RSS MSU LT Global Temperature Anomaly for April 2008 - flat
5 05 2008I’ve plotted the results of the RSS Microwave Sounder Unit (MSU) global temperature anomaly data by RSS (Remote Sensing Systems of Santa Rosa, CA).
For April 2008 it has moved a tiny bit higher, with a value of .080°C for a change (∆T) of 0.001°C globally from March.
RSS
2008 1 -0.070
2008 2 -0.002
2008 3 0.079
2008 4 0.080
click image for a ZOOMED 1998 -2008 DATA PORTION of the 1979-2008 image
RAW RSS data is available here
Note that there does not appear to be any sustained upwards trend post 1998.
Here is the entire RSS MSU dataset plotted:
click for a larger image
I was wondering the other day, that the 1998 spike never seems to have been discussed in the plethora of blogs on climate.
To my old style simple mind, the spike seems an outlier of pluto or whatever it’s name is nowadays proportions. Also coincidentally it was about the time the world went AGW rabid.
I used to be a banker (and please dont tell anyof my neighbours) but if I saw a number like that in a series for forecast as a business venture was being started with the associated prior numbers my finance hackles would rise.
So I wonder if anyone has ever truly looked at that one remarkable kick start temperature for the Climate scare, has the data been audited for massage.
Because that is the kick off time for the hysteria.
The last six months have averaged +.046, the lowest six-monthly average since March 2000. The March 2000 six-monthly average included some figures from late 1999, so we can say that the current spell has been the coldest six month spell of the century! (relatively, that is: it is still positive after all)
The 10-year trend (since May 199
is about +.04 degrees per decade. The trend from January 1998, which includes those high figures from Jan -April 1998, is -.04 degrees C per decade. Trends this small are essentially zip.
These figures could change. I noticed that some earlier RSS numbers have changed a little since last month.
Tropics now have 6 months in a row with a negative temperature anomaly, SH 4 months in a row.
Strange kind of global warming that is only in the NH, excluding the tropics.
John Van Krimpen: I believe you might actually question the source of the 1998 spike in temperature. I’m not sure, but you might. Just in case you do: The 1998 spike is the result of the well-documented and highly discussed 97/98 El Nino–the “El Nino of the Century”.
For those who haven’t seen this graph of global HADSST minus ERSST.v2: That 97/98 El Nino was so strong it broke the Hadley Centre’s SST calculator. Note the step change. Can’t miss it. It’s also reflected in their combined global temperature and other data. http://i28.tinypic.com/2ronf9w.jpg
No other source has that step. Sorry I went off topic, Anthony.
John Van Krimpen: The 1998 spike was due to the very strong El-Nina that occurred that year. And you’re right, the warming crowd went crazy that year!
Oops, mean’t to type El-Nino, not el-nina!
Can somebody else check and confirm?
RSS 12 month mean Oct 1987 to Sep 1988 = 0.17783
RSS 12 month mean May 2007 to Apr 2008 = 0.16917
That’s over 19 and a half years folks.
“was wondering the other day, that the 1998 spike never seems to have been discussed in the plethora of blogs on climate.
To my old style simple mind, the spike seems an outlier of pluto or whatever it’s name is nowadays proportions. Also coincidentally it was about the time the world went AGW rabid”
As this blog mentions climate cycles to explain away AGW you should check your El Niño cycles, 1997-1998 was the last major event. Considering we are in the middle of a La niña, there is s solar minimum and the north Pacific is on a cooling cycle then we would expect the global mean temperature to dip, not slowly rise since February. The Arctic ice sheets are again retreating rapidly (could this winters high ice sheet cover be the result of melt water from the summer/autumn reducing the salinity of the water and thus raising the freezing point?) and with Eurasia and the north east of North America having much higher temperatures than the norm at the moment then this year could still be a warm one. When the current cooling cycles end and the next El Niño hits then we will see the true effects of AGW.My mum always told me to walk away from hornets nests if they are disturbed so I’m off!!
P.S I applaude Mr Watts work on temperature sensors, excellent stuff.
Dear John Van Krimpen,
the warm year 1998 was due to the “El Nino of the century”, the strongest warming pattern in the equatorial Pacific Ocean. It explains virtually everything about the peak, is a well-known fact admitted by “both sides”, and it is certainly not being hidden by the skeptics. JunkScience likes to add the “El Nino of the century” label to the peak.
Best
Lubos
Anthony I hope you don’t mind me putting in a word for Philip Stott’s website. But again, yet another great piece by the Scot himself (with a tip for wine lovers)!
http://web.mac.com/sinfonia1/Global_Warming_Politics/A_Hot_Topic_Blog/Entries/2008/5/2_It%E2%80%99s_All_Unravelling.html
I think GISS will show a record warm april
+ 0.85 C
..plce your bets..
The last 2 months the tropic regoin is colder than any time since the late 80s. This La Nina is very strong.
The hysteria started long before then, early to mid 80s.
Not positive when compared to pre-Hansenized historic data.
John Van Krimpen:
The spike in 1998 was a giant El Nino where the Pacific Ocean dumped a tremendous amount of heat into the atmosphere. You can see spikes caused by other El Ninos in the temperature series, they are just not as large. The obvious ones are at months 48, 108, 144, and 198.
UAH has 0.015:
2008 4 0.015 0.170 -0.140 -0.531 30. 0.148 0.231 0.066 -0.139 365.
http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/public/msu/t2lt/tltglhmam_5.2
John M Reynolds
UAH also in, at 0.015:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/last:12/plot/uah/last:12
And Mauna Loa CO2, seemlingly returning to it’s normal pattern after a marked ‘knee’ last month:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/last:120
Braddles,
Won’t the RSS anomalies change slightly every month until a solid baseline has been established (i.e., 30 yrs worth of data)? In other words, you can expect the RSS numbers (of the past) to vary slightly since the baseline is still being developed.
John:
There was an extremely strong el nino in 1998, which caused sea surface temperatures to rise across a wide area of the Pacific. I don’t think the data were massaged more than other data - several sources (including direct measurements from things like ships and bouys as well as satellites) recorded warming of approximately the same magnitude.
The warmer temperatures associated with that event most certainly were held up as evidence that the globe was warming - “the hottest year on record”, and were largely responsible for kicking off the current hysteria. There was relatively little comment on the fact that this was the strongest El Nino on record (at least back to 1950 - handlily beating the 1972 event).
