Re: The Global Warming Swindle

My previous post didn't show up.....which is OK since I had to make a
couple of minor corrections.....here it is again:

On Apr 21, 11:18 am, DirtCrashr <D...@xxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On 20 Apr 2007 18:36:14 -0700, Ken Shackleton <ken.shackle...@xxxxxxx>
wrote:

So.....I cannot answer the original question unless I heavily qualify
it. Is the earth getting warmer? I have no idea.

I think that the next thing for me to investigate is the role [if any]
that CO2 plays in all of this.....

Ken.

I appreciate your deliberation and open mindedness in examining all
this.

-keith

DirtCrashr - '97KTM300M/XC

No problem Keith....

Actually, I am finding the exercise to be rather enlightening.

So....let's talk about CO2, actually, let's talk about greenhouse
gases in general. I am very interested in the link between the
greenhouse gases [methane, and CO2] and earth's temperature. In my
last post, I presented data that showed a correlation between CO2 and
temperature; but the data did not support and conclusions as to the
nature of the relationship.

The first thing that I should do is to determine how this data is
gathered. A lot of stock has been placed on the ice core data, so an
examination of that data is warranted. Here is another common graph:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Vostok_420ky_4curves_insolation.jpg

This graph shows CO2 in blue, temperature in red, methane in green;
and solar radiation in orange. The last one is interesting for the
following reason...we can spend a lot of time arguing the relationship
between temperature and the greenhouse gases....but it is impossible
for any condition on Earth to have a feedback influence on the Sun. If
there is a correlation between solar radiation and a condition on
Earth....it is either unrelated coincidence, or the Sun is driving the
Earth.

The graph [like others that I have seen] shows a close relationship
between the greenhouse gases and the temperature of the planet. In
this graph, there is also a correlation between solar radiation and
temperature from at least 150kya to present. The relationship seems
less obvious earlier than that time.

Back to greenhouse gases and the methods for extracting the data from
ice cores. The reason why this is relevant is one of sampling. We have
atmospheric CO2 measurements from direct observation for about 70
years or so. Here's a graph:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Carbon_History_and_Flux-2.png

If we want to know about CO2 levels prior to about 1950, then we have
to use ice cores or other proxies.
Here is a link for ice core data:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ice_core

In the article, the difficulty of accurately dating the ice is
discussed. The error for ice that is 15,000 years old is +/- 2,000
years; for ice that is 480,000 years old, the error is +/- 10,000
years. Another problem is that it takes time for the ice to completely
seal off from the atmosphere....between 2,500 and 6,000 years. So the
atmosphere contained in the bubbles is always younger than the ice by
at least several hundred years; perhaps much longer.

Also complicating this picture is the need for almost a kilogram of
ice to get a measurable sample of the gases contained within it. The
annual bands are from 2 to 10 cm wide, the older ice tending to have
the narrower bands due to compression forces. This means that a data
point for CO2 measured in ice is an average over several years. You
can see this when you look at the graphs of the data....the more
recent readings tend to have a lot of very close peaks and valleys
when compared to the older data.

Another point to consider is also related to sampling. The Volstok
cores are sampled every metre. In the newer ice, this means that the
time between samples is measured in decades; in the older ice, it is
centuries. The following link is the Vostok raw data for depth, ice
age, and gas age.

ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/gt4nat.txt

Another point that I found interesting in the [wikipedia] article is
that even with all these variables, the data still shows that during a
deglaciation, CO2 rise lags temperature rise by 600 years [+/- 400
years].

So....in order to make today's measured spike in CO2 comparable to the
data of the previous interglacial, we would have to take the average
of the CO2 content of the past several years at least. The snapshot
data points of the past few decades are not a proper comparison.

I am beginning to believe that the reason why today's CO2 content is
the highest measured is partly due to this averaging effect; and that
today's measurements are snapshots, rather than averages comparable to
the ice data.

I do not know if today's spike in CO2 is a problem or not.

One thing that I have not discussed so far is the human contribution
of CO2. The only data that I can find is that we humans *do*
contribute a significant percentage, far more than volcanic output [by
as much as 150x]. I have heard people say that volcanoes produce far
more, but I have *never* seen anyone produce numbers to support that
notion. The only numbers that I have seen support the opposite. One
other thing too, there have been a couple of major eruptions since CO2
has been directly measured.....and none of those eruptions have caused
any spikes in the CO2 curve....if volcanoes were major sources, then
large eruptions would spike the curve, and that simply does not
happen.

http://volcanoes.usgs.gov/Hazards/What/VolGas/volgas.html

Again though.....I have not seen evidence that CO2 is the cause of the
temperature rise, so who cares if we humans belch out large volumes of
CO2?

Here are a couple more graphs:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/2005/ann/ts-sfc-radiosonde-jan-nov-pg.gif

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/2005/ann/msu2005-pg.gif

They provide data on the surface temperature when compared with the
mid-troposphere. As has been stated by others, if the current warming
trend has been due to greenhouse gases, then the mid-troposphere would
be warming faster than the surface. Again, the data is rather
ambiguous. The first graph supports the notion, the next one does
not.

There does not seem to be any definitive evidence that the warming
that has been happening this past century, especially these past two
decades, has been driven by the greenhouse effect.

I have examined the data and to my great surprise, I find it wanting.

The possible solar connection is interesting.....I will look at that
one next.

Ken





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