Here is a solution. Free public transport.
http://frepubtra.blogspot.com

Hemant, why the pessimism. There is enough time.

1) We should wait for another couple of decades. If warming continues in the times of lowering solar activity for decades, it will be a proof, that warming is manmade and no longer controlled by the Sun.

2) If so,we can clean the air or decrease global temperatures even RETROACTIVELY. We can cool and clean the climate/Earth in 2090s, WHEN WE HAVE DEVELOPED THE NEEDED TECHNOLOGY

First you soil it, then you clean it. We did it with rivers, we can do it with climate too.

Interesting link you posted there. It didn’t occure to me to connect the growing scepticism with the Terror Management Theory but now that it is pointed out it’s quite logical.

Vitezslav, if (just looking at things from an AGW paradigm) we wait for several decades it will be too late to change anything…According to IPCC scenarios (you obviously don’t believe in either) in 2090 we will already have experienced severe demage…If you then tell dead GW victims that you found out how to cool the planet…Well they won’t answer you, as they’re dead. (Well but as I said, our paradigms are differing strongly…so why am I telling you this?)

Well…rivers and climate…somehow I don’t see where the two fit together, despite that they are obviously in relation. But as I see it, cleaning the one has few do to with cleaning the other. Please enlighten me on where you took this comparision from.

It’s so sad. So many people have made a religion of global warming.

Do the homework. Read the actual published science on what we know about our climate on this planet. It is very limited. Our fears are based on models, which are based on this limited science.

Turning to history, we see warm and cool periods in historical times. The world did not end but it got really tough when it was colder. When it was warmer than today, life flourished and so did civilizations all over the world. In pre-history and from geology, we see the same - cycles. There are tree- stumps in the tundra of the Arctic - what does that tell you? Did the planet die of runaway warming on that occasion?

We know that CO2 was at much higher levels for long periods and at many times over the past 500 million years. At no time did Earth turn into Venus.

I could go on. Please do your homework and don’t just follow the propaganda. The debate is being lost because the science does not support it.

Global warming has become the Armageddon of the modern age. In the past they had Nostradamus or Revelation. A bit of hubris would be welcome - we are not yet planetary engineers. Hopefully when we are, we will do so with better science and data than that which is scaring people today.

No climate change isn’t a religion.
Why do you have to make it look like one?
It’s real, and it has been caused by our actions.
@Christian forget propaganda. Why don’t you come to India and see the effects for yourself.
The climate patterns ahve changed. Sunderbans is sinking….but to quote you:
I could go on. Please do your homework and don’t just follow proaganda.
As for science not supporting it, which science are you referring to here?
The same junk science that is going around telling people that dinosaurs co-existed with man?
Get real. This isn’t a class room debate. This is the future of humanity at stake here.

Climate has always been changing. And always will. Trying to stop climate change is like trying to stop universe from expanding.

If, as you claim, the greens seem to “lose the debate” because their viewpoint is too crazy.

By the way, who do you blame for the expanding of universe? Is it also our fault?

I don’t understand you. Could you please explain what is your contention, in simple logic.
Here is what my common sense tells me:

1. Human activities have made un-natural changes in the environment. We can start from the Ozone hole and go upto unnatural amounts of SPM in the atmosphere.
It isn’t good for health. Not for humans. Not for animals. And as we are finding out, not very conducive to life on this planet.

2. This unnatural increase in greenhouse gases has affected the climate, so much so that the glaciers are melting, sea levels are rising and psoing a threat to many countries already.

3. When scientists say we need to do something about climate change - it means we need to devise a more sustainable lifestyle. Production to consumption.

I would like to understand your argument against these three simple points.
Please don’t try to cloud common sense with rhetoric (universe expansion etc).

If you can argue conscisely and clearly, I would indeed like to know what is it that you do not understand.

As far as religion is concerned, look at you, you have to use such branding tactics to get your point across and steer the debate on if climate change is a religion or not. It is, dare I say the word, pathetic.

Your points are not based on science, which is MY point.

1. Humans are indeed changing the environment in lots of ways. Aerosol emissions, and not just pollution and heating but also their effect on cloud formation; changing land cover/use; biogeochemical effects of higher CO2; and the greenhouse effect of CO2 (By the way, water vapour is the principal greenhouse gas, at 95%). So the question is: why did they pick only CO2 as the problem to be solved? I care about the environment but not to the extent of wasting money on the wrong problem. It is much more complex than simply reducing CO2 levels.

Incidentally, the science of the ozone hole is not over either. We moved a bit too quickly there.

2. We don’t know if the increase in CO2 is unusual. We do know that the IPCC has estimated that we contribute about 5% of total annual planetary CO2. And even that’s not certain because our data on the oceans, two thirds of the planet, is poorly measured.

Sea level data - get the (peer-reviewed) papers! There has been no unusual sea level rise except that which has gone on since the Little Ice Age over the last 200 years. There has been subsidence of land surfaces from mining and groundwater extraction. There is no evidence for accelerating sea level rises.

You should be pleased to know that FAO has estimated that the productivity of the biosphere has gone up by 5% thanks to increased CO2. Earth would be rock without it.