By contrast, there seems to be greater willingness to credit La Nina and the apparent change in the Pacific Decadal Occilation (which has been in its “warm phase”, and may be shifting into its “cool phase”
for the current cooling.
I think that I will continue to cut and stack fire wood. I agree with JVK that 98 was an outlier just as 1934ish was an outlier. And just think GISS is now revamping the older readings and the new history seems to be cooler. What a wonderful way to negate the current flat to cooling trend change. Please notice that I said trend change not trend. How can we see cooling if the past is made to appear cooler.
I am looking forward to looking at the numbers from UAB and HC and GISS. I wonder if there will be any divergence from metric to metric.
By the way the conservative group Grass fire is now on the anti AGW politically. They had an article this morning calling for the end to the hysteria about global warming using the RSS figures in their article. I think things are getting interesting and look forware to the rebuttals to the new measurements and John C’s open letter.
Bill
Bill Derryberry
John:
Certainly the spike in temperature associated with the 1998 El Nino was unusually strong relative to what has been seen since modern measurements of temperatures but Super El Ninos have been found throughout the historical record including 1596, 1630, 1789-1793, 1877-1878, 1899-1900 and 1972. All were associated with the worldwide weather disruption such as was seen in the 1998 El Nino. Also El Nino events are subject to modifcation by what else is occurring in the weather system. For example, some researchers have pointed out that the 1982 El Nino was modified by the powerful eruption of El Chichon. The point is that strong El Ninos have occurred throughout history and as several have correctly commented, what one makes of a natural and recurring event may depend upon belief rather than science. We are far away from understanding ENSO with only glimpses of relationships to solar activity and the PDO.
Paul Clark, regarding CO2 - should we not be using the seasonal corr numbers produced by ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends/co2_mm_mlo.txt ?
Is the accuracy of the measuring instrument and technique really 1/1000 of a degree C? It doesn’t seem to make much sense to talk in such numbers unless it is. To do so seems to be playing under hockey rules.
And please don’t confuse resolution with accuracy. Is my electronics background showing?
Morgan said: “The warmer temperatures associated with that event most certainly were held up as evidence that the globe was warming - “the hottest year on record”, and were largely responsible for kicking off the current hysteria. There was relatively little comment on the fact that this was the strongest El Nino on record”
But according to the Pogies, the El Nino was an aberration and had little if anything to do with Planet Earth’s temperature. They recently made this statement when painting the current cooldown as the result of natural variations. I’ll find the article somewhere in my stack and post the URL later.
Jack Koenig, Editor
The Mysterious Climate Project
http://www.climateclinic.com
Hi,
Guys take a look at the tropics in UAH -.53. I can’t see how temperature can go up if the tropics stay cool. So far only the NH is warmer than average. I think soon as AMO flips we will really see temperatures drop.
This looks like Feb-April were a slight bump up before the next drop (like June-Aug 07). -.3 global anomaly by summer?
If the El Nino of 1998 was the strongest of the century why was 1934 the warmest year of the 20th century?
Ed, that was only for US temps…
Dormant sun, negative trending PDO and AMO, Asian (SOx) aerosols out the wazoo, Kiluea spewing out more (SOx) aerosols and now stratospheric ash spreading across the SH … we are going to be in a world of hurt.
The caption on the top graph, when you click to enlarge, is incorrect. It should say “1998.”
REPLY: It is a ZOOMED SECTION of the 1979-2008 graph.
pdm: [Seasonally corrected CO2]
At the time I decided to use the raw data (well, the one with interpolated missing values) because we should be able to apply our own seasonal adjustment. For example, here’s the data with a 1-year running mean subtracted:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/esrl-co2/mean:12
But granted this isn’t as sophisticated as their method, so perhaps I should include both; I’ll add it to the (ever-growing
) list.
Paul
[This comment seemed to get lost earlier, sorry if this results in a duplicate through some time wormhole feature of WordPress that I'm not aware of...]
Folks,
I’ve been wondering about the difference in baselines in the four temperature series, and I couldn’t find a definitive statement of how to align them, so I’ve tried to work one out - I’d appreciate comments…
The four temperature series quote their baselines as follows
HADCRUT: Jan 1961 - Dec 1990 (30 years)
UAH: Jan 1979 - Dec 1998 (20 years)
RSS: Jan 1979 - Dec 1998 (20 years)
GISTEMP: Jan 1951 - Dec 1980 (30 years)
(Note in woodfortrees.org you quote the sample _after_ the last one in ‘to’, so it would be e.g. rss/from:1979/to:1999, and I’ll quote them like that below)
The period of comparable overlap is therefore 1979-1999. I’ve added a feature in the ‘raw data’ output of woodfortrees.org so you can see the mean of all the samples at the end. So if we look at the raw data of the 4 series for that period, we get:
Graph: http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1979/to:1999/plot/uah/from:1979/to:1999/plot/rss/from:1979/to:1999/plot/gistemp/from:1979/to:1999
Data:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/data/hadcrut3vgl/from:1979/to:1999/plot/uah/from:1979/to:1999/plot/rss/from:1979/to:1999/plot/gistemp/from:1979/to:1999
The means are as follows:
HADCRUT3: 0.146
UAH: -0.001
RSS: 0
GISTEMP: 0.238
So, allowing for a bit of rounding, UAH & RSS are both zero across that period, as we would expect. HADCRUT3 is 0.146K higher, GISTEMP is 0.238K higher.
Before anyone complains about GISTEMP reading high, this is inevitable given that its baseline includes an earlier, relatively cooler period!
So, it would seem that
GISTEMP = UAH/RSS + 0.238
HADCRUT = UAH/RSS + 0.146
and therefore
GISTEMP = HADCRUT + 0.092
I’ve heard 0.24 quoted for GISS before, so it would seem this is reasonable.
