There is a tendency around to claim that satellite Lower Troposphere (LT) T trends now agree with Jones et al (land & sea) and GISS land based trends.
But this is not so.
Trend differences of circa 0.047 C per decade are huge when viewed against the claims by Jones et al / IPCC of only 0.05 C UHI contamination over the century plus surface record. For graphic and details.
The trends for the graphic below for the 27 year period Dec 1978 through Nov 2005 are 0.12516 per decade for MSU and 0.17256 per decade for Jones. A difference of 0.0474 degrees C per decade which when pro-rated suggests circa 0.4 degrees C per century. A figure that is far from insignificant when considered alongside the IPCC / Jones et al claim that their data only includes only 0.05 degrees UHI contamination over the course of the record. The GISS trend is 0.185 per decade.
In addition to the above both Jones /CRU and GISS late in 2005 made news with claims raising the possibility that 2005 could be the warmest year yet, topping 1998.
However with both groups now quoting data through November 2005 claims have been wound back slightly.
On the CRU front page under News, they say;
WMO/CRU/Met. Office press release on Global Temperature for 2005: second warmest year on record.
That means warmer than 2002 but not topping 1998.
GISS are a little more confident and their homepage states;
The global surface temperature for the 2005 meteorological year is probably the hottest on record. Although 2005 tied 1998 within the margin of error, the 2005 mark is particularly noteworthy because no El Niño contributed to this year’s heating. (Dec. ’05)
Dr John Christy at University of Alabama at Huntsville (UAH) quoting the the MSU data finds less warming than GISS or CRU and says 2005 has been the equal second warmest year in the 27 year satellite record, equal with 2002 and clearly cooler than 1998.
We will present more trend comparisons as data come to hand.
Warwick, I think people should look for any greenhouse warming trend by looking exclusively at trends over the oceans. Trends over land can be influenced by changes in land use as well as by greenhouse effects. Furthermore, measurement of trends over land can easily be biased by the failure to remove urban heat islands. So examining trends over oceans avoid these problems and give one a more pure play on determining any warming due to greenhouse warming. There are too few surface stations and buoys over the oceans to really determine what the trends are. However, one can use the MSU data of Christy and Spencer to derive the trends over the oceans and then divide these upper air trends by two to account for the greenhouse warming prediction of more warming at the MSU level than at the surface level. Vincent Gray provides a way to do this at www.warwickhughes.com/gray04/nzct44.htm. The Northern Hemisphere is 0.292 land and is warming at 0.196 C/decade for 1979 to 2005. The Southern Hemisphere is 0.152 land and is warming at 0.057 C/decade. Thus, we get the following two equations: 0.196 = 0.491 * Land warming + 0.509 Ocean warming 0.057 = 0.152 * Land warming + 0.848 Ocean warming Solving them we get: Land warming = 0.490 C/decade Ocean warming = -0.006 C/decade. The oceans are actually cooling at the MSU level and dividing by two would give -0.003 C/decade or essentially indistinguishable from zero. So there is no evidence that greenhouse warming is a significant factor. All this suggests that the recent observed warming is caused by land use changes rather than greenhouse gases. Evidence for this claim is as follows: 1. The warming is primarily over land whereas a greenhouse gas warming would be equal over land and ocean, particularly at MSU altitudes. 2. The warming is greater in the NH than in the SH consistent with more land in the NH. The GHG warming hypothesis would have equal warming in the two hemispheres. 3. The warming is greater in the mid-latitudes of the NH than at the poles which is not what the GHG hypothesis predicts. 4. The warming is greater at the surface than higher up, opposite of what the GHG hypothesis predicts but consistent with land use changes. 5. Antarctica is cooling opposite to the warming predicted by GHG warming hypothesis. 6. Warming is greater at night than day, consistent with land use changes, and inconsistent with GHGs which predict equal warming day and night (Watterton, 1997). 7. Warming is greater in winter than in summer, consistent with both hypothesis. The land use change hypothesis is completely consistent with the observations. The GHG warming hypothesis fails nearly ever test against observations. A good day to you.