3. I’m all in favour of a more sustainable lifestyle but not one enforced by dogma instead of science. We are wasting our resources on the wrong problems.

Why call man-made global warming a religion? Because we are told: ‘the debate is over’. Now you must do what we tell you.’

This is not science. Remember the logic of the Inquisition? Surely we have advanced from that type of thinking. I am a scientist, specifically geology, and my own opinions have formed slowly because I didn’t know the debate was over.

Finally, sustainability is a human goal, not a scientific conclusion. We can do this while living with climate change, which will happen anyway.

@ Hemant: Your “common sense” is misleading you.

1) Human activities do exist, but their impact on climate is negligible and microscopic.

2) The increse of greennouse gases and temperatures was caused by increased acitivity of the sun and its delayed effect due to thermal inertia of oceans. Melting glaciers not caused by man. No proof of that.

3. Do not say “scientists say”. It is not true. IPCC is controlled by politicans, not scientists. It is UNO. UNO is a political body.

The only known sustainable life style is free market capitalism. The other life styles lead to poverty and suffering.

Vitezslav, reality has already proven your theories wrong. . Climate has been changing, but not in this way. People’s like the Nenets in Siberia had a way to live that worked in warmer and colder times. It is not working any more, sorry.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/gallery/2009/oct/20/climate-change-nenet-russia?picture=354386254

Hemant! You and Monbiot are also wrong We are not losing this discussion, ask the people around you. Is anyone sceptical about the fact that the earth is getting warmer?

Daniel, I doubt the illiterate people of Siberia remember anything older than 150 years. If they remembered climate change from 1000 or 5000 ago, they would know, that their ancestors were repeatedly forced to migrate and change their life style due to recurrent climate changes.

By the way. Do you know, that in the times of ancient Sumerians (3000 BC) their cities like Kish were actually sea ports? Because the Persian Gulf was much higher back then.

@Christian, before I answer your question, I would like to know:
What are the right problems?
You say we are concentrating on the wrong problems. What acording to you are the right ones?
Could you please explain.
Oh, and what are the solutions to those right problems?

@Vitezslav You seem to revel in drama.
1. If you say the impact of human activities is microscopic, I am afraid you went to the wrond school. So why don’t you prove it. Remember, in the world I live in, there are many many countries. And about 50% of the world lives in Asia. Have you ever seen what devastation human activities have caused?
Anyways, don’t just indulge in rhetoric, point out facts.

2.I think you should read science really. Forget IPCC, forget Al Gore, we are talking school level science here.
Start from the 6th standard and work yourself up to college level. And you will know what is the difference between human caused effects and the increased activity of the sun.
By the way, could you present some data on that please, as you go along.

And just so that you understand, climate change is not just an environmental issue. It has many more facets to it, as ‘common sense’ would tell you.
Emissions is just one part of the story.
Sustainable development is another.
People’s rights.
and so on.
But I will write a post about that. You need to be educated properly.

Denying climate change blindly and calling it a one dimensional problem is worse than religion. It is downright fanatic and stupid.

No wonder, they call it the age of stupid.

Hemant, 3% out of 1/3 or even less is microscopic, I think. If you do not know, what I am talking about now, read my blog posts about the climate science! I have already explained it all there.

Real environmental problems we can fix are water quality, air quality, soil preservation, fisheries protection, to name a few. Greenpeace used to concentrate on such problems before they focused entirely on CO2.

Instead we are being asked to solve a problem we can’t fix. The climate will change anyway. Meanwhile the evidence for CO2 NOT being the ONLY driver for climate is being increasingly highlighted, instead of the propaganda focused only on CO2.

By the way, a court case recently ruled that Global Warming is a religion!

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/earthnews/6494213/Climate-change-belief-given-same-legal-status-as-religion.html

As I said before, your good arguments in favour of sustainable development, people’s rights etc have nothing to do with climate change. Insulting me doesn’t change my argument.

This is for Christian and Vitezslav.
Here is an article by Geroge Monbiot where he takes apart climate deniers.
Point for point. Fact for nonsense.
And Vitezslav, I have read your posts. Your claims and explanations defy logic and science. Rhetoric can only win classroom debates - not real science.
But here is the article. It’s not long. Ponder over it and try to answer the 11 questions Monbiot puts across:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2009/aug/05/climate-change-scepticism

Oh I am not insulting you Christian.
I merely asked for what according to you, were the problems.
What I understand of the climate debate is: It isn’t only about CO2. Climate change is a bigger issue than that. And all the points that you mentioned ARE being talked about as a part of the climate change debate.
If you only pick what some people are saying, it will never lead to a solution.
The debate in India is about various issues. About sustainable development and other things…and not just CO2. But of course they are related.
So basing your argument that the climate change debate is only about CO2, is fallacious. It isn’t.
And which is why you, to me, are not a climate change denier.
As for religion, take a look at my post which will tell you how this “branding” is so misleading.
Here’s one of the most respected environmentalists from India talking about emissions. It may give you another perspective:
http://www.business-standard.com/india/news/sunita-narain-whos-afraid2-degree-c/366890/

Christian, here’s the link about how branding it ‘religion’ is so misleading:
http://climatechange.thinkaboutit.eu/think2/post/climate_change_as_the_new_religion._a_lesson_in_advertising/

I read George Monbiot’s article you refer to some time ago. You may be surprised to hear I haven’t read Ian Plimer’s book, but this is what Monbiot’s article is about. He is criticising editorial inconsistencies and then arguing this proves man-made global warming is happening.

