Home/BlogWeather balloon measurements have been made twice daily at Desert Rock, Nevada for many years. In 1998, a surface radiation (SURFRAD) measurement facility was also installed there, which allows new kinds of analysis of how the radiation budget is affected by atmospheric profiles of temperature and humidity.
Fig. 1. One portion of the SURFRAD instrumentation network at Desert Rock, NV.
The location is arid, minimizing the influence of clouds and precipitation, making it an ideal site for analysis of downwelling infrared (IR) sky radiation and how it influences surface temperature.
A example of the main radiation components measured every 3 minutes at Desert Rock is shown in the following graph, for July 1, 1998. I have also annotated the approximate times that the radiosonde ascents are made:
Fig. 2. 3-minute radiation budget data at Desert Rock during July 1, 1998.
There are many more measurements than this in the Desert Rock data archive, such as temperature, wind, relative humidity, barometric pressure, ultraviolet radiation, etc.
Of particular interest is the question: How does the downwelling IR intensity depend on the vertical profiles of temperature and humidity? Obviously, IR intensity depends upon temperature….but there has to be an atmospheric emitter of IR, and that is primarily water vapor.
We can examine the issue using nighttime data, so that we don’t have to deal with the huge fluxes of solar energy during the daytime. If I average the SURFRAD fluxes of downwelling IR between 00 UTC and 12Z every day, and compare them the to average of the 00 and 12 UTC radiosonde profiles in ~100 mb thick atmospheric layers, I can do correlations to see how the nighttime “sky radiation” variability is related to atmospheric temperature and humidity variability.
The results are very interesting:
Fig. 3. Correlation coefficients between daily variations of nighttime average downwelling IR and atmospheric temperature and humidity in different layers (vertical axis is pressure altitude, mb), during July 1998 at Desert Rock, NV. Several days that experienced more than scattered clouds and some precipitation were omitted.
The dominant influence of humidity variations on downwelling IR is clearly seen; the greater the humidity, the lower in the atmosphere the downwelling IR radiation measured at the surface originates, and thus the warmer the emitting temperatures and greater the IR intensity.
In contrast, the correlations of downwelling IR variations with temperature variations themselves are rather poor, probably because the temperature variations are so small. Clearly humidity variations dominate the downwelling IR signal, moving the effective radiating altitude up and down as humidity decreases and increases, respectively.
Now, the downwelling IR flux (the dashed line in Fig. 2, above) is what a few of our friends claim does not exist. They claim that there is no “greenhouse effect”, and that the sky (which is almost always colder than the surface) cannot emit IR in the direction of the surface because that would violate the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics.
But, of course, it is the net IR (the sum of upwelling from the warmer surface plus the downwelling from the cooler sky) which must flow from higher to lower temperature, which it does.
So, what, in their minds, is actually being “measured” by these instruments for downwelling IR? Whatever it is, Fig. 3 clearly shows it’s closely related to the humidity of the atmosphere (correlations up to 0.88 for mid-tropospheric humidity), but not very well related to temperature variations in the atmosphere. Barring some sort of conspiracy between all of the atmospheric radiation experts in the world (as well as most of us “skeptics”) it is difficult to imagine how such a “fictitious” measurement, so sensitive to atmospheric humidity, could be constructed by mistake.
But what influence do these variations have on nighttime cooling of surface temperatures? For that is how the “greenhouse effect” is usually expressed: the increase in surface temperatures caused by greenhouse gases compared to if those gases did not exist. It is not possible to answer that question in an absolute sense with measurements because we do not have a full-depth atmosphere with no greenhouse gases we can experiment on. Instead, we can only examine how surface temperature changes by relatively small amounts when the amount of greenhouse gas changes by relatively small amounts.
This can be seen in the next plot, where I have compared the change in surface temperature from 00 UTC (late afternoon) to 12 UTC (early the following morning), to the average downwelling IR during the night:
Fig. 4. Nighttime cooling of surface temperatures at Desert Rock during July, 1998 becomes less as downwelling IR intensity increases.
While the relationship is noisy because there are many factors governing nighttime surface cooling (wind speed, storage of solar energy in the soil during the previous day(s), etc.), we still see that the surface temperature drop during the night becomes less as the downwelling IR increases. This follows our daily weather experience that nighttime temperatures cool off more when humidity is lower, all other weather variables being roughly equal.
While the above analysis is preliminary, and there are many more relationships that could be examined (with many more years of data), the results clearly show that increasing greenhouse gas concentration in the atmosphere (in this case, water vapor) increases downwelling IR radiation from the sky, and increases surface temperature. And, while I have used nighttime data to isolate the effect from the complications introduced with daytime solar heating, it should be remembered that infrared effects on surface temperature are occurring 24 hours a day.
Downwelling IR from the sky continuously maintains surface temperatures well above what they would be without greenhouse gases (while at the same time cooling the upper atmosphere well below what it would be without those gases). Surface temperature is a function of energy gain (from the sun) and energy loss (which is reduced by greenhouse gases).
It’s not magic..it’s just physics.
NOTE TO COMMENTERS: I intend to delete any comments which include personal insults.
NOTE TO READERS OF COMMENTS: Some commenters here throw around technical terms and make grand assertions and detailed arguments which I consider fallacious. I do not have time to counter them all every time they arise, although I have addressed virtually all of them in other posts over the years.
Of particular interest is the question: How does the downwelling IR intensity depend on the vertical profiles of temperature and humidity? Obviously, IR intensity depends upon temperature.but there has to be an atmospheric emitter of IR, and that is primarily water vapor.
The current climate science explains that greenhouse gas effect is a function of the concentration of the greenhouse gases. Pleases see the formulas used in the first, second, and third IPCC reports. Based on the current understanding, the effect is independent of surface temperature.
Please note that the first paragraph above is a quote from your introduction. The second paragraph is my comment.
Not sure what you are saying. I suspect we are talking about different things. What formulas are you talking about, specifically?
Simplified expressions in the IPCC reports. They are of this nature:
Forcing= f(C), where C is the concentration of greenhouse gases.
That’s radiative *forcing* as a departure from 1XCO2 greenhouse gas conditions. The “greenhouse effect” is, qualitatively, the surface temperature *response* to all atmospheric greenhouse gases compared to if there were no greenhouse gases.
Surface temperature is warm because of solar radiation. The science explains that surface temperature is warmer with greenhouse gases because it traps heat of surface radiation. The relationship forcing is a function of concentration of greenhouse gases and not surface temperature based on the simplified expressions.
Forcing is variation of heat trapped resulting from variation in the concentration of greenhouse gases. It is independent of temperature. If integrated, back radiation or downwelling infrared is thus independent of temperature as well. This is a mathematical reasoning based on the science. However, this is not what is observed. Downwelling infrared is directly related to surface temperature. If temperature increases, downwelling IR increases and vice versa. This is contrary to what the science says. There is something wrong here, and I have concluded that pyrgeometrs are unsuitable instruments for measuring backradiation.
The GHE is independent of surface temperature. Depends on ghg concentration. That makes sense. According to this principle, the GHE is least over the dry Sahara and the greatest over the tropical oceans. And what effect do we observe? Higher tmax in the Sahara, lower tmax over the tropics. Hmmm. Dragon sausage, anyone?
Land has less thermal mass (inertia) than oceans. Hence Sahara tmax is higher. Tmax is driven by daytime Solar, not GHE.
That’s what I said. GHE depends on concentration of ghg. Compare humid tropics _land_. Same thing.
Spencer,
Nabil Swedan says, August 23, 2016 at 12:11 PM:
The whole point is this: It is specifically NOT a function of the concentration of so-called “GHGs”. The degree of IR activity in a massive atmosphere doesn’t matter. Once this atmosphere is radiatively active, it means atmospheric circulation will become and stay operative, and at that point, making the atmosphere *more* radiatively active wont matter to the T_s.
Why? Because theres a general HEAT balance between in and out at the surface, NOT a general radiative balance between in and out. Yes, IR-absorbing atmospheric constituents do indeed reduce the radiative heat loss of the surface at some given mean temp. But this doesnt mean they reduce the TOTAL heat loss of the surface. The radiative heat loss, as long as the atmosphere is radiatively active, is a matter of the temperature DIFFERENCE between the surface and the relevant air layers above, not of the absolute temperature of the surface alone. It wouldnt be a problem for the surface radiative heat loss per se to remain at 52-53 W/m^2 on average (Stephens et al., 2012) even at a mean temp of, say, 100K rather than 289K. As long as the atmosphere above were accordingly colder. However, convection/evaporation wouldnt work very well at 100K. With an average solar input to the surface of ~165 W/m^2 and an average radiative output from the surface of ~53 W/m^2, that leaves 112 W/m^2 to be shed by non-radiative heat transfer mechanisms before we can reach a surface heat balance. In order to get there, the surface would have to become seriously warmer on average. But, as youll notice, this is not because of a reduction in radiative heat loss. It is, after all, held at 52-53 W/m^2. Its simply because of the way too low initial mean sfc temp.
So it’s not the fact that the radiative heat loss is ~53 W/m^2, not ~165 W/m^2, when the solar heat gain is 165 W/m^2, that makes the surface T_avg 289K rather than 100K.
And then you might counter: But what if the radiative heat loss happened to be much larger, say 100 W/m^2 rather than 50+? Then the non-radiative heat losses could be much smaller, and so the surface wouldn’t have to become so warm to achieve its heat balance. And THERE’S your dependence on CONCENTRATION, on DEGREE of IR activity.
And I would say: Nope. Nice theory. But what does Reality say?
We see this particular relationship in action very well in the real world, when for instance comparing dry tropical regions and wet tropical regions. As an example, we could pick the Sahara-Sahel region (20-14N, 15W-36E, semi-arid) and the Congo region (5N-6S, 10-27E, very humid), both in tropical Africa, and if we did, we would see a couple of very interesting things.
First, the two regions in question absorb at the surface basically the same amount of solar heat over the course of a year, on average ~175 W/m^2 (CERES EBAF). And since we know that the annual temperature in both areas is pretty much constant over time, we can safely assume that the surface is in a relative steady state both places, that is, as much heat goes OUT as what comes IN during a full year.
However, the tropospheric column lying on top of the solar-heated Sahara-Sahel surface, contains A LOT less water than the similar column over the Congo. Both in the form of water vapour and of clouds. (The CO2 content can be assumed to be the same in both columns.) What does this entail? Well, there should be A LOT more atmospheric back radiation to the surface in the Congo than in Sahara-Sahel. Even relative to air temperature.
And according to CERES EBAF, this is also the case. In the Sahara-Sahel region, the mean DWLWIR flux to the surface is ~375 W/m^2. In the Congo its at least 405 W/m^2. Thats easily 30 W/m^2 extra. So, the same average input from the Sun in both regions, ~175 W/m^2, but 30 W/m^2 more back down from the atmosphere in the Congo. So total radiative input to the surface in the Sahara-Sahel: [175+375=] 550 W/m^2, and in the Congo: [175+405=] 580 W/m^2.
So, based on these radiative numbers alone, where would you think the higher surface T_avg is to be found?
Well, like we already made plain, both areas is in a dynamic heat balance, so the average annual heat input AND heat output are both 175 W/m^2 in Sahara-Sahel as well as in the Congo. So no difference there. But the total RADIATIVE input is seemingly much larger in the Congo than in the Sahara-Sahel.
What we need to know next, of course, is the surface radiative heat loss (net LW) in the Sahara-Sahel region? It’s about 95-100 W/m^2. What about the Congo? 50-55 W/m^2. Thats a 45 W/m^2 difference.
What does this tell us? It tells us a few things:
1) The much higher degree of tropospheric IR activity over the Congo (from much more H2O in the tropospheric column) reduces the radiative heat loss from the solar-heated surface by A LOT.
2) However, it doesnt reduce the TOTAL surface heat loss. It simply means that more of the total heat loss is shifted over to NON-radiative mechanisms in the Congo.
The all-important question then becomes: Does this fact, that the highly IR active atmosphere on top of the solar-heated surface in the Congo reduces its radiative heat loss so much more than in the (equally solar-heated) Sahara-Sahel, where the atmosphere is much less IR active, thus forcing the surface to rid itself of much more of its total heat via OTHER mechanisms, cause the average T_s in the Congo to become significantly higher at equilibrium than in the Sahara-Sahel?
No. Not at all. Because 3) The ‘net LW’ numbers above also tell us that the Sahara-Sahel surface is in fact hotter on average than the Congo surface. By several degrees.
Isnt that funny? Equal solar heating. Much more effective radiative cooling. And still a higher T_avg.
And so wheres the progressive radiative GHE to be found in all this? Where’s the real-world evidence that if we merely have more IR active constituents in an atmospheric column, a higher degree of ‘IR activity’, then the surface underneath will have to be warmer on average, pretty much by physical necessity …?
We could move on to other planets as well. No evidence whatsoever there either.
https://ceres-tool.larc.nasa.gov/ord-tool/jsp/EBAFSFCSelection.jsp
Compare this chart …:
https://okulaer.files.wordpress.com/2016/04/olr-trop.png
(Originally from here: http://ceres.larc.nasa.gov/documents/STM/2015-05/40_Lee_OLR_in_Tropical_Expansion_FULL.pdf )
… with this quote:
http://www.st-andrews.ac.uk/~dib2/climate/tropics.html
When looking at the chart above, you get the impression that the equatorial band is unable to rid itself of a substantial portion of its energy, relative to its average temperature (and what it absorbs from the Sun), since the OLR at the ToA is so low. So you assume a strong GHE. Conversely, the subtropics appear to shed significantly more energy in the form of OLR at the ToA than what they get in from the Sun, and so should really cool, if they didnt somehow get extra energy in from somewhere else.
According to MODTRAN logic (or, according to the logic of people using MODTRAN-generated spectrums to “prove” how the “GHE” works), since so much less OLR escapes the equatorial band through the ToA than in the subtropics, then the surface around the equator should be a fair bit warmer than in the subtropics, due to a much larger “atmospheric back radiation flux” at the surface. It’s not. In fact, not at all.
But is this really the case? Are our eyes telling us the whole story here? Or are there dynamic mechanisms at work – NON-radiative mechanisms – that can explain the peculiar OLR pattern?
Refer to the quote above. The equatorial band does indeed rid itself of its energy, probably even more than it gets in directly from the Sun. It just doesnt happen via radiation through the equatorial ToA. And so there appears to be a strong GHE i this region. The energy, however, is still effectively removed. It is convected/advected away, first up to the tropopause, then north and south toward the subtropics. The excess equatorial energy, initially non-radiatively transported and held within the moist equatorial air, is therefore released to space via radiation, as the air subsides, warms and dries, rather above the subtropics, between on average 10 and 30 degrees N and S.
IOW, the radiative GHE is effectively short-circuited. The radiative attempt at inhibiting the surface energy from escaping to space is bypassed. By atmospheric circulation.
So the subtropics SEEM to radiate a lot more energy to space than what they receive from the Sun. But much of the radiated energy making those subtropical bands look so fiery red, actually isnt subtropical in origin at all, but is rather transported there from the equatorial band.
You can get a feel of how this works when checking with the CERES data for the surface vs. the ToA. At the surface, the Sahara-Sahel gains a LOT more energy from the Sun than what it is able to radiate away, so theres a huge radiative surplus (on the order of +75%). At the ToA, however, considerably more radiation goes out than what comes in (about 4.5%).
Conversely, in the Congo, straddling the equator, the ratio between incoming and outgoing radiation (net SW/net LW) is ~3.5:1, an even much larger radiative surplus than in the Sahara-Sahel, but while the strongly positive radiative imbalance at the surface is turned into a negative radiative imbalance at the ToA over the Sahara-Sahel, the radiative imbalance is still massively positive at the ToA over the Congo (by about 28%).
And as we know, the T_avg at the surface in the Congo is several degrees cooler than in the Sahara-Sahel, with the total heat balance in both regions being 175 W/m^2 IN = 175 W/m^2 OUT.
I realised a surface T_avg at 100K might be a bit on the low side for maintaining a radiant heat loss on the order of 50-60 W/m^2, although it could perhaps be physically possible (the Moon has a mean global surface temp of ~197K, but still manages to shed on average about 290-300 W/m^2 to space, because of its huge spatio-temporal temperature swings). Either way, let’s go with 200K instead, rather than 100. My argument remains unchanged. 200K, after all, is still -73 degrees Celsius, -100 degrees Fahrenheit.
3) “The net LW numbers above also tell us that the Sahara-Sahel surface is in fact hotter on average than the Congo surface. By several degrees.”
Not so. Congo mean temperature = 24.6 C
Sahel mean temperature = 18 C
Sahara mean temperature = over 20 C
Most of Sahara desert = over 25 C
Congo and Sahara are comparing apple and orange. One is a tropical rainforest, the other is a desert. If you increase atmospheric CO2 to 4,000 ppm, what do you think will happen? A) Sahara will get warmer, B) Sahara will have more evaporation and precipitation and temperature unchanged
I’m not a meteorologist but I bet A. What say ye Roy?
Dr. Strangelove says, August 25, 2016 at 5:04 AM:
Hehe. How do you figure this? Where do you get your figures from exactly?
i) CERES shows that avg UWLWIR from the Sahara-Sahel sfc is significantly higher than the same from the Congo sfc. How does that work if the Congo sfc is much warmer than the Sahara-Sahel sfc on average?
ii) https://okulaer.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/atl_avganntemp_afr-11.jpg
Sahara-Sahel is definitely warmer than the Congo, Dr. Strangelove. You’re just gonna have to live with it.
Congo = 24.6 C
http://en.climate-data.org/location/513570/
Sahel = 14.9 C
http://www.worldweatheronline.com/sahel-weather-averages/tizi-ouzou/dz.aspx
Sahara = 16.1 C
http://en.climate-data.org/location/548145/
Despite these data, let’s assume your hypothesis is correct that Sahara-Sahel is warmer. The explanation why Congo is cooler is evaporative cooling. Rainforest = evaporation & precipitation. But increase CO2 to 4,000 ppm. You think Sahara desert will become a rainforest? hehe. Live with that.
Dr. Strangelove,
I wrote: “As an example, we could pick the Sahara-Sahel region (20-14N, 15W-36E, semi-arid) and the Congo region (5N-6S, 10-27E, very humid), both in tropical Africa (…)”
And then I presented you with this map:
https://okulaer.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/atl_avganntemp_afr-11.jpg
Do you see those two rectangles? Do you see how they are denominated “Sahara-Sahel” and “Congo” respectively? Do you also see the colours inside both rectangles? What do they tell you?
And just to remind you again, why do you think CERES EBAF shows a significantly higher mean “UWLWIR flux” for the Sahara-Sahel than for the Congo? You think it’s because the surface within the Sahara-Sahel sector (the upper rectangle) is 8-10 degrees cooler on average than the surface within the Congo sector (the lower rectangle)?
(Check Kisangani in the Congo (447masl) and Khartoum (386masl) in the Sahara-Sahel. The annual mean temp in the former is +25.2 C, in the latter it’s +29.6 C. T_avg in Khartoum, then, is ~4 degrees higher than T_avg in Kisangani (adjusted for altitude).)
So when you say …:
… then I can’t but laugh. It is not my HYPOTHESIS that the Sahara-Sahel is hotter than the Congo. That’s according to the DATA.
And then you proclaim:
Why? I already explained that the HEAT budget of both regions is the same: 175 W/m^2 IN, 175 W/m^2 OUT. So the evaporative cooling in the Congo simply makes up for the smaller radiant heat loss. It doesn’t do *more* than that. The TOTAL heat loss in both regions is the same, as is the heat gain in both regions.
So what’s so magical about evaporative cooling that, if it holds a larger share of the total heat loss, then the surface temperature drops?
What you need to remember, Dr., is the fundamental “GHE/AGW” logic: The larger the COMBINED radiative input (from the Sun + the atmosphere), the hotter the surface should become.
There are at least two problems with this:
1) The combined radiative input in the Congo is (according to CERES EBAF) ~580 W/m^2. In the Sahara-Sahel is ‘only’ ~550 W/m^2. And still, the latter is hotter on average by several degrees.
2) Even if the combined radiative input to the surface (solar flux + “DWLWIR flux”) is larger, it doesn’t mean the HEAT input to the surface is larger. And it’s the HEAT input that matters. Only the solar flux represents heat. The “DWLWIR flux” doesn’t. It’s actually part of the surface heat loss.
But if the heat input/output is the same in both regions (included evaporative cooling), and if the total, combined radiative input to the surface in the Congo region is larger, then why is the surface T_avg in the Congo still cooler by several degrees?
Dr. SL,
Your link starts out that the Congo is “tropical” and so it is, just a few degrees north of the equator. It goes on to say that “summer” precipitation varies from “winter” precipitation. That sort of mental fumbling always is a red flag, to me.
You don’t accept the measured temperatures on the ground. If actual data do not fit your theory, reject the data. That’s science for you? You try to impress us with your theory not supported by data.
UWLWIR does not all come from the ground. The atmosphere is radiating LWIR in all directions including up. 580 W/m^2 in Congo vs. 550 W/m^2 in Sahara is a problem for you because it contradicts your theory. But it is consistent with the temperature data that Congo is warmer than Sahara.
“Only the solar flux represents heat. The DWLWIR flux doesnt.”
That’s classic Dragon Slayer. I rest my case
Dr. Strangelove says, August 25, 2016 at 8:18 PM:
Haha, you’re too funny! Of course I accept measured temps on the ground. But I normally prefer it if they’re actually from the place I discuss. Like your “Sahel” site. That’s Tizi Ouzou, in the north of Algeria (36 43N):
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tizi_Ouzou
That’s not tropical and its not within my “Sahara-Sahel” rectangle, Dr. Strangelove.
The other one is ‘Amran Governorate in … the mountains of Yemen! ~2000 masl.
No, YOU’RE trying to divert by linking to completely irrelevant data to make it SEEM you’re countering my point.
Did you check the climate data of “Khartoum” (386 masl, Sahara-Sahel) and “Kisangani” (447 masl, the Congo), Dr. Strangelove? No? That’s RELEVANT data. That YOU apparently don’t accept. That you in fact try to ignore. Did you look at the temperature map I linked to? No? Why? Can’t accept it? Did you check the CERES EBAF “UWLWIR” data for the two regions in question? No? Can’t accept?
You’re quite the troll, aren’t you, Dr.?
Er, yes, it does. When the parameter is specified as surface LW up, that’s the “UWLWIR” from the surface.
No, it contradicts YOUR “theory”.
It would be if it were. But it isn’t. As shown unequivocally by the data.
LOL. No, Dr. Strangelove. That’s you not getting regular thermodynamics. You seriously think the “DWLWIR” represents heat to the surface?
I rest my case.
And your case has won the jury. Note the blognomen: Strangelove.
Kristian writes: “Only the solar flux represents heat. The DWLWIR flux doesnt. Its actually part of the surface heat loss.”
Kristian confuses IR with heat yet again, drawing incorrect conclusions.
Neither the solar flux SW nor LW contain kinetic energy Kristian; solar SW is broadband IR so the solar flux does not represent heat hence as usual results in a confusing Kristian comment. IR is just not heat by Clausius’ own defn. So LW is just not heat loss either as Kristian incorrectly writes.
Correctly: emitted LW reduces the KE of the surface and atm. constituents. Absorbed solar SW increases the KE of the surface and atm.
Thermodynamics is a hall of mirrors.
And they are not necessarily straight ones either; there are nonlinear ones, spooky exponents, and integrals and ones that reflect light we cannot even see. What an interesting hall.
Ball4 says, August 26, 2016 at 6:53 AM:
Nope. Ball4 confuses IR with heat yet again.
And nobody said it does, Ball4. Because heat isn’t kinetic energy. Molecular kinetic (translational) energy is part of a system’s “internal energy”. It is what gives the system its temperature. “Heat”, though, is energy thermally transferred from one system or region to another, simply by virtue of the temperature difference between them. Heat always spontaneously flows one way only, from hot to cold. When it comes to radiative transfer, the “radiant heat” is defined as the ‘net thermal radiation’ flowing between the two systems/regions.
“And nobody said it does, Ball4. Because heat isnt kinetic energy.”
Nobody? No. Only the man himself said heat is a measure of KE Kristian, as you continue to ignore the master on heat you will simply continue to insist on drawing faulty conclusions:
Clausius’ definition of heat in his 1st memoir up front p. 18: “We…shall assume generally that a motion of the particles (in a body) does exist, and that heat is a measure of their (kinetic energy).”
“Because theres a general HEAT balance between in and out at the surface, NOT a general radiative balance between in and out. “
I didn’t read through everything in detail, but it seems you are missing the idea that there is also a heat balance between in and out at the TOP of the atmosphere (not just at the BOTTOM of the atmosphere).
GHGs at the TOP will affect the radiative balance there (ie the heat blance since there is no evaporation/conduction/convection to outer space). And any heat imbalance at the top will eventually impact the heat balance at the bottom.
Tim Folkerts says, August 25, 2016 at 11:12 AM:
Will they indeed? Since the atmosphere’s IR-active constituents are what enables it to radiate its heat to space in the first place, it would seem logical that the atmosphere would be better at radiating its heat to space if you were to increase their concentration where the atmospheric emission to space mostly takes place – at the levels where the bulk air is thin enough to ‘allow’ proper release of internal energy in the form of radiant heat to our planet’s surrounding void.
You know of course, Folkerts, that it’s not supposed to BE a radiative/heat imbalance at the ToA as the concentration of your so-called “GHGs” goes up. Only Z_e and T_s are supposed to change, not T_e:
http://www.climatetheory.net/wp-content/uploads/2012/05/greenhouse-effect-held-soden-2000.png
Your “imbalance theory” would only work if all other processes within the dynamic troposphere remained constant during one particular radiative change. Back to the double-pane window situation …
Do you see the (purely hypothetical) “raising of the effective radiating level (ERL) as you increase the atmospheric content of so-called “GHGs”” mechanism in operation anywhere, Folkerts?
Why is there a seeming positive radiative imbalance at the ToA today? Is it because of reduced OLR? Or is it because of increased ASR?
“Is it because of reduced OLR?”
OLR has slightly reduced lately over ~11 years of CERES EBAF 2.8. As I pointed out to Kristian in earlier thread, Earth OLR has slightly reduced within CI per the CERES team latest published paper using their own EBAF data correctly (2016 paper from principal investigator Loeb website).
Ball4 says, August 26, 2016 at 8:12 AM:
Er, CERES EBAF Ed2.8 spans 16 years of OLR data, Ball4. It has NOT “slightly reduced”. If you cherry-pick your end points, you may of course find whatever you want, and OLR did indeed go down somewhat from, say, 2002-2003 to 2012-2013. But so did tropospheric temperatures. And that’s the point: The OLR simply follows tropospheric temps over time.
Also, Ball4 likes to compare GLOBAL TLT with TROPICAL OLR to draw his conclusions.
And Ball4 still doesn’t understand that CERES have used their data “correctly” the entire time. Ed2.8 was no exception. It’s a fully validated dataset. What they do is simply releasing new upgrades of their data and algorithms.
And yet their newest version (Ed4) is close to identical with Ed2.8. As I’ve shown Ball4 on at least a couple of occasions already.
Kristian, for someone confuses IR with heat and thus draws faulty conclusions there is little confidence you have used the EBAF data fully in compliance with the known instrument calibration techniques the CERES team has published. One way to build confidence is if you demonstrated that in the exact same time frame your method replicates CERES team results in PI Loeb’s website latest paper.
See Sec. 3.0 all 10 dots.
http://ceres.larc.nasa.gov/documents/DQ_summaries/CERES_EBAF_Ed2.8_DQS.pdf
Kristian
I am sorry if some of my posts annoy you. I have read through your study of the two African cities and did my own research on it.
The one value you use I am not sure where you are getting this one. The 175 W/m^2 solar input into both the cities. I looked at the graph from CERES on your link but the resolution would be too large to get specific data for a city location.
I used this resource:
http://www.gaisma.com/en/location/kisangani.html
It has ground measurements for the city themselves of incoming solar flux. I used an albedo of concrete of 0.2 for both cities since on photo images they looked similar to get the actual heating solar flux (no reflected).
I put all the data on an excel sheet to calculate things and I did arrive at the fact that the Khartoum tempreaure is higher when its incoming radiation is higher but lower when the incoming radiation is lower. I used measured values for the incoming solar but I used your given values for GHE. I think this would be variable as well since the Khartoum city gets higher humidity in summer months.
Here is the results: If they copy okay:
45.664 2.3
39.36 1
-14.664 -2.3
-51 -5.4
-53.336 -8.4
-63.328 -8.9
-49.336 -7.6
-41.256 -6.2
-32.968 -7.1
-23.328 -7
-5 -2.7
32 0.9
-45.664 -2.3
-39.36 -1
14.664 2.3
51 5.4
53.336 8.4
63.328 8.9
49.336 7.6
41.256 6.2
32.968 7.1
23.328 7
5 2.7
-32 -0.9
Norman, those two cities were just meant as projects for Dr. Strangelove here. My ‘study’ was rather one of comparing wide regions, the “Sahara-Sahel” and “The Congo”, as seen in this map:
https://okulaer.files.wordpress.com/2014/11/atl_avganntemp_afr-11.jpg
This is NOT a case of “Khartoum” vs. “Kisangani”. This is a comparison between two vast tracts of land.