Interestingly the quoted numbers for decadal warming, 0.196 C/decade would be 0.0196 C/year. Given that the BOM published temperatures to 1 decimal point accuracy (24.1 C for example), testing the hypothesis that the temperature increased by 0.0196 C over one year is physically impossible to measure. I have also discovered that if daily temperatures are weighted by their respective relative humidities to yield a weighted monthly mean temperature then these weighted averages are up to 0.4 C lower than BOM mean temperatures. Hence simple arithmetic averaging of the daily max and min temperatures produces significant errors that are compounded with subsequent data processing. Again the errors here are an order magnitude greater than the predicted warming trends. So any warming being predicted from the various computer models seem to be essentially statistical artefacts rather than physical fact.
Douglas – and the extra approx 100ppm of CO2 and 1000ppb of methane are just doing nothing???? stephenschneider.stanford.edu/Climate/Climate_Science/IndicatorsOfHumanInfluence.html
Ender – Douglas did not say that the CO2 and methane are doing nothing. Please read what he said. You are confusing observations with theories. Douglas is reporting on observations. As you point out, the observations certainly don’t fit your theories … guess what happens then? What you seem to be overlooking is that the climate system of the earth is replete with feedbacks, both positive and negative. Which ones predominate? The long term stability of the earth’s temperature, particularly given the ~30% brightening of the sun in the last couple billion years, clearly indicates that the negative feedbacks must predominate. Otherwise, the earth’s temperature would have been all over the map, swinging wildly at the behest of positive feedbacks. It would also have risen by 30%. Neither one has happened, so negative feedbacks must rule. Thus, while in theory rising CO2 has to warm the planet, in an interconnected, externally driven, multistable, chaotic system with extensive internal feedbacks (such as the Earth’s climate), CO2 may end up having little effect at all. Certainly, it may have too small an effect to be detectable on a time span of centuries. Other effects, like (as Douglas theorizes) land use changes, may have much larger effects, and may totally mask whatever CO2 effect exists. Douglas makes a good case that observations support his theory, not yours. In that situation, your asking if the "extra approx 100ppm of CO2 and 1000ppb of methane are just doing nothing" is meaningless. To support your theory, it is useless to simply restate your theory or insist it is correct as you have done. Instead, you must show how each one of the observations can be explained as well by your theory as by his. And doing this, of course, is your responsibility, not Douglas’s. w.
Statistical Significance: As the margin of errors are rarely quoted for the various temperature plots, I have often wondered whether there is any real statistical significant difference between the three plots above and the gradients derived ? Comparison with Balloon data: Some plots of comparisons of the MSU (& surface) with balloon results were published by John Daly, showing the Balloon and MSU in good agreement. How or has anyone compared the surface data with balloon data, back as far as has been published – that is, enough to be a world average ? This would be post WWII ?
Warwick, it is a shaky proposition to rely on the error-prone UAH figures while seemingly pretending that RSS doesn’t exist. Is that appropriate scientific behavior?
Willis – Then Douglas should write up his observations in a paper and submit it to the scientific community for peer review. I am sure if the observations fit all the data then this should overturn the body of work already in. As well perhaps be can test his conclusions in some of the GCMs that are running. It should be quite simple to confirm that land use changes fit the data better.
Also he would have to fit the observations to all the data like the sea surface temperature record and the land surface temperature record. Saying that the surface record is contaminated without peer reviewed conformation is just not enough. Finally the MSU data of Christy and Spencer is a composite psuedo instrument derived from 2 other measurements and is not regarded as accurate as some.
Trying to say the ALL the warming is land use changes rather than AGW from ONE instrument record is cherry-picking data. And even if all the warming turned out to be attributable to land changes then this IS STILL anthropogenic as human activity is the primary cause of the land use changes.
I will just note that none of the GCMs have ever included land uses changes as a forcing.
The MSU data of Christy and Spencer agree with the balloon observations everywhere. The previous version of MSU agreed with the balloons everywhere except over the tropical oceans and that has now been corrected. The RSS data do not agree with the balloon data and are not validated.
