Misconceptions About Global Warming

Originally posted by Yarcofin
You're still ignoring my mention of the earth's oceans, which give off massive amounts of both CO2 and water vapour

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Didn't realize I was ignoring, let alone still ignoring.

Water vapor is not considered as climate "forcing" because the amount of H2O in the air varies basically as a function of temperature.
As the Earth warms due to other greenhouse gasses the H2O increases due to evaporation.

It isn't water vapor spewing out of coal plants or SUVs it is CO2.
Increased Water Vapor is not the cause of Global Warming it is a symptom and an accelerant.

mustelid.blogspot.com...

Water vapour is not the dominant greenhouse gas

OK, so it may not surprise you that I'm going to have to qualify the headline a bit lower down, but the point itself remains.

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In contrast, CO2 has a long lifetime (actually calculating a single "lifetime" for it doesn't work; but a given CO2 pulse such as we're supplying now will hang around for.. ohh... a century or more). It doesn't rain out (amusing factoid: the surface temperature of the deep interior Antarctica in winter can be colder than the freezing point of CO2; but this doesn't lead to CO2 snow (sadly, it would be fun) because the freezing point is lower because of the lower pressure because its higher up). So if you put in extra CO2 the climate warms a bit; because of this move WV evaporates (it doesn't have to, but just about all models show that the relative humidity tends to be about constant; so if you heat the atmos that means that the absolute humidity will increase). This in turn warms the atmosphere warms up a bit more; so more water gets evaporates. This is a positive feedback but a limited one: the increments (if you think of it that way) get smaller not larger so there is no runaway GH effect.

So: adding CO2 to the atmosphere warms it a bit and ends up with more WV. Adding WV does nothing much and the atmos returns to equilibrium. This is why WV is not the *dominant* GHG; its more like a submissive GHG

www.realclimate.org...

Water vapour: feedback or forcing?

Whenever three or more contrarians are gathered together, one will inevitably claim that water vapour is being unjustly neglected by 'IPCC' scientists. "Why isn't water vapour acknowledged as a greenhouse gas?", "Why does anyone even care about the other greenhouse gases since water vapour is 98% of the effect?", "Why isn't water vapour included in climate models?", "Why isn't included on the forcings bar charts?" etc. Any mainstream scientist present will trot out the standard response that water vapour is indeed an important greenhouse gas, it is included in all climate models, but it is a feedback and not a forcing. From personal experience, I am aware that these distinctions are not clear to many, and so here is a more in-depth response

Regarding CO2 from the oceans.

The ocean is responsible for 80% of the carbon dioxide on Earth.

Where does this stat come from?

To my knowledge the oceans absorb CO2 not emit it.

www.harvardmagazine.com...

Of all the carbon dioxide (CO2) emitted into the atmosphere, one quarter is taken up by land plants, another quarter by the oceans.
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Another process, called "the biological pump," transfers CO2 from the ocean's surface to its depths. Warm waters at the surface can hold much less CO2 than can cold waters in the deep

Any CO2 coming out of the ocean comes down in rain as the "fertilization effect"

Its effect is to pull carbon out of the upper ocean and cause it to rain down into the depths, where bacteria and other organisms metabolize and release it back into the water as CO2, enriching carbon dioxide in the deep ocean.

Oceans are natural carbon dioxide sinks.

en.wikipedia.org...

A carbon dioxide sink or CO2 sink is a carbon reservoir that is increasing in size, and is the opposite of a carbon "source". The main sinks are the oceans and growing vegetation. The concept has become more widely known through its application by the Kyoto Protocol.

Originally posted by magicmushroom
why is this fact not brought into the equation.

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Why do you think that it isn't incorporated into the climate models?

Secondly the other subject that is never mentioned is that changes in the suns activity must and does effect us you know like massive solar flares that can knock out our power supplies.

Indeed, you are correct, solar activity is a great driver of global climate. Its something that even varies according to certian patterns and has been detected deep in the past.
It doesn't account for the current increase in global temperature.

but I dont want to get screwed in higher costs and taxes because of some unproven scam.

Similarly, I don't want to have New York, London, Venice, New Orleans, and the other coastal cities in which the majority of the human population lives to be destroyed, because of some unproven anti-warming scam.

We need to look at the evidence to make informed decisions, not rhetoric.

yarcoffin
You're still ignoring my mention of the earth's oceans, which give off massive amounts of both CO2 and water vapour

I don't know why you think that this has anythign to do with the current warming trend. The oceans have allways been part of the global Carbon Cycle. They are not acting in such a way that can explain the warming trend.