This is to miss the point. I agree with all the alarmists that the temperature has gone up - we also agree the amount for the last 100 years - 0.7 degrees celsius. I think this increase is natural. I think there is no scientific evidence to say that CO2 drove this temperature increase, nor that man made CO2 was entirely responsible for the increase in CO2. The only proof we have of future global warming are models. These are grossly deficient because climate science is in its infancy.

But even if there was some risk of global warming happening to the degree predicted by the alarmists, where is the evidence that this is bad? The IPCC points out the water balance will improve but this did not get highlighted in the Summary for Policy Makers. The problem to fear would be global cooling, which has been partly responsible for the demise of civilizations in the past.

Why do the climate alarmists want Armageddon? Back to religion I guess.

Unfortunately, you are wrong about CO2. In Europe, we are about to put in place a regime of carbon taxes. Not aerosol emission taxes, or fishery destruction taxes, or water pollution charges, but carbon taxes. Copenhagen is all about carbon trading and carbon taxes, which will make a lot of people very rich. Al Gore himself is now a big investor in the ‘carbon industry’, with hundreds of millions of dollars already made. Europe and the USA are being asked to transfer wealth to the developing world based on CO2 emissions. It is ALL about CO2.

CO2 is the lifeblood of our planet. Life would not exist above the oceans without it. Increased CO2 is good for life.

@Christian I may not agree with your arguments, but at least they are not rhetorical.
I am curious to know what do you mean by: increased CO2 is good for life.
Could you elaborate with some science behind it, please?

Hemant, could you explain which my “claims and explanations defy logic and science” and how?

I just say, that solar activity in 20th century was unprecedented high and its effects last due to thermal inertia of oceans. This ist he cause of increased CO2 and temperatures. Ice cores prove, that CO2 is caused by increased temperatures, not vice versa. Where do you think the lack of logic and science?

First: Your claim that human activity has not contributed…

The evidence is clear – the long-term trend is that global temperatures are rising, and humans are largely responsible for this rise. Global warming does not mean that each year will be warmer than the last. Natural phenomena will mean that some years will be much warmer and others cooler. You only need to look at 1998 to see a record-breaking warm year caused by a very strong El Niño. In the last couple of years, the underlying warming is partially masked caused by a strong La Niña. Despite this, 11 of the last 13 years were the warmest ever recorded. […] Over the last ten years, global temperatures have warmed more slowly than the long-term trend. But this does not mean that global warming has slowed down or even stopped. It is entirely consistent with our understanding of natural fluctuations of the climate within a trend of continued long-term warming.

You can find the paper here:
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2008/warming_goes_on.pdf

Second: humans are indeed the reason for increase in CO2 emissions.
Pay attention and read every word:

The most convincing arguments for scientists (based on isotopes and oxygen decreases in the atmosphere) may be hard to understand for the general public because they require a high level of scientific knowledge. Corinne Le Quéré, University of East Anglia presents a simpler evidence of the same statement based on ocean observations, and she explains how we know that not only part of the atmospheric CO2 increase is due to human activities, but all of it.

On time-scales of ~100 years, there are only two reservoirs that can naturally exchange large quantities of CO2 with the atmosphere: the oceans and the land biosphere (forests and soils). The mass of carbon (carbon is the “C” in CO2) must be conserved. If the atmospheric CO2 increase was caused, even in part, by carbon emitted from the oceans or the land, we would measure a carbon decrease in these two reservoirs.

Number of observations of carbon decreasing in the global oceans: zero.

Number of observations of carbon increasing in the global oceans: more than 20 published studies using 6 independent methods.
The methods are:
(1) direct observations of the partial pressure of CO2 at the ocean surface (Takahashi et al. 2002),
(2) observations of the spatial distribution of atmospheric CO2 which show how much carbon goes in and out of the different oceanic regions (Bousquet et al. 2000),
(3) observations of carbon, oxygen, nutrients and CFCs combined to remove the mean imprint of biological processes (Sabine et al. 2004),
(4) observations of carbon and alkalinity for two time-periods combined with an estimate of water age based on CFCs (McNeil et al. 2002), and the simultaneous observations of atmospheric CO2 increase and the decrease in (5) oxygen (Keeling et al. 1996), and (6) carbon 13 (Ciais et al. 1995) in the atmosphere.

to be contd…

contd from previous comment….

The principle of the last two methods is that both fossil fuel burning and biospheric respiration consume oxygen and reduce carbon 13 as they produce CO2, but the exchange of CO2 with the oceans has only a small impact on atmospheric oxygen and carbon 13. The measure of atmospheric CO2 increase together with oxygen or carbon 13 decrease gives the distribution between the different reservoirs.

All the estimates show that the carbon content of the oceans is increasing by ~ 2±1 PgC every year (current burning of fossil fuel is ~7 PgC per year). One method is able to go back in time and shows that the carbon content of the oceans has increased by 118±19 PgC in the last 200 years. There is some uncertainty about the exact amount that the oceans have taken up, but not about the direction of the change. The oceans cannot be a source of carbon to the atmosphere, because we observe them to be a sink of carbon from the atmosphere.