Hence we can now provide a 4-series comparison to a single baseline:
1979-1999, baselines adjusted:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1979/to:1999/offset:-0.146/plot/uah/from:1979/to:1999/plot/rss/from:1979/to:1999/plot/gistemp/from:1979/to:1999/offset:-0.238
and the data shows all means now roughly zero, as we’d hope:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/data/hadcrut3vgl/from:1979/to:1999/offset:-0.146/plot/uah/from:1979/to:1999/plot/rss/from:1979/to:1999/plot/gistemp/from:1979/to:1999/offset:-0.238
This means we can now compare series properly:
1970 onwards, 12 month mean, baselines adjusted:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/from:1979/offset:-0.146/mean:12/plot/uah/from:1979/mean:12/plot/rss/from:1979/mean:12/plot/gistemp/from:1979/offset:-0.238/mean:12
Last 10 years, baselines adjusted:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/last:120/offset:-0.146/plot/uah/last:120/plot/rss/last:120/plot/gistemp/last:120/offset:-0.238
Last year, baselines adjusted:
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut3vgl/last:12/offset:-0.146/plot/uah/last:12/plot/rss/last:12/plot/gistemp/last:12/offset:-0.238
(note that HADCRUT & GISTEMP aren’t out for April at the time of writing, but the link will automatically fill them in when they are)
Does this make sense? Can anyone spot any flaws in this logic? The only fly in the ointment that I can see is that the anomalies are quoted against the average of that particular month in the baseline period, so technically doing it on an annual average like this is invalid - but done globally, I can’t see it is going to make a significant difference.
Paul
In response to Jim Arnt’s suggestion that we take a look at the tropics, here are three quick graphs, one each for the tropics, the NH, and the SH, respectively. Plotted are the raw UAH monthly data, and a smoothed trend using HP filtering.
http://s3.tinypic.com/2i13yx.jpg
http://s3.tinypic.com/n4xhlw.jpg
http://s3.tinypic.com/2e0l7bm.jpg
I don’t see a much of a “trend” at all through the “satellite era” in the tropics. The trends in the NH and SH have leveled off, and are moving downward.
UAH satellite temps are out. Small decline in April to +0.015C from +0.089C in March.
http://www.atmos.uah.edu/data/msu/t2lt/tltglhmam_5.2
I am confident that the GISS numbers will show 2008 to be among the warmest years ever, and if they don’t… I’m sure they will after a few “corrections” are made.
I expect they will still be strongly positive as the Ice sheet covers my home.
SteveSadlov,
Relax…we are not all going to die.
We’re only cooling back to normal.
We’ll have a much better picture in a couple of years.
If you start feeling anxiety, just think of them IPCC climate models!
Two German physicists have constructed a very convincing argument against AGW. It is guite lengthy but I can find no errors in their logic. Their math is beyond my abilities to verify so you’re on your own with it.
The translation into English is a little rough in spots.
Check it out.
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/Falsification_of_CO2.pdf
Paul,
You have built an awesome tool on your website. I was reviewing similar charts earlier, but without applying the baseline adjustment. I output your data from 2001 onward to Excel and found three sources with downward trends since 2001, and GISS with an upward trend which raises the GISS alarm a little higher for me, though I’m not sure it would still be there with the baseline shift. Is it possible (without a herculean effort) to add trendlines to your graphing program?
Quick question for you statiscians out there - if GISS Temp’s baseline period ends in 1980, why would they still be ajdusting (lower) mid century data? The mean is suppose to have beeen established, so stop lowering it? Or am I missing something?
Sorry, “statisticians” (I’m a lowly EE that can’t spell)
I have a comment about CO2 beeing back on track, it isn’t.
CO2 has shown a significant decrease in growth rate for april, as you could expect with lower global temperatures.
Here are the last 5 years of april CO2 meassurments.
Year _ Month _ CO2(ppm) _ increase(ppm)
2002 _ 4 _ 374,93
2003 _ 4 _ 377,75 _ 2,82
2004 _ 4 _ 380,42 _ 2,67
2005 _ 4 _ 382,18 _ 1,76
2006 _ 4 _ 384,69 _ 2,51
2007 _ 4 _ 386,37 _ 1,68
2008 _ 4 _ 387,19 _ 0,82
AS you can see the growth from april to april is much lower than previous years. Lower temperatures yeilds in a lower CO2 increase in atmosphere.
The increasing CO2 level follows the temperature much more closely than anthropogen CO2 emissions.
http://farm3.static.flickr.com/2056/2471196255_c3318ee700_o.jpg
So considering those facts this years annual increase will be much lower than previous years due to lower global temperatures. We may see as small increase as 1-1,5 ppm this year.
UAH shows SH has a negative temp anomaly for the last 7 months. Clear cooling trend. Current month is coldest since 1989.
A global climate signal should be clearest in the SH because there are far fewer people, less land use changes, weather is less noisy and a few other reasons.
An unbiased observer would probably say we are seeing an accelerating global cooling trend, largely obscured by local factors in the NH.
Basil, your UAH SH graph shows an uptick at the end, while the UAH SH data has no uptick. Last 6 months are all cooler than the previous month.
And so now Gore is using the Burma cyclone to trump his agenda. Al Gore Calls Myanmar Cyclone a ‘Consequence’ of Global Warming.
He chases disasters with his rhetoric like a city lawyer chasing ambulances. And the saddest part is that it is a bald-faced lie.
pAUL cLARK SAID: “Does this make sense? Can anyone spot any flaws in this logic? The only fly in the ointment that I can see is that the anomalies are quoted against the average of that particular month in the baseline period, so technically doing it on an annual average like this is invalid - but done globally, I can’t see it is going to make a significant difference.
Paul, you sure did a hell of a job. I’ve been studying your charts and can’t see any flaw yet.
Jack Koenig, Editor
The Mysterious Climate Project
http://www.climateclinic.com
Rod Duke said: Two German physicists have constructed a very convincing argument against AGW. It is guite lengthy but I can find no errors in their logic. Their math is beyond my abilities to verify so you’re on your own with it.
I read this last year when it first appeared and again last January. Although I have a math and chemistry background, I found it quite a challenge. The Pogies hammered the authors when it was first published, even though they probably didn’t understand a word of it.
Jack Koenig, Editor
The Mysterious Climate Project
http://www.climateclinic.com
Philip_B
I think I have it right. Here’s a portion of the data I imported:
2008 3 0.089 0.424 -0.246
2008 4 0.015 0.170 -0.140
The last number is the anomaly for SH. That’s an uptick, moving from -0.246 to -0.140.
Basil
Oops! I confused SH with tropics. Apologies, you are right.
