blip, Some trend.
Kindest Regards
“Craig O’Neil has an interesting piece on this process in the April 2008 edition of Australasian Science.”
You have already been told your error in using that as evidence. O’Neill is talking about geological scale timeframes. The Mantle hasn’t suddenly increased it’s heat output by a significant amount. We are talking about changes that are taking a few hundred years to play out, the blink of an eye in geological terms. Studies have indicated the heat output from the earth is insiginificant compared to the solar output, and that’s not the cause for the warming.
There is definitely a contradiction in the data. How are we expected to be able to develop a clear idea of what is happening and what needs to be done, when this is the best the government can come up with?
I’d love to live in a world where CO2 emissions have no effect on anything. But I suspect that is not the case. We need the facts.
Jennifer, “Michael Hammer is one of those guys who likes to work things out for himself from first principles. And which bit did he get wrong?”
I’ve nothing against working things out from first principles, but when it is such a central area, then it’s worth making some reference to what others have done.
So what’s wrong? Mainly the incoming power. Michael has done a very roundabout calc invoking CO2 doubling and sensitivity. I don’t know exactly what’s wrong, but the basis for these figures is the actual power coming in. And that’s right upfront in the AR4 SPM – Fig 2, 1.6 W/m2 – nothing like 11.3. And Hansen et al then get the heat retained, after allowing for extra radiation, of 0.85 W/m2. That’s the major part of the difference.
I think the rest is that the top 700 m of the ocean is just part of the total ocean heating, which Hansen et al estimate as 0.6, vs Michael’s 0,38 for the top part.
That brings things pretty much in line.
As per my previous post, debate Pielke Snr – here is some of what he says at
http://climatesci.org/2009/07/05/real-climate-permits-the-continued-presentation-of-misinformation/
“This paper supports both conclusions in my recent weblogs (see and see) that the sea level rise has flattened and that the upper ocean heat content changes have been essentially flat since 2004.”
“Real Climate has it backwards; these climate metrics are changing less than was expected a few years ago!”
Please advise of any failures of logic or data supplied by this 25+year veteran of climate science.
This post is most specific about recent changes in OHC and why RealClimate and Pals have some rather pointed questions to answer about misleading their readers on OHC.
luke says “what’s the heating pattern and profile over all oceans”; according to NOAA this is the heating pattern;
http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/index.html
Don’t have anything for the profile but this is interesting;
http://omniclimate.wordpress.com/2009/06/24/scientists-mediterranean-sea-not-warming/
SJT; you have been demoted to little will again; the O’Neil piece, if you bothered to read it, notes that a complete cycle is in geological terms but that it is happening continuously but not evenly.
This is rot; the period from 1976 to 1998 was dominated by the oceanographic effect of a decrease in the upwelling in the tropical pacific from 47 sverdrups to 35 sverdrups; when the upwelling resumed in 1998 the convergence of cold interior ocean pycnocline water towards the equator increased from 13.4 to 24.1m3s-1; as a result, indisputably, ocean temperatures cooled;
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1998/to:2010/scale:0.1/mean:10/plot/hadsst2gl/from:1998/to:2010/scale:0.1/mean:10/plot/uah/from:1998/to:2010/scale:0.1/mean:10
see also;
http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/ml/ocean/sst/anomaly.html
Prior to the resumption it is no surprise that OHC was increasing as measured in the top 700 metres and disregarding the usual modeling estimates from Hansen and other nitwits about lower depths; no heat was created just shuffling of the deckchairs on the good ship AGW. Titanic.
People in this field have a proven track record of lying. We have an alleged surge in ocean heat content just at the time when they switched over to the Argos floats. Thats not just a little bit suspicious. It entirely suspect. They have to be considered guilty of using the changeover to rig the figures until they prove themselves innocent. Therefore there is nothing to be gained by averaging any ten year period. Its misleading since it adds in the phantom-warming from the rigged-up changeover-surge and adds it into the rate of energy-gain/loss of the ocean.
We’ve just got to get to the reality of the situation. The reality of these people being compulsive liars. They’ll try and rig the data any time they think they can get away with it. The ocean heat content oscillates on a yearly basis and it surges up and down. Unsmoothed it is by no means a gentle or regular process other than its yearly oscillation. We ought to try and pinpoint that specific time period when these presumed charlatans are trying to smuggle in a whole new plateau of energy content. But in any case nothing not much good can come of going to work on tainted data.
“SJT; you have been demoted to little will again; the O’Neil piece, if you bothered to read it, notes that a complete cycle is in geological terms but that it is happening continuously but not evenly.”
You don’t quantify the time scale nor the magnitude.
Just checking out Penny’s link. Since her people were so badly beaten by the Fielding questions, they’ve had to go the whole hog and pull out fraudulent data in order to put up a plausible face to the public. Naturally one has to hold fire on the oceanic data that must be presumed to be rigged for the time being. But consider the third graph down. This is blatant fraud and may well be the second coming of the hockey stick. In fact it most certainly is. Since it has this explosive twentieth century temperature that exceeds the medieval warm period. In the real world, outside the world of fraudulent alarmist graphs, the medieval warm period was warmer then the twentieth century.
http://www.environment.gov.au/minister/wong/2009/tr20090624c.html
One wondered how Penny and her coterie were going to react to being so badly beaten. And there you have it. Resorting to science fraud. Notice how green and unfamiliar they are to the practice of using the ocean as the reference point:
“Most of warming since 1960 (about 85 percent) has happened in the oceans. Thus, in terms of a single indicator of global warming, change in ocean heat content is the most appropriate.”
What a bizzare and ludicrous statement this is. There is no use opening up an whole new field of Penny-interpretation to try and come to grips with what she could possibly mean. The oceans hold vastly more joules than the air does. At least 1000 times more. The oceans can quickly lose more joules than the air ever did. So this nonsensical 85% statement is evidence of a rush job. To rig up some presentation necessary for distracting the public.
So Penny, or her fraudulent advisors, have rigged up a presentation using one fraudulent graph and another couple of graphs wherein the veracity of the data is not yet confirmed but is probably going to have to be corrected. All in all a shabby performance meant only to stooge the laity.
What’s up with all this mathematics? The calculations are superfluous. Let us apply the technique of reductio ad absurdum, a logical process that goes like this:
– state a hypothesis to be tested
– deduce by logically valid steps the consequences of the hypothesis.
If correct reasoning leads from the hypothesis to an obviously wrong conclusion, the hypothesis must also be wrong.
So, here we go. Hang on tight.
Hypothesis:
Combustion of fossil fuels is causing dangerous climate change.
Logic:
Combustion of fossil fuels is widespread across all nations and most economic activities. Climate change will also affect all nations and most economic activities.
The only way to solve a problem that affects all nations and most economic activities is by government-led collective action.
Whoa, whoa, whoa “government-led collective action” cannot solve or even achieve anything. This conclusion is absurd.
Relax, folks, this proves that AGW cannot be happening.
Hello Nick; regarding your comments that IPCC claim 2.16 watts/sqM they certainly do quote this number but it is not appropriate to compare it with my 11.3. The 2.16 is what they calculate the direct impact of CO2 plus all other ghg and land use changes. CO2 by itself they calculate as 1.7 watts/sqM. However this is up till about 2006 not for doubling and even mkore importantly this is before the impact of the claimed positive feedbacks. To compare, my number up to about 2006 is 5.1 watts/sqM. That is different to the 2.16 because it includes the claimed positive feedbacks. The direct impact of CO2 does not equate to 3C warming by 2070. This has been pointed out many times and the answer has been that while such a claim is true the 3C comes about when one considers the action of positive feedbacks. These positive feedbacks increase the energy retained and need to be included in the calculations.
In fact, while I think the direct impact of 1.7 watts/sqM may be slightly exaggerated I don’t strongly disagree. However I believe the net climate feedback is negative not positive and that makes all the difference. If one assumes negative feedback the conflicts resolve very nicely but then the temperature rise by 2070 is nowhere near 3C.
It is also illustrative to look at the implications for time constants in the climate system. Someone suggested that I ignored heat going into the deep oceans and indeed I did not add in a factor for that. Two reasons, the first is that the government paper suggests very much that the top 700M are where the heat is going. The second reason is that the AGW movement has been suggesting that the deep oceans have a very long time constant (800 years I read) so that energy flow over 30 years should be pretty small. After all 700M is still a very significant depth and thus a very significant portion of the total ocean (not all the ocean is 5000M deep).