What about the land biosphere? We know that deforestation has contributed to the increase in atmospheric CO2. Yet because carbon needs to be conserved, observations of the carbon increase in the atmosphere and the oceans combined with estimates of fossil fuel burning tell us that deforestation has been largely compensated by enhanced growth by the land biosphere. For example, during 1980 to 1999, fossil fuel burning was 117±5 PgC, and the carbon increase in the atmosphere and the oceans were 65±1 and 37±8 PgC, respectively. Thus that leaves 15±9 PgC that has been taken up by the land. This 15±9 PgC includes deforestation (and other land-use changes) which reduced the land biosphere by 24±12 PgC, and an additional land uptake of 39±18 PgC in response to elevated CO2 and climate changes (Sabine et al. 2004). Here also there is some uncertainty about the exact amount, but there is no uncertainty that the land biosphere has taken up a quantity of CO2 that is roughly equivalent to the deforestation.

Why are the ocean and land taking up carbon, when we know that warming of the oceans reduces the solubility of CO2 and warming of the land accelerates bacterial degradation of the soils? The answer is that warming is not the only process that influences the oceans and land biosphere. The dominant process in the oceans is the response to increasing atmospheric CO2 itself. If the oceans had not warmed, they might have taken up even more carbon, although we cannot say for sure because warming may have other impacts, for example on marine biota. On land, bacterial degradation of the soils may have increased in response to warming, but for the moment this effect is smaller than the land response to other processes (for example fertilization by CO2 and nitrogen, changes in precipitation, etc).

Is this consistent with what we know of the glaciations? Yes. During glaciations, the balance of processes was very different. Cooling and other climate changes occurred first. The response of the oceans and land biosphere to climate caused the atmospheric CO2 to decrease, which caused more cooling (more on the feedbacks between temperature and CO2 can be found here). During glaciations, there were no external changes in atmospheric CO2 and the oceans and land biosphere responded primarily to climate change. In the last 200 years, there have been large changes in atmospheric CO2 as a result of human activities, and the oceans and land biosphere respond primarily to rising CO2.

In summary, we know that the rise in atmospheric CO2 is entirely caused by fossil fuel burning and deforestation because many independent observations show that the carbon content has also increased in both the oceans and the land biosphere (after deforestation). If the oceans or land had contributed to the rise in atmospheric CO2, they would hold less carbon. Their response to warming may be real, but it is less than their response to increasing CO2 and other climate changes for the moment.

Got it Vitezslav?

And as for your ‘sunny’ theories:

It’s true that the earth is warmed, for all practical purposes, entirely by solar radiation, so if the temperature is going up or down, the sun is a reasonable place to seek the cause.

Turns out it’s more complicated than one might think to detect and measure changes in the amount or type of sunshine reaching the earth. Detectors on the ground are susceptible to all kinds of interference from the atmosphere—after all, one cloud passing overhead can cause a shiver on an otherwise warm day, but not because the sun itself changed. The best way to detect changes in the output of the sun—versus changes in the radiation reaching the earth’s surface through clouds, smoke, dust, or pollution—is by taking readings from space.

This is a job for satellites. According to PMOD at the World Radiation Center there has been no increase in solar irradiance since at least 1978, when satellite observations began. This means that for the last thirty years, while the temperature has been rising fastest, the sun has not changed.

There has been work done reconstructing the solar irradiance record over the last century, before satellites were available. According to the Max Planck Institute, where this work is being done, there has been no increase in solar irradiance since around 1940. This reconstruction does show an increase in the first part of the 20th century, which coincides with the warming from around 1900 until the 1940s. It’s not enough to explain all the warming from those years, but it is responsible for a large portion.

———-

Got it? This is how your claims and explanations defy logic and science.

I would be happy to teach you more science and answer your questions. But let’s talk science now. Enough of your aggressive rhetoric.

Enough of your aggressive rhetoric, Hemant. Cool it down. And please, try to be more brief, next time.

Read closely my article about thermal inertia of oceans (Boiling the earth oceans). Read it very carefully please. Every word.

CO2 was rising between 1940s-1970s and yet the temperatures were not going up. Just like in the last ten years. So much for the alleged strong CO2 forcing on climate.

Let me explain to you: ice cores proved, that CO2 does not cause warming. It is caused by warming. You are mistaking the cause and effect.

Even if the whole CO2 increase was caused by us, it still does not explain the warming warming, which we experienced. There must be some other cause.

Just to teach you a bit of science.

And considering your measurements of how oceans are sink or source of carbon…

I have found contradictiong surveys: http://www.i-sis.org.uk/OceanCarbonSink.php

A 1991-2000 survey of the North East Atlantic Ocean: It was found to be a net source of carbon.

“The scientists estimated that 0.5 Gt of carbon is released per year just by the plankton community covering the 5.26 million square kilometres of the subtropical NE Atlantic.”

Anyway I am afraid all these estimates are questionable. Just read Eamon’s article “Oh my god”.