You can read more here:
https://okulaer.wordpress.com/2014/11/16/the-greenhouse-effect-that-wasnt-part-2/
https://okulaer.wordpress.com/2014/11/16/the-greenhouse-effect-that-wasnt-part-2/#comment-389
Kristian
I did visit your website and read through some of your material on your page. Before going further I really have to know the way you got the information in your figure 4 which shows Congo having a higher absorbed energy than the Sahara (287 to 267). My problem with your Figure 4 is it does not match other resources.
I already linked to one that gives direct solar insolation at the surface.
http://www.gaisma.com/en/location/kisangani.html
When converting the numbers to W/m^2 I used this resource:
http://barani.biz/apps/solar/
I had around 200 W/m^2 insolation (not counting reflected just the raw incoming solar).
This is similar to this graph:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/Insolation.png
It shows the Congo around 200 W/m^2 insolation. If the surface is only receiving an annual maximum of 200 W/m^2 it becomes impossible to have a higher absorbed value of 287. The 200 is not what is getting reflected by the surface, tropical forests have an albedo or around 0.12.
I am not sure which resource is incorrect but until the issue is resolved your research can not be validated. The other resource would clearly show why Sahara is hotter than Congo and that is because it is receiving a lot more solar input.
Have a good day. Hope you can link me to the source of your Figure 4 data.
Norman says, August 26, 2016 at 9:33 PM:
Well, it says so right there in the diagram description. It’s from “CERES EBAF Ed2.8 ToA”. Once again, Norman, you would benefit (and save a lot of time and effort) from reading what I actually write before you start objecting to it.
The upper (yellow) curve is TSI at the ToA (not at the sfc), the middle (golden) curve is reflected SW at the ToA (not at the sfc), and the lower (white) curve is the “absorbed solar radiation (ASR)” below the ToA (not at the sfc), which is simply TSI minus reflected SW. Reflected SW derives from all reflective and scattering surfaces and molecules in the Earth systems, both in the troposphere (mainly clouds) and at the surface (in the Sahara, the surface albedo is pretty high, much higher than in the Congo, which you can verify by looking at Fig.5).
The 267.5 W/m^2 (Sahara-Sahel) and the 287.4 W/m^2 (the Congo) quantities are the ASR fluxes for the two regions in question, basically the solar heat from the ToA down, the incoming solar radiation actually absorbed by the Earth system. They are NOT surface quantities. They are total system quantities.
And so it is clear that the Earth system on average absorbs ~20 W/m^2 *more* solar heat from the ToA down in the Congo region than it does in the Sahara-Sahel region.
However, once you reach the actual surface, this Congolese surplus is gone. Why? Because the tropospheric column above the Congo contains a lot more H2O (water vapour and clouds) than the tropospheric column above the Sahara-Sahel, and so absorbs a lot more of the original ASR for itself.
Which is to say that the solar input (ASR) in the Sahara-Sahel is 267.5 W/m^2 at the ToA, but this is reduced to a mere ~175 W/m^2 at the surface, meaning the intervening atmosphere absorbed about 93 W/m^2 of the original input (268 – 175). Likewise, in the Congo, the solar input (ASR) at the ToA is 287.4 W/m^2, but at the surface this is reduced by 112 W/m^2 to ~175 W/m^2. So generally the same ASR at the surface as in the Sahara-Sahel, but reduced much more from the original input because of more H2O in the tropospheric column.
So where did I get the ASR_sfc = ~175 W/m^2 from? Again from CERES, only this time from “CERES EBAF Ed2.8 Sfc”.
ToA data:
http://ceres-tool.larc.nasa.gov/ord-tool/jsp/EBAFSelection.jsp?
Sfc data:
https://ceres-tool.larc.nasa.gov/ord-tool/jsp/EBAFSFCSelection.jsp
If you go over many of the recorded downwelling Infrared irradiance by pyrgeometers (NOAA climate monitoring), you will find that downwelling infrared irradiance is correlated with surface temperature virtually all the time. This is a subject that I have been looking at for quite sometime and looking for explanation. The only conclusion I have at this time is that pyrgeometers are inadequate climate instruments for measuring downwelling IR, particularly for nighttime.
By “correlated”, do you mean when variations between sites are compared? Or variations at a given site?
And are season variations included?
If seasonal effects are included, or if high lattiude sites are compared to low latitude sites, then of course surface temperature is going to be correlated with downwelling IR…
….because….
the warmer the airmass, typically the greater the water vapor content of the atmosphere, and so the stronger the downwelling IR.
So, again, maybe you can be more specific about what you are talking about?
The recorded data available show that if surface temperature increases, downwelling IR increases and vice versa. This is virtually always true at the seasonal and daily levels for a given site and for different sites as well.
That makes sense because the sky radiation is essentially a ‘mirror’ of energy at the surface as a result of the existence of the conductively derived lapse rate slope.
Sky radiation therefore contributes nothing to surface temperature being merely a lapse rate induced reflection of surface temperature.
As one moves up along the lapse rate slope to cooler regions the downward sky radiation declines at the same rate so that the sky radiation is always a reflection of the temperature along the lapse rate slope at any given height.
It is true that at any given point there can be a discrepancy but taking the atmosphere as a whole convection always ensures that over time sky radiation averages out to surface radiation.
If one points a pyregeometer at a cloud it will record the temperature along the lapse rate slope at which the cloud floats. There is often a discrepancy because there are constant distortions of the lapse rate slope causing it to be diverted to too warm or too cold by air movement involving advection and convection.
However for the system as a whole all such variations net out to zero.
Therefore no net surface warming effect from downward IR.
“If one points a pyregeometer at a cloud it will record the temperature along the lapse rate slope at which the cloud floats.”
I think you are oversimplifying Stephen, if you point your pyrgeometer at unclouded sky, it still reads a temperature, so you risk confusing those already challenged by the concept of “back radiation”.
It has more to do with the emissivities of the contents of the beam length the pyrgeometer is viewing. Of course water droplets in cloud are a biggie, water vapor next, CO2 less, etc.
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/1520-0450(1970)009%3C0365%3AFETFWV%3E2.0.CO%3B2
DM,
If you point it at a cloudless sky it will record the temperature at which the optical depth of the clearer atmosphere triggers the sensor which is invariably at a much higherr colder point along the lapse rate slope than the cloud in question.
Stephen,
This however is not what the science says. The science explains through the simplified expressions that forcing is independent of surface temperature. By mathematical integration of forcing, then downwelling infrared must be independent of surface temperature. This is not what is observed. I concluded that pyrgeometers are unsuitable instruments for measuring backradiation.
Nabil:
When you turn on a stove under a pot of water, that “forcing” does not depend upon the temperature of the water. But if you do it many times you will find that the forcing is correlated with water temperature.
-Roy
Nabil:
Simple reason. Surface temperature is well correlated with lower atmospheric temperature. (It would be astounding if that were not true!) Downwelling IR varies directly with lower atmospheric temperature.
No one says so in the literature, you are the first.
Nabil: Seriously?
The concept that radiative output increases with temperature has been in textbooks (with equations!) for over a century. Certainly not a new idea with me.
The idea that lower atmospheric temperature would be similar to surface temperature, higher when the surface temperature is higher, lower when the surface temperature is lower, is so obvious that any schoolchild would understand.
Forcing is independent of temperature based on the IPCC reports. It is a function of concentration of greenhouse gases. Forcing is variation of radioactive output of the sky. Its mathematical integration yields to sky downwelling infrared irrdiance, or backradiation, independent of temperature as well. This is not what is observed.
Correction… radiative instead of radioactive.
Prepare to be astounded. Study figure 2 carefully. DWIR correlates only slightly but also tardily with UWIR under insolation. This despite the fact that TSI is over 1/2 IR and this is largely absorbed by the atmosphere.
We clearly have differing definitions of “astounded” since these graphs behave exactly as I would expect.
Hi Tim,
My comment was addressed to Ed, above. Did you read his? Or do you consider the plot to be “well correlated”?
I’m assuming UWIR to be determined by surface temperature, and to vary proportionally to that.
mpainter, originally Nabil was surprised that DWIR is related to *surface* temperature (as opposed to air temperature, I suppose). Ed explained that since DWIR is related to air temp, and air temp is related to surface, it is completely expected that DWIR is related to surface temperature.
Is there something here you disagree with? Certainly in summer both air and surface tend to be warm; in winter both tend to be cool. Even in the graph, DWIR and UWIR hit a minimum just before dawn (coolest air and land) and max out in the mid to late afternoon (warmest air and land). There is a bit of a lag in hte afternoon, but it still sounds well correlated to me.
Tim, you should consider my comment again. It referred specifically to figure 2. I don’t want to repeat my comment.
mpainter:
Let’s see … The sun comes up in the morning and starts warming the surface, as the majority of the solar radiation passes through the atmosphere and is absorbed by the surface.
This is true even for the shortwave infrared (< 4 um) in the solar radiation — while more of this is absorbed in the atmosphere than is true for visible light, still a substantial majority of the SWIR passes through.
By the way, this is the reason for the greenhouse metaphor (and it is only a metaphor). The GHGs largely let the solar energy through, but inhibit the escape of the energy from the surface — albeit by radiative inhibition, not convective inhibition.
So as the surface temperature increases and its UWIR increases, soon the lower atmospheric temperature starts to increase — by conductive, convective, and radiative transfer — with some lag.
And have you ever actually done correlation calculations? Ever written code to calculate correlations of data sets? If you had, you would understand that the DWIR and UWIR curves are highly (but not perfectly) correlated.
Please demonstrate some basic competence and comprehension if you are going to comment here!
Looking at fig. 2, I see poor correlation between UP and down IR flux during daytime. I also see poor manners in your insult, contrary to Roy Spencer’s injunction.
I agree with “Please demonstrate some basic competence”, which I do not consider a personal insult.
“You incompetent moron” would be an insult. -Roy
Still poor manners, and I think Ed Bo realizes that.
…and yet you lecture a PhD in meteorology with 25 years of climate research to “think it through”?
Roy, I meant no offense. Delete the offending comment, that’s fine with me.
###
I am mystified by the lag of Down IR with respect to Up IR, on the daytime plot. Perhaps this represents the lag in warming of the atmosphere with respect to surface radiation. or, as the surface warms, its emissions spectrum will alter slightly, perhaps. Anyone?
mpainter:
Please re-read my explanation above. I thought it was pretty clear.
Yes, and total UWIR includes the window component and other wavelengths not absorbed near the surface. Thus the slight DWIR response. Also, a locale with higher humidity might show a different curve, one with a more responsive DWIR flux. I would like to see such a comparison for the humid tropics. All sorts of considerations come to mind.
Ed Bo says, August 23, 2016 at 12:50 PM:
Yes, Ed Bo. Causal chain: higher surface T_avg -> higher troposphere T_avg -> more apparent “DWLWIR”.
The “DWLWIR” is a radiative expression of air column temperature. It is NOT a cause of surface temperature.
Krisitan,
Could you please explain of what you mean with apparent DWLWIR, thanks.
“DWLWIR” is perceived as a distinct macroscopic power density flux (W/m^2) of radiant energy, from the atmosphere to the surface. It’s not. The instruments allegedly “measuring” it don’t. They COMPUTE it. They measure (as in DETECT) the radiant heat flux (‘net LW’) between the instrument sensor and the air layers above, plus the sensor temperature. From a blackbody assumption, they then calculate the thermal radiance (the “UWLWIR”) of the sensor and finally subtract the detected radiant heat flux value from this calculated radiance and derive an apparent “DWLWIR” from the air. But the number appearing in the display after this operation is an entirely computed one.
I Agree, it is not measured. Pyrgeometers are programmed to display virtual backradiation. That is why I am presently disputing the first paper claiming to have measured down welling infrared irradiance or backradiation by
“Sidney, C. S., and F. Schwartzmann, 1954: An Infrared Detector for Measurement of the Back Radiation from the Sky. Journal of Meteorology, 11, 121-129”
Would you like to have a copy of my paper that is currently being reviewed?
Downward IR is obviously related to the average temperature of the entire atmospheric column above an observation point fixed at the surface.
Equally obviously there will be variation related to the average height within the atmospheric column from which it emanates. The more opaque the atmosphere is to IR the lower the height and the higher the temperature.
However, one must take note that the temperature along the lapse rate slope is derived primarily from energy received at the surface (by oxygen and nitrogen)from solar radiation and then conducted upwards through the mass of the atmosphere.
So it is primarily the non radiative gases of oxygen and nitrogen that determine the temperature along the lapse rate slope at any given height.
Radiative material in the atmosphere (including GHGs) then simply rises above or falls below the lapse rate slope depending on its temperature relative to the temperature of the surrounding non radiative gases.
For the atmosphere of the planet as a whole convection always ensures that on average there is as much radiative material above the lapse rate slope as below it for a zero net effect on surface temperature.
Stephen do you believe there is a GHG effect? I do but as I have said it is a result of the climate.
The Greenhouse Effect is a result of conduction and convection (non radiative processes) and not radiation. I’m sure it was taught as such in the 1950s
Like with the glass roof of a greenhouse descending air in high pressure cells inhibits convection so that the surface beneath gets hotter than it otherwise would at any given level of solar input. At any given moment half the earth’s atmosphere is descending so that is a lot of greenhouse effect.
Furthermore descending air dissipates clouds to let more solar radiation reach the surface in the same way as the glass greenhouse roof lets solar energy in.
Such a similarity to an actual greenhouse was the original derivation of the concept. Nothing to do with downward IR at all.
Sky radiation is simply a mirror of surface radiation or rather of radiation from above any point along the lapse rate slope.
It can only heat the surface (or make the surface cool more slowly) if the air above the surface at some point along the lapse rate slope is warmer than it should be for its height along the lapse rate slope.
For the globe as a whole such air is equally matched by air along the lapse rate slope colder than it should be for its height so it all nets out to zero.
In both situations any thermal effect on the lower location is neutralised by advection and convection.
That is what weather is. The constant neutralising of thermal imbalances (whether radiative or conductive) by advection and convection.
The outcome is an atmosphere in long term hydrostatic equilibrium
http://www.newclimatemodel.com/neutralising-radiative-imbalances-within-convecting-atmospheres/
An excellent post on the topic that will assist many commentators here.
Of course, there will always be a stuborn vociferous minority who refuse to listen to reason.
I expect some will cling to the work-wide conspiracy theory and claim that the Desert Rock
meteorologists are involved.
I have found that if horizontal movement of the atmosphere is absent then as the atmosphere warms up containing more water during the day then the surface heats up less but at night the surface cools down less if the atmosphere is warmer. The Sun can only warm the atmosphere or the surface but not both over 24 hours.
The discussion seems to be about land areas only. What about the 70+% of the Earth covered by water? We know DWLR can’t penetrate water.
Right, but that doesn’t fit the scheme, you see.
You are missing the point.
The measurements indicate 300+ Watts per share meter downward IR at the site.
Do you imagine this disappears if you move over water?
square meter
oldbrew:
You say “We know that DWLR can’t penetrate water.”
DWLR can’t penetrate dirt, rock, or sand, either.
For that matter, we know that solar radiation can’t penetrate rocks. That’s why rocks left in the desert sun don’t get hot.
Oh, wait…
Rocks don’t cool evaporatively, unless they are wet. Your smart guy comparison flops.
I can never figure out why this mistaken idea can’t just die out!
Yes, all of the DWIR gets absorbed in a very thin surface layer. Also, all of the UWIR gets emitted in a very thin surface layer. If there was no DWIR, then much more energy would be emitted by that surface layer of the oceans. So the oceans would cool.
The oceans do cool, but mainly evaporatively. The thermal inertia of the oceans is not due to DWIR, which is absorbed at the surface and quickly re-emitted as latent energy. This thermal inertia is not accounted for in the present misconceived GHE. True, oceans cool partially by IR, but this emission derives from insolation, in the main. Remember, solar IR (SWIR) is absorbed within the first mm.
oh, please…evaporation also only occurs at the surface, same as IR absorption/emission. Why does this “IR doesn’t penetrate the surface” meme still exist?
Of course evaporation occurs at the surface. I never said otherwise. My point is that, the physics of the sea surface properly considered, the GHE has no effect on SST. The energy of DWLWIR incident on the surface is transient and is not transferred to depth. And the sea surface cools mainly through evaporation. DWIR enhances evaporation. The sea surface IR flux is exaggerated. Earth energy budget charts exaggerate surface IR flux. The GHE is misconceived.
In short, if SST owes nothing to DWLWIR, where now is your GHE, i.e., warming of the surface? The GHE moderates the diurnal temperature range.This is confirmed by observations.
Not all that condenses to droplets falls out of the sky to hit the earths surface. Some of it evaporates as it falls. Even clouds appear/disappear with evaporation being involved. So “only occurs at the surface” is a bit of a stretch.
oldbrew
I have some news for you. DWLR does not penetrate solid Earth either so what is the point?
If you have water at 30 C it will be radiating away almost 459.7 Watts/m^2 (used emissivity of 0.96). Without any GHG or DWIR the surface would need to get a resupply of this loss of energy from its internal supply of joules so the whole body of water will start cooling. With the DWIR the surface has two sources of joules. It will still radiate at 459.7 Watts/m^2 but now it is getting 300 Watts/m^2 from the sky so it only needs to use 159.7 watts of internal energy to maintain the UPIR flux, this will keep the whole body of water warmer and if you have a source of incoming energy (like the Sun) you will achieve a higher equilibrium temprarture. Hope that makes sense to you.
Nested wrong, please excuse. Water cools mostly through evaporation. The partition of surface energy loss for the ocean is evaporation – 60%; radiation – 30%; conduction – 10%. Radiation at the ocean surface is due to accumulated energy of insolation but is only partial, in a diurnal sense. The thermal inertia of oceans is not properly accounted for in the misconceived GHE.
Seems that everyone agrees that water is opaque to DWLWIR. The implications of this escape many. They believe that the GHE warms the oceans, which means that the atmosphere determines SST. But No. The opposite is the case: the oceans warm the atmosphere. The whole GHE is misconceived, based on the assumption that the GHE determines surface temperature, when in fact SST is determined by insolation alone.
In the tropical ocean surface temperature (SST) is 30-31 C max, and air temperature one or two degrees less. Yet the tropics has the highest GHE, according to ghg concentration. Whither surface warming?
The GHE is misconceived. In fact, it moderates air temperatures by reducing diurnal extremes. Compare humid tropics with dry Sahara.
Norman, water cools mainly via evaporation. You know this but ignore it.
as I mentioned above, evaporation only occurs at the surface, too, just like IR. Why do you persist with the “water is opaque to IR” argument?
and your claim that temperature is determined by solar insolation alone is contrary to basic physics. No physicist or thermodynamicist would try to compute the temperature of any system by addressing only the rate of energy input alone. Temperature always reflects a balance between energy inputs and outputs, and the greenhouse effect modifies the rate of energy output.
Roy,
The ratio of energy taken up by evaporation relative to the energy required to provoke evaporation is 5 to 1 at 1 bar atmospheric pressure (latent heat of vaporisation)
How, then, is any energy left over to heat the water when an evaporative event caused by downward IR occurs?
For any energy to be left over the latent heat of vaporisation would need to be less energy taken up by the phase change than is needed to induce it. The opposite of the accepted reality.
“Why do you persist with the water is opaque to IR argument?”
###
Because it is. DWLWIR only penetrates a few microns. For example, the 15 micron band is absorbed within the first four microns of the interface. This incident energy is returned via evaporation or radiation almost instantaneously. Evaporation rates in the tropics is several microns per minute. Think it through.
Repeat, DWLWIR makes no contribution to SST. Ergo, the enhanced GHE does not warm the surface.
OMG…did you really miss my point?? Evaporation only occurs at the skin of the surface, and so does IR. Yet you claim IR can’t affect ocean temperature because it only affects the skin?
“This incident energy is returned via evaporation or radiation almost instantaneously.” Oh, so you admit that water emits IR…but you don’t believe it absorbs IR? What’s up with that?
Also, if there is an increase downward IR, how does the water at say, 1 m depth “know” that the slight warming it is experiencing is due to increase IR or reduced evaporation? It doesn’t.
And I’m fully aware of how fast water evaporates over the ocean. Do you think a PhD in meteorology, and 25 yrs in climate research, needs to “think through” such things? You are getting dangerously close to being banned here…
Roy, trying to find a reason to ban me? You don’t need one, its your blog.
You cannot show that DWLWIR contributes to SST. Is that what’s got you riled?
I’ve already shown, in this and other posts, that downwelling IR changes the surface temperature of solid surfaces, and near-surface air temperature (this post).
Are you now requiring that it must also be demonstrated for a liquid surface? Really? What will you shift the goal posts to next?
Keep digging your hole deeper….
And Roy, at no time did I claim that water did not emit IR. I fact, I put IR at 30 % of ocean energy loss in a previous comment this thread.
well, if you admit water emits IR, it must also absorb IR. And if it absorbs IR, then downwelling IR radiation can change ocean temperature. Look up Kirchoff’s Law.
mpainter:
You miss several crucial things in your analysis of the water’s skin layer.
The most important issue is that if water absorbs all longwave infrared in the top few microns, it emits virtually all of its own longwave infrared from this same top few microns, since it is opaque to any LWIR emitted from lower layers.
At typical temperatures of 15C (288K), this emitted radiation is almost 400 W/m2. If there is no downwelling LWIR to counteract this, you have a pretty ferocious power imbalance in this surface layer. This would have to be made up by significant conduction from below.
Of course, in the real world, there is significant downwelling LWIR absorbed in this layer. To use typical numbers (e.g. from K&T), there is DWLWIR of 324 W/m2 and UWLWIR of 390 W/m2 for a radiative imbalance of 66 W/m2. So the DWLWIR typically reduces the radiative imbalance from 390 to 66, or by more than 80%. But note that the net radiative imbalance is still in favor of outward power.
When you quote that the water surface power losses are 60% evaporative, 30% radiative, and 10% conductive, you are using the NET radiative losses, which means you are including the DWLWIR from the atmosphere in the computations. Keihl and Trenberth, in their (in)famous diagram, show a total of 160 W/m2 losses from the (land and sea) surfaces to balance the solar gains, with 80 W/m2 (50%) evaporative, 396-333=63 W/m2 (39%) radiative, and 17 W/m2 (11%). Over the water alone, the evaporative would likely be somewhat greater, aligning with your numbers.
Note carefully that the DWLWIR flux density of 333 W/m2 is more than 4 times the evaporative loss flux density of 80 W/m2. So it simply CANNOT BE that all that DWLWIR does is cause more water to be evaporated.
You can show this experimentally by artificial addition of DWLWIR. LWIR lasers (10.6 micron wavelength) are quite inexpensive. Their radiation will penetrate only a few microns into the water. According to you, shining one of these down on the surface of the water should just increase evaporation from the surface without increasing its temperature. But that’s not what happens at all! You would find that you can increase the temperature all the way to boiling, at 100C.
Ed Bo.
The ‘downwelling’ you quote cannot be achieved with respect to the atmospheric window. You can’t have emissivity without broadband opacity. The ‘downwelling’ you quote is largely cancellation of horizontal vector components. The surface attempts to emit into a hemisphere. The resultant atmospheric effect is that energy arrives by parallel flux and can take advantage of short atmospheric paths but surface emissions, which curve towards the density gradient, never can. Always greater resistance to radiating to space as a function of geometry. Any physical mass above the surface will reduce the surface emissivity and raise equilibrium temperature and its physical existence to above the solid or liquid surface.
Ed Bo,
To obtain a realistic idea of energy loss of the oceans, you must partition it among evaporation, radiation, and conduction. Do this yourself, and see what you get.
mpainter:
I just did that! It’s hard to refrain from snark about you when you are so obtuse…
No, you did not partition energy absorbed as shown on the KT diagram as 396 W/sq m “absorbed by the surface” (as worded on the diagram). Who is the obtuse one?
I see that I shall have to do it for you:
396 X .60 = 238 W/sq m lost per evaporation at sea surface. What’s wrong with the KT diagram, O Name Caller? This is an intelligence test.
To put it another way, insolation absorbed at the surface is 160 Watts per sq m, DWLWIR is 333 W per sq m, for a total of 493 W per sq m absorbed by the ocean.
The KT diagram partitions the emission of this absorbed energy at 80 W per sq m via evaporation (about 15%), the rest attributed to radiation. None to conduction. What’s wrong with the KT diagram, O Name Caller?
Now remove that 333 W/m^2 DWLWIR. What will happen? 80 W/m^2 evaporation stops. But the water still emits 493 – 80 = 413 W/m^2. The solar input is only 160 W/m^2. So the water cools until its emission is down to 160 W/m^2 matching the solar input. And you claim DWLWIR does not warm the ocean?
mpainter:
High school dropout cashiers making change understand the difference between gross and net flows; why can’t you?
Most kids understand the associative property of addition and subtraction, where order of operations does not matter, by the time they are 10 years old, but this seems utterly beyond you.
K&T show the longwave radiative exchange between surface and atmosphere as counteracting gross flows (because these can be measured individually). They show the evaporative and conductive exchanges as net flows, because there is no feasible way of measuring the gross flows of these.
Oh, and when you say they show “None to conduction”, you are just displaying that you lack basic comprehension of this subject. They show 17 W/m2 as “Thermals”, which is conduction from the surface to the atmosphere, followed by upward convection. It almost exactly matches the 10% (of 160 W/m2 solar input) you cite. They agree with you here, but you can’t understand it!
So to repeat, when sources you quote (without ever actually citing) list 60% evaporative losses, 30% radiative, and 10% conductive, they are talking about net flows in all these cases, so 100% equals the solar input.
So they are subtracting the gross flows first. When K&T do this for combined land and sea, they get 50% evaporative, 39% radiative, and 11% conductive. This is completely in line with the 60%, 30%, and 10% you cite for !sea alone. But you cannot see it!
Dr SL, Hunh?
Ed Bo, the KT diagram shows 333 W/sq m of “back radiation absorbed by the surface” and 396 W/sq m emitted at the surface, radiatively. Not properly partitioned for the sea surface.
What you say in your comment is simply not what the KT diagram shows. The diagram does not play your pea shell game with your invented “net”, sorry.
So, try again on your partition problem. Let me know if you need help.
mpainter:
I am certainly not going to get any actual help from someone who does not possess the conceptual capability to understand making change in a purchase, understanding when it is necessary to use gross flows in an exchange, and when it is necessary to use net flows.
You keep citing this “60% evaporative, 30% radiative, 10% conductive” as if it were gospel, but you never provide any actual link or citation. The devil is in the details on this, and one of the key points in something like this is “X% of WHAT?” (What is the denominator? What is 100%? You never say!)
Ed Bo,
The difference between radiative potentials referenced to zero Kelvin and the true net losses and gains are deducible from the degree of thermal coupling. Only the net is ‘realised’ by the surface and only the net is ‘realised’ by the atmosphere. The surface effective radiative potential has been annihilated by the presence of this atmosphere such that long wave radiative heat transfer is rendered a product.
“You keep citing this 60% evaporative, 30% radiative, 10% conductive as if it were gospel, but you never provide any actual link or citation. The devil is in the details on this, and one of the key points in something like this is X% of WHAT? (What is the denominator? What is 100%? You never say!)”
###
100 % of what the KT diagram shows as radiation absorbed at the surface.
The authors Kiehl, Trenberth apparently partitioned the absorbed insolation roughly 60-30-10 but ignored this step for the 333 W/sq m of DWLWIR “absorbed at the surface” (as per diagram). Instead of trying to partition this “absorbed” radiation, the authors simply represent it as re-emitted to the atmosphere as IR.
By the way, the 80 W/sq m of latent heat of the KT diagram is a figure consistent with global precipitation totals. This is probably why the authors did not partition the “absorbed” back radiation. It would have implied global precipitation totals of over three times the actual total.
For the 60-30-10, I cited a partition study that is linked on an earlier thread, a year or so ago. You can look for it or you can figure out the KT partition scheme and use it.
Let me know if I can be of further service.
“It would have implied global precipitation totals of over three times the actual total.”
The partitioning of the KT09 333 all-sky LW emission to surface does not imply 3x actual total mp, the partitioning implies 1x evapotranspiration emitted to surface as LH from condensation into rain:
17 downdraft thermals + 80 rain + 78 solar absorbed + 158 effective atm. = 333
mpainter:
As usual, you miss the point completely.
YOU regard 100% as the value of combined SW and LW input to the surface in K&T.
I asked for information about the (at this point alleged) source you keep referring to, without actually citing. The information you give does not help in searching.
So if you want to be of any service whatsoever — you haven’t been any so far, so “further” is not warranted, you will provide an actual citation with a link. (I’m not at all sure you can do it…)
B4
You misunderstand “partitioning”. This has to do with the ocean surface giving up energy in its various forms. It has nothing to do with the radiation absorbed by the ocean, nor any aspect thereof.
Ed Bo,
I’ve helped you all I can. You’re on your own from here.
mpainter writes you did not partition energy absorbed as shown on the KT diagram
Therefore I used partition according to mpainter use.
With quotes not deleted:
mpainter writes “you did not partition energy absorbed as shown on the KT diagram”
Therefore I used partition according to mpainter use.
Concerning partitioning of energy loss at the surface, global precipitation serves as an absolute constraint on latent energy loss, and we have reasonably accurate estimates of this. This amounts to about 80 W/sq m, globally. If 333 W of back radiation (per KT diagram) is summed to the 161 W of insolation, the sum is 494 W “absorbed by the surface” (in the words of the diagram). Partitioning this to yield a latent energy figure using 50% as the ratio for latent energy loss, globally, we obtain 197 W.