I did not make a big issue of time constants in this article because it would have complicated it further but it is a relevant issue.
Look at what Roger has to say about it:
“Even a causal (he means casual) view of the Levitus et al figure, which is reproduced in my weblog, shows that upper ocean heat content has been flat in their data for the last 4 years. The large rise just before than is suspicious (as I am told by colleagues working of this subject), and, moreover, is not consistent with the sea surface temperature trends for this time period (see the GISS data on the ocean surface temperature trends at http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2008/Fig2b.gif). Thus even the group that Gavin Schmidt works for (GISS) presents data with no sharp spike that is at all consistent with the Levitus et al analysis and, moreover, the GISS analysis shows that the global average sea surface temperature has been essentially flat since 2002!”
So Penny’s crowd has used one out and out fraudulent graph and others that are, as we speak, the subject of ongoing rancour and debate. What could have launched the ocean heat content onto an whole new plateau like that? All of a sudden? Out of a clear blue sky as it were? Clearly we are just looking at leftist liars, exploiting the changeover between the buoys, and nothing more.
It is true that ocean heat content didn’t reach a peak until well after 1998. Earlier data indicated that the peak came about September 2003. And so what? Only a simpleton would expect all these metrics to peak together in some sort of cosmic orgasm. Everything seems a little bit up in the air at the moment. No doubt we will be delayed in getting hold of good data while decent people are trying to overcome the efforts of the global warming fraudsters who will be trying to rig the data in this specific area. As they try to in every single other area. All the time. Without fail. This is normal. The fraud movement will charge in and try and rig the data. The others will have to walk in later and try to clean up the mess. This is the normal order of events now. We have to get used to it. Until such time as we can thin public service numbers out this will be standard and ongoing procedure in this field.
The 2.16 is what they calculate the direct impact of CO2 plus all other ghg and land use changes. CO2 by itself they calculate as 1.7 watts/sqM. However this is up till about 2006 not for doubling and even mkore importantly this is before the impact of the claimed positive feedbacks. To compare, my number up to about 2006 is 5.1 watts/sqM. That is different to the 2.16 because it includes the claimed positive feedbacks. The direct impact of CO2 does not equate to 3C warming by 2070.
nice, you factor in all positive feedbacks, as if they were instant (artificially increasing your high number). but on the other hand, you ignore the deep ocean (artificially decreasing your low number).
and from comparison of those two false numbers, you draw the conclusion, that climate science is false. interesting method.
the first is that the government paper suggests very much that the top 700M are where the heat is going.
a pretty wild claim, from a rather short answer. you can rule out, that the choice of 700 m was not just due to available data? to simplify the response?
http://www.environment.gov.au/minister/wong/2009/tr20090624c.html
The only “deep ocean” around here sod is between your ears.
The only “deep ocean” around here sod is between your ears.
the superiority of your intellectual capacities is showing in every single post you write!
while i waste time quoting stuff like the “journal of climate”
http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=14776475
you are overwhelming me, using only the pure power of your brain.
You’ve got to almost admire Penny. There she was on the ropes. Caught without answers to the Fielding questions. But she comes back with this brazen abuse of the data and pictures that look convincing supposing that the public doesn’t know they are being lied to. Fielding and his people must be stupefied at the brazenness of it.
Michael Hammer there is just no use playing around with this bogus data. You will just make-legitimate graphs that never ought to have been published. I used to argue constantly that the alarmists ought to accept oceanic heat content as the main metric. William Connelly, and pretty much all the others too would reject this outright out of pure idiocy. Now as a result of a single paper with crap figures, Penny has decided to adopt ocean heat content as her temporary guide after-all.
Lets look at your argument. You are saying that the flat earth model of watts-per-square metre implies a buildup in joules of so much. And then you say that the actual buildup, according to her own dishonest figures, is only one tenth that much. The alarmists are going to turn around and say “negative feedback” or “deep oceans” and thats their answer. So they will argue that it will just take a little bit longer to get to disaster. And that we have to ration energy as soon as possible. I don’t see that this is a productive line of argument. This is not a line of argument conducive to us getting down to the business of a massive build-up in nuclear power and synthetic diesel.
The real story is that their watts per square metre model is crap as is their data. If they have to rig up their data to sell their story what does that tell you?
Thats the real message we have to get out there. The satellite data is the only good data. And it shows no net warming since about 1980. The Gistemp and the Hadcrut and the other land-based aggregations are falsified rigups. The ocean heat content seems to have warmed up until late 2003 and now its on the slide. Thats how it stood anyway last time I ran across graphs that purported to be about joules in the ocean.
Where is the evidence for a cap-and-kill or a carbon-tax given all that? Fake data doesn’t count. People need to tell Penny that in no uncertain terms. They need to say “Penny. Fake data does not count.” What they don’t need to do is take her fake data and start putting it through the mathematical wringer.
I responded to your paper link at 9.54am and subsequent posts; you’ll note I don’t rely on models but empirically verified oceanographic effects; in short the difference between your waffle and my facts is a microcosm of the larger AGW debate; virtual reality vs reality; like little will sod, I think you deserve a fitting sobriquet befitting your reverence for the computers; my take would be one of the Mario bros but I’ll open the debate to what computer game character best fits your persona.
SOD; sorry you feel I am biased in what I include or exclude but let me assure you it is not so. You should know from personal experience that humidity and cloudiness can change radically from one day to the next and water vapour plus clouds are the two positive feedback mechanisms that the AGW advocates speak of as the strongest. So over the time scales we are discussing (30 years) these positive feedbacks are equivalent to instantaneous. By contrast the deep ocean is separated from the ocean “surface” by the thermocline so that there is very little mixing. Again it is the AGW advocates who have been saying the deep oceans exhibit a very long time constant not me and that it takes a long time for the surface energy to penetrate these ocean masses.
Coho – where are we up to – there’s so much Bird-shit on the windscreen here one can’t see.
Your OHC graph is up so WTF? (such a lonely statistic)
Decadal variation exists – get over it – so WTF?
As Barnett has shown us – temperature being sunk progressively to depth globally over 40 years – ALL ocean basins – so WTF?
And as we know robust AGW simulations have explained the obs – namely – the maximum is located at approximately 60S, in terms of the change in surface wind stress curl, the maximum is situated at approximately 48S. This change in the wind stress curl causes a spin-up of the
entire southern midlatitude ocean circulation including a southward strengthening of the subtropical gyres, particularly the East Australia Current
With all this twirling and whirling going on – who knows where the joules go.
Maybe you need … a … a …. hahahahah …a AOGCM model.
Tell me do you also have recurring dreams about seeing Bird outside your window.
http://www.ldp.org.au/images/GraemeBird_web.jpg Scary stuff and that was a PR photo. “Vote for me or I’ll kill you tax-eater”.
P.S. You’re starting to sound like a lawyer. ” fitting sobriquet befitting your reverence for the computers” – maaattteee – you’re with your mates now.
Jen have you spotted the error yet?
BTW when you correct it you will indeed find that about 85% of global warming is going into the oceans.
“BTW when you correct it you will indeed find that about 85% of global warming is going into the oceans.”
This is an ignorant statement. The oceans are continually “inhaling” and “exhaling” huge amounts of joules. And in doing so they affect the temperature in the troposphere. You people are talking as if you are describing the buildup of cement or something. This is a dynamic situation we are talking about here. You dummies are trying to fit a square peg in a round hole. Bear in mind that Penny is using fraudulent data. Thats not to be forgotten so soon.
You cannot disaggregate the oceans and the air in order to fit the alarmist flat earth model into the picture. It is a particularly ignorant statement given that we are cooling. Is 85% of the cooling going to the oceans? The statement itself is nonsensical. And you would not be talking this way if Penny’s henchmen hadn’t suddenly taken up this bogus way of describing things.
Without reading the posts here, Wong’s tack is transparent – as atmospheric heating has not been observed, she now, on the advice of here scientific advisors, shifts the expected evidence from AIR, to SEA, and proposes that the increased temperature will be observed shortly, once we gather the data.
Horsehocks!
It’s pseudoscience.
Also called goal post shifting.
