Tuesday
Apr142015
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill The Salby lecture
Apr 14, 2015 Climate: Sceptics Climate: carbon budget Murry Salby's recent lecture in London can now be seen on YouTube.
Apr 14, 2015 Climate: Sceptics Climate: carbon budget
Reader Comments (179)
Rich,
I have looked at your blogpost. That contains about all the common errors made again and again...
1. There are two unique sources of low 13C CO2: fossil organics and recent organics. All inorganic sources are high in 13C/12C ratio. That includes oceans, volcanoes, rock weathering,...
The only exception may be methane of both organic and inorganic origin. But as CH4 increased together with human activities, it would be a hell of a coincidence that nature was hardly changing its emissions until humans started to emit much larger quantities. The same for CO2...
2. The biosphere as a whole is a net source of oxygen, thus a net sink for CO2, thus not the cause of the CO2 increase in the atmosphere, neither of the 13C/12C ratio decline. Thus there is one unique source of the decline: human emissions. See:
http://www.bowdoin.edu/~mbattle/papers_posters_and_talks/BenderGBC2005.pdf
Neither are the oceans, as their 13C/12C is a lot higher than in the atmosphere, thus any substantial increase of ocean emissions (or even circulation) would increase the 13C/12C ratio in the atmosphere, where we see a firm decline...
3. Where you are completely wrong, like many before and after you, including Dr. Salby:
τ = V / q
Where τ is the residence time, V is the total mass of the given particles within the location (in our case the atmospheric CO2 mass) and q is the removal constant.
The problem is that q is the removal rate of a concentration, not the removal rate of an excess quantity above equilibrium.
Even of q was 5 times V, thus moving 5 times the total quantity of all CO2 in the atmosphere within a year, that doesn't change one gram of the total CO2 mass in the atmosphere, as long as what comes in goes out. Only if there is a difference between ins and outs, the total CO2 mass in the atmosphere changes with a rate called the e-fold decay rate which is:
driving force / effect. For the current ~110 ppmv above the equilibrium for the current ocean temperature, the net sink rate is ~2.15 ppmv/year. The e-fold decay rate of the excess CO2 in the atmosphere then is:
110 ppmv / 2.15 ppmv/year = ~51 years.
A little longer than your residence time, but much shorter than the IPCC's Bern model, which assumes a fast saturation of the deep oceans, for which is not the slightest indication...
All what you have proven is how long an individual CO2 molecule in average stays in the atmosphere and thus how fast the human injection will be exchanged by CO2 molecules from natural origin. That doesn't say anything about the origin of the total increase of CO2 in the atmosphere.
Compare it to the turnover of capital (and goods) through a factory: that can be small or huge, increasing or decreasing, but that says next to nothing about the gain (or loss) of the same capital at the end of the year. The latter is what interests every share holder, no matter the turnover...
4. You are also completely wrong about the Revelle factor vs. Henry's law. Henry's law applies to CO2 gas only: in the atmosphere vs. in the water surface layer. That does NOT apply to bicarbonate and carbonate ions.
Henry's law is for the 0.5% pure CO2 in seawater at the current pH. A doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere gives a doubling of free CO2 in seawater per Henry's law, that is from 0.5 to 1%. That is all. Good for us that the Revelle factor is of some help: instead of only a 0.5% increase of CO2 in seawater, the chemical equilibrium reactions make that bicarbonates and carbonates also increase to in total around 10% increase of total carbon (DIC) for a 100% increase in the atmosphere.
Thus instead of a limiting factor, the Revelle/buffer factor makes that seawater does absorb about 10 times more CO2 than fresh water for the same change of CO2 in the atmosphere...
5. You are right and wrong about what will remain of the human addition: ultimately, the up to today human emissions will give not more than 1% (3 ppmv) increase in the atmosphere, after been fully mixed with the deep oceans. But that takes time: the ocean surface is fast mixed, but constantly saturated at 10% of the atmospheric change. The deep oceans are far from saturated, but the deep ocean - atmosphere exchanges are very limited and remove not more than ~1.5 ppmv from the ~4.5 ppmv human emissions today. So at this moment human emissions are the main cause of the increase, while nature (oceans as well as the biosphere) is more sink than source.
It amuses me that sinks seem to be accelerating against human emissions. And why shouldn't we expect recruitment of previously unknown negative feedbacks to the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide?
================================
Kim,
The overall sink rate over the past 55 years increased quite linear with the increase in the atmosphere, which means that the whole CO2 cycle is acting as a simple first order process.
There may be increasing unknown sink processes, but until now it looks like that the oceans and vegetation (including vegetation in the oceans) are the main sinks...
I would not normally bother debating you Ferdinand because disputing anything with you is like charging at a mountain of putty. My energy is absorbed and the mountain remains unmoved.
Ferdinand: "That contains about all the common errors made again and again".
The ‘errors’ you see are only the ones you have invented in your own mind Ferdinand.
Ferdinand: "All what you have proven is how long an individual CO2 molecule in average stays in the atmosphere and thus how fast the human injection will be exchanged by CO2 molecules from natural origin. That doesn't say anything about the origin of the total increase of CO2 in the atmosphere".
You appear to have misread my argument. I have not overlooked the lifetime of atmospheric CO2 so please clear that misconception out of your mind. I merely pointed out that calculating the mean residence time for CO2 molecules in the atmosphere by the IPCC’s formula enables us to determine how much anthropogenic CO2 is up there at any one time. Therefore the claim that we can prove humans have contributed 40% to the atmospheric CO2 greenhouse through the isotopic measurements as is often claimed are radically at variance with the predictions of the conventional scientific theories. That is all. If you bothered to read my post you would see that I acknowledge that the IPCC accepts CO2 has a short residence time.
Ferdinand: "Henry's law applies to CO2 gas only: in the atmosphere vs. in the water surface layer. That does NOT apply to bicarbonate and carbonate ions. Henry's law is for the 0.5% pure CO2 in seawater at the current pH. A doubling of CO2 in the atmosphere gives a doubling of free CO2 in seawater per Henry's law, that is from 0.5 to 1%. That is all. Good for us that the Revelle factor is of some help: instead of only a 0.5% increase of CO2 in seawater, the chemical equilibrium reactions make that bicarbonates and carbonates also increase to in total around 10% increase of total carbon (DIC) for a 100% increase in the atmosphere".
You are talking out the back of your head. It is true that Henry’s law applies specifically to atmospheric CO2 and H2CO3 but all the CO2 species exist in a state of chemical equilibrium and the 1:50 partitioning ratio encompasses all CO2 species, not just HCO32 as you appear to be thinking. Furthermore the equilibrium-time between the CO2 species is very fast. If you add more CO2 to the atmosphere above the water, more atmospheric CO2 will dissolve in the seawater until the fixed equilibrium partitioning ratio to which I have referred is restored. This process can continue practically without limit. Hence only a small fraction of the human emissions can end up as permanent additions to the atmospheric CO2 greenhouse at equilibrium. This means that, no matter how much CO2 goes into the atmosphere from whatever sources, the system will end up at equilibrium with about 50 times the CO2 concentration (as all CO2 species) is dissolved in the oceans as exists in the atmosphere at the current global mean temperature of about 15C .