Dan, read these posts and you basically will understand what Hansen and GISS temp has done. They splice station data together, sometimes selectively choosing which sets to obsolete:
http://www.climateaudit.org/?cat=40
Basil,
You somewhat stole my thunder. At work today (don’t tell anyboby), I plotted RSS data using the following data:
NH minus Tropics (20 / 82.5)
Tropics (-20 / 20)
SH minus Tropics (-20 / -70)
World (-70 / 82.5)
The MONTHLY trend was the following (multiply by 120 to get decadal trend):
Data Source: Monthly Trend Decade Trend
NH minus Tropics (20 / 82.5) 0.0029 0.348
Tropics (-20 / 20) 0.0014 0.168
SH minus Tropics (-20 / -70) 0.0005 0.060
World (-70 / 82.5) 0.0015 0.180
Thus, it appears that the following is true (especially seen when plotted):
- World trend is essentially the same as the Tropics trend. There are very few occasions in the last 30 years where they part. Actually, the last 7 months has been a big exception.
- Very little warming in SH (minus tropics)
- A lot of warming in NH (minus tropics)
- Tropics appears to be the average between NH (minus tropics) and SH (minus tropics)
One last thing, I plotted NH (minus tropics) against SH (minus tropics). I wish I had the time to figure out how to do tinypics. Anyway, here is what’s interesting. NH and SH temp anomalies (minus tropics) are pretty much aligned between 1979 and 1994. Then, 1994 onwards, there is this huge split between them, especially since 1999 (post El Nino). This is unparalled in the history of satellite-derived data. I can’t explain it except for:
a) less aerosols over the land masses of NH causing preferrential heating,
b) land heats quicker than ocean under a hotter sun (NH land >> SH land), c) changes in land use (NH land>>SH land),
d) localized CO2 effect (from industrial activity in NH), preferential absorption of CO2 in oceans (SH ocean>>NH ocean), better atmospheric convection in SH, and finally, better negative feedback mechanisms in SH due more ocean,
e) solar effects that preferentially affects the atmosphere over land masses.
I encourage everyone to do the plots themselves (again, I wish I had time to learn tinypics). Gotta run.
The formatting wasn’t the best (plus, I had an memory error):
NH minus Tropics (20 / 82.5)
0.0024 monthly
0.288 decade
Tropics (-20 / 20)
0.0014 monthly
0.168 decade
SH minus Tropics (-20 / -70)
0.0005 monthly
0.060 decade
World (-70 / 82.5)
0.0015 monthly
0.180 decade
Both satellite datasets’ latest 12-month-running-means are below values FROM OVER 19 YEARS AGO.
RSS 12 month mean Oct 1987 to Sep 1988 = 0.178
RSS 12 month mean May 2007 to Apr 2008 = 0.169
UAH 12 month mean Sep 1987 to Aug 1988 = 0.151
UAH 12 month mean May 2007 to Apr 2008 = 0.148
Yes folks, that’s nineteen EIGHTY-eight, not merely nineteen-ninety-eight. See http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/mean:12/from:1986/plot/uah/mean:12/from:1986
One question:
Is the January ‘08 as much an outlier as the 1998 peak? Or is this the beginning of a massive drop-off in temperatures as China, the sun and Chaitén Volcano combine to freeze our butts off?
McGrats / Jack Koenig: As a physicist, I can tell you that the Gerlich & Tscheuschner paper (which I believe is the paper by German physicists that you refer to) is complete and utter garbage. (And, by the way, it not only claims to disprove AGW but the entire greenhouse effect period, which makes me wonder if it is only a matter of time before someone writes a paper arguing not only that CO2 does not cause warming but that the molecule does not even exist.) Actually, a very smart fellow who I went to grad school with, Arthur Smith, has written something that tears most of it apart: http://arxiv.org/abs/0802.4324
In addition, their argument that the greenhouse effect violates the Second Law of Thermodynamics is such nonsense that, if I were in academia rather than industry and taught an undergraduate physics course (maybe even a first year one), I would give my students a simple radiation problem that would lead them through showing how silly this claim is.
Godozo,
Over the last 6-8 years, there has been a number of NH “drops” to negative values. Interestingly, they almost always occurr in December, January, or February. So, being clever, I only plotted the anomalies of those 3 months over the past 29 years. Guess what? The trends were almost exactly the same for the NH, SH, Tropics, and world as when all the months were analyzed (see post above for my trend values). So, I concluded that these occassional negative spikes had no impact on the long term trend. Something else is going on that is causing a split between NH and SH temp anomalies. Note that this split started in 1994 and became worse (and consistent) post 1998. By the way, world trend between 1979 and 1993 was 0.05 C/decade (or essentially zilch). The positive trend did not start still 1994, and again, essentially due to warming in the NH alone. However, as pointed out elsewhere, even the NH trendline has flattened over the past 10 years (since 1998).
By the way, none of the observations being discussed above fits with classical global warming theory.
Joel Shore,
Did you read page 89? The authors had some choice comments regarding realclimate.org. Apparently, the two parties were in contact with each other prior to the paper being published. I taught radiative heating once in an enginering class. Some of the ideas in the paper don’t seem to square with what I remembered teaching. But, I do remember this (at least for engineering calculations): at low temperatures (such as the atmosphere), conduction and convection are vastly more important for heat transfer than radiative heat transfer. But, I suppose the difference in temperature between the earth and outer space is pretty high, which makes radiative heat transfer important (as it happens on a dry, clear night that cools quickly after the sun is down). Interestingly, the Stefan-Boltzman equation can be used very easily to approximate the maximum surface temperature for the earth (roughly 130-135 F), which does occur in a few places around the world. Anyway, the uncertainties in the climate models regarding cloud cover, convection, etc. are much larger than any forcing effect of CO2, so I have never understand why those guys at RC.org are so smarmy about their models in the first place.
Mike K; Not to worry. We are a relatively friendly lot.
You have to consider that although the PDO is flipping to cool it is still quite warm. Also, the AMO, AO, and NAO are all in maximum warm phase. So its not surprising it’s warm in the NH. Contrast that with the SH where none of that applies and you have record ice down there, even more than the pit of the last cool at the end of te 70s.
Is the accuracy of the measuring instrument and technique really 1/1000 of a degree C?
Not a prayer. Of by a factor of 100. On a good day. (And there ain’t never been no good day.)
Measurements to that resolution are what we can “the fallacy of misplaced precision” in the history biz.
Joel Shore,
I believe you did not read their paper. They were very explicit about CO2 and other gases, basically our atmosphere, keeping us from freezing.