Now, let’s wait for Wongknight Sir Luke, and WongKnight SJT to deliberate
Luke, you are taking the piss here ain’t you?
(I rather enjoyed the Monty Python production of “The Life of Brian”, especially the reaction by Pwontious Pwilate that one his Centwuions were mocking him).
Yes Marcus – most of the time. We’re actually a troupe from La Boite.
So, Wuke,
You admit ewwor?
Michael,
The Hansen arithmetic goes like this. They cite (in 2005) 1.8 W/m2 as the AGW forcer. Incidentally, the AR4 figure was 1.6 (the 2.16 I think comes from tricky punctuation in my post). H et al then say that a temp rise of 0.6C would be a response to about 1 W/m2. That uses the climate sensitivity, which includes positive feedback. They then say that the remaining 0.85 W/m2 is an imbalance – heat that isn’t causing an air temperature rise at the moment. They reason that most of this is going into the sea. With the aid of modelling, they calculate an ocean heating of 0.6 W/m2. It isn’t quite clear to me, but I think that includes sub-700m. As you say, the time constant for the whole ocean is long, but that doesn’t mean that there can’t be a significant amount of heat crossing the 700 m level. It just means that it will go on for a long time. Actually, the relevant time constant there is that for the top 700 m.
So as I say, 0.85 in, 0.6 accounted for. Given the errors, I think that is pretty close, but there are heat sinks like melting ice as well.
Incidentally Hansen was criticised for describing the 0.85 as heat “in the pipeline”, and indeed that is misleading. The heat isn’t in any pipeline. What he means is that it’s a transient effect, which will diminish as the ocean approaches equilibrium. Then the temperature will have to come into equilibrium with the full 1.8 W/m2 (or 1.6 for AR4).
Nick Stokes,
well put but the physics is trickier than your summation – based as it is on the behaviour of objects in vacuo in receipt of sources ….Armchair scientologist?
“They then say that the remaining 0.85 W/m2 is an imbalance – heat that isn’t causing an air temperature rise at the moment. They reason that most of this is going into the sea. With the aid of modelling, they calculate an ocean heating of 0.6 W/m2. It isn’t quite clear to me, but I think that includes sub-700m. ”
This is an whole string of bad inferences. People don’t seem to know when to circle back over first principles. The flow of joules isn’t anything like this. Its a more down-up movement of joules. The very same joules that warm the oceans when they are punched in their by the sun are those same joules that warm the air as they make their way back out to space.
They ought not keep building on the flat earth model of watts-per-square metre. Its like those bad static-equilibrium models in economics. A total denial of the way the world works. Their model is based on an otherworldly planet. One that is flat, twice as far from earth, without convection or overturning. In this make-believe world its always noon.
This is all ridiculous. A stupid model and faked-up data, and continual bad logical inferences built upon this bad model and faked up data.
Nick I was waiting for this issue to come up. Some AGW supporters allow for positive feedbacks not by increasing the energy retained but by changing the climate sensitivity to fewer watts per C. Such an approach is completely incorrect in this situation as I am 100% certain you already know.
The climate sensitivity measured in watts per C is determined by the rate of change of energy loss from the Earth with temperature and has nothing whatever to do with positive feedbacks. Positive feedback acts to amplify the energy retained. Since we want to know the amount of energy retained we have to allow for postivie feedback effects explicitly. As I said Nick, I had expected this argument to be raised at some stage but I did not think you would be the one to raise it. I know you know better, please be honest.
If the oceans are a heat sink, their temperatures have to increase.
Cēterīs paribus, this would lead to thermal expansion and a rise in sea level. A June 2009 paper showing no rise in sea level over the past 3 years of improved instrumentation is at – http://www.ocean-sci.net/5/193/2009/os-5-193-2009.pdf . If there is a perceived rise, it is within the error bounds of the best measurements possible to date. At the upper bounds of errors, the highest rise the authors consider possible is 1 mm per year. They find NO change since year 2005.
In theory, it is possible that an ocean can act as a heat sink with no change in mean sea level. For this to happen, those parts of the ocean that are warming are offset by some mechanism that cools alternative parts of the oceans. No such mechanism appears to exist in the recent literature.
The simple explanation is that MSL in not changing; that the overall temperature of the oceans is not changing; and that the oceans are not acting as a heat sink unless complex dynamics remain to be quantified.
End of story, end of argument.
To further elaborate on my previous comment. The relationship between change in temperature and change in energy radiated can be calculated from the first derivative of stefans law if one knows the effective radiation temperature. In this case I used the often mentioned effective radiation temperature of 255K.
stefan law states energy = 5.67e-8*T^4 so the first derivaative is 4*56.7e-8*T^3
At 255K this gives 3.76 watts/sqM/C. This is often expressed in reciprocal form as 0.266 C/watt/sqM. to put this in perspective i found the following able of values onthe net
Romanathan(1988) cited in IPCC(2001)
Don’t know what happened it suddenly decided to post for no good reason. To continue (read this and the post above together
Romanathan(1988) cited in IPCC(2001) 0.24 K//M^2
Soden and Held (2006) 0.25
Hansen et al (1984) 0.26
Bony et al(2006) 0.263
Colman (2003) 0.3
Kiehl (1992) 0.305
Bony et al (2006) cited in IPCC(2007) 0.31
If I average all these (for whatever that means) I get 0.238 which for a 3C rise equates to 3/.238 watts/sqM or 12.6 watts/sqM. My number of 0.266 gives the somewhat lower value of 11.3 watts/sqM. If you all perfer I could use 12.6 but it would make the problem worse.
luke; it’s old but it still applies to Barnett;
http://www.john-daly.com/mobydick/oceans.htm
MH’s comment about climate sensitivity and +ve feedbacks sums up the rubbish being dished out here by those defending Wong; in respect of CS Lindzen’s new paper is due shortly; this continues his observations about OLR variations misunderstood and misrepresented by Chris Colose. The increased OLR puts paid for any necessity to expand the ocean sink. Adjustments to OLR show that the CS to increased CO2 is zilch. So to with water; AGW cannot accept that water is anything but a +ve feedback; it’s not as the Kump and Pollard paper shows, let alone Spencer’s work; but Nick knows this as well.
Opps make that average 0.276 not 0.238 can’t read a calculator
The irony is so thick you could cut it with a knife. If you look at the time scale John Daly refers to satellite sea level data, he falls for exactly the same error the denialists are falling for now, from Pielke to Watts and probably soon to arrive here.
Daly cherry picked a short time scale, that matched an initial peak to an end point low, and complete missed the trend. What’s that saying about those who don’t learn from history being doomed to repeat it?
http://sealevel.colorado.edu/
little will, the whole import of Wong, Steffen and accompanying detritus associated with this charade is that OHC, sea level and any other parameter they can pluck from the air is getting worse, indicating AGW acerbation is increasing; but clearly OHC is not and neither is sea level steric or otherwise; that is the point of the time-scale; it is the time-scale nominated by AGW’s spokespersons as demonstrating the acceleration of trend. The whole notion of the deep ocean sink being the repository of this damn heat is grotesque for reasons I have explained elsewhere on this thread; but what the hell, its Davy Jones Locker; anything can happen there in the Never Never Land of AGW.
Coho – you’re shocking. Folland et al show the basic stats of Daly’s feather duster rebuttal to be a yawn. PDO again. Sure ! The analysis is of a centennial trend ALL OCEAN BASINS. Barnett simply repeats a segment with much more detail for ALL ocean basins.
As for water vapour you’re pitching a small piece of work localised versus the wider impact of Pinatubo. And you have Philipona’s water vapour feedback in Europe although RC cautions the interpretation.
It will be the day when you give a fair and honest account of BOTH sides.
The problem for you here is that since 1850s you would have cried wolf at least 3-4 times – AND BEEN WRONG ! Temperature increased. Sea level increased.
You’re wiggle watching. Time will tell.
As I said Nick, I had expected this argument to be raised at some stage but I did not think you would be the one to raise it. I know you know better, please be honest.
Sorry, Michael, I’m mystified. What dishonest argument am I raising? I’ve described how H et al are doing their calculations. Are you objecting to my claim that climate sensitivity includes positive feedback? I thought that was well known – indeed, sceptics often argue that since there isn’t positive feedback (they say) CS is low.