Ferdinand: "Thus instead of a limiting factor, the Revelle/buffer factor makes that seawater does absorb about 10 times more CO2 than fresh water for the same change of CO2 in the atmosphere".
The Revelle Factor is logically absurd Ferdinand, your BATS time-series is hugely extrapolated and worthless, and even Roger Revelle (the guy that came up with the idea) later concluded that “It seems therefore quite improbable that an increase in the atmospheric CO2 concentration of as much as 10% could have been caused by industrial fuel combustion during the past century”. You don’t have to think too hard about the Revelle Factor to see why it is nonsense. The Revelle Factor implies that at the current DIC ratio the surface ocean can only absorb 10% of any increase in atmospheric CO2 from whatever source at equilibrium. However if the Revelle Factor were true then the oceans would be incapable of annually reabsorbing practically all the natural CO2 they outgas as they are doing now. This divergence between theoretical prediction and scientific observation is an anomaly that remains to be explained and Tom Segalstad is correct when he states that the Revelle Factor is an ‘ideological construct’. This is just one, of many reasons, as to why the Revelle Factor should not be taken seriously.
Ferdinand: "You are right and wrong about what will remain of the human addition: ultimately, the up to today human emissions will give not more than 1% (3 ppmv) increase in the atmosphere, after been fully mixed with the deep oceans".
The residence time of DIC in the surface ocean before being transferred to the deep ocean according to the IPCC’s own figures is only around 10 years, but nevertheless the biological process of CO2 sequestration that you are referring is a totally different thing. It is a separate process that is happening alongside and mostly independently of the dissolution process, so the ‘bottleneck’ does not apply to it and it is a complete red-herring in the debate. Sorry, but you cannot escape the rigours of Henry’s law that easily Ferdinand. Henry’s law applies to all cases of gases dissolving in liquids and the dissolution of CO2 in seawater is not an exception to that general rule. Henry’s law deems that at the end of the day, year, or however long it takes for equilibrium to be reached, less than 1/50th of the amount of CO2 that humanity puts into the atmosphere will stay there as a permanent addition to the existing CO2 greenhouse. And this equilibrium occurs very fast. Since human CO2 emissions are currently about 30Gt/year, this implies that only about 0.6Gt/yr will become permanently added to the resident CO2 greenhouse as Segalstad correctly states.
Ferdinand: "So at this moment human emissions are the main cause of the increase".
This is only true in your whimsical subjective dreamworld.
I will leave you to look over my blog-post and Segalstad's papers until you understand it.
My apologies, that should read:
"It is true that Henry’s law applies specifically to atmospheric CO2 and CO2(aq) but all the CO2 species exist in a state of chemical equilibrium and the 1:50 partitioning ratio encompasses all CO2 species, not just CO2(aq)".
Rich,
I have no problem to change my mind if you have good arguments which show that you are right and I am wrong. But it should be good arguments, based on facts...
Have a look at the 13C/12C ratio: if that drops in the atmosphere, there are only two possible sources. One source, the whole biosphere is a proven sink for CO2, thus not the cause of the decrease. Neither are the oceans, as the oceans 13C/12C ratio is higher than of the atmosphere. That proves that at least 1/3rd of the CO2 increase is from the human contribution, as that is what is measured as 13C/12C decline in the atmosphere compared to what it would be if all human CO2 remained in the atmosphere.
You said:
Hence atmospheric isotope measurements cannot prove we have increased atmospheric CO2 by 120ppmv (or 43%) because the vast majority of anthropogenic CO2 has already been absorbed by natural sinks and is no longer in the atmosphere.
You still don't understand the main difference between residence time and e-fold decay rate of an excess amount of CO2, whatever the origin.
If you add 100 GtC red colored CO2 (~45 ppmv) in one shot into the atmosphere, the total CO2 will increase from the pre-industrial 560 GtC (~290 ppmv) to 660 GtC (~335 ppmv) in less than a year, where about 14% is red colored. With a residence time of ~5 years, the red colored CO2 is almost all replaced with transparent "natural" CO2 within about 50 year.
Not so for the total quantity above the original equilibrium: The total quantity still is about half the original extra shot. Thus while hardly any red colored CO2 is left, the 50% extra still is 100% caused by the initial shot of red CO2 See:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/fract_level_pulse.jpg
How many human CO2 is left in the atmosphere is based on total human emissions and the residence time. How much of the total increase is caused by the human emissions is a matter of total human emissions and the net sink rate, which was smaller than the human emissions for each year in the past 55 years. Thus humans are the main cause (96%) of the increase, despite the fact that they are only 9% of the total atmosphere today.
the 1:50 partitioning ratio encompasses all CO2 species, not just HCO32 as you appear to be thinking.
The 1:50 ratio is how much carbon as CO2 is in the atmosphere vs. how much carbon in all forms is in the total oceans, That has nothing to do with equilibrium. If you shake a 0.5 or 1.0 or 1.5 bottle of Coke from the same batch at the same temperature, you will find app. the same pressure under the cork. Quantities don't matter much, exchanges don't matter much, it is the difference between what goes in and out that matters: that is what changes the CO2 content of the atmosphere.
If you add more CO2 to the atmosphere above the water, more atmospheric CO2 will dissolve in the seawater until the fixed equilibrium partitioning ratio to which I have referred is restored.
That is only fast between the atmosphere and the ocean surface: the exchange rate indeed is less than a year. But the ocean surface layer is only ~1000 GtC vs. 800 GtC in the atmosphere. That is about 1:1.2, the rest of the 1:50 is in the deep oceans, which has an exchange rate with the atmosphere which is much slower in comparison...
But again, exchange rate says next to nothing about how much CO2 is taken out of the atmosphere caused by any excess CO2 pressure in the atmosphere. Even if all 800 GtC out of the atmosphere was going in and out from/to the 1000 GtC from the ocean surface, that wouldn't change the total quantities in either of them. Only if there is a difference between input and output, then the amounts do change. But that is a much slower process...
Thus the 1:50 will be reached some time in the future, but the half life time of that process is ~40 years, if we stop all emissions today.
However if the Revelle Factor were true then the oceans would be incapable of annually reabsorbing practically all the natural CO2 they outgas as they are doing now.
Different processes at work: the huge seasonal changes are caused by temperature changes, the small sink rate is the result of the pressure increase in the atmosphere...
Moreover seasonally the NH extra-tropical forests are dominant, not the oceans, while for pressure differences the oceans are dominant in sink rate.
Anyway, the Revelle/buffer factor is alive and kicking and is actually measured: the increase in DIC at Bermuda (and other stations) is about 10% of the CO2 increase in the atmosphere over the periods that was measured, despite what Revelle said in his later life, but that was before the accurate measurements at the South Pole and Mauna Loa started...
<I>Henry’s law applies to all cases of gases dissolving in liquids and the dissolution of CO2 in seawater is not an exception to that general rule.</I>
Yes gases not ions: CO2, not bicarbonates, not carbonates.
For some chemistry background which explains the Revelle factor:
http://www.eng.warwick.ac.uk/staff/gpk/Teaching-undergrad/es427/Exam%200405%20Revision/Ocean-chemistry.pdf
Henry’s law deems that at the end of the day, year, or however long it takes for equilibrium to be reached, less than 1/50th of the amount of CO2 that humanity puts into the atmosphere will stay there
That may be right, if the Revelle factor does apply to the surface layer, but not directly to the deep oceans. Anyway that certainly needs more time than you expect: ~40 year half life time, thus ~200 years to reach app. equilibrium.