What they did claim is that the classic Greenhouse effect is not the same physically as so called greenhouse gases.
They explained that a greenhouse retains heat through a LACK of convection/circulation, which is easily proven (open the doors/windows).
The enhanced greenhouse effect that AGW loves is quite different in function with only IR in common. CO2 absorbs and reradiates IR. One of their points is that the Enhanced GG claims appear to require all the reradiation back to the earth rather than in multiple directions. Another is that they do not appear to include convection and conduction at a reasonable level.
Unfortunately this idea that they claim to disprove well understood physical principals is being used to scare people away from the paper.
Here is a quote from the paper you provide a link to:
“Incoming solar radiation still drives everything - if the solar constant S drops, then so does everything else. But
the effect of the absorbing layer is to reduce the final outgoing energy for a given temperature, so the planet heats up
until things are back in balance again.” (bottom page
Now, if I were to treat this paper the same way others treat the Germans I would claim he is saying the Greenhouse Gas actually heats the planet while the external energy input drops.
I think we all accept he MEANS that the GG SLOWS the radiative losses or RETAINS heat.
The Germans paper say the same thing, but, disprove the idea that GG can cause excessive radiation delay at conditions even remotely similar to the earths.
For example, they point out the difference in AMOUNT of CO2 in the Venusian atmosphere which is 98% with a pressure of almost 100 times earths at the surface. Mars has little retention even though it is also over 90% as its surface pressure is about 1/10 of earth. The actual number of molecules available for radiative delay or absorption is enormously smaller at each step.
Basically the paper you reference, without me being able to parse the math, does NOT falsify the Germans. I think the term RED HERRING applies as they appear to be using a strawman.
I will admit I don’t fully understand either sides claims on the Average Global Temp. I really don’t care as it does not appear to affect whether CO2 is going to cause a catastrophe or not.
By the way, would you explain to me how CO2 can ADD energy?? Otherwise I think their claim about the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics probably holds.
One of the things I have noticed is that the AGW crowd appears to have started accepting the idea that the second doubling of CO2 will NOT cause the same increase in temp as the first doubling. They used to ascribe almost as much effect on second on later doublings in their calcs. I believe this is also a part of the Germans claim that Enhanced Greenhouse is against the 2nd Law, but, may be corrected in their models now.
Here is an example of the faulty conception from the IPCC statement on GG:
“…For example, an increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration leads to a reduction in outgoing infrared radiation and a positive radiative forcing.”
Similar to the statement in the paper you reference, they can not POSSIBLY mean that the amount of outgoing radiation decreases permanently, can they??? What would be the mechanism??? More CO2 simply means more possible “stepping stones” for the outgoing radiation. That is, it is DELAYED, not STOPPED!!! If the CO2 ABSORBS the IR, then it warms and convection enters, Boyles law and all that rot!! Their statements make it sound like CO2 increases heat, or, is an extremely good insulator!!!
Back to the Venus Mars comparisons. We simply do not have enough CO2 to cause significant warming even if it ALL managed to ABSORB heat rather than reradiate it!!
I believe the AGW types are now saying the water vapor cycle will provide the feedback they need to replace this disproven enhanced CO2. Of course, they apparently do not admit to the extensive NEGATIVE forcings that can also be in the H2O cycle!!! Hopefully the findings from the Argo Observations will help straighten that area out!!
OK, I’ve exhibited my ignorance. Please, will some one give the paper a real evaluation rather than head bobbing and hand waving??????
The quote from the paper Joel linked was from the bottom of page 8.
Rod Duke,
I read the summary, which summarises everything us skeptics have been saying all along. Nothing in the German press about them.
Crosspatch
Good way to put it. Al Gore: Disaster-chaser.
Of course we all know the Burma disaster here is a civic one, and not so much due to the climate. Kind of like Ray Nagin / Kathleen Blanco…
godozo
I like your question. It seems many people only see either a warming disaster or a cooling disaster, and nothing in the middle. Why can’t people ever think that maybe it’ll just be a little cooler, or a little warmer? Why must it be either this extreme, or that extreme?
—-
I’ve had it with all the global warming doomsaysers. Now, hopefully, the folks on this side are not succumbing to global cooling doom and gloom. We’re supposed to be smarter than that.
So far I don’t see any data suggesting we’re headed for a cooling disaster?
If you have it - then show it! So far I’ve seen only imaginations running amok. Keep your fantasies in check folks.
Chris,
As you describe it, sounds like most of the warming took place from 1994 - 1998. Maybe it was all due to the El Nino?
Looking at Don Easterbrook’s graph of PDO periods reminded me of the SOI measurements; from 1980-1998 there was a preponderance of -ve SOI’s; -ve SOI’s indicate a greater number of El Nino events, which in turn reflect warm PDO’s. Since 2000, there has been a majority of +ve SOI’s’ which appears to be reflected in the temp decline and the PDO flip to cold. 1998 didn’t show the biggest and most sustained -ve SOI’s ,but it was preceded by some very large -ve years; perhaps a lapse or just simple accumulation is responsible for the 1998 spike; given the correlation between temp, SOI and PDO configuration, and the lack of correlation with a steadily increasing CO2 level, it is hard to go past natural factors.
KuhnKat,
You seem to have a lot of confusions about the G&T paper. First of all, let me clarify that when I said that the paper was “garbage”, I did not mean everything in it is wrong. What I meant is that what is in it is either well-known or wrong. (In particular, many…maybe even most…of their mathematical calculations are probably correct but the interpretation of them is wrong, in fact, sometimes bizarrely wrong.) The statement that real greenhouses operate by a different mechanism than the atmospheric greenhouse effect is an example of something that is correct but is also well known (see, for example, the last paragraph in the “Basic mechanism” section of the Wikipedia article on the greenhouse effect: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Greenhouse_effect ).
I don’t know how you use the term “RED HERRING” and “strawman” to describe Arthur’s paper where he very specifically notes what part of what they say (which is basically the “meat” of their paper) he demonstrates is wrong. And, you frankly admit to not being able to “parse the math”. G&T are very clear in claiming that they have falsified “the Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse effect”, as can be seen from the title of their paper and their abstract. Admittedly, there are lots of different arguments (or unsupported statements) in that very long paper and Arthur did not attempt to address all of them, but he addressed most of the ones that they seemed to emphasize as most important, e.g., in their abstract.