Luke, stop with the “my cherry picking is better than yours! Saying: “The problem for you here is that since 1850s you would have cried wolf at least 3-4 times – AND BEEN WRONG ! Temperature increased. Sea level increased.
You’re wiggle watching. Time will tell.” Add’s nothing to the discussion, but is just even another short term look at climate.
Let me ask again this question: If the GMST went up the whole 5C predic…oops projected, where on the planet would we exceed the Honolulu average temp? Is that bad. And, stop with the enumerated list of coulda happen, or at the least show us where they are related to average temp.
Mr. Hammer, thanks for the forum that the AGW-comedy-Team seem to enjoy. I’m still waiting for that meaningful discussion from them of your point(s).
Silly point CoRev – even small differences in water temperatures cause the world’s current climate to shift. The ol’ but we experience more weather temperature variation each day is really moronic. You obviously haven’t passed grade one. GMST is a single broad index – far from the end game.
Read http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2007/2007JD008411.shtml seriously and properly. Then we can have a sensible discussion.
Luke stops the diversion and answer the simple question. It’s you and Team-AGW that claim the catastrophic consequences of this temp change.
I will read the reference after you have answered that simple question. It is obvious to the most casual thinker that a warming climate is more sanguine to humankind than a cooling one.
No you read CoRev – you’ve had too much investment in answering your silly questions which simply try to corral the debate on minutia. Your basic understanding of even what is being said is pathetic. Otherwise stay ignorant. Doesn’t worry me. You will simply retort in a never-ending cascade of dissatisfaction to any answer on whatever the question is really.
Indeed a partial answer is that poleward expansion of the tropics with many unfortunate consequences has perhaps already begun. I’ve told you before.
“Such areas include heavily populated regions of southern Australia, southern Africa, the southern Europe-Mediterranean-Middle East region, the south-western United States, northern Mexico, and southern South America – all of which are predicted to experience severe drying.
“If the dry subtropics expand into these regions, the consequences could be devastating for water resources, natural ecosystems and agriculture, with potentially cascading environmental, social and health implications.”
http://www.jcu.edu.au/top/JCUPRD_049036.html
http://www.jcu.edu.au/idc/groups/public/documents/media_release/jcuprd_048832.pdf
‘Luke’,
People are tired of never-ending, never-accurte prophecies of doom from the AGW community.
And frankly your snarky, rude and boorish behavior only underscores that your ensemble really does not have the facts your side. You all simply engage in the low-class lawyer trick of arguing louder when neither facts or law is on your side.
AGW true belivers consistently use the non-falsifiable rationalizations that any weather event that may support the predictions of global apocalypse are proof of cliamte change, and any weather that does not is ismply weather.
AGW has not passed the smell test as science. You have already lost.
AGW may pass on to be social policy, which has beeen the only actual goal the entire time. And those policies will fail, at great cost.
The lack of integrity you have demonstrated in your ensemble is a perfect example of the decpetion involved at every step of AGW. Arogant, angry, deceptive, misleading and ultimately wrong.
Yea yea – you’re so utterly tediously boring – the sort of boredom that could get you a role in Saw XII chewing your own arm off. YAWN. How come you never read anything apart from blog slops anyway?
Was there a point in you drivelly comment – ah yes – mmmm devastating too. I’m stumped.
ooooo Huntsy – you’re such an intellectual beast. You stud. So dominating.
Weather id not climate. Well duh? I neva nue dat? Is dat so? Well gee – holy cow. I give in then. Who wud have taught dat.
But I reckon there will be a global apocalypse very soon – a major earthquake – when all the wankers like you get in sync there’s bound to be a major harmonic. It’s coming.
Are you actually paid Hunter to write the same 2-3 scripts on cue. How much do they pay you to be a denialist shill anyway. Probably not much or we’d have some more variety or at least intelligent comments. zzzzzzzzz
Luke said, “If the dry subtropics expand into these regions, the consequences could be devastating for water resources, natural ecosystems and agriculture, with potentially cascading environmental, social and health implications.” The operative terms are “IF” and “DRY.” If they are not DRY then the expansion of the subtropics becomes a very good thing.
What amazes me is that there are always winners and losers in these weather and climate events. A longer and more moderate climate in the expands the NH growing areas. In my areas there are two growing seasons, early small grains and then short season beans. They are effected by rain, seldom temps unless cold.
Pray you are correct re: the warming continuing, Luke, because the alternative is going to be devastating to mankind’s food supply.
BTW, questions are never silly, unless one can not answer them. Since you made a half hearted attempt, I will read your reference, and then like Coho, pick apart its logic.
CoRev,
The zero-sum fallacy is just one of the many AGW extremists use to sell their policy demands.
At the end of the day, the AGW true believers are simply tedious and boring.
People have awakened to the untenable faith that is AGW, and frankly debating the true believers is no longer productive. AGW fear mongering has reached saturation levels, and it is losing ground for all of its believer’s efforts. Minds are being made up irt AGW, and the fear mongering extremists are losing. Expending efforts on those who have not been hoodwinked by the AGW marketing campaign is far more productive. If the catastrophe that is US cap-n-trade and the Australian ETS can be derailed, and Copenhagen made meaningless, the social meme of AGW continue to blow itself apart. and then maybe climate science can become a science, instead of a tool used by a deranged social movement. And people of goodwill can work to actually clean up the environment in sustainable ways, and build a rational energy future. AGW offers nothing in those areas.
CoRev – the only reason the term IF is used is the usual scientific caution. In fact if you do some reading that is precisely what appears to be happening – as a TREND !
you don’t think in systems. Denialists only ever think in one dimension. Warming doesn’t have to just warm. Warming will change circulation systems. Patterns of rainfall, storm tracks etc. Perhaps winners and losers.
If you’d like the MWP as a dry run for AGW (ho ho ho) you have mega-droughts in SW USA, China and Africa.
You already know that a small change in SST produces quasi-climatic phenomena like El Nino and the AMO. These oscillations can bring droughts to some parts of the world and floods to others. Only a small change in temperature from the current mean.
Why are you guys disingenuous ” I will read your reference, and then like Coho, pick apart its logic.” – so much for an open mind. But like Coho – don’t flatter yourselves – whiny nitpicking is usually what we get back.
And indeed CoRev – an AGW sceptic should be very concerned how natural variation itself interacts – i.e. how does El Nino, NAO, IOD, AMO and the PDO all interact. On your own logic and that of Cohenite’s – natural variation should throw up some very bad combinations and bad sequences of years back to back. And has if you look at the paleo.
WHY do you never report these issues ?
Dear sulking Hunter – you really do have yourself on.
The global climate doesn’t give a rats arse what you think actually. It doesn’t care about minds being made up. It’s simply gonna resolve it’s physics.
Indeed politically you are very likely to get what you wish for – the Aussie ETS defeated and Copenhagen not to get anywhere.
As for people of “goodwill” – don’t pretend you have a monopoly on goodwill. AGW blog http://bravenewclimate.com/ has been posting positive new energy articles for months including “new nuclear”.
And for CoRev and Coho – and on the theme of ocean heat – the latest implication of El Nino Modoki mode – if Modoki a derivative of a warming Pacific and reducing Walker Circulation. And gee willies – CoRev – only a few degrees and look what ya get !! Such a weensy change in temperature. Teensy weensy …
So has AGW turned up Modoki mode?
Science 3 July 2009:
Vol. 325. no. 5936, pp. 77 – 80
DOI: 10.1126/science.1174062
Impact of Shifting Patterns of Pacific Ocean Warming on North Atlantic Tropical Cyclones
Hye-Mi Kim, Peter J. Webster,,* Judith A. Curry
Two distinctly different forms of tropical Pacific Ocean warming are shown to have substantially different impacts on the frequency and tracks of North Atlantic tropical cyclones. The eastern Pacific warming (EPW) is identical to that of the conventional El Niño, whereas the central Pacific warming (CPW) has maximum temperature anomalies located near the dateline. In contrast to EPW events, CPW episodes are associated with a greater-than-average frequency and increasing landfall potential along the Gulf of Mexico coast and Central America. Differences are shown to be associated with the modulation of vertical wind shear in the main development region forced by differential teleconnection patterns emanating from the Pacific. The CPW is more predictable than the EPW, potentially increasing the predictability of cyclones on seasonal time scales.