Oh, and I have had a direct clash with Segalstad when we were both in the European Parliament some years ago... He too is completely mixing up residence time and e-fold decay rate for an excess amount of CO2 in the atmosphere. Two different forms of decay rate which have nothing to do with each other...
1. Confusing the residence time for an individual CO2 molecule and the decay rate of an increase in atmospheric concentration of CO2 (what Ferdinand calls the e folding time) is both common, and commonly used polemically to confuse others. Which side of that divide is Rich on?
2. Increasing the temperature of oceans results in a slightly quadratic increase in the equilibrium concentration of CO2 in the marine boundary layer because of shifts in the carbonate ion/hydrogen carbonate ion/carbonic acid/dissoved CO2 gas equilibria
If still someone is watching,
Willis Eschenbach has made a nice impression of what Dr. Salby said about the CO2 increase in the atmosphere at WUWT, where he too explains the difference between residence time and e-fold decay rate of an excess CO2 injection into the atmosphere:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/04/19/the-secret-life-of-half-life/
The real question is, aside from a valiant few with more patience or conviction than most observers, is anybody still listening to Ferdinand Engelbeen?
Ian,
I know, mainly the convinced of one or the other side are actively following the clash of the ideas... Although I would like to get back to my (too many) other hobby's, I will defend what science shows against wrong ideas of any side, be it the Salby's or Barts on one side or the warmistas on the other side...
The skeptics should be focused on where the IPCC e.a. are weakest: the climate models which are way out of reality, not on the cause of the increase of CO2. That is a completely lost battle with overwhelming evidence that humans are the cause. It only weakens the much more solid arguments that skeptics have...
Oh yes, Ferdinand is doing good work.
If you look at the change in atmospheric CO2, D,
1. He - the emission of CO2 due to humans burning fossil fuel,
2. Ne - the natural emissions of CO2 from all sources. Here, Eli is using the word nature to stand for everything except CO2 generated by burning fossil fuels.
3. Na - natural absorption of CO2, Na. .
We can simply write this as
D = He + Ne - Ne
This is an accounting identity. Rearrange the equation by subtracting He from both sides of the equation
D - He = Ne - Ne
We know that emissions from humans burning fossil fuel He are greater that the change in atmospheric CO2 by about a factor of 2, so He > D and (D - He) is negative.
0 > D - He = Ne - Na
This means that Ne - Na must be negative, the natural emissions must be less than the natural absorption or, Ne < Na, and nature is not the source of the observed increase in CO2 since the amount of CO2 emitted into the atmosphere by not burning fossil fuels is less than the amount of CO2 absorbed from the atmosphere by both physical and biological processes.
See how easy it is. It is only necessary to know two things.
First that the change in CO2 atmospheric concentration, D, is positive. That comes from the Mauna Loa observations, ice cores, you name it. Second that emissions due to burning of fossil fuel would increase the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere more than the observed increase (D-He < 0).
That is known as both a source term, the amounts of fossil fuels mined (coal and tar sands), pumped (oil and gas) and a sink term, the amounts burned to generate electricity, run cars and trucks, etc. If anything the measures of He are underestimates.
Ferdinand: “Different processes at work: the huge seasonal changes are caused by temperature changes, the small sink rate is the result of the pressure increase in the atmosphere”.
The natural CO2-emissions of 771 gigatonnes/year are apparently caused by temperature changes, but the Revelle Factor would still not be able to completely reabsorb natural emissions unless it were somehow discriminating between natural and human CO2. The natural CO2 would just keep accumulating in the atmosphere until the Revelle Factor has been reduced to near 0.
Ferdinand “That may be right, if the Revelle factor does apply to the surface layer, but not directly to the deep oceans”.
The physical pathway that I mentioned as being governed by Henry’s law does not involve CO2 in the surface ocean having to be transferred to the deep ocean, since it relates solely to the dissolution of CO2 in pure water. It is thus not a process of carbon sequestration but instead is one of simple dissolution.
Ferdinand: "You still don't understand the main difference between residence time and e-fold decay rate of an excess amount of CO2, whatever the origin. If you add 100 GtC red colored CO2 (~45 ppmv) in one shot into the atmosphere, the total CO2 will increase from the pre-industrial 560 GtC (~290 ppmv) to 660 GtC (~335 ppmv) in less than a year, where about 14% is red colored. With a residence time of ~5 years, the red colored CO2 is almost all replaced with transparent "natural" CO2 within about 50 year".
I think it is you who does not understand and your objection above is meaningless because we have not dumped 45ppmv of CO2 into the atmosphere in “one shot”. Human CO2 is being put into the atmosphere incrementally and so it will not take 50 years for it to be removed. Human CO2-emissions are 30 gigatonnes/year and the removal-rate is 788 gigatonnes/year. This implies with mathematical certainty that almost all human CO2 will be removed from the atmosphere within 4 years, and this has already been confirmed (albeit tentatively) by isotopic measurements, as explained on my blog. Measurements of nuclear-C14 appear to have a slightly longer residence time of 10 years probably because the C14 from nuclear-testing was ejected into the stratosphere where it apparently takes 5 years for it to be transferred to the troposphere. Still I agree the residence time is meaningless in the debate, and I only used it to dispel the myth that we could prove humans have added 40% to the CO2 greenhouse. That was all. When refuting the lifetime (or adjustment time) of CO2 I applied Henry’s law. You know, that law you still don’t understand?
Ferdinand: “The 1:50 ratio is how much carbon as CO2 is in the atmosphere vs. how much carbon in all forms is in the total oceans. That has nothing to do with equilibrium”.
Where on earth have you got that idea from? Henry’s law determines a specific fixed partitioning ratio between the concentrations of CO2 residing in the atmosphere and the amount that will be dissolved in the oceans at a given temperature at *equilibrium*. At the current mean ocean temperature of ~15C (at the surface) that partitioning ratio comes out to be ~1:50 at *equilibrium*. The 1:50 partitioning ratio of course includes all CO2 species and these equilibrate almost instantly.
Ferdinand “Despite what Revelle said in his later life, but that was before the accurate measurements at the South Pole and Mauna Loa started”.
Eh? You’re suggesting that the Mauna Loa measurements are evidence for the Revelle Factor? Where is there any semblance of a logical argument in all of this?
Ferdinand: “That may be right, if the Revelle factor does apply to the surface layer, but not directly to the deep oceans. Anyway that certainly needs more time than you expect: ~40 year half life time, thus ~200 years to reach app. Equilibrium”.
That is a sequence of unquantified, unqualified and unsubstantiated assertions, not a scientific argument. The 1:50 partitioning ratio applies over relatively short time-periods of a year or so. The IPCC’s figures for total (i.e. natural + human) annual CO2 emissions are around 800 gigatonnes and the net annual growth of the atmospheric CO2 greenhouse from the Keeling curve is around 16 gigatonnes. If at the end of an annual cycle 800 gigatonnes have been emitted and 16 gigatonnes have remained in the atmosphere unabsorbed by other systems, then the amount that was absorbed must be 800 - 16 = 784 gigatonnes. Hence the ‘partitioning ratio’ of unabsorbed/absorbed CO2 at year’s end would be 16/784 = 1/49. The very slight difference between this fraction and the 1/50 is probably due to the almost certain fact that CO2 equilibrium between atmosphere and oceans would not quite have been reached within a term of one year.