If all the carbonate rocks in the earth's crust were to be converted back into carbon dioxide, the resulting carbon dioxide would weigh 40 times as much as the rest of the atmosphere.

Why do you think this is relevant?

Oceans are heating due to hot spots rotating in the earth's core,

Thats patently absurd and not based on any evidence. Why do you accept that as a mechanism for warming the oceans, but don't accept CO2 emissions as warming the atmosphere????

umbrax
As the Earth warms due to other greenhouse gasses the H2O increases due to evaporation.

This will, however, result in higher temperatures. Any increase in greenhouse gases will have a green house effect.

I haven't seen any data showing that the warming trend is due to increase vapour levels, however.

Come to think of it, is the amount of water vapour increasing anyway???



[edit on 10-5-2006 by Nygdan]

Global warming is, imo, real, but CO2 (or any other single gas for that matter) is not the culprit - it blocks a single frequency in the IR spectrum, while clouds block much more. Btw, once the spectral line is fully blocked, more CO2 in the atmosphere becomes irrelevant, climatically, which is imho, not taken into account, otherwise all d00msday prohecies would be laughed out of the court of public opinion.


It has simply become a racket, introduce the Kyoto protocol and its air tax and a few elitists can live off the billions people pay in tributes. combine that with alarmism-science (want to be heard, assume an extreme stance) and you know why the media loves Global Warming®.

To say global warming does not exist is silly. We are going through a warming period. Temps and climates are changing.

The real issue here is not if global warming exists, but what is causing it. In that, I tend to think that it is probably 80% natural and 20% manmade.

Modern science has only been around for about 400 years. We have only been studying and keeping globasl weather records for at the most, the past 150. We know in europe 400 years ago there was a mini ice age, but we know nothing of what other regions of the world where records were not kept were like.

What we have is alot of natural geoligical evidence of drastic limate changes in the earths history. A Major catastrophic one occured about 10,000 years ago, and this was a period of global warming in the extreme. For example, the English channel. The british isles were once a part of mainland Europe. But within the4 space of 50 years....count em, one human life span, the ice melted so fast that a body of water was created that seperated Britian and made it the island it is today.

And as far as we know, there were no man made greenhouse emiisions, save for those made after eating alot of beans.

There is evidence in alot of the fossil record of massive, drastic, and sudden climate changes. We still do not know alot about earth's history and what caused what exactly. So i still say its premature to say that we are causing the current climate change. We only have about 150 years of stringently collected climate data, which in the grand scale of time, is but a second.

I do however believe on a very local scale we might have an effect on our own weather patterns. Thats possible. But while science is wonderful, I still do not see the sound evidence indicating that this current global warming is entirely manmade, or could even be controlled with a reduction in greenhouse gases.

The fact that other planets are experiencing global warming is very interesting, since the last mini ice age 400 years ago was possibly related to a major slowdown of solar activity.

I have never heard any scientist with the prefix Paleo- in his title ever talk about Global warming.

Originally posted by GTBurns
the prefix Paleo-

Well I have.

What I always wondered...they made McD's stop using those nice styrofoam Big Mac cartons because they said they said they caused "Global Warming". They stopped chloroflourocarbons in spray cans for the same reason. They outlawed Freon as well.

Has ANYONE ever gone back and done a study to see what effect these bans have had on the environment? Of course not. No one ever measures the effect of the regulation because GLOBAL WARMING IS A JOKE!! It is perpetuated by anti-capitalists. The science is laughable. Although these bogus outlawings did nothing to help the "fragile environment" I can tell you FOR A FACT they destroyed certain American industries...which is really the true goal of "global warming" cretins.

[edit on 19-5-2006 by Apoc]

Originally posted by Apoc
What I always wondered...they made McD's stop using those nice styrofoam Big Mac cartons because they said they said they caused "Global Warming". They stopped chloroflourocarbons in spray cans for the same reason. They outlawed Freon as well.

You are confusing Ozone depletion with Global Warming.

Ozone depletion is caused by the release of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and other ozone-depleting substances. CFCs were used in refrigerants(Freon), insulating foams (Big Mac clamshells) , and solvents (spray cans.)

Has ANYONE ever gone back and done a study to see what effect these bans have had on the environment? Of course not.

Ozone Layer. Good News, Bad News.


[edit on 19/5/2006 by Umbrax]

I personally dont believe global warming is caused by humans. I believe it is a natural event resulting from the glacial epoch reduction. That is just one of many theories. I don't think that humans being their natural selves...can destroy Earth. After much mentation and the reading of certain chapters from the much desputed book by Rush Limbaugh