And this follows from an unprecedented 50 years of warming
Nature Geoscience 2, 46 – 50 (2009)
Published online: 21 December 2008 | doi:10.1038/ngeo390
Unprecedented recent warming of surface temperatures in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean
Jessica L. Conroy1, Alejandra Restrepo2, Jonathan T. Overpeck1,3,4, Miriam Steinitz-Kannan5, Julia E. Cole1,4, Mark B. Bush2 & Paul A. Colinvaux6
Through its intimate connection with the El Niño/Southern Oscillation system, climate variability in the tropical Pacific Ocean influences climate across much of the planet. But the history of temperature change in the tropical Pacific Ocean during recent millennia is poorly known: the available annually resolved records1, 2 are discontinuous and rarely span more than a few centuries. Longer records at coarser temporal resolution suggest that significant oceanographic changes, observed at multi-year to multi-century resolution, have had important effects on global climate3, 4, 5. Here we use a diatom record from El Junco Lake, Galápagos, to produce a calibrated, continuous record of sea surface temperature in the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean at subdecadal resolution, spanning the past 1,200 years. Our reconstruction reveals that the most recent 50 years are the warmest 50-year period within the record. Because our diatom-based sea surface temperature index resembles Northern Hemisphere temperature reconstructions, we suggest that with continued anthropogenic warming, the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean may continue to warm.
Try to keep up Coho !
Any forecasts for Austral spring – El Nino ? IOD? hahahahahahaha
OK, Luke, I have read your references.
Secondly, the article on the “arid” tropic zones is really not too frightening. It supports what I said earlier that expansion of the tropics and therefore, the moderate zones is probably a good thing. Expansion of the US S/W arid zone is also expected, because it has been ongoing for centuries. It is already desert or mostly a desert. Much of our anthropological/archeological findings are done there because it is desert.
As to the logic of the first paper. I read the abstract and chose to go no further. Findings one two (and even maybe a third, IIRC) were all model based. Please, please do not use model based papers to prove a point to a skeptic. Even this old fart has done some computer modeling and know their strengths and weaknesses. If the model findings were backed up in the abstract with references to empirical evidence, then maybe it would have been worth reading further. They were not, so I did not.
My first impression is that you are grasping at straws, any new reference, as it is presented. The same thing you claim we skeptics are doing.
It shoudl be obvious why I keep harping on the average tmep in cities around the world. Two degrees centigrade is actually nothing when you look at averages. Your reference to the various sea current states is, ho hum. No one I know of denies that they occur, and there are surely even more still to be defined. But, discovering them adds to our knowledge, but PROVES NOTHING regarding creation of catastrophic climate/weather events. You are reaching.
Roger pretty scathing of this new study.
http://climatesci.org/2009/05/18/comments-on-a-new-paper-global-ocean-heat-content-1955%e2%80%932008-in-light-of-recently-revealed-instrumentation-problems-by-levitus-et-al-2009/
Yet this hasn’t stopped Penny from reaching out and grasping it.
“We provide estimates of the warming of the world ocean for 1955–2008 based on historical data not previously available, additional modern data, correcting for instrumental biases of bathythermograph data, and correcting or excluding some Argo float data. The strong interdecadal variability of global ocean heat content reported previously by us is reduced in magnitude but the linear trend in ocean heat content remain similar to our earlier estimate.”
We’d want to know the justification for all these exclusions and “corrections”. Because to me it looks like they’ve ethnically cleansed out the dance between the oceans and the sun that the earlier graphs implied. They’ve tried to make it look like a straight-line improvement in warmth. Rather than the gigantic mega-joules see-saw we took from earlier data.
You see now it looks like a story with a narrative that describes the advance caused by the ceaseless March of CO2-warming. But prior the heat content would swing upwards and then plunge. The oceans quickly losing far more joules than the atmosphere ever held. But this has all been smoothed out somehow. The plunge in imbedded joules in the face of rising CO2 was too much for this crowd. So one suspects that a good way to get something published, if not a grant, would be to find some semi-plausible excuse to eliminate some of this soaring and swinging action.
But as surprising as the soaring and plunging imbedded joules were when we first saw the earlier (and probably superior) data it all made perfect sense. Since the oscillations of the ocean systems have some momentum to them. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation and the North Atlantic decadal Oscillation flipping from one phase to the other. And its maybe more of a 30 year deal. Which puts it out of sync with the 10.7 year solar cycle, hence quite a complicated dance going on. The whole thing arbitrated by Stefan Boltzmanns law. This new smoothed arrangement therefore makes no sense to me. And I therefore pronounce it lies until proved otherwise in the most transparent fashion. We ought not be using this graph at all. We ought to be using earlier reconstructions.
I had a simplified model going where I imagined that the Gulfstream was a proxy for the entirety of oceanic behaviour. Which of course it isn’t. But I was trying to explain to myself how these soaring and plunging energy levels could be explained. One doesn’t want to confuse ones small models with the reality. But I thought I’d figured out the following inferences using this simplified model. What I was trying to do is get some smart researcher to pick up on this way of thinking and team up with some expert on ocean currents and other oceanic behaviour like cold-water upwelling. This sort of thing. Skip over it since the details are not important:
((((1. The “Gulf Stream” is faster-then-average AND decelerating……………. then the ocean WILL BE GROWING IN HEAT whenever the irradiance is above average AND SOMEWHAT BELOW AVERAGE AS WELL.
This is the clearest time when the ocean will absorb-most-readily the suns energy.
When the Gulf stream is very-fast-but-decelerating. The deceleration says that the heat differentials aren’t particularly strong………… yet the differential with the new energy coming in from the sun……. will be distributed very quickly and efficiently.
And so Stefans-Boltzmanns law says that the oceans will retain an unusual amount of the suns energy under those circumstances.
2. When the “Gulf Stream” flow is slower-then-average and ACCELERATING then under all but the strongest solar-flux-conditions…………….. the oceans will be losing heat energy.
So under ALL levels of solar flux, up to average and somewhat beyond average… under the above conditions the oceans will lose energy.
This is because the ocean will not redistribute the energy from the sun very well and so Stefans-Boltzmanns law dictates that this means that much energy will be radiated into space.
And the fact that the “Gulf Stream” is ACCELERATING means that on-the-instant the heat differentials are very strong and so the oceans will lose a great deal of heat.
So we have a few TENDENCIES here for the researcher to track.
1. ACCELERATION (associated with the oceans LOSING energy)
2. A HIGH-VOLUME-”GULF-STREAM” (assiciated with the oceans GAINING energy)
3. HIGH-SOLAR-IRRADIANCE (WITH AN EXTRA WEIGHTING FOR FORBUSH EVENTS)………….
(associated with the oceans GAINING energy)
Now I could number these generalisations up to 6…. But its just the vice-versa of the above three….))))))))))
The important point was that to get beneath the mystery of how the oceans readily inhale and exhale so many joules and the troposphere keeps reasonably stable while all these joules are passing both ways through it…… Well you had to think about the rythym of the oceans, how the extra solar energy would affect this rythym, and what that would do to the joules once stefan-boltzmanns law was taken into account.
Let me give you an example. Supposing you are pushing your niece on the swing. If you push in the right way at the right time this is akin to the extra solar energy adding to the “gulf streams (the gulf stream as proxy for all ocean behaviour) momentum. And your niece will swing nice and high. Which is akin to the oceans being in a position to distribute heat very well, and therefore being able to retain and absorb a lot of joules vis a vis stefan-boltzmanns law.
But supposing you ineptly push just at the wrong time? So the force neutralises the swinging action. This is a bit analogous to a Forbush event punching joules in the ocean all at once and perhaps against the oceans rythym. So the water cannot retain all that energy. Its quickly released to the air step-fashion and we get that extra hot weather for awhile.
Another factor is the viscosity of water. Suggesting cycles since the colder water having higher viscosity will impede the “gulf-stream” even if the heat differentials are higher than otherwise. Upwelling of cold water will retain more joules in the ocean yet mean colder drier weather where this upwelling affects climate.
Anyway all this appears to be nixed by this ethnically-cleansed new version of oceanic energy. The swinging action so airbrushed out of arrangements that Michael was able to draw a red line gradient through it. So until someone can come up with the best you-beaut justification for these guys tampering with the data, then it ought to be simply dismissed for the time being.