Ferdinand “Yes gases not ions: CO2, not bicarbonates, not carbonates. For some chemisty background which explains the Revelle Factor see”.
Don’t try to teach me how to suck eggs. CO2(aq), CO32 and HCO3 exist in state of equilibrium. HCO3 and CO32 are also present in carbonated drinks and the chemical equilibrium-time between them is almost instantaneous. If it weren’t, soda siphons would not work.
Ferdinand: “Have a look at the 13C/12C ratio: if that drops in the atmosphere, there are only two possible sources. One source, the whole biosphere is a proven sink for CO2, thus not the cause of the decrease”.
Only two? In climate science the alternative possible drivers of the observed increase in atmospheric CO2 are innumerable and climate scientists have hardly begun to explore the tip of this vast iceberg as yet. Why have you prejudged the work of centuries and decided what is the best explanation for your perceived climate change over the last 150 years when you do not even know what all of the alternative possible explanations for it might be, let alone know what all their respective contributions to the perceived change might amount to? Anyway, since anthropogenic CO2 (in fact all CO2) is removed from the atmosphere extremely fast then the C12/C13 ratio is a complete red-herring in the debate and cannot tell us if the entire CO2 increase (i.e. 120ppmv) since 1850 is anthropogenic. There are other possible sources such as ocean eutrophication/degradation.
Ferdinand: “If you shake a 0.5 or 1.0 or 1.5 bottle of Coke from the same batch at the same temperature, you will find app. the same pressure under the cork”.
Coke bottles do not even have corks and if you are talking about the same pressure between the partial pressure of CO2 in air above the bottle-cap and CO2(aq), HCO3 and CO32, then you’d be wrong. The pressure would be higher in the liquid, obviously.
Ferdinand “Oh, and I have had a direct clash with Segalstad when we were both in the European Parliament some years ago”.
I doubt that.
Ferdinand: “Anyway, the Revelle/buffer factor is alive and kicking and is actually measured: the increase in DIC at Bermuda (and other stations) is about 10%”
Bermuda ≠ the entire ocean.
Anyway, that’s me done. I’m sure if I continued this debate I would be here until Christmas.
Rich,
You are wrong on a lot of even elementary points. Ask any chemist to check what you wrote and what I wrote and show him/her the chemical background of the Revelle factor. If you don't believe me, just ask someone else you do trust.
- Temperature is the main driver for the seasonal changes. It is not the driver for the increase in the atmosphere, as the increase caused by temperature is not more than 5 ppmv for the 0.6°C temperature increase in the past 55 years. That is what Henry's law says. Nothing to do with the Revelle factor.
- If the CO2 pressure (pCO2) in the atmosphere is less than the pCO2 of the oceans, CO2 will be released. If the CO2 pressure is higher than in the oceans, CO2 will be absorbed. Currently the atmosphere is 110 μatm (~ppmv) above the pCO2 of the oceans for the current ocean temperature. Thus a lot of CO2 is absorbed by the oceans. How much is a matter of exchange speed and for the surface of the Revelle factor.
- Fresh water contains very little CO2, because the pH sinks rapidly, preventing further uptake. seawater contains 10 times more CO2 in different forms, because of its alkalinity.
- The example I did give showed the difference between residence time and e-fold decay time. It was relevant for anybody who has some knowledge of process behavior. But I have the same graph based on the yearly emissions over the past 160 years:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/fract_level_emiss.jpg
where FA is the fraction of "human" CO2 (today ~9%) in the atmosphere, FL in the ocean surface (~5%) and tCA the calculated increase in the atmosphere based on a residence time of 5.1 years and an e-fold decay rate of 51 years. tCAobs is the observed increase in the atmosphere. Although human CO2 is only 9% of total CO2, it still is for 96% responsible for the rise in CO2...
- You are completely lost about the 1:50 ratio: that is not the ratio in concentration, that is the ratio in mass. I did give the example of shaking the 0.5 or 1.0 or 1.5 bottle of Coke; all three have the same concentration and will give about the same pressure under the screw cap when shaken until equilibrium, but the difference in CO2 mass between atmosphere under the cap an the liquid may be 1:30, 1;60 and 1:90... Even if the deep oceans have a thousand times the mass of CO2 than in the atmosphere, all that counts is the pCO2 difference between the oceans and atmosphere: no difference, no exchange.
- The Revelle factor is measured as the change in the atmosphere over the change in the oceans. The change in the oceans is about 10% of the change in the atmosphere. That is what Revelle didn't have: the changes in both when he made his remark. I know, Bermuda is not the whole oceans, but there are 6 longer series at different places and a few million samples over most oceans which show the same trends:
http://www.tos.org/oceanography/archive/27-1_bates.pdf
- CO2, bicarbonate and carbonate ions are in equilibrium, but as you know the Bjerrum plot: the equilibrium changes with pH. Your carbonated drink is 99% free CO2 and 1% bicarbonate, virtual no carbonate. Seawater is less than 1% free CO2, ~90% bicarbonate and ~9% carbonate. Thus if you double CO2 in the atmosphere, that doubles free CO2 in seawater, but that does not double bicarbonates and carbonates in seawater. These two together only change some 10%. Not 100%. That is the point of the Revelle factor...
- If you have knowledge of any other source of low-13C except the biosphere (land + ocean) and human emissions, I like to see the evidence... Or any evidence that land and sea life are not more sink than source...
- I don't know if Segalstad is still active nowadays, he was in Brussels some years ago (a few days before climategate broke out, about half November 2009) and had a speech on invitation of a British member of the European Parliament (Fred Singer speeched there too, Anthony Watts was also there). What he said was the same problematic mixture of residence time and e-fold decay rate. When I protested, it was a nice clash of idea's, until the president of the conference asked to go on between us during the pause...
"How did you transfer – ΔpCO2(atm) into + k2?"
I assumed ΔpCO2(atm) = CO2. That's what CO2 is, the atmospheric concentration of CO2.
If that's not how you intended it, you need to state explicitly what you are referring to. At the very least, they are related to one another, and that forms a feedback which produces a high pass filter. A high pass response for which there is no evidence in the data.
"OK, my knowledge of transfer functions is near zero, but I don't see any problem with a filtering function if the low to higher frequency process integrates..."
The high pass knocks out the contribution of the trend in T to the trend in dCO2/dt. That's the only way you can make the trend in T NOT produce a trend in dCO2/dt.
"And there is no filtering at all for the slope part if the slope is mostly caused by a process which is independent of temperature ..."
No. For this to be the case, you have to remove (i.e., filter out) the trend from T so that it does not influence dCO2/dt.
This filtering would produce phase (and gain) distortion which are not evident in the record. Ergo, the trend in T is the cause of the trend in dCO2/dt, and there is little room left for the trend in human emissions to have any influence.
"In short: nature can't be the cause of the increase in the atmosphere, as long as the net increase in the atmosphere is smaller than human emissions."