If the land use changes are significant, as already argued in the scientific literature by Pielke, Kalnay, and others, then the Kyoto protocol is not a proper solution.
re: Douglass’s observation www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=28#comment-224
I’d have a mechanism:
Reduced air pollution over land increases temperature.
home.casema.nl/errenwijlens/co2/usso2vst.gif
SO2 data EPA, temperature data GISS (note SO2 emissions are increasing downward in the graph!)
But that is a solution Greenpeace won’t like.
Hans, Yes you are right – James P Hogan in his "Killing The Sacred Cow" book also mentions that from 1945 to 1970 global temperature decreased 2 C but from 1970 to 1990 increased and has stabilised. This seemed to be the result of a massive cleanup of coal fired (and similar) emissions – reducing the aerosols significantly and of course raising the temperature. So in addition to Douglass’ observations we also have a reduction in aerosols for the same period. Hah we clean up our act the place gets warm but Greenpeace instead still blames it on us for the CO2 fetish. You are damned if you do and damned if you don’t.
Doug, by all means go ahead and ignore S+C’s record of screw-ups. Has anyone ever seen their code, BTW? If you think RSS is wrong, please provide the proof for specific errors. As for the balloon data, you know as well as I do that there is a systemic error. Broadly speaking, the train on these issues seems to have left the station: www.climatescience.gov/Library/sap/sap1-1/public-review-draft/default.htm. Interestingly, Spencer and Christy are co-authors on this document, which includes the following statement in the executive summary: "These results have at least two possible explanations, which are not mutually exclusive. Either amplification effects on short and long time scales are controlled by different physical mechanisms, and models fail to capture such behavior; and/or remaining errors in some of the observed tropospheric data sets adversely affect their long-term temperature trends. The second explanation is judged more likely." It’s a very softly-worded mea culpa by S+C, but a mea culpa nonetheless. Given that you presumably have strong disagreements with this document, did you submit comments? If so, please post or link to them here. Hans, I don’t think Greenpeace will have great difficulty adjusting to a world in which we need to reduce both air pollution and GHG emissions. It’s the one they already live in.
First of all your quote "remaining errors in some of the observed tropospheric data sets adversely affect their long-term temperature trends. The second explanation is judged more likely" may just be referring to the RSS dataset rather than the CS dataset as you assume. Secondly, even if one accepted the RSS dataset as correct, it would have no qualitative effect on my arguments concerning land use change being a major factor in climate change. It would require a modification in the calculated numbers only. Thirdly, Hans’s plot of sulfate aerosols applies only to the US and is not a global number. In China and India, aerosol concentrations are increasing along with temperatures which is just the opposite of the case in the US. It suggests aerosols are a minor factor in global climate change.
Doug, you would have to read the whole document (or at least chapters 3 and 4) to see the parts where it is made clear that the problems are with S+C. I find it fascinating that you have yet to read the whole thing. Don’t you know that this material is going straight into the AR4? Regarding land use change, I agree it’s important. At this point , thought, it’s not clear what the sign of the forcing is for various land use types, or even whether it makes sense to plant forests in existing grasslands. As you know, there’s a lot of conflicting research. Also, land use forcings are region-specifc, and such forcings have a habit of cancelling out. Another complication is that in at least some circumstances, e.g. exurban development patterns here in California, it’s hard to separate out land use forcings from direct GHG emissions. On China and India aerosol effects, I hadn’t seen any papers to that effect. Links?
Doug, according to Douglass, D. H., B. D. Pearson, S. F. Singer, P. C. Knappenberger, and P. J. Michaels (2004), Disparity of tropospheric and surface temperature trends: New evidence, Geophys. Res. Lett., 31, L13207, doi:10.1029/2004GL020212. The difference between satellite and surface is over the ocean, suggesting that the sea surface temperature proxy that is used in the surface record uses for atmospheric temperature is the culprit. Surface and satellite agree very well over continental Europe and North America.
Doug, that elaborate exercise in your initial comment is kind of strange given that you must know about blue.atmos.colostate.edu/publications/pdf/willis_jgr_04.pdf. The data and methodology seem a speck more reliable than what you endorse.