Good post Birdie; the Pielke link puts the cleaner through the Hansen “deep ocean” paper which Nick and sod mario brother were harping on about.
luke; the Kim et al and the Cole et al papers are interesting and I’ll try and have a look at the originals; but the Cole claim that their Galapagos data is somehow unique is not true; CO2 Science’s MWP map has some links to work there; still there is no doubt the tropical Pacific is where the action is. BTW the paper is in review; it is plain that 20thC temperature is not a linear trend and a structural break approach [ie a step-up] is statistically verified.
“little will, the whole import of Wong, Steffen and accompanying detritus associated with this charade is that OHC, sea level and any other parameter they can pluck from the air is getting worse, indicating AGW acerbation is increasing………………”
You ignored the point. Daly was claiming back then exactly what Pielke and Watts are claiming now. When you look at his own source, the sea level had not stopped rising, as he claimed, he was just indulging in ‘wiggle watching’.
Well, you got me there little will, I’m a wiggle watcher: I’m watching you and sod and the rest of the AGW crowd; wiggles to a man and woman.
John Ray on his Greenie Watch picked up on a AGW blog yesterday which noted that climate sceptics seem to be politically conservative and Christians, while climate alarmists generally progressive or left leaning politically.
“Wow. These guys are scholars. Aren’t they supposed to read stuff? At least have a stab at a theory. Back in May, Professor Geoffrey Heal, professor of finance and economics at Columbia Business School, told an audience at the London School of Economics and Political Science, the following”
“It is mainly politicians on the right, who champion the efficiency of free markets, that have tended to dispute both the science and economics of climate change. They have a problem because they believe that governments should not intervene in markets. But environmental problems, such as climate change, cannot be tackled without governments acting. In addition, there are many on the right in the United States who are hostile to science because of their beliefs, whether it is evolution or climate change.””
This coming from a lefty merely confirms, as Michael Hammer has here by pointing to a large amount of missing heat, that it’s a political agenda literally misusing science as it’s smokescreen.
As for the missing heat in the oceans, this idea is no different to the missing species argument hiding in geological lacunae – both evolution and AGW were generated by the same mindset or philosophical approach – hence the clear partitioning in the debate over AGW along political lines. The problem is that you cannot falsify such assertions – we can’t disprove that missing species are not in the geological lacunae, for example. It’s simply pseudoscience in which “truths” are established by debate and not by the scientific method.
So it was never about the science in the first place, and it’s nice to get further confirmation of this from an Australian AGW supporter.
http://blogs.news.com.au/couriermail/greenblog/index.php/couriermail/comments/denialists_hiding_behind_ideology/
Alarmists, the issue is still settled by the simple expedient of looking at sea level.
IF there is warming below 700m there WILL be expansion and sea level rise unless it is balanced by water loss to glaciers and/or temp decrease in the upper 700m. As you claim neither…
Where is it???
Sorry, the oceans are losing heat and contracting. This may be short term, BUT, it makes a mockery of the fools saying that the missing heat is in the oceans and the atmospheric cooling is just masking the REAL warming of the oceans.
Nick,
exactly how does ice melting enter into ocean temps??? The arctic has melted more than our short period NORMAL. The Antarctic has increased in the same period. Nice approximate balance held.
Glaciers melt above the sea. By the time the run off reaches the sea my GUESS is that it is fairly neutral to the sea energy balance. Sea LEVEL should go up if there is excess glacier melt. If it isn’t going up, yet there are still claims of net glacial loss, what does that say about the energy in the ocean???
To balance excess glacial melt the energy in the ocean must be going DOWN!!!!!!
Could you please explain how sea level can stay constant or decreasing with excess glacial melt AND a constant or rising energy???
Are you saying that we have net glacial growth?!?!?!?!
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
“Well, you got me there little will, I’m a wiggle watcher: I’m watching you and sod and the rest of the AGW crowd; wiggles to a man and woman.”
I’ll take that as an acknowledgement they are making the same mistake now that Daly made eight years ago.
Well its becoming patently obvious to the public that the air temp is not getting any warmer so we’ll have to hide the “heat” in the oceans. Just keep the fear up. Keep the suckers up at Lukesville believing . Next they’ll be telling us that the oceans are a closed system( with maybe even a greenhouse effect going on in them.) Just like the atmosphere, all yea gullible faithful.
CoRev – so predictable – I knew you’d think that way and there is much more in there than modelling. In any case CoREv I honestly don’t know how sceptics could make sense of anything without some modelling – too many interactions to isolate otherwise. How do you do it? Oh that’s right I forgot – look for spurious correlations not supported by physical mechanisms. Anyway – ho hum. Your loss not to read.
And your loss to underestimate and widening of the drying zone. Try looking at a globe.
Frankly CoRev I think we have little to discuss – your average concepts are like – bizarre?!?
For those who wonder where’s the expansion of sea levels, here it goes:
http://sealevel.colorado.edu/current/sl_ib_ns_global.jpg
If you see a decrease of sea levels, you should really consider turning your screen upside down.
Or remove the mirror you’re using to look at the screen.
Well, I’m still waiting for sod or Nick to explain the discrepancy between Hansen 2005 and Levitus 2009 as outlined here;
http://climatesci.org/2009/05/18/comments-on-a-new-paper-global-ocean-heat-content-1955%e2%80%932008-in-light-of-recently-revealed-instrumentation-problems-by-levitus-et-al-2009/
Luke: “Your average concepts are like – bizarre?!?”
That phrase is even more bizarre! Is average in this case an adjective, and then qualifying concepts is patently bizarre, or is it a noun, and then it’s cohenite’s understanding of a statistical average conceptually problematical.
Luke’s statement falls into the class of comment labelled as “well, you know what I mean” stuff I had to put up with from undergrads when I was doing post-grad – sad to see English skills have deteriorated even more.
“I’ll take that as an acknowledgement they are making the same mistake now that Daly made eight years ago.”
John Daly was aware that sea levels are not rising by measureable amounts as evidenced by this 168 year old MSL mark.
Does anyone know of any coastal community that has ever raised its MSL data point [the basis of all town planning on coastlines]?
http://www.john-daly.com/
I don’t think they have done it in Kent in the last 2,000 years.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1066712/Uncovered-lost-beach-Romans-got-toehold-Britain.html
It is interesting, a few hours after this article was posted, SOD asked why a skeptic working in the field did not notice such a massive difference. Nick agreeing with SOD called it a discrepancy in such a central area.
Well I agree with both SOD and Nick, the difference is massive and is in a central area. In fact I would argue that such a massive difference in such a central area does not just speak against the AGW hypothesis, it completly falsifies it.
Jennifer commented that I like to work things out myslef from first principles and she is 100% correct in that comment. Why would I do that. For two reasons, firstly becuase it helps me understand the material and secondly becuase it is truly surprising how often it leads to interesting outcomes. Quite a few of my patents have come about through “working things out for myslef”.
Yet others have commented that I display ignorance of the subject. They are entitled to their oipinion but my response is that if the analysis is based on ignorance then it should be easy to point out the error, please do so.
The reality is that there are now 80+ comments on this thread and not one of them has pointed out a significant error in the analysis or a reason why it is invalid. Please don’t reply with a vague statement along the lines of “of course its invalid just look at this web posting”. Don’t refer to some other authority which when I look it up says nothing of the sort. Explain to me in your own words where my error is. If you can’t then I think you should maybe consider the alternative notably that the hypothesis of AGW at a dangerous level is simply wrong.
Since the posting I have been informed that the article is not original in that others more learned than I have already written articles pointing out the same thing. People like Roger Pielke senior. I checked that and it is perfectly true he and others have commented on the same subject and their conclusions are the same as mine. That I guess is one of the dangers of “working it out for yourself” however such an outcome does no harm (unless of course you try to patent some aspect of your deliberations). Indeed in this case it strengthens the outcome.
So I repeat, if you cannot explain my error please consider that the GW hypothesis may be falsified.
Luke, thanks for the the at least less rabid responses.
Anyway, the question was not a trick question. I predicted the discussion would digress into enumerated list of climate/weather events. As it did. Expanding dry region(s), indeed. Has been happening for many K years.