Absolutely absurd. Not even remotely true.
"There is one exception and only one"
There is an entire continuum of "exceptions". The "exceptions" are, in fact, the rule.
For Christmas we'll get a year's worth of OCO2 data, if we've been good.
Now we need to observe the sedimenting of carbon from the oceanic biome to the vasty deep.
==============
May 2, 2015 at 1:35 PM | Eli Rabett
"This means that Ne - Na must be negative, the natural emissions must be less than the natural absorption or, Ne < Na, and nature is not the source of the observed increase in CO2 since the amount of CO2 emitted into the atmosphere by not burning fossil fuels is less than the amount of CO2 absorbed from the atmosphere by both physical and biological processes."
When will we ever rid ourselves of this monumentally stupid argument?
This is a dynamic system, Eli. Na is a response to all the CO2 in the atmosphere.
The sinks are dynamic. They expand in response to all input CO2.
Let me emphasize that several times:
The sinks are dynamic. They expand in response to all input CO2.
The sinks are dynamic. They expand in response to all input CO2.
The sinks are dynamic. They expand in response to all input CO2.
The sinks are dynamic. They expand in response to all input CO2.
The sinks are dynamic. They expand in response to all input CO2.
Thus, Na is dependent on both Ne AND He. We can write this as a functional dependence: Na = Na(Ne,He).
As you say, Ne - Na(Ne,He) is less than zero. So what? The inequality still has a dependence on He.
Only when you have completely removed the influence of He on the inequality can you establish human attribution. Only when you can say Ne - Na(Ne,0) is less than zero.
Let me emphasize that, in fact, let me shout it:
ONLY WHEN YOU HAVE COMPLETELY REMOVED THE INFLUENCE OF He ON THE INEQUALITY CAN YOU ESTABLISH HUMAN ATTRIBUTION. ONLY WHEN YOU CAN SAY Ne - Na(Ne,0) IS LESS THAN ZERO.
But, you cannot say Ne - Na(Ne,0) is less than zero. You only have Ne - Na(Ne,He). If human inputs were to cease altogether, Na(Ne,He) would decrease, It would eventually reach the level of Na(Ne,0).
Now, READ CAREFULLY. If Na decreases, then Ne - Na is no longer as small. In fact, it is very possible for it to turn positive.
Not only is it possible, it is assured, because the relationship dCO2/dt = k*(T - T0) is telling us quite plainly that human inputs have little impact.
The so-called "mass balance" argument you have proffered here is deeply flawed. It is grossly naive. It is, in fact, stupid.
Please stop promulgating this ridiculous, absurd, daft, and abominable argument.
Corklined bottlecaps? Everyday occurrence where I'm from, emphasis on 'from'.
That's a very nice historical vignette from EU deliberations. Hope it's transcribed or taped. If not, write it down as well as you can remember it, and place it in a time capsule.
===============
Bart,
I assumed ΔpCO2(atm) = CO2
More or less, but is an increasing negative feedback, not a positive constant term...
I can make it more clear in a repeat of what I wrote on WUWT:
It is the integral of the temperature difference influence minus the influence of the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere:
dCO2/dt = k2*[k*(T – To) – ΔpCO2(atm)]
where ΔpCO2(atm) is the integral of dCO2/dt from t0 up to t-1.
Therefore dCO2/dt, if starting from steady state, without other influences, integrates towards zero, far from giving a slightly quadratic increase of CO2 over time.
The moment that dCO2/dt = 0, the whole ocean – atmosphere carbon cycle is again in steady state and
ΔpCO2(atm) = k*(T-T0) which is what Henry’s law says
Where k = ~8.
The only slightly quadratic increase left is from human emissions. The complete formula then is:
dCO2/dt = k2*[k*(T – To) – ΔpCO2(atm)] + dCO2(em)/dt
As dCO2(em)/dt was larger than dCO2/dt for every year of the past 55 years, besides the small term for k*(T-T0) of about 8 * 0.6 = ~5 ppmv in 55 years, the whole term ΔpCO2(atm) is the increasing pressure in the atmosphere, getting far above the temperature influence and thus giving more and more net sink growth.
In fact, the above terms dCO2(em)/dt – k2*ΔpCO2(atm) are about (*) what I plotted as the calculated increase of CO2 in the atmosphere, middle the variability caused by the temperature variability, assuming that temperature has little effect on the sink rate over time…
(*) For my calculation, I included (T-T0) in the base temperature to calculate ΔpCO2(atm)
***********************************
That above transient response is also what Paul_K did prove over a year ago already at Bishop Hill’s blog:
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/10/21/diary-date-murry-salby.html page 2, 4th comment:
For the transient behaviour, I am just using a simple response function of the form:-
τ * dCO2/dt = ΔT – f(T)* ΔCO2
where ΔT and ΔCO2 are measured from an arbitrary initial equilibrium condition. This equation is based on the assumption that the process of release of solute with temperature change starts off quickly and slows down as the concentrations adjust – a commonly observed phenomenon for the transient behavior of chemical equilibration processes.
Which gives always a pi/2 lag of a sinusoidal CO2 change of any frequency if the ocean response is slow enough, which is obvious the case here…
Kim,
No problem, we still have cork lined alu caps here, but only on small bottles, larger bottles have screw (polyprop) caps... I was not sure about the English term...
But nevertheless the type of cap: do you see now the difference between the 1:50 mass (in the deep oceans) and what the equilibrium at the surface dictates: If there is equilibrium, as much CO2 enters the oceans as they release, no matter the difference in mass.
If there is a disequilibrium, that disequilibrium will spread over the masses, thus if CO2 doubles in the atmosphere, that will spread 1:50 over the oceans. In that case the oceans get 50.98 and the atmosphere 1.02 at equilibrium again. How long that will take is a different question, which depends on the e-fold decay rate in the atmosphere, not the residence time.
Henry's law only says when there is (dis)equilibrium, but that says nothing about masses. The Revelle factor does tell something about ratio's specific in seawater beyond Henry's law, again not about masses...
Bart,
In your response to Eli you repeat what I have refuted already at WUWT:
The increase of the sinks caused by the yearly human emissions is negligible.
The sinks are the result of the total increase in CO2 above equilibrium for the current temperature, which is ~290 ppmv. Adding ~4.5 ppmv of which halve is left is increasing the momentary sink capacity with 2.5% that is all.
If we stop all CO2 emissions, the sinks would hardly change and only gradually get to zero when reaching the temperature controlled equilibrium again...
The temperature controlled equilibrium is defined by Henry's law and measured in millions of laboratory and field samples since 1803...
May 2, 2015 at 8:51 PM | Ferdinand Engelbeen
"and ΔpCO2(atm) = k*(T-T0) which is what Henry’s law says...
You mean, what Henry's law says for a steady state, closed system, of which this isn't one. And, ΔpCO2(atm) = k*(T-T0) does not match the observations. You are 90 degrees out of phase.
"The only slightly quadratic increase left is from human emissions."
In which, you are asserting that human emissions are somehow treated differently than natural ones. No, Ferdinand, if the feedback you hypothesize were large enough to limit continuous influx of natural CO2, it would also limit human input, to the point that you would get no quadratic increase.
"...what I plotted as ..."