Hans, the paper you cited is viewable at blue.atmos.colostate.edu/publications/pdf/douglass2004.pdf. It is dissected in detail at www.scottchurchimages.com/enviro/docs/MSU-Troposphere-Review01.pdf (beginning on page 51) and found guilty of cherry-picking among other crimes. We would expect no less from a paper with Fred Singer listed as co-author! But in any case Willis 2004 seems to have resolved the issue.
Thanks for the links steve, that is a lot of homework 😉
It was less than a couple of hours overall and I did learn a lot, so it wasn’t that bad, Hans, only now I have to put Scott’s MSU paper on my list of things to read — it’s a *book*, for goodness sake.
Warwick, another trend comparison here: www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/2005/ann/global.html. NCDC’s revised methodology (scroll down a bit for the link) finds 2005 the hottest year on record by a nose. So, 2005 beats 1998 by a 2 to 1 decision! (Of course I assume everyone knows that 1998, 2002. 2003 and 2005 are all within each other’s error ranges in all three data sets.)
Steve, "The global annual temperature for combined land and ocean surfaces in 2005 is 0.58°C (1.04°F), ranking 2nd, which is near the record global temperature that was established in 1998 under the influence of an extremely strong El Niño episode". This statement I got from your reference www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/2005/ann/global.html This is an iceworld. You have no scientific credibility. Period.
Steve, The Wills paper discusses ocean water temperature, not air temperature, as I originally discussed. Louis is right when he says "You have no scientific credibility. Period." The Wills paper does not even mention the ISCCP data that has a similiar geographic distribution to the water warming. Simply put, where clouds decrease in amount, the water warms. It has nothing to do with carbon dioxide. A handy plot of the ISCCP results can be found as Figure 3 at www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2006/01/11/jumping-to-conclusions-frogs-global-warming-and-nature/ Clouds have large natural variations going up and down entirely independent of any greenhouse effect. The climate models do not predict these variations and apparently Wills and others are unaware of these variations.
Hans says,”.. the sea surface temperature proxy that is used in the surface record uses for atmospheric temperature is the culprit.”
Yes why not Hans. From the early 1990’s Jones et al have inserted UHI contaminated land trends into the SST.
Hans also says, “Surface and satellite agree very well over continental Europe and North America.”
The Jones group is based in this region as are NOAA and GISS with their “me too” surveys, along with the main concentration of climate scientists on the planet which must have some moderating influence on outcomes. Thus it can not be surprising that the significant errors in the results of all three groups are far from their own back yards.
Louis, did you catch the part where I said the new methodology that identified 2005 as the warmest year could be seen by scrolling down a bit? Do have a look; the link is about two-thirds down the page. As you discovered, you won’t even know it’s there unless you scroll down.
Doug, I keep forgetting you’re a sun and clouds guy. I would only ask where is that cold and dry upper troposphere to go with? Remember that Soden (2005) was Lindzen’s last hurrah. Whatever cloud variation there may be, it doesn’t seem to be having the effect you propose. Also, just so I can let some of the modellers know what they should be using, what’s your calculation for the net global forcing of clouds? Finally, that is one interesting concept about clouds having a globally coherent natural cycle. Granting for the sake of argument that one exists, does that happen all by itself? Is there a paper?
Willis, so because you believe Jones is using (or has used) contaminated data that becomes a reason to rely on unrelated data with known problems? Say what? You haven’t even had a chance to read the material linked to the new NCDC numbers. It seems a little like, well, imagining a conspiracy where there is no evidence for one. Regarding GISS, I think Jim Hansen would be a little taken aback to hear that anyone thinks he has a “me too” relationship to Jones. Finally, your point about the results of all three being somehow biased just because they’re all located in the North Atlantic region is simply silly. If you want to be taken seriously, don’t make remarks like that without sticking a smiley after them. (BTW, I did see your response on the December RC stuff and will respond in detail, hopefully this weekend. It would be helpful if you could post at least some of the correspondence with Jones where he refused to produce the data on his more current material. Just to clarify, are we talking raw or processed station data here?)