As for your question, “By the way, would you explain to me how CO2 can ADD energy?? Otherwise I think their claim about the 2nd Law of Thermodynamics probably holds”: The CO2 does not add energy but helps retain energy in the same way that a heat shield can do so. They claim that it is impossible for this to happen without violating the 2nd law of thermodynamics because they say it involves a flow of heat from a colder place (the upper troposphere) to a warmer place (the earth’s surface). However, their statement is incorrect as the net flow is still from the earth’s surface to the upper troposphere and then out into space. The existence of a radiatively-active troposphere just makes this rate of loss of heat from the surface slower. One can in fact come up with very simple radiative physics problems that demonstrate the same effect. For example, take a blackbody sphere at a constant temperature that represents the sun. Put a concentric blackbody spherical shell around it (that will be analogous to the earth) and then either put or leave out a second larger radius blackbody spherical shell around it (to be analogous to a radiative-active troposphere). Assume this is immersed in empty space (T=0). Then, it is a simple 1st-year physics problem to calculate the temperature of the 1st (earth-analog) shell both with and without the presence of the 2nd shell. One finds that this shell is warmer when the 2nd shell is present even though the 2nd shell is at a lower temperature than the 1st shell. By their arguments, this would violate the 2nd law of thermodynamics, which is proposterous.
As for your question “they can not POSSIBLY mean that the amount of outgoing radiation decreases permanently, can they??? What would be the mechanism??? More CO2 simply means more possible ’stepping stones’ for the outgoing radiation. That is, it is DELAYED, not STOPPED!!!”: Well, it depends what you mean by “permanently”. It is more than just delaying the outgoing radiation. The net effect of CO2 is to cause the outgoing radiation from the earth to be emitted higher up in the atmosphere where it is cooler. And, as a result, the earth as a whole (including the atmosphere) behaves as a blackbody emitter having an average temperature of around 255 K, rather than the average surface temperature of 288 K. In other words, the surface temperature of the earth is 33 K warmer than its blackbody temperature. This, in the most basic sense, is the atmospheric greenhouse effect.
Now, to the question of permanence of a radiative imbalance produced by an increase in greenhouse gases: No, such a radiative imbalance will not be maintained indefinitely. What will happen is that the earth’s atmosphere will slowly heat up until it is at a temperature such that the outgoing radiation again balances the incoming radiation. And, this is how a rise in greenhouse gas concentrations causes an increase in the earth’s temperature. (So, the summary is that the rise in greenhouse gases causes radiative imbalance which causes global warming to restore the radiative balance.) Note, however, that there is a lot of thermal inertia, particularly due to the oceans, so that this warming takes a long time (say a “half-life” on the order of a decade to several decades).
Your statement “We simply do not have enough CO2 to cause significant warming even if it ALL managed to ABSORB heat rather than reradiate it!!” is simply wrong. A doubling of CO2 levels, with no feedbacks is enough to produce about 1.2 C of warming. You are correct that the water vapor feedback (and other feedbacks like the ice albedo feedback) are what then raise the estimate climate sensitivity to doubling from about 1.2 C to about 2 to 4.5 C. As for your speculations about there being extensive negative feedbacks in the water cycle, this is rather far afield from the G&T paper but let’s just say that some such feedbacks have been speculated about but there does not seem to be good evidence for them…and strong negative feedbacks seem incapatible with our current understanding of the oscillations of the earth’s climate in the past, such as the ice age - interglacial cycles.
Much better Joel
When I read your first comment I suspected you had not read the paper.
I am as skeptical about the whole AGW idea as just about anyone but from what I can get out of this paper I don’t see that they have actually falsified the things they claim they have. Much of it is pretty boring and much of the math was to prove points I didn’t need proven.
What bothers me about it is their Thermodynamics section, Unless I missed something it looks like the authors here set up a straw man. There is no claim I know of that the stratosphere is what is heating the earth. Rather what is supposedly happening is that GHG is slowing down the transfer of heat away from the surface producing warming.
I have seen claims that stratosphere should warm faster than the surface and it is failing badly to do so, but that isn’t what the authors are talking about.
The authors are likely right about the incorrect assumptions in the models like setting parameters to zero that are not zero, but, I don’t see that they have proven anything. As you said they are proving things we already knew.
Meanwhile, I am still freezing, I wish global warming would hurry up.
I do think you should take a serious look at the water vapor feedback being positive as it is in the models. This seems unlikely to me for many reasons but the most obvious one is that if it was true, previous periods of high CO2, much higher than today, would have caused “catastrophic” warming events which they clearly didn’t.
Net feedbacks pretty much must be negative or must change to negative as temperature rises or the entire paleo record is totally wrong. A mighty good case can be made that there is no evidence of any positive feedback in the recent past especially if your temperature data set has not been … (Hansenized?)
Pierre,
Yes, world trend since Jan 1998 is slightly negative at -0.036 C/decade (inclusive of the 1998 peak). Other trends since Jan 1998 are shown below:
NH minus Tropics (20 / 82.5)
0.0003 monthly
0.036 decade
Tropics (-20 / 20)
-0.0004 monthly
-0.048 decade
SH minus Tropics (-20 / -70)
-0.0008 monthly
-0.096 decade
As mentioned above, world trend between 1979 and Dec 1993 was 0.05 C/decade. So, what were the trends between Jan 1994 and Dec 1998 (again, inclusive of the 1998 peak for dramatic effect)?
World (-70 / 82.5)
0.008 monthly
0.96 decade
NH minus Tropics (20 / 82.5)
0.0066 monthly
0.792 decade
Tropics (-20 / 20)
0.0105 monthly
1.260 decade
SH minus Tropics (-20 / -70)
0.0067 monthly
0.804 decade
So basically ALL of the accrued warming since 1979 occurred in a 5 year span (1994 through 1998). That’s it! Again, let me point out that it was during this period that the divergence between NH and SH anomalies began, and, since 1998, has essentially held steady at approx. 0.4 delta C (or 0.5 C NH vs. 0.1 C SH).
Wondering Aloud,
I agree, if water vapour is a positive feedback increasing the effect of CO2 by 2.5 times, as the IPCC models say, how can the Earth have ever recovered from previous high levels of CO2? The temperature would surely have just kept on rising?
There must therefore be some other mechanism, not yet modelled, that is occurring.