Compare this 197 W with the 80 W and the problem becomes obvious. Kiehl, Trenberth had no choice but to diagram the 333 W of back radiation “absorbed by the surface” as emitted as IR. They had run out of latent energy.
As a per cent of 494 W/sq m “absorbed at the surface” 80 W calculates to 16%, as the partition ratio of latent energy loss.
Thus we have observational means of testing KT type energy diagrams. It is clear that latent energy loss is accounted for by insolation alone. By this, the “back radiation absorbed at the surface” is grossly over stated.
Begging your pardon, I miscalculated. The figure should be 247 W as latent energy loss, not 197 W: 494 X .5 = 247.
Compare this to the observational constrained 80 W.
B4, you seem to be partitioning the 333 W of back radiation into its atmospheric sources. This diversion notwithstanding, the question remains the partitioning of energy loss at the_surface_, i.e., latent, radiation, conduction/sensible heat.
Ball4 does that. He/she thinks latent heat transfer is 100W/m-2 up and the same returned such that only radiation balance exists!
mpainter:
So you admit you have no source, and you still don’t understand the associative property of addition and subtraction as a 10 year old can.
I thought so!
Nothing but snark, Ed Bo?
Provide a link to your (supposed) source!
Put up or …
Ah! You want a link. But why?
Surely you do not dispute that evaporation is the primary means of ocean energy loss.
If you know this fact, you need nothing else to to inform you of the error in the KT type diagrams.
Make up your own partition ratios. Put the latent energy loss ratio at a ridiculously low figure, say, 35 %, thusly:
161 W (insolation) + 333 W (back radiation) = 494 W (total “radiation absorbed by the surface”)
494 W X .35 = 174 W
Now, compare this to the 80 W that is observationally constrained. Over twice as much. Clearly, the observed latent energy loss at the surface confirms the error of the KT type energy budget diagrams.
mpainter you were talking about global precipitation which comes from the atm., now writes: “the question remains the partitioning of energy loss at the_surface_, i.e., latent, radiation, conduction/sensible heat.”
The partitioning of energy loss 493 from the surface is easily shown in the KT09 cartoon, explained in the text, only the 333 is not partitioned or explained in the text so I filled that work in for you. There is not a 3x imbalance in any loss item.
mpainter, “Clearly, the observed latent energy loss at the surface confirms the error of the KT type energy budget diagrams.”
It does not confirm anything of the sort. It only shows mpainter can not add and subtract or do percentages correctly as Ed notes.
17 downdraft thermals + 80 rain + 78 solar absorbed + 158 effective atm. = 333
17 updraft thermals + 80 evaptransp. + 396 effective surface = 493
333 + 161 = 494. 494 – 493 for the ~0.9 net absorbed. Pretty cool.
Inspection shows 80 evaptransp. balances the 80 LH from rain. 100%. And…AND the 17 thermals are 100% balanced updraft and downdraft.
B4, math is spurious. The sources of the back radiation “absorbed by the surface” are not of account in the partition of energy loss at the surface.
Yours is the same pea shell game of Ed Bo and others here who maintain that back radiation can be “absorbed by the surface” without accounting for that energy in the partition of energy loss at the surface.
mpainter:
You still don’t get it. K&T shows NET evaporative losses of 80 W/m2 (they have no way of measuring gross evaporation and gross condensation), NET radiative losses of 63 W/m2 (here they can measure 396 up and 333 down, and yes, these figures are from real measurements), and NET conductive/convective (labeled “thermal” in the diagram, since you could not make the connection by yourself) of 17 W/m2 — this is shown as a NET value, not as a larger gross upward value (mostly daytime) and a smaller gross downward value (mostly nighttime).
Because you don’t understand the associative property as well as most 10 year olds do, you don’t understand that this 50%, 40%, 10% split of NET losses from the surface is well in line with what you are claiming — from some source that you continually refuse to cite.
mpainter writes, “without accounting for that energy in the partition of energy loss at the surface.”
I and others have accounted for that energy in the partition of energy loss at the surface as anyone that can add and subtract like Ed’s 10 y.o. can plainly see. There is no missing pea… well except for that little fella’ 0.9 which some claim to have found running around in the observable ocean.
Ed Bo: “You still dont get it. K&T shows NET evaporative losses of 80 W/m2 (they have no way of measuring gross evaporation and gross condensation)..”
###
What a statement!! Most assuredly gross precipitation, worldwide, is known to within reasonable accuracy. You should know that!!
Your whole argument is based on the repetition of the word “Net”. YET not once is this word used in the KT diagram or any other such diagrams. No pea shell math for Kiehl, Trenberth.
And now we see that mpainter does not understand the difference between condensation (“dew”) and rainfall…
What is your point? That rainfall is not condensation?
My point is that you don’t understand the difference between gross and net flows even to the level required to be a cahsier.
You don’t understand the associative property well enough to know that people who do their mathematical operations in a different order than you do can still be right.
What about fog. You forgot about fog, did you not? Fog is condensation. Tsk, Tsk you missed a golden opportunity to blow more smoke and….fog.
mpainter is an expert on fog now. I’ve heard the morning sun burns off fog droplets mp, is that why mp thinks fog is missed in the balances? Or is sun burning off the fog just folklore, does mp even question that?
Oh and why are fog lamps on cars sometimes yellow mp? Is that sound physics?
B4, correct, fog is condensation but the moisture remains in the atmosphere, returned thereto as wv. In fact, much condensation (cloud) is re-evaporated, entirely immeasurable but of no consideration when determining the partition of latent energy loss at the surface. I note that you caught the allusion in my comment above.
Meaning the allusion in the phrase “blowing more smoke and…fog.”
mpainter:
You say: “Your whole argument is based on the repetition of the word Net. YET not once is this word used in the KT diagram or any other such diagrams. ”
You obviously have not read their papers. Their is long accompanying text explaining what is in the diagram, with sections like: “Your whole argument is based on the repetition of the word Net. YET not once is this word used in the KT diagram or any other such diagrams.”
When you looked at the diagram, you didn’t even understand the most basic idea that “thermal” meant conductive transfer. So you are in no position to lecture anyone else about what that diagram means!
Well, Ed Bo, I have been presenting my views, which presentation you characterize as as “lecture”. I do not mean to “lecture” anymore than other commenters mean to. If I were to lecture, I believe that I would choose the topic of “manners”.
Your assumption that I did not read Kiehl, Trenberth is correct. Nor do I intend to read it. I have closely studied their energy budget diagram and note the absence of the word “net” on that diagram, your profuse employment of that term to interpret that diagram notwithstanding.
If their study advanced the claim that back radiation is absorbed (as per “333 W back radiation absorbed by the surface” stated on their diagram) without the absorbed energy being returned accountably to the atmosphere (as in partitioning), then I wholly reject that claim as violating fundamental physics. Implicit in such a claim is that the energy of back radiation “absorbed by the surface” is not subject to the same rules of physics that the energy of insolation is subjected.
Ed Bo, I agree that the “thermal” portion of the diagram probably refers to the ratio of surface energy loss attributable to conduction/sensible heat. I do not understand their preference for that term rather than “conduction” or “sensible heat”, for I regard “thermal” as an alternate term for atmospheric convection.
I agree with you that the “thermal” of their diagram represents a partition of the energy of insolation only, with the “333 W back radiation absorbed by the surface”) ignored in their partitioning (except it is summed with the partitioned insolation ratio emitted as IR).
mpainter:
You started this whole exchange with your “Prepare to be astounded” snark, so you probably shouldn’t be going on about “manners”.
Now you admit you haven’t read, and are not going to read, any of the accompanying text to the K&T diagram you dispute — and which you demonstrably did not understand all of (no convection, indeed!).
Do you realize what this makes you look like?
I studied the KT diagram. I doubt that I missed anything important.
Ed Bo, I should thank you for calling to my attention that the “thermal” of the KT diagram in fact represented conduction/sensible heat and not some vague convective diagramatic. This throws new light on the KT energy budget diagram.
This signifies that Kiehl, Trenberth in fact did partition the energy loss of the surface but only in a restricted sense: the partition ratios, summed, equal to insolation: 17 W (thermal) + 80 W (latent energy) + 63 (IR) = 160 W (insolation).
They utterly neglected to partition the energy of “333 W back radiation absorbed by the surface”. What they did instead was to first partition the _total_radiation_absorbed_ (“absorbed by the surface”) then treated only the lesser fraction of that (insolation) in their partition of surface energy loss.
One cannot doubt that the authors realised that the 80 W/sq m constraint of latent heat loss made it impossible to partition the “333 W back radiation absorbed by the surface”. Good grief.
Why is the net Solar less than 850 watts per square meter around mid summer at noon in Nevada?
Answer: Part reflection.
Look up “albedo”
Don’t be silly.
gbaikie
doctor no is quite correct with this.
Here is a link. The upwelling solar (not absorbed by surface) is 200 watts which would be subtracted from the incoming 1000 watts from the Sun.
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/webdata/tmp/surfrad_57bd2432c7a91.png
correct. For example, the Sahara Desert loses more total radiation than it gains from the sun, partly because the sand is so bright. The net radiative deficit is made up for by persistent subsidence warming of the troposphere, driven by moist convective ascent thousands of miles away.
“The net radiative deficit is made up for by persistent subsidence warming of the troposphere, driven by moist convective ascent thousands of miles away”
Quite so.
Now take that concept to the logical conclusion and reread my material.
Works in reverse too which is why the net global effect is zero
Dr Spencer, I noted your similar comment on WUWT about the Sahara and I wondered if the Sahara sand had a variable emissivity. NASA has used a S-13G white paint on electronic boxes for many years. The paint has a high emissivity for sunlight and a low emissivity for long wave radiation that allows the electronic box to reflect sunlight and radiate longwave at the same time. One thing that many people don’t notice is in the derivation of the thermal balance equations, they are often simplified by assuming that both surfaces have the same emissivity. When two surfaces are separately by a substantial temperature and the low temperature surface has a variable emissivity such as the S-13G paint, the lower temperature surface can radiate to the higher temperature surface.
yes, I’ve heard about this before regarding the use of paints with differing emissivities. (btw, “emissivity” refers to infrared, “reflectivity” should be used for solar).
Norman your answer is not silly, but it does not alter that doctor no reply as being silly.
Now, where the graph which includes direct and indirect sunlight?
gbaiki
“Now, where the graph which includes direct and indirect sunlight?”
Who is being silly?
Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D. says, August 24, 2016 at 5:09 AM:
You recently stated this also on WUWT. And there I asked you the following:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/08/20/putting-it-on-the-line/#comment-2282526
You never responded. Do you mind doing it here instead …?
(Quoted) Downwelling IR from the sky continuously maintains surface temperatures well above what they would be without greenhouse gases. (End quote)
No. This is incorrect, as evidenced by your Fig 2. Note that the net IR is always negative. That is the very reason why the downwelling IR cannot be claimed to be keeping the surface warmer than it would be otherwise, because the upwelling IR is always greater.
If you spend more money than you earn, can you claim you are becoming wealthier? No, of course not, as that is nonsensical. But that is exactly what you are claiming, Dr. Spencer.
Look at it this way: If the atmosphere was completely transparent to IR energy, and completely incapable of absorbing or transmitting IR energy, the atmosphere would still warm via conduction with the planets surface, but it would not possess any means of cooling itself by radiating IR to space. Those conditions would result in a situation such as exists on Venus, a planet with an atmosphere incapable of effectively cooling itself to space, where surface temperatures are extremely hot.
Yes, our planets atmosphere is IR active, but it does not keep our planet warmer, it keeps our planet cooler. It is our planets refrigeration system!
Have a nice day.
jjfox,
There is an inconsistency with the signs in Figure 2. It would be more consistent to list upwelling IR as negative, since it is power flowing OUT of the surface. If the signs were consistent, then you would add all three to get “Net Total” and you would add the two IRs to get the “NET IR”
However, on the graph:
(Net Total) = (Net Solar) + DWIR – UWIR.
(Net IR) = DWIR – UWIR
The point is that if DWIR was removed, then the NET IR would be *even* *more* *negative*. There would be *even* *more* *cooling*.
It’s standard nomenclature, used by all experts in the field…just like “lapse rate” as a positive number represents the negative change in temperature with height.
–Look at it this way: If the atmosphere was completely transparent to IR energy, and completely incapable of absorbing or transmitting IR energy, the atmosphere would still warm via conduction with the planets surface, but it would not possess any means of cooling itself by radiating IR to space.
Those conditions would result in a situation such as exists on Venus, a planet with an atmosphere incapable of effectively cooling itself to space, where surface temperatures are extremely hot.–
The earth atmosphere is warmed by the surface being warmed by sunlight and is cooled by the surface becoming cooler by radiating into space.
At 5.5 km [18,000 feet] of elevation one has about 1/2 of the atmosphere mass above it, and 1/2 below it. Or the pressure is
1/2 of sea level pressure of 14.7 psi [1/2 being, 7.35 psi].
Roughly the atmosphere cools by 6.5 C per 1000 meters elevation.
At 5.5 km the air is 5.5 times 6.5 = 37.75 C cooler.
So if air temperature at surface is 37 C, 18,000 feet above it will
be about 0 C.
So one have empty parking lot with the asphalt at around 60 C and have air at about 37 C and 5.5 km up the air will be about 0 C.
And this rather common. Typical summer day almost anywhere- and
it’s somewhere around noon or midday. In morning and late afternoon the asphalt will cooler than 60 C, and likewise the air above the ground will be warmer after noon- cooler in morning and cooler before sun goes down. The air surface temperature follows the ground surface temperature And the air temperature at 5.5 km
above the surface air, moves up and down in temperature relative
to surface air temperature.
One can see this by comparing ocean air temperature to land air temperature. The ocean surface rarely gets about 35 C, and air above doesn’t get above 35 C. Or if ocean surface temperature is about 20 C, air doesn’t get above this temperature nor get below it. Or at border of land and ocean- at the beach- then doesn’t get as hot and doesn’t get as cold compared to further inland.
Or in higher latitudes where is freezes [Not LA area:)] lakes can freeze while oceans only freeze if in polar regions.
Sorry, but you can’t just assume the results that you want and then use that as proof that your results are correct!
Sure a sunny parking lot in the summer could get to 60 C with just sunlight. Now show that the AVERAGE for the whole surface could be ~ 15 C with just sunlight. Only then could you use your (incorrect) reasoning to get a warm atmosphere above the surface.
–Sure a sunny parking lot in the summer could get to 60 C with just sunlight. Now show that the AVERAGE for the whole surface could be ~ 15 C with just sunlight. Only then could you use your (incorrect) reasoning to get a warm atmosphere above the surface.–
Well not going to get average of 15 C with sunny parking lots- they like the Sahara desert, they have net loss in terms of global average temperature.
A key aspect of why earth average temperature is 15 C, is because the tropics [particularly tropical oceans] is a large portion of Earth surface and it has average temperature well above 15 C.
Another aspect is tropical ocean region has ways of moving massive amount of heat outside of the tropics while maintaining it’s average temperature well above 15 C. It does this with massive ocean currents and large warm moist atmosphere. Or if was large warm dry atmosphere it would be less powerful in terms moving heat to the rest of the World.
The tropics has a long arms in terms of it’s ability to even being able to significantly warm the poles with it’s ocean currents and atmospheric circulation.
So if tropics were instead land areas mostly, the tropics would still be a warm region, but having it be mostly land region would limit it’s ability to transfer heat to rest of the world- and therefore the other half of the world would have much lower average temperature.
And basically the ocean absorbs all sunlight and holds it’s heat and lands regions are madly dumping their heat into space. The ocean saves money and the squanders it on a daily basis. The ocean has moderate temperature and land surface becomes warm during daylight even when there isn’t even a large amount of sunlight. Or 60 C parking lot isn’t unusual, getting up to 40 C is possible briefly near noon if have few warmer sunny days close to winter- even as far north as London or Paris- but this would not be possible without having higher average temperature in these regions caused by the Gulf Stream.
The whole GHE approach is misconceived. It attributes the thermal inertia of the oceans to the GHE and otherwise ignores the physics of the sea surface. This is error.
Ugh..why do you have to muddy the waters with such assertions? The thermal inertia of the ocean and the GHE are separate issues. The thermal inertia of the oceans partly determines *how long* it takes the climate system to reach energy equilibrium in response to a radiative forcing, such as that associated with the greenhouse effect. No one I know of “attributes the thermal inertia of the oceans to the GHE”. Also, climate models (for all their faults) do not ignore the physics of the sea surface…for example, evaporation and its dependence on temperature, wind speed, etc., is included. Where do you come up with this stuff? -Roy
I should clarify, my comment was carelessly put. By ocean, I meant the photic zone, the upper 100 meters. By thermal inertia of this I meant its slow accumulation of solar energy and retention thereof. Diurnally, SST varies by only a degree or two; there is no cooling until MOC circulation transports it poleward. This is my thermal inertia.
I did not mean to refer to the process of ocean overturning type thermal inertia.
@Tim Folkerts…”Now show that the AVERAGE for the whole surface could be ~ 15 C with just sunlight”.
Lindzen claims that without convection, direct solar radiation could heat the surface to around 70C.
I can accept that. I live in the province of BC, Canada, near the ocean in Vancouver. About 150 miles NE there is an area which has a pure desert climate. A town there, Lytton, has among the hottest temperatures in Canada.
I was camping there one day in summer and I have seldom experience direct solar radiation that hot. It was so hot we had to relocate. While traveling through a nearby town, we stopped in at a hotel to escape the heat.
I talked to the hotelier about the heat and he laughed. He claimed locals would locate thermometers in direct sunlight and watch them climb to 56 C then brag about how hot it was. On the day in question, it was above 40C in the shade.
The thing I noticed most was the complete lack of apparent convection. There was not a whiff of a breeze.
many years ago it was assumed that as the wind speed goes to zero, that evaporation over a water body ceases. But this led to unrealistic behavior in weather and climate models. Then they discovered that at what appear to be no-wind conditions, there is still small-scale turbulence which transports water vapor and maintains evaporation which is the same as if the effective wind speed was something like several meters per second. So, I suspect there was dry convective overturning still occurring…there had to be, with a strongly super-adiabatic lapse rate.
Roy,
Water vapour being lighter than air it rises spontaneously and creates its own microclimate with small scale turbulence that keeps the process going even if the surrounding air is still.
“Lindzen claims that without convection, direct solar radiation could heat the surface to around 70C. “
70 C sounds about right. For early afternoon. In the summer. With no clouds. That tells us nothing about the whole surface of the earth (other than it would be MUCH colder 70 C). Solar radiation alone is simply incapable of achieving a mean global temperature of 15 C.
jjfox
YOUR POINT: “Look at it this way: If the atmosphere was completely transparent to IR energy, and completely incapable of absorbing or transmitting IR energy, the atmosphere would still warm via conduction with the planets surface, but it would not possess any means of cooling itself by radiating IR to space. Those conditions would result in a situation such as exists on Venus, a planet with an atmosphere incapable of effectively cooling itself to space, where surface temperatures are extremely hot.
Yes, our planets atmosphere is IR active, but it does not keep our planet warmer, it keeps our planet cooler. It is our planets refrigeration system!”
Another poster named Kristian thinks along similar lines. I want to ask you how you conclude that an atmosphere that can’t radiate away would continue to warm. Via conduction the atmosphere could only get as warm as the surface. It would not get hotter than the surface below, now the surface below would not get as warm since it would now radiate away energy at a much faster rate and have less so in effect be much cooler, it would attain a surface temperature equal to the incoming solar.
Norman says, August 23, 2016 at 9:21 PM:
You STILL misrepresent my position, Norman! Can you please stop!?
You do remember we had our discussion(s) about this. Or don’t you?
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/07/record-warm-2016-what-a-difference-one-month-makes/#comment-217694
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/08/suggested-backyard-experiment-to-measure-the-greenhouse-effect-of-more-carbon-dioxide/#comment-220507
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/07/the-warm-earth-greenhouse-effect-or-atmospheric-pressure/#comment-219125
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/08/observational-evidence-of-the-greenhouse-effect-at-desert-rock-nevada/#comment-221158
You need BOTH atmospheric mass AND for that mass to be radiatively active in order to achieve an “atmospheric thermal effect” on the surface of a planet, Norman.
But after the massive atmosphere has become radiatively active, then atmospheric circulation has become operative and stable, and so only mass (and solar input) matters.
So, fundamentally, the atmospheric MASS (being warm and ‘slow’) is what helps the Sun set the surface T_avg of a planet. The atmosphere’s radiative properties are but a tool …
jjfox:
You say: “If the atmosphere was completely transparent to IR energy, and completely incapable of absorbing or transmitting IR energy, the atmosphere would still warm via conduction with the planets surface, but it would not possess any means of cooling itself by radiating IR to space. Those conditions would result in a situation such as exists on Venus”.
NO!!!
If the atmosphere was completely transparent and had no way of transferring energy to space, it would get no hotter (at least on average) than the surface. If it locally got hotter than the surface, it would transfer energy TO the surface (as often happens at night on earth).
With such an atmosphere, the surface could not over the long term transfer any energy to the atmosphere, so it must radiate as much energy through the atmosphere to space as it absorbs from the sun. This would result in surface — and atmospheric — temperatures far below what we actually have on earth.
Ed Bo
Totally agree with your comment. Are you a physics professor?
Norman:
I sometimes teach at the university level as an adjunct, but primarily I am a practicing technical professional, in fields that require me to master many areas of science and engineering.
Ed Bo said:
“If the atmosphere was completely transparent and had no way of transferring energy to space, it would get no hotter (at least on average) than the surface. If it locally got hotter than the surface, it would transfer energy TO the surface (as often happens at night on earth).
With such an atmosphere, the surface could not over the long term transfer any energy to the atmosphere, so it must radiate as much energy through the atmosphere to space as it absorbs from the sun. This would result in surface and atmospheric temperatures far below what we actually have on earth.”
That is not correct:
With such an atmosphere and at equilibrium all radiation coming in from space would indeed be lost to space via radiation from the surface but energy would previously have been absorbed by the non-radiative gases via conduction when the gases first became suspended off the surface.
That energy is then locked into the adiabatic portion of the convective overturning cycle indefinitely and adds to surface temperature. That is where the surface temperature enhancement above the S-B prediction comes from.
Any radiative imbalances within the atmosphere are then dealt with by air circulation adjustments that serve to deliver energy back to the surface at the correct speed to allow radiation out of the system to match energy coming into the system.
There are lots of variations over time due to variable internal thermal inertias but on average it all balances out so that the surface temperature represents the amount of energy required to both match energy in from space AND keep the overturning gases suspended off the surface
Stephen:
You say: “energy would previously have been absorbed by the non-radiative gases via conduction when the gases first became suspended off the surface.”
That’s a “one-off” effect (and it assumes the atmosphere started off colder…). Not relevant for steady state analysis. Does your chair constantly expend energy to keep you off the floor?
You continue: “That energy is then locked into the adiabatic portion of the convective overturning cycle indefinitely and adds to surface temperature. ”
Energy that is “locked into” a system has no effect on objects outside the system. It would therefore have no effect on surface temperature.
Averaged out in steady-state conditions, a transparent atmosphere would have a net energy transfer of zero with the surface. Therefore, the surface temperature is the same as it would be without an atmosphere (with a possible slight difference in a cyclic system due to its capacity Holder’s inequality).
You go on: “Any radiative imbalances within the atmosphere are then dealt with by air circulation adjustments…”
But there are NO radiative imbalances in a transparent atmosphere. There CANNOT be any! It’s transparent! In a cyclic day/night system, any energy transferred from surface to atmosphere in the daytime must be exactly matched by energy transferred from atmosphere to surface at night. There is no other place for the energy in the atmosphere to go! (This is unlike our own radiatively active atmosphere, which can reject energy to space by radiation.)
Such an atmosphere would still produce the same average surface temperature and show the same average lapse rate slope for two reasons:
i) Since gravity creates a density gradient in the vertical plane the ability of the atmosphere to conduct energy from the surface upwards declines at the same rate as the density declines and
ii) Lower density molecules that move upwards within the gravity field convert their kinetic energy to convectively available potential energy during the uplift process and since potential energy does not register as heat they cool at the same rate as height increases. The reverse in descent.
Thus, in the end, on average the radiative capability of an atmosphere makes no difference at all other than in the particular configuration of the atmospheric circulation required to maintain hydrostatic balance. The necessary changes in configuration are achieved by adjustments in convection and advection (weather).
An example of periodic such adjustments is Mars which has little or no water vapour to assist the energy transfer process. Instead, in the absence of the phase changes of water, the Mars atmosphere has to become much more violent than that of Earth to maintain thermal stability. Hence, periodic planet wide dust storms that alter albedo for a while until the thermal balance returns to neutral.
@Stephen Wilde…”Thus, in the end, on average the radiative capability of an atmosphere makes no difference at all other than in the particular configuration of the atmospheric circulation required to maintain hydrostatic balance”.
If you read Lindzen on that, he claims radiation takes place from the top of the atmosphere after heat has been transported there by mechanisms like clouds.
BTW…I’m still curious as to how hot air rises. The theory seems to go that hot air is less dense but that suggests a pocket of hot air stays together as a unit.
I wonder if there’s something in the properties of a hot air mass that causes it to resist dispersing into surrounding cooler air.
Think Hot Air Balloon. Is there significant atmospheric convection without the release of latent energy?
Gordon said:
“The theory seems to go that hot air is less dense but that suggests a pocket of hot air stays together as a unit.
I wonder if theres something in the properties of a hot air mass that causes it to resist dispersing into surrounding cooler air”
Correct. See parcel theory in meteorology:
http://www.srh.noaa.gov/jetstream/upperair/parcels.html
Ed Bo: Well explained. Thank you.
jjfox: On your financial analogy:
When you pay for a purchase with a large bill and the cashier offers you change, do you turn it down on the grounds that it could not help your net wealth?
That is in effect what you are arguing. With a steady salary analogous to the steady solar input, your spending is analogous to the upwelling infrared. Change back from your large bills is analogous to the downwelling infrared (less than upwelling, and only there if there is upwelling).
Just as getting change back from your large bills does result in a larger net wealth than not getting change, the DWIR does result in a higher surface energy level (and so temperature) than no DWIR, as would occur with a transparent atmosphere.
BTW,
for those who are fans of imperial units, I think you may better understand Roy’s graphs if you convert Watts per meter squared into:
horse-power hour per second per square furlong
or, you could use slug-feet per fortnight.
@dr no…”…horse-power hour per second per square furlong…
Technically, and don’t you just hate us Cliff types (from Cheers…and no…I’m not a mailman), the horsepower and watt measure the same thing. There are 746 watts in 1 HP.
Therefore it has to be horsepower per square furlong.
Unless you’re talking about watt-hours, which in the east end of London becomes wot-hours?
Cockney humour. Wots a bison? It’s somethin’ you wash yer ‘ands in, mite (aka mate).
Or, where did Napoleon hide his armies? Up his sleevies. Then again, that would be a metric joke since Napoleon was from the continent.
Technically, watts, horsepower and (horsepower*hr/second) all measure the same thing — power. There are 3600 hp in 1 hp*hr/sec. So the original statement was right all along …
The dry adiabatic lapse rate of 9.8C per km compared with the moist lapse rate of 6.5C per km is evidence that the presence of water vapour in the atmosphere slows the rate of surface cooling. The warming effect of clouds and/or water vapour at night should not be controversial regardless of the mechanism.
It is what happens during the day which is not so clear. The same clouds which delay cooling at night, reduce temperatures by blocking sunlight in the day. Similarly, locations which have low humidity levels (hot deserts) usually experience higher average day temperatures than those with higher humidity levels (eg Singapore).
@Ross Handsaker…”The same clouds which delay cooling at night, reduce temperatures by blocking sunlight in the day”.
I would like to know more about this but clouds are not technically water vapour, are they? Therefore, not technically GHGs.
I have heard that clouds are modeled as small lakes, a very thin layer of water.
In his book on Atmospheric Radiation, Craig Bohren, compared the temperatures picked up by a handheld IR meter to clear sky versus clouds. When pointed at clear sky, which would have water vapour, the meter indicated -50C, or so. When pointed at clouds, the temperatures indicated about -3C.
Clouds don’t seem to be addressed very well in the AGW theory.
Depends on cloud type, height, and optical depth. High cirrus warm because the ice crystals are transparent to swr but opaque to lwr. High dense cloud ‘cools’ via albedo and by lwr from the space side. Low thin cloud may net warm by trapping lwr more than reflecting albedo. Models do clouds very poorly. Essays Cloudy Clouds and Models all the way Down provide salient details.
There is a study which shows contrails reduce the diurnal temperature range, compared to a sky with none. This study incorporated data from the three days post 911, when air travel was banned in the US.
Mr a Spencer states “But, of course, it is the net IR (the sum of upwelling from the warmer surface plus the downwelling from the cooler sky) which must flow from higher to lower temperature, which it does.” Of course it does, which is why the greenhouse effect is falsified! The NET effect is that heat flows from hot to cold when only radiative energy transfer is involved. The Greenhouse Effect hypothesis claims not to slow the process or make the Net flow smaller it claims to REVERSE it. So 161Wm^2 incoming direct solar becomes 396Wm^2 outgoing surface radiation. He is not measuring “down welling radiation”, he’s just measuring radiation! Just because an atmosphere has a temperature, it will emit the corresponding radiation to go with it! Measuring that radiation output says nothing about what caused the temperature to be as observed.