So the goal of the discussion/question was to lead to the final question: What SINGLE measurement (or if you wish set of measurements) can be used to determine the efficacy the proposed solutions to AGW? Beware of the measurement set solution, their proofs may get even more tricky than the everyday discussions here.
I believe there are a handful of bottom lines in this climate science debate. I’m trying to get to a reasonable and rational discussion of those bottom line issues without the snark. First bottom line: GMST and how it is used to create fear and its value as a measurement of progress. My bizarro concept: if the increase in GMST is 1, 2, 5, or even 10C is there evidence that temp/climate is bad for ….. Answer: Nope! Is it a reliable measurement for tracking impacts? Answer: Nope!
Since this kind of discussion is bizarre to you, with what would replace it?
Well CoRev – start by just pondering what natural climate variation – semi-annual, quasi-decadal, and inter-decadal variation we have at the moment. What effects occur. What are the causes, manifestations, symptoms.
A scenario more fearful than impending global warming is global warming already here,hidden in the ocean, and impending.
Cunning looneys aren’t they. This will still keep working on the useful idiots,and Wong knows it.
“So I repeat, if you cannot explain my error please consider that the GW hypothesis may be falsified”
What, again?
Luke, out of curiosity, why did you limit the research to NATURAL climate variation.
In the area of “bottom line” points. I consider them conclusions that may be drawn, so are you saying none exist, by your expansion of the discussion back to the general (albeit limited to natural causes) subject of climate?
Anyway, thanks again for lowering the invective.
Michael I am a bit confused about something. Are you confusing the radiative forcing (3.8 w/m2) with radiative imbalance?
I’m no expert on this, but I’ve been following Roger Pielke’s blog, and there’s a link to giss.
http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2005/2005_Hansen_etal_1.pdf.
Pielke extracted the following quotation from that:
“Our climate model, driven mainly by increasing human-made greenhouse gases and aerosols among other forcings, calculates that Earth is now absorbing 0.85±0.15 W/m2 more energy from the Sun than it is emitting to space. This imbalance is confirmed by precise measurements of increasing ocean heat content over the past 10 years.”
So they are saying 0.85 W/m2 more energy is absorbed, not 3.8 W/m2. Pielke agrees with this. Can you explain my misunderstanding please?
It is, indeed, amazing how the government department known as “Luke” and clods such as Sod, are more concerned with living in the model, rather than living in the real world.
In the real world, temperatures are declining.
In the model world of 2005, temperatures escalated signficantly and more or less constantly. In the fully revised and improved model world of 2009, temperatures can decrease for a few years: it just makes the ultimate, apocaleptic inferno so much more sudden and heart-rending.
Oh, woe betide the faithful, Luke!
CoRev – a probably hopeless attempt at communication – trying too see what you actually believe. Removing AGW just a simplification I would thought you’d agree with.
Well TheWord – must be fun interpreting the climate system without a model.
Sentences like this are simply dogshit “ultimate, apocaleptic inferno so much more sudden and heart-rending.” – means what – simply verballing by some little prick who needs a good smack in the mouth.
and more or less constantly.
if you had looked at a model output, once in your life time, you would know that this is utterly FALSE!
http://www.environment.gov.au/minister/wong/2009/images/fig3.gif
Thanks for the answer, Luke. Simplification is a good thing. We’ve already discussed my beliefs. You know how to get in touch with me if you need clarification or have them repeated.
MH, good time to challenge the mob. There will be no answer here. Taking it to RC would get you answers, all wrong, and not worth the invective received. The wagons are circled and the defenses are prickly, but weak for Team-AGW.
Well I agree with both SOD and Nick, the difference is massive and is in a central area. In fact I would argue that such a massive difference in such a central area does not just speak against the AGW hypothesis, it completly falsifies it.
Michael, is this an attempt to show, that you know even LESS about science, than about the climate?
demonstrating anything on a blog, falsifies, contradicting a statement by Wong, falsifies nothing.
what you are saying is: the guys in the bar couldn t contradict me, so i have falsified the theory of relativity.
—————–
you have been told multiple times now, that the forcing that you calculated is too high. you can NOT take the full feedback 3°C and use it to calculate current CO2 forcings. your calculation is based on the assumption that those feedbacks are instant and linear. both those assumptions are false.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_sensitivity
what you are saying is: because the motor of my car will break down over the next 500000 km, it should have broke down over the last 5000 km.
Vinny; radiative forcing and radiative imbalance are indeed two different things. CO2 rises which supposedly increases the radiative forcing. Since the temperature does not respond instantly this increased energy all represents radiative imbalance which goes to heating the Earth. As the Earth heats, the energy radiated to space increases thus reducing the radiative imbalance. Once equlibrium is reached again the increased radiation to space will match the radiative forcing reducing the imbalance to zero so the temperature is now stable at a new value. This is just re-stating what you claim in a more long winded form.
In this case we are neither at the point where there has been no temperature response nor are we at a new equilibrium so one needs to calculate both the increase in radiative forcing and the increase in energy radiation to space. The difference is the radiative imbalance which goes to heating the planet.
In th article I calculated the radiative forcing including the claimed positive feedbacks to be 5.1 watts/sqM. the temperature according to the websites I quoted is 0.4C and from that I calculate the increase in radiation to space as 1.5 watts/sqM. The difference is 3.6 watts/sqM which is the current radiative imbalance using the AGW advocate numbers.
There is another way of loooking at this. Assume the 0.38 watts/sqM calculated from ocean heat content is correct. The at 0.266 C/watt/sqM we are 0.1C away from equilibrium (0.38 watts/sqM * 0.266 C/watt/sqM). ie: another 0.1C rise and the earth will again be radiating as much energy as it receives. That would mean the equilibrium rise is 0.5C. Now if 0.45 doublings gives 0.5C rise the next 0.55 doublings should give 0.5 * 0.55/0.45 = 0.6C. Thats a long way from the claimed 3C rise.
The only way one could rationalise that the first 0.45 doublings gives .4C yet the next 0.55 doublings gives 3C would be if there was a huge time constant involved so that we are currently nowhere near equilibrium. But a huge time constnt implies a huge heat sink. The largest heat sink on the planet is undoubtedly the oceans and according to the scientists advising Penny Wong their data shows that the ocean heat sink is nowhere near large enough.
Several ways of looking at the situation but the result is the same no mater how one looks at it.
Hope this answers your concern and thanks for the interest you express
Michael Hammer
” it is plain that 20thC temperature is not a linear trend and a structural break approach [ie a step-up] is statistically verified.”
I like that wording. A structural break approach. A step-up. Thats the sort of wording I need to use when I’m trying to explain next time how I think the Holocene maximum was sustained so long. The Holocene optimum defies alarmist models. But this step-up, structural break-talk.
Thats the way to describe it when I bring my idea of viscosity into it. The simplified model is where the equilibrium imbedded joules is reliant mostly on resistance to circulation. Resistance to mixing. But then warmer water has lower viscosity and so less resistance to circulation. Hence if you have other things going for you. If you have other causes that can keep your momentum going, the viscosity factor might lead to this structural break. This step-up.
I saw this article by Goddard I think, about the holocene optimum. You know the attitude;
“It didn’t happen. We know all about it. It was only in the Northern hemisphere. And even then only in Winter. The computer has spoken. You weren’t there. You cannot know. I work for NASA and you don’t….”
You know how they are. They ignore the evidential record and go with whatever their computer says.
But it stands to reason. It went from 8000-5000 years ago I think in traditional estimates. It turns out that proxy evidence gives 8000 years ago as being when there was a burst of even more powerful solar action than the twentieth century. I’ve heard 6000 years ago being thought of as the most optimal from a Milankovitch point of view. And the holocene optimum stood for another thousand years after that.
It all seems to hang together as far as I can see. I don’t see it necessary to do anything else but follow the evidence. But Goddard seems to see things differently.
As far as I know I’m the first person to bring up the factor of viscosity changes due to water temperature. And I think I was the first person to deal with stefan-boltzmanns insofar as what that means when you dissaggregate into different areas of territory. Although I think Lubos went into this but no-one seems to have worked with this all that much. They waste so much money but they don’t tell you what you need to know. Also the idea that Stefan-Boltzmanns leads to some measure of “resistance-to-circulation” being the best determinant of how many joules will be imbedded in some implied equilibrium.