Concerning water vapor, Maurellis and Tennyson state “It might therefore appear that an increased greenhouse effect, which causes the atmosphere to get warmer, would also lead to more water vapor in the atmosphere. This would result in a positive-feedback system that causes the Earth to become increasingly warmer. However, as is often the case with atmospheric processes, the situation is not quite this simple. Water vapor in the atmosphere can change phase, which leads to more clouds, and greater cloud cover means that more sunlight is reflected straight out of the atmosphere. Crude calculations suggest that the two effects approximately balance each other, and that water vapor does not have a strong feedback mechanism in the Earth’s climate.” If the Earth really had positive feedback loops, then one could use it to build a perpetual motion machine. Think about it. Karner has already demonstrated in a couple of papers that the Earth is behaving as a system that has net negative feedback loops.
There are at least 3 other experimental papers that do not agree with Soden on water vapor. See, for example, www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2004/03/18/the-vapor-rub/
Climate models have lots of deficiencies, for example:
1. No model predicts the ISCCP measurements of cloud cover change either regionally or globally.
2. No model includes dimers which have a concentration equal to methane.
3. Radiation codes in present models underestimate the absorption of solar radiation in the near infrared.
4. No models include land use changes, unless Pielke has published something recently.
5. No model includes cosmic ray variations.
There are many other model deficiencies, so they are still research tools under development. Of course, when modelers are approached with these and other problems, their response is “In the
words of one such user I interviewed, the model developers had ‘built themselves into a shell into which external ideas do not enter’. His criticism suggests that users who were more removed from the sites of GCM development sometimes have knowledge of model limitations that modelers themselves are unwilling, and perhaps unable, to countenance.”
See sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/climate_change/000675myanna_lahsens_late.html
Also, Doug, I referred to the ocean temps because that’s what you discussed in your initial comment. Rather than engaging in an elaborate exercise to try to derive atmospheric temps over the oceans from a flawed data set (UAH) that was never intended to be used for such a purpose, why not just do what Willis did and look directly at the ocean temp? As has been pointed out many times, the size of the oceanic heat sink compared to the atmopheric one means that the mixed surface layers of the ocean are the one place where we would have to find a global warming signal. Instead, you use a flawed method based on a flawed data set to try conclude that there is no atmospheric warming over the oceans and that therefore there must be no warming resulting from anything but land use changes. Were it not for those million in situ ocean temp measurements showing the warming, maybe you’d have an argument. BTW, people like Roger Pielke Sr. who study land use forcing agree that while it is very important regionally it nets out to very close to zero on a global basis.
Thermal radiation from greenhouse gases can only penetrate the top one millimeter of the ocean. It cannot be the cause of the observed ocean warming. The ISCCP data shows that clouds have decreased where ocean warming is observed. It is the resulting increased solar radiation that is warming the oceans.
Those who claim the oceans are warming from greenhouse gases are usng flawed physics.
I disagree that land use changes net to zero.
Douglas – "Thermal radiation from greenhouse gases can only penetrate the top one millimeter of the ocean" so how would you account for this then: "not only had the surface of the Antarctic ocean heated up about 10 degrees at the beginning of the Eocene, but that the entire depth of the ocean had warmed, and its chemistry changed disastrously. There was severely reduced oxygen in deep sea waters, and 30 to 40% of deep sea foraminifera suddenly went extinct" from en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paleocene-Eocene_thermal_maximum
Ender, You are talking about things that happened many millions of years ago when the Earth was very different from the present world having different continental positions, different ocean circulation, different rotation rate, and so forth and so on. It is not relevant to what I am talking about.
Ender, at the end of the eocene there was no antarctic icecap, which presently is the source of icecold ocean bottom water. It takes 3000 years to melt greenland, I haven’t seen numbers for antarctica. So: different mechanism and configuration during the eocene. en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:65_Myr_Climate_Change.png
Douglas – so what you are saying is the the past warming has no relation to present warming then.