Joel writes, “The CO2 does not add energy but helps retain energy in the same way that a heat shield can do so. They claim that it is impossible for this to happen without violating the 2nd law of thermodynamics because they say it involves a flow of heat from a colder place (the upper troposphere) to a warmer place (the earth’s surface). However, their statement is incorrect as the net flow is still from the earth’s surface to the upper troposphere and then out into space.”
Absolutely so. CO2 or other such greenhouse gasses is like a diode, lets sunlight IR heat in, yet prevents an equal or greater loss going out into space in the opposite direction. I dn’t see any rational scientific position against this. And no, I’m not algore.
The crux of the arguement is the positive feedback amplification factors in the computer models and their degree of completeness. Are there negative feedback mechanisms? We don’t really know enough. So, what to do? As a lukewarmist, I say we’re advised to err on the side of caution about things we don’t understand like doubling a gas in our atmosphere. There are plenty of other good reasons to mitigate CO2 emissions besides any pseudoscientific algoreish exaggeration of climate effects (e.g. Katrina, Myanmar). Utilize nuclear power to run our new electric cars, develop solar photovoltiac power and don’t panic.
Wondering Aloud: Thanks for your response.
Just a couple of further comments:
(1) It is the troposphere (especially the lower and, perhaps, mid-troposphere) that is supposed to be warming at least as much as the surface, not the stratosphere. In fact, the stratosphere should be cooling as it has been, and in fact this is a signature that the cause of the current warming is greenhouse gases rather than, say, solar irradiance changes (which would cause the stratosphere to warm too). Admittedly, interpretation of the stratospheric cooling is somewhat complicated by the fact that ozone depletion also contributes to stratospheric cooling, although I think the best estimates are that there is more cooling seen than can be accounted for purely by ozone depletion. As for the tropospheric warming, the discrepancy between prediction and data from the satellites used to significant but, now, with corrections to the satellite data and a longer record, this discrepancy seems to have disappeared (within error bars) at least on a global scale; in the tropics, some unexplained discrepancy remains.
(2) I am not sure why you think that the paleo record is compatible with a negative feedback. The scientists who study the paleo record, e.g., who have actually tried to use the Last Glacial Maximum or other paleo evidence to estimate the climate sensitivity, come up with estimates compatible with net positive feedbacks. In fact, here is a paper that argues that the climate sensitivity based on paleo evidence suggests the climate models may be, if anything, UNDERESTIMATING the climate sensitivity: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/summary/sci;306/5697/821 Note, by the way, that a positive feedback does not imply an instability, as some seem to think, unless that feedback exceeds a certain value. For feedbacks less than that value, what you get is a magnification of the warming but no instability…and that is what the estimates of climate sensitivity give. (There is a close relation between positive feedbacks and infinite series and an instability corresponds to a diverging infinite series but a magnification occurs for a converging infinite series like 1 + (1/2) + (1/4) + (1/
+ …, which converges to, and thus gives a magnification of, 2 to the effect.)
Joel Shore:
Having a degree in physics, and there are many specialties within physics, does not ensure that one’s opinions let alone one’s work will not be other than basura, garbage, empty posturing.
Your concentric black-body illustration is just such an example.
The emissivities of living matter are routinely > 0.9, that of CO2 at 25C is equal to its absorptivity at 9*10^-4 or 1000 times smaller(Hottel 1942).
Even if the 2nd Law did not apply, and re: back-radiation it certainly does, the flow of heat is inexorably into the atmosphere.
Heat transfer at the surface is ruled by evaporation removing heat from the surface. Near the tropopause heat transfer is ruled by condensation, releasing heat to the atmosphere.
The fact that MSU data do not show tropopause heating, and Aqua data do not show stratospheric cooling means the effect of CO2 is evidently unmeasurable.
In the ionosphere, where temps prevail in the thousands of degrees Kelvin, all gases emit radiation, thus the earth cools.
I do think you should take a serious look at the water vapor feedback being positive as it is in the models. This seems unlikely to me for many reasons but the most obvious one is that if it was true, previous periods of high CO2, much higher than today, would have caused “catastrophic” warming events which they clearly didn’t.
Monckton pointed out (in an essay on Doc P.’s Climate Science) that the significant tidbit in IPCC AR4 was to increase the feedback factor in the basic projection equation.
But whether or not water vapor does have the effect the IPCC says it does, much of the increased vapor is not going to GHG but instead into low-level cloud cover, which increases albedo, which produces homeostasis. Which may well be why the temps have been relatively flat since 1998.
This was discovered by NASA’s AquaSat, and its findings are why hardly anyone seems to have heard of it. (And when you look it up on the NASA site it never quite tells you the actual results.)
AquaSat was built for the express purpose of confirming AGW. One can’t help wondering that if NASA had known the results in advance the project would ever have been approved.
Paired with the results of the ArgoBots, which, since deployed, have shown a slight ocean cooling, one can’t claim the heat is merely “hiding in the ocean”, either.
OTOH, when CO2 was 7000 ppm, temperatures are estimated at 22°C, 8°C higher than today. CO2 dropped, rose back to c. 3000 ppm, then dropped again since 600mya. Earth’s climate spent most of its time at 22°C with one or two big, temporary dips. The around the time of the Cretaceous, both COS and temperatures declined steadily to present levels.
CO2 does not correlate very well with climate.
Joel,
Less aerosols and ash in the stratosphere will cause it to cool as well (relative to the past). How does global warming theory explain the high temperature anomalies in the NH versus the tropics and the SH (see my trend data in my posts above). Is it possible to have regional CO2-driven global warming only over land? Does a cleaner atmopshere and land use changes lend itself to higher temperatures over land (most of humanity live in the NH). By the way, these are questions that the modelers don’t want to hear because a) they don’t have answers for them (thus, potentially showing their ignorance), and b) it suggests their models are fallible. Methinks mother nature is playing one big trick on these modelers. Haven’t they learned: Don’t mess with Yo’Mama!
Joel,
then you agree that we have to have more warming in the upper trop before we can have the enhanced greenhouse effect go catastrophic??
I believe the OBSERVATIONS, even if there is some error still in them, simply do NOT support a large change happening any time soon. In fact, the observations support the Germans in that the temps generally get cooler with elevation. I believe the correct scientific method is to modify your theory when the FACTS contradict it!!