You have never plotted anything that remotely matches both the long term evolution and the short term variation.
"That above transient response is also what Paul_K did prove over a year ago already at Bishop Hill’s blog:..."
Paul K "proved" nothing of the sort. He simply suggested that the high pass filtering operation could have a very low cutoff. But, there is no cutoff which is low enough to pass through the frequencies observable in the 57 year record with no distortion, yet high enough to eliminate the trend which started in the 1800's.
May 2, 2015 at 9:29 PM | Ferdinand Engelbeen
"In your response to Eli you repeat what I have refuted already at WUWT:"
You have "refuted" nothing. You have simply refused to understand why you are wrong.
"The increase of the sinks caused by the yearly human emissions is negligible."
Isn't. It is very clearly very significant.
"The sinks are the result of..."
Further assertion lacking any foundation, and directly inconsistent with the dCO2/dt = k*(T - T0) observation.
"If we stop all CO2 emissions, the sinks would hardly change and only gradually get to zero when reaching the temperature controlled equilibrium again..."
Going "to zero" is inconsistent with "hardly change". It would, indeed, drop, which is to say that Na(Ne,0) is unquestionably less than Na(Ne,He). Which means nature can easily become a net source. I.e., the so-called "mass balance" argument proves nothing.
Bart:
You mean, what Henry's law says for a steady state, closed system, of which this isn't one.
As repeatedly said, but you don't accept anything that is remotely opposite to your theory, Henry's law always is applicable, as good as the mass balance is applicable in all circumstances.
As far as I know, the earth is a closed system and any CO2 that is added to one of the reservoirs stays there until removed into another reservoir.
Henry's law says what the equilibrium setpoint is for any temperature of the ocean surface with the atmosphere. How fast that is reached is mainly a matter of average ΔpCO2 between atmosphere and ocean surface and wind speed. If there is no ΔpCO2, there is no difference in influx and outflux between oceans and atmosphere, regardless of the ocean upwelling or downwelling.
The current steady state CO2 pressure of the carbon cycle is 290 ppmv for the current average temperature of the ocean's surface. Not 400 ppmv. As the pressure in the atmosphere is way higher than the steady state pressure, more CO2 is pushed into the oceans than is released, assuming that the other variables (upwelling waters, concentration) or rather stable, for which is no counter evidence.
That means that at this moment the term ΔpCO2(atm) is much higher than k(T-T0) and thus nature is a net sink for CO2 for years to come, as ΔpCO2(atm) is only slowly decreasing to zero which is at the moment that ΔpCO2(atm) = k(T-T0).
That is elementary process dynamics, which any first grade chemical engineer can explain to you.
ΔpCO2(atm) = k*(T-T0) does not match the observations. You are 90 degrees out of phase.
No, as Paul_K showed, for a transient response to a disturbance, which the reaction of pCO2 to a change in temperature is, the response always lags the cause with pi/2, whatever the frequency, if the overall response of the system is slow enough, which is certainly the case for the oceans.
In which, you are asserting that human emissions are somehow treated differently than natural ones. No, Ferdinand, if the feedback you hypothesize were large enough to limit continuous influx of natural CO2, it would also limit human input, to the point that you would get no quadratic increase.
Not at all, the natural carbon cycle reacts on any disturbance of the process alike. If the process is disturbed by temperature, say 1 K, the in(/out)outfluxes will go up(/down) with about 3%. That gives an increase of pCO2 in the atmosphere, which does decrease(/increase) the influx(/outflux), that is opposite to the disturbance (Le Châtelier's Principle). The moment that the pCO2 reaches ~8 ppmv extra (= k(T-T0)), the original in/outfluxes are restored at 8 ppmv extra in the atmosphere: the system is again at steady state.
If the process is disturbed by an extra CO2 input from the deep oceans, the CO2 level in the atmosphere will go up until the extra CO2 input is compensated with an even distribution of half the original extra input and the other half extra output. Again the system is at steady state,
If the process is disturbed by a fixed extra human input, the level in the atmosphere will go up until the extra input is compensated with an equal distribution between suppressed input and increased output in total the same as the human input. Again the system is at steady state.
As the reaction of the sinks is relative slow and yearly human emissions increase linear over time, that results in a linear increase in atmospheric increase rate and sink rate and a slightly quadratic sum of total emissions, total increase in the atmosphere and total sink over time.
You have never plotted anything that remotely matches both the long term evolution and the short term variation.
I will do that shortly, but as the short term variation is only +/- 1 ppmv around the trend and the trend caused by temperature (which is included in my plot) is less than 5 ppmv over the past 55 years, temperature is only a small player in the CO2 increase. It only modulates the increase rate somewhat from year to year, but that is hardly visible in the increase itself.
That plot includes the 8 ppmv/K increase per Henry's law.
there is no cutoff which is low enough to pass through the frequencies observable in the 57 year record with no distortion, yet high enough to eliminate the trend which started in the 1800's
According to what Paul_K wrote for a transient response, there is no filtering at all and always a pi/2 phase shift, whatever the frequency, if the system response is slow enough. My impression is that you still see the term -ΔpCO2(atm) as a (positive) constant, while it is a negative, growing feedback over time...
The system response in this case has a tau of over 50 years, is too slow to disturb the short term frequencies, too slow to remove all human emissions in short term, but fast enough to track the 5000 years temperature change between an ice age and an interglacial or the ~200 years MWP-LIA transition.
Further assertion lacking any foundation, and directly inconsistent with the dCO2/dt = k*(T - T0) observation.
Assertions based on established ocean chemistry, founded in 1803 and since then proven in millions of laboratory and field samples... Your attribution of the slope is not based on any physical observation, it is curve fitting only.
Going "to zero" is inconsistent with "hardly change". It would, indeed, drop, which is to say that Na(Ne,0) is unquestionably less than Na(Ne,He). Which means nature can easily become a net source.
It will slowly change with an e-fold rate of over 50 years. Thus going to zero is not inconsistent with hardly change from one year to the next. Nature can only become a net source the moment that the steady state is app. reached, that is 290 +/- 1 ppmv for the current temperature, or at least 200 years from now (five half life times)...
Of course:
and thus nature is a net sink for CO2 for years to come, as ΔpCO2(atm) is only slowly decreasing to zero
must be:
and thus nature is a net sink for CO2 for years to come, as dCO2/dt is only slowly decreasing to zero
"As repeatedly said, but you don't accept anything that is remotely opposite to your theory, Henry's law always is applicable, as good as the mass balance is applicable in all circumstances."
I will agree with that. You apply both wrongly in this application.
"As far as I know, the earth is a closed system and any CO2 that is added to one of the reservoirs stays there until removed into another reservoir. "
You don't know what is going on in the reservoirs, and when you assume you know, you are begging the question. It is an open system as long as you are only looking at what happens at the surface.
"That means that at this moment the term ΔpCO2(atm) is much higher than k(T-T0) and thus nature is a net sink for CO2 for years to come, as ΔpCO2(atm) is only slowly decreasing to zero which is at the moment that ΔpCO2(atm) = k(T-T0)."
That is 90 degrees out of phase with empirical measurements. When you find the data and your hypothesis disagree, it is time to modify the hypothesis, not the data.
"No, as Paul_K showed..."
Paul_K showed nothing of the kind, as I have explained in great detail.