Whatever the conditions then the rise in temperatures from greenhouse gases managed to heat the oceans – I was wondering how this fits with the statment “Thermal radiation from greenhouse gases can only penetrate the top one millimeter of the ocean”
Hans – the whole ocean heated up at this time not just the Antartic
“Prominent, widespread dissolution horizons in deep-sea carbonates (e.g., the horizon formed during the Paleocene-Eocene thermal maximum, PETM), may have been caused by significant CH4 – CO2 into the ocean-atmosphere system and thus correspond to abrupt climate events.”
gsa.confex.com/gsa/2005AM/finalprogram/abstract_92425.htm
Ender,
I suggest you read a basic work on physical oceanography.
Cold water sinks, the main reason why the whole ocean was warm in the Eocene (and cretaceous) was because there was no active coldwater production.
www.geo.arizona.edu/Antevs/ecol438/thermohalinewatrmas.gif
or google antarctic bottom water
Ender,
Your Eocene comment to Douglas has one problem – humans were not around at the Eocene, so no one could make a measurement of the ocean. Hence your argument is not an instance of using measured fact to counter Douglas’ point but that of intepretation of data derived from proxies and computer modelling.
As for the present warming, if that warming is from computer predictions, then has to be ignored. If it is from measurement, then as Christy notes and as Jennifer also pointed out, how come only arctic warmed?
Hans, I think Ender’s point is that the oceans had to have some mechanism for getting much warmer all of a sudden. Actually I’m having a wonderful time imagining all that heat getting into the top millimeter of the oceans and just getting hotter and hotter until it flashes into steam. Hey! That explains the clouds! In the meantime, we all need to be really careful when sticking our toes in. Oh, wait… mixing. Darn.
Ender,
Your quote is from Wilipedia. Perhaps a more reliable source would be required” Wikipedia tends to be censored with politically correct entries in controversial areas.
There is a mechanism for heating an ocean suddenly except that its heretical in the extreme.
The assumption is that the earth is an electrified sphere in a solar plasma where electricty dominates.
Occasionally the earth has a near encounter with another similar body and ti is possible that an electric short circuit could occur between the earth and the interloper.
If this discharge were a Birkeland current of immense votage and current and hit an ocean, that ocean would be boiled in a short time via an enormmous water spout formed the planetary discharge. This catastrophically evaporated ocean would then be as steam suddenly hitting the cold stratosphere where it freezes to fall suddenly onto another part of the earth as an ice age.
Limit yourself to gravity alone and this explanation is not possible. Introduce plasma and electricity and one has immense forces and energy.
It is however a heresy at the present time.
Hans – “Cold water sinks, the main reason why the whole ocean was warm in the Eocene (and cretaceous) was because there was no active coldwater production.”
So it had nothing to do with the higher atmospheric temperatures then? Cold water does indeed sink and creates circulations like the present Atlantic Themohaline Circulation. sam.ucsd.edu/sio210/lect_5/lecture_5.html
Louis – “so no one could make a measurement of the ocean” If you looked at the link the authors used precise measurements of isotopic ratios of oxygen and carbon to measure the temperature. This cannot be compared to tree ring proxies that only provide an estimate of the comparitive temperature.
“If it is from measurement, then as Christy notes and as Jennifer also pointed out, how come only arctic warmed?” As was pointed out to you on Jennifers blog it is not only the arctic that has warmed. It is warming faster in line with predictions of GCMs.
Ender,
Precise measurements during Eocene times ?
Ahem.
Ender,
you still don’t get it.
Measurements of what” Proxies. Son, get a life
As was pointed out to you on Jennifers blog it is not only the arctic that has warmed. It is warming faster in line with predictions of GCMs.
Proof Pluuuess
Please
Louis – "Proof Pluuuess" www.acia.uaf.edu/pages/scientific.html If you would like a summary then www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=234 "Precise measurements during Eocene times ?" No precise measurements of the isotopic ratios which is a quite precise measurement of temperature. "The O-18/O-16 ratio provides an accurate record of ancient water temperature. Water 10 to 15 degrees Celsius (18 to 27 degrees Fahrenheit) cooler than present represents glaciation. Precipitation and therefore glacial ice contain water with a low O-18 content. Since large amounts of O-16 water are being stored as glacial ice, the O-18 content of oceanic water is high. Water up to 5 degrees Celsius warmer than today represents an interglacial, when the O-18 content is lower. A plot of ancient water temperature over time indicates that climate has varied cyclically, with large cycles and harmonics, or smaller cycles, superimposed on the large ones. This technique has been especially valuable for identifying glacial maxima and minima in the Pleistocene." Again from Wikipedia en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oxygen_isotope_ratio_cycle – If you don’t like the entries then edit them.