His musings over measurements taken in one small location become even more disjointed when you consider the following points: water has a higher heat capacity than air. Of course it takes longer to cool down in humid conditions. He doesn’t bother to take readings during the day. He gives a good excuse for not doing so. I will give you a better one: it takes longer for humid air to heat up too!
If the greenhouse effect manifests itself locally from day to day changing with humidity, then we should expect MUCH bigger changes. The claimed effect of water vapour in the hypothesis is an AVERAGE of 27C based on 1% concentration in the atmosphere. Humidity can change the local content from between 0.2% to 4%. Are humid days 10-40C warmer than non humid ones? What about comparing two different locations of similar latitude and altitude but with different climates in regards to humidity? Deserts get both hotter and colder than rainforests. But compare the mean temperatures of minimum and maximum against one another and you will discover that they aren’t too different from one another. I’ve heard of a study that compared dozens of locations with another at equal latitudes and altitudes and the humid areas were in general slightly COOLER than the less humid ones.
Once again, a proponent of the Greenhouse Effect confuses the effect (warmer surface temperatures than the energy from the sun can provide) with the cause. Measuring more IR radiation on a humid night, simply confirms what we all know, that humid air takes longer to cool down than dry air. It does nothing for the fictional greenhouse effect other than confuse its advocates further.
as i have said before “You can lead a horse “
“Moisture laiden air parcel rises, cools at dry adiabatic lapse rate (~1oC/100m) until it reaches the dewpoint, at which point condensation occurs. After that, any further rise causes cooling at the moist adiabatic lapse rate (0.5 – 0.9oC/100m), because of the released latent heat.”
http://www.ldeo.columbia.edu/~martins/climate_water/slides/lapse_rate.gif
no, the heat capacities of moist and dry air are nearly the same. While it is true that water vapor has about 80% greater heat capacity than dry air, the amount of water vapor in air is tiny, so the impact on moist air heat capacity is tiny…about 1% or so.
Heat capacity of water
In liquid water, hydrogen bonds are constantly formed and broken as water molecules slide past each other. The energy to break the hydrogen bonds comes from the kinetic energy, or energy of motion, of the water molecules. The average kinetic energy of a group of molecules is called its temperature.
It takes a lot of heat to increase the temperature of liquid water because some of the heat must be used to break hydrogen bonds between the molecules. In other words, water has a high specific heat capacity, which is defined as the amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of one gram of a substance by one degree Celsius. The amount of heat needed to raise the temperature of 1 g water by 1 C is has its own name, the calorie. [Like in nutrition information?]
Because of its high heat capacity, water can minimize changes in temperature. For instance, the specific heat capacity of water is about five times greater than that of sand. The land cools faster than the sea once the sun goes down, and the slow-cooling water can release heat to nearby land during the night. Water is also used by warm-blooded animals to distribute heat through their bodies: it acts similarly to a cars cooling system, transporting heat from warm places to cool places, causing the body to maintain a more even temperature.
Heat of vaporization of water
Just as it takes a lot of heat to increase the temperature of liquid water, it also takes an unusual amount of heat to vaporize a given amount of water, because hydrogen bonds must be broken in order for the molecules to fly off as gas. That is, water has a high heat of vaporization, the amount of energy needed to change one gram of a liquid substance to a gas at constant temperature.
Waters heat of vaporization is around 540 cal/g at 100 C, waters boiling point. Note that some molecules of water ones that happen to have high kinetic energy will escape from water even at lower temperatures.
https://pl.khanacademy.org/science/biology/water-acids-and-bases/water-as-a-solid-liquid-and-gas/a/specific-heat-heat-of-vaporization-and-freezing-of-water
“Heat of condensation is measured only in gases. The amount of energy released by condensation is the exact same amount of energy required to make a liquid evaporate into a gas. For instance, 1 gram of water needs 600 calories of energy to transform from a liquid to a gas. This same amount of energy is released when water condenses back into water droplets from water vapor.
When heat is released by condensation, the air around the water droplets become warm. This heat continues to carry water vapor higher into a thunderstorm and rejuvenates the storm. This water then cools off and falls back through the cloud, keeping the storm active.
Latent heat is defined as heat released or absorbed as water changes phases between a solid, liquid and gas. The latent heat of melting is the energy absorbed by ice to make water, the latent heat of fusion is the energy released by frozen water turning into ice and the latent heat of vaporization is the thermal energy needed to evaporate water. The latent heat of vaporization is how human sweat cools a body when the substance evaporates and absorbs heat simultaneously.”
https://www.reference.com/science/latent-heat-condensation-69ddafaffb585067#
ren, why do you copy and paste a bunch of facts that have little or nothing to do with the point being made? I made a factually correct statement, “the heat capacities of moist and dry air are nearly the same” to counter you assertion, and put in simple terms why that is the case. You then launch into side issues related to density, buoyancy, the energy of phase changes, etc., which are separate from the point being discussed Why do you do that? It is simply a diversion and a waste of time. -Roy
Because the atmosphere is always seeking to hydrostatic equilibrium, and it is not a closed room. Imbalance causes local changes in air humidity.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_MEAN_ALL_NH_2015.png
Absorbed solar radiation is the difference between the incoming solar radiation at the top of the atmosphere and the outgoing reflected flux at the top of the atmosphere.
http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/atmosphere/radbud/gs19_prd.gif
@ren …”The average kinetic energy of a group of molecules is called its temperature”.
And temperature is a relative measure of thermal energy, which is heat.
At the same temperature, a column of dry air will be denser or heavier than a column of air containing any water vapor, the molar mass of diatomic nitrogen and diatomic oxygen both being greater than the molar mass of water. Thus, any volume of dry air will sink if placed in a larger volume of moist air. Also, a volume of moist air will rise or be buoyant if placed in a larger region of dry air. As the temperature rises the proportion of water vapor in the air increases, and its buoyancy will increase. The increase in buoyancy can have a significant atmospheric impact, giving rise to powerful, moisture rich, upward air currents when the air temperature and sea temperature reaches 25 C or above. This phenomenon provides a significant driving force for cyclonic and anticyclonic weather systems (typhoons and hurricanes).
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_vapor
— Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D. says:
August 24, 2016 at 7:25 AM
no, the heat capacities of moist and dry air are nearly the same. While it is true that water vapor has about 80% greater heat capacity than dry air, the amount of water vapor in air is tiny, so the impact on moist air heat capacity is tinyabout 1% or so.–
Moist air can have less than 1% water vapor concentration and if warmer at most it’s about 4%.
And water vapor is about 1.8 vs air being 1 KJ per kg per degree of K [or C].
The more significant aspect about water is it’s latent heat
and condensation of H20 as gas into liquid [or solid-ice].
Or instead of 1.8 KJ/Kg/K, if 1 kg of gas becomes liquid one gets 2257 kJ/kg of heat, and/or if becomes ice 1 kg of ice
makes 334 kJ/kg.
So sea level air being 1.2 kg per cubic meter has 1% water vapor – .012 kg of H20 gas into become liquid it is 27 KJ
or same amount energy needed to heat 1 cubic meter of air by 27 C.
It works the other way, take water and add .012 kg water per
cubic meters of air [make water become a gas via evaporation] and it cools the air by 27 C, which is what swamp coolers do. Or you need warm and unsaturated air
to cool with swamp cooler. Also cold air doesn’t hold much water vapor- not used to make a freezer type air temperature.
“Gaseous water represents a small but environmentally significant constituent of the atmosphere. The percentage water vapor in surface air varies from 0.01% at -42 C (-44 F)[16] to 4.24% when the dew point is 30 C (86 F).[17] Approximately 99.13% of it is contained in the troposphere. The condensation of water vapor to the liquid or ice phase is responsible for clouds, rain, snow, and other precipitation, all of which count among the most significant elements of what we experience as weather. Less obviously, the latent heat of vaporization, which is released to the atmosphere whenever condensation occurs, is one of the most important terms in the atmospheric energy budget on both local and global scales. For example, latent heat release in atmospheric convection is directly responsible for powering destructive storms such as tropical cyclones and severe thunderstorms. Water vapor is also the most potent greenhouse gas owing to the presence of the hydroxyl bond which strongly absorbs in the infra-red region of the light spectrum.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Water_vapor
I strongly feel the focus which is related to this discussion should be how, will and why will albedo change and to what degree?
I really think this is the single most important parameter when trying to nail down what direction the climate may be heading going forward.
In addition which this discussion is about is the balance between radiation coming into the earth and leaving the earth due to the GHG effect.
Of course those who believe that the GHG effect drives the climate say in simple terms that the GHG effect is causing less radiation in the form of IR to leave the earth which in turn is causing global warming.
I discount this because I believe this GHG effect is tied into the climate more then the climate being tied to it despite man’s contribution of late.
The historical climatic record I would say supports this conclusion thus far.
My approach given what I believe is to try to figure out future albedo and the climatic impact it may have.
I have come up with the thought that extreme prolonged minimum solar conditions in addition to causing less solar radiation to reach the surface of the earth will also influence the terrestrial items involved in the earth’s albedo in a direction which will serve to increase albedo.
The two thoughts
Less radiation concept – due to slightly less solar irradiance and volcanic activity increasing.
Albedo increase — due to secondary effects associated with prolonged minimum solar conditions which I have talked about many times which will cause the following terrestrial items to move in a direction which would promote a greater value for albedo.
Those terrestrial items being an increase in global cloud coverage, snow coverage and sea ice coverage.
Just a slight increase in the albedo would have significant climatic impacts.
So all I need to be correct here is basically is an increase in total cloud coverage, snow and sea ice coverage in response to prolonged minimum solar conditions.
Throw in an increase in major volcanic activity and the global temperatures will be heading down.
I think this process has already started with the ending of the recent strong El Nino, which is the main driver thus far in the global temperature response over the past few months which has been heading in a slightly down direction.
Things are so civilized here without “he who cannot be named”.
actually, “he who cannot be named” was considerably more civilized than a couple people I have banned recently.
@roy….”…of course, it is the net IR (the sum of upwelling from the warmer surface plus the downwelling from the cooler sky) which must flow from higher to lower temperature, which it does”.
Roy, IR is electromagnetic radiation. The 2nd law has nothing to do with IR, it is a statement about the direction of heat transfer. Clausius stated with great clarity, when he formulated the 2nd law, that heat, of itself, cannot be transferred from a cooler body to a warmer body.
When you talk about net IR you are talking about an alarmist theory that is not backed by physics. It is a theory proposed by alarmist scientists like Stephan Ramstorf who hangs out at real climate, where they snigger at your skepticism about catastrophic warming.
There is nothing in physics to account for net IR since it is essentially a meaningless term. When two nearby bodies of different temperature radiate, they radiate IR isotropically. Any ‘exchange’ is incidental since one body intercepts a fraction of the isotropic radiation of the other.
You are claiming that any IR intercepted by a body is absorbed and according to the 2nd law that is false. Only IR that has the proper frequency and intensity can be absorbed, and that satisfies the 2nd law if IR from the colder body is not absorbed by the warmer body.
I have not seen anyone on your blog deny that down-dwelling radiation exists, the bone of contention is that Kiehle-Trenberth are wrong as to it’s intensity and that it cannot warm the surface based on the requirements of the 2nd law.
KT have claimed there is an equal amount of radiation back-radiated. How? With all the IR radiated from the surface, which supposedly warms GHGs in the atmosphere, how can GHGs representing 1% of the atmosphere possibly return the same amount of IR radiated from the surface?
1) I agree with your initial statement about the 2nd Law.
2) “Net IR” is a commonly used term in radiative transfer that has nothing to do with “alarmists”. It is analogous to “Net solar”. Is that an “alarmist” term, too?
3) my only claim about the 2nd Law was that IR radiated from a colder sky toward warmer surface does not violate the 2nd Law, as is oftern asserted by the Sky Dragon Slayers.
4) If you “have not seen anyone on your blog deny that down-dwelling radiation exists”, then you must be new around these parts.
5) Regarding the K-T diagram, there is not an equal amount back-radiated. Downwelling IR from the atmosphere arriving at the surface is almost always less than upwelling IR from the surface.
By the way, “Net IR” is defined as (DWIR – UWIR). You seem to agree that the two quantities in parentheses exist, yet you don’t agree that their arithmetic difference exists? How does that happen?
@Roy…”You seem to agree that the two quantities in parentheses exist, yet you dont agree that their arithmetic difference exists? How does that happen?”
Roy…I have a deep respect for what you and John have accomplished at UAH and I appreciate your willingness to debate this issue. I mean no disrespect by debating it. I have heard of the Dragon Slayers but I am not basing my arguments on their material. I do think that one of them, the chemical engineer, lays out compelling arguments.
I have no problem with a theorized net difference in IR radiation between bodies. If both bodies are independent sources of heat, even more so. However, in the Earth surface to atmosphere model, GHGs in the atmosphere are dependent on surface IR to warm them. To have that absorbed energy be back-radiated to the surface in such a manner as to warm the surface, strikes me as anti-science.
Rahmstorf over at realclimate goes so far as to claim that back-radiated IR can be added to incoming solar energy to increase the net effect of solar heating. That’s the positive feedback included in models and it not only contradicts the 2nd law, it represents perpetual motion.
Roy…your data says this is not happening. The 2nd law says it should not happen. I’d go with your data.
As I said in my post, the arithmetic IR difference does not apply to heat transfer. If anything, net IR would apply to the 1st law, the conservation of energy. However, when talking about conservation of energy you must treat EM and thermal energy separately since they have different properties. You can’t sum EM and call it thermal energy transfer.
The net whatever is of no concern to me, I am concerned that the basic tenet of the 2nd law be met that heat without compensation cannot be transferred from a colder body to a warmer body. You can’t brush that requirement aside and claim it is satisfied by a net transfer of EM.
When you talk about net solar radiation, I don’t thing that applies to the net IR difference between the Earth and the Sun. I would think it applies to the average radiation since the Sun radiates a broad spectrum of EM wavelengths intensities. Or, it may apply to the varying internal thermal energy intensities at which the Sun radiates EM.
It’s probably a good example, however, because some people may think the heat transferred from the Sun, an independent radiator, to the Earth, a heat sink, is related to the Net IR emitted by both.
I find it ludicrous to think that IR emitted by the Earth affects the Sun.
Gordon,
“However, in the Earth surface to atmosphere model, GHGs in the atmosphere are dependent on surface IR to warm them. To have that absorbed energy be back-radiated to the surface in such a manner as to warm the surface, strikes me as anti-science”
This is no different than putting a blanket on in a cold room. The blanket is colder than you, but your heat warms it to an intermediate temperature, and this warms you–your heat loss to the medium-warm blanket is slower than it would be to the cold room.
Nate,
When you analyze your blanket example and that of surface and air, you will find that they cannot be compared. Let us define thermodynamic system and surroundings:
In the blanket and room case, the warm body is the system and blanket is surroundings. The system produces energy and thus warms up with time. Not so for surface and atmosphere. The surface does not produce energy, the source of energy is the sun and the surface is one of the surroundings. If you blanket the surface, its temperature remains constant instead for the surface produces no energy.
Nabil,
I take your point. But since the atmosphere lets in sunlight-it is acting like a ‘clear’ blanket that allows the surface to be heated, but reduces flow of IR. Whether it is heated from an external or internal source makes no difference imo.
Would it make you feel better to replace the blanket with a clear blanket. Replace the body and and its internal heat with an inert dark object and an external sunlamp? The understanding is the same. Perhaps the blanket can have small holes to allow air exchange.
@Nate…”This is no different than putting a blanket on in a cold room”.
I have never been much for analogies. In electronics theory, some people like to compare current flow to water through a pipe. I have always found the analogy to be silly.
My point is that if such a blanket exists, with all GHGs at 1% of the atmosphere, all CO2 at 0.04%, and ACO2 at roughly 0.001%, based on 390 ppmv, that blanker will be threadbare, if that. It will provide absolutely no warmth.
Speaking of silly, in his book on Atmospheric Radiation, physicist/meteorologist, Craig Bohren, referred to the blanket theory as a metaphor at best, and at worst, plain silly.
Nabil, the Earth’s GHG ‘blanket’ is transparent to sunlight but opaque to infrared coming from the surface. Most of the warming action from the GHG ‘blanket’ comes from slowing down the escape of heat to space (like a blanket on a body), not from the GHGs being warmed by the sun directly. That’s why the blanket metaphor is apt.
Gordon, do you agree that if you had two bodies facing each other with the same IR emissivity, but at two different temperatures, that the rate of transfer of IR energy from the warmer body to the cooler body depends on BOTH bodys’ temperatures?
so, the rate of IR loss (and thus the cooling rate) of the warmer as it emits IR to cooler plate would be very different for:
CASE 1:
Plate 1: 350K
Plate 2: 349K
CASE 2:
Plate 1: 350K
Plate 2: 50K
If you agree that the IR cooling rate would be much greater in Case 2 then Case 1, we have no fundmental disagreement regarding the net result in the climate system: a cool body (the atmosphere) can passively affect the temperature of a warm body (Earth’s surface) which is actively heated with constant energy input from an outside source (the Sun).
@Roy…”Gordon, do you agree that if you had two bodies facing each other with the same IR emissivity, but at two different temperatures, that the rate of transfer of IR energy from the warmer body to the cooler body depends on BOTH bodys temperatures?”.
I agree that the rate of IR transfer between bodies of different temperatures is a function of the temperature difference between them. I can’t see, however, how the bodies could have the same IR emissivity since IR wavelength and intensity is a function of temperature.
I don’t see where you’re getting the notion that bringing a cooler body closer to a warmer body is going to affect the cooling rate of the warmer body.
In a thermos, a hot liquid in the thermos has to be isolated from the cooler exterior atmosphere by a vacuum in order to slow down the cooling. Otherwise, the liquid would cool at the rate of it’s ability to emit IR, or lose heat through conduction or convection.
A hot liquid in a normal container is unaffected by the surrounding atmosphere at room temperature. It will cool based on the rate at which IR transfers heat to the air or warmed air by the container is removed by convection.
Of course, if you surrounded the liquid in a normal container with a heating blanket, where you supplied heat to the system, you could slow the cooling, or maybe even maintain the temperature.
That’s my point, there are no external devices in the atmosphere. IMHO, there’s nothing to slow down surface cooling.
@Roy…need to clarify something before I’m called a hypocrite. Benn called worse.
I said, “I agree that the rate of IR transfer between bodies of different temperatures is a function of the temperature difference between them”.
I should not have used the word transfer. Flow would have been a better word. Although I cannot prove this yet, I don’t think the IR flow from a cooler body can affect the thermal energy in a warmer body. I am basing that on something I read from Bohr, who claimed only IR of specific wavelengths and intensity can be absorbed by a particular body.
You seem to be claiming that GHGs slow down the emission of IR from the surface. Remember that calculation you offered at one time regarding the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere at 390 ppmv or so? It does not seem feasible to me that a gas of such low concentration could affect the mammoth IR flux radiated from the surface.
Youve got Clausius exactly backwards. He anticipated confusions like yours and took great pains to set people like you straight. Over 160 years later, you still dont get it. Ive quoted his exact words to you before, and you completely misinterpreted them. But it is worth one more shot:
*************************
This principle, upon which the whole of the following development rests, is as follows: Heat can never pass from a colder to a warmer body without some other change, connected therewith, occurring at the same time*.
* [The principle may be more briefly expressed thus: Heat cannot by itself pass from a colder to a warmer body; the words by itself, (von selbst) however, here require explanation. Their meaning will, it is true, be rendered sufficiently clear by the expositions contained in the present memoir, nevertheless it appears desirable to add a few words here in order to leave no doubt as to the signification and comprehensiveness of the principle.
In the first place, the principle implies that in the immediate interchange of heat between two bodies by conduction and radiation, the warmer body never receives more heat from the colder one than it imparts to it. The principle holds, however, not only for processes of this kind, but for all other by which a transmission of heat can be brought about between two bodies of different temperatures, amongst which processes must be particularly noticed those wherein the interchange of heat is produced by means of one or more bodies which, on changing their condition, either receive heat from a body, or impart heat to other bodies.
On considering the results of such processes more closely, we find that in one and the same process heat may be carried from a colder to a warmer body and another quantity of heat transferred from a warmer to a colder body without any other permanent change occurring. In this case we have not a simple transmission of heat from a colder to a warmer body, or an ascending transmission of heat, as it may be called, but two connected transmissions of opposite characters, one ascending and the other descending, which compensate each other. It may, moreover, happen that instead of a descending transmission of heat accompanying, in the one and the same process, the ascending transmission, another permanent change may occur which has the peculiarity of not being reversible without either becoming replaced by a new permanent change of a similar kind, or producing a descending transmission of heat. In this case the ascending transmission of heat may be said to be accompanied, not immediately, but mediately, by a descending one, and the permanent change which replaces the latter may be regarded as a compensation for the ascending transmission.
***********************
Lets look at some key parts that you cant seem to understand.
in the immediate interchange of heat between two bodies by conduction and radiation, the warmer body never receives more heat from the colder one than it imparts to it.
He is explicitly stating here that the wamer body does receive heat from the colder one, just less than what it sends to the colder body. This is in direct contradiction to your claims.
He also says: we find that in one and the same process heat may be carried from a colder to a warmer body and another quantity of heat transferred from a warmer to a colder body without any other permanent change occurring.
Note the end clause: without any other permanent change occurring. He is talking about heat transferred from a colder to a warmer body without anything else going on. He is definitely not talking here about a refrigeration cycle with a work input, as you seem to imagine.
He says that there are but two connected transmissions of opposite characters, one ascending and the other descending, which compensate each other. The descending (hot to cold) heat transfer is clearly the compensation he refers to.
Every science or engineering textbook I have seen covering radiative heat transfer clearly explains this heat transfer as a bi-directional radiative exchange. Are all of these books used worldwide completely wrong?
You say: When bodies of different temperature are adjacent they are both emitting IR isotropically of different frequencies and intensities. Only the higher frequency/intensity IR from the hotter body has an effect.
So lets take an example. You have an object at 288K (15C). Lets call it a blackbody to keep things simple. On one side of this object is a second object at 298K (25C). On the other side is a third object at 278K (5C). All of these objects emit significant radiation in the 15um range.
Is it really your claim that the middle object will absorb the 15um radiation and the energy it carries from the hotter object, but it wont absorb the 15um radiation from the colder object?
If this is truly your claim, please let us know what the mechanism is for this middle object to discern the source temperature of the 15um radiation.
And if the middle object does not absorb the 15um radiation from the colder object, what happens to the energy carried by that radiation?
“Every science or engineering textbook I have seen covering radiative heat transfer clearly explains this heat transfer as a bi-directional radiative exchange. Are all of these books used worldwide completely wrong?”
First, we are in the 21st century, long after Clausius. We know that heat flows from hot to cold. As an engineer, your above quoted statement is incorrect. Heat transfer is not bi-directional radiative exchange. In the formula it is. So is it in Ohm’s law, Ficks law, and hydraulics. But there is only one direction for electric current, diffusion of matter, water flow, and radiation: from high potential to low potential. There is no practical application that demonstrates otherwise.
Please do not get me wrong. I do not mean to say that backradiation cannot be calculated, of course it can. The issue at hand is whether it reach the surface or not. This is the big question that needs to be addressed. As of now pyrgeometers are the only instruments recognized by the World Meteorological Organization for measuring backradiation at surface. I am finding that this instrument is inadequate for measuring backradiation and what this instrument displays is virtual backradiation resulting from incorrect instrument calibration. We need to demonstrate that backradiation is measurable at surface by suitable and adequate instruments instead.
Some backradiation reaches the surface. Some doesn’t.
Backradiation is just radiation fron the atmosphere.
The atmosphere is a substance, and like all substances it radiates.
This isn’t some big mystery, it’s just reality.
It’s measureable to anyone who wants to.
So what is the problem?
@Ed Bo…”Heat can never pass from a colder to a warmer body without some other change, connected therewith, occurring at the same time…”
Ed…go back and read your quote from Clausius. Read it carefully. He made the assertion that heat cannot be transferred from a colder body to a warmer body without some other change occurring at the same time.
In the explanation you quoted he is presenting the case where heat can be transferred both ways, as long as you provide the required EXTERNAL compensation.
He said…heat can NEVER pass from a colder to a warmer body without that compensation. How clear is that?
I don’t care what you have read in modern texts you need to think for yourself. When I was at university I accepted whatever was written in my texts . I now realize that scientists can be wrong or that in this paradigm driven world, they are simply regurgitating what they have learned.
Bi-directional IR transfer does not explain heat transfer. Furthermore, you have to read the fine print. What is the context in which the IR is being transferred? Is it between independent radiators or between an independent radiator and a dependent radiator at different temperatures?
Gordon:
You are the one who needs to re-read Clausius, because you get him mind-bogglingly wrong. I’ll repeat the key passages:
“we find that in one and the same process heat may be carried from a colder to a warmer body and another quantity of heat transferred from a warmer to a colder body without any other permanent change occurring.”
The final clause “without any other permanent change occurring” clearly rules out the “external compensation” you claim.
He follows this with: “In this case we have not a simple transmission of heat from a colder to a warmer body, or an ascending transmission of heat, as it may be called, but two connected transmissions of opposite characters, one ascending and the other descending, which compensate each other.”
He is very clearly stating that it is the “descending” (hot to cold) transmission of heat that is the compensation for the “ascending” transmission of heat.
There is NOTHING, absolutely NOTHING, in this entire passage talking about any “external” compensation. That is simply a figment of your imagination!
Bi-directional IR (or more generally EMR) COMPLETELY explains radiative heat transfer. There is nothing else to radiative heat transfer. Radiation from an object at a given time has absolutely NOTHING to do with whether an object is “independent” or “dependent”. (What happens over time to the internal energy of the object can be a result of whether the radiated energy is replaced — have you ever solved this type of differential equation.)
Any even your silly distinction of “independent” and “dependent” radiators is completely irrelevant in this case, as both the earth’s surface and its atmosphere are merely “re-radiating” energy that was ultimately sourced by the sun.
Nabil:
The terminology has changed since the 19th Century, but the fundamental science has not. Clausius’ understanding of radiative (and conductive) heat transfer as a bi-directional is still universally accepted in scientific and engineering circles, and fully explained in detail by the field of statistical mechanics that emerged later.
I always find it amusing that the very people who most object to the (imperfect) metaphor of the “greenhouse effect” have no objection to the even less perfect metaphor of “heat flow”, and often don’t even realize that it is only a metaphor! The 18th and early 19th-Century scientists, reasoning by analogy, had no way of knowing better. But you in the 21st Century have no such excuse!
Ed Bo
Again thanks for you sanity and science. There are a few on all the threads that cannot understand bi-directional radiant energy flows. Heat flows one way, yes we all know this and not one climate scientist amongst them believes different. Heat flows from Hot to Cold. Radiant energy flows from a surface in all directions and is only dependent upon the temperature of the surface and its emissivity.
They consider radiant energy and heat as one and the same.
I am really sad with Nabil’s understanding. On his blog he says he took Chemical Engineering. In Chemistry he should know that most chemical reactions are two way.
The insane thing with their thought process is they will not see how illogical their thoughts are. You have a surface with giggling molecules emitting IR radiation on a continuous basis. In their ideas if you bring another surface in to the picture that is also radiating and if its molecules are giggling at a higher rate, the first surface will completely stop radiating.
Goofy as they are they can’t see a simple experiment with a light will show how poor their thought processes are.
If you turn on a 50 watt bulb to illuminate a room it will not stop radiating if you then turn on a 1000 watt bulb in close proximity. If you have the two lights on the room will be brighter than if you only have one on. The 50 watt bulb will still increase the room’s brightness.
Norman says, August 26, 2016 at 10:59 AM:
And Norman shows ONCE AGAIN how he doesn’t understand even the most basic thermodynamic principles and concepts.
You CAN add two HEAT fluxes, Norman. You CANNOT add a radiant heat flux and a radiance. As has been explained to you a dozen or so times by now … A radiance only becomes a radiant heat flux at the point where it’s faced with surroundings at absolute zero, or at least at a temperature much, much lower than the emitting object. In all other situations, the radiance can only ever by CALCULATED. Meaning, it is only hypothetical in nature. As first noted by Josef Stefan himself.
I have stopped hoping you will EVER understand this distinction, Norman. But I will keep on pointing it out …
Norman:
Turn on two flashlights (torches) in a dark room. Align them so their beams intersect somehow. Now you and I, and anyone with scientific sense (Feynman made a point of this in his lectures) will say that the beams pass through each other unimpeded.
But Kristian says we’re wrong, that the individual flashlight beams are just our mathematical fictions, that the only thing that is real is the net EM field in the area of intersection.
Now we could get into a stoner-physics debate as to “what is reality?” but I think almost everyone would agree that at both the macroscopic and microscopic levels, the beams are much more “real” than anything we calculate in the area of intersection.
But the real kicker is this: If you do the calculations that Kristian proposes, whether you consider them reality or a mathematical construct, you will get the same answer as just saying that the two beams pass through each other unimpeded.
Kristian reminds be of a few kids I knew in my science classes who would immediately go to the most complex equations possible, make an error in their analysis, then claim that those of us who understood how to use the simplifications got it all wrong. Those kids never got too far…
Ed, good one. What is more the Kristian point is if the flashlight beams align opposing each other they both go out! No radiant heat flow!