Ha! Ha1
Unfortunately you repeat yourself.
And it is obvious you haven’t read anything of what I put up as the answer to your questions.
As I mentioned:
In the last 200 years, there have been large changes in atmospheric CO2 as a result of human activities, and the oceans and land biosphere respond primarily to rising CO2.

Science is science. I cannot make it brief or long. Scientsts do that. And your arguments have been trashed by scientists.

before I forget, you may be losing the battle here. You can’t convince me or anybody with an iota of intelligence -  about your theories. ANd unfortunately for you, all the world leaders seem to agree that that global warming has been caused by human activities.
So, do write a petition or two to the leaders to make them stop believing.

Or this:  “We discovered that natural processes play such an important role that the signals they generate can be as large as or larger than the anthropogenic signal,” says Feely. Said about fluctuations in the intake/venting of carbon from/to oceans.

http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/OceanCarbon/page2.php

Hemant, I am afraid it is you, who is losing the battle. It will be obvious to you in 2030 or 2040 after decades of cooling, in spite of rising CO2. Just wait.

Hemant,

You ask how CO2 is good for life. This question is answered in the text you quote. Also, I can find the reference for my earlier statement if you wish. I said earlier:
“You should be pleased to know that FAO has estimated that the productivity of the biosphere has gone up by 5% thanks to increased CO2.”

In case you are not a biologist, plants through photosynthesis take in CO2 to grow and produce oxygen. They are a carbon based life form, just like all of life on the planet. We animals breathe in air, take up the oxygen and breathe out CO2. There is good evidence that the biosphere suffered when there was low CO2 in the past and greenhouse growers often add CO2 to improve plant growth rates.

The key problem with blaming CO2 for driving temperature is that all the evidence points to the opposite. The ice core data shows that temperature increases precede CO2 increases. Certainly CO2 has been going up but since we have only measured it in a consistent manner since the 1950s, we don’t know what it means. The paper you quote is excellent work but is still based on premises and models. We lack the data, especially temperature data.

My problem rests with the expenditure of very large sums (billions of euro) on a perceived problem, CO2, ‘just in case’ - the precautionary principle. This decision is political, not scientific.

I asked: How is increasing levels of CO2 good for life?
Not how Co2 is good for life.

I found an interesting bit here, which answers a lot of questions:

I don’t know if there is a meaningful way to define an “optimum” average temperature for planet earth. Surely it is better now for all of us than it was 20,000 years ago when so much land was trapped beneath ice sheets. Perhaps any point between the recent climate and the extreme one we may be heading for, with tropical forests inside the arctic circle, is as good as any other. Maybe it’s even better with no ice caps anywhere.

It doesn’t matter. The critical issue is not what the temperature is, or may be, or will be. The critical issue is how fast it is moving.

Rapid change is the real danger. Human habits and infrastructure are suited to particular weather patterns and sea levels, as are ecosystems and animal behaviors. The rate at which global temperature is rising today is likely unique in the history of our species.

This kind of sudden change is rare even in geological history, though perhaps not unprecedented. So the planet may have been through similar things before—that sounds reassuring, right?

Not so much. Once you look at the impact similar changes had on biodiversity at the time, the existence of historical precedent becomes anything but reassuring. Rapid climate change is the prime suspect in most mass extinction events, including the Great Dying some 250 million years ago, in which 90% of all life went extinct.

What we know about ecosystems, and what geologic history demonstrates, is that dramatic climate changes—up or down or sideways—are a tremendous shock to the biosphere and cause mass extinction events. That, all in all, is not likely to be a good thing.

Specifically on CO2, I found this, which may interest you Christian:

While there are poorly understood ancient climates and controversial climate changes in earth’s long geological history, there are no clear contradictions to greenhouse theory to be found.

What we do have is an unfortunate lack of comprehensive and well-resolved data. There is always the chance that new data will turn up shortcomings in the models and unforeseen new aspects to climate theory. Scientists in the field are working hard to uncover such things—every scientist relishes the thought of uncovering new data that overturns current understanding. But it makes no sense to reject CO2 as a primary driver of climate change today because it looks, through the foggy glasses of time, like CO2 has not always completely controlled climate changes in the past.

The climate system is complicated—even the configuration of the continents has a big effect—so one can not expect complete correlation on all timescales between temperatures and any single factor.

Hemant, your rambling ends here.

The Greenhouse Effect.

This is why rising CO2 cannot possibly cause global warming/climate change by any measurable degree.

No amount of your “science” has proven otherwise.

Mike, it would do you good to read. It took exactly two minutes for you to come to this post and comment on it. You haven’t read the comments and like you have been doing in the past, you just want to have your say.
Well, you’ve done that.
If you had read some of what I posted, it would have made you think a little.
But that isn’t your forte, is it?

Hemant, you can fantasise all you want, but the reality is that I am probably the only visitor to this site that actually reads what the opposing side has to offer. I’ve read almost everything on this site, every post, followed almost every link, as much as I can read as I have time for. I have been following the comments in this article post by post, read the monbiot article and the met office article, of which neither focus on the merits of CO2 induced global warming and only attack opposing arguments (quite frivolously might I add).

If you cannot disprove my depiction of CO2 greenhouse mechanics then you must concede defeat. I suggest reading these two papers so that you might better understand my position.