But IF it was ONLY Stefan-Boltzmanns, that would be a pretty powerful equilibrating mechanism in my view. If it was only Stefan Boltzmanns the planet would be like a pretty good thermostat.
But you throw in regional serendipity and VISCOSITY EFFECTS you have the potential I think, for this structural break you are talking about. This step up. This step down. This step up and step down and stay down effect. I think VISCOSITY plays a part here.
And I think its going to be a case of step-down and stay down a long time. And I think this sort of thing will be happening pretty soon.
sod says;
“you have been told multiple times now, that the forcing that you calculated is too high. you can NOT take the full feedback 3°C and use it to calculate current CO2 forcings. your calculation is based on the assumption that those feedbacks are instant and linear. both those assumptions are false. ”
This encapsules all that is wrong and deficient in AGW theory and logic; MH has looked at how the Equlibrium Climate Sensitivity concept which is inextricably based on lags and sinks requires a huge time constraint to explain away the fundamental inconsistency that the current radiative imbalance [.45 doublings] has produced only a 0.4C increase and therefore the remainder of .55 doublings logically will produce only another 0.6C increase which is much less than the ECS temp increase of ~3C predicted by the IPCC.
Another way of looking at this is that over the 20thC there was a 0.4C in temp and an ~30% increase in CO2; based on the 3C ECS there should have been an increase of ~0.9C; that is a shortfall in temperature response of 0.5C which now has to be added to the remaining 2.6C necessary for the ECS from a doubling of CO2 to be achieved which gives a figure of 3.1C to be achieved through a further 70% in CO2; in effect the ECS for 2CO2 is now 3.1/70% x 100% = 4.43C an increase of nearly 50% over the IPCC original ~3C but still within the range of 2-4.5C. However if temperature continues to drop while CO2 inreases that catch-up and consequent increase in temperature response to 2CO2 will contiunue to rise and soon fall outside of the ECS range postulated by the IPCC.
AGW utilises 2 theoretical devices to overcome this growing lack of correlation between 2CO2 and ECS temperature; one is the lag and various times are put forward ranging to centuries; the main suspect for the repository of the lagged heat is of course the ocean and as I have shown there is no effective lag between SST and atmospheric temperature; the deep ocean storage concept has to be used; it is essential for AGW; which brings me back to the conflict between Hansen 05 and Levitus 09, both gold-star advocates for AGW and ineluctably contradictory.
THe second device is that natural variation is used to explain masking or dampening of the temperature response a la Keenlyside; part of this is that natural variation is mimicked by AGW induced macro-climate responses such as the Modoki form of El Nino and the Vecchi form of El Nino; the problem with this is that if natural variation can mask underlying AGW so as to produce non-linear responses then part of the warming periods must have a natural amplification; there have been a number of studies by Trenberth, Christy and Douglass, Christy and McNIder and Lucia all removing natural variability to isolate the effect of AGW; all these studies show AGW much less than predicted by IPCC and a new study will show no discernible AGW effect in Australia over the 20thC.
Given this one realises why the notion of the time delayed response to 2CO2 is so crucial to AGW.
Non-linear and delayed effects.
This is the 12th Imam theory of where the joules have gone. The extra joules are hiding down a well with the 12th Imam of shiite.
In AGW-land, heat can magically hide and then jump out and say ‘boo!’ at the proper time.
“In AGW-land, heat can magically hide and then jump out and say ‘boo!’ at the proper time.”
How do you explain the 1998 spike?
I explained a possible way of looking at it earlier. If Forbush events punch heaps of joules in the ocean AGAINST the “rythym” of the sun-ocean dance, then instead of moving up to a new energy plateau we would expect the energy to be released step-fashion into the air over a number of months causing unseasonably hot weather.
El Nino events seem to follow Forbush events a lot of the time. Although I don’t think this is a perfectly cut and dried matter.
Michael, a good reason for comparing with what others have done is to debug your logic. Compared with Hansen et al, you’re in agreement on the ocean heating side, but have a vastly greater radiative input. So that’s where to look.
Start with this sentence:Now to get a 3C rise at the average claimed emission temperature (255K) requires an additional energy input (additional energy retained by greenhouse gases) of 11.3 watts/ m2. I don’t know where you get that from, but it is far too high. You’ve asked people to spot the flaw, but the fact is that you’ve gone around a big logical loop, with this as an unexplained step, when there is a simple, far more primary figure that you could work from.
It looks to me like the curves are bogus, according to Pielke, Sr. According to him, there has been no increase in ocean heat content for several years.
http://climatesci.org/2009/05/18/comments-on-a-new-paper-global-ocean-heat-content-1955%e2%80%932008-in-light-of-recently-revealed-instrumentation-problems-by-levitus-et-al-2009/
Sombody already provided the link; sorry for the repitition, I should have read all the comments. But maybe it’s good for emphasis. Wonder where Wong got her graphs?
I have seen the link to Pielke above which shows no accumulated joules as observed in the oceans. As I understand it, because the oceans are hundreds of times denser than the atmosphere, then the amount of heat equivalent to a 1 degree temperature anomaly in the atmosphere would be equivalent to a tiny fraction of a degree if sequestered in the oceans. How are they supposed to measure such tiny increments of temperature? Wouldn’t the error bars be greater than the measured temperatures?
Hello Nick; Sorry to take so long to get back to you, I was distracted by other matters.
I gave the background to my figure of 11.3 in earlier replies but lets play by your numbes for a while. You commented in an earlier post that the true sensitvity should be 0.6C/watt/sqm. Lets examine this. According to IPCC (4th report) we have had 1.7 watts/sqM increase in retained energy from CO2 and doubling CO2 retains 3.7 watts/sqM. That means there is a further 2 watts/sqM increase between now and 2070. At 0.6C/watt/sqM that equates to 1.2C rise. But IPCC 4th report claims 3C rise by 2070 – a big difference. So maybe you argue that CO2 is not the only effect, other effects make up the difference? If so why harp on CO2 reduction it would only be 40% of the problem, why not harp on the 60%.
However IPCC and ther AGW movement strongly imply the 3C rise is due to CO2. If the 3C rise is due to CO2 then the sensitivity would have to be 1.5C/wat.sqM. Now you claim a total of 1.8 watts/sqM retained heat at present and 0.6C rise. I have a problem with the 0.6C since the story is that only temp rise since about 1960 is due to CO2 before that it was natural and since 1960 the sites I quote (AGW sites) all suggest 0.4C rise but again lets play by your numbers. For 0.6C rise at 1.5C/watt/sqM the extra radiated heat would be 0.6/1.5 = 0.4 watts/sqM. If I accept your claim of 1.8 watts/sqM retained heat that leaves 1.4 watts/sqM going to hetaing the earth. Compare that with the 0.38 watt/sqM you say you agree with and we have an almost 4:1 discrepancy.
If I accept your figure of 0.6C/watt/sqM there is the paradox that the rise by 2070 should be only 1.2C not 3C – a very significant difference. Using that 0.6C/watt/sqM with an 0.6C rise suggests 1 watt/sqM extra radiated energy leaving 0.8 watt/sqM absorbed which even so is double the 0.38 figure you say you substantially agree with – in short using your numbers there are 2 paradoxes, firstly the reatined heat is still double what can be accounted for and the projected temperature rise due to CO2 is overstated by 2.5 times.
I respectfully suggest there is a problem.
Michael,
I tracked down your reference here. I see the problem. As I say, you have a logical loop, and there is a loop gain. You’ve used the IPCC fig of 3C, which was calculated from the increase in IR retained, multiplied by a sensitivity which included positive feedback. Then you’ve divided by a sensitivity kappa which did not include feedback to get a radiative load again. The second figure is smaller, so the end result (11.3) is much higher.
There is heat loss as the Earth radiate back into space as well as the fact that the ice in the Arctic and Antarctica melt into the ocean and increase the heat absorption capability of it; hence keeping the planet cool and the rate of global temperature rise at a slow pace at the moment. I guess when there is great migration of refugees affected by rising sea level come knocking then the climate-change deniers will take notice and panic.
It is uncleared to me that whether skeptics have taken into account that a vast amount of carbon dioxide will be absorbed by plants, the sea, and the increased number of algae which should be calculated in the model. Also why don’t skeptics look at coastal and island communities being affected by rising sea level as well as the erratic weather pattern changes that affect many farming communities around the world.