Please do not start the semantic war about Greenhouse Effect. The original Greenhouse Effect was based on preventing CONVECTION, not capturing IR!!! This is a common misunderstanding and causes problems talking about the issue. It is why I try to use Enhanced Greenhouse when referring to the CO2 theory. They ARE NOT THE SAME!!!
The Germans are specificaly correct in that their paper is titled “Falsification of the Atmospheric CO2 Greenhouse Effects in the Frame of Physics.” In other words, claiming that they claim to falsify the Greenhouse Effect is FALSE. This is the Strawman I am talking about. They do not claim to disprove the Greenhouse Effect or the standard theory for the habitability of the earth, only the IPCC and other warmers Enhanced Theory.
By the way, the reradiation of the IR is so fast there is typically no real time lag in its leaving. Not much of a heat shield if the CO2 doesn’t ABSORB the IR. If it does in appreciable amounts (warming trop faster than surface) then you would have convection and conduction to remove the heat. Also, unless you are over a desert where there is little water vapor the CO2 has little effect as the water vapor gets the energy directly.
I notice that you also used a poor analogy of how GG’s are supposed to work. A heat shield?? Again, poor analogies and labels are part of the problem with conceptualizing the issue!!!
By the way, repeating the arguments do not change them. The GG in the atmosphere is NOT equivalent to a black body sphere (mostly holes in the bandwidth) and they NEVER claim that the atmosphere does NOT keep the earth warm. Again they claim that CO2 and other GG in conditions anywhere approaching the earths atmosphere CAN NOT RETAIN ENOUGH HEAT TO CAUSE A CATASTROPHE!!! The IR is reradiated too quickly for there to be any large temp increase under earth conditions among other reasons.
Basically their paper sticks with known physics and does not ADD to it with poorly conceptualised models of the atmosphere that would require GG to perform in unknown ways.
You state that the doubling of CO2 will cause 1.2 to 2 to 4.5C with other feedbacks. I believe when the Germans wrote the paper the IPCC were still claiming almost twice that amount WITHOUT feedbacks other than CO2 itself. Maybe the IPCC are coming to believe in real physics also??
Would you like to address the question of how much the second doubling will raise the temps?? Personally I would LOVE a 4.5C average warming over the next 200 years for my great great grandkids!!
I will jump into your other discussion about the paleo record. CO2 apparently has been over 1000PPM. If the feedback from GG including water vapor is so strong, how do we explain that their is no record of a disastrous warming?? It would also appear that it has been rather cold with these levels. After the first 2 doublings there is no appreciable effect left. I do not believe there is any paleo record of an earth since the dinos that we could NOT have enjoyed with modern technology.
Another issue with the theory is the lack of Ocean Warming. The unphysical “reflection” of IR from GG to the surface should be warming it. The Aqua system has not found elevated temps. So, no atmospheric signature, no ocean signature. Only SOME indication of melt as both Greenland and Antarctica appear to be gaining mass while melting at the edges. Please, pray tell, where are all the indications of the ENHANCED Greenhouse Theory?? If there is no retained heat in the atmosphere and none in the oceans, apparently there is NONE. Only the original physical model that gives a more linear warming. No catastrophic warming.
By the way, you do know that there are at least 2 other papers in the last year that give a much lower sensitivity to GG???
http://www.ecd.bnl.gov/steve/pubs/HeatCapacity.pdf
http://met.hu/doc/idojaras/vol111001_01.pdf
They are both closer to the Germans than the IPCC. You might also want to take a look at this if you haven’t already:
http://www.dailytech.com/Researcher+Basic+Greenhouse+Equations+Totally+Wrong/article10973c.htm
It is an article about the second paper and explains the equations including one of the same points the Germans make. The IPCC math includes an INFINITE atmosphere (apparently easier to solve the equations). Here again is a well known scientist showing that the original IPCC math is problematic with energy balance equations.
KuhnKat; I think you have nailed it; when read in conjunction with the Gerlich paper, the Miskolczi and Schwartz pieces just about bury AGW; especially when combined with the Aqua and Argo data. Now, let’s sit back and wait for ipcc to acknowledge this. Perhaps Anthony can set up a clock and counting.
Chris, Pierre Gosselin:
I raised my question because I noticed that the timeline between 1998 and 2007 seemed to point towards a relative stable range of between .1 and .5 (with 1999 through early 2001 being a rise to the “stable range” and mid 2001 to 2007 holding steady). Suddenly we get a drop of .4 to the negative portion of the graph. Not only that, but the spring rise seems to be stalled.
Hence my question: Is this an outlier, or a clue of things to come? (a cooling down over the next few years?)
Just so you know, I do believe in human-caused global warming, but am definitely aware of the solar minimum of the middle ages, the power of volcanoes, and what I’m calling the Pollution effect (think China’s coal dust polluting the states of California, Washington and Oregon). And even without the evidence of a built-in limit of how warm the atmosphere can get (which does intrigue me), it wouldn’t surprise me to see the Pollution effect of this winter multiplied by the seeming disappearance of sunspots (cooling of the sun) and the volcano down south over the next year or two to overwhelm whatever warming we may have caused and hit us with some severe winters and cool, wet summers.
With my traning in chemical engineering, I’m wondering if the climate is behaving like a distillation column. Like adding more steam (i.e., heat) to a reboiler, GG’s absorbed more of the heat that would have been lost to space. In a distillation column, when more steam is sent to the reboiler (i.e., a heat exchanger at the bottom of the tower), then more liquid is vaporized and sent up the tower. If unchecked, more of the higher boiling component (think water and ethanol as the two main components inside the tower) is sent up the tower. Eventually, the purity of the ethanol going overhead as the distillate decreases as the concentration of water increases (not good!). So, how does one compensate if steam to the reboiler (i.e., the source of heat to the system) cannot be cut back? Easy, you send some the condensed overhead stream (called reflux) back down the tower as a liquid to cool it down. So, if more heat is being redirected back to the earth’s surface due to GG’s, then it appears to me that the atmosphere over the oceans (such as in the SH) causes more water to be vaporized. But instead of producing a positive feedback, it condenses at some altitude as it is loses heat. Eventually, this heat finds its way out to space. If all this happens very fast (i.e., it’s in equilibrium), I don’t see how “climate sensitivity” occurs.
So, to continue the analogy, the incoming irradiance plus the additional heat from GG absorption is like the steam to the reboiler, and the coldness of outer space is the overhead condenser. When more heat is appl