A BBC article which may be useful to the climate skeptics. But then, nothng seems to hold their attention.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/in_depth/629/629/7074601.stm
If anyone considers Monbiot and the scientiic research paper from where I put the CO2 argument - frivolous, then I cannot help you.

Hemant,
I will repeat the point a third time in this thread.

The only evidence for a correlation between temperature and CO2 comes from ice cores. They show a correlation, with temperature leading CO2. If they are related, it is temperature driving CO2, not the other way around.

your question - how is CO2 good for life? If you read what I said, it is clear because I answered both points. All life on the surface of the earth (not in the oceans) would end if there was no CO2 in the atmosphere (OK - maybe some algae or bacteria living on a limestone rock).

As for rapid climate change events, this can be caused by a number of geological events such as volcanism. Certainly this has happened many times in the past. I’ll leave you with a quotation (forgotten who) “In geological time, the improbable happens frequently and the impossible occasionally”.

So while this is true, we can’t predict them and we have no evidence that such a rapid change is about to happen.

Christian
Why the repetition?
I asked you -  How is INCREASING LEVELS of CO2 good for life?
To which you haven’t answered me.
On the contrary, I have made it clear:
1. Increasing levels of CO2 cause global warming
2. Global warming is a threat to life on the planet
3. the increasing levels of CO2 are human caused.
Which part is unclear?

As for for the belief that One decent-sized volcanic eruption puts more CO2 in the atmosphere than a decade of human emissions. 

It couldn’t possibly be true given the CO2 record from any of the dozens of sampling stations around the globe. If it were true that individual volcanic eruptions dominated human emissions and were causing the rise in CO2 concentrations, then these CO2 records would be full of spikes—one for each eruption. Instead, such records show a smooth and regular trend.
The fact of the matter is, the sum total of all CO2 out-gassed by active volcanoes amounts to about 1/150th of anthropogenic emissions.

Again, your articles speak nothing of how exactly CO2 causes warming when 99% of the radiation is absorbed to extinction within 10-100 metres of the planet’s surface.

Back radiation from the atmosphere does not just beam down from the stratosphere as they like to illustrate, it is absorbed again within a few metres; there is no net change in the location of the heat as convection and air currents are constantly moving heat both laterally and vertically.

I assume you will hold yourself up to your own standards and read the papers I suggested?

Until you can address these issues, then you have no argument whatsoever.

@Mike I think I explained in great detail how CO2 caused warming. If you di not understand it, too bad. (It’s just after the comment where I give the met office link)

@Christian - to your point - it is temperature driving CO2, not the other way around….

When viewed coarsely, historical CO2 levels and temperature show a tight correlation. However, a closer examination of the CH4, CO2, and temperature fluctuations recorded in the Antarctic ice core records reveals that, yes, temperature moved first.
Nevertheless, it is misleading to say that temperature rose and then, hundreds of years later, CO2 rose. These warming periods lasted for 5,000 to 10,000 years (the cooling periods lasted more like 100,000 years!), so for the majority of that time (90% and more), temperature and CO2 rose together. This remarkably detailed archive of climatological evidence clearly allows for CO2 acting as a cause for rising temperatures, while also revealing it can be an effect of them.
The current understanding of those cycles is that changes in orbital parameters (the Milankovich and other cycles) caused greater amounts of summer sunlight to fall in the northern hemisphere. This is a small forcing, but it caused ice to retreat in the north, which changed the albedo. This change—reducing the amount of white, reflective ice surface—led to further warmth, in a feedback effect. Some number of centuries after that process started, CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere began to rise, which amplified the warming trend even further as an additional feedback mechanism.
So it is correct that CO2 did not trigger the warmings, but it definitely contributed to them—and according to climate theory and model experiments, greenhouse gas forcing was the dominant factor in the magnitude of the ultimate change.
This raises a warning for the future: we may well see additional natural CO2 come out of the woodwork as whatever process took place repeatedly over the last 650K years begins to play out again. The likely candidates are out-gassing from warming ocean waters, carbon from warming soils, and methane from melting permafrost.

Here is a more scientific explanation by scientists:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2004/12/co2-in-ice-cores/

Discussion with you is exhausting Hemant!

Increasing levels of CO2 are discussed in my post. I’m not going to repeat it when you won’t read it - it’s obviously a waste of time.

Your 3 points:
1. Increasing levels of CO2 cause global warming. UNPROVED
2. Global warming is a threat to life on the planet WHAT THREATS? HOW MUCH GLOBAL WARMING? FROM WHAT LEVEL? WHO DECIDED?
3. the increasing levels of CO2 are human caused. THE IPCC ESTIMATES THAT HUMAN EMISSIONS REPRESENT LESS THAN 5% OF THE TOTAL.

Finally, look at the temperature data the year Mt Pinatubo erupted. All climate folk including the alarmists agree the fall was due to ash in the atmosphere. Have 2-3 of those in one year and you’ll get a big blip in the weather. I wasn’t arguing for CO2 with volcanoes and climate - after all, CO2 has a negligible effect on climate.

It is exhausting because you are up against the scientists not me.

To answer your newly raised points. Yes CO2 causes global warming. WHo decided?