Ed illustrates the problem that arises when Kristian misuses the term radiant heat when it should be radiant energy once Kristian starts to use the Clausius heat definition correctly.
Kristian is smart, you and Clausius are right, eventually Kristian will agree with tests that you & Clausius run. Unless Kristian keeps living up to all my expectations.
Ed Bo says, August 27, 2016 at 10:04 AM:
Er, no, Ed. I’m not saying you’re wrong. Only your straw man does.
You’re not getting what I’m saying, Ed, so you’re left with creating simple straw men for yourself to tear down.
Cute. Ridiculous and sad, but still sort of cute.
Ed Bo says, August 27, 2016 at 10:04 AM:
Wow! Yoy are a clever guy, aren’t you?
You don’t understand my argument at all, Ed. (I’m guessing you don’t even want to try.) My argument isn’t that you get a different end result using a unidirectional rather than a bidirectional approach. If that’s what you think …
Kristian:
So all your bloviating is over trivial semantics, and you really agree with the mainstream interpretation of the basic greenhouse effect, and you spend pages and pages on terminology???
Ed Bo says, August 28, 2016 at 9:09 AM:
No, Ed. If you’d bothered to read what I actually write, then you would see that it’s not all about semantics, although the warmists try their best to make it seem that way. And if you can’t be bothered to read what I actually write, then why do you comment on it …?
“I have no problem with a theorized net difference in IR radiation between bodies. If both bodies are independent sources of heat, even more so. However, in the Earth surface to atmosphere model, GHGs in the atmosphere are dependent on surface IR to warm them. To have that absorbed energy be back-radiated to the surface in such a manner as to warm the surface, strikes me as anti-science.”
You accept that radiation can be reflected and thereby insulate against heat lost, correct?
But your problem is with re-radiating, correct?
Or is quantitative, as we dealing with a trace gas and only portion of Earth’s blackbody spectrum is re-radiated- and it way off to think it adds as much 33 K to the planet’s average temperature?
@gbaikie…”You accept that radiation can be reflected and thereby insulate against heat lost, correct?
But your problem is with re-radiating, correct?”
No, my problem is with the complete cycle.
–Gordon Robertson says:
August 25, 2016 at 12:25 PM
@gbaikieYou accept that radiation can be reflected and thereby insulate against heat lost, correct?
But your problem is with re-radiating, correct?
No, my problem is with the complete cycle.–
Well, I think clouds and dust can cause warming and/or lack of cooling at the surface.
And clouds and dust aren’t gases.
Or clouds do keep night time temperature warmer and dust can increase the air temperature.
And since this is observable, the idea that only some kinds of gases can cause warming is obviously false.
I also think the ocean are main reason Earth appears warmer
than some might think it should be. And the ocean is also not a gas.
I think the greenhouse effect theory is good example of pseudo science and apparently, it allows some to think that without CO2 gas, Earth average temperature would be -33 C.
Not claiming all the believers think this is true, but what pseudo science commonly does is allow many crazy ideas to seem valid. And there is long list glaring examples of irrational beliefs associated with the Greenhouse Effect Theory.
Gordon,
“….that back-radiated IR can be added to incoming solar energy to increase the net effect of solar heating. Thats the positive feedback included in models and it not only contradicts the 2nd law, it represents perpetual motion….” It is additive because both are downward… Check Dr. Roy’s Fig 2 to confirm. As far as the second law, you must remember that the heat transfer between two surfaces is E= K x ( Thot^4-Tcold^4) where K is ‘constant’ that depends on the emissivity of each surface and shape factor which is how much each surface can ‘see’ of the other, and can be worked out by any 3rd year engineering student…but bottom line from the equation heat only flows from hot to cold, totally in keeping with the 2nd law. As far as I can tell, only physicists and climate scientists refer to the (-Tcold^4) term expressed as a positive number as ‘back radiation’, engineering profs would eschew such usage because it’s already difficult enough to keep proper sign conventions in thermo.
Roy: “3) my only claim about the 2nd Law was that IR radiated from a colder sky toward warmer surface does not violate the 2nd Law, as is oftern asserted by the Sky Dragon Slayers.”
Roy, the Slayers (Principia Scientific International) do not dispute radiation goes wherever it wants to. What we dispute is your unscientific belief that cooler can make warmer even warmer yet. That is junk science contrary to the laws of thermo.
John:
If you were hypothermic on a winter day, wouldn’t you put on a heavier jacket?
The jacket is cooler than your body , but putting it on has the result of increasing your body temperature.
So if you think that “cooler can make warmer even warmer yet” “is junk science contrary to the laws of thermo”, I guess you don’t believe in winter jackets.
(Yes, the jacket works primarily by inhibiting net conduction, not radiation, but you made a very broad statement.)
Gordon Robertson says:
“The 2nd law has nothing to do with IR, it is a statement about the direction of heat transfer. Clausius stated with great clarity, when he formulated the 2nd law, that heat, of itself, cannot be transferred from a cooler body to a warmer body.”
Ridiculous.
IR *is* a method of heat transfer. Radiatively.
Clausius did not say what you claimed he said. Please, PLEASE, read more carefully.
@David Appell…”IR *is* a method of heat transfer. Radiatively.
Clausius did not say what you claimed he said. Please, PLEASE, read more carefully…”
Agreed…IR is a method of heat transfer, it is NOT heat. The 2nd law applies to heat, not the transport mechanism.
My quote on the 2nd law is taken almost verbatim from Clausius.
Gordon,
Please note that Stephan-Boltzmann law equation is derivable from the traditional laws of thermodynamic. Therefore, what applies for heat applies for radiation as well, there is no difference whatsoever.
As in heat, the means to convert radiation into mechanical work is required. Solar radiation was converted into mechanical work directly long time ago. Radiation can be converted to mechanical work through solar cells. These cells are only means to convert solar radiation to work, just like engine chamber does for steam. Other similar applications of converting radiation to other forms of energy are numerous.
Is there any correlation between the downwelling IR radiation at a given moment and surface temperature at a time Δt in the past? I mean, such a correlation would say, how long the heat is dwelling in the atmosphere – is it in hours, seconds or nanoseconds…?
The atmosphere is continuously gaining and losing energy by a variety of processes. If it warms from some process, it immediately starts radiating more IR. How long heat energy dwells in the atmosphere depends on heat capacity of the air, and the rate of energy loss. It would be difficult to isolate a warming event and the radiative cooling response…except maybe for daily solar heating, energy which is then lost during the night through infrared loss to outer space.
Which is why it is so hard to change the climate in any meaningful way yet it has despite this from time to time.
Why? I want to know why.
Salvatore,
You have the basic conclusion which is that any climate variations when raw TSI is held steady have to be caused by changes in global albedo. You know of my hypothesis relating to solar induced cloudiness / albedo changes.
If raw TSI changes then the temperature will change and that brings in the Milankovitch cycles.
So the question then arises as to what sets the base temperature around which albedo and TSI changes can cause variations.
Roy and the AGW crowd would have us belive that the base temperature in so far as it is above the S-B prediction is entirely due to the radiative characteristics of the atmospheric composition.
I say it is a result of atmospheric mass absorbing surface heat by conduction and then recycling it up and down adiabatically in convective overturning.
Stephen Wilde says:
“I say it is a result of atmospheric mass absorbing surface heat by conduction and then recycling it up and down adiabatically in convective overturning.”
And of course you have never come anywhere near proving that scientifically; all you ever offer is word salad.
The rises and the falls of air parcels are separately nearly though not too nearly adiabatic, but the circulatory convective air body as a whole is not adiabatically isolated. It is heated by the land and sea through its bottom by conduction and radiation, and cooled through its top by radiation to space. It also gains energy from land and sea by evaporation. The total radiation to space comes (1) from the land and sea, radiation which penetrates the atmosphere, and (2) from the atmosphere, radiation arising from greenhouse gases such as water vapor and carbon dioxide, and from cloud tops. Loosely speaking, adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere will reduce the amount of radiation from land and sea that penetrates the atmosphere. It will also increase the radiation that arises from atmospheric carbon dioxide and passes to space.
The water vapor and carbon dioxide, and the cloud bottoms, also radiate downward, and thereby pass a significant flux component of energy to the land and sea. This flux component of energy contributes to the energy budget of the land and sea, amongst other contributions. Loosely speaking, carbon dioxide added to the atmosphere will increase this flux component.
I think Stephen Wilde denies the just previous paragraph.
I have not studied the views of David Appell, but I concur with his comment that Stephen supports his denial with word salad, not sound physical reasoning.
The two effects of adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere will together primarily increase the greenhouse effect. The overall effects, primary, and secondary (called in this debate “feedback”), of adding carbon dioxide are presented with great exaggeration by the IPCC and other warmophobic alarmists. Such exaggeration is very harmful.
“Such exaggeration is very harmful.”
###
On the contrary, I’m afraid, such exaggeration is very beneficial as it has given an immense boost to the cause. It is probably safe to say that without such exaggeration, AGE would be nowhere.
AGW, meant;
Salvatore Del Prete says:
“Which is why it is so hard to change the climate in any meaningful way yet it has despite this from time to time.”
Because it requires a substantial forcing to change climate.
The Sun rarely provides this, since the climate solar intensity to changes in the solar constant is approximately
dT/dS = T/4S = 0.05 K per W/m2.
But other forcings do, especially greenhouse gases and, over a long period of time, Milankovitch factors.
GHG EFFECT IS CAUSED BY THE CLMATE NOT THE CAUSE OF THE CLMATE.
Look at the historical climatic record.
Dave what in your opinion caused the low global temperatures associated with the Maunder Minimum?
For that matter all of the other prolonged solar minimums?
It is fast becoming make or break time for me as it looks like the prolonged solar minimum is becoming established.
If the global temperatures do not respond the way I have said to the expected prolonged solar minimum I will be wrong if they do I think I have to be correct.
The answer if prolonged minimum solar conditions continue should be known within 3 years.
I committed myself to this line of reasoning can not spin out of it if it does not occur.
Yeah, if nothing else, David Appell will make sure you won’t forget it. 😉
That is for sure. David is not to be taken lightly he makes his points.
“here is my prediction for climate going forward, this decade will be the decade of cooling.”
– Salvatore del Prete, 11/23/2010
http://ourchangingclimate.wordpress.com/2010/10/20/andrew-dessler-debating-richard-lindzen/#comment-8875
Dave the solar minimum conditions were not present then now it looks like they will be and we shall see.
I might be right or I might be wrong.
Salvatore,
I think the main value of your prognostications is that you attempt to set specific values of solar variables that ‘should’ lead to climate variations.
I think you are approximately correct with those numbers and we can refine them in due course with the benefit of ongoing observations.
David Appell et al have never put forward anything that could remotely be so constructive. All they do is denigrate and obfuscate.
In contrast, my concern has been to identify the mechanism or mechanisms which lead to the outcome that you suggest.
Thanks Stephen . I think we are both on the correct path time will tell.
“If the global temperatures do not respond the way I have said to the expected prolonged solar minimum I will be wrong if they do I think I have to be correct.
The answer if prolonged minimum solar conditions continue should be known within 3 years.”
I think “it” will not happen within 3 years.
Though if “it” is prolongation or continuation of the pause- you will be good.
I think the religion of global warming is not quite dead- but as a significant political force [trillions of dollars public money wasted on it] it is dying.
Which doesn’t mean all the corruption is over- that is unending.
Basically the results are coming in, and they obviously indicate the stupidity of the policies related to global warming.
The most significant factor in this demise has been China.
The left is willing to blame the US for every evil imaginable, but China is emitting more the twice as much CO2 as the US and China timetable for “going green” is couple decades from now, when they have essentially or practically have used all the coal they have.
Though China is focusing on nuclear energy- it’s the only vaguely
rational thing to do, if you lack the skill for other things [space based solar energy production- which far beyond the ability
of mere socialists].
But anyhow I expect global warming religion to become more focused
on nuclear energy- though this going to upset some of the believers].
Salvatore, I admire your fortitude in making such a long-term climate prediction, win or lose. That’s something I doubt that I could ever bring myself to do. Except for the obvious ones, like La Nina.
“here is my prediction for climate going forward, this decade will be the decade of cooling.”
– Salvatore del Prete, 11/23/2010
http://ourchangingclimate.wordpress.com/2010/10/20/andrew-dessler-debating-richard-lindzen/#comment-8875
I think there is probable substance in Salvatore’s proposal that the solar changes will lead to significant cooling in coming years. I am inclined to guess that the cooling may not come quite as soon as Salvatore proposes. I am inclined to assess his proposal in three decades’ time, not three years’. I think the cooling is probable, but I am not sure of it. I think Salvatore is mistaken to support Stephen Wilde’s denial of the importance of downwelling infrared radiation. Dr Spencer is right about it.
@Salvatore…”If the global temperatures do not respond the way I have said to the expected prolonged solar minimum I will be wrong if they do I think I have to be correct”.
Don’t worry about it Salvatore, you’ll be in good company if you are wrong. Many a good scientist has gone out on a limb and been wrong.
At least you have the courage to present your analysis and prediction and I applaud you for that.
These discussions feel like Medieval style theological debates.
It’s not because the science is not determinable and real.
I think it’s because climate change/environmentalism has taken the place of religion in the modern world.
Actual secularism being an illusion.
The emotional void has to be filled by something for most people.
It is funny that the true believers who tend to want to stifle debate are usually the progressive types that look down so sanctimoniously on religion.
This accounts for the cranky challenges to any utterance from the Church of Decarbonization.
I certainly sympathize with the resistance to these Crusaders on every front.
Being of the same age as Dr. Roy, I fear that actual secularist descendants of the Reformation, like us of the space race generation, are becoming dinosaurs.
The sky slayers seem fixated on the thermodynamics of a cooler gas (atmosphere) heating a solid surface that has a higher temperature. The use of thermodynamics can be tricky due to how model system boundaries are defined. Also, the various differing IR spectra involved as a confounding factor.
Maybe try tinkering with the MODTRAN tool will help. Of interest may be the recent WUWT discussion on how the Planck function operates. Or look at the following link. Clive Best shows an excellent graphic that shows how the (poorly named) lapse rate changes due to water vapor.
http://clivebest.com/blog/?p=5911
Various approaches to visualizing how long wave IR densities change, as if you had a FLIR camera tuned to the relevant wavelengths, etc.
— bw says:
August 24, 2016 at 2:18 PM
The sky slayers seem fixated on the thermodynamics of a cooler gas (atmosphere) heating a solid surface that has a higher temperature.–
It can’t do this, but cooler air can warm if it descends- so if air is warmer than the surface it could warm the surface.
Let’s thought experiment. Imagine floating platforms- say 1 Km square each. And have top surface black.
Have one at 100 meter high, another 1100 meter, another 2100 meter.
So start with the one floating 100 meter above the ground [or ocean- whatever] and in middle of it have white box 5 feet above it’s surface. The sun is at zenith, and top surface should be about 70 C, and shaded box air temperature might be 50 C. [Or it’s like a weather station on asphalt- rather than surrounded properly by “natural terrain”].
Now what about the floating 1 square km platform at 1100 meters high- with same set up as one at 100 meter elevation.
Due to lapse rate, one might say it’s 6.5 C cooler than one at 100 meter [depending whether dry or wet or etc- but call it 6.5 C].
But there seems to be little reason for the black surface of the platform to be cooler [or if anything, it should be a bit warmer].
But let’s go to next one at 2100 meter [6889 feet] elevation or slightly higher than 1 mile city, Denver.
Again there is no reason that in middle of 1 square km the black surface is not 70 C or higher. Though if there was strong breeze- that could be a reason it is cooler.
At this elevation [2.1 km] the air at this level should be 13 C cooler. And the air at this elevation should be drier [unless in middle of cloud] and lower density- 1 kg per cubic meter [or less] vs 1.2 kg per cubic meter at 100 meter elevation. And air pressure is less.
Chart:
“0000 15.0 C 1013 {pressure] 1.2 [kg/cubic meter]
1000 8.5 C 900 1.1
2000 2.0 C 800 1.0
3000 -4.5 C 700 0.91 ”
http://usatoday30.usatoday.com/weather/wstdatmo.htm
So cause of chart maybe should be above the ocean, and 43 latitude clear day mid summer- that makes sun 10 degree away zenith. Though a problem is it’s unlikely to be only 15 C [59 F] – and the warmer day affects density- at noon in summer. But let’s just say it’s very unusually cool day for this time of year.
But the huge platform- it’s very large, will changes air temperature [but not pressure or density- or should not cause hurricane, etc]. And btw, these platforms are not shading each other.
But since we changed region air temperature to 15 C, the air temperature in middle of 1 sq km platform is unlikely to be 50 C. Let’s say at most it’s 40 C [104 F]. Or as walk from it’s edge to the middle it gets gradually warmer- every 50 to 100 meter distance.
Now back to 2100 meter elevation. Oh, platform is well insulated- and huge helium balloon would make it well insulted, btw- or it’s floating on 2 C air. And let go again to the edge of platform where air is colder. Air density is
1 kg per cubic, air pressure of 800 HPA [13.05 psi] and air temperature warmer than 2 C, and as go towards the middle air temperature increases and density lowers and pressure remains constant.
The ‘Slayers’ (applied scientists at Principia Scientific International) are indeed “fixated” on the correct application of this key thermo equation:
Q = σTsurf4 σTatmo4
This is because most at PSI are applied scientists, many trained to PhD level in thermo and often performing such equations in their daily working life ensuring real things work (eg space craft, satellites, etc).
On here the biggest supporters of the magic gas GHE nonsense are sophists with little or no training in thermo. That is the root of the problem. Once you understand the above equation you can appreciate it shows clearly in black and white that heat only flows from warmer to cooler.The heat flow Q, from above, is a local transient term, and is not a conserved quantity and does not represent the energy coming from the Sun. Nor does the solar energy received by earth get more than one go at thermalizing, which you do not seem to comprehend in your wrong and misguided claim that “cooler air can warm if it descends- so if air is warmer than the surface it could warm the surface” and various junk thought experiments. Please go do a course in thermodynamics.
A puzzling inconsistency in Roy’s account.
He asserts that the warmth of the surface above the S-B prediction is due to downward IR.
He also asserts that descending air warms as it falls.
What does Roy say is the relationship,if any. between those two phenomena?
Apples and oranges. Descending air warms is because it is being compressed (ideal gas law).
jimc,
You miss the point that both processes are implied by Roy to be capable of warming the surface above the S-B prediction yet Roy says only DWIR warms the surface above the S-B prediction. I say it is a consequence not of net radiative flows but rather warming by compression in descent within half the atmosphere at any given moment.
Observations show that the lapse rate slope follows the declining density gradient with increasing height which proves that the surface temperature is related to mass density leading to conduction at the surface just as much as the level of radiation entering the system from the sun.
The surface temperature at a given level of incoming solar radiation must therefore be related to atmospheric mass conducting rather than radiation flowing.
I want to know from Roy why he ignores the evidence provided by the lapse rate slope following the density gradient that mass and conduction are the true determinant of the extent to which the surface temperature can rise above the S-B prediction at a given level of insolation.
How does he explain the lapse rate slope following the density gradient if DWIR is what determines the surface temperature rising above S-B?
If there is no atmosphere (no mass and no conduction) then S-B is complied with. Only the addition of mass and conduction can send a surface temperature above S-B unless he can explain the lapse rate slope following the density gradient purely from radiative theory.
Can he ?
“Can he?” I’m pretty sure he can, since it is just basic meteorology Stephen, you know, from the 1950s and much earlier.
“How does he explain the lapse rate slope following the density gradient if DWIR is what determines the surface temperature rising above S-B?”
Basic meteorology has the ideal LR slope & the standard atm. LR slope linear in the troposphere and the density (and pressure) gradient(s) exponential so they do not follow. If Stephen had even the most basic math training, then this would be obvious but Stephen gets very confused. Even about the most basic math. Easily.
And Stephen, the scf Tmedian never, ever rises above S-B, it is ALWAYS equal S-B. By test. By observation. By the top post data above. Also by theory developed from test.
Stephen, I have read your stuff on several blogs now over the years.
It’s clear, to someone with science training, that all you are doing is waving your hands, always vague.
I’ve never seen you do a calculation, ever.
Numbers will prove your hypoetheses. Not hand waving.
So, you got any calculations, of anything?
mpainter
Way up thread you state: “Nested wrong, please excuse. Water cools mostly through evaporation. The partition of surface energy loss for the ocean is evaporation 60%; radiation 30%; conduction 10%. Radiation at the ocean surface is due to accumulated energy of insolation but is only partial, in a diurnal sense. The thermal inertia of oceans is not properly accounted for in the misconceived GHE.”
And then you add: “Norman, water cools mainly via evaporation. You know this but ignore it.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth%27s_energy_budget#/media/File:The-NASA-Earth%27s-Energy-Budget-Poster-Radiant-Energy-System-satellite-infrared-radiation-fluxes.jpg
The link is an image of a recent global energy budget. The energy hitting the Earth’s surface is 163.3 Watts/m^2. The Energy emitted in IR by the surface is given as 392.2 Watts/m^2. the DWIR is listed at 340.3 Watts/m^2. The Evaporation loss is 86.4 Watts/m^2 and the other losses (convection and conduction) are 18.9 Watts/m^2.
So your percentages are close to this. Evaporation removes 86.4 of the 163.3 or 52.9% . Here is where you might rethink what you are stating. The radiation is the NET taking the GHE into consideration which is a net surface loss of 51.9 or around 31.8 %. So in your mind the evaporation is dominant and GHE plays little roll.
Now for the Aha in your brain. Without the GHE the surface loss would be 392.2 Watts/m^2 instead of 51.9. The loss of energy would be 240% (much greater than the 52.9% from evaporation).
It is why you are unable to work this through your mind. It seems you, Kristian, and Gordon Robertson are not able to grasp the NET radiant energy concept, maybe it makes no sense to you. I think Ed Bo up above did a great job of explaining the concept using money and NET wealth.
So you can see I do understand that evaporation is a process in regulating ocean temperature but GHE is much more significant.
Evaporation removes 86.4 Watts/m^2 from the water surface. DWIR adds 340.3 Watts/m^2 to that same surface. So how is evaporation a bigger player than DWIR?
If you do not understand this point I can try another angle.
Can the IR energy from GHGs and the atmosphere be harnessed like visible solar energy? Can it be focused or gathered to do useful work? About 350W/m^2 is a lot of energy flux, especially since it is constant 24 hours a day. If it cannot, why not?
That’s what happens when the First Law of Thermodynamics is ignored. The only energy that heats the earth comes from the sun. You cannot magnify it in any way, shape or form. The atmosphere is not an energy source as Trenberth and his cartoon energy balance diagram suggests. That type of pseudoscience leads to all kinds of silly notions like IR from the earth heating the sun.
SkepticGoneWild
The first law would demand the Earth’s energy increase the temperature of the Sun. What would happen to the energy? The amount would be exceedingly small.
If you take a 300 W/m^2 flux and expand it to a sphere with a solar radius I calculated the Earth flux reaching the Sun’s surface would be in the order of 5.4 x 10^-7 W/m^2. Not much but is would still be there and the Sun would be just a wee tad warmer with an Earth or other planets in Orbit than without any.
Case in point. See?
And people who violate the First Law also violate the Second Law as well.
You are creating energy out of nothing. The earth is not an energy source. Heat does not transfer from a cool earth to a warm sun.
SkepticGoneWild
Maybe open a physics textbook, it will not really be a meaningful conversation because you have lots of holes in your understanding of the physics reality.
The Earth is an energy source. If it has a surface temperature it is a source of energy and you are really on the wrong page with your statement. It is emitting energy until it cools. It does not matter the source, as long as it has a temperature, it has energy and is a source of energy.
You have the same lack of understanding as these other posters. mpainter, Mike Flynn, Gordon Robertson, Kristian and others. None of you seem to understand NET energy or even the second law.
The Earth is not warming the Sun. It is allowing the Sun (which is generating internal energy) to get a very wee bit higher surface temp with an Earth as opposed to a system without the Earth present. It is a relative warmer state only in comparison to another state. I doubt you will ever understand it or even care to try.
@Norman…” None of you seem to understand NET energy or even the second law”.
There’s a simple explanation. Net energy is a vague term that is not mainstream physics. You would not try to sum nuclear energy and mechanical energy so why would you try to sum EM energy and thermal energy? And why would you sum them and claim they satisfy the 2nd law?
With regard to the 2nd law, what’s there to understand? Clausius explained it quite well. Heat cannot of it’s own be transferred from a colder body to a warmer body.
He did not pull that notion out of a hat, he did it through a meticulous analysis of a heat engine, examining it’s four phases of operation. He concluded that heat transfer in a heat engine must proceed from a hot source to cold sink, and that the process cannot be reversed under normal means.
Imagine, as has been done in science fiction, that a spherical shell surrounded the sun. Would the sun’s surface heat up cool down or remain the same.
Put a heat lamp in a spherical container, is it hotter than without the container?
Lack of understanding, Norman? You are singular in your claim that the surface absorbs back radiation with no effect on the kinetic energy of the absorbing molecules. You, alone, make such a preposterous claim.
Norm,
You live in an alternate universes where the laws of physics are not only ignored, but redefined.
Thanks for the laugh.
mpainter,
Maybe explain your point so that I might understand what you are saying.
YOU: “You are singular in your claim that the surface absorbs back radiation with no effect on the kinetic energy of the absorbing molecules. You, alone, make such a preposterous claim.”
If I made such a claim, not sure where I made that one at, I would admit this would be an incorrect statement or wrongly posted. The molecules absorbing the backradiation would temporarily jiggle more until they passed the energy to surrounding molecules so for a brief time the absorbing molecules would increase in their vibrating state.
The point I would make (and if my earlier post stated what you did) is that backradiation will not increase the surface molecules (composite) kinetic energy as a whole. The surface will still receive less energy from backradiation than what is being emitted so the backradiation will not increase the surface’s molecular kinetic energy but it could temporarily increase the kinetic energy of the molecules that directly absorb the IR. Does that clear up this issue?
SketpicGoneWild
Can you explain more specifically your statement: “You live in an alternate universes where the laws of physics are not only ignored, but redefined.”
Which laws have I redefined and ignored and if so why do your believe this to be the case. Thanks.
Norman says
“the backradiation will not increase the surfaces molecular kinetic energy but it could temporarily increase the kinetic energy of the molecules that directly absorb the IR. Does that clear up this issue?”
###
A positive step. You now understand that the back radiation is absorbed by water molecules at the surface, as kinetic energy. All 340 W/sq m. Let us take the example of an individual water molecule absorbing an IR photon. Will this molecule transfer the absorbed energy to its neighbors? Will it emit it as another photon? Or, is the absorbing molecule at the interface where it might break loose from the inter-molecular forces that grip it and so become a gas molecule?
Or perhaps the absorbing molecule will re-emit the photon and the photon will be re-absorbed by another water molecule. Lots of things could happen to that quanta of energy before it is finally returned to the atmosphere.
But the individual molecule is of no account. What matters is the general probability. That probability is expressed in the partition of energy loss at the sea surface thusly: evaporation – 60%; radiation – 30%; conduction – 10 %
Now, Norman, let’s see you partition the 340 W/sq m absorbed at the sea surface.
Norman says, August 25, 2016 at 9:27 AM:
I’m afraid I do understand ‘net energy’ and the 2nd Law all too well. YOU, however, have shown time and time again that you don’t understand even the most basic thermodynamic principles and concepts like “heat”. In radiative heat transfer, your ‘net energy’ is equal to ‘radiant heat’. And so, when you say things like …:
… it’s pretty obvious to any physics litterate that you don’t understand what you’re talking about. That you are utterly confused in your thinking.
Exactly HOW is the Earth “allowing” the Sun to get warmer (i.e. to achieve a higher steady-state temperature) in your scenario, Norman?
In one way only: By directly transferring energy (in fact, a power flux) TO it. You’re ADDING energy to it, raising its absolute content of “internal energy” [U] as you do so.
So you have now transferred (a macroscopic flux of) energy from a cold object to a hot object and thereby increased the U, thus raised the absolute temperature of, the HOT object.
The 1st Law has no inherent problem with this description of reality. The 2nd, however, does indeed.
SGW:
Take a household appliance — like an iron — with a constant power input, place it on an open surface, and turn it on. Now put some flammable material, like shredded paper, next to it so that it gets hot from the iron but is still below the temperature where it would burst into flame.
If you really believe what you claim, place a well insulated covering over the iron and the paper and walk out of the house. By your analysis, this covering, which inhibits the energy transfer from the hot bodies to the colder ambient “cannot magnify it in any way, shape, or form.”
Come on, I dare you!
CO2 is not insulation. All these “insulation” thought experiments are meaningless.
SkepticGoneWild says:
“Thats what happens when the First Law of Thermodynamics is ignored. The only energy that heats the earth comes from the sun. You cannot magnify it in any way, shape or form. The atmosphere is not an energy source as Trenberth and his cartoon energy balance diagram suggests”
Trenberth never said it was.
Good God, understand someone before you try to call him and idiot.
What a shame.
But the diagram in fact shows two suns: The first on the left with 345 w/m2 to surface and the second on the right with 343 w/m2 to surface. That is creation of energy.
I understand that backradiaiation can be calculated, but does it reach the surface?
Nabil, there are not two suns. The actual sun radiates from a very small part of the sky. The diffuse LW radiates from the whole sky (and surface features). If the sun filled the whole sky like LW there would be a LOT higher sfc Tmedian. And consequently a lot more LW.