"As the reaction of the sinks is relative slow and yearly human emissions increase linear over time, that results in a linear increase in atmospheric increase rate and sink rate and a slightly quadratic sum of total emissions, total increase in the atmosphere and total sink over time."
How do you know natural emissions are not increasing linearly over time? In fact, the increase of natural sources can easily be much higher than human emissions, at which point, they become the driving force. And, that is what the data tell us is happening.
"I will do that shortly..."
You will find it is impossible according to your recipe.
"It only modulates the increase rate somewhat from year to year, but that is hardly visible in the increase itself."
That is not what the data show.
"According to what Paul_K wrote for a transient response, there is no filtering at all and always a pi/2 phase shift, whatever the frequency..."
Again, he showed nothing of the kind, as I have explained in depth.
"The system response in this case has a tau of over 50 years, is too slow to disturb the short term frequencies..."
A response of 50 years would visibly disturb anything with a 500 year periodicity or less.
"Assertions based on established ocean chemistry, founded in 1803 and since then proven in millions of laboratory and field samples..."
Improper application of static results to a dynamic system.
"It will slowly change with an e-fold rate of over 50 years."
It would be much faster, but the question is moot. Whatever the timeline, Na(Ne,0) is unquestionably less than Na(Ne,He). Which means nature can easily be revealed as a net source.
"Nature can only become a net source the moment that the steady state is app. reached..."
No. Nature is a net source all the time. It is simply being masked from your perception by the response to human forcing. Once that response is entirely dissipated, then the true character of the natural system is revealed.
Bart:
That is 90 degrees out of phase with empirical measurements.
and
Paul_K showed nothing of the kind, as I have explained in great detail.
Paul_K showed that for a transient function, there is no phase distortion at all and that "T"-variations (from 2 sinusoids combined with a straight line) exactly synchronize with dCO2/dt for any frequency. That gives that CO2 variability has always a lag of pi/2 after T variability and dCO2/dt variability has always a lag of pi/2 after dT/dt variability, if the (ocean) response is slower than the slowest frequency of the variability. That is exactly what the atmospheric data show.
Have a better look at his picture:
http://img837.imageshack.us/img837/8824/a7uw.jpg
(and ignore the warning if you get one for a dangerous website)
The T and scaled dCO2/dt changes match exactly, but there is only a modest increase in CO2, which is scaled from the small total T increase: ΔpCO2(atm) = k(T-T0). Not the integral of the T increase.
For the past 55 years, that gives less than 5 ppmv extra in the atmosphere.
With his own words:
The main message is that the observation of an approximate scale relationship between temperature and the time derivative of CO2 does not allow us to conclude that there is a simple underlying relationship of the form dCO2/dt = k(T-Te) .
How do you know natural emissions are not increasing linearly over time? In fact, the increase of natural sources can easily be much higher than human emissions, at which point, they become the driving force.
Because that violates all observations:
- There is not the slightest observation that the natural cycle increased over time, to the contrary, the latest calculations of the residence time are longer than the earlier calculations, which points to an increase in mass of CO2 in the atmosphere with a rather stable throughput.
- The 13C/12C ratio decreased in the atmosphere, ocean surface and vegetation, in ratio to human emissions. If there was an increase in natural circulation the ratio would have decreased over time.
- The pre-bomb 14C level (pre-1960) in the atmosphere decreased in ratio to human emissions, causing corrections to the tables for radiocarbon dating. No disturbances seen in the corrections.
- The post-bomb 14C peak (after 1960) shows a steady decline in 14C, without acceleration.
- The biosphere as a whole is a proven source of O2, thus a proven sink for CO2 and preferentially 12CO2, thus not the cause of the CO2 increase or the 13C/12C ratio decline.
- The oceans can't be the cause of the increase, or even not of an increase in circulation, as their 13C/12C ratio is way too high.
- The oceans show an increase in DIC while the pH is decreasing at a lot of places, which shows that the average CO2 flux is from the atmosphere into the ocean surface, not reverse.
- Human emissions increased a 4-fold in the past 55 years. So did the increase in the atmosphere and so did the net sink rate. If the natural cycle was the cause of the increase, it should have increased a 4-fold in lockstep with human emissions, but there is no sign for a 4-fold reduction in residence time, to the contrary.
Do you know of any single observation which proves that the natural carbon cycle increased in the past 55 years, besides the arbitrary matching of two slopes?
Which means nature can easily be revealed as a net source
Which hardly can occur in the natural world (as seen over the past 800,000 years), as long as the pCO2 of the atmosphere is way above the steady state equilibrium for the average temperature of the oceans. Except if you have a few thousands of Pinatubo's all spewing a lot of CO2 at once, but then we have other problems than discussing the origin of all that CO2...
"Paul_K showed that for a transient function, there is no phase distortion at all and..."
Wrong. He didn't show that at all.
"...but there is only a modest increase in CO2, which is scaled from the small total T increase: ΔpCO2(atm) = k(T-T0)."
You can't scale it. If you have dCO2/dt, CO2 is uniquely defined except for a constant offset. You don't have ΔpCO2(atm) = k(T-T0). There is a 90 degree phase difference between ΔpCO2(atm) and T-T0.
"With his own words:"
His own words? Why should I care about his own words?
"The main message is that the observation of an approximate scale relationship between temperature and the time derivative of CO2 does not allow us to conclude that there is a simple underlying relationship of the form dCO2/dt = k(T-Te) ."
It does, because there is no phase distortion observable.
Ferdinand, you really don't understand this stuff. I do. It is painful how you flail away, and make no sense at all.
"There is not the slightest observation that the natural cycle increased over time..."
Yes there is. Right here.
"...to the contrary, the latest calculations of the residence time are longer than the earlier calculations..."
IOW, the calculation of the residence time under the assumption that the observed rise is from human emissions is long enough that the residence time is long enough for human emissions to be driving it. Why do you not see that this is a circular argument?
"If there was an increase in natural circulation the ratio would have decreased over time."
You think. But, there is no proof.
"No disturbances seen in the corrections."
See above.
"The post-bomb 14C peak (after 1960) shows a steady decline in 14C, without acceleration."
Which, given that you have to propose increasing sink activity to account for the deceleration in atmospheric CO2 since the temperature lull of the past two decades, should push you toward the conclusion that human inputs are not the driving factor.
"The biosphere as a whole...The oceans can't be ... The oceans show an increase in... "
These are all merely consistent with your narrative. But, they are not proof. They are merely factoids to confirm your preconceived bias.
"... it should have increased a 4-fold in lockstep with human emissions..."
Wrong. There is an entire continuum of sink and source activity which could produce the observed results.
"Do you know of any single observation which proves that the natural carbon cycle increased in the past 55 years, besides the arbitrary matching of two slopes?"
Yes. The matching of the slope, and every bump and burble here. It is unique. Every one of your claims has an alternative explanation. This one does not.
"Which hardly can occur in the natural world (as seen over the past 800,000 years), as long as the pCO2 of the atmosphere is way above the steady state equilibrium for the average temperature of the oceans."
You don't know what can and cannot occur. You only have a bias. And, that bias keeps you from seeing that you are continually begging the question, and making assumptions which lead you back to that bias in a circle.