Well, the “consensus” about anthropogenic climate change entails the following:

  * the climate is undergoing a pronounced warming trend beyond the range of natural variability;
  * the major cause of most of the observed warming is rising levels of the greenhouse gas CO2;
  * the rise in CO2 is the result of burning fossil fuels;
  * if CO2 continues to rise over the next century, the warming will continue; and
  * a climate change of the projected magnitude over this time frame represents potential danger to human welfare and the environment.

While theories and viewpoints in conflict with the above do exist, their proponents constitute a very small minority. If we require unanimity before being confident, well, we can’t be sure the earth isn’t hollow either.

This consensus is represented in the IPCC Third Assessment Report, Working Group 1 (TAR WG1), the most comprehensive compilation and summary of current climate research ever attempted, and arguably the most thoroughly peer reviewed scientific document in history. While this review was sponsored by the UN, the research it compiled and reviewed was not, and the scientists involved were independent and came from all over the world.

The conclusions reached in this document have been explicitly endorsed by ...

  * Academia Brasiliera de Ciências (Bazil)
  * Royal Society of Canada
  * Chinese Academy of Sciences
  * Academié des Sciences (France)
  * Deutsche Akademie der Naturforscher Leopoldina (Germany)
  * Indian National Science Academy
  * Accademia dei Lincei (Italy)
  * Science Council of Japan
  * Russian Academy of Sciences
  * Royal Society (United Kingdom)
  * National Academy of Sciences (United States of America)
  * Australian Academy of Sciences
  * Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Sciences and the Arts
  * Caribbean Academy of Sciences
  * Indonesian Academy of Sciences
  * Royal Irish Academy
  * Academy of Sciences Malaysia
  * Academy Council of the Royal Society of New Zealand
  * Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences

More irrelevant drivel. The long term climate record is exactly that. Long term. It tells us nothing about the short term variations of temperature and CO2. Additionally, correlation is not causation.

You continue to ignore the issues I have highlighted above. You have no argument.

In addition to the above:

In addition to these national academies, the following institutions specializing in climate, atmosphere, ocean, and/or earth sciences have endorsed or published the same conclusions as presented in the TAR report:

  * NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies (GISS)
  * National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)
  * National Academy of Sciences (NAS)
  * State of the Canadian Cryosphere (SOCC)
  * Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
  * Royal Society of the United Kingdom (RS)
  * American Geophysical Union (AGU)
  * American Institute of Physics (AIP)
  * National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR)
  * American Meteorological Society (AMS)
  * Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society (CMOS)

If this is not scientific consensus, what in the world would a consensus look like?

@Mike, get a life. But not in science - it will be a waste of time for you.

You can claim to have the support of a million scientists for all I care, it only takes one person to prove them all wrong.

If you represent the majority, then I am that one person.

I have put forward my arguments and they prevail over yours and that of the so-called majority; if you cannot invalidate them then you have no basis for argument.

‘Consensus’ is a political word, not science. I’m only interested in the data.

* the climate is undergoing a pronounced warming trend beyond the range of natural variability; PRONOUNCED? 0.7 DEGREES PER CENTURY? THIS FIGURE IS AGREED. THE ‘CONSENSUS’ IS THAT THE MODELS SAY IT WILL BE PRONOUNCED IN THE FUTURE.THESE MODELS ARE ALREADY DEVIATING STRONGLY FROM REALITY.
  * the major cause of most of the observed warming is rising levels of the greenhouse gas CO2; UNPROVED. I HAVE YET TO FIND THE SCIENCE THAT SHOWS THIS, AND IT’S NOT FOR THE LACK OF TRYING. IT CAN BE EXPLAINED AS A NATURAL RECOVERY FROM THE LITTLE ICE AGE.
  * the rise in CO2 is the result of burning fossil fuels; 5%
  * if CO2 continues to rise over the next century, the warming will continue; FROM CO2 ALONE, THE MAX. POSSIBLE IS 1.5 DEGREES FOR THE NEXT CENTURY. IS THAT A PROBLEM? HOW DO WE KNOW?
and
  * a climate change of the projected magnitude over this time frame represents potential danger to human welfare and the environment. I DISAGREE AND SO DO THE ACTUAL PEER-REVIEWED SCIENTIFIC STUDIES ON E.G. PRECIPITATION, STORM FREQUENCY.(These are the ones I have read). Society thrived in Roman times and the Vikings had fun in Greenland when the climate was warmer. Sorry, we don’t have temperature or CO2 data but you can’t deny tree stumps sitting in what is now tundra.

Your list proves to me that the politicization of science is the real disaster that we are all facing, not just in climate science. Billions are being spent trying to prove anthropogenic global warming and so far the results are at best inconclusive.

In bringing up new points, you are not responding to the earlier ones I tried replying on.

Little Ice age argument:

This argument relies on an implicit assumption that there is a particular climatic baseline to which the earth inexorably returns—and thus that a period of globally lower temperatures will inevitably be followed by a rise in temperatures. What is the scientific basis for that assumption?