Yes the LW reaches the surface, Dr. Spencer proved that by building a night time LW passing cirrus cloud detector last summer with water filled coolers on the surface exposed & not exposed to all sky LW. Also, the NOAA ESRL DWLWIR instruments detect added LW from passing clouds. The DWLWIR data in the top post do not show passing cloud so it was a clear day.
Listen David,
Don’t put words in my mouth. I never called Trenberth an idiot. According to the Kiehl/Trenberth energy balance diagram, the sun produces 341 w/m-2, whereas the atmosphere produces 333.
Apparently we have two suns heating the earth.
Not the brand of physics I was taught at university.
Actually, this is the sort of physics you were taught at university … its just apparently not the sort of physics you learned at university.
“the sun produces 341 w/m-2, whereas the atmosphere produces 333”
Let’s analyze this — using that university physics you studied, ie conservation of energy. Energy is never created nor destroyed, but can change form or be transferred from one place to another.
So, first of all, energy is not technically “produced” by either the sun or the atmosphere. The sun transforms lots of nuclear energy into lots of thermal radiation energy. Some of that energy arrives at the earth. So we could say the sun “provides” or “delivers” power to the earth — power that is accounted for by nuclear reactions in the sun.
OK, so the atmosphere also “delivers” power to the surface to the tune of 333 W/m^2 of IR. This would be a problem if this power could not be accounted for somehow. Well, lets see … from K&T diagram:
POWER INTO THE ATMOSPHERE:
78+17+80+356 = 531 W/m^2
POWER OUT OF THE ATMOSPHERE:
333+169+30 = 532 W/m^2
So give or take a little uncertainty/rounding, the university physics you learned — conservation of energy — DOES work! phew! No energy is “produced” by the atmosphere.
If you can find some OTHER physics you learned besides conservation of energy that you would like to apply, by all means show us how the K&T diagram violates THAT physics.
Only, Folkerts, as you well know, there is no actual (as in ‘physically detectable’) power flux into the surface from the atmosphere. Mathematically you are free to pretend that there are in fact two separate, oppositely directed ‘power fluxes’ inside one heat transfer (the same, after all, goes for convective transfer: q/A = h_c (T_sfc – T_fluid)), and accordingly put them on either side of, say, the surface energy budget (the one on the “energy IN” side and the other on the “energy OUT” side). However, such a procedure clearly isn’t physically sound.
The true energy budget of the surface and of the atmosphere is a “heat budget”:
Surface: 165 W/m^2 IN, [53+24+88=] 165 W/m^2 OUT.
Atmosphere: 220 W/m^2 OUT, [33+24+88+75=] 220 W/m^2.
Using some real heat fluxes and some conceptual heat component fluxes only creates confusion as to thermodynamic cause and effect.
In Kristian’s balance, as Ed points out above, two flash lights pointing at each other in a dark room will also then go out as the radiant heat flux is 0! Ed’s room stays dark until the flashlights are misaligned.
Radiant heat does not exist Kristian, radiant energy exists.
Your 53 is the net of two opposing real, physical incoherent photon streams that do not interact like garden hoses pointing at each other, the incoherent photon streams do not interact as in flashlights.
No — you can’t run a heat engine from a cooler reservoir to a warmer reservoir and generate energy.
Norman, the K-T diagram says “330 W/ square m absorbed at the surface” of back radiation. You hold, if I remember correctly, that none of this was so absorbed. We have been over this thoroughly, and until you can agree that the back radiation is indeed absorbed, as kinetic energy, there is no basis for discussions.
mpainter
There is much basis for discussion. Water is a very good absorber of IR and will absorb nearly the entire spectrum of IR.
It will not become increased kinetic energy in the water even though it is absorbed because the water is radiating at a higher value than 330 W/m^2 in effect the GHE is not adding energy to the water.
It is the net flux that increases the water temperature and it is only a comparison view of an Earth’s surface with GHG at a given level and one without. The GHG will lead to a higher equilibrium temperature because they will suppress the rate the surface would radiate without them allowing for more energy to remain in the surface.
If I recall our past interaction on this topic I was having a difficult time explaining the concept of NET. For every 330 joules of energy the surface gains with backradiation it is still losing 390 joules at the same time meaning it is losing a total of 60 joules and its kinetic energy is going down. Without GHE it would lose 390 joules instead of 60. It is as Roy Spencer pointed out “Its not magic..its just physics.”
Norman wrote:
“Water is a very good absorber of IR and will absorb nearly the entire spectrum of IR.”
That’s false.
And it’s easy to look up. (See the HITRAN database.)
Scientists have been measuring and calculating this stuff since forever. Again, see the HITRAN database.
There is no excuse for getting it wrong.
David Appell
Not so false. It looks like water absorbs well over all but the near IR wavelengths.
http://www1.lsbu.ac.uk/water/images/water_spectrum_2.gif
Roy Spencer: Why does your site just suddenly stop accepting comments??
Are you blocking them?
Are you censoring them?
Is some bot blocking them?
Why? This never happens elsewhere (except, suspiciously, on Judith Curry’s blog).
Still can’t comment her with what I wrote, after 9 tries.
David, we’re all in the same boat here. Roy isn’t preventing posts, the site is buggy. Frustrating, yes, but we live with it.
When someone shows me by experiment that backradiation can actually heat a pool of water during the night, or in the shade during the day, I might be convinced of the GHE.
SkepticGoneWild
What if someone removed the backradiation and you would see how fast the pool of water would cool. Also note the GHE does not heat the pool. It allows a higher equilibrium temperature to be reached in comparison to a system that has no GHE with a continued input of energy.
I do not think anything will convince you unless you actually work to understand the concept and what it means.
Do you agree that photons carry energy?
So when the photons of backradiation — which is just radiation from the atmosphere — strike an object, do you not think they transfer their energy to that object?
These are basic laws of physics, discovered over 100 years ago.
What evidence do you have that they are wrong?
You confuse “heat” with “energy”.
SGW:
Take a longwave infrared laser (10.6-micron wavelength) and shine it down into a glass of water. You can heat the water to boiling.
So?
SkepticGoneWild says:
“When someone shows me by experiment that backradiation can actually heat a pool of water during the night, or in the shade during the day, I might be convinced of the GHE.”
And what if it reduces the rate of heat loss?
SGW:
Another experiment, this one much easier to perform.
Stand right in front of a wall in your kitchen, facing the wall. That wall is providing a “back radiation” to your face of ~400 W/m2. Feels like nothing, right?
Now open the freezer in your kitchen. The cold air in the freezer will fall right out (it’s neat to watch it on an IR camera!) and replaced by room temperature air.
Now stick your face right where the closed door of the freezer would be. You can easily feel the difference. Your cheeks are especially sensitive. And remember that the air around your face is virtually the same as in the bulk of the kitchen.
The difference is that the “back radiation” from the contents of the freezer (at about -18C or 255K) is substantially less than the back radiation from the walls of the kitchen at room temperature (at about 25C or 298K).
We are so used to living in an ambient field of radiation of about 400 W/m2 that we think it is nothing. But it is not nothing!
Kristian
From way above.
YOU: “The whole point is this: It is specifically NOT a function of the concentration of so-called GHGs. The degree of IR activity in a massive atmosphere doesnt matter. Once this atmosphere is radiatively active, it means atmospheric circulation will become and stay operative, and at that point, making the atmosphere *more* radiatively active wont matter to the T_s.”
Wrong statement! Use a little logic here. Each molecule is a potential emitter at a certain temperature. More emitters obviously means more potential IR! If you have but one CO2 molecule as an emitter it is obvious to logical thought process that more molecules at a given temp will be able to radiate more radiation. With Carbon Dioxide the emissivity is around 0.19 because it will only radiate at certain IR wavelengths and not the entire IR spectrum so it is limited on how much IR radiation it can emit at various temperatures.
Also YOU claim: “So its not the fact that the radiative heat loss is ~53 W/m^2, not ~165 W/m^2, when the solar heat gain is 165 W/m^2, that makes the surface T_avg 289K rather than 100K.”
Why do you think the radiative heat loss is only 53 W/m^2? If not for GHG’s the radiative heat loss would be around 390 W/m^2 so it really boggles my logic and reasoning circuits on how you claim GHG’s are not significant when they reduce the loss of surface radiation from 390 to 53. Pretty huge contribution here I would think.
Not sure how your brain processes logic information. I read your posts, reply and you still make these conclusions that are not reasonable like GHG does not matter as long as there is sum. This seems so unscientific and illogical on many levels, even the most simple common sense addition that if you have more emitters you will have a greater flux and it will greatly alter you surface radiant loss.
Norman, firstly, can you please reply directly underneath the comments you wish to respond to, not start a new subthread at the other end of the thread each time? Makes it easier to follow a specific discussion.
Secondly, you quote me, writing:
And then you yell: “Wrong statement! Use a little logic here. Each molecule is a potential emitter at a certain temperature. More emitters obviously means more potential IR!”
As if you hadn’t at all read the rest of my entry. What did I write, Norman?
And then I proceed showing you an empirical example from the real world how there ISN’T a direct connection between less radiant heat out from the surface and higher surface temperature (quite the contrary, in fact). Earlier I have given you examples from other planets (Mars, Venus) with hugely different degrees of IR activity (both ~95-97%, as opposed to Earth’s, which is a mere 0.5% overall), but where in both cases it is the MASS of the atmosphere making all the difference.
You are a strange person, Norman. You obviously STILL don’t understand (and/or for the life of you doesn’t WANT to understand) my central argument. And yet you accuse ME of illogic and misunderstanding.
Norman, you state:
No!!! If not for the TEMPERATURE of the air holding those IR-active gases, Norman, the surface radiant heat loss would be 390 W/m^2 at 288K. If the atmosphere were at 2.7K, then it wouldn’t matter if it had all the radiative properties in the world.
You need both MASS and RADIATIVE PROPERTIES to achieve an “atmospheric thermal effect”.
For the nth time, Norman: I’m not saying you don’t need radiative properties. I’m saying that the DEGREE of atmospheric radiative activity doesn’t matter.
Kristian,
If the DEGREE of radiative activity doesn’t matter how do you deal with zero such?
As you know, I agree with you about mass being a relevant factor but not radiative capability.
http://www.public.asu.edu/~hhuang38/mae578_lecture_06.pdf
“Radiative equilibrium profile could be unstable; convection restores it to stability (or neutrality)”
The surface must carry enough heat to enable the system to both radiate to space what comes in AND provide energy for ongoing hydrostatic equilibrium within the atmosphere.
That requires a mass and conduction driven GHE with radiation not involved.
Kristian
For the nth to the !0th time I totally disagree with your claim:
“Im saying that the DEGREE of atmospheric radiative activity doesnt matter.”
Your own posts state clearly it does but then you still write this.
So far to date I have not disagreed with you that you need some base mass to hold temperature. It is a point I am not disagreeing. The surface loss would be 390 W/m^2 if the atmosphere had no GHG present unless you can come up with a large flux from collision induced radiation (which you have not done so to date) of N2 molecules.
The degree of radiative activity is what determines the surface flux you use the 53 W/m^2 loss. If you remove a lot of GHG from the air this flux will go up considerably until it approaches 390 W/m^2.
You went on a wrong road somewhere with your physics understanding and are so stubborn you will refuse to try to get on the correct and real path. No big deal your opinions of the GHE really do not matter, you will never convince anyone with actual physics background. You could act to convince those that have just a bit of science background. Too bad you do not want to learn real physics though. I think it is sad you seem intelligent, I think either ego or just being stubborn prevent you from understanding the many flaws in your current thought process.
Have a good day.
Norman says, August 25, 2016 at 4:55 AM:
Tell me something new! You keep saying you disagree, but you provide absolutely NO empirical evidence that the degree does in fact matter (i.e. that a higher degree causes a higher T_avg, and that a lower degree causes a lower T_avg).
What is this nonsense? Stop throwing out unsubstantiated assertions like this! My posts all lead up to the conclusion it DOESN’T matter, Norman. If you don’t understand what I’m talking about, or you misunderstand it on purpose, that’s not my fault and its not my problem. So stop blaming your shortcomings on me!
**Arms thrown up in despair**
OK. So you misunderstand on purpose. Got it. Because NO ONE is this stupid!
Yes, sort of. Well, is it? How do you know? How do you know it isn’t the OTHER heat losses being so effective at shedding the surface energy that you don’t need much radiant heat loss? Like in the Congo. The heat input from the Sun is equal to the heat input in the Sahara-Sahel (~175 W/m^2 both places), but the evaporative cooling in the former region is MUCH more effective than in the latter. Even at a LOWER T_avg.
But even if the radiative activity of the air layers on top of the solar-heated surface is what determines the surface radiant heat flux, then – AS I EXPLAINED AND SHOWED EMPIRICALLY – it doesn’t determine the TOTAL heat loss of the surface!
The IR activity of the Sahara-Sahel atmosphere is MUCH lower than the IR activity of the Congo atmosphere. And yet, the TOTAL surface heat loss is the same in both regions. And the T_avg is significantly HIGHER, not lower (!!!), in the Sahara-Sahel.
Do you understand this point, Norman? Yes or no.
No, Norman. That’s just your muddled thought process speaking. Your dogma telling you that that’s how it is, that only particular changes to internal thermal radiation matters. MODTRAN doesn’t tell you the whole story about how the atmosphere works. It only tells you the potential RADIATIVE story. Heard of atmospheric circulation? Heard of convection/advection? Heard of the water cycle? Heard of clouds? Heard of other heat loss mechanisms besides radiation? Heard of density and pressure of gases? Heard of molecular collisions? Heard of “internal energy”, molecular kinetic (translational) energy?
If you increase the temperature of the air, the apparent “DWLWIR” will go up. If you reduce the temp, it will go down. If you increase the density/pressure of the bulk air above the surface, then the apparent “DWLWIR” will go up. If you reduce the air pressure/density, it will go down. If you merely increase the concentration of IR-active constituents in the air, other changes will automatically occur alongside the immediate change in absorp tion regime of surface IR. And the ‘radiative change’ will not raise the surface temperature. We see empirical proof of this both here on Earth (as I’ve shown above), and on other planets/moons in our solar system (Mars, Venus, Titan) (as I’ve shown on previous blog posts).
Priceless. The only stubborn fool here is you, Norman. I modify and outright change my views whenever I realise I’m wrong about something, whenever new perspectives are being presented to me that I didn’t think of before, and/or whenever new data comes to my attention that goes directly against my ideas. You, on the other hand, haven’t budged a single millimetre ever since I started discussing these matters with you. And what would your response be to this? “That’s because I already know I’m right!” Naturally. And that’s a telltale sign of a dogma devotee.
I know and use ‘actual physics’, Norman. Actual thermodynamics. Actual radiative physics. And actual atmospheric physics. That’s exactly what I do. However, this fact seems to thorouhly pass you by on a regular basis. Because you’re utterly stuck on the “Climate Science^TM” version of ‘actual physics’. Which is too bad. For you. You need to look outside your bubble once in a while. It’ll help. The world is a complex place.
You KNOW I’ve changed my mind on topics debated, Norman. I even did so just recently, remember? YOU haven’t. Still you call me stubborn, implying I have an inflated ego that cannot admit a mistake or acknowledge different perspectives on things other than my own.
That’s pretty hilarious … Oh, the irony.
Small observation.
“The effect is much increased by elevation. At 10,000 feet, in December, at 9 a.m., I saw the mercury mount to 132, while the temperature of shaded snow hard by was 22. At 13,100 feet, in January, at 9 a.m., it has stood at 98, with a difference of 68-2, and at 10 a.m. at 114, with a difference of 81-4, whilst the radiating ther- mometer on the snow had fallen at sunrise to 0*7.'”
From Tyndall.
“He finds on the summit of the Pic du Midi the heat of the soil exposed to the sun, above that of the air, to be twice as great as in the valley at the base of the mountain. ‘ The immense heating of the soil,’ writes M. Martins, ‘ compared with that of the air on high mountains, is the more remarkable since, during the nights, the cooling by radiation is there much greater than in the plain.’ The observations of the Messrs. Schlagintweit furnish, if I mistake not, many illustrations of the action of aqueous vapour.”
Also from Tyndall.
No need for a GHE. Just observation.
The less insulation between you and a heat source, the hotter you get.
And, at night, the less insulation between you and space, the colder you get. Very simple, no GHE required.
Any questions?
Cheers.
“The less insulation between you and a heat source, the hotter you get.
And, at night, the less insulation between you and space, the colder you get. Very simple, no GHE required.”
No radiative GHE but rather a conductive GHE as evidenced by the lapse rate slope following the reducing density gradient with height.
The insulating effect both by day and night being related to the density of the air rather than related to the radiative capability of the air.
The GHE is derived from mass conducting rather than radiation flowing and the lapse rate slope following the density gradient is the proof.
“The GHE is derived from mass conducting rather than radiation flowing and the lapse rate slope following the density gradient is the proof.”
Prove that, by calculating the observed greenhouse effect and by comparing it to observations such as
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/schmidt_05/curve_s.gif
The spectral profile of outgoing radiation can be anything at all as long as energy out equals energy in.
It will depend on the radiative characteristics of both atmosphere and surface and does not preclude the GHE being a product of mass and conduction.
Please explain how a solely radiative explanation could produce a lapse rate slope following the decline in density with height as per observations.
You can only get that feature of an atmosphere from conduction.
Stephen, you avoided my question.
You wrote:
The GHE is derived from mass conducting rather than radiation flowing and the lapse rate slope following the density gradient is the proof.
My question was, and still is:
Prove that, by calculating the observed greenhouse effect and by comparing it to observations such as
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/schmidt_05/curve_s.gif
The observed greenhouse effect is a given so I don’t need to calculate that ab initio.
The real issue is whether the cause is mass and conduction rather than radiative flows and the spectral distribution of the radiative flows as per your link is not conclusive either way so there is no need to address that.
The one thing that is not consistent with radiative causation is the observed decline in temperature with height following the density gradient.
Therefore it is up to you to account for that in solely radiative terms.
Stephen, yes, you do need to demonstrate how your theory gives the observed greenhouse effect.
What you are admitting here is that you can’t show that.
That means your idea doesn’t hold water.
It is not confirmed. In fact, it’s most likely wrong.
That’s science, baby.
Please recall that I’m asking you the question and you are not answering.
As an AGW proponent it is for you to explain how radiative physics alone can account for a lapse rate slope that on average globally as per the US Standard Atmosphere follows the density gradient in the vertical plane.
Unless you can do that then mass and conduction control the GHE and radiation does not.
“As an AGW proponent it is for you to explain how radiative physics alone can account for a lapse rate slope that on average globally as per the US Standard Atmosphere follows the density gradient in the vertical plane.
Unless you can do that then mass and conduction control the GHE and radiation does not.
It’s not “either/or” it is “both/and”. You need to understand BOTH aspects of the atmosphere to really understand the GHE.
PS. You *also* have to understand conservation of energy. Your “adiabatic loop” theory violates conservation of energy at a very basic level!
Tim,
I am gratified that you are familiar with my concept of the adiabatic loop.
There is no breach of conservation of energy in that concept since energy in from space equals energy out to space whilst energy lifted up in adiabatic ascent matches energy returned to the surface in adiabatic descent.
System energy content fully conserved whilst solar energy flows through the system.
Otherwise I do of course agree that the system involves BOTH radiation AND conduction.
However it is well established that convection neutralises radiative imbalances for an atmosphere in hydrostatic equilibrium:
http://www.public.asu.edu/~hhuang38/mae578_lecture_06.pdf
Radiative equilibrium profile could be unstable; convection restores it to stability (or neutrality)
and:
Note that the hydrostatic equation depicts the vertical balance of force for a piece of fluid at rest. The balance is between the upward pressure gradient force and downward gravitational force.
The hydrostatic equation is the vertical component of the momentum equation (Newtons equation of motion) for the fluid parcel when the forces are in perfect balance and the net acceleration = 0.
Readers should study that lecture since it explains the concept of hydrostatic balance within atmospheres.
It appears that those climate scientists who apply the radiative gases theory of climate change have overlooked the means by which convection neutralises radiative imbalances.
Stephen Wilde,
The lapse rate is just the thermal gradient. I see you now have two types of GHE. Which one works at night in the freezing arid tropical desert?
The density of the air has little to do with anything, but nice try.
Air at 1013 mb can vary widely in temperature – from roughly 45C to -90C.
Your comment –
“The GHE is derived from mass conducting rather than radiation flowing and the lapse rate slope following the density gradient is the proof.”, doesn’t make any sense to me. Did you really mean to write it? As Tyndall points out above, observations of surface temperature contradict you, in any case.
Cheers.
Mike Flynn wrote:
In cold conditions, I wear clothes to reduce the rate of heat loss.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/08/uah-global-temperature-update-for-july-2016-0-39-deg-c/#comment-219326
David Appell.
Nice try David.
I also use a tea cosy for the same purpose. It still doesn’t make my tea any hotter. Your gotcha has fizzled and died.
Clothing a corpse will reduce its rate of heat loss. It won’t heat it up again. What is your point?
Cheers.
“Clothing a corpse will reduce its rate of heat loss. It wont heat it up again.”
Does a corpse have a heat source?
Does the Earth have a heat source? Maybe, the Sun?
David Appell,
Questions. Questions.
More attempts at pointless gotchas.
Why does the surface cool at night? Why does a corpse wrapped in a blanket still cool? What is the skin temperature of a cooling baked potato?
If you are seeking knowledge, I will gladly answer your misleading and ill posed questions. I believe you are just trolling (as I understand the term), rather than seeking, or endeavouring to impart, knowledge.
Continue to deny, divert, and confuse if you wish. Continue to deny that hot things cool. The Earth has cooled. Pretending it’s getting hotter is about as silly as pretending you can heat water by wrapping it in an overcoat. Give it a try, if you like!
Cheers,
Flynn wrote:
“Why does a corpse wrapped in a blanket still cool?”
I have addressed this already.
Why do you ignore my answer?
Mike Flynn says:
“why does a corpse wrapped in a blanket still cool?”
Does a corpse have a heat source?
Come on — you understand this. But you keep avoiding my answer — the best sign you understand this stuff well.
Mike Flynn says:
“The Earth has cooled.”
How do you know this?
Mike Flynn says:
“The Earth has cooled.”
And notice how little CO2 is in the current atmosphere, compared to severals 10s and 100s of millions of years ago.
See the correlation?
It reduces heat loss.
You clearly understand this, Mike.
Why are you pretending not to?
David Appell,
More pointless questioning?
Why?
Cheers.
Why are you avoiding these most basic questions, Mike?
You obviously understand how the greenhouse effect works.
What are you gaining by your (transparent) attempts to pretend you don’t understand it?
Only the mass and conduction version, not two.
The density of the air controls the number of collisions that can take place and thus the rate and efficiency of conduction.
Local variations are indeed large but taking the atmosphere as a whole the surface temperature and the decline in temperature with height are fixed as per the US Standard Atmosphere.
It is observed that the decline in temperature with height follows the declining density gradient with height.
How would a purely radiative GHE theory account for that ?
Stephen, it’s clear that your ideas are just handwaving, and you can’t actually calculate anything with them.
That makes them unproven hypotheses only.
It is all out there in the US Standard Atmosphere, the Gas Laws, atmospheres at hydrostatic equilibrium, basic meteorology and basic physics. Nothing for me to prove.
It is up to you to explain how all that can be replaced with pure radiative theory which is what AGW proposes.
“Does CO2 reduce the rate of heat loss?”
Not according to surface records, when you compare today’s warming to tonight’s cooling.
That would be weather Michael not climate.
Stephen Wilde,
The Earth’s surface is hotter than the nominal 3 K of its surrounding environment.
It follows that the atmosphere will have a thermal gradient from surface temperature to 3 K.
The correlation between higher pressures closer to the surface, and higher temperatures closer to the surface does not necessarily imply causation. And observation at equal surface pressures shows that temperatures vary by up to 135 K or thereabouts, at different geographical locations.
A cylinder of compressed gas at 100 bar, and an empty cylinder at 1 bar, at 20C are exactly the same temperature. Heat them both to 30 C, and they will both be at 30 C. Pressure makes no difference to temperature. Chilling a molten cast iron sphere rapidly causes internal pressure high enough to create diamond from graphite. At 20 C, it’s 20 C. The internal pressure is still enormous.
Cheers.
“Pressure makes no difference to temperature.”
Ever hear of Gay-Lussac’s law?
David Appell,
Gay-Lussac –
“All gases have the same mean thermal expansivity at constant pressure over the same range of temperature”, or when heated, a wide variety of gases respond in the same predictable way.”
Your point being?
Only a foolish person would believe that they could establish the temperature of a gas from its pressure. Possibly you are such a person. Or maybe you believe that CO2 behaves differently. Gay-Lussac didn’t seem to think so.
Cheers.
“Only a foolish person would believe that they could establish the temperature of a gas from its pressure.”
No one said that. That’s your first lie.
Now you are going to try and dismiss the ideal gas law, too Mikie?
David Appell,
“Only a foolish person would believe that they could establish the temperature of a gas from its pressure.”
With what part of that do you disagree?
You keep throwing up red herrings. Unless you have an endless supply, I’m not sure why you’re wasting your energy. No temperature increase due to CO2 in air. No temperature decrease if you remove CO2 from air.
Maybe you could dive into your book of pithy aphorisms (foolish Warmist version) and try and find something apposite. Or, if you are a qualified journalist, you could try “wow, just wow!” Or “duh!”. What about calling me a “denier”? That might help!
CO2 still won’t raise the temperature of anything, but you’ll probably feel better.
I’ll let others decide if you are providing an example of the triumph of faith over fact.
Cheers.
“No temperature increase due to CO2 in air.”
Does CO2 reduce the rate of heat loss?
Mike Flynn says:
“Only a foolish person would believe that they could establish the temperature of a gas from its pressure.”
No one says this.
Why do you make up lies like this, Mikie?
Flynn, you say:
I’ve got one. Why do you assume that insulation always works equally in both directions?
On heating (and cooling).
CO2 at 1 K can be heated by an environment of anything at all at 20 K. It is nonsense to suggest that CO2 can only be heated by EMR of particular frequencies. Assuming sufficient mass for the environment, the CO2 will rise to 20 K. And vice versa.
Or O2, or N2.
The air you expire contains CO2, O2, and N2. The temperature of the mixture is around 37 C. The expired air will shortly be the same temperature as the environment. Day or night.
Any more questions?
Cheers.
People: Don’t let Mike Flynn fool you. He understands perfectly well how CO2 causes the greenhouse effect — it reduces heat loss.
He proved that awhile back when he wrote:
Mike Flynn wrote:
In cold conditions, I wear clothes to reduce the rate of heat loss.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/08/uah-global-temperature-update-for-july-2016-0-39-deg-c/#comment-219326
David Appell,
Reducing heat loss merely reduces the rate at which something cools, if it is hotter than its environment.
Your attempts to deny, divert, and confuse by claiming that insulation provides energy, or that reducing the rate of heat loss at night somehow results in an increase in temperature, are simply bizarre.
Maybe you could propose some falsifiable hypothesis to explain why the Earth has cooled for four and a half billion years – that at least would demonstrate you understand the principles of science. Or do you deny that as well?
Cheers.
“Your attempts to deny, divert, and confuse by claiming that insulation provides energy,”
False, Mikie.
It’s the Sun that provides the energy.
But you understand this already.
Lord knows why you pretend not to…..
David Appell,
Indeed the Sun heats part of the Earth. And the parts without sunlight cool.
And after four and a half billion years, the net result is surface cooling of thousands of degrees.
Or do you believe the Earth has miraculously decided to heat up at night?
Winter is still colder than summer. The Earth has cooled, whether you accept the fact or not.
Cheers.
Mike, your trolling is especially shameful, because you clearly understand perfectly well how the greenhouse effect works.
Why are you trying to avoid this?
Consider a house. A steady amount of heat is pumped into it.
Is that house warmer than if it had no insulation?
Now consider that the insulation is increasing all the time.
Does the house get warmer still?
David Appell,
I will overlook your attempts to deny, divert, and confuse, and stick to the subject – the Earth.
Consider the Earth. Over the last four and a half billion years, it has cooled, GHGs notwithstanding.
This appears to be a fact. You may attempt to deny, divert, and confuse by introducing irrelevant and pointless analogies. Houses, overcoats, furnaces – none are the Earth. None demonstrate any temperature increasing properties of CO2. All your devout hopes and desires cannot apparently change the fact that the Earth has cooled.
You cannot even provide an experimentally falsifiable hypothesis to support your musings. Some science! Try again David. Maybe you could consider the Earth, and physics.
Cheers.
Mike: Why are you doing this???
You are a very transparent troll.
You know the Sun is a continuous heat source for the Earth.
You know CO2 reduces heat loss.
So you clearly know that when the insulation (C02) increases, and the heat source remains the same, the Earth gets hotter.
This is trivial. You understand this.
Why are you going to such extremes to pretend otherwise?
Mike Flynn says:
“Consider the Earth. Over the last four and a half billion years, it has cooled, GHGs notwithstanding.”
What has led you to conclude that GHGs are the only influence on the Earth’s climate, now or then?
David Appell,
I see you cannot bring yourself to accept fact.
For anyone who may be obsessing about the temperature raising properties of insulation, I’ll just point out that refrigerators, cold rooms, and so on, actually use insulation to keep cold. The more, the colder.