This is my objection to Wikipedia writ large: "If you don’t like the facts, then change the facts"
Steve, The absorption coefficient for liquid water as a function of wavelength is given at www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/vibrat.html (see the figure near the end). Thermal infrared in the Earth’s atmosphere is around 10 to 20 microns where the absorption coeficient (A) is about 1000 cm-1. The transmission in liquid water (T) equal exp(-A*L) where L is the depth of penetration. For the case where 1/e of 27% of the incident photons remain unabsorbed, with A=1000 cm-1, the L= 1/1000 cm = 1/100 mm. 98% of the incident photons will be absorbed within 3 times this distance. So one can see from the figure, than practically no infrared photons penetrate beyond 3/100 mm. When I said all the photons are absorbed in the top millimeter of the water, I was being very generous. A more precise estimate of A is 5000 cm-1 at 15 microns where carbon dioxide is emitting radiation, so even 0.03 mm is extremely generous. Since the liquid water is such an effective absorber, it is a very effective emitter as well. The water will not heat up, it will just redirect the energy back up to the atmosphere much like a mirror. The only way to explain the ocean heating in depth is for the solar radiation to change and I have already pointed out that decreasing clouds, as measured by ISCCP, indicate increasing solar radiation is occurring right where the ocean heating is reported to be occurring.
Two typos in the last message: The text "The transmission in liquid water (T) equal exp(-A*L) where L is the depth of penetration. For the case where 1/e of 27%" shoudl read "The transmission in liquid water (T) equals exp(-A*L) where L is the depth of penetration. For the case where 1/e or 27% "
Doug, has this concept passed peer review anywhere?
Doug – So the present themocline circulation transfers it’s heat from the tropics to Northern Europe by infrared radiation?
Steve, it is all basic physics and has been known for many years as common knowledge. I remember it being well known in 1968 when I was doing radiative transfer calculations. It is so well known, like Newton’s laws, that one normally doesn’t even think of giving a specific reference. There are many lab experiments that confirm the absorption of liquid water as shown in the plot that I referred you to. Perhaps there are some more specific references located in this listing: www.lsbu.ac.uk/water/ref.html
It is worth mentioning for A = 5000 cm-1 at 15 microns, the implied water emissivity is 0.9998 implying that of the incident radiation only 0.02% of it will be absorbed. The emitted radiation will closely follow a blackbody emission curve whereas the incident flux from carbon dioxide is confined to a band centered at 15 microns. The implication of this is that much of the radiation emitted will escape directly to space through the IR windows, so it is a negative feedback. The initially absorbed energy cannot be transfered to the ocean depths by conduction (too slow), by convection (too small an absorption layer), or by radiation (too opaque). It must escape by the fastest way possible meaning upwards radiation away from the water. I don’t see why anyone is having problems understanding basic physics.
Ender, your baffling comment doesn’t really make any sense, so I can’t comment on it. Do you have any background at all in science?
Douglas – I am just wondering how the heat gets transmitted from the warmer air in the tropics to the water which is flowing north. Also how this warmer water then imparts it warmth to the air that warms Northern Europe?
Ender
I said precise measurements DURING eocene times, so have another try.
Steve,
“Doug, has this concept passed peer review anywhere?”
Scientific facts are independent of peer review. That is the nature of science. According to your reasoning, gravity is not deemed to be a fact until it is peer reviewed.
Peer review maintained that the sun orbited the earth in Galileos’ time.
As I noted above, you have no scientific credibility, period.
(one more inane statement and I score a hat-trick, I wonder if Warwick awards prizes :-))
Ender,
answer the question – “have you any background in science”.
Please.