There is no evidence of such a baseline. The climate is influenced by many factors, which change or remain stable in their own ways. The current understanding of the Little Ice Age is that it was likely the result of a decrease in solar irradiance combined with an increase in volcanic activity, blocking additional sunlight. The LIA was also not particularly well synchronized globally, affecting different regions at different times. Scientists are aware of no century-scale pattern in solar output or volcanic activity, so there’s no reason to expect a reversal of those changes. As it happens, solar output did increase somewhat in the early 20th century, which did contribute to warming at that time. However, that’s not behind current warming.

Another problem with appealing to a natural recovery from the LIA is that temperature has now risen to levels higher than the assumed baseline climate. So even if some recovery were to be expected, why have we now exceeded it?

And your question about ...FROM CO2 ALONE, THE MAX. POSSIBLE IS 1.5 DEGREES ...has been answered well:

Even without addressing the numbers in this argument, there is a fundamental flaw in its reasoning.

We don’t yet know exactly how much the climate will warm from the CO2 already in the air. There is a delay of several decades between forcing and final response. Until an equilibrium temperature is reached, present day observations will not tell us the exact value of the climate’s sensitivity to CO2.

The reason for this is primarily the large heat capacity of the oceans. The enhanced greenhouse effect from higher CO2 levels is indeed trapping energy in the climate system according to expectations, but the enormous quantity of water on earth is absorbing most of the resulting heat. Due to water’s high heat capacity, this absorbed energy shows up as only a modest ocean warming, which in turn dampens the temperature change on land and lowers the global average trend.

This is commonly referred to as the climate system’s thermal inertia. According to model experiments and consistent with data from past climate changes, this inertia results in a lag of several decades between the imposition of a radiative forcing and a final equilibrium temperature.

Now let’s look at a couple of further details. CO2 is not the only factor affecting global temperature. There is a phenomenon called “global dimming” counteracting greenhouse gas warming. Global dimming refers to the blocking of incoming sunlight by particulate pollution in the troposphere and airplane contrails in the stratosphere. It is not a well quantified effect, but it may well be masking a great deal more warming; it is definitely masking some.

This is just one example of why we cannot attribute global temperature trends entirely to CO2—the same mistaken premise that fuels arguments about the mid-century cooling trend.

I believe it was Richard Lindzen who first made this argument about climate sensitivity. The numbers he uses don’t add up. A 35 percent increase in CO2 should correspond to 43 percent of the forcing from two times CO2 (ln(1.35)/ln(2)= 43%), which is not three-fourths….

It is not necessary to prove natural variation to disprove anthropogenic global warming. It is the null hypothesis that whatever was driving climate before is what’s still driving it now. There is no evidence to suggest current trends lie outside natural variation, for both temperature and CO2. It is also irrelevant, since rising CO2 from present levels cannot produce any measureable amount of warming.

Still waiting for you to address my explanation of the greenhouse effect. Until then you have no basis for argument.

@Mike
You put forward Dr. Hug’s paper.

as Hug has pointed out, with higher concentrations of greenhouse gases the radiation will be absorbed closer to the ground and so the air there will be heated more. From the Beer-Lambert Law it can be seen that if all the radiation is absorbed in 30 m with preindustrial levels (280 ppm) of CO2, then when CO2 is doubled the bottom 15 m will receive the same amount of heat. Heinze Hug claimed that this would not cause global warming because the hot air would convect away. But in deserts the hot air does not convect away. The air density has to be reduced by mixing it with water vapour before it convects. A point to note here is that with the current models it is predicted that the surface temperature will increase with the log of the concentration. With the Barrett/Hug scheme the heating is greater since it increases linearly with concentration.

If Barrett and Hug are right, why then is the planet warming? The answer is that it is more complicated than they describe. The absorption decreases exponentially with distance from the surface. Thus the strongest absorption is closest to the surface. The laminar surface layer below 1cm does not convect and it warms the surface by conduction. Here, is where water comes into play on two fronts. First, the warmer surfaces evaporates more water vapour which is also a greenhouse gas. But more importantly in the present climatic regime, the warmer surface leads to a melting of snow and ice. It is CO2 which is directly leading to the melting of the glaciers world wide, and to the sea ice and ice shelves in the polar regions. This leads to the ice albedo feedback which also causes warming.

Please: be positive!
I have just told that in a post before:
http://climatechange.thinkaboutit.eu/think2/post/my_best_copenhagen
The new energies are able to change many things you are afraid.
You are so young; be happy!

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I am a global warming skeptic on the basis that the world is actually cooling at present and has been for the last few years. Given that the main protagonists in the climate debate promoting warming and carbon taxation are the same Wall Street brokers that gave us the sub prime market that brought the financial world to its knees and us with it. Is it any wonder that we find it hard to go along with their advice on global warming. On top of that there are equally compelling arguments against Co2 being the baddie green house gas it’s painted to be. It is a relatively benign gas and a plant food without which we would suffocate for lack of oxygen. We have serious pollution problems that need to be dealt with desperately but to focus on Co2 is absurd and only beneficial to Goldman Sachs and all the other Hole in the Wall Street gang members surrounding the false prophet of doom, Al Gore. The green movement under Sir Maurice Strong has become the new religion and those of us that do not agree with its tenets to the letter, are viewed as heretics. The green movement has a lot of good things going for it but using it to squeeze money out of people already struggling to feed their children is beyond the pale.

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