That is not how science works. If science were about thinking up how you think things ought to be, and then seeking out data which supports your conception, there would have been no need for The Enlightenment. Science is hard, Ferdinand. And, it is advanced by avoiding the well catalogued logical fallacies which you display in abundance. You are not offering science. You are just storytelling.
We are talking in circles. You keep making the same wrongheaded assertions, and I keep explaining why what you claim is mathematically impossible. Then, you make the same assertions all over again, and round and round we go.
There is no way around it, Ferdinand. The trend in T is responsible for the trend in dCO2/dt. It is entirely, or as near entirely as makes little difference, explained by it. Emissions also have a trend. Their impact can only be small, since the trend is already explained by the relationship with T. Thus, human emissions have little impact on atmospheric CO2. This is a very ordinary type of behavior which is typical of feedback regulatory systems.
And, that is where I think I will leave things as we head into the new week. Until we meet again.
Bart,
As all what you are doing is hand waving and yelling "No it is Not", it has no sense to go on with this discussion.
To the last lurkers here:
In short, Bart's theory violates every single observation in the field and only has one "proof" for his theory: he can match the slopes of two straight lines.
What he doesn't show is that either the two slopes exactly match, but the amplitudes of the variability don't, or the amplitudes match, but the slopes don't.
The difference in factor to match either the two slopes or the two amplitudes is over two times since the satellite era.
That only gets worse, the less the slope gets, which is together with the length of the "pause". If you take the last 18 years of the RSS temperature, there is near zero slope and the amplitude of the temperature variability causes near zero variability in CO2 variability while the CO2 variability itself still is the same...
To match the amplitudes, you need a 10 times larger factor, but then of course the slopes don't match...
The factor to match the slopes even was negative in the period 1976-1996 leading to upside down variability of temperature and CO2...
That all is the simple result of the proven (from the 13C/12C ratio changes) fact that slopes and amplitudes are from different processes: slope and amplitude have nothing to do with each other.
That variability and slope are from the same temperature controlled process is at the very base of Bart's theory, which thus is proven wrong.
It is certain that the short term CO2 variability is caused by short term temperature variability (mainly its effect on tropical vegetation), but there is no evidence at all that temperature has more than a very small (8 ppmv/K) influence on the CO2 increase over the past 55 years.
All what I can say for anybody still interested is to have a direct look at what Paul_K said, who obviously knows where he is talking about:
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/10/21/diary-date-murry-salby.html second page of the comments, fourth comment.
And here is what a temperature increase of 1 K does on the CO2 level in the atmosphere:
http://www.ferdinand-engelbeen.be/klimaat/klim_img/upwelling_temp.jpg
The net effect was calculated for 17 ppmv/K, the overall response is more like 8 ppmv/K over the past 800,000 years.
Further have a look at how to solve transient responses:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Runge%E2%80%93Kutta_methods
Try one of the surface records and nothing matches.
“You are completely lost about the 1:50 ratio: that is not the ratio in concentration, that is the ratio in mass”.
My apologies. I have no idea why I said concentration. Scratch that.
“Ask any chemist to check what you wrote and what I wrote and show him/her the chemical background of the Revelle factor. If you don't believe me, just ask someone else you do trust”.
It is not that I don’t believe you Ferdinand. I believe you are sincere but I think you don’t have enough evidence to support your contention that nearly the whole increase of 120ppmv is human-induced. I think the counter-evidence is abundant and I think over the next few years more scientists will dissent from the IPCC’s position regarding this topic and I think you’re find your position increasingly more difficult to defend.
“Temperature is the main driver for the seasonal changes. It is not the driver for the increase in the atmosphere, as the increase caused by temperature is not more than 5 ppmv for the 0.6°C temperature increase in the past 55 years”.
I never said that it was the main driver of the increase in atmospheric CO2, well, at least not from CO2’s reduced solubility anyway. I have calculated the reduction in CO2’s solubility from a mean temperature-change of 1C in the oceans and got 19ppmv. I agree that others who have suggested that the increase is a result of CO2’s reduced solubility are wrong and flies in the face of Henry’s law. I would never contest that. However there may be factor that is related to temperature that may cause changes in atmospheric CO2 such as changes in phytoplankton (of which we know very little about).
“That is what Henry's law says. Nothing to do with the Revelle factor”.
I’m not sure why you think I thought the seasonal changes in atmospheric CO2 from the temperature-changes was due to the Revelle Factor. I never suggested that. What I was saying is that the Revelle Factor maintains an average of around 10 throughout the year which is why it is only absorbing 10% of anthropogenic CO2 (actually according to the IPCC figures it’s absorbing a little more than 10% because of the diffusion of CO2 from the surface ocean to the deep ocean). So considering the Revelle Factor maintains an average of around 10 and it would not discriminate between anthropogenic and natural CO2 my objection was that it would preclude the oceans from absorbing natural CO2 just as it is precluding the oceans from absorbing anthropogenic CO2.
“Fresh water contains very little CO2, because the pH sinks rapidly, preventing further uptake. Seawater contains 10 times more CO2 in different forms, because of its alkalinity”.
By my understanding fresh water contains about 50 times as much CO2 as the air above it, just as the oceans do, and the pH is determined largely by PCO2.
“The example I did give showed the difference between residence time and e-fold decay time. It was relevant for anybody who has some knowledge of process behaviour”.
Not sure what you’re getting at here. You do realise that e-folding time is the same as residence time as defined by the IPCC?
“CO2, bicarbonate and carbonate ions are in equilibrium, but as you know the Bjerrum plot: the equilibrium changes with pH”.
Indeed, and pH changes with PCO2. As PCO2 increases, pH decreases.
“Your carbonated drink is 99% free CO2 and 1% bicarbonate, virtual no carbonate. Seawater is less than 1% free CO2, ~90% bicarbonate and ~9% carbonate. Thus if you double CO2 in the atmosphere, that doubles free CO2 in seawater, but that does not double bicarbonates and carbonates in seawater. These two together only change some 10%. Not 100%. That is the point of the Revelle factor”.
I think where me (and Segalstad) and you differ is that you are of the viewpoint that the oceans would not be able to absorb 98% of anthropogenic CO2 as Henry’s law implies because of the small amount of CO2(aq) in the ocean of around 1% whereas I am of the viewpoint that the amount of CO2(aq) is determined largely by the PCO2 and that increasing PCO2 changes the pH and this change has no real knock-on effect to the 1:50 partitioning ratio. If it did, the Henry’s law 1:50 partitioning ratio would only be applicable over a narrow range of PCO2 values and that is not the case. The Revelle Factor to me seems nonsensical, not just because of the reason mentioned above, but because when I calculated the increase in the Revelle Factor with Egleston’s equation some time ago with a pH value of 2.5 and a high PCO2 value, as would be expected in a carbonated drink, the result I got was a Revelle Factor of over 1000, which is clearly impossible. And keep in mind, the Revelle Factor is a chemical buffer and it applies *at equilibrium*. This would imply that a carbonated drinks should be impossible, and agrees with what Segalstad says in his 1998 paper about the Revelle Factor ‘violating physical reality like carbonated soda’.
I would have been better of having this discussion with you years ago when I wrote that post and when things were clearer in my mind. I’ll do the Revelle Factor calculation again and get back to you.