I am surprised that you would think that increasing the amount of insulation around your freezer would cause its contents to increase in temperature. That’s just ridiculous!
If one wishes to remain cool, one insulates oneself from the heat source. The space shuttles, for example, used highly efficient insulation to keep heat away from the crew. The more insulation, the less heat.
As it is on Earth. Without an atmosphere, temperatures in the direct Sun would rise above 100 C.
The GHE appears to have morphed into an insulator. Unfortunately, as the Sahara desert shows, the less the insulation, the hotter the surface. Or maybe you have an alternative explanation?
Cheers.
David Appell,
You wrote –
“What has led you to conclude that GHGs are the only influence on the Earths climate, now or then?”
More inane straw man argument. You cannot quote me, so you just make stuff up – a little transparently, if I may say so.
You might be better off abandoning your futile gotcha attempts. What’s wrong with addressing the science? Do you deny that climate is the average of weather? Do you deny that the weather, and hence the climate, has changed continuously throughout Earth’s history?
Have you any facts to support your mindless repetitions of claims that air can be heated by increasing the CO2 concentration? Does this mean that air can be cooled by extracting CO2 from it? Really?
I don’t believe so, but maybe you can provide some evidence supporting the CO2 cooling effect!
Cheers.
Mike, of course I can quote you. And you know it.
“Over the last four and a half billion years, it has cooled, GHGs notwithstanding.”
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/08/observational-evidence-of-the-greenhouse-effect-at-desert-rock-nevada/#comment-221226
Mike Flynn wrote:
“Have you any facts to support your mindless repetitions of claims that air can be heated by increasing the CO2 concentration? Does this mean that air can be cooled by extracting CO2 from it?”
Now that I’m on to you, I only wonder why you’re trying to appear dim.
CO2 reduces heat loss.
Hence, more of it reduces more heat loss.
With a constant heat source (the Sun), that means the planet warms.
Yes, if you take CO2 out of the atmosphere, the surface will cool.
And you clearly understand why —
less reduction of heat loss.
Stop pretending, Mikie….
David Appell,
You may have intentionally overlooked the fact that more insulation between the Earth and the Sun cools the surface. Or do you deny this?
I know you wish for a magical one way insulator which retains or traps heat day by day, year by year, to increase temperatures, but alas, no such thing exists.
The surface heats during the day, cools at night, is cooler during Winter, and warmer during Summer. As to removing CO2 from the atmosphere, your assertion is unsupported by fact. Experimental evidence shows that maximum transmission of EMR occurs in a vacuum. The radiative transfer equations will allow you to calculate how much EMR from the Sun does not reach the Earth’s surface, due to the impediment posed by the atmosphere.
No GHE. Just physics. Erroneous Arrhenius was brilliant, but mistaken about the heating effect of CO2, just as Lord Kelvin was mistaken about the age of the Earth. Some would say Svante was also mistaken about the benefits of eugenics. Brilliant scientists are often wrong – for a variety of reasons.
Play with words, look for gotchas, erect and demolish strawmen- it changes nothing. No experimentally demonstrable CO2 heating. Correlation is not causation. You’re barking up the wrong tree, as far as I can see.
Cheers.
Mikie, why do you keep dancing like this?? It just makes no sense.
“You may have intentionally overlooked the fact that more insulation between the Earth and the Sun cools the surface.”
Between the Earth and the Sun? Yes, if the insulation absorbs sunlight.
But that’s not the insulation GHGs are providing — they absorb IR given off by the Earth, not sunlight.
Surely you understand at least that much, right?
Mike Flynn wrote:
“Erroneous Arrhenius was brilliant, but mistaken about the heating effect of CO2”
Just stop it, Mikie. The jig is up.
You know this isn’t how the greenhouse effect works.
Of course CO2 provides no heat. It reduces heat loss, just like the coat you put on in the winter.
Don’t treat us like we’re stupid, Flynn.
Maybe that works elsewhere in your life. It won’t work with me.
“…but mistaken about the heating effect of CO2”
You look really dumb when you write this, Mike.
You know it’s not how the greenhouse effect works.
And you know people like me and Dr. Spencer know that.
So why — really — do you keep writing such transparent stuff?
Mike Flynn says:
“You cannot even provide an experimentally falsifiable hypothesis to support your musings.”
Study harder, dude:
Radiative forcing measured at Earths surface corroborate the increasing greenhouse effect, R. Philipona et al, Geo Res Letters, v31 L03202 (2004)
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2003GL018765/abstract
“Observational determination of surface radiative forcing by CO2 from 2000 to 2010,” D. R. Feldman et al, Nature 519, 339343 (19 March 2015)
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v519/n7543/full/nature14240.html
Press release for Feldman et al: “First Direct Observation of Carbon Dioxides Increasing Greenhouse Effect at the Earths Surface,” Berkeley Lab, 2/25/15
http://newscenter.lbl.gov/2015/02/25/co2-greenhouse-effect-increase/
I’m sure you will ignore these, just as you ignore all other evidence that contradicts your claims.
Mike Flynn says:
“Consider the Earth. Over the last four and a half billion years, it has cooled, GHGs notwithstanding.
This appears to be a fact.”
So you accept the findings of science and what scientists have discovered and figured out.
And then you pretend not to understand the greenhouse effect, which was also discovered and figured out by scientists.
How is that?
How do you think you better than 10s of thousands of scientists over the last 150 years?
Why are you so special?
@David Appell…re your links supporting the GHE.
http://arxiv.org/PS_cache/arxiv/pdf/0707/0707.1161v4.pdf
And please don’t quote me Eli Rabbett, aka Halpern, as a rebuttal.
Of course any reasonable scientist would deny “the Earth has cooled for four and a half billion years”. It has cooled. and warmed. And cooled again. And warmed again. …
For example, here is a graph of the last 0.5 billion years. Estimated temperatures are all over the place.
http://www.geocraft.com/WVFossils/PageMill_Images/image277.gif
Within the last million years, the temperate has swung rapidly, resulting in repeated cycles of glaciation.
The earth has VARIED in temperature for 4.5 billion years. After an initial rapid cooling (from molten to solid surface), the surface temperature has swung back and forth several degrees C.
“CO2 at 1 K can be heated by an environment of anything at all at 20 K”
F*cking gibberish.
Mike Flynn says:
“It is nonsense to suggest that CO2 can only be heated by EMR of particular frequencies.”
Ever studied quantum mechanics, Mike?
Ever studied quantum levels?
Ever calculated them?
“Just stop it, Mikie. The jig is up.
You know this isnt how the greenhouse effect works.
Of course CO2 provides no heat. It reduces heat loss, just like the coat you put on in the winter.
Dont treat us like were stupid, Flynn.”
Flynn has been told, and pointed to evidence/empirical science that he is talking out of his posterior.
In fact noting same, one is left with the inevitable conclusion that either he has a psychological condition, or that he posts just as a wind-up – for the effects (the DEFINITION of an internet Troll).
Given Roy’s newly found moderation procedure – then it is only a matter of time.
I think Flynn just likes to wind people up.
Because he clearly understands the science.
And because he clearly avoids responding to certain points, like the answers to the questions he asks.
Whatever the case, please just ignore him.
On Venus, like on the Earth tropopause starts at a pressure of about 0.1 bar.
Lapse rate at a pressure of from 50 to 55 km is slightly less -9 C / km.
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/6/63/Venusatmosphere.svg/1024px-Venusatmosphere.svg.png
“The altitude of the troposphere most similar to Earth is near the tropopausethe boundary between troposphere and mesosphere. It is located slightly above 50 km.[17] According to measurements by the Magellan and Venus Express probes, the altitude from 52.5 to 54 km has a temperature between 293 K (20 C) and 310 K (37 C), and the altitude at 49.5 km above the surface is where the pressure becomes the same as Earth at sea level.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Venus
This is the current temperature at a height of 0.1 bar on the Earth.
http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/soundings/atovs/profiles/RODF_RT_20_noaa19_D1_t1.png
And such a level of 200 mb.
http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/soundings/atovs/profiles/RODF_RT_24_noaa19_D1_t1.png
At 100 mb “illuminates” ozone.
See if I’m understanding this greenhouse effect – in layman’s terms.
The sun radiates energy, some of which impacts the earth’s surface but, because of it’s wavelength, does not heat the atmosphere along the way. Various materials on the earth, water, rocks etc, are heated by this energy, being able to absorb the particular wavelengths, then emit their excess energy, some of it into the atmosphere, where the so-called greenhouses gases can absorb the energy. These gases then re-emit the energy in all directions, some back towards earth, some towards space, and in its way out, it may be reabsorbed and re-emitted numerous times.
The greenhouse gases, including methane, CO2 and H2O are the main influences on this process. AGW is supposed to be caused by the increase in CO2 volume in the atmosphere. (My understanding is that CO2 is about .04% of the atmosphere while H2O is 2%+/- and methane is .00017%.)
So the change in CO2 volume in the atmosphere, from about .03% to whatever it is now or in the future, is supposed to be the cause of global warming.
What I’m missing is how much the various gasses absorb and re-emit relative to each other. For example, if CO2 is 100 times as strong/effective a greenhouse gas as H20, then the increase of concentration from .03% to .04% would equate to 5% of the effect of H20.
My guess is that 5% seems small, but the cumulative effect over two or three months would have the surface boiling?
What am I missing?
“….would have the surface boiling?”
What am I missing?
Hansen…boil the oceans, Hansen.
@Lewis…”The sun radiates energy, some of which impacts the earths surface but, because of its wavelength, does not heat the atmosphere along the way”.
What do you mean it’s wavelength (singular). The Sun is our major source of EM and the EM spectrum has an incredibly broad range of wavelengths.
I have always been skeptical of the notion that only GHGs can absorb EM, in fact, I know it’s false. The major molecules in the atmosphere, N2 and 02, which make up 99% of the atmosphere, can absorb EM capable of warming them.
What I don’t know is how much.
Do not forget solar energy absorbed by clouds. It is the greatest. After clouds absorb solar energy, the energy as heat is then exchanged with the surrounding air.
Lewis, the description seems right to me, but you’ll have to research the numbers. CO2 is not “100 times as strong/effective a greenhouse gas as H20.” I could repeat the numbers I’ve read, but if you sincerely want a drill-down understanding you were best to read the research for yourself.
This paper was a seminal calculation of radiative transfer of various gases through the atmosphere. It’s a good starting point, though the math might make your head spin.
www-ramanathan.ucsd.edu/files/pr15.pdf
Dave the solar minimum conditions were not present then now it looks like they will be and we shall see.
I might be right or I might be wrong.
Dr Spencer, this is what I’ve found.
Night time cooling is nonlinear, at sunset the cooling rate is very high, this is the regime controlled by co2, but later in the night, as air Temps near dew point, cooling greatly slows, this is the regime controlled by water vapor. The thing is, even if there is a slight warming from co2, that heat is lost to space prior to the switch to the low cooling rate water vapor controlled regime(because the switch is temp controlled). Water vapor controls cooling, not co2. Consider deserts and tropics as the 2 extreme examples, deserts, mostly co2 limited cooling drop on average of 35F in a night, there tropics controlled by water drop on average 15F at night.
To go with this, I get this from surface station data.
Since 1940 75.6 million surface station records (all stations with 360 samples/year/station).
Average daily warming 17.841F (min temp to max temp) average daily cooling 17.845F (max temp to following days min temp)
Now, I can hear the protesting that I went back to 1940.
1980 to 2015, 59 million surface station records (same criteria).
Daily warming 17.868F daily cooling 17.875F
Surface stations cool more than they warm. Now you might say, well how can that be!!! Because tropical oceans evaporate water, and that water vapor blows inland to cool.
Ummm … something is wrong.
17.868F daily warming and 17.875F daily cooling equals 0.00F7 net daily cooling. That is 0.007F/day * 365 days = 2.555F annual cooling. From 1980 to 2015 is 35 years, so that is 35*2.555F = 89.4F cooling in 35 years.
I rather doubt there has been about 90F cooling at surface stations in the last few decades! There must be some major round-off error or mistake in the interpretation of the data or error in the analysis.
It’s the difference between the sum of rising temps and the sum of falling temps, divided by the number of days.
The sum’s for the 75M records is about 1.3B F, and for 60M it’s 1B F.
The difference between these sums (+/- any rounding in the terms) is about 90F (out of a billion F change in daily temps).
I went back and checked the data, there’s a -389988 differences between the sum (of the average, I have to do more coding to get the actual sum, though I have done this before and the resulting numbers were the same (the total sum/count vs average)), then divide that by 60M is -0.00661
Current temperature in Australia.
http://oi68.tinypic.com/34pm6fq.jpg
“Night time cooling is nonlinear, at sunset the cooling rate is very high, this is the regime controlled by co2, but later in the night, as air Temps near dew point, cooling greatly slows, this is the regime controlled by water vapor. ”
H2O and CO2 act simultaneously and you neglect that Planck -ve feedback is a maximum at sunset.
There is no “switching” from one to the other though the water re-radiation effect will dominate in moist air.
“Consider deserts and tropics as the 2 extreme examples, deserts, mostly co2 limited cooling drop on average of 35F in a night, there tropics controlled by water drop on average 15F at night”
This is the same argument as mpainter’s, though phrased differently – you have to consider the local meteorology……..
Desserts get hot during the day because they lie under areas of HP – descending air which warms under compression. That creates a stable atmosphere that puts a “hat” on convection and allows high temps. They fall cooler at night because the air is dry, skies clear and they have sandy soils, with a low level surface inversion capping the cooling to a few hundred feet – this rapidly warmed out soon after sunrise.
Tropical air is close to being conditionally unstable to local SST’s, and quickly convects and being moist/close to water, a LOT of heat is used up in evaporation and released aloft. There is no capping subsidence inversion to stop that.
At night , more cloud, often more wind (sea breezes) and moist air limits cooling.
Lower maxes as well as higher mins
You can see the rate change when you look at by minute temps
https://micro6500blog.files.wordpress.com/2016/08/high2slowcooling.png
and
https://micro6500blog.files.wordpress.com/2016/07/therealcontrolknobof-temperature.png
as examples.
while I know it isn’t a wide band measurement You can measure Tsky with an IR thermometer(you then need to convert the temp to a flux, add flux from co2, then convert back to temp), under clear skies the radiative sink for the surface is quite cold, it can be nearly 90F difference in dry air from the ground, even right before dawn. Yet cooling rates fall quickly compared to nearly the same difference to Tsky, and when air temps near dew points, the rate slows.
The Sahara has extreme tmax (and extreme diurnal range) because it is dry, not because of descending air mass (aka blocking high pressure). My neck of the woods is at the same latitude as the Sahara and occasionally suffers prolonged drought, from blocking high pressure. During such periods, the GHE is alive and well due to humidity circulating in from the G of Mexico.
Repeat, descending air mass does not, of itself, generate extreme tmax and diurnal range. See ENSO and the Tahiti-Darwin atmospheric circulation cycle.
My comparison of Sahara climate with that of the humid tropics is a valid comparison of GHE, as it varies on this planet.
“Repeat, descending air mass does not, of itself, generate extreme tmax and diurnal range. See ENSO and the Tahiti-Darwin atmospheric circulation cycle.”
Sorry wrong.
Repeat, descending air does (can), of itself, generate an extreme tmax and diurnal range.
Look up a Tphi (skew LogT) diagram from a desert environment …. Or any location that is presently under a blocking high.
There will be a marked warming of the bulk of the atmosphere due to subsidence. It is a basic gas law. Compress a gas and it warms. So you have warm ( in comparison to a standard ELR ) air above. Now what does deep convection require? Exactly – cooler air (relative to a standard ELR) aloft. So result – suppressed convection. Actually it most closely resembles the true affect of what happens in an actual greenhouse.
Convection is easy to compute on a Tphi – can even work out a max temp from a midnight ascent by input of the expected thermal energy of the day. A Tphi is essentially a thermodynamic diagram whereby areas equals energy. So I routinely computed a max temp for central England via this method. Yes, I still did this even though the UKMO’s mesoscale model would predict it. I was often closer. PS: this was 10 years ago.
Ever noticed why there is often not even any fair-weather Cu under HP?, or that some forms then burns off?
That is either the subsidence inversion is too low to even allow Cu to form at all, or it is just high enough that it forms and “disappears up it’s own arse”. It is not because it is just dry. Cu will form but at a high base in such circumstances.
This of course is visible, moist convection, don’t forget dry convection would also be suppressed under a subsidence inversion.
Ask a glider pilot if he’d like to fly in such conditions.
Heat stays near the surface.
Hot air at the surface is prevented from rising to cool the surface. Ergo extreme max temps (under extreme conditions of airmass temp and persistence).
“Hot Air does not rise”. It does, in small-scale fashion as dust devils, etc. But the real reason for lack of convection in Sahara type terrain is the lack of surface humidity and this means low atmospheric humidity. The GHE varies according to the concentration of ghg, but you seem unable to grasp that. Your comment evades the fact that there are plenty of examples of descending air mass in other than Sahara type conditions, as I gave above.
“The GHE varies according to the concentration of ghg, but you seem unable to grasp that.”
No, it is you that is unable to grasp what I am saying.
In basics….
Energy from the sun is thermalised on land.
It warms the air above via conduction initially. It then will heat air further aloft via convection.
If convection cannot occur because the air aloft remains warmer – then heat builds up at the surface.
Simple as that.
The GHE is NOT needed to attain an extreme max under a HP subsidence inversion.
Been there and got the T-shirt ta (as in forecasting these occurrences professionally).
And where is the ascending air mass/convection? In the tropics, where the wv is higher and the GHE is greater. You have only explained why the Sahara is dry.
This still doesn’t alter what was measured at the surface. dry air under clear skies cools a lot more and faster than moist air. While at the same time the measurable temperature of the sky under these conditions, is far below air temps at the surface. It doesn’t matter if at 5,000 altitude above the surface it’s 100F, the surface does not see that radiation, or you could measure it from the surface.
This is the beauty of measuring IR, it’s light and you can measure it, the same as when I collect photons of a galaxy in my telescope from 200 Million light years away in my driveway.
And while it might not rise, it still drops on average of 25F in the deserts of the US SW (day’s increase 25.394/following nights drop 25.397F).
“The GHE is NOT needed to attain an extreme max under a HP subsidence inversion.”
I’m not suggesting it is. What I do suggest is that for Co2 to cause warming, it has to limit the night time cooling rate, it doesn’t.
Dave what in your opinion caused the low global temperatures associated with the Maunder Minimum?
For that matter all of the other prolonged solar minimums?
Dr Roy, you have found the perfect time to investigate the Greenhouse Effect. That is night, when convection ceases. Now, you can demonstrate the marvelous effect of water vapor on downwelling radiation, not bothered by convection which has ceased, allowing the formation of temperature inversions which confound the lapse rate and seem to demonstrate that radiation dominates, and at night it does, so that scoundrels can shake down the public with unfounded claims about greenhouse gasses. What you are not measuring is actual heat flux. Certainly dry air allows higher radiant heat flux at night than moist air, and with dry air the surface can radiate directly to space so that the surface cools dramatically and a temperature inversion forms, putting an end to convection for the night. But with daylight convection begins again, destroying the temperature inversion and beginning the real work of reestablishing the lapse rate and putting excess heat where it belongs, in space. Because convection does not know anything about CO2. All it wants to do is to maintain the surface at the temperature that God has decreed for the earth and its inhabitants. All it knows about is the gas law and gravity. Yes, the final step for heat escaping to space is radiation from a zone at the top of the troposphere where radiant emission goes as the fourth power of temperature, so that any small increase in temperature above the Planck temperature causes a massive opposing response in radiant emissions. That is why our climate is stable and has remained stable for billions of years. The same argument can be made for any planet with any atmospheric composition.
Correct.
Dr. Spencer,
I don’t say downwelling IR doesn’t exist, but your results do not prove that any IR being emitted downward from 500 mb makes it to the surface. Nearly all the downward IR that is measured at the surface comes from the H2O and CO2 molecules in the layer of air up to a few meters above the surface. That is the consequence of a layer of air being sufficiently opaque to IR.
Wikipedia defines the greenhouse effect differently than you: “The greenhouse effect is the process by which radiation from a planet’s atmosphere warms the planet’s surface to a temperature above what it would be without its atmosphere.” There is no mention of IR-active gases in that definition. More to the point, there is no need for any IR active gases in an atmosphere for it to make a planet’s surface warmer than it would be without an atmosphere.
You wrote “…the results clearly show that increasing greenhouse gas concentration in the atmosphere (in this case, water vapor) increases downwelling IR radiation from the sky, and increases surface temperature. And, while I have used nighttime data to isolate the effect from the complications introduced with daytime solar heating, it should be remembered that infrared effects on surface temperature are occurring 24 hours a day.”
Increasing surface temperature during the night does not mean that daily average surface temperatures increase with increasing concentration of IR-active gases, because those gases may have a cooling effect during the day.
I think it is time to abandon greenhouse terminology. Everyone has a different opinion on what it means. Confusion occurs by not considering the difference between a planet with no atmosphere, the same as our atmosphere with IR-active gases, and our atmosphere without IR-active gases. If we had to express our views without mentioning greenhouse, we would arrive at more common ground sooner.
Chic:
You need to go look at a spectrum of absorption at different wavelengths of radiation…it is only at specific wavelengths the emission comes from a thin layer near the surface. Much broader ranges of wavelengths, encompassing more total energy, are only partly opaque to radiation, and see much higher in the atmosphere. The total across the IR spectrum ends up being emission at the surface comes from an effective radiating altitude of the lower-mid troposphere.
Yes, there are somewhat different definitions of “greenhouse effect”…but we have to use words to convey what the equations are representing. I actually program the equations and run numbers through them. But in order to explain the results we use words, which leads to ambiguity.
Since you mention daytime, one of the results is that if I do a regression between daytime hour-to-hour temperature changes during July 2016 at Desert Rock against (1) net solar, (2) downwelling IR, and (3) upwelling IR, the regression coefficient to explain hourly temperature changes is actually larger on the downwelling IR changes than it is on the net solar changes. In such a multiple regression, the statistics decide how important each of the 3 terms are to explaining hour-to-hour temperature changes, and the results show observationally that increases in downwelling IR cause increases in temperature. I already showed in the current blog post that this is primarily a humidity signature.
You can hand-wave all you want, but (apparently) until you and a few others actually analyze data like I and many others do, you really can’t understand the physics of what’s going on.
Thanks, Dr. Spencer.
This helps a lot. As others have said before, this is one of the best places, if not the best, for amateurs to get educated. I will study the full spectrum to see where my reasoning went wrong. I’ll also re-examine my day versus night expectation.
If I understood you correctly, I totally reject your assertion that explaining equations with words leads to ambiguity. Unless the goal is to keep people in the dark, as I suspect is the warmists’ intent.
If you’ve been reading and understanding the disputes here, a great deal of it has to do with semantics. The processes being discussed are not intuitively understandable at fine resolution – eg, what to make of fields moving perpendicularly to each other to get a handle on temperature?
The processes can be defined accurately, I would guess, only with pure math. Verbal descriptions must perforce be analogistic, and that is where much confusion arises. From what I can gather, this difficulty is not limited to lay people on blogs, but also with experts who may have learned to express the processes with different (descriptive) language.
I agree. And if I understand correctly, the equations representing all the factors involved can’t be solved explicitly. Analogies are too vague. Take Toneb’s pachinko analogy to explain how radiation 5 km up reaches the surface for example. Photons don’t bounce off molecules all the way down to the surface. No single photon emitted from CO2 molecules at that altitude will make it to the surface without being absorbed by another CO2 molecule, only those close enough to reach the surface before being absorbed. I hadn’t considered the possibility that photons emitted from water molecules at some wavelengths might reach the surface at high altitudes. I have to think that through some more.
The important factor is that there is a temperature gradient and that more photons will be emitted the closer they get to the surface where they will be absorbed. I still have doubt about that making the surface any warmer given the same energy source. The point I’m trying to make is that detailed verbiage is necessary if we are to understand each other.
“I dont say downwelling IR doesnt exist, but your results do not prove that any IR being emitted downward from 500 mb makes it to the surface. Nearly all the downward IR that is measured at the surface comes from the H2O and CO2 molecules in the layer of air up to a few meters above the surface. That is the consequence of a layer of air being sufficiently opaque to IR.”
Well during my career with the UKMO I routinely observed Ci cloud of the order of 6 miles up raise the temp of a road surface (the RST needs to be below 0C to be noticeable). The GHE can and does work from the high atmosphere. Roy has an experiment written up that shows similarly I believe.
Think in mechanically visual terms – of one of those Japanese pin-ball machines (pachinko). You are saying that no ball bearings would ever get through the pins to reach the bottom. No – even with an infinity of pins they would eventually fall through (Vis Venus) and so they would be affected by pins lower down (read higher in the atmosphere) … As Beer’s law states with its term for path length.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/BeerLambert_law
Even with 100% saturation at the surface (wet fog) the top of the fog will cool if exposed to space.
Likewise does CO2 – the effective radiation level where more escapes to space than is received from below is why the lower/mid Stratosphere is expected to, and is cooling.
I might add that fog can lift when exposed to back-radiation from cloud drifting over. It will warm the fog top greatest but also with time the whole depth of the fog.
This is the case in freezing fog even from high Ac and Ci cloud.
Again a Meteorologists tool, as is cloud warming RST’s ( road surface temps).
Toneb, are clouds part of the GHE?
Cirrus, and all clouds, radiate in the “atmospheric window”. This is the reason for their surface warming effect. But whilst they radiate downward, they also radiate upward. How about that!
Toneb said:
“I routinely observed Ci cloud of the order of 6 miles up raise the temp of a road surface (the RST needs to be below 0C to be noticeable). The GHE can and does work from the high atmosphere.”
I too have noticed that ANY increase in atmospheric opacity even at Ci level will reduce the rate of surface cooling to space and thereby allow surface temperature to recover from the lowest temperature achievable beneath a clear sky.
However, the reduced rate of cooling simply allows other factors to become more dominant such as ground warmth from below seeping up and/or horizontal advection overwhelming the reduced rate of radiative cooling.
So, do we really see warming from Ci radiating down from an extremely cold location or simply a change in the balance between the rate of surface radiation to space and other factors?
Note also that Ci often flows in across an otherwise cloud free descending area of air such as in a high pressure cell so you also have to consider the warming of that descending air by compression offsetting radiative loss from the ground.
On balance I suspect that the idea that DWIR from the Ci directly caused the surface warming is actually erroneous.Very few photons of IR emanate from such a cold high location.
“However, the reduced rate of cooling simply allows other factors to become more dominant such as ground warmth from below seeping up and/or horizontal advection overwhelming the reduced rate of radiative cooling.”
Yes, that is the consequence of back-radiation impacting the surface…. The conductive heat flux from below raises the surface (skin) temp. The UKMO algorithm for RST cooling has as one of it’s variables, a depth temp. That is what is happening, as the GHE only reduces the surface (skin) cooling via radiation. It does not warm it.
“So, do we really see warming from Ci radiating down from an extremely cold location or simply a change in the balance between the rate of surface radiation to space and other factors?”
We see a change in the balance of surface radiation. Sorry I thought I’d made that clear. The warming is via transport of heat from below the skin surface.
“On balance I suspect that the idea that DWIR from the Ci directly caused the surface warming is actually erroneous.Very few photons of IR emanate from such a cold high location.”
Please read the para above.
Roy, Chic is correct,
Non radiative atmospheres, if they could exist, would still absorb energy from the surface by conduction, would still show a lapse rate slope linked to the decline in density with height, would inevitably have convective overturning (due to uneven surface heating causing density variations in the horizontal plane) and all that would occur within an atmosphere in hydrostatic equilibrium which would still have a surface temperature higher than that of a planet with no atmosphere.
Radiative gases not needed.
Downward radiation ORIGINATING from within molecules at a colder and higher location along the lapse rate slope never reaches the surface because the lapse rate gradient subsumes its output into the downward radiation from the lower warmer molecules immediately above the sensor. Because of the higher colder location the energy emitted must be LESS energetic than that originating from a warmer lower location.
You cannot add DWIR from a higher colder molecule at 500mb to that from a lower warmer molecule at 1000mb. You only get the radiation from 1000mb and no more.
Your suggestion that the atmosphere itself generates different more energetic wavelengths from a colder higher location such that those wavelengths ADD to the surface temperature is wrong.
Such warming stronger wavelengths emanating from a higher colder location are not being generated from within the atmosphere itself but are instead a consequence of incoming solar energy exciting radiative molecules so that they scatter the incoming solar radiation and pass it on downwards so that it eventually reaches the surface. That is quite separate from DWIR.
By suggesting that it is being generated from within radiatively active molecules in a higher colder location you are effectively double counting.
The warming, more energetic downward radiation is part of the incoming solar irradiation and NOT energy created within the radiatively active molecules.
Furthermore,Pyregeometers are designed to see past the molecules immediately above them and instead read a more distant, higher and colder location.
So, the variations in readings are because they produce different results when they measure the temperature at different heights along the lapse rate slope.
If there is a cloud they record the temperature at the height of the cloud. If there is no cloud then depending on the sensor setting they record the temperature at a higher colder location. In neither case will radiation from the higher location increase DWIR at the surface UNLESS the higher location is warmer than air molecules immediately above the surface as sometimes does happen due to warm air advecting horizontally above the observing site.
However for the globe as a whole convection ensures that as often as there is air warmer than it ‘should’ be (according to the US Standard Atmosphere lapse rate slope) above the observing site there is also air colder than it should be above some other observing site for a zero net effect on surface temperatures globally.
As for your humidity signature it is correct to say that clouds or water vapour are often warmer than they should be along the lapse rate slope (due to horizontal advection) and therefore can indeed provide enhanced DWIR at the surface but at other locations clouds or water vapour are colder than they should be along the lapse rate slope as a result of enhanced UWIR so it all nets out to zero globally.
The effective radiating altitude in the lower troposphere is the height at which the the DWIR and UWIR effects of clouds and water vapour net out to zero.
Note that although the dry descending air in a high pressure cell is warming by compression as it descends it is in fact colder than it should be relative to the lapse rate slope all the way down to the surface until it picks up heat or moisture from the surface.
Such descending air is half the atmosphere at any given moment and it is in those regions that one finds the offset for the enhanced DWIR that you noted in more humid regions with rising air.
“…still have a surface temperature higher than that of a planet with no atmosphere.
Radiative gases not needed.”
That’s not true, an atmosphere of non-radiative gases (say 20% oxygen and 80% Nitrogen for example) would allow IR to escape to outer space at the same rate as no atmosphere at all. Net result, same average surface temp, except conduction and convection of the non-radiative atmosphere would keep the day-time/night-time variation smaller than no atmosphere….
Disagree
A transparent atmosphere (non-radiative gasses) would have its surface temperature equal to the Planck temperature. Temperatures at successively higher altitudes would be lower, still in accordance with the lapse rate.
With an opaque atmosphere the top of the atmosphere is at the Planck temperature and temperatures at successively lower altitudes would be higher, following the lapse rate.
The earth is semi-transparent, in between these two extremes.
It radiates from an intermediate altitude, the “equivalent emissions height.” In all three cases convection would still take place.
Disagree once more, the idealized transparent atmosphere we have “imagined” that contains no radiative water vapor or CO2 will have an emissivity of zero so won’t radiate heat, even though it has a temperature that can be calculated from thermodynamics as a lapse rate. The upwelling IR will all come from the ground. An idealized pyrgeometer aimed upwards in such a transparent atmosphere would read 3 Kelvin.
The “greenhouse effect” as far as planet Earth is concerned is a direct result of the water vapor and clouds and CO2 and a few minor gases having a temperature and an emissivity in the SB equation P=ekA(Th^4-Tc^4)
Stephen 12:45pm writes: “If there is a cloud they record the temperature at the height of the cloud. If there is no cloud then depending on the sensor setting they record the temperature at a higher colder location.”
Yes, that is a decent hand wave description of the rGHE Stephen, well supported by data that Dr. Spencer has previously published. Passing clouds can be detected by the ESRL pyrgeometer data in top post on cloudy days, the top post appears to happen to be a clear day. Dr. Spencer has also shown the rGHE on a clear day by recording the results pointing up at zenith and then pointing just above the horizon.
DM writes: “An idealized pyrgeometer aimed upwards in such a transparent atmosphere would read 3 Kelvin.”
Incorrect DM, 80% N2,20% O2 Earth Tmedian at same albedo would be just a little higher than 255K, so the instrument would not read space Tmedian, it would record the 24/7 glow every 3 minutes of the O2,N2 optical depth at 1bar. The ERL radiating at global, annual 255K would thus be much closer to surface than around 5km now in the midlatitude tropics.
D. MacKenzie: “Disagree once more”
But a gas that does not interact radiatively can still transmit heat by conduction, so that the layer in contact with the surface will warm and thereby initiate convection. Even monatomic gases transmit heat.
Yup, Pochas94 @ 5:06, lapse rate works by conduction and convection and thermo laws, but my point is radiation to outer space, conduction being non-existent at top of atmosphere.
And Ball4 at 4:10, Wilde said radiative gases were not needed to have a GHE, and I was making the point that, in total absence of radiative gases, an infrared thermometer (sorry said pyrgeometer) would see outer space at 3K instead of water vapour, clouds, and CO2 at somewhere closer to,as you say 255 K. We are probably arguing the same point….
DHM, as I wrote the O2,N2 atm. at same albedo 1bar would not measure out at space 3K, there would still be substantial optical depth from collisions, total pressure and extinction coefficient of N2,O2 which is not zero. You would get 3k background looking up on the moon, not at 1bar on Earth with only N2,O2. The background would be lower than now but nowhere near 3K. The lowest on Earth ever measured in dry, cold conditions very little wv or liquid/frozen water in the column is still ~130 W/m^2 dry arctic conditions. Emissivity of atm. measured there looking up ~0.7
Stephen:
“You cannot add DWIR from a higher colder molecule at 500mb to that from a lower warmer molecule at 1000mb. You only get the radiation from 1000mb and no more.”
The molecule at 1000mb radiates the same number of photons it would were there no photons coming down from 500mb BUT because it does receive some it cools more slowly.
“Because of the higher colder location the energy emitted must be LESS energetic than that originating from a warmer lower location.”
No. It is the same radiation as that from the warmer location. It is IR – same wavelength and frequency. Just less photons because the higher molecule is colder. That is no impediment to it returning to the surface.
BTW: I agree that GHG’s are not needed to shape the lapse rate, but they do locally/temporally.
The overturning of the atmosphere does, as you say create the LR, modified by LH effects.
Toneb
Ok, I can live with those adjustments.
The fact that the 1000mb molecule doesn’t get any warmer as a result of the radiation from 500mb is consistent with what I said. The issue of it potentially cooling more slowly is dealt with by convective adjustments because the slower rate of cooling provokes more convection for a faster convective turnover which allows faster radiation to space to offset the DWIR.
Less photons from above rather than less energetic photons from above is fine because I was addressing Roy’s apparent assertion that more energetic photons of different wavelengths were coming from the higher colder atmosphere.
I agree that GHGs affect lapse rates locally and temporally but convection changes to neutralise any net thermal effect.
Stephen hand waves without data “I agree that GHGs affect lapse rates..”
Incorrect Stephen, the GHGs do not condense as does water vapor releasing LH reducing 9.8 ideal LR to 6.5 avg. LR observed in midlatitude tropics.
Incorrect Ball 4.
Non condensing GHGs do affect lapse rates
Incorrect Stephen in basic ref. for meteorology a member of RMS should know GHG’s affect the starting surface point for the LR aka Tmedian or local thermometer reading , GHG’s do not affect the LR slope as they do not condense. Well, except in Stephen’s imagination.
Look up the formula for dry or wet LR, the derivation for dry or wet LR slope, no significant factor for GHG. Oh wait, Stephen is incapable of dealing with that higher math. So gets the wrong answer. Which drives Stephen’s incorrect conclusions.
Long-term changes in the circulation of water vapor (eg due to solar activity – jetstream or ocean cycles – El Nino) have a decisive influence on the change in the average temperature in different regions of the Earth.
https://earth.nullschool.net/#current/wind/isobaric/250hPa/equirectangular
http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/Products/ocean/sst/anomaly/anim_full.html
Roy
YOUR results above are a most interesting contribution to the discussion of this topic
Radiative Theory might be correct however the Pyrgeometer does not measure backradiation directly.
As Nabil Swedan says:
August 25, 2016 at 12:20 AM
“Please do not get me wrong. I do not mean to say that backradiation cannot be calculated, of course it can. The issue at hand is whether it reach the surface or not. This is the big question that needs to be addressed. As of now pyrgeometers are the only instruments recognized by the World Meteorological Organization for measuring backradiation at surface.”
This topic was discussed at Science of Doom and Tallbloke.
The physics literate commentators (both warmist and skeptics) agree that the two streams of radiation cannot be separated.
So a backradiation reading is obtained by calculation.
There just does not seem to be an independent way of verifying the pyrgeometer readings.
Or is there?
It seems to me that a pyrgeometer could be used as a CO2 meter if the greenhouse theory is correct.
Humidity is readily measured so the water vapour content could be stripped out.
After several corresponding samplings of humidity, temperature, air density and pyrgeometer values then the CO2 fraction could be determined.
The CO2 fraction could be independently measured by traditional methods .
If the pyrgeometer readings agreed broadly with CO2 fraction values then I for one would be convinced that the greenhouse explanation is fundamentally correct.
Bryan – That has been done. Routinely in basic texts. Using precipitable water in the column over a site from climate records, one can come up with what you need – a measure of the radiation from H20 states reasonably close for well mixed CO2 et. al. in the column. For instance at an arid site (Desert Rock) and a more humid site (Goodwin Creek). The results can be counterintuitive meaning there might be more water in the column over Desert Rock than Goodwin Creek which has rained out.
Also, pyrgeometer values are routinely calibrated against a known source at NOAA ESRL. Radiometers are well know to be very stable but not extremely accurate (from CERES team calibration report(s)).
Thanks Ball4
Could you give a link to one of the ‘basic texts’ that give the experimental results of reverse instrumentation of a pyrgeometer into a fractional CO2 meter.
Search amazon.com for string: atmosphere thermodynamics bohren
https://www.amazon.com/Atmospheric-Thermodynamics-Craig-F-Bohren/dp/0195099044/ref=sr_1_fkmr1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1472307603&sr=1-1-fkmr1&keywords=atmosphere+thermodynamics+bohren
See page 366, first two or three paragraphs.
NOAA ESRL pyrgeometer calibration overview:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/grad/surfrad/surfpage4.html
Ball4
Thanks for going to the trouble supplying links but the Bohren book would require me to spend $140 and I’m not that curious.
Do you have a link to a free PDF or similar
Here is a link to a study that used pyrgeometers in the field and is fairly recent (2008)
http://www.ocean-sci.net/4/247/2008/os-4-247-2008.pdf
On page 256 you will find this unsettling comment
“These improvements may prove marginal compared with
calibration uncertainties. Figure 4 is from a shipboard test
of instruments from two manufacturers, whose calibration
references were presumably both traceable to the WRR. Yet
during clear-sky periods the two types group separately, by
4060 Wm−2”
Now I would think that such a wide discrepancy renders the instrument completely unusable for clear sky use.
Your pyrgeometer link does not give any results from a field test so may be little more than wishful thinking.
For some reason the passage above lost its separation bar
4060 Wm−2 should read 40-60 Wm−2
Bryan, the Bohren book is free at the college library near you or your local library can order in a copy. It is not all that hard.
Radiometers are very stable but not extremely accurate and they have to be calibrated continually. The link I gave was an overview as I noted, there are references for further details and pictures of the BB source etc.
There is paper somewhere on the net that shows how calibration labs used by NOAA ESRL got the range from your 40-60 down to something like 5-10. CERES team goes through all the calibration they do in detail, they get 6 raw down do 0.5 or so calibrated:
http://ceres.larc.nasa.gov/documents/DQ_summaries/CERES_EBAF_Ed2.8_DQS.pdf
Ball4
Thanks for the link
To think that this instrument(pyrgeometer) that has been around for about 70 years and continually needing a new notice warning that gross errors can be expected if the ‘latest new fix’ is not followed.
Perhaps your link fits into the long line of ‘false dawns’.
Only time and extensive field trials are required before I will take the instrument seriously.
The situation is very serious because this instrument seems the only experimental evidence offered for the vast downwelling radiative fluxes claimed by warmist radiative theory.
Perhaps the theory is wrong and warmists are trapped in a circular reasoning situation.
Given the experimental evidence provided by Dr Roy in his day job of no accelerating global temperature I think the skeptic’s case has yet to be answered.
Bryan says, August 28, 2016 at 2:48 AM:
Not only that, but he should also explain this elegant piece of observational evidence from the real Earth system:
https://okulaer.files.wordpress.com/2016/08/uahv6-vs-ceres-olr-gl1.png
Watch how the OLR simply follows the TLT. It shouldn’t have, if the increase in atmospheric concentration of CO2 did in fact create an enhancement of some perceived “radiative GHE”, causing global warming, as claimed.
Quite revealing. But, of course, no one wants to be the one who brings it up …
No one? Ummm, I’ve brought it up. Repeatedly. I think it would be a very interesting discussion. But first Kristian has to show:
1) His UAH anomaly calc.s in the bassline period was also from 30-30
2) His method replicates CERES Team results in their exact time period and show his comparable CI work.
Without at least that work understood any discussion is mere speculation, not worth it as not science. OLR decreased conclusion stands until Kristian catches up.
Good to see such a lively debate on the “greenhouse gas effect.” Kudos to Roy for being patient in permitting opposing arguments. However, Roy’s defense of ‘magic gas’ theory is defeated in detail here:
http://principia-scientific.org/observational-evidence-surfrad-sites-falsify-greenhouse-effect-hypothesis/
“When you combine all of these effects, one observes within weather balloon soundings the predictable, well documented decrease in the tropospheres temperature lapse rate and this in turn drops ground level air temperatures. Again, this is the inverse of the greenhouse effect as defined by Dr. Spencer, which is an increase in surface temperatures caused by greenhouse gases compared to if those gases did not exist. Remove water vapor (the most potent greenhouse gas) from a climate system and the average yearly temperature goes up.”
Nope.
Btw, it’s strawman to claim Spencer is unaware of Iris effect:
wiki: “The iris hypothesis is a hypothesis proposed by Richard Lindzen et al. in 2001 that suggested increased sea surface temperature in the tropics would result in reduced cirrus clouds and thus more infrared radiation leakage from Earth’s atmosphere. ”
Or other factors which prevent the suppose runaway effect or act as “thermostat”
But enough about Spencer- I don’t imagine he likes me speaking on his behalf [we tend to disagree].
Anyways I think that decreasing water vapor does not lead to warmer average temperatures. Or making the Sahara desert green [which increases water vapor in the region] would increase average temperature in the region and increase global average temperature.
Water or tropical Ocean reduces daytime highs but increases nighttime temperature and increase the global average temperature.
John O’Sullivan
I read the article you linked to.
One point made may not be valid. Weather plays a large role in annual temperatures and should not be used in a debate about radiation effects on the surface. The winter jet stream dips down over the Central US but no so much Nevada. It would have normal winter cooling from lower solar insolation but would not have to face the polar fronts that can dip down to Mississippi.
Here is the article quote: “What I point out though is that in spite of the higher humidity in Mississippi, in spite of the higher level of down-welling IR radiation in Mississippi and in spite of the fact that the SURFRAD installation in Mississippi is both lower in altitude and a little further south, the yearly average surface level air temperature at the Mississippi SURFRAD site was measurably lower than at the Nevada site, which is opposite from Dr. Spencers definition of the greenhouse effect which he says is an increase in surface temperatures caused by greenhouse gases compared to if those gases did not exist.
John O’Sullivan
A better approach to see the effects of GHE is to use actual measured values of given locations. Local weather effects can change things considerably but this would be a better start.
Mississippi:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/webdata/tmp/surfrad_57c247a2030df.png
Nevada:
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/webdata/tmp/surfrad_57c2477646293.png
Temperatures are about the same. It is really difficult to tell the solar input in Mississippi because of probably clouds and the sensing equipment.
Outside local weather events, the total net energy should tell the temperature story.
John O’Sullivan
One should note that water vapor and it GHE is most complex. It will generate a much higher radiation flux downward than CO2 but it also will form clouds that greatly reduce incoming solar energy. Water vapor has competing actions that carbon dioxide does not. Carbon Dioxide will not block incoming solar.
None of this in any way disputes GHE. In the linked article the author points out both locations have downwelling IR. The Desert Rock location still has a considerable amount of downwelling IR.
If you removed that downwelling flux with the current surface tempearture what would happen? It would cool much faster. The surface would reach a lower equilibrium temperature that would equalize with the solar flux. Water vapor with clouds will limit the GHE effect and wetter locations can end up being cooler but the Water vapor is still sending down a massive amount of IR to keep the surface from losing energy (unless you believe that IR from a cold source cannot be absorbed by a surface…I definitely do not believe this one and I would have to have some strong experimental evidence to convince me it does not).
— Norman says:
August 27, 2016 at 8:30 PM
John OSullivan
One should note that water vapor and it GHE is most complex. It will generate a much higher radiation flux downward than CO2 but it also will form clouds that greatly reduce incoming solar energy. Water vapor has competing actions that carbon dioxide does not. Carbon Dioxide will not block incoming solar.–
The Co2 in our atmosphere might not “block” much incoming solar radiation but it does “block” some:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sunlight#/media/File:Solar_spectrum_en.svg
As does O2 and O3.
Of course if there wasn’t such a small amount it, could “block” a bit more
gbaikie
Thanks for the link. From calculations the DWIR component from CO2 would be a low of around 32 W/m^2 in wetter environments (overlap with H2O emissions) and up to 20% in dry areas or maybe 64 W/m^2.
If you could let me know how much energy is in the Solar spectrum at the wavelengths CO2 absorbs that does not reach the surface and subtract the difference.
–If you could let me know how much energy is in the Solar spectrum at the wavelengths CO2 absorbs that does not reach the surface and subtract the difference.–
I try to post something long and useless [twice], but try shorter version.
Of 1360 watts which pass thru clear skies and at Zenith giving
1000 watts of direct sunlight. I would say/guess about 25 watts was absorbed and about 5 watts before the troposphere.
Or if like K/T diagrams, one apparently said atmosphere absorbs
67 watts on averaged global basis and 10 of 67 absorbed above troposphere.
http://www.barrettbellamyclimate.com/page15.htm
And in that metric, I guess H20 adsorbs about +40 W/m2:
CO2: stratosphere about 1/2 and somewhere around 7 W/m2 total
gbaikie
The calculated effect of doubling CO2 has been given as an increase in 3.7 W/m^2 for the DWIR.
If currently CO2 is absorbing 7 W/m^2 of solar flux that would be between 7/32 to 7/64 or 21.9% to 10.9%. Increased CO2 could then absorb 1.4 to 0.7 of the 3.7 increase. The effect will be slightly reduced but the overall effect will still be a slight increase in surface warming with double Carbon Dioxide.
–Norman says:
August 29, 2016 at 5:24 AM
gbaikie
The calculated effect of doubling CO2 has been given as an increase in 3.7 W/m^2 for the DWIR.
If currently CO2 is absorbing 7 W/m^2 of solar flux that would be between 7/32 to 7/64 or 21.9% to 10.9%. Increased CO2 could then absorb 1.4 to 0.7 of the 3.7 increase. The effect will be slightly reduced but the overall effect will still be a slight increase in surface warming with double Carbon Dioxide.–
Hmm.
doubling CO2 is suppose to increase water vapor. Did you include that? Not sure where water vapor suppose to increase. It would matter as far as I am concern, but I guess doesn’t matter where
in regard to K/T diagrams. But don’t know how water vapor increase
is suppose to be- I guess it should be part of sensitivity of Co2- whatever is picked.
Joe Postma has added his own supplement to the aforementioned link, which reads:
As to this strawman statement from Spencer, from the above:
Dr. Spencers article makes a failed attempt at lampooning those who dont believe in the existence of a radiative greenhouse effect by advancing a very common straw-man argument. He states, the downwelling IR flux is what a few of our friends claim does not exist. They claim that there is no greenhouse effect, and that the sky (which is almost always colder than the surface) cannot emit IR in the direction of the surface because that would violate the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics.
we simply have to conclude that Spencer and his cohorts are in fact the climate alarmist establishment itself. Or theyre just really incompetent scientists. They must laugh at us, being political climate alarm supporters, while it takes us so long to catch on to what theyre doing and realize whats happening. Well, I should say, it was actually figured out what role theyre playing a long time ago, the problem is in figuring out what to do about it, and exposing it, and getting people to care about it.
Roy, heres the definition of heat flow:
Q = σTsurf4 σTatmo4
The term for the cooler object is right there, right in the equation, on the far right. If you still dont see it, it is this term: σTatmo4. Thats the cool term. Thats the radiation from the cooler object. And with that term, the heat equation shows that heat only flows from warmer to cooler.
Weve had this precise discussion with you multiple times. And yet you still create this strawman, this fraud, completely inventing something we did not say, while trying to ridicule the idea of approaching what we do actually say. You do this specifically for the purpose of protecting that precise fraud of the radiative greenhouse effect of climate alarmism, which climate alarmism is based on and which it requires to survive.
The heat flow Q, from above, is a local transient term, and is not a conserved quantity and does not represent the energy coming from the Sun.
If you and your cohorts know these things, then youre frauds and clandestine operatives. If you dont know them, then youre incompetent.
Test
Now surround the heat generating ball with a colder shell that completely surrounds it (making the view factor 1 for the ball).
The colder shell is at -68.15 C.
Plugging into the equation of how much heat the heated ball is losing with the cold shell around it.
Q (heat flow from the heated ball) =(5.67 x 10^=8 w/m^2 k^4)(T(ball)^4-T(outer shell)^4.
Q=(5.67 x 10^-8)((255.15^4)-(205^4))
Q=(5.67 x 10^-8)(4,238,208,231-1,766,100,625)
Q=(5.67 x 10^-8)(2,472,107,606)
Q=140.17 Watts/m^2
Because of the effect of the outer sphere on the heated ball, the heated ball will only lose heat at the rate of 140 watts but that means the constant input of energy will now start raising the ball’s temperature until it can once again radiate 240 Watts. (Logic…if it is losing only 140 watts but keeps gaining 240 watts the number of internal joules will go up and it will heat until the surface can once again radiate enough energy to lose 240 watts.
Now what temperature will this be. Again no magic just using the equation.
To find the new temperature you merely isolate the ball temp.
So now Q/(5.67 x 10^-8)+(T(shell)^4)=T(ball)^4
The heat loss of the heated ball has to match its heat addition (which is 240 watts). Q must then be set as 240 since this is the amount of energy the inner ball will have to emit to be at equilibrium temperature with its input energy.
240/((5.67 x 10^-8)+(205^4)=New T(ball)^4
(4,232,804,232)+(1,766,100,625)=T(ball)^4=278.3 K
In Free space the inner ball’s equilibrium temperature was -18 C with a constant input of 240 watts.
With the exact same constant input of 240 watts but now with a cold outer shell surrounding it the new equilibrium temperature will end up at 5.15 C.
So the outer shell (colder than the inner ball, not adding heat to the ball just radiant energy)…The whole time the flow of heat is from the heated inner ball to the outer shell but the outer shell’s energy reduced the loss of the inner ball’s heat so the heat builds up until a new equilibrium is established.
That is what the GHE is doing with our planet. The warmed atmosphere (using the same equation) is now reducing the energy loss of the surface forcing a higher temperature until the outgoing energy equals the incoming energy.
Maybe a post too long for you to read but maybe forward it to Joe Postma it might wake him up.
John O’Sullivan
The last post was just part of a larger post.
I was using the equation Joe Postma undertands to show him and you how a cold object can lead to a higher equilibrium temperature.
I probably will not try to explain it more the fragment may not do.
Basic concept.
You have a 1 m^2 ball in outer space by itself radiating freely. it has a 240 watt power supply that maintains it temperature. At 240 Watt with free radiation and an emissivity of 1 the ball will have an equilibrium temperature of -18 C.
With a cold shell around it it will warm to 5.15 C
The heat did not flow from the cold shell to the hotter ball. It still flowed from the hot ball to cold shell but the cold shell is also radiating and inhibits the loss of energy of the heated ball using the standard radiative heat formula:
Q(heat flow)=(emissivity)(Area)(Stefan=Boltzmann constant)(T1^4-T2^4)
— Norman says:
August 27, 2016 at 9:56 PM
Basic concept.
You have a 1 m^2 ball in outer space by itself radiating freely. it has a 240 watt power supply that maintains it temperature. At 240 Watt with free radiation and an emissivity of 1 the ball will have an equilibrium temperature of -18 C.–
At it’s surface.
“With the exact same constant input of 240 watts but now with a cold outer shell surrounding it the new equilibrium temperature will end up at 5.15 C. ”
The “cold shell” is another surface added. If has similar area as old surface and same emissivity as old surface it will also be -18 C.
Or you have defined how much energy is generated and that much energy must leave the surface.
But you lack the interest of what the temperature was below
the old surface which was -18 C.
But Earth is not ball in a vacuum. It’s a ball in vacuum with an atmosphere. And it’s not internally heated- or not significantly internally heated.
gbaikie
Your concern: “Or you have defined how much energy is generated and that much energy must leave the surface.
But you lack the interest of what the temperature was below
the old surface which was -18 C.”
At equilibrium the whole ball would be at -18 C with some local variations depending upon where and how the energy is added, the overall ball would be -18 C.
Also YOU: “But Earth is not ball in a vacuum. Its a ball in vacuum with an atmosphere. And its not internally heated- or not significantly internally heated.”
That was the point of my discussion the ball in vacuum is much colder than with a surrounding shell that has temperature. The Sun heats the surface and adds energy to it. I fail to see how that would change the results. If a light heats a surface or if an electric wire heats it the same amount of energy is being added in both cases and causing the molecules to increase in vibrations. Thanks for your concerns. I think my post was rather scrambled. Something in the original was not liked so I split it up to see if anything would post so I was only able to post a partial.
Norman,
What Postma and his followers don’t appear to understand, or don’t want to understand, is the fact that while the warm atmosphere merely reduces the surface heat LOSS, and could thus never ITSELF make the surface temp go up in absolute terms, the Sun is there heating the surface at the same time. They seem to have a complete blind spot to this simple circumstance.
Wrote about it here:
https://okulaer.wordpress.com/2015/01/19/postmas-confusion/
— Norman says:
August 28, 2016 at 6:58 AM
gbaikie
Your concern: Or you have defined how much energy is generated and that much energy must leave the surface.
But you lack the interest of what the temperature was below
the old surface which was -18 C.
At equilibrium the whole ball would be at -18 C with some local variations depending upon where and how the energy is added, the overall ball would be -18 C.–
I assume it’s being heated near the center. If off center, the heat will travel shortest and/or easiest path that heat can be conducted to the surface and radiate. And has to be hotter nearer the source of the heat, for it to conduct the heat.
Where is it hottest is where the heat is generated.
Or probably the reason people imagine the surface of Venus is where the sun is heating it. [Though it’s probably the clouds which are heating Venus.]
Kristian
I tried to post a comment on your blog but was unable.
I posted this question for you somewhere way up there. It concerns your blog post and Africa.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2016/08/observational-evidence-of-the-greenhouse-effect-at-desert-rock-nevada/#comment-221560
The link will take you to my post and maybe you can answer my question. Thanks.
I can’t see why you shouldn’t be able to post a comment on my blog.
Kristian
I figured out how to post on your blog and left you a message on your African study thread. I tried to link to some CERES graphs but when I clicked back on them CERES webpage had an error.
My study confirms that the reason Sahara is warmer (in summer mostly) is because it is receiving more solar energy than the Congo. It would not prove Water Vapor cools, it would prove that clouds do and water vapor can cool locations but the overall GHE will still warm the surface much above a surface without GHG’s even with the clouds.
I think Water Vapor is a complex beast in GHE calculations and feedback. More water vapor seems to increase DWIR as you pointed out (more in Congo than Sahara) but water vapor also produces thick clouds which greatly reduce the other incoming flux, solar insolation. It has two opposing effects. I can completely agree that overall clouds do not warm the surface (night yes, daytime no) with a random distribution between day and night as a feedback but are a cooling effect. Your study will definitely show this is the case. This would remove one leg of the CAGW theory of a massive increase in temperature of the surface because of feedbacks.
Hi Kristian,
Thanks for taking time to reply. I took at look at your site. I see you’re a geologist (not practicing). As I understand it, you therefore have no higher level training in thermodynamics. This is often the root of the problem where less well trained critics stumble and fall in this debate. I see you have resorted to some name calling and this is not helpful. A better starting point might be if you conceded that those who advocate the science promoted at Principia Scientific International (PSI) and elsewhere are ‘hard’ scientists (ostensibly Physics, Chemistry, Thermo, etc). Moreover, PSI scientists are applied scientists, such as Postma (rocket scientist). He is regularly required to perform thermo equations in his work for the the Canadian space agency as well as Indian space agency. Moreover, Postma’s papers on the GHE have been peer-reviewed by Dr Pierre Latour (engineer on the Apollo space program). He too, has in his long and distinguished career performed thermo calculations. In short, my colleagues are not “sophists” but applied scientists (about a third with PhDs) earning a living from making highly technical things operate in the real world. Sophists are those who conjure with words to deceive and throw insults when out of their depth. Please note the difference.
John, “Sophists are those who…throw insults”
Please see the last sentence in the piece you posted from Joe Postma and judge it accordingly.
What many would be interested to see posted up by you is experiments similar to many simple ones Dr. Spencer does. Especially on the real atm., especially replicating his – they are inexpensive in $ and time as he has that rule.
These tests to be aimed at supporting what Joe and Carl have asserted (or Latour). I could spot no testing cited by them in your link, no data – just study calculations, and just uncited assertions. An insult free response based on test (even the ones by the masters) would further discussion here.
Engineers perform thermal analyses on buildings in order to design HVAC systems.For this purpose, the downwelling I.R. radiation is often calculated using a “sky emittance”to give the sky radiosity.An often used formula is due to Brunt (1940),
epsilonsky=0.55+1.8(PH2O/P)**0.5
where PH2O is the partial pressure of water vapor, and the constant 0.55 also accounts for CO2 and other greenhouse gases.The sky temperature is taken to be the ground level air temperature.
Do they do something wrong?
well, Anthony, the Sky Dragon Slayers who comment here will claim those engineers are computing something that doesn’t actually exist